Guild Wars Wiki talk:Projects/Editing bots

Policy proposal
I was thinking of having something like this to formalise requests for bot tasks. -- Gordon Ecker 05:58, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm starting to think that a policy may not be necessary, and a project page would be sufficient. -- Gordon Ecker 23:21, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

Project
By the way, does anyone have bot privileges right now? -- Gordon Ecker 23:28, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, Dirigible and I both have bot accounts set up. I think we're the only ones with bot accounts (aside from Mike O'Brien) at the moment. MisterPepe talk 23:32, 25 May 2007 (UTC)
 * I'll bookmