Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Archive 17

Archive 10

←

Archive 15

Archive 16

Archive 17

Archive 18

Archive 19

Archive 20

Clarification of trivial edits

Is it considered appropriate to edit a page if the only thing that is changed is to add the defaultsort template and then to adjust the categories accordingly. I see this often as I assess articles for our project but since that edit is made on the article talk page I haven't been making the defaultsort edit on teh main page. Any thoughts? JodyB _talk 20:23, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

That'd be an 'insignificant' edit IMHO. If they were say, typo fixing at the same time, that'd be fine. Reedy Boy 20:56, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Error Message

I got approved and downloaded the NET framework. When I try to run AWB I get "AutoWikiBrowser has encountered a error and must close"(something to the likes of that). Any help? --T. Wiki 19:33, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

What version of the .NET Framework did you download? (→zelzany - review) 23:59, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Scanning subcategories

I'm working on the WP:1.0 project and I found AWB (particularly the list comparer) very useful in organizing the lists of pages (thank you!). What I'd like to be able to do is generate a list of articles from a given category, including all of the sub-categories. For example, I could generate a list of all Australian cities from Category:Cities in Australia by state or territory. Is this possible? I understand there is a tool for this here, but if it can be done directly within AWB I'd like to know. Thanks, Walkerma 20:23, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

AWB can do it, but the feature is buggy, and is therefore disabled in the release build. We may be able to help out though Reedy Boy 20:43, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

It's not really buggy, but circular categorization and server hogging are of a big concern. —METS501 (talk) 20:45, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly. I'll see how things go - we may end up with a bot - but if not I may contact you later in the year for help. If they're working on that feature maybe they can keep this in mind (e.g. write something to abort if someone asks for a list of all biographies...!). For now I'll get by with the existing tools. Thanks a lot! Walkerma 03:34, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

If you need it, we can provide build that will allow you to do it. Its just like mets said, its a potential server hog, so it isnt on general release to the public. Reedy Boy 10:15, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Funny picture

File:AWBroundel.jpg

Mildly amusing!

- I saw this in Lithuania on holiday; if it's any use for anything then I've got a much larger version.--Rambutan (talk) 17:19, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Navbox conformity script

I just posted the Navbox conformity script that I've been using. This is the reason why I've been bugging the devs so much. Some of the things maybe be useful since it attempt to pseudo-parse the wikitext. You can read about the navbox conformity if want to know what this is about. —Dispenser 05:01, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

AWB on other wikis

Is it possible to use AWB on telugu wikipedia. I suppose AWB supports unicode? Do I need some special approval from admins on that wiki?--(Sumanth|Talk) 05:30, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Added in rev 1335. Will be in next release Reedy Boy 10:15, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Could you update the Danish entry as well? It is located at lines 331 to 352 in the indicated file. The parameters for Portal space were missing, and I've included them here (the numbers taken from the similar entry for Norwegian). The .da text should read:

                        case LangCodeEnum.da:
                        Namespaces[-2] = "Media:";
                        Namespaces[-1] = "Speciel:";
                        Namespaces[1] = "Diskussion:";
                        Namespaces[2] = "Bruger:";
                        Namespaces[3] = "Brugerdiskussion:";
                        Namespaces[4] = "Wikipedia:";
                        Namespaces[5] = "Wikipedia-diskussion:";
                        Namespaces[6] = "Billede:";
                        Namespaces[7] = "Billeddiskussion:";
                        Namespaces[8] = "MediaWiki:";
                        Namespaces[9] = "MediaWiki-diskussion:";
                        Namespaces[10] = "Skabelon:";
                        Namespaces[11] = "Skabelon-diskussion:";
                        Namespaces[12] = "Hjælp:";
                        Namespaces[13] = "Hjælp-diskussion:";
                        Namespaces[14] = "Kategori:";
                        Namespaces[15] = "Kategoridiskussion:";
                        Namespaces[100] = "Portal:";
                        Namespaces[101] = "Portaldiskussion:";

                        strsummarytag = " ved brug af ";
                        strWPAWB = "AWB";
                        break;

I don't know why, but the Danish material differs between using a hyphen or not on discussion pages, but the names here work. The Danish Wikipedia doesn't (yet) have a page similar to en:Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser but the link here would be the logical name. Valentinian ^{T / C} 10:56, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Yup, Done - rev 1336. Some of the namespaces are sometimes missed due to the fact that the query.php output doesnt list them. But if people tell us, we'll gladly add them! Reedy Boy 11:03, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Mange tak :) Valentinian ^{T / C} 11:10, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Btw, your query.php dump was probably correct. The Danish Wikipedia is still in its infancy and both portals and projects are relatively new additions. I'll get back to you if da:wiki gets its own page about the AWB. Happy editing. Valentinian ^{T / C} 11:13, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Any info about the date of next release (in a month or so?)? What about the approval of AWB on that wiki? Do we need to have a page similar to Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage?--(Sumanth|Talk) 11:16, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

See below about checkpage. As for the release date, it should hopefully be soon (Hopefully before the end of july!). Most of the implementation has happened, there are just a few last things that are being ported, and have broken a few things, and until they're sorted, it cant really be released. The lack of development is due to a number of factors - All of the younger developers (ok, i know the dev team isnt very old anyway ;)), ie the under 20's - Me, Mets501 and Martinp23, have/have had exams currently, which as you'll agree are more important. Then Kingboyk, who has been doing a lot of the changes, hasn't been able to develop due to computer issues, and with these changes, he knwos most about them (his code ported from VB), so its a bit difficult for the rest of us to help. Reedy Boy 11:53, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

For what it is worth, the Swedish Wikipedia doesn't use such a feature. Valentinian ^{T / C} 11:22, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Yup, a lot of the smaller wiki's dont, and you dont have to, but if its prone to be abused - like it would probably be on en.wiki, a checkpage is used.. Reedy Boy 11:53, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

When to use

In Wikipedia_talk:Spoiler you can read a long discussion based around the fact that a few users have decided to use the tool to remove 45000 spoiler warnings, and then claim that there's consensus for their removal because few of them have been reverted (though "few" turns out to be "at least hundreds"). Is this appropriate? It seems to at least violate "Don't do anything controversial with it." Ken Arromdee 15:28, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

I'll concede "at least dozens". If it were controversial, you'd see expect to see massive reverts and a huge kerfuffle on thousands of talk pages. --Tony Sidaway 20:47, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Moving stub template

Hi, I use AWB on another wiki and our policies/conventions are slightly different. Is it possible to disable the program from moving the {{stub}} template to the bottom of the page and leaving it in place instead? Also, is there a way to disable it from using subst: on the prettytable template. -- Prod-You 21:32, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

C#.NET examples

Sounds like I'm an ancient if the dev team is generally around 20! This humble 30-something is trying to create a module to work on a specific project at the is-wiki, I dropped some code into the ProcessArticle (I have a reference to a MySql connection on my own server) but am unsure on how to get it to load up inside AWB. I drop the DLL in the folder and a Plugins menu option appears but it is empty. What code do I need in the Initialise section etc? Any examples out there, in C# in particular?--Stalfur 11:56, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Hmmm... Maxsem = 26, I'm 18, Mets501 = 16, Martinp23 = 16, Kingboyk = 34 (?).... Average just over 20.. Hmmmm. Anywho. Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Plugins would be a good start. If you checkout the SVN version of AWB, there are a couple of basic(ish) plugins included - The source in C#. They may be better examples to help you out.

Depending on what its exactly doing, the 'Make Module' feature, may be appropriate...? As for the MySQL bit... Just out of interest, what are you looking at doing? Reedy Boy 13:16, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Yeah I looked at that page and the SVN but it was all VB.net as far as I could see (if I overlooked something.. a direct pointer would be appreciated). The MySQL bit is for updating information from the national census we include. For example is:Jóhannes article is about the given name, in the sidebar we have the grammar forms for it and then the amount of currently living people who have that name (as first name and middle names). That amount needs updating and I was hoping to be able to use regex and a MySQL-query per name to update each name with the relevant values (thousands of names). If not it's a lot of manual labor! This method could also be employed later on to update the graphs in 2008. --Stalfur 16:04, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Here is a C# example. MaxSem 16:42, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

Just started using AWB

This isn't actually a complaint or question, but I couldn't find a place for "kissing major ass". I just started using AWB, and I'm just starting to figure it out, but so far, it's fantastic. This makes link-disambiguation waaaay easier. CSWarren 20:35, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Good to hear... You know, barnstars are always appreciated ;) (Joke!!). But unfortunately, a lot of the credit goes to BlueMoose, who left wikipedia :(, so cant recieve the praise. /me wonders if he checks up on us.... Reedy Boy 20:37, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Debugger

While AWB is amazing, my progress with it is severely hampered by a "Just-in-time" Debugger which appears at least twice every time I do something, asking me to debug the script. (which is something that is both not working and that I really dont want nor camn be bothered to do) Can anyone help me out? What should I do to turn this annoying debugger off? I'd really appreciate some help. Thanks, Anonymous Dissident^Talk 12:02, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

In IE, try, Tools --> Options --> Advanced. Make sure 'Disable Script Debugging (Internet Explorer)' and 'Disable Script Debugging (Other)' Are both checked. Apply and close. Reedy Boy 13:41, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks alot. Works perfectly now. Anonymous Dissident^Talk 02:17, 30 June 2007 (UTC)

Placement of cats vs stub tags

Does AWB place cats above stub tags? As in: [1]

Shouldn't the stub tag(s) - as actual text - go before the cats - which show up in their own section all the way at the bottom? -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 05:02, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, that doesn't look right. My impression was that stub tags go first so the stub category/ies, being most time-sensitive and deserving of editors' attention, are displayed before the rest. --zenohockey 06:28, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Looks ok to me. The stub categories may be time sensitive and deserving of editors attention, that's not why the encyclopedia is written. It's for the readers, and they don't need to see a list of stub categories before the main categories. --Kbdank71 11:25, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

True. But readers will see the same format no matter which way it's done. And editors should see the stub tags first, since those need attention. -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 15:56, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Readers will not see it the same. If the stub tags come before the categories, then the stub categories will show in the article before the regular categories. If the stub tags come after the categories, then the stub categories will show last in the list. And editors who are working on stubs will come to the article via the category, so it doesn't matter if the stub category is at the end of the list. Editors who aren't working on stubs won't care if the stub category comes last. We're not here to make things easier on editors to the detriment of the readers. --Kbdank71 16:04, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Roman vs. roman

Some people using AWB have changed "roman" to "Roman" at the International Phonetic Alphabet article a couple of times, thinking that "roman" is always wrong. However, the term "roman", when used to describe typefaces, is meant to be in lowercase. It's like Italic languages vs. italic type.

I haven't tried AWB, so I'm not sure if this is a bug or a user problem. In any case, is there something that can be done to prevent roman being changed to Roman in the future? Thank you in advance.. :) --Kjoonlee 17:40, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Note: roman type --Kjoonlee 18:18, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Its a typo fix. So its not awb exactly. The fix is remove the typo/change it so it doesnt change the first letter... I'll have a look Reedy Boy 20:02, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

2 removed as false positives (one was an un-necessary duplicate) Reedy Boy 20:06, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

How long does a confirmation take?

I added my name to the request page to request confirmation to down load the program however there seems to be a bit of a backlist building up. Did I do something wrong? How long does it usually take? Wikidudeman ^(talk) 01:15, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

It takes as long as it takes for someone to get to it and sort it. It hasnt even been a day since you added your request. Sometimes it can take a few days. Please just be patient. Reedy Boy 08:43, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

Features list?

(Comment by a passerby software developer.)

To sell this tool the page would better start with short bullet list of features, like "you can do this with AWB, you can do that". Those proverbial 10 seconds should give sufficient impression what it is and what it is good for. Pavel Vozenilek 13:25, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

japanese link

[2] (or ?maybe that's its right place?), sth is wrong with it, tried to doubleclick green [ja:...] field to ignore that change but then I get [3] --84.234.42.68 15:09, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

• wrongly displaced [[kab: link [4], after doubleclick it looks that AWB is gonna remove the whole [[kab: link, be-x-old is displaced but there's no [[kab: on the right diff side --84.234.42.68 12:15, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
• I have also doubt about [[arc: link [5] --84.234.42.68 12:49, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

AWB has 4 strings used for IW sorting... One must have something 'wrong', or its using the wrong string for your native wiki... Reedy Boy 13:17, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Only one change

I'm pretty new to AWB (i.e. I started using it today!) and I was wondering, when it automatically comes up with two or more changes to make, how can you choose to make only one (or a selection) of those changes, and not all of them? •97198 talk 08:35, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

In the versions that include the new diff engine, you can double click on the changes you want to revert, and therefore they wont be applied. The v4 beta has this. Reedy Boy 10:23, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

Okay, thanks, except I don't think I have the right version. •97198 talk 12:02, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

You can also find the changes you don't want to fix, and change them back manually. If you look at the "Show changes" screen, you'll see enough to allow you to find them. Od Mishehu 14:14, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Removal of whitespace between template and categories

As discussed at User talk:Jogers#Minor whitespace issue, I was wondering why AWB removes the empty line between an artist navigation template and the categories that follow it, like in this change. That makes the code less clear in my opinion (and apparently in Jogers' too). I do think removing that empty line is appropriate iff the template is a {{DEFAULTSORT}} magic word. --PEJL 16:46, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I think this has been changed again for the next release... MaxSem should be able to confirm... Reedy Boy 16:51, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Custom Wikis

I am trying to use AWB on a custom wiki with pretty links installed. The main page of the wiki is : http://devweb/ltwiki/Main_Page , when I click edit the URL is http://devweb/ltw/index.php?title=Main_Page&action=edit . If I try adding devweb/ltw/ or devweb/ltwiki/ I get an "Error loading namespaces" and it kicks me back to en.wikipedia.org. Any help?-Ravedave 22:33, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Nevermind for now. I see the FAQ above mentions 2 APIs I need to install, perhaps that info should go on the manual page too? -Ravedave 22:41, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

sctipting or command line

As well as one my idea of converting the settings file into a pywikipedia bot has been denied, I think it will be very interesting when some scripting or command line options will be implemented. I usually run subsequently two tasks, each with its own settings file and its own input data file. It will be very convenient to use AWB with a task of a sequence of inputs and in some sense replace me pywikipedia bot for a while. Thank you =). Mashiah 22:40, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

It was only denied as it would be a lot of work as they have been coded completely differently.... [6] Reedy Boy 23:16, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I am ok with it =) Now we may concentrate on the new approach which give us more AWB users and not overload the toolserver =). Mashiah 23:21, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Why won't it run?

