Wikibooks:Reading room/Administrative Assistance/Archives/2007/June

New contributions
Not got enough time to deal with this but could folk take a look at this. It has a copyright notice and is not formatted, other than that ....! Thanks -- Herby talk thyme 11:21, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
 * The copyright is incompatible with the GFDL since it specifies non-commercial use only. I will delete it shortly. --Jomegat 12:59, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Many thanks Jim for dealing with it - on wiki time is very limited at present & I know those patrolling RC can miss things, I do myself. Regards -- Herby  talk thyme 14:54, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Now merged
G'day, I've been merging a few modules from the Cookbook and transwiki, and have tagged them with now merged which places them into Category:Modules now merged into other modules. Could a kindly admin take a look at these and merge the edit histories please? cheers, Webaware talk 06:49, 6 June 2007 (UTC)


 * ✅ &mdash; I've also went the extra step of importing and merging some of the articles from Wikipedia, to remove the need for listing the history attributes on the talk pages. --dark lama  14:40, 6 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks mate, that's excellent. Webaware talk 15:31, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Another "keep an eye"
Going off line now but I think we have a classroom project happening Classroom Management Theorist and Theories. I've moved things to the right names, fixed the redlinks & welcomed them so far but I think it may still require attention - cheers -- Herby talk thyme 16:12, 6 June 2007 (UTC)


