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Pointless lint filter fixes on discussion pages[edit]

These fixes of lint filters in discussion spaces is becoming both tiresome and annoying where it is pointless and basically noise. I can understand fixes in content namespaces, but discussion spaces! Further changes in discussion archives is just plain wrong, they are archives and archives just should be left alone. Why should someone be going in there when someone has archived their pages, and has it noted to leave them alone? Who will go down to their local archive office and take out the books and change those records?

People, please do not be driven to do fixes that are next to valueless. Do not be automatons driven to do pointless issues because someone has given you a toy that finds faults. Be mindful in your actions, do something because it needs doing, not because it can be done. @TheSandDoctor and ~riley: I am talking to you both here as the most recent actors in this place.  — billinghurst sDrewth 08:52, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Problem is that the old code can break pages and even make half of the page disappear. It's better to fix those for people who later are reading these pages. I know it's not nice when own watchlist is full of this kind of edits, maybe we should leave those for bot accounts. Stryn (talk) 14:35, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
@Billinghurst: can you provide a couple example diffs for our reference? In some cases, lint errors can make a page unreadable so fixing a lint error in general isn't necessarily useless. If these are being done in any volume or bothering recent changes/watchlists then using a bot flag should alleviate that sort of issue. — xaosflux Talk 14:43, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
Stryn, how often have you seen disastrously broken discussion pages? Hardly ever. How often are we seeing these linter corrections coming through? Very regularly. Replacing <tt> with <code>. Replacing <font> b/c as has been deprecated, that doesn't mean that it will ever stop working, it means don't use it further. I am not saying don't fix the content pages, where the fixes truly matter. That is not the case for discussion pages. Not user talk pages. Not archives of discussion pages.

I will plead guilty to having fixing some major issues in archive pages, but manually when sighted, not running a bot process through for little value. When we have people running bot-like process on Special:LintErrors#Low priority issues on these discussion pages not focusing on the high priority, then we have an issue. If people want to fix things, go and do something that really matters.  — billinghurst sDrewth 15:11, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

At least parts of your statement are not correct. Yes, they work now, but that does not mean they will work forever, otherwise the deprecation is useless. They'll stop working one day, and where they're not replaced will break badly. And deprecation does not mean "don't use it further" only, it means don't use it further and replace existing usages. – Ammarpad (talk) 06:03, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
  • If you are talking to two specific users, why are you creating a community discussion rather than approaching them directly? This is the equivalent of dragging two editors to AN without approaching them first. A polite request to not touch discussion pages rather than a rant on Babel goes a long way. ~riley (talk) 19:36, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
    We have a system design problem with a social component. You two are not the first, and you won't be the last. The system encourages people to come and address low value tasks. When valued and experienced users get sucked into doing those tasks then we are losing. That users are drawn to edit archive pages that are usually tagged with {{archive-header}}, {{talk archive}} or an equivalent, then we are losing. That we cannot exclude these pages ourselves, then we are losing. I am talking to you both to get an understanding of what draws you, understanding why it happens is important.  — billinghurst sDrewth 00:18, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi. It seems like there are three potential objections to these linter edits:

  1. Modifying discussion pages, particularly archives.
  2. Clogging up recent changes, watchlists, page histories, and user contributions feeds.
  3. How volunteers choose to spend their time.

sDrewth's posts focus on the third point, which is the worst and weakest argument, in my opinion. There are a lot of time sinks around here: user renaming, sockpuppet investigations, account creation, broken and double redirect management, people deleting and re-creating category description pages all the time, etc. But we don't typically fault users for wanting to get involved in these byzantine and often asinine systems. --MZMcBride (talk) 03:28, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

I cannot agree with your PoV, the three points are raised by me. I am not here raising these points because I am irritated by what people are doing with their time, the issue is raised of what they are doing at the higher level, and of other people's edits in discussions that shouldn't be changed without real purpose.