I downloaded the AWB thing today from the site that I was given. From the folder that opened right away, a folder titled "AutoWikiBrowser3910," I clicked on AutoWikiBrowser, and extracted the files, as it was a compressed folder. I clicked on AutoWikiBrowser again in the folder that then opened up, but it says "The publisher could not be verified. Are you sure you want to run the software?" I clicked on "Run", but then I got the following note:

To run this application, you first must install one of the following versions of the .Net Framework:
   v2.0.50727
Contact your application publisher for instructions about obtaining the appropriate version of the .Net Framework.

What is the problem that is preventing be from using the AWB and how can I correct it? Thanks. ––Ksy92003(talk) 19:03, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

As the error message says. You need v2 of the .NET Framework - [7] Reedy Boy 19:06, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I thought so. I just wasn't sure how to get it. Would this link provide me with what I need to run the AWB? And which version: x86, x64, or IA64? ––Ksy92003(talk) 19:10, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

It should solve your problem yes. You most likely will need the x86 version. If you needed one of the others, you would have probably known that you did Reedy Boy 19:15, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Alright, hopefully it will work. If it doesn't, well I'll come right back here. Thanks for your help, Reedy Boy. ––Ksy92003(talk) 19:16, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Alright, it is working perfectly fine. Thank you for all of your help, Reedy Boy. Ksy92003(talk) 21:58, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

User contribs not working?

Because of persistent misformatting by Czimborbryan (talk · contribs), I tried to get AWB to bring up the articles he had contributed to. However, both Czimborbryan and User:Czimborbryan in the textbox failed to produce anything, so I eventually had to just search for things like his... umm... unique method of categorizing articles. Should this have worked? Thanks.--SarekOfVulcan 20:07, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

There were changes in the mediawiki software. So this feature in 3.9 is broken [8]. If you try v4 - [9], it should work fine. Reedy Boy 20:42, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Yup, that works -- thanks, and sorry for not reading through the bug archives first. (Should it do de-duping on Make List, or is the Remove Dups button enough?)--SarekOfVulcan 21:42, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

SpecialPages

I ´ve been using AWB in spanish wikipedia in order to make faster some disambiguation and I thought it could help me to check pages containing unexisting categories. However, I haven´t been able to make a list from Special:Wantedcategories. It works properly for Lonelypages -the example given in the manual provided on the net-, but the list given for Wantedcategories is empty. Version is 3.9.1.0 How should I write it in order to make that list?--FAR 12:50, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Response

Has anyone else encountered intermittent problems with WP recently when running AWB: either failure to save or very slow. Rich Farmbrough, 13:47 17 July 2007 (GMT).

Once in a while. I've assumed it was the servers, and taken that as a sign that I should do other (real world) things for a while. When I come back later, all is well.--Fabrictramp 13:53, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I've had that for over a month or so, but my bot doesn't. --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 03:42, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Watchlist

I'm having trouble getting my watchlist to load. I've tried logging in via both IE and Mozilla and the problem occurs in each. - Dudesleeper · Talk 16:17, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Should've really been reported as a bug, but no matter. You may have noticed there has been some mediawiki changes with watchlists... I think that must have broken it, but i've fixed it to use another method (the get raw watchlist) - rev 1472 Reedy Boy 20:06, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

Bugs pages

Could/should we add a "severity" field to the bug reports? e.g. I've just posted a bug which is real but trivial...

Alternatively, perhaps we should get a buzgilla or similar solution? I'd be happy to install and host such a thing. Would it be superior or inferior to on-wiki reporting do we think? --kingboyk 13:13, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

It could be a better solution, for both feature requests AND bug reports - Saves a lot of archving and such. We should be able to get the WMF or similar to host it... Ie on the toolserver or something. Reedy Boy 14:14, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

A quick enquiry on #wikimedia-tech, we should be able to get AWB listed as a project on the MediaWiki Bugzilla if we decide to go that way... Reedy Boy 14:41, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

I'd be interested in trying that, I think. What do other people think? --kingboyk 15:08, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

I honestly prefer it on wiki. I like to see the reports and requests, but I know that I would never go look at wherever you move them to. Also, there are a bunch of things that non-devs answer and help with that probably wouldn't happen any more (or at least reduced). Finally, I don't think people should have to create another account on bugzilla to report things. I know that I prefer this current system to the off-wiki approach that was implemented for Vandalproof. --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 02:43, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Bad correction

Not sure where to report this, but a few days ago, I created a page for Bernadette Speach, and this morning somebody used AWB to correct her name to "speech". I'd like to keep that from happening in the future. Chubbles 14:12, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

That will have been Regextypo fix. Not AWB itself par se... Its false positive, just, is it common enough to remove the mis-spelling... I'll have a look Reedy Boy 15:35, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

I would suggest that a note just be left on the talk page of the editor who was running the typo fixes to politely ask them to more carefully check their edits. It is incumbent on the user of AWB to validate their changes before saving. --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 15:39, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Help with Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CFD plugin

I know this must be really simple, but I cant figure it. I click open my autowikibrowser, then i click plugins, then CFD, but then there is just a 'CFD.dll'. I dont understand how to get this plugin. I need help. Can someone please help me? -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 03:58, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Im presuming its already in the folder with autowikibrowser.exe? If so, start awb, plugins, expand CFD, and click options... Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CFD plugin Reedy Boy 10:50, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

So I'm actually meant to activate awb, not just enter the folder?? -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 11:17, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

You need to copy the CFD plugin to the main AWB folder... Reedy Boy 11:19, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

The 'CFD plugin' being a file simply called 'CFD', and the 'main AWB folder' being C:\Documents and Settings\User\Desktop\AutoWikiBrowser3910? -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 11:24, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

CFD = CFD.dll - Move that to the place where AutoWikiBrowser is. So from C:\Documents and Settings\User\Desktop\AutoWikiBrowser3910\Plugins\CFD to C:\Documents and Settings\User\Desktop\AutoWikiBrowser3910 Reedy Boy 14:06, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

Ok. Thanks a ton. -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 08:19, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Oh no. I'm sorry to ask again - but what do I do then, after that? Do I open CFD.dll? because I get a message saying 'windows cannot open a file unless it knows what programme made it'. -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 08:24, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Just put it in the directory with AWB and start AWB Reedy Boy 18:31, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

Ok. I'm up to number 3, but when I click Ok in the plugin window, after copying and pasting the contents of WP:CFD/WU, I get a message saying 'Unhandled exception has occured in your application. if you click Continue, the application will ignore this error and attempt to continue. If you click Quit, the application will close immediately. An item with the same key has already been added.' YThe problem is, when I click Continue, the message just comes back up. I dont know what to do. Cheers, -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 01:22, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

This might be easier to resolve in real-time if you go on IRC in #AutoWikiBrowser. --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 02:44, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Good idea. -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 02:45, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Actually - I'msure that if you answered this last question I would be ok, so going on IRC would be pointless. Thanks for all your help by the way :) -- Anonymous Dissident^Talk 02:49, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Sending Messages

If I need to notify a group of people about something via their talk page, how can I get AWB to send a lot of people a single message, opposed to simply going to each user page and leaving them a message? I noticed that the Signpost is sent out using AWB, so I was wondering if that was possible. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 02:52, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Yup, and ive done so myself on a few occasions. Add all the articles to the make list, turn off auto tag, general fixes and such. Go to the more tab, then enable Append/Prepend Text. If you want to leave a message on bottom of the page, make sure appends selected. Then put all the text in the box beneath it. Make sure you include a title - == Message Title ==. Sign at the bottom, and give an appropriate edit summary! Reedy Boy 09:22, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Seems to work. Thanks.

Beta release

Was able to get the autoupdater to update from 3.9.1.0 to 4.0.0.0, but it hung and I had to kill it's process (but the upgrade worked); but my main question is regarding this release ebing in beta, while that is an obvious step in the development lifecycle, why has the latest stable version been de-authorized? — xaosflux ^Talk 03:51, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

This versions isnt really any less 'stable' that the last proper release version. There is a hell of a lot that has been fixed, improved, and made to work again after MW changes. We decided, that unless major problems were encountered, moving everyone onto the lastest version was a beter idea. Reedy Boy 08:13, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

I encountered major problems. After an autoupdate, when any changes were previewed in the upper pane, I got the error: "The type initializer for 'WikiFunctions.WikiDiff' threw an exception", and the process stopped, every time. This made it completely unusable. The fix was to completely delete C:\Program Files\AutoWikiBrowser, re-download 4.0.0.0, and re-create AWB in the default folder of C:\Program Files\AutoWikiBrowser4000. Don't know if rebuilding the config file was what worked, or if the new folder name is hard-coded somewhere, but the updater clearly needs looking at. Thanks, Clicketyclack 08:29, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Problems - Error message

When I try to open AWB, all I get is an error message saying:

To run this application, you must first install one of the following versions of the .NET Framework:
v2.0.50727
Contact your application publisher for instructions about obtaining the appropriate version of the .NET Framework.
                                   ____________________
                                  |        OK          |
                                  |____________________|

Could somebody please explain what the problem is and how I can fix it. ChrisDHDR   ^{ • @} 14:21, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Have you run AWB in the past? —METS501 (talk) 14:47, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

AWB is a .Net application. To run AWB on Windows, you'll need the Microsoft .Net runtime, version 2.0. To install .Net, just run Microsoft Update: you'll find .Net 2.0 in the "Optional Updates" section. Clicketyclack 18:02, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

I've added this question to the FAQ above, as it's bound to come up again. Clicketyclack 09:10, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, but which link do I choose??? ChrisDHDR   ^{ • @} 15:03, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Just use Microsoft Update, if you're not sure. See expanded answer in FAQ , above. Clicketyclack 16:13, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Multiline regular expressions

I'm trying to make a change to many pages which will replace several lines of text and template invocations with just one line. So I figured a regular expression that used either the line start or line end characters was the way to go. But I can't seem to get $ and ^ to work as I expected. Do I need to be using "\r\n" instead? Or escaping $ and ^ ??? (I tried some tests in the RE tester as well as AWB itself, the RE tester is very handy!) I am pretty certain this is a clue shortage on my end, not a problem with the app. Does anyone have an example multiline RE that they have used in AWB that they could share (the RE itself and what text it recognised)? Once I suss out what I am doing wrong perhaps I can enhance the appropriate part of the instructions? (perhaps Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Settings#Sample_regular_expressions??) I did scan through the archives but did not find too much of use... Thanks! ++Lar: t/c 15:52, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

If your using the multiline option it means that ^ and $ will match \n. You might want to use the single lined (makes ^ and $ match the beginning and end of the text). I've found from working that you typically want to use \s to match newline as some editor will concatenate everything onto a single line. And with v4 of AWB it will strips all \r, but not the same way mediawiki does. —Dispenser 18:30, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure I follow that answer. The text I want to find has line breaks in it already, and the location of the line breaks are part of the way that one knows one has found the right text. So I want the line breaks in the match expression. ^ and $ are not matching the way I expect in multiline mode. I'd again ask for an example RE that shows matching a multiline text chunk... that will allow me to figure out what I am doing wrong. If you have an example can you post or mail it? Thanks! ++Lar: t/c 19:46, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

To match

{{X1
| url =

use \{\{X1\n\| url = with SingleLine and Regex checked. (Use the advanced windows, this will not work in the regex tester, that has \r\n behavior (a BUG apparently)) You can also use an unescaped newline. And version prior to v4, you need to us \s*\n. You may also be able to do it without checking singlelined. My best advice is to use AWB normally, right-click on the edit box and select reparse will run the script again. If you want to see a script where this is done see User:Dispenser/AWB Navbox.xml. —Dispenser 22:45, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

OK that was the clue I needed, thanks. I now have a regex that does almost all of what I want. one small problem remains, I would like to be able to get at the page name, and substring something out of the page name to put in a $n var for use in the replacewith part... any ideas on that? Archive 17 gives me the last part of the name but I need just a part of THAT name for it to work. ++Lar: t/c 03:58, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

RE:

use \{\{X1\n\| url = with singlelined checked.

I changed the instructions to read:

use \{\{X1\n\| url = with SingleLine and Regex checked.

Key words for people searching: line break, paragraph break, return.

Errectstapler (talk) 16:35, 28 January 2011 (UTC)

Disallowing preview/save

I'm using 4.0.0.0 and it's not letting me save an edit or preview. Start and stop are enabled, but none of the buttons below them. I checked that my userid "Larbot" is still on the approved list of users for en, and that the page is not protected, and that I am logged in. Anything else I should be checking? I got the regex I wanted to do to work, just about, and now I can't save my changes! :) ++Lar: t/c 04:06, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

See bug Show Preview disables edit buttons. —Dispenser 04:31, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Thats now fixed :) Reedy Boy 14:24, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

That sorted it. As for the one remaining question, instead of figuring out how to substring "4" out of "Archive 4" (the page name) I'm just typing in the 4 :) Thanks for your help... but DOES AWB have a way to let you get at the value of the current page name from within a regex? ++Lar: t/c 04:50, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Gudeldar posted something similar to what you describled in his Feature requests#A way to filter regexp by namespace. —Dispenser 04:58, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Hm... So does %%MAGICWORD%% give you access to what you would get (at template invocation time) for {{MAGICWORD}}? Because if it does, I have part of what I want, the ability to know what the pagename is. I could not tell if what Gudeldar posted was his workaround or how he wanted his enhancement to work. With the pagename, parsing out part of the name is easy using RE. Thanks! ++Lar: t/c 12:19, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

To have %%MAGICWORD%% do the same as {{MAGICWORD}} were the intentions behind another of my Feature requests, but as it stands now only %%title%%, %%titlename%%, and %%namespace%% exist. —Dispenser 21:32, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

"Beta"

A comment: If you're going to make a "beta" release, that explicitly states that it may have bugs in it, you should never force-feed it on users. I don't mind beta-testing for you, but please, make it an option. Instead of being given the option of running stable or beta-testing, I was forced to upgrade to 4.0.0.0 beta (manually, no less, since the updater kept stalling). In all honesty, if the software hadn't forced me to upgrade, I could've very easily just used the same version for the 15 months I've been using AWB - none of the new features, as great as they may be, affect me, making upgrading pointless for me. Please don't force upgrades when they're not necessary, and if you're going to force upgrades at all, please come up with an AWB updater that just *works*. Ral315 » 23:26, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Ral, you know just as well as we do that we developers are a just a group of people who are volunteering our time to put forward free software for the wiki community. You are not paying for the software; we are not working for profit. The reason we are forcing upgrades is because of bugs in old releases, not because we are trying to push the new features onto everyone. Most people have no use of the new features, yes, but the bugs affect everyone all the same. We can take down the notice and call it a stable version if you like, but the new version is still going to have bugs, just like every other version that we've released since the creation of this software. The upgrades are absolutely necessary to fix old bugs, and new bugs are continually being discovered and released. It says on your bot's page that you're "interested in coding", so why don't you help out? It's not that easy to develop and maintain software, and we're trying our best. —METS501 (talk) 23:47, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I can appreciate that you are trying to avoid bugs, but surely the 3.9.1.0 version wasn't so dangerously buggy that it necessitated forcing users to upgrade to a beta version? I was able to do basic changes with the old version, but the new beta version failed to make a basic, non-regexp pattern match to allow me to quickly change a bunch of redirects. Since 3.9.1.0 is no longer allowed to edit, I can no longer use AWB. What is the logic of refusing to allow us to run the latest stable released version? Is it just that the system is only smart enough to allow one precisely numbered version to run at a time? ~ Jeff Q (talk) 04:54, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

The system will handle, and allow many different versions to be run. As Mets said, yeah its a 'Beta', but we could have released it as not a beta, and still had these problems. 3.9.1.0 wasnt dangerous buggy, but it does introduce errors, and other mistakes - Its been months since that was released. Features dont work due to MW changes.

As for the updater that works, other than a few minor niggles, at the last release, it worked fine. It maybe does need a rethink, as the way it currently works, means that if some files have been renamed, deleted, and such, the updater wont take account of this till the next version, therefore meaning we do get problems. And also, sourceforge change things, we cannot fix already released versions, so all we can do is try our best to work with what we've got. As for the point about having to upgrade manually... What about every single prior version to whenever the updater was released? Ideally, we could do with some form of static Updater (ie one that doesnt change), but it downloads a cs file from the internet, and then compiles/runs that to find out what it needs to do.

Bugs can only be found if users use it, or developers find them themselves. If they dont show to us, we cant fix them, as we cant fix what we cant find! Reedy Boy 12:02, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and im sorry if it sounds like we are getting at people. Its just its not a simple task, and MaxSem (our lead/main developer), has been absent. And he usually helps out rather well with developing and bug fixing... Reedy Boy 12:13, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

[10]

Revision 1035 = 3.9.1.0

Revision 1496 = 4.0.0.0

461 Revision. Have a look at some of them, some are minor, but others are major re-writes of the software. And theres been 14 commits since v4, fixing bugs and tweaking things... Reedy Boy 12:13, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

All software evolves over time and all software has bugs. The key point here is that we've been upfront in saying there are some big changes in this version and it might have bugs hence it is "beta". The version you were using was never meant to be permanent and was basically a version 4 pre-release; whether we had labelled the current release as v4 beta, v4, 3.9.3.0 you would still have the bug. Now, please quit moaning because there's nothing worse for demotivating volunteers than having people whinge. File a bug report, explain this is pressing, thank folks for their time, and see what happens. AWB is free - gratis (you didn't pay for it), libre (you have the source and can fix it yourself or hire somebody to do it). At that price you are getting value for money and should be extremely grateful. --kingboyk 12:40, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

Actually, AWB is not free. Like all software, using it requires an investment in time and changes in work practices. From what I've seen in the past few SourceForge releases, each update requires abandoning the previous version to get past the "version is not enabled" message to use the tool. This last change isn't working for me, and I'm not willing to invest the time and effort in debugging the problems. There are people like myself who don't find this investment of time — often far more dear than a few bucks — worth it. That doesn't mean AWB isn't a very useful tool for many, and that your work isn't quite valuable. But don't be surprised when you lose some folks along the way. ~ Jeff Q (talk) 21:24, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Alright I'm stick of you whining, just file a damn bug report. They're typically fast enough to do it within the week. —Dispenser 22:54, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Let's not get this heated, please. Jeff Q and others: if you want us to keep old versions of the software enabled then fine, we will (if the other devs agree with me), but you must understand that you are responsible for EVERY EDIT you, and do not come complaining to us if you have to spend hours cleaning up work caused by a bug long fixed. How about a compromise: we'll keep them enabled but not allow bot mode on them, because in manual mode you are checking every edit anyway so you'll notice any bugs before saving. How's that? —METS501 (talk) 23:12, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

That seems quite reasonable. I believe we are already reponsible for every edit we make, regardless of how we make it; this would merely be a totally reasonable refusal of a volunteer development group to support old versions of a helper tool. Anyone operating a bot should probably be (and probably already is) devoting the time to ensure that each new AWB version continues to work with their bot. (BTW, Dispenser, I'm sorry you are so angered by my legitimate concerns. I am trying very hard to make clear that your work is appreciated, but not everybody has the time to devote to helping to fix problems. If you really feel this is an unreasonable request, don't do it. I'm sure this project and Wikipedia in general will get along just fine without the portion of AWB users like myself who prefer to wait for something less likely to cause them difficulties.) ~ Jeff Q (talk) 23:32, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

I'd agree with that. The only thing is, we wont keep enabled too many old versions, just the one before - ie with v4, until we know its definately ok, 3.9 enabled, then v4 can stay with v4.1 - etc etc. Also, the latest sub build/version in a stream may be kept, as the 'bug fixes', so rather than 3.9, its 3.9.1 that will be enabled? And as Mets said, if you cause problems/a lot of work for yourself, its the users "problem", especially if we have recitified it. Reedy Boy 09:02, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

One potential compromise could be a change to the updater, along the following lines:

1) "Update available" message pops up when new version is made available on sourceforge, with yes & no buttons

2) If user clicks "no", a warning follows saying something like:

* the AWB project will only support upgrades from the last version (or two, etc.)
* your current version has known bugs, for which you are responsible if you stick with this version
* we only fix bugs on the newer version
* if you don't upgrade now, you will probably need to manually uninstall & re-install later

This way AWB users could agree to test new versions, but if there are known issues (as with 4.0.0), they could opt to manually upgrade later instead.

I haven't filed this feature request yet, but if there's broad consensus here, I'll be happy to do so. Clicketyclack 11:15, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Sounds to be in the right direction, IMHO. The only thing will be, is we shall only keep a certain number of "old versions" active, as otherwise the checkpage list of approved versions will get rather long, and people will get further behind with bug fixes. When we released v4 beta, there werent any really 'known' issues - we had fixed what we had found, but we knew it wouldnt be perfect. Reedy Boy 11:20, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Certainly. I'm quite happy to keep on testing beta releases BTW, though it's also reasonable to assume that not everyone can or should. Climbing the vast mountain of daily WP admin is as much as most people have time for, and I'm as grateful to them for donating admin hours as I am to the AWB team for developing and maintaining AWB. Thanks, all of you. Clicketyclack 13:37, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

I didn't mean for this conversation to raise such a heated discussion. My main problem was with you labeling a product "beta" and giving it to everyone - if it's potentially volatile and bugs may exist, it should be a beta, and not be forced on everyone, and if it's pretty much bug-free, it should be a normal release. On the other subject of forced upgrades, even projects like Mozilla Firefox, where bugs may lead to system takeovers (not just a buggy bot that'll get you blocked for a few days at most), give you the option of not installing the new version until you restart the program, something that would allow me to finish my work, then upgrade - something I'd be perfectly happy to do. Part of what bothers me the most is that often, I have very limited time to do my AWB work every week, and to have to upgrade is a pain, particularly when I know that the upgrade's probably got nothing to do with the features I actually use.

Don't get me wrong, I seriously appreciate the work you guys do. But while I understand that you don't want to support old versions (and I do agree with your reasoning on that), we should be allowed to use old versions, except where they contain serious bugs, at our own risk. Ral315 » 08:11, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

\r\n

has something changed recently with the end of the line \r\n ?

I wrote a simple regex to remove a blank space at the end of each line of the list= +\r\n -> \r\n and that doesn't work

I used "test regexes" for

1. Czarodziejki (Charmed) (1998-2006)
2. Wanted (2005)
3. Bounty Hunters (2005)
4. "Clubhouse" (2004)

and the result is:

1. Czarodziejki (Charmed) (1998-2006)
2. Wanted (2005)\r
3. Bounty Hunters (2005)
4. "Clubhouse" (2004)

\r\n changed to \n in "replace" tab ? --84.234.42.68 01:04, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, AWB has switch to unix style linebreaks so no more \r! See above. —Dispenser 01:10, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

is \r\n still is compulsory in "find" but not in "replace"? I changed all \r\n to \n and now it does the mess in the articles --84.234.42.68 15:55, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

I figured that in find should be \n and in replace still \r\n, and I finally see on the diff spaces that were removed, thank's for that;) --84.234.42.68 16:09, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Error messages

When I attempt to send out a message to someones talk page using AWB I get an error message saying "The Type initializer for 'Wikifunctions.WikiDiff' threw an exception." What does this mean? How can I fix it? How does one send out messages using AWB to people? Wikidudeman ^(talk) 00:50, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Throwing an exception is when something went wrong. As to fixing it... We cant unless we know what exactly you were doing to get the error.... Reedy Boy 18:54, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Look at the top message on this page.. Reedy Boy 18:55, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm getting that every time a diff is supposed to be rendered and then AWB just stops everything (this is on the SVN version). I can't do any more developing until I figure out what this is. —METS501 (talk) 19:35, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Fine for me... Blame Vista? Reedy Boy 19:44, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Reedy Boy, Remember what you told me to do to send messages to various people using AWB? That's what I was attempting to do but it didn't work. I got that error message. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 22:28, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm still not able to figure out how to do it. How does one send a message to multiple users on this new version? Wikidudeman ^(talk) 10:43, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

It should still be the same... We just need to find a cause for that error, unfortunately, i dont get it, so troubleshooting it is harder! Reedy Boy 10:57, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I have the same problems on ro.wikipedia. I receive the following messages: "The Type initializer for 'Wikifunctions.WikiDiff' threw an exception.". --Pixi 16:07, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm doing it the same way it's always been done. Have you tested it to see if it works for you? Wikidudeman ^(talk) 11:02, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

[11] - Confirmed working for me Reedy Boy 17:20, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Are the people who are having problems on vista? Reedy Boy 17:15, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Not me. When I run AWB, it's on XP (SP2). I've had no troubles with AWB itself though: only the updater (see my reply to Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Archive 17#Beta release above). After removing v3.9, and installing v4.0 from scratch, it works fine so far. Clicketyclack 20:07, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm on Vista. —METS501 (talk) 20:14, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, Vista.--Pixi 23:12, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Seems to be the common link. No chance of me being able to debug it then. :/ Reedy Boy 18:13, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

I need to update it?

Just today I went on AWB for the first time in a couple weeks. But when I tried to open it, I got the following message:

This version is not enabled, please download the newest version.  If you have the newest version,

check that Wikipedia is online.

Please press "Yes" to run the AutoUpdater, "No" to load the download page and update manually,

or "Cancel" to not update (but you will not be able to edit).

I click on "Yes", but it doesn't seem to complete the update. The meter always stops at about 40% full. Am I doing something wrong? Ksy92003(talk) 18:50, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't know, but I saw the same behavior myself, and ended up cancelling the update and downloading a fresh copy.--SarekOfVulcan 19:06, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, how would I do that? I mean I had problems when I was downloading the AWB the first time and somebody walked me through it. I mean I'd really like to be able to use the AWB software again... I can't use it as it is; it says "Software disabled." How would I at least download the fresh copy? Should I delete the AWB folder I currently have and start from scratch? Ksy92003(talk) 19:12, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it's a known bug in the updater. They're working on it. In the meantime, deleting the old AWB and re-installing the new one worked for me.

We'd better add an entry to the FAQ on this one. Clicketyclack 19:28, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Okay, but could you please provide the link to where I have to go to install the new one? In the meantime, I'll start removing all traces of the old AWB, if that'll help me install the new one. Ksy92003(talk) 19:32, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Clicketyclack :). Link for download - [12] Reedy Boy 19:33, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

Thank you very much, Clicketyclack and Reedy Boy (Reedy Boy, I think you're the one who helped me the first time I had problems). It's working for me now. Ksy92003(talk) 19:49, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

No problem. This AWBUpdater problem could be tricky... As it wont update to the next version, due to the "bug"/SF changes that are preventing it from currently working... Its just weird some people have upgraded fine Reedy Boy 20:24, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

After much pain I got 3.x to upgrade to 4.x, but had persistant issues. A clean install of 4.x in it's own directory has resolved multiple issues. — xaosflux ^Talk 21:42, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

It must get stuck due to a missing file in the new release - no wikifunctions2.dll... Its just weird how it works fine for some and not for others... Im thinking AWBUpdater should download the updater file and compile it on the fly... Then it can be made to work with any changes... Any other opinions? Reedy Boy 22:38, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

AWB + Stubsensor == Goodness

Hello, I've been doing the Stubsensor cleanup project for a while and I just talked to one of the volunteers who is using the AWB on the cleanup project. Since stubsensor flags articles that might need to have the stub tag removed for human review, and AWB has a built in stub remover, the two projects get along great. I'll certainly be linking back to AWB in the instructions for the project but I was hoping that you might also point back at stubsensor as something that AWB is really good at. If I can get more volunteers using AWB for the task, I can push up the number of results per cleanup project too. As a side note, is there some way I could organize the results on the cleanup pages to make them automatically load into AWB? Thanks! Triddle 06:56, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Good to hear its helped you out. Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Projects - Feel free to add it to a page such as that one. AWB can make lists from various sources, methods such as Links on Page... Whats the sources? Reedy Boy 08:22, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I just found Stubsensor yesterday (thanks, Triddle!), and yes, AWB is very nice for it. Triddle, I know of two ways to load up AWB for that. One is to use "links on page". However, that will load every link on the whole page, wanted or not. The other is to copy the links on a section to a word processor (I did this when I edited the section to claim it), and save as a plain text file. In AWB, choose to make the list from the text file. --Fabrictramp 14:21, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Another good reason to use AWB - All the other general fixes, and also typo fixing that can be done at the same time during edits ;) Reedy Boy 14:31, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Natch! Thanks again for all the hard work you and the team do on AWB. I'm also quite active on WP:DEP, and our project literally wouldn't exist without AWB. :) --Fabrictramp 14:37, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