 * You are correct, the leader of the project is User:Classroom management and she has messaged me a couple times about it, I pointed her to the help pages but may need assistance without knowing so we'll keep an eye out. Mattb112885 (talk) 22:32, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Project Locks
Talking with another Muggles' Guide user, the topic of the upcoming Harry Potter book (the final one) has come up and how its release might severely and negatively affect the book. Many users will likely rush to the book and add a lot of inappropriate and poorly developed content. Does anyone care to share ideas on how a book lockdown might work? I'd like to get a bot to lock all pages from anonymous users' editing for a few weeks around the book release. -within focus 02:39, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * In the event that you needed to lock down the entire book, you should use the automatic cascading protection feature. Create a page, such as User:Withinfocus/Muggles Guide Pages, or something similar, and create links to all the pages in the muggles guide book on that page. If you need to lock down the book, you go to protect your page, and select the option "Cascading protection - protect any pages included in this page." This should quickly and immediately lock all the pages in the book. I don't know if it's as easy to unprotect them all, however. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 18:38, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Why is it necessary to lock down this book? This is Wikibooks and not a select club of people so let them contribute, help them and fix whatever language and formatting 'mistakes' they make.  Comments like "Many users will likely rush to the book and add a lot of inappropriate and poorly developed content" seem a little inappropriate and big-headed although I don't think you intended it to look that way.  We really need to be more welcoming to new users rather than trying to scare ghem away. Xania [[Image:Flag_of_Italy.svg|15px]]talk 18:59, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * This is by far not going to be language and formatting mistakes. I am expecting a large number of vandalism edits to hit the book pages over several weeks. Wikipedia will surely experience this as well. If you peruse Wikipedia from time to time you may have also noticed some ideas regarding locking articles once they're sufficiently and professionally developed. Besides the topic of vandalism, keeping a work open forever has its positives and negatives and my book doesn't have the staff to comb through tons of edits. If a user would like to make a positive contribution to a page then I think it would be wise for them to create an account. This locking action would only be for anonymous users. You may not like this idea but at the same time I would expect you to understand the need for professionalism. The Muggles' Guide is very organized and I'd rather have edit waves like this managed with a little bit more quality control. This can be as simple as creating an account and establishing a real presence here. There are plenty of common or "mistake" pages we block or restrict here for anonymous users. I guess this issue might be something some people just fundamentally disagree with. -within focus 19:46, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't prefer this method. I'd much rather have a bot that sweeps the book's namespace. Based on past work with Herby on the book, I know this technically can be done but am interested in a tool that will accomplish it (or someone to make the action for me since I don't use bots). -within focus 19:34, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I'm not really interested at all in creating or using a bot that can perform Admin tasks such as page protections. Something like that really should be put up for community discussion before we try to do it, because it is a departure from how Admin tools are currently employed. Considering that bots can be a touchy subject, it's much better (and will be much less hassle) to use the cascading protection option.
 * Also, in response to Xania, Page protections are provided precisely for the reasons that a certain page is being misused. A millon newbie page tests will have the same effect as a concentrated vandalism attack. Protecting one page, or even a swath of related pages, will help to keep high-risk pages from going to hell. We don't protect pages to scare away users, we protect pages to protect content and prevent future problems. I see no reason why we couldn't page protect an entire book if the situation called for it. However, i will stipulate that it should likely be a very serious situation, and that the page protection should be very short-lived. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 19:42, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * If I recall correctly there already exist bots that can perform this action. I also see this as the community discussion since it involves the people who use the tools. -within focus 19:49, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Fair enough, I won't argue the point. I guess I don't understand the preference to using a bot over a cascading protection. A cascading protection can be done in one click, And should take effect immediately. A bot would have to go page-by-page, and in the worst case it could take several seconds to several minutes to perform all the page protections depending on the speed of your computer and the latency of the server. It would seem to me that for a truely critical situation the cascading protection would be more immediate and therefore more usefull. In terms of ease-of-use as well, the cascading protection is just one button click, and isn't going to be prone to the bugs and other nonsense that a bot could have. It might just be me, but that really does seem like the better solution. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 20:01, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Hope I'm not out of place here; I'm not an admin, but as the person who started this whole mess, it occurred to me that it might be useful for me to mention my thinking here. The thing is, we have had a lot of vandalism in the Muggle's Guide already, and we have dealt with it; but a lot of it has been people gratuitously posting spoilers in various places. With the release of the final book in the series, I think that we can expect to see a lot of posting of spoilers on the public pages of the project, and I was hoping to avoid a lot of that. The technique we use to protect the project does not matter; we have prior warning of the onset of this particular issue so the time it takes a bot to walk the list is immaterial. And this is a one-time thing, there will not be anything of this magnitude happening after this. Whatever people are more comfortable with, I think... Chazz (talk) 20:44, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * OK I can see why protection may be necessary but I would prefer protection only to be used when we see that it is necessary and not pre-emptive. The ability for anyone to add anything is central to Wiki projects so I would prefer to see an increase in vandalism before such measures are used. Xania [[Image:Flag_of_Italy.svg|15px]]talk 21:09, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Bot or cascade, both are fine really, it's just that the unlock will most likely need to be a bot action. I believe we have over 500 pages in the Muggles' Guide so automation is important. We can also wait to see if undesirable edits develop and withhold locking until then. -within focus 22:23, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * If we're going to wait until inappropriate edits start happening, I suspect that the cascade approach would be better, simply for the sake of speed... unlocking is not so critical, as we can always say "We're working on it, if you want a head start just get an ID." As for "how many pages": I make it 615. Chazz (talk) 23:04, 11 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Unfortunately, I really think that we have to wait until a problem arises. We aren't really in the habit of protecting pages--especially book pages--without a clear and present reason. Now if there is a problem though, You can be certain that there will be plenty of help if you need it. I'll look around for bots that can protect/unprotect the pages just in case a better solution cannot be found. Also, considering that no books have ever been mass-protected before, We should definitely err on the side of caution with this. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 00:11, 12 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Much as I hate to say it, I think you have a very good point. We do have time to prepare, in any event. The target date is 21 July; book 7 will be released at 0001 UTC. Chazz (talk) 00:50, 12 June 2007 (UTC)


 * An easy alternative is to use DynamicPageList to monitor the book for most recent edits (assuming the book is fully categorized). See User:SB_Johnny/MGtest for an example (it only uses the main category there, but you can add others). -- SB_Johnny | talk 09:16, 12 June 2007 (UTC)


 * If all you want is RC on pages in a single category, you can use, e.g. Special:Recentchangeslinked/Category:Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter. But that won't reduce the effort much, if a bazillion new anon page edits / moves happen in the first 48 hours of a book release. Webaware talk 09:45, 12 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Two things to consider as well: first, once the edits have started, it is entirely possible that at least some pages will be edited to be no longer in the Muggles' Guide category. It's easier for a vandal to do that – edit, Ctrl-A, start typing – than it is to retain the category. And second, a lot of the concerned editors may well be off line during the danger period – I know I will be, deliberately, because I want to read the ruddy thing myself. Chazz (talk) 15:58, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