At meta I can only deal with meta, and try to understand why people are now doing something that for years we would not have done, and seemingly just because a tool has listed it on a page report. The community hasn't asked for it to be done, and it isn't resolving any existing issues. I will deal with the problematic system issues at phabricator, which I have separately done.  — billinghurst sDrewth 05:37, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

  • Such "pointless" fixes are often necessary as it breaks HTML syntax and (consequently) makes it invisible or hard to see. (Example: This is not the "extreme" one, actually one of the most mild one, but d:User_talk:GerardM/Archive_1#Human_groups and scroll to the bottom) Fixing such thing is a good thing and should not be discouraged. — regards, Revi 16:47, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
    • That's a different category of errors, none of these actually affect the display of the page. Legoktm (talk) 03:31, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
  • I agree with Revi here. These fixes may seem pointless, but are somewhat useful, and if someone wants to volunteer to do them then I don't see any harm. If the notifications are disruptive, then this can be done manually from a bot account. – Ajraddatz (talk) 17:00, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
  • I agree with MZMcBride on this. Lint errors are errors that need to be fixed. Deprecation is typically done with the intent to remove in the future. As such, fixing lint errors is fairly important. The less reliant, for example, a page is on deprecated HTML tags the better. Just because they are time sinks doesn't mean that users should not be repairing them when they see them. I do, however, agree that flood rights would be a better option for doing any quantity of them and will be sure to use flood rights for this sort of work in the future as to avoid flooding anyone's watchlist. In regards to a bot doing this work: a lot of the awb results require manual adjustment prior to saving. Letting a bot loose on these would not be the best option. --TheSandDoctor Talk 17:40, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
  • There also appears to be further consensus on the related phab ticket that backs up what has been said here by myself and others. --TheSandDoctor Talk 23:22, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
  • Not really, I doubt any of the browsers are ever going to remove support for <font> for example. What kind of AWB regex are you using that requires manual fixes? Legoktm (talk) 03:31, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
  • en:HTML_element has plenty of examples of tags that are invalid or outright removed starting in HTML5. I will specifically note that, starting in HTML 4.0 strict, the font tag is considered invalid markup and is outright not a part of HTML5. It is not a leap to consider that it will outright have support in browsers etc removed in the future. --TheSandDoctor Talk 01:07, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
  • It is definitely a leap, given that no browser has given these indications. Anyways, if it ever happens, Tim figured out a plan at gerrit:334990 which is kind of documented at mw:Parsing/Notes/HTML5 Compliance. In short, there is literally no urgency to make these changes. Legoktm (talk) 04:32, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
  • Mozilla, the developers of Firefox, have given such indication, stating in a prominent warning "...Although it may still work in some browsers, its use is discouraged since it could be removed at any time...." (emphasis mine). So unless we're to use the logic "not all smokers die from cancer, so it's fine to pick up smoking", I think we should definitely follow the advice of Mozilla and begin removing these errors. Further, how volunteer editors spend their time and whether they choose to do wikignome work is their call. I've decided this is an area I want to allot my time towards, and as the flood flag prevents the edits from disrupting the RC feed I will be moving forward. --TheSandDoctor Talk 20:15, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
  • I'm sure you have the best of intentions, but if you're not going to understand or read the links I posted, there's not much point in me engaging further. You're trying to fix something that isn't actually a problem, and that we have better ways to fix if it ever did become a real problem. If you want to keep going and tell yourself that it's not disruptive, instead of doing something productive, have fun. Legoktm (talk) 23:09, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