We do have a private offshore bank account... ;) Reedy Boy 14:55, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I'll make a big deposit just as soon as I get the money from the Nigerian prince! ;) --Fabrictramp 19:14, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I'd doubtless have a bowel movement too if that happened to me. - Dudesleeper · Talk 19:21, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Damn, i wanted Ugandan Dollars ;) Reedy Boy 09:58, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Version 4/Māori wikipedia

Firstly thanks for all the hard work with AWB - it has made a great difference to the Māori Wikipedia (where I am a bureaucrat. However, with version 4 I am having problems getting it to work. It takes about 45 to 50 seconds or more to load pages - and that goes for pages with hardly any text in them, one or two lines. This means it is way faster to do it all manually - this may be due to the slow NZ internet speed, I'm not sure - which means it doesn't get done because its too onerous. I'm thinking this would be quicker and easier when you're not on the wrong side of the world from the server? I'm wondering how or if we can re-enable older versions? Also for the Māori Wikipedia, how do we grant certain users the AWB bot status so that they can use the full range of features if we need them to be able to do lots of work quickly. At the moment I have a lot of categories and subcategories that I want created. Unless there is some bot that can take a list of names and churn them out for me? Kahuroa 12:48, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Do you have a checkpage for AWB? If so, you look at the AWB checkpage here on en.wiki, if you follow the bot format, that will work. What is the page loading like in normal IE? And what specification computer are you using? Reedy Boy 12:51, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

The enabled version list is done from here on en.wiki. We were discussing re-enabling 3.9, but it never came to a proper decision, and was never done. Was it faster for you in the old version? MaxSem had written a page about how to setup a checkpage, but i cant find it for the life in me! Reedy Boy 12:56, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

I created a checkpage for you at mi:Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage. Feel free to customize it and add users and bots as necessary. If you'd like a non-open approval (that is, users have to request approval), then change the page and ask people to request access on the talk page and remove the message (the line starting with <!--Message:) Hope this helps! —METS501 (talk) 14:37, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for that and for creating the page. Yep it was faster in the old version. Page loading time in normal IE is less than 3 secs. The new version takes ages to start too. Computer is 3.2 gigahertz pentium, 1 gig ram, 128 meg display card. 2005 vintage. Kahuroa 19:38, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

"Free but shackled"

GPL + C#/VS ? I recommend this reading: Free But Shackled - The Java Trap --Arny 15:35, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

Nice reading, but we can't do anything about it. —METS501 (talk) 15:41, 12 August 2007 (UTC)

AWB Error

Hi, i just got my self AWB. After i added my user ID and passwd onto my profile and when i tried to login in i get this error pops-up: "This Software does not support skins other then Monobook. Please choose monobook in your preferences and try to relogin." Ive went thru the preferences hundreds of time and couldn not found a field for choosing a Skin . I even went thru and search the AutoWikiBrowser archives and wiki bugzilla still no clue on what could probarbaly be. Can someone advice which part ive missed out. --killerserv (talk) 13:48, 13 August 2007 (GMT)

Special:Preferences - Skin under those preferences Reedy Boy 12:28, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Random articles

Can AWB have an option to look through random articles to reach articles that might not be seen in systematic searches. There could be an option to see 50 or 100 random articles at a time. Snowman 10:21, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Does query.php/api.php do a list of random pages. As otherwise, it would have to run the Special:Random many times... If the query.php/api.php doesnt do it, we can put in a mediawiki bugzilla request... Reedy Boy 12:29, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

IRCMonitor error

Hi. When I try to connect to #en.wikipedia, after logging in, the following error is displayed.

Unhandled exception has occurred in your application. If you click Continue the application will ignore this error and attempt to continue. If you click Quit, the application will close immediately.

followed by,

See the end of this message for details on invoking 
just-in-time (JIT) debugging instead of this dialog box.

<nowiki>************** Exception Text **************
System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
   at WikiFunctions.UserProperties.set_WikiStatus(Boolean value)
   at WikiFunctions.UserProperties.UpdateWikiStatus()
   at IRCMonitor.IRCMonitor.CheckStatus(Boolean Login)
   at IRCMonitor.IRCMonitor.btnStart_Click(Object sender, EventArgs e)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Control.OnClick(EventArgs e)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Button.OnClick(EventArgs e)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Button.OnMouseUp(MouseEventArgs mevent)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WmMouseUp(Message& m, MouseButtons button, Int32 clicks)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WndProc(Message& m)
   at System.Windows.Forms.ButtonBase.WndProc(Message& m)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Button.WndProc(Message& m)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Control.ControlNativeWindow.OnMessage(Message& m)
   at System.Windows.Forms.Control.ControlNativeWindow.WndProc(Message& m)
   at System.Windows.Forms.NativeWindow.Callback(IntPtr hWnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wparam, IntPtr lparam)


************** Loaded Assemblies **************
mscorlib
    Assembly Version: 2.0.0.0
    Win32 Version: 2.0.50727.312 (rtmLHS.050727-3100)
    CodeBase: file:///C:/Windows/Microsoft.NET/Framework/v2.0.50727/mscorlib.dll
----------------------------------------
IRCMonitor
    Assembly Version: 1.0.0.0
    Win32 Version: 1.0.0.0
    CodeBase: file:///C:/Program%20Files/AWB/IRCMonitor.exe
----------------------------------------
System.Windows.Forms
    Assembly Version: 2.0.0.0
    Win32 Version: 2.0.50727.312 (rtmLHS.050727-3100)
    CodeBase: file:///C:/Windows/assembly/GAC_MSIL/System.Windows.Forms/2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089/System.Windows.Forms.dll
----------------------------------------
System
    Assembly Version: 2.0.0.0
    Win32 Version: 2.0.50727.312 (rtmLHS.050727-3100)
    CodeBase: file:///C:/Windows/assembly/GAC_MSIL/System/2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089/System.dll
----------------------------------------
System.Drawing
    Assembly Version: 2.0.0.0
    Win32 Version: 2.0.50727.312 (rtmLHS.050727-3100)
    CodeBase: file:///C:/Windows/assembly/GAC_MSIL/System.Drawing/2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a/System.Drawing.dll
----------------------------------------
WikiFunctions
    Assembly Version: 4.0.0.0
    Win32 Version: 4.0.0.0
    CodeBase: file:///C:/Program%20Files/AWB/WikiFunctions.DLL
----------------------------------------
System.Configuration
    Assembly Version: 2.0.0.0
    Win32 Version: 2.0.50727.312 (rtmLHS.050727-3100)
    CodeBase: file:///C:/Windows/assembly/GAC_MSIL/System.Configuration/2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a/System.Configuration.dll
----------------------------------------
System.Xml
    Assembly Version: 2.0.0.0
    Win32 Version: 2.0.50727.312 (rtmLHS.050727-3100)
    CodeBase: file:///C:/Windows/assembly/GAC_MSIL/System.Xml/2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089/System.Xml.dll
----------------------------------------
System.Web
    Assembly Version: 2.0.0.0
    Win32 Version: 2.0.50727.833 (QFE.050727-8300)
    CodeBase: file:///C:/Windows/assembly/GAC_32/System.Web/2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a/System.Web.dll
----------------------------------------

************** JIT Debugging **************
To enable just-in-time (JIT) debugging, the .config file for this
application or computer (machine.config) must have the
jitDebugging value set in the system.windows.forms section.
The application must also be compiled with debugging
enabled.

For example:

<configuration>
    <system.windows.forms jitDebugging="true" />
</configuration>

When JIT debugging is enabled, any unhandled exception
will be sent to the JIT debugger registered on the computer
rather than be handled by this dialog box.

Subsequently, the recent changed list is not loaded. I have had similar problems with both Vandalproof, when verifying authorisation and Vandalfighter, when attempting to retrieve the Recent Changes list.

I have tried disabling active scripting and turning off my firewall. Thanks.Tbo ¹⁵⁷talk 19:21, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

If your getting the problems with both AWB and Vandalproof. Your missing the .NET framework - [13] Reedy Boy 19:42, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, I forgot to mention that I run Windows Vista, which I think already has .net framework 3.0 installed.Tbo ¹⁵⁷talk 20:11, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Many people run vista with it fine. .NET framework v3 does nothing for AWB, it needs v2 Installed. Does AWB work? Reedy Boy 20:46, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, AWB works fine. Its just IRCMonitor which doesnt work.Tbo ¹⁵⁷talk 22:26, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

IRCM is slightly broken, due to its versionning being changed, but the program not being updated to cope with the changes. Just with you saying you got errors with Vandalproof, i thought it may be something else... Really needs sorting for the next release Reedy Boy 22:35, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for your help. With vandalproof I can't even login but Im guessing thats a separate problem.Tbo ¹⁵⁷talk 22:57, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Suggestions

• {{THISPAGENAME}} could be replaced which the actual page name.
• When searching Users:edits on the AWB panel all the edits are listed and it can return the same page dozens of times when many edits have been done. A list without duplicates would be useful.
• {{disambig}} (and perhaps for other forms of this template) gives a warning that there are no categories on the page unless one is included in a template. Perhaps AWB need not give this warning for disambig pages. Snowman 12:28, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

For the second one, this is easily done by the user. Click filter, make sure remove duplicates is selected... Reedy Boy 12:23, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Or just press the Remove duplicates button. Reedy Boy 20:36, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

includeonly

not sure if it's a bug, feature or what, but as i think the category shouldn't be moved from here to the end [14] (it means that there is no such section but it is required, category's name means "articles to expand") --84.234.42.68 17:48, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Its something that the General Fixes does... Reedy Boy 17:51, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

i don't know what "includeonly" is but is there for some reason --84.234.42.68 19:34, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I've been thinking about that as well. If a category that is up for deletion at CFD is edited with AWB, the deletion categories are moved to the end, which is fine if the cat is deleted. But if it's kept, the CFD template is removed and more times than not, the deletion categories are left. I'm sure this happens with articles that are up for deletion as well. Is there any way to skip moving any categories that are within the subst'ed xFD templates, even with General Fixes on? --Kbdank71 19:41, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Include only tags are used on templates that are transcluded. If the include only tags are used, whatever is between them, will only affect the page where the transclusion occurs, rather than the template page. If your just removing/replacing categories, turn off General fixes Reedy Boy 20:35, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

They are right though, those categories shouldn't be moved. Feature request? —METS501 (talk) 00:31, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

You said they shouldnt be moved - ie Bug. Reedy Boy 16:34, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Many times, yes, I'm just removing or replacing categories, but this will happen no matter what people are using AWB for. I suppose it would be a bug for categories within any includeonly and noinclude tags. What about the xFD tags? Would that be a feature request? --Kbdank71 16:48, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Using WikiFunctions.dll

How can I use WikiFunctions.dll in order to make list of articles from certain source in a C# application? When I try to use functions from GetLists class the type initializer for 'WikiFunctions.Variables' throws an exception. Jogers (talk) 19:29, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Try use the Listmaker control... May give better results. Reedy Boy 20:47, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

I get the same exception when I try to invoke the ListMaker constructor. Jogers (talk) 21:48, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Everything suddenly started working when I added the [STAThread] attribute above the Main method. Jogers (talk) 22:21, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Get talk pages

Is it possible to get a list of pages, but then use the talk pages of those pages? I would like to know so that I could use it with the Kingbotk plugin, which allows you to place and fix up {{WPBiography}} tags on talk pages. --Credema 22:29, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, there is the option "convert to talk pages" in the "list" menu. Jogers (talk) 22:39, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I found it, thank you for your help. --Credema 20:54, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Placement of stubs

Hi. I disagree with AWB putting stubs after categories, like here. Any reasons AWB does things this way? Thanks. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 22:15, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

This is a common question, so we really should integrate it into the FAQ somehow. The short answer is that there are two sides to this issue and while many people agree with you that the stubs should be above the categories, there are also large numbers who like them better below the categories. I will note however, that the edit you link to should probably not have been made, as it appears to fall against the guideline of insignificant editing. If the stubs are to be moved, they should only be moved when other more significant edits are taking place. If I had more time, I would examine the AWB user's diffs more closely to see if a warning is in order; perhaps someone else could take a look. --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 02:25, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

I notified the user in question. Apparently that edit was a glitch, the user uses AWB for a good purpose most of the time.

Since there is no consensus about moving the stubs, is it possible to have AWB not move them from whatever location it encounters them? Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 15:17, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Thats the difficult one - As its good to move them, say if the user tags it up at the top or whatever... Reedy Boy 15:53, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree that AWB should continue to do it the way it is now. --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 18:26, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Redistribution of Wikifunctions.dll

I'm working on a Microsoft Word VSTO add-in (which will be GPL'd) for MediaWiki-based sites, which will be GPL'd and downloadable from Codeplex. The WikiFunctions.dll assembly seems like the best external library of basic MediaWiki connectivity, and I'd love to be able to use it in my application. However, I'm very much inclined to NOT having users have to download and piece together the various bits from separate packages - I'd far rather be able to include the WikiFunctions.dll in the installer for the Word add-in. Have you ever faced this situation before? Is there any reason that a GPL-licensed application couldn't redistribute the WikiFunctions.dll as part of its binary installer package (with appropriate attributions of course)?ParanoidMike 01:38, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

No problem if you include the binary you downloaded yourself. Don't forget, it's copyleft. Of course, you'll have to honor GPL by mentioning that "this software includes parts from AWB developed by blah blah blah...". Be advised though that WikiFunctions is designed primarily for AWB and thus has some limitations such as requirement for approval to be able to edit pages. Probably you will find something else more useful. For example, WikiAccess (with docs in Russian, hehe). MaxSem 08:32, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Followup to MaxSem: There's a statement on the [Wikipedia:WikiFunctions] page that says “WikiFunctions also contains much in the way of standalone code reusable by other projects and AWB plugins.” In light of your advice, what does this statement mean exactly? I'd advise at least an expansion of the WikiFunctions reuse text, if not a re-examination of the construction of WikiFunctions - e.g. to require approval only when performing some of the more “dangerous” functions (whatever you believe those to be). Surely editing wiki pages isn't considered dangerous, is it?