(reset tabs) Well, vandalism may (and probably will) happen, but new contributors might come by too, and protecting the whole book isn't going to encourage them. HerbyThyme might or might not be around for the onslaught (RealLife stuff for him), but Xania is on Italian time, Az_1568 is on Pacific time, and Whiteknight is around a lot these days too (I'm around from 4-6 AM EDT, and whenever it happens to be raining (like it is at the moment)). We are, thankfully, not short-staffed admin-wise any longer though more would be merrier. Protecting an entire book -- particularly a book that intellegent young people might want to help write -- is not a good way to ensure the long-term health of our project (some of those young Harry Potter fans might later help write textbooks for particle physics or automotive repair). The best defense against vandals is to make sure that all of our trusted users have admin tools so that they can use them when they need them (hint, hint, Chazz and Webaware!), rather than needing to hope that some other admin will happen to be around when there's trouble (this is a wiki, after all... we're supposed to fix problems when we see them). -- SB_Johnny | talk 18:51, 12 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Don't have time right now for picking up admin responsibilities, but will gladly add the Muggle's guide cat to my RC rounds when it pops up in July and will watch the full RC from time to time (as I do now). But Chazz has a valid point, it will take extreme vigilance to keep a lid on this if a squillion new anon editors descend on the book, and "defences" are effectively just "clean up after the marauding hordes". In every other sphere (health, work safety, military, software design, manufacturing, driving, etc.) prevention is preferable to repair - so why can't we apply that here, just short term until the madness passes? Webaware talk 00:04, 13 June 2007 (UTC)


 * The only "responsibility" here is to just block an account or IP that you notice actively vandalizing while doing RC patrolling... it's just 3 buttons, not a wedding vow :).
 * The problem with protecting the book for that reason is that with those 100 vandals that will be attracted by the attention, there will also almost certainly be a few earnest new contributors, and our protection tool can't block anons without also blocking new accounts (hence the problems new editors have with adding things to bookshelf templates). Every book, wiki, etc. will be vandalized from time to time. When something's in the news, there will be more vandals. But when something's in the news there will also be new users interested in contributing. We have to just deal with vandalism, but we can't thrive without new contributors. -- SB_Johnny | talk 00:33, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I think we (as a community) should create the page of all Muggles Guide pages in advance in anticipation that protecting the whole thing may be necessary on the 21st. Also we should gather a group of admins to watch the guide closely between mid July and mid August. I will be available in July to help. I also think that this is a tremendous opportunity for the Muggles guide to get some new contributors (and possibly attract some attention to Wikibooks as well.) I think those of us with interest and knowledge should all think about pitching in on the Muggles Guide in the upcoming weeks to prepare it for the large number of visitors it might receive July 14th-28th. Maybe Chazz or Webaware withinfocus could create/point us to a to-do list and organize a barn-raising of sorts. -- xixtas talk 14:04, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Another preparatory step that might be useful is putting an informational template at the top of the Muggles guide pages that could be used for a book-wide announcement on the 20th. ("Please don't post spoilers... blah blah..") -- xixtas talk 14:11, 22 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Almost everything you would need to know about editing the project can be found here. If anyone would like to create a full list of Muggles' Guide pages with perhaps a bot that would be great, but this link might suffice for watching the book. I do hope that we can get some new editors and get a new bunch of content additions going. The entire book is basically outlined and all editors have to do is edit existing pages in their respective sections. There's a lot of structure to the book and so as long as people don't bust out new content (which should be relatively small if anything) we'll be running smoothly. If someone would like to be creative with some sort of Harry Potter template to post on the pages that would be awesome. I personally am not that template-creative but we do have a Wikijunior editor here who seems to write creative things pretty well ... -within focus 19:05, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I have created a page linking to all current book pages to facilitate protecting the whole book should it become advisable to do so. The page is at Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/All pages -- xixtas talk 01:35, 27 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes, I'm wittering on about project locks again... I just finished reading the RfD for the plot detail of book 6 over on Wikipedia, and one of the things that came up there was that the timing of the appearance of the summary was bad: it appeared immediately after the book itself came out, and so could be seen as copyvio: by publishing a detail summary so soon, there was the appearance of trying to cut into book sales by providing a free equivalent. Is this something that we are likely to run afoul of? Chazz (talk) 21:55, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Robbywilliams255
I don't know what to make of this:

Special:Contributions/Robbywilliams255

Opinions? --Jomegat 16:42, 13 June 2007 (UTC)
 * I deleted the pages as they only contained spam and warned the user. I'd probably block if the user continued to create spam pages tho. --Az1568(Talk) 17:10, 13 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks Az. That was what I was thinking too. --Jomegat 17:38, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Endorsements now open for Wikimedia Foundation Board
Please post this notice to as many high-visibility locations as make sense for this community

The Wikimedia Board Election Steering Committee invites all community members to endorse candidates they support. Endorsements may be submitted on meta now till next Saturday, 23:59 June 23, 2007.

Each qualified community member can submit up to three endorsements. Please note several things: - Only confirmed candidates are listed, so the list can be updated during the endorsements phase. - You need an account on meta, not just the project that you are qualified to vote under, unless you meet the criteria on meta too. - Please link your meta user page and your home wiki page. Detailed procedure can be found on the meta endorsement page.

All information is available on meta at: On endorsements: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2007/Endorsements/en On candidates each: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2007/Candidates/en Election general: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2007/en FAQ: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2007/FAQ/en

Questions about election are welcome at: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Board_elections/2007/FAQ

Thanks to devoted volunteering translators, those pages are also available in some languages other than English.

Thank you for your attention, we look forward to your participation.

For the election committee, - Philippe | Talk 00:35, 17 June 2007 (UTC)

"Wikiversity:" Namespace
Not many people might be aware of this, but the pages from the "Wikiversity:" namespace were not deleted when the interwiki prefix for wikiversity was created. All the pages in that namespace, including some pages that were used in conjunction with our books, were essentially lost because they could not be reached by the system.

Well, all that has now been fixed, and all the "lost" pages are now found. All the pages that were in the "wikiversity:" namespace have been renamed to start with "Wikiversity-" instead. You can find a complete list of these pages at Special:Prefixindex/Wikiversity-. What we need to do is go through these pages, determine if any information in them is salvagable (like it can be used here by our books, or if it still needs to be moved to wikiversity), and possibly delete pages that aren't being used. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 22:10, 26 June 2007 (UTC)

User:MS SEXY
Probably harmless (although perhaps a bit creepy). Does this violate the "no offensive usernames" policy? if not, should we perhaps consider a "no creepy usernames" policy? --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 02:43, 29 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Not the latest Microsoft API for extranets then? Webaware talk 05:08, 29 June 2007 (UTC)


 * You don't know about Redmond, but I wouldn't doubt that some team there hasn't at least made it a code name for a future product. :) In all seriousness, my experience with people who make crazy and off the wall user names like this usually are just playing with the user name creation system of the Wiki and nothing more. Although on some rare occasion I've seen them (particularly on Wikipedia) become a very major and significant contributor... more often because once they get started with a few edits it becomes additive and what was something as a lighthearted romp turns into something much more significant. Blatantly obvious user names that are offensive, which either use hate words, impersonate others (such as the various Jimbo Wales wannabe trolls), or use obvious swear words certainly should be deleted.  This one is a borderline case, but it only ranks on my smell-o-meter as something to watch closely and not necessarily something to be killed on sight.  --Rob Horning 13:04, 29 June 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't understand. How could this username possibly be a violation?  Xania [[Image:Flag_of_Italy.svg|15px]]talk 21:39, 29 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Rob, nothing Redmond does could possibly rival the guys at Motorola in Texas. Guess what they called the 6809 instruction for Sign-EXtending an 8-bit accumulator into a 16-bit one, i.e. where A gets its end-bit into B to make D?
 * I'm with Xania on this one; a silly name, but not offensive. Not even particularly silly, in the scheme of things. For a time, my now-wife went by the nickname "Ms Completely" (to her chagrin). Webaware talk 01:54, 30 June 2007 (UTC)


 * No. I see nothing wrong with it. Probably a moot point anyway. -- xixtas talk 02:09, 30 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Let's not be reactionary with usernames. Hateful and vulgar names shouldn't be permitted, but silly names like this seem fine to me. They might want to change it later, but we have b'crats a-plenty here, so changes won't cause problems.
 * Keep in mind that some names like this might be created for SUL-related issues. This one apparently wasn't created for that reason, but with the exception of globally offensive usernames, we probably shouldn't assume bad intent. -- SB_Johnny | talk 14:38, 1 July 2007 (UTC)

Citing sources
This page was created with an unhelpful message. Any suggestions on good text to replace it with? It is linked to by pages using the fact and uncited templates. Webaware talk 23:56, 29 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Deleted for now, can replace with something appropriate later. -within focus 01:42, 30 June 2007 (UTC)