  • There is nothing wrong with what they are doing. Fixing archives to make it more readable is always a good thing... Leaderboard (talk) 18:01, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
    • Just to be clear, you understand that there are no visible changes to these archive pages right? That they look exactly the same? Legoktm (talk) 03:31, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
  • Per above, nothing harmful. However, I would strongly suggest using a bot to fix lint errors on talk pages and archives. Minorax (talk) 06:28, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
  • Seems moot as TSD had asked for Limited Admin here per Meta:Requests for limited adminship/TheSandDoctor where they can add flood flag to themselves and I think ~riley noted. There is a consensus that the edits are useful as well as the possible adding of flood / bot might be useful in some situations. I don't see any need for this thread to be continued. Camouflaged Mirage (talk) 15:43, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the edits in question were all replacing deprecated HTML tags, which isn't a real problem today, hence the low priority designation. Just use a bot account please and have a script (I'm sure someone has already written one) fix all of the issues in one go rather than requiring multiple edits for each type of tag. Legoktm (talk) 03:28, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Good reminder to use a bot; we'll both proceed with using the pseudobot flag when performing these edits. I am not going to comment on the value or priority of these lint errors. Although we may be working on the low priority ones now, primarily because one page can have up to 10 lint errors and it's easy to tackle, the medium to high priority lint errors are on the list to be done. @Legoktm: Do you have any ideas for who may have written such a script? I have tried searching. ~riley (talk) 22:39, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
mw:Help:Extension:Linter#Tools, probably WPCleaner. Legoktm (talk) 04:32, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
  • My meta limited/temp RfA just recently closed as successful. Given that there is both consensus here on meta and phabricator that lint fixes should go ahead regardless of location, I will continue as before. However, I do agree that using flood rights is vastly preferred for this and have received confirmation from Matiia that assigning myself flood rights for this activity would not constitute going outside of my approval. Based on this, I will temporarily assign myself the flood flag for the duration of runs. I also second what riley has said above. If lego has a script for this or knows someone who does, I would likewise be interested. --TheSandDoctor Talk 01:32, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
    I don't think there's an informed consensus here, mostly because most people here aren't really aware of what is being discussed. Legoktm (talk) 04:32, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
I don't think that's the case, Babel is the most public place for meta-Meta discussion, serving as the Village Pump for the project. In my opinion, those that wanted to have a say on this already did it, and from the ones that did, a consensus emerged that the lint errors should be fixed. Best, —Thanks for the fish! talk•contribs 01:57, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
Lego isn't saying the venue is inappropriate, he's saying that consensus isn't based on hard facts (i.e. that these changes have no substantive value). I'm personally fine with them so long as they are happening behind the scenes and out of my watchlist/the recent changes. – Ajraddatz (talk) 02:41, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
That makes more sense than my original thinking of the here in "most people here" being this page. Thanks for clarifying :) —Thanks for the fish! talk•contribs 20:19, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
Right. Most of the people commenting here don't appear to understand the technical issue being discussed, so it's not really possible to call it a consensus. Legoktm (talk) 23:09, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