This brings up a good question: is the approval authorization managed on the server side, or is there some “guard code” in the Wikifunctions.dll code? If some of the authorization is performed at the client side, then I believe that (a) folks looking to bypass such restrictions could simply edit and recompile the Wikifunctions.dll source - is that what was done in the MWikiBrowser fork? - and (b) it should be reasonable to re-factor that code so that it only applies to atypical functions.ParanoidMike 17:50, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

The approval is done on the client side. Personally, I found the authentication code and removed it within about 15 minutes of downloading the project. Now I can use AWB without any approval at all (note: this was just for the sake of interest. I don't do enough editing to warrant AWB usage). Such is the nature of open source. Ahsile 11:57, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Suprised you took you that long. But yeah, its open source, all source released, so you can in theory do what you want to it Reedy Boy 12:33, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

New user help - disambig

I have recently been approved and I want to make sure I use this tool properly as I'd assume a screw up could cause wide spread "chaos". A significant number of American football player articles have improperly disambiguated the content. The improper "convention" is PLAYER NAME (football player), and the proper "convention" is PLAYER NAME (American football). I can explain this if need be, but in the meantime - i'm trying to figure out the best way to use AWB to get the task done. I have succesfully loaded all the articles in the category, and i've read the user's manual - but i'm just not 100% sure on exactly where in the disambig function to specify what to do. Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  06:09, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I presume your not wanting to move pages or anything? Just changed the disambigauted links? Reedy Boy 09:32, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

• LOL - nope actually i am wanting to move pages first. I've figured out the "fixing" issue - just not the moving issue (unless you can't move). Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  09:36, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Hmm... I think you can load the pages, press the move button, as long as you have the rights, but you'd have to enter the new name... I dont really know. Theres that many features that i've never even touched... Reedy Boy 09:39, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm totally stumped at this point, but i appreciate the help - i can't figure it out at all. :-) Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  09:56, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

• So i can't find seem to find any instructions on mass article renaming - am i missing something? Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  02:16, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I dont think your missing anything - Im sure AWB doesnt support mass page moves... Dotnetwikibot can to an extent... Could be setup to take current name, change the names as you suggest, and move it. Whats the backlog number that needs doing? As it could be a bot task... Reedy Boy 10:07, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

• What do you mean by "backlog number that needs doing"? I 'm not very familiar with bots, but would a bot be able to pick up on variables in parenthesis? basiclly if the article in Category:National Football League players uses (football) or (football player) it needs to be moved to (American football). Does that make sense or am i confusing everyone :-) ? Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  17:26, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

The backlog would be the number of pages that needed changing over. Basically, it needs to go through a list of articles in that category, and if it uses the wrong disambiguation, it could be moved/renamed... Reedy Boy 18:25, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

How do I count the backlog? Juan Miguel Fangio| ►Chat  18:29, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

User:Reedy Boy/American footballers - 1001 pages. Those are the ones that have things in brackets, but its not American footballer Reedy Boy 18:50, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Question

Is there a way for AWB to compare two categories? I'd like to be able to use it to clean up duplicate categorization (e.g. articles that are simultaneously filed in both Category:Writers and Category:Canadian writers), but haven't been able to figure out how to do that yet except by manually looking through articles in the parent category one by one. Bearcat 19:07, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

• Go to the List menu and select List Comparer. You will have the option to create 2 distinct lists in the same manner that you create lists for AWB use. When you hit the compare button, you will get results that show which items are duplicated and which are exclusive to each list. HTH. --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 01:44, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

deg

I think that there is something wrong with the way AWB converts deg in notation from to the small circle and visa versa. If there is a word beginning with an f or F after a deg, with or without a space between, it removes the space and changes a small f to a large F. Sometimes the deg sign is used other than for temperatures. Snowman 21:54, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs/Archive_3#Degrees_F_and_degrees_from... - Already reported and fixed. Reedy Boy 11:22, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

commas in quotation marks

I know this is a small thing, but I noticed that AWB just edited an article I've contributed to, and it moved a comma from inside a quotation mark to outside. i.e. "fsgfdgfdgdf," → "sdfdsfdsfs", Gramatically speaking, the first is correct, not the second, so why does AWB do this? Can this issue, albeit a small issue, be fixed? Drewcifer3000 22:58, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

I think the latter is grammatically correct in En-English, but I will probably be corrected on that. - Dudesleeper · Talk 01:00, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean by "En-English." But, according to the MLA Style Manual the comma comes before the quotation mark. So unless Wikipedia is based on some other set of style rules, I'd recommend changing it. Either way, even if there is a disagreement on style, one way shouldn't be favored over the other, so I'd recommend just taking it out of the program altogether. Drewcifer 02:33, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

This is a British English vs American English thing. AWB shouldn't change it one way or another. —METS501 (talk) 03:48, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

I cannot reproduce it. MaxSem 07:44, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

What does that mean? You mean you can't make the program do it on another article? Drewcifer 08:32, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Right. Please provide a diff, but I currently suppose that it was caused by Find & Replace, or by operator's mistake. MaxSem 09:03, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

diff Drewcifer 09:11, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

I've asked the user who made it about a clarification. MaxSem 09:24, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

The matter is addressed in Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Quotation marks—"Inside or outside: Punctuation marks are placed inside the quote marks only if the sense of the punctuation is part of the quotation (this system is referred to as logical quotation)". Example provided: Arthur said that the situation is "deplorable". (When a sentence fragment is quoted, the period is outside.) The MLA Style Manual notwithstanding, if the venue, in this case Wikipedia, proffers its own manual (based on other solid orthographic authorities), that manual becomes the norm to assure uniformity of style. —Roman Spinner (talk) 10:01, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Interesting. Thanks for the quote. But can the program detect how a quote is being used? There are cases where a comma should be inside a quotation such as: "You see," said Drew, "can AWB tell the difference?" That's a much more common usage than the other. Drewcifer 10:13, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Obviously, the earlier example can be turned on its head by alternate usage [Arthur said, "The situation is deplorable."] (the sentence-within-the-sentence, including the period mark, becomes a part of the quote). Under ideal circumstances, the AWB is overseen and guided by an experienced user cognizant of the Manual of Style in all its complexities (not nearly always the case, as we know). If one disagrees with a specific detail of a multi-detail AWB edit or series of edits, the individual point in question can be restored to its original form, accompanied by an edit summary quoting the particular application of the Manual of Style applicable to the situation. —Roman Spinner (talk) 10:56, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

This is not something AWB is doing on its own. I have my AWB 'Find and Replace' set up to change <comma><quote> to <quote><comma> as per the Manual of Style, as mentioned above. If there's a particular place where this is wrong, I'd be glad to change it back. However, I've been making this change (as part of other more substantial corrections) to articles for a long time now; I've never seen a case where the final comma logically belonged inside the quote and no-one has ever objected to any of these changes. In the examples that started this discussion I'm in no doubt that the comma does logically belong outside the quotes. (By contrast, although there are often cases where logically the final full stop/period ought to be moved outside the quotes, these are harder to distinguish, so I don't attempt to automate that change.) Colonies Chris 18:39, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Given that the MoS says in certain circumstances a comma should come after a quote, the edit that I was initially concerned with seems ok. But there are cases where a comma should be in the quotation marks. Ideally, the editor should be able to tell the difference, but I doubt this is often the case. So I'm just worried that this program is changing something based on the user's ability to interpret an obscure rule that the majority of its users don't know about. I imagine the majority of edits go something like this: "AWB says I should change it, I guess it's right." Whether or not a particular edit is correct or incorrect, I don't think it's something that should be included into a semi-automated program. Drewcifer 18:48, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Please read what people are trying to tell you. It's not AWB, it's custom replacements this particular user created and uses for his own tasks. MaxSem 18:59, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Oooooh, gotcha. Nevermind than. Drewcifer 03:04, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Errors in quotations

I'm not familiar with AWB. All I know is that, in one of the articles I watch (Free Republic, about a political website), there's a quotation from the site's founder that includes a misspelled word. AWB shouldn't be used to alter verbatim quotations. In this instance, the error has been marked with "sic" but it was "corrected" again today. People using AWB need to check the context more closely. If an error in a quotation is such that you doubt it was so in the original, please check it yourself or at least query it on the talk page rather than just automatically altering the quotation. JamesMLane t c 16:56, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, things like that are always a problem, and that's why we don't let any users run the typo fixing feature on automatic. That means that this is really the users' responsibility, not the software's. —METS501 (talk) 18:06, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

JamesMLane, Please feel free to leave a polite note on the talk page of the user who made the "correction error". The user who did it probably did not WL the page and won't know that you reverted, so a polite note will help get their attention and hopefully make them more aware of their actions. If they continue to do this, they could end up with their access removed. --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 01:38, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Presumably it would help if AWB was a bit more careful about stuff that was contained within one of the various <quote> tags though? You can understand why people might miss a one-letter change in the middle of a dense piece of text, perhaps make it default to requiring users to positively change stuff in quotes rather than requiring them to undo an auto-change. FlagSteward 14:56, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Userbox

How about a Userbox for users to put on their userpage, so they could identify themselves? ChrisDHDR ( C @) 13:30, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Feel Free to make one. Reedy Boy 19:16, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Like Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Userbox. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:24, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

Cheers xaosflux - I thought there was one somewhere. Reedy Boy 16:06, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

View page, edit Talk?

Hi guys. I do a lot of article assessment (High Start etc) for various Projects, which means that ideally I'd like to have the whole article in 'view' mode in the main screen, and edit the Talk page in the edit box. Is there a way of doing this? The best I've come up so far is to have two instances of AWB running, one editing the Talks and one the articles, but it's suboptimal. Failing that could we have an "Article Assessment" mode (or plugin?) on the wish list? ;-/ FlagSteward 14:50, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Kingbotk/Plugin. MaxSem 15:13, 1 September 2007 (UTC)

That's the ticket, cheers. Once I'd sussed where the new tabs were that is.... ;-/ Would be even better if you could edit the Talk page while Previewing the article page though. FlagSteward 01:28, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Problems viewing the bottom parts of the program

When I run the program, I can't see the bottom buttons such as "add" because they are cutoff for some reason. When I try to resize it or use a different screen resolution it does nothing and makes no difference. When I resize it seems to stay cutoff. How can I fix this? Wikidudeman ^(talk) 00:56, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Visit WP:AWB/B archives and notice that it's alreadyfixed. MaxSem 05:20, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Using AWB on other Wikis not related to Wikipedia

How is this possible, I've seen it done before. --User:Charitwo/Sig 16:39, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

#Frequently asked questions. MaxSem 16:46, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Logging to file

If I read this tab correctly, AWB can upload logs of activity. I've tried to get this to work, but I get nothing. I've checked the archives here, and the User Manual, but I can't figure it out. Can someone help out? --Kbdank71 14:19, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Generally only used for bot activity, but should work fine for normal users. It did work last time it was checked. What did you do? Reedy Boy 17:31, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Here's what I did (granted, I had no idea what to do, so I was guessing at everything): Clicked on "Log to Wiki Code", then "Upload", unchecked "Add to Watchlist". At this point I think I clicked on "Turn on", chose the desktop, clicked "Apply", created a profile and entered my password. I didn't know what else to do then, as nothing was happening. I made some changes, but nothing was added to the log file and nothing was uploaded. --Kbdank71 20:37, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Sounds about right in general. You will notice there is the number of lines. It will only upload when it hits the number of lines. Minimum is 1000 lines (may want to set it to that to test it out). Try doing quite a bit of stuff till you hit the 1k lines. It should then auto-upload. Reedy Boy 20:57, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Makes sense. Of course, nothing is even going into my log files. The only thing that happens is *Logging: WikiFunctions.dll v4.0.0.0 *'''[[7 September]] [[2007]] 11:09 Initialising log.''' and then nothing after that, no matter what I do in AWB. --Kbdank71 15:41, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Opening lists

When I wanted to stop last night, I saved my (long) list as a text file. Today, I can still find the Save List As Text File bit, but no-where to choose to open my saved list. Help ! thisisace 23:16, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Click the "make from" box. It's an option there. --Izno 01:25, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

• Thank you. thisisace 18:07, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

AWB for Mac OS X!

I demand an edition of AutoWikiBrowser for Mac OS X! It would make my life so much easier. (Also, I wouldn't have to keep booting into my Windows partition to do something like generate a list). MessedRocker (talk) 02:49, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

If it wasn't you I would remove this comment as trolling :-) It can't happen, so don't stay awake waiting for it :-) —METS501 (talk) 02:52, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Afaict AWB is highly tied into microsoft technology and removing that dependency would basically mean a complete rewrite. Plugwash 12:37, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Do you have an Intel chipped Mac? If so, you can use Parallels Desktop for Mac or VMware Fusion to run Windows programs without rebooting. I don't know of any reason why AWB wouldn't work with them. (Unfortunately, I bought my newest Mac about 3 weeks before the Intel Macs came out, so I can only use AWB at work). --Fabrictramp 13:37, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I believe a few users do do that currently... Reedy Boy 13:41, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Windows ME

Can AWB work on Windows ME? Minesweeper.007 (talk · contribs) 15:09, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Not sure. Try it out and let us know :-) —METS501 (talk) 03:00, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

It does indeed. - Dudesleeper · Talk 19:45, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Does it not through the error about not supporting unicode or whatever? If not, we'll add it to the main page Reedy Boy 21:07, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

D'oh. I have XP, not ME. Sorry. - Dudesleeper · Talk 21:38, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Need help about using this on Wikia

Hi,
I've use AutoWikiBrowser a lot last week on my admin (bureaucrat) account at fr.guildwars.wikia.com (same username as here) and did some needed work. But the list of things to do just keep growing and the software ask me to manually validate every changes. So, i've asked for a bot account that is nammed Vorlax1. Got it. But now, even though i've made a check page, AutoWikiBrowser just keep saying that "Vorlax1 is not enable to use this."

Can you help me a little ? TulipVorlax 20:30, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Think it needs to be a bot on the master page too... AFAIK Reedy Boy 20:34, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

And this page would be on wikia.com or wikipedia.org ? TulipVorlax 20:46, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

[15] is the central Wikia Checkpage Reedy Boy 21:09, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, i know where it is. Thanks. I'll ask them about this. If they put it on that list and it still dont work, i'll return... TulipVorlax 21:13, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Ok! It can log in now. A staff guy added the bot name on the central check page. Wonderfull. But now, every attempts to make a list of page did absolutly nothing. I even try to get links from the Main page, nada! I'll go check the others help pages around here but if someone understand more than me what is happening, i'll be gratefull if he would give me a hint. TulipVorlax 01:18, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Just to keep you informed, i can make a list with a Google search. Strange. TulipVorlax 02:09, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Geez ! I've just downloaded the previous version of AutoWikiBrowser and now i can get a list from a category again. But, now, it just keep asking me to upgrade. so annoying ! TulipVorlax 02:52, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

You'll need to have api.php installed on that wiki. —METS501 (talk) 02:55, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, i've read the update notes but was thinking this was already part of a normal wiki installation. I've asked Wikia staff about this. TulipVorlax 03:13, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikia staff reported that api.php is already installed on Wikia. It's just that it's not in ...wikia.com/w/api.php but in ...wikia.com/api.php. See this link for confirmation of it's presence : http://fr.guildwars.wikia.com/api.php Wikia staff said i should configure the bot to use the correct path to the script. But, i dont think we can do that. Unless maybe, by modifying the source if it can be compile with SharpDevelop (i dont have MS-Studio). If there's is no solution, i'll just keep using previous version sadly loosing Google support. See ya TulipVorlax 04:13, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Ah, that wont help. You could change it, There is probably no easy way for us to do this in code, without having to have an if for wikia... Unless you can get the wikia admins to do a symlink or some other referencing of api.php in /w/...? Reedy Boy 13:43, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Don't think i can ask them that. I'll continue to use version 4.000 for as long as i will need it or will be able to. And then, might delete the bot account because i'm unable to use the python bot. Thanks for your help in understanding what was wrong. TulipVorlax 18:06, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, just as a side point, googling uses a different method for searching! If you ask nicely, i cant see why they'd have a problem doing a symlink for api.php.... Most other stuff that work straight from mediawiki, use api.php Reedy Boy 18:31, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I've post information already. There : [16] Last reply. I dont know what is a symlink but leave the decision of letting the software get unuseable to them. As i said, i will continue to use previous version because i need it to be able to get category listing, as for Google, if i ever need to use it (my wiki is not referenced much; i get too few results), i can fire the other one (i have both version installed) get a list and save it for loading it in the other one. Lol. TulipVorlax 18:43, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

A symlink is a symbolic link. A shortcut, in affect. Reedy Boy 18:58, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the full version of the name of this. Now i can read this : symbolic link (or even better this Lien symbolique) TulipVorlax 19:58, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Je ne pas parles vous Francais (or something like that) ;) Reedy Boy 20:12, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

héhé! I live in Montréal. And yes, my first language is french (that's why my wikia project is also in french) and i learn english on TV and video games like Final Fantasy 7 (they try to teach me in school but they did not succeed). As weird as it seems, i dont speak english. Lol. When english people ask me directions downtown in my city, it's like my brain freeze or crash... Lol. But i can translate written english to french or the other way around. Aside that, i dont know if Wikia use Unix or a compatible OS. I hope they will find a way some day. They do a real lot for us already and they don't always have time for the troubles of a single user even when it's the founder of a wikia. TulipVorlax 20:23, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Although its generally an OS thing, most webservers can do a similar thing. Chances are they're using apache, which, if they are, can do it. Reedy Boy 20:38, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

<butting in> That's why it doesn't work on the project i work on... :( --Izno 06:12, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Set options menu

I am unable to see the entire set options menu, as it goes below the bottom of my screen and doesn't scroll. I tried increasing how many pixels my screen will display, but that has had no effect on the problem. Is there a way for me to fix this? Thanks, The Hybrid 21:54, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs#Bottom_Frame_doesn.27t_show - Its a bug... Reedy Boy 21:57, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Alright, so if wait for the next release to come out, then it won't be a problem anymore? The Hybrid 06:35, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

We dont know. We tried to fix it in 4.1, but it didnt seem to be fixed... Reedy Boy 10:39, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Alright, I just have one last question: I downloaded 3.9 like the bug report said, but it won't let me edit with it because it isn't the most recent version. Is there a way around this, or should I just be patient and wait for a new version without the bug to come out? Thanks, The Hybrid 19:54, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Its ok with 3.9... There has to be a common factor. We will hopefully get this sorted, and soon as we do, we will get a release out. Reedy Boy 20:02, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not allowed to edit with 3.9. I keep getting a notice saying that I have to download the most recent version in order to edit. Is there a way around this? The Hybrid 20:13, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Nope, it was disabled, not because it broke anything, just because it was really out of date. Reedy Boy 20:37, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Alright, that's what I needed to know. Thanks, The Hybrid 20:38, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Creating articles?

Is it allowed/possible to create articles using AWB? I want to create a lot of articles with a lot of information similar except for the name and the corresponding link to foreign wiki. Is it possible to do this? For instance to input a list of articles to be created as well as the redundant info? Wikidudeman ^(talk) 15:34, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, that's possible. Make a list of pages to be created and use "Append/Prepend text" in the "More..." tab to specify article content. Jogers (talk) 15:58, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

I want to make variables though. For instance I want to change some things in the text for each article and the thing changed is the name of the article itself. How is that done? For instance I need to create a list of articles about a district in Germany and the only thing changed in the text is the name of the article. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 16:02, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

If the name of the article subject is identical to the page title you can use "Find and replace" to change some string in the appended text to %%title%% (it's a keyword that represents the title of the current article). Otherwise, I see no easy way to do this. Jogers (talk) 16:16, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Actually there are two variables. The name of the article in the text and the alternative German language version of the article. I want both variables to equal the name of the article which I would be creating at the time. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 16:47, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

The solution above should work then. Just remember to check "Apply after general fixes" in the "Find and replace" menu because it won't work otherwise. Jogers (talk) 16:59, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

So what should I do? Create the articles with specific things that need to be changed and then after creating them go through and replace what needs to be changed with the "find and replace" tool? Wikidudeman ^(talk) 17:03, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it's going to work. I have a list of articles that I need to create and this is what is in the "append" area:

'''Eixen''' is a municipality in the Nordvorpommern district, in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Germany.
{{Mecklenburg-geo-stub}}
{{Cities and towns in Nordvorpommern (district)}}
[[Category:Municipalities in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern]]
[[de:Eixen]]

I want to replace "Eixen" with the names of the articles that I plan to create, I.E. "Behnkendorf" or "Deyelsdorf". How do I create an article and add the above as the content except replace "Eixen" with the name of the article being created? Wikidudeman ^(talk) 17:17, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Create the "Find and replace" rule that will change "Eixen" to "%%title%%". Jogers (talk) 11:27, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

It's actually easier to substitute the {{PAGENAME}} variable. Jogers (talk) 21:08, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

User:Sumibot did something similar while creating Indian village articles. See the bot's AWB settings page and the RFBA page for more information. I have made a feature request that would take this even further. Regards, Ganeshk (talk) 20:11, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Can't use custom wiki

I have a custom wiki on my computer that I'd like to use, but it doesn't have a domain name. I can enter "localhost", "127.0.0.1", or my computer's network address (192.168.x.x), but no domain, and AWB doesn't accept these. How can I use it on my wiki? Tuvok[^T@lk/_{Improve me}] 01:04, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

As of now, you can't. /Feature requests. —METS501 (talk) 20:58, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Proxy server

I'm not sure where to put this. I essentially can't use AWB from behind a proxy server (returns error "The remote server returned an error: (407) Proxy Authentication Required."). I'm not sure if it's just because I have the wrong settings somewhere (in which case I just need some help), whether I have got everything right and it just wont' work (in which case it's a bug), or if it simply doesn't have the required funcitonality (in which case I need to go to "requested features"). Which is it, and can it be solved? Happy‑melon 14:04, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Can you use Internet Explorer? Jogers (talk) 14:37, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

It has been reported as a Bug and also a feature request. AWB doesnt actually have the feature, so, its a feature request. In theory, it should follow the system IE settings, but this wouldnt work for internal processes. It has already been requested as a feature on the page. Reedy Boy 17:42, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

SCRIPTPATH

Did you know there's a magic word that report the scripts path ? I mean, of course you know, but, could this be used on a sort of check page to tell the bot where is the script on that perticular wiki ? On Wikia it seems to give an empty string. Here, it give this : /w
TulipVorlax 21:59, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

AWB not working?

I haven't used it in a while, so I don't know if it's the new version that I just downloaded, or AWB in general. Anyone having problems? --Kbdank71 20:28, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

What sort of problems are you having? —METS501 (talk) 20:57, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I can load categories using the CFD plugin, and start the process, but as soon as I press save for the first change, it just doesn't do anything. It says saving, but it doesn't. That's pretty much it. --Kbdank71 21:03, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

I hate to ask this, but did you forget to click the check to the left of the plugin name? --After Midnight ⁰⁰⁰¹ 17:31, 22 September 2007 (UTC)

Ah, the typical "Is your computer plugged in?" troubleshooting question. I've asked that many times myself.  :) No, I can confirm that the plugin was checked. Although, after upgrading today the problem seems to have resolved itself. --Kbdank71 16:33, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

WikEd

A specific script that does not work with IE7 on Vista is wikEd, finally figured this out after trying to figure out what was keeping AWB from running since I got a new computer in April. I thought I had read all of the FAQs, but I guessed I missed the one about some scripts not being compatible with some IE versions, I discovered it accidentally today when I was logged in with IE to check my paystub (for some reason the Disney employee portal doesn't work with Firefox) and rather than load Firefox I decided to just stay in IE to go to Wikipedia, and IE refused to load the page. Knowing that AWB uses IE, I slapped myself in the head and said "That's been the problem!". I figured it was wikEd because before IE barfed on the page it had a broken image icon on the little wikEd icon in the corner; I disabled wikEd and AWB (and IE) started working. Would it be a good idea to specifically list wikEd as a script that doesn't work on Vista in tha FAQ?--HarryHenryGebel 16:44, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

The latest (0.9.44 - yesterday) version of wikEd is indeed not compatible with IE7, I will fix that tonight. I doubt that previous versions were incompatible. Please use the wikEd talk page for wikEd-related problems. Thanks, Cacycle 17:11, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Cacycle, sorry I thought since the wikEd talk page asked for help making it work on Vista that the problem was already known there. I tried before in April and June to get AWB working and couldn't get it to work; I assumed that since the fix I made today made it work that wikEd was the problem all along. If it was popups or something in monobook at those times I'm sorry for the mistaken assumption.--HarryHenryGebel 18:09, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Batch input for dab link repair

How to batch input the disambiguation pages that has links that need to be repaired to fix them in AWB? --Dunnob 18:09, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Find and replace

I made a change to the EB1911 template on Wikisource a while ago and I'd like to use AWB's find and replace feature to help fix some of the articles. I want AWB to make changes to articles on the list that just have the parameters 'previous', 'next', and 'wikipedia'. Also, the value for |wikipedia= should be in the format [[Wikipedia:Whatever|Whatever]] or [[w:Whatever|Whatever]] or [[Wikipedia:Whatever]] or [[w:Whatever]]. So the occurences of the templates it will change should look something like this:

{{EB1911 |previous=Autocracy |next=AutoWikiBrowser |wikipedia=[[Wikipedia:Automatic|Automatic]]}}

I would like the |wikipedia= paramater to just have the word. e.g.

{{EB1911 |previous=Autocracy |next=AutoWikiBrowser |wikipedia=Automatic}}

I would also like a list of all the articles it skipped (those would be found in the logs section, right?). I hope my question was somewhat clear. Psychless 20:53, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I'd appreciate an answer, as it will take me over 80 hours, at least, to finish this without AWB. Psychless 21:28, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

What's the problem? Do you need somebody to help you write proper regular expressions? Jogers (talk) 12:11, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, that would be it. I've tried to do it myself with no success. Psychless 01:19, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Firstly, use the database scanner to search the relevant database dump for articles containing the following regex:

{{EB1911 *\|previous=.*?\|next=.*?\|wikipedia=\[\[(Wikipedia|w):(.*?)\]\]}}

This will create the list of articles to work on. After you do this, use advanced find and replace settings as follows:

• create an "in template rule" that catches the EB1911 template
• create a "template parameter rule" that catches the wikipedia parameter as a subrule of the above
• finally, create a subrule of the rule above that replaces \[\[(Wikipedia|w):([^\|]*?)(\|(.*?))?\]\] with $2.

It worked in my sandbox for all cases you provided. Hope that helps. Jogers (talk) 12:45, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Find and Replace

Is there anyway to have the find and replace ignore certain phrases? For example, I'm going through and cleaning up contractions, in accordance to the "copy edit guidelines". In a lot of The Simpson's episodes, it mentions a book called "I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide", so it tags on and changes can't to can not, and it's to is not, since that is how i have it set. Is there anyway to make it ignore that title as a whole, but still change other times can't and it's show up? Ctjf83 04:31, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

as the changes are done in order, wouldn't it work to just make the last find and replace in your list to (a) find the expanded 'over-corrected' version of the title and (b) replace it with the desired version? Kahuroa 10:45, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

User Contributions over 5000?

Greetings, AWBers. I've got a bit of a pickle that I hope you can help me with. Recently, Polbot finished up autogenerating species articles and categories from the IUCN Red List. I run BotanyBot, which cleans up after Polbot. I was going to run WP:PLANTS assessment tags on the category talk pages of all the categories Polbot generated for us (and to check for any problems, like misplaced taxonomies, etc.), but I can only reach 2500 articles into Polbot's past using the "user contribs" make list function. I can extend that to 5000 when using the Special pages function ("Special:Contributions/Polbot&limit=a number larger than 5000"), but that only gets me Polbot's category contributions from roughly the letter R to Z. Is there anyway I can expand this range or is this a limitation of the software? Or do I simply need to change some preference I haven't located yet on articles numbers returned from a search? I'm still using thr 4.0.0.0 version - would an update help this issue? Alternatively, if nothing can be done the way I'm thinking, do you have any suggestions on alternate ways to get at this goal? Thanks! Cheers, --Rkitko ^(talk) 00:02, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Hi. It should work if you use the special page function and copy completely the URL (after "Special:") to the text box in AWB. Make a list of the first 5000, and then click "next 5000" and copy the new url. —METS501 (talk) 21:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Ah, excellent! Thanks you. --Rkitko ^(talk) 02:36, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Interwiki tag and general fixes

Hello. I tried AWB's "general fixes" option, but AWB does indistinct sorting for interwiki tag. Does not AWB's sort alphabetically? --Nightshadow28 12:49, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

It sorts according to the interwiki sort order. I think on en.wiki we use InterwikiLocalAlpha. —METS501 (talk) 12:53, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for speedy response. I see. I am a little strange feeling, but I understood its reason. Thanks! --Nightshadow28 13:10, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

ignore templates, refs, ... too greedy?

• simple link fix don't work for me if I check that option, [[Iwan Pietrowicz Pawłow| can't be matched in *[[1849]] – [[Iwan Pietrowicz Pawłow|Iwan Pawłow]],

• how to use \r\n ? \n doesn't work, AWB places it as text string, I read something about \s*\n but don't know if it should be on the "find" or/and "replace with" side, and I'm not sure if it works as previously \r\n? --84.234.42.68 23:49, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

"Ignore templates, refs..." option ignores all kinds of links by design. If you intend to use "\n" in find and replace you have to check the "Regex" option. Jogers (talk) 14:59, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

it is checked like it was when using \r\n (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs#.5Cr_bug_in_regex_mode) --84.234.42.68 23:07, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

How would I...

Use AWB to perform the task that is being discussed here? (Scroll down to the bottom of this conversation) We are wondering if I can use AWB to deliver a weekly message/notification about the Collaboration of the Week or something. I don't know how I would go about doing this, as I mainly use AWB for DAB/find and replace and general editing. Thoughts, suggestions, comments ..all appreciated :) Thanks! --Naha|^(talk) 17:03, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Problems remaining logged in

I posted about this some months ago but it still seems a problem for me. Because of my internet connection, I need to go through the secure server to remain signed in to Wikipedia. The regular http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... address will, within a few pages, say that I am signed out. I'm unclear about the root cause of this, whether my IP changes or what, but the effect is that loading pages in AutoWikiBrowser quickly fails by saying I'm not logged in. Of course, the only way AWB knows how to present a log in page is through the above address. What I need is a way to sign in through https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/ and for AWB to access the pages through the secure server.

I'm glum about the possibilities of AWB being able to do this. I expect/predict the AWB way of accessing pages is probably wired deep into the program and altering it to serve a minority such as myself is unlikely to happen. I'm not using proxies (at least not that I know) and I swear my IP seems stable within any given session.

Because it's unlikely for AWB to change for me and my situation, I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions or workarounds for me to employ to be able to work with AWB. It used to work fairly well for long periods of time, sometimes processing hundreds of pages and allowing me to make changes and corrections to many of them before it said I was logged out. Currently AWB is unusable for me and I really like it so I'm frustrated. Any suggestions? Pig^man 18:17, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Potential gotcha wwith interwikis

At Wikipedia:Village_pump_(miscellaneous)#en-interwiki_links it is mentioned that the practice of putting

<!--[[en:Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser]]-->

Is being seen...

This could trip up the interwiki sorting.

Rich Farmbrough, 09:42 3 October 2007 (GMT).

Generating indexes of pages

Has anyone written an AWB regex that can take the topics (headings) on a page and construct an "index" ? For example Meta:Talk:Interwiki_map/Archives has an index on it (built by hand) of all the topic names of each archive. It would be nice to automate this (in particular I would love to see an index of the archives of THIS page :). Just to know the names of the topics helps decide if you should look within a particular archive or not. Thanks. ++Lar: t/c 10:47, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Automating page moves

I have a need to move a lot of pages (this is on WikiSource), as they have bad names. Can this be done with AWB under some sort of regular expression control? AWB offers an option to move the page manually but that requires retyping the name. The new name can be derived from the old one (remove a subpage prefix and go from UPPER CASE to Capital Case). Or is this function kept manual on purpose? Thanks. ++Lar: t/c 10:47, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

The DotNetWikiBot [17] framework can do it. Something i wrote for another purpose... - Parses a list and then moves them.. I can customise the code for you if you need!

using System;
using System.IO;
using System.Text;
using System.Text.RegularExpressions;
using System.Collections;
using System.Xml;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Threading;
using DotNetWikiBot;

class MyBot : Bot
{
    static Regex inBrackets = new Regex("(\\([A-Za-z ]*\\))", RegexOptions.Compiled);
    public static void Main()
    {
        Site enWP = new Site("http://en.wikipedia.org", "Reedy_Boy", "*****");
        PageList pl = new PageList(enWP);
        pl.FillFromAllPageLinks("User:Reedy Boy/American footballers");

        foreach (Page p in pl)
        {
            string newTitle = p.title.Replace(inBrackets.Match(p.title).Captures[0].Value, "(American football)");
            Page p2 = new Page(enWP, newTitle);
            p.Load();
            if (!p.IsRedirect())
                p.RenameTo(newTitle, "Renaming page due to bad disambiguation");
        }
    }
}

Reedy Boy 19:26, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

That's cool! However I don't have dotnet so can't build my own version. I need this for something on WikiSource. Any chance this functionality could be made into a plugin? For best results access to the name of the page would be helpful as the old and new names are variants of each other. For example s:The Posthumous Works of Ann Eliza Bleecker/On the IMMENSITY of CREATION needs to become s:On_the_immensity_of_creation (remove the prefix, which for a run, never changes, and change the case of the name) ++Lar: t/c 20:18, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

If you use AWB, then that means you have the .NET framework v2 installed, meaning you can run this. However, AWB can work with the DotNetWikiBot plugin.. I have just never done so before myself. I'll have a play, unless someone can get to this first - ie someone who has done it before! Reedy Boy 08:56, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm confused, don't I have to compile this code (or a modified version of it) with csharp? Or can I just put it somewhere and run it. I thought csharp was compiled (Note that I found some free development tools at Microsoft following the links in the sourceforge pages). If I can just place this code somewhere and run it from within AWB that would really sort this out nicely. ++Lar: t/c 14:08, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it does have to be compiled, but there is a command line c# compiler called csc.exe that is part of the .NET framework. If you can run AWB, you dont have to install anything else to be able to write/compile/run the dotnetwikibot framework. Reedy Boy 19:32, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Assistance required

"How did you get the external link for WP:AWB to open for you? I've already added my name to the list, but have tried countless times to get that link to open and "Page Can Not Be Displayed" is all I get. I have Windows XP, but is there something amiss? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 11:35, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

What link are you talking about? The one to download it? TTN 04:30, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Every time I try to install it, it makes me lose connection. Which is it? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 07:35, 6 October 2007 (UTC)"

<This was copy/pasted from TTN's talk page. To sum it up, how do I install the program without having it crash on me?> I have already added myself to the list. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 17:05, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Chances are if its crashing, your missing the .NET framework - [18] Reedy Boy 17:29, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Assistance creating a Regex to remove commas from numbers

What I want to do is to use the find and replace function in AWB to remove commas (or spaces) in numbers within parameters of an infobox template. For example, if the parameter |area= has a value entered of 102,003. I want to have AWB replace it with 102003. That way, calculations can be done on that raw formated number. Can anyone assist in creating a regular expression to do this? —MJCdetroit 14:28, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

FYI—
"Find1": (\s|\|)(parametername1|parametername2|parametername3|parametername4)(\s*)=(\s*)(\d+)[,|.|\s](\d\d\d)[,|.|\s](\d\d\d)+ "Replace1":$1$2$3=$4$5$6$7 "Find2":(\s|\|)(parametername1|parametername2|parametername3|parametername4)(\s*)=(\s*)(\d+)[,|.|\s](\d\d\d)+ "'Replace2":$1$2$3=$4$5$6

MJCdetroit 01:59, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

style.css

How can I make the diffs look like Wikipedia diff style? —MC 00:15, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Quick guess, would be, if your using a custom Monobook.css, look for the matching sections in that and paste them into your custom style.css AFAIK. Reedy Boy 09:50, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Software disabled message

I'm sure you're asked this all the time, but I haven't used the AWB in a while and when I updated it and tried to log in it told me "software disabled" in the status bar. Did they kick me off this? -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 00:51, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Nope, you still have access. Chances are the update may not have worked correctly. Download a version manually and try that, Report back if your still having issues! Reedy Boy 09:49, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Account move - can someone update AWB list please?

Recently had my username changed from Alexj2002 to AlexJ ([19]). Can the whitelist be updated so I can have access to the tool again. Thanks, AlexJ 17:40, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Done - [20] Reedy Boy 18:52, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. AlexJ 19:02, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Approved, but AWB says I am unapproved

I was approved for AWB recently (my name is on the checkpage), but it still says I am unapproved. As I listed my name with underscores where the spaces are while adding myself to the approval list, I am listed as Life,_Liberty,_Property on the checkpage, even though my actual username is Life, Liberty, Property. I believe that this is the cause of the problem. Life, Liberty, Property 23:28, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

All fixed. —METS501 (talk) 00:08, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

DEFAULTSORT

Can some kind soul show me how to use AWB to add {{DEFAULTSORT:Key, Sort}} correctly. Many thanks—G716 <^T·_C> 14:03, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

AFAIK, it adds it automatically if certain criteria are met by the current format of the categories... Reedy Boy 14:30, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

Do you know what the criteria are? I just created Category:Instructors of The Teaching Company, and used AWB to add the category to a bunch of pages. I was expecting AWB to add DEFAULTSORT, and remove the manual sort from existing cats, but it didn't. For an example, seeJoseph Nye. Regards—G716 <^T·_C> 14:43, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

All categories have to have the same sort key. It didn't add the DEFAULTSORT automatically in Joseph Nye because Category:Instructors of The Teaching Company didn't have one. Jogers (talk) 14:49, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

Rats! I goofed. Does that mean I should have run AWB through my list once to add DEAULTSORT based on the exisiting categories, and then run AWB a second time to add the new category? Is there any way I can fix this now? (without manually editing 40+ pages) Many thanks for your quick replies. Regards—G716 <^T·_C> 14:58, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

If AWB doesn't add the {{DEFAULTSORT}} automatically, you can always right-click in the edit box, choose the "Insert tag" menu in the popup, and then choose the first item which will add the {{DEFAULTSORT}}.--Fabrictramp 15:05, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

You shouldn't have to make two passes as a workaround in the next release. I've changed the execution order in rev 1757 so categories will be added/replaced/removed after general fixes. Jogers (talk) 15:28, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

Many thanks for all your help. I have used AWB to manually add DEFAULTSORT using right-click, add tag, reparse, as suggested by Fabrictramp. Was going to suggest the modification that Jogers just made. Would it be possible to modify AWB to add DEFAULTSORT if (a) manual keys are missing from some categories, and (b) all the existing manual sort keys are all the same? Should I suggest this on the requested features page? Regards to all —G716 <^T·_C> 16:11, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't think it's a good idea. It used to work like this but concerns were raised. Jogers (talk) 16:20, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

See this bug report. Jogers (talk) 16:21, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

Makes sense not to, based on the example shown with the bug report. Regards—G716 <^T·_C> 00:45, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Perennial "monobook skin" problem

Could this be triggered by the WP error page? Rich Farmbrough, 10:57 15 October 2007 (GMT).

Can you expand on what you mean? —METS501 (talk) 22:31, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Toolbar

What happened to the toolbar on the edit box? It's disappeared in the latest version. Colonies Chris 08:11, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Its still there. Maybe just be hidden Reedy Boy 09:20, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Is there an option somewhere to show/hide it? I can't find one - there's an option to show/hide the toolbar above the preview box, but none that I can find for the edit box toolbar. Colonies Chris 12:15, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Go the the "Edit" menu. Down towards the bottom, choose "Show Edit Toolbar".--Fabrictramp 14:36, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Strange. It was already selected (but no toolbar). I unselected it then selected it again, and the toolbar appeared. Thanks. Colonies Chris 20:25, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

It's not right though. It covered the top of the text in the edit box, then since I switched it off again, I can't access the first line of any article - the display starts at line 2 and the scrolling won't go up any further. Colonies Chris 22:38, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

It's been reported in the bugs. That bug caused me to go back to 4.1.2.0. --Fabrictramp 23:34, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

"CLR Error"

When I try to open AutoWikiBrowser or IRCMonitor 4.1.3.0 or the updater, I get a message box that says "CLR error: 80004005. The program will now terminate." Anyone know why this is happening? -- BlastOButter42 ^See Hear _Speak 03:35, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Have you the .NET v2 Framework installed? Reedy Boy 08:49, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Software disabled message (back from archives)

I'm sure you're asked this all the time, but I haven't used the AWB in a while and when I updated it and tried to log in it told me "software disabled" in the status bar. Did they kick me off this? -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 00:51, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Nope, you still have access. Chances are the update may not have worked correctly. Download a version manually and try that, Report back if your still having issues! Reedy Boy 09:49, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

Ah, I JUST got it to temporarily work. I downloaded the new version from: [21]. And that still didn't work. So then I opened up IE and logged in, tried some other witchcraft, and then after I opened up the OLD version, it gave me the software disabled message, and then let me log in and make changes. Funny... it must be something with my computer. -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 01:48, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Scientific names

In the article Stromateoidei the bot "corrected" Centrolophus niger to ''Centrolophus Niger(diff here). However this is a mistake. In scientific names, only the first part of the name is uppercase, all other parts are lowercase. Please see Binomial nomenclature for more details. Totnesmartin 10:43, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Regex fixed. Please report issues with typo fixing to WT:AWB/T next time. MaxSem 15:37, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

Unhandled exception

I don't know if this is an AWB issue or not. Hopefully someone here can point me in the right direction. :)

I'm trying to regenerate the DEP listing from the most recent (10-18) database dump. I've done this successfully a couple of times before, but now every time I get 4014 results and then AWB halts with an unhandled exception error. The text of the error is here (it's a bit long). The first time I was running other stuff on my machine, so I ran it again without anything else running and had the same experience. I know that AWB hasn't made it all the way through the dump because I easily found an article from the old list that should have been on the new one and wasn't.