Proposal to amend Meta:Interface administrators[edit]

Hello. I have started a proposal for a little amendment to our Meta:Interface administrators. The discussion can be seen at the talk page. Thanks. —MarcoAurelio (talk) 10:16, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

Checkmark This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. Sgd. Hasley 14:55, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

Propose to amend Meta:Snowball[edit]

After Stewards'_noticeboard#Steward_requests/Global_permissions#Global_rename_for_Joseluispasa, we have a second request on SRGP that is clearly not going to pass. I propose to add the following to Meta:Snowball: 

==Exception==
Any request that is purely disruptive, or suggests that the requester is going to the wrong venue, may be closed by any uninvolved steward or Meta-Wiki administrator, or any uninvolved user in good standing if the requester is indefinitely blocked in Meta or globally locked.

Note:

--GZWDer (talk) 15:30, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

That policy has only ever applied to closing and implementing a successful discussion early. Votes have been and can continue to be closed when they are clearly in the wrong place, the person has absolutely no chance of passing, etc. This was also confirmed in a discussion for SRGP within the last few years. – Ajraddatz (talk) 16:24, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
I don't see a need for adding this exception. Nemo 18:21, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
@Ajraddatz and Nemo bis:
  • Among Wikimedia project using snowball on successful permission requests seems rare.
  • Votes have been and can continue to be closed when they are clearly in the wrong place, the person has absolutely no chance of passing, etc. - this means we are (harmlessly) violating the established rule. Alternatively this means the rule should be rewritten. See File:Diagram_of_IGNORE.svg.
  • "This was also confirmed in a discussion for SRGP within the last few years" - I mention the amendment above, which only allow stewards to close the request and only after a number of inputs.

--GZWDer (talk) 19:55, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

  • Comment Comment Meta:Snowball does not apply to stewards' pages, it is for metawiki business alone. Stewards/community are welcome to adopt it as required, though I don't think that it should be adapted in the formats expressed to cover stewards' business.  — billinghurst sDrewth 22:36, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

Proposal to add Lenta.ru to the global spam blacklist[edit]

Lenta.ru earlier this year is in the English Wikipedia spam blacklist entry. Lenta.ru over the years has published fake news, conspiracy theories and propaganda, just like Alex Jones' InfoWars.The Guardian I think that Lenta.ru should be added to the global spam blacklist in order to prevent COVID-19-related conspiracy theories. 139.101.127.181 10:24, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Please make requests for consideration for global blacklist to Talk:Spam blacklist. Adding conversations to this page for that list will gain little discussion as it isn't the place.  — billinghurst sDrewth 02:18, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

A transparent appeal venue for users locked out of local talk pages[edit]

The following discussion is closed: User blocked. ——SerialNumber54129 08:03, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

Accepting the general point that Meta is not an appeals court, what do people here think of carving out a specific portion of this project for use as a venue for appealing instances of local project user talk page lockouts, as typically the next and final step after a local block. I think this would provide much needed transparency and a sort of brotherly sanity check to counter the incredible power that such a thing represents to local functionaries. To completely shut a user out of a project, after all, is an extreme measure that should be deployed only in response to extreme threats, or at the very least, incontrovertible abuse of the page. Whenever a local project locks a user out of their talk page, they would be provided a link to the Meta appeals venue, where independent functionaries would respond, either upholding or rejecting the appeal. If people here have no appetite for a general case appeal venue, then perhaps it can be one that can only be used if the user's case satisfies certain qualifying criteria, such as a reasonable belief that availing themselves of the local private channels would put their personal data at risk, or that the manner of the lockout was so egregiously bad, seen from the outside, the user would probably be justified in preferring to contact the media rather than spend their time and energy navigating local private channels. It strikes me that such a venue would not only be a nice way to show local projects do not hold certain users in contempt, seeing the process of locking people out as some kind of grand game of chicken, as if they only want to test their willingness to actually use private channels to challenge a lockout, it would also stop that apparently unwanted behaviour of the next logical step for a user locked out of one project, to want to take the matter up on other projects, including of course, Meta, much to its apparent irritation. BarryBoggside (talk) 19:53, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

  • Oppose Oppose Most projects already have a local method of doing this most involve IRC or email. One is not needed on meta as only local admins would be able to solve that problem. -Examknow (talk) 20:31, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
The proposal is for people who cannot or will not use private channels, for very good reasons, such as protecting their privacy. Is it impossible for you to even conceive of such a scenario? What makes you assume private channels will keep your information secure, or that complaints submitted privately are always handled properly? Have you ever tested this assumption? Have you ever even been locked out of a local project? BarryBoggside (talk) 21:03, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Also if you are only looking for a way to be unblocked on the English Wikipedia since your TPA has been revoked, please see en:WP:AAB. -Examknow (talk) 20:34, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
I am not. Take the proposal in good faith, or not at all. Don't simply oppose it because you cannot believe anyone here would want to help anyone but themselves. BarryBoggside (talk) 21:03, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Comment Comment Meta is not an appeal court. Wikis look after their local management of their wikis, so bringing formal processes here as a means for alternate resolution is just rehashing a closed conversation; it sounds like an appeal court. The resolution is able to be determined at that language wiki, so there is no need to bring it out of the wiki. We understand "I don't like the decision", however, each wiki is self-managing, and that means that their decisions hold where there is a suitable and significant community.