Is this an AWB problem? A bad download/unzip of the database dump? Something whacky with my PC? FWIW, AWB is version 4.1.2.0, PC is Windows XP Pro, 768MB of RAM. Thanks much!--Fabrictramp 22:29, 24 October 2007 (UTC)

It looks like the IE scripting errors tbh... Updated IE or anythign recently? Does AWB work using "normal methods"? Reedy Boy 21:35, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

No IE updates (unless WindowsUpdate snuck one in on me without my knowledge), and I don't recall installing any new software (other than updating AWB) in the last couple of months. No other problems with AWB, and I run it for far more hours a day than I should be. :) --Fabrictramp 22:14, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

I've now redownloaded and re-unzipped the file, and it stops at the same place (with 4014 matches). This time, however, I didn't get an error. (But it isn't making it all the way through the list.) Sigh.--Fabrictramp 21:48, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Registration

When I hit start it says my user name and that I am not "enabled". What did I do wrong? --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 23:59, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Your username was written with underscores. Fixed. MaxSem 06:04, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Cleaning up after (i.e. reverting) this bot's "cleanups"

Look at this edit. Some good things, maybe, but also a bad thing, that had to get reverted.

cos² θ

got changed to

cos² θ.

I have no quarrel with the changed in the Greek letter, but the superscript "2" was just as it should have been until this "cleanup" happened, and I've reverted.

Look at this:

1 + x + x² + x³ + x⁴ + ...

Obviously this should instead say

1 + x + x² + x³ + x⁴ + ...

with all superscripts the same size. The same uses using this same bot did a similar thing at partial derivative yesterday and it had to get reverted, and the same thing has happened with other editors using this bot on other occasions.

Can someone fix this bug in this bot? Michael Hardy 20:16, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(mathematics)#Superscripts_and_subscripts for a handy reference. --Kbdank71 20:29, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Michael Hardy on this one. Changed in rev 1801. —METS501 (talk) 18:11, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Application Error

1. When i click on AutoWikiBrowser.exe it shows an Application Error:

Application has generated an exception that could not be handeled.

Process ID= Thread ID=

Click OK to terminate the application. Click CANCEL to debug the application.

What should i do? The program fails to start.

2. Does AWB require .NET framework 2.0 or it can work on 3.0 also?

3. What version of IE does AWB require?

--Siddhant 10:03, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

2 - Its built on v2.. v3 is more just an add-on to v2... You can have 1, 2 and 3 running all simultaneously on one computer

3 - IE6 Upwards

Reedy Boy 18:39, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Make list not working

No matter how I choose to make it, it simply will not make a list from anything. Any idea what would cause it to not load anything like this? --User:Charitwo/Sig 00:12, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Is you copy of the program up to date? It will fail to run if it's an old version that is no longer supported. - Mgm|^(talk) 09:47, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

I downloaded a fresh copy from sourceforge to be sure, still doesn't work. --User:Charitwo/Sig 18:07, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Are you editing the English Wikipedia? Can you add pages manually (one at a time) and make edits? —METS501 (talk) 18:08, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Using on a custom project. --User:Charitwo/Sig 18:20, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Does it have the api.php installed? Reedy Boy 18:38, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Doesn't look like it, the updater says there is nothing to update. --User:Charitwo/Sig 18:49, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

You'll need to look on your actual wiki. Like here it is at [22]. AWB uses this for interfacing with the wiki, therefore, you need it. Reedy Boy 18:51, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

It's worked before, the wiki in question is a Wikia wiki, and I believe they do have it. --User:Charitwo/Sig 19:00, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Did you select wikia from the project list? Reedy Boy 21:47, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

I never had to use that option before, I've always used custom and entered in the above domain and it has worked fine. When selecting the wikia project option I get the following errors 1 2 --User:Charitwo/Sig 22:01, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

It was broken/not working properly up until recently... MaxSem fixed it.. I did get it to work when i tried... No VS or AWB for me atm, in the middle of a pc re-install Reedy Boy 21:13, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

Superscript

Hey, I have been using AWB to do general fixes, one of these is to change a ³ (³) to ³. I have to agree with the user that left this message on my talk page that it makes it a lot harder to read. Is it correct to keep changing or what do you think? Thanks, Tiddly-Tom 19:19, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

I've changed it for the next release. —METS501 (talk) 19:50, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

Thank you :) Will it not replace it, or do something weird? Thank you. Tiddly-Tom 19:55, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

Please mention this change in full on the 'feature requestes' page under 'Smart superscripts', to bring it up-to-date. Snowman 19:57, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

Regex for {{city}}

I just came up with the following Regex for changing [[aCity, aState|aCity]], [[aState]] and [[aCity, aState]] to {{city|aCity|aState}, and figured I'd share it in case someone found it useful. It can't handle three-word city names, like {{city|Lake Forest Park|Washington}}, but that's a pretty limited case.

\[\[([A-Z][a-z]*?(?:\s[A-Z][a-z]*?)?)\,\s([A-Z][a-z]*?(?:\s[A-Z][a-z]*?)?)\|\1\]\]\,\s\[\[\2\]\]

I generated it using the following code: it's VFP, but should translate easily into anything else.

cLBracket = "\["
cRBracket = "\]"
cPipe = "\|"
cUpper = "[A-Z]"
cLower = "[a-z]"
cLazyMatch = "*?"
cComma = "\,"
cSpace = "\s"
cBackRef1 = "\1"
cBackRef2 = "\2"

StartWiki = lcLBracket + lcLBracket
EndWiki = lcRBracket + lcRBracket
PlaceWord = lcUpper + lcLower + lcLazyMatch
City = PlaceWord + "(?:" + cSpace + PlaceWord + ")?"
State = City

lcFirstLink ;
	= StartWiki ;
	+ "(" + City + ")" ;
	+ cComma + cSpace ;
	+ "(" + State + ")";
	+ cPipe ;
	+ cBackRef1 ;
	+ EndWiki
	
lcSecondLink ;
	= StartWiki ;
	+ cBackRef2 ;
	+ EndWiki

lcRegExp ;
	= lcFirstLink ;
	+ cComma + cSpace ;
	+ lcSecondLink

What's the purpose of this template? MaxSem 21:59, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

A note and a question:

• Standard wiki markup provides either [[Kennewick, Washington]] (displays as Kennewick, Washington) or [[Kennewick, Washington|]] (displays as Kennewick), so I don't see what this template adds
• In the past I've changed the likes of [[Dubuque, Iowa|Dubuque]], [[Iowa]] to [[Dubuque, Iowa]], and had the change reverted by an editor claimng that the original is the 'canonical version'. Is there a rule or guideline on this sort of thing? I haven't found anything in the MoS.

Colonies Chris 14:17, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't know what the standard is, but I think there's value in linking both the city and state. This template makes that link as easy to maintain as your examples above.--uɐɔlnʌɟoʞǝɹɐs 11:42, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm completely unsure if AWB should do it, or even if this template should be used at all. You see, although minor conveniences are nice, the yet another template will make editing even harder for novices. MaxSem 11:59, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Skip if contains

Is there a way to put more than one term in the "Skip if contains" field? --Malevious Userpage •Talk Page• Contributions 16:38, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, check "Are regexes" and enter as complex regular expression as you like, including alternating constructs, etc. MaxSem 17:06, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Regression involving mathematics

In October of 2006, in response to pleas from the mathematics community, the AWB code was changed to avoid Unicodifying mathematics articles. As well, user were asked to avoid doing so. Both of those prophylactics now seem to be missing, and unsuspecting users are again screwing up our markup. Worse, now AWB is gleefully replacing "²" with "²", which is completely unacceptable in the context of mathematics (and unreadable everywhere, but that's another issue). Consider an expression like a₀+a₁x+a₂x²+a₃x³+ ⋯ +a_nxⁿ, with consistent appearance, and compare to a₀+a₁x+a₂x²+a₃x³+ ⋯ +a_nxⁿ, which simply won't do. Please reinstall the caution, and the code fix, and a fix for this new problem! Thanks. --KSmrq^T 18:15, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

It is already fixed in the next release. Jogers (talk) 18:26, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Released. MaxSem 21:07, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. The prompt response is much appreciated. --KSmrq^T 23:25, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

Logging

Is there a way to say run AWB in typo-correction skipping mode? I'd like to be able to scan a large category (cleanup, wikify, etc) overnight and then examine each one id' at a typo to manually correct. Mbisanz 21:09, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

You mean a form of "dry run"? Keeping a list of articles with stuff to change? If so, not currently... A database dump can be scanned for typos then run on the live WP... Reedy Boy 21:20, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes, a "dry run" to eliminate the pages without possible typos on them. I'm on a network and the admin would throw a fit if I did a database dump download. Guess I'll just have to request a feature. Mbisanz 21:47, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Lol.. I think it was requested sometime before.. Reedy Boy 22:01, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes, as I found out about 5 minutes after that last edit. At least I added my support to it. And saw the long point-counterpoint of its benefits/costs. Mbisanz 01:59, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

"Recursive"

I have been using this term in my bot's "message" as well as edit summaries. Two people have objected/questioned this use - so I'm brining it up here for an explanation/discussion. See User talk:SkiersBot for the details. SkiersBot 06:48, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

I understand "recursive" in AWB in its right meaning, that is, "inclusive", "including also subcategories", etc. However, I still think that "recursive" is not the most correct term, and should be changed as "with subcategories" or something better in this sense. "Recursive" has a connotation of "going back to the beginning" which is not what is meant. Lantonov 07:14, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

That's because it uses 'recursive search'. If someone can suggest a better name for this - they're welcome. Btw, why did it appear in release builds? MaxSem^{(Han shot first!)} 16:01, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Cause i fixed the server hoginess of it - Its not going to visit categories again that its already been to, which, is what i understood the problem was if categories came up multiple times whilst spanning a category tree.. —Reedy Boy 18:12, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

FWIW, I love this feature and use it a lot. :) --Fabrictramp 18:40, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Perchance "dependent" or "descendent" (though both have other meanings that could be misconstrued)? The long phrase "including subcategories" is the most accurate, but a bit long! Also - as you can guess by my offering the question - I use this feature constantly! SkierRMH 22:22, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

STOP!!!

I have reverted this edit, which the user called a "cleanup".

Wrong:

1 + x + x² + x³ + x⁴ + ...

Right:

1 + x + x² + x³ + x⁴ + ...

It is necessary for exponents to have the same size.

The same user did dozens of edits within a few minutes. I agree with MOST of the "cleanups" (e.g., changing [[abc_xyz|blah]] to [[abc xyz|blah]], but this one is destructive. Michael Hardy 19:13, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

We've released an emergency fix for this. MaxSem 21:07, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

I am the user that Michael Hardy refers to above. After he warned me, I went back and removed the ugly superscripts. However, another issue popped up, for which I was warned by User:KSmrq: AWB insists on changing <references /> to {{Reflist}}. Those do not look the same because the template makes the print smaller. In math articles, especially, people prefer references to have larger print, because they often contain formulas. Is there any way to change this default behavior? Lantonov 10:47, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes -- see User talk:Mets501#Bot replacing references with reflist -- JHunterJ 17:07, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

AWB still insists on putting {{Reflist}} template. It must be born in mind that there are 2 varieties: <references/> and <references /> (space in the second one).Lantonov 13:27, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes I have general fixes suppressed because of this, which is a shame. Rich Farmbrough, 14:40 14 November 2007 (GMT).

IE

Can something be put in the lead section that notes it's for use in IE? Because, as a FF user, it was a waste of time and space to download a program I won't be using. And I didn't realize it until I had the need to read the section for those encountering problems. Lara❤Love 03:23, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

It's not acutally in I.E. it just utilises IE components. FWIW I use firefox and AWB - I can use AWB as my bot, and FF as me at th e same time. Rich Farmbrough, 14:43 14 November 2007 (GMT).

Yup. I think, it will only cause problems if IE isnt installed... I think it actually needs to be, but not 100% sure. And its a small download, and no difficult install so, for most people it wouldnt cause a problem. I like Rich, use FF for my WP stuff, and have my bot generally logged in via IE. —Reedy Boy 14:34, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

#Frequently_asked_questions - And its in the FAQ —Reedy Boy 14:48, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, guys. Lara❤Love 17:55, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Case

I'm lost here; I know a bit about regular expressions, but, I can't seem to figure out how to use AWB to change the case of a string. Say... "KEYBOARD" -> "keyboard"... Anyone know how to do this? SQL^{Query me!} 20:47, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

It can't be done with regular expressions as far as I know but if you know C# or Visual Basic you could write a custom module (in advanced menu). If you need assistance with it I'd be more than happy to help. Jogers (talk) 23:49, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

Yeah... .ToUpper() FTW - Or just a literal replace (FAR) if you only need to change some things... —Reedy Boy 14:31, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Secure

Is there any way to get AWB to work with the secure Wikimedia server? --Rschen7754 (T C) 22:17, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

Not at this time, as far as I know. —METS501 (talk) 00:49, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

And may I add, it will not be implemented unless a developer assures us that mass editing via SSL will not be too much for servers. MaxSem^{(Han shot first!)} 12:45, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

I suppose... If you've got an account such as a 'crat account you dont want to be logging onto http incase of password stealing - create a sock account, and sign that up for AWB use... —Reedy Boy 14:29, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

OMG I should be shot for using AWB o_0 MaxSem^{(Han shot first!)} 14:33, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Lol, you bad steward ;). I was just stating teh reason someone else quoted before.. —Reedy Boy 19:24, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Line-spacing before stub tags

I commented previously about AWB stripping double blank lines from stub template transclusions, in "general fixes" mode. I think this behaviour's been tweaked somewhat, but it's still proposing to make alter text that conforms to the stub guideline ("It is usually desirable to leave two blank lines between the first stub template and whatever precedes it."), to the "less desirable" state. I realize this is yet another special case to clutter up the code with, and it's somewhat less than ideal in that it's trying to cater for visual considerations in markup that in an ideal world would be taken care of with changes to the corresponding CSS, or otherwise "under the hood", but if AWB would respect this convention it would reduce unnecessary to-ing and fro-ing until such time as that's taken care of. Alai (talk) 00:16, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Find & Replace

How can I Find a*b and Replace with something else? --Sadik-khalid (talk) 15:39, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

If it needs to be a regex use escape sequence (a\*b). Otherwise, just uncheck the regex option. Jogers (talk) 19:43, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

References

Just out of curiosity, why does AWB replace <references/> with {{Reflist}}? TJ Spyke 04:47, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Turn off clicking sound in IE

As well as the method dsceribed in the FAQ above, you can used regedit to delete the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\Explorer\Navigating\.Current key from the Windows registry. Is this worth adding? —Moondyne 13:28, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Feel free! —Reedy Boy 19:20, 27 November 2007 (UTC)