That said many users over the years have made enquiries at meta with those administrators of their local wikis about processes, and opportunities and that is acceptable as long as it done with civility and as a reasonable approach. Some have done it as a continuing attack on their local administrators, and that is not considered acceptable.  — billinghurst sDrewth 02:29, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

As I thought I had already made clear in the very first line, this would be a justified exception against 'Meta is not an appeals court', and given the reasons for it. Suffice to say, this is not about giving people who merely dislike a local decision, an alternative outlet. It is a recognition that there are going to be situations where even a large community can make an egregious mistake in how it wields this ultimate power of exclusion, and before the excluded user is forced to either put their personal data at risk, or persuaded they are better off trying to capitalize on it through negative media coverage, there is a sensible and indeed ethical role for Meta to play, one that at the very least can be seen as entirely in the interests of the local communities, to the point it should be possible to support it even if you were the sort of person who assumes, before it is even live, that every single person who arrived there, will not have a valid case. BarryBoggside (talk) 10:01, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
  • @Billinghurst and Examknow:, now that User:BarryBoggside has been established to be a sock of AttackTheMoonNow on en., this should clearly be opposed as a blatant attempt to weaponise one wiki against another. ——SerialNumber54129 06:26, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
    I will discuss the issue on the premise of the argument, not the proponent.  — billinghurst sDrewth 06:45, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
    Weopnise is an apt phrase, only in the sense that the proposal is in effect a counterbalance in the same vein as opposing nuclear arsenals. It is a means to ensure local projects don't, through their own sheer collective hubris and group-think, or simple internal power dynamics, amass a power at their highest levels so great it is possible for them to wholly disregard what are in reality meant to be community wide norms and expectations, such as this idea people's personal data is sacrosanct, or that it is only the Foundation (or the entire movement acting in their name) who can block a user forever. Although quite how far that analogy holds when in this case the United Nations would also have a sovereign base in Switzerland with their own missile silos, for use against any rogue nation not upholding their values, up to and including the US, is open for debate. Perhaps we are still at the stage of the movement's development that en.wiki is as powerful and unassailable as the U.S. is to the UN, and places like Commons (Canada) are not independent in the true sense, not when there are so many close ties between it and the U.S. But it is ironically the Wikimedia Movement who are apparently working to rectify that issue, on behalf of the whole world, through appealing to a notion of universal human rights. The proposal therefore is no more threatening to local projects than the establishment of international criminal courts should be to the U.S. If they have nothing to cover up, they have nothing to fear from a genuinely independent and wholly public appeal mechanism, whose scope is necessarily limited to only challenging the most draconian measure any local functionary can implement as an individual, in the name of their local project. The local private channels will still be available for those who think they have a reasonable expectation of their use will not merely compound or even exacerbate the original abuse, hence the suggestion of using qualifying criteria in this proposal to show there is reason to believe that is unlikely, if an appeal mechanism for the general case is rejected. BarryBoggside (talk) 10:01, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
  • The mention of my supposed connection to "AttackTheMoonNow" is entirely irrelevant, to the point I am now struggling to see why it was mentioned here at all, in that context. I will say though that it is relevant in the sense that my talk page lockout at en.wiki prevents me from appealing these further charges using local procedures, for reasons of personal data security, but that is as far as I will risk going here in terms of details or accusations on the specifics of my case, on the understanding this proposal is not about me, but the protection of future victims of this sort of tactic of using local lockout powers not as a defensive mechanism, but as an offensive one, a powerful weapon that can and should have a counterbalance, at least in any movement that genuinely believes in transparency and equanimity. BarryBoggside (talk) 10:45, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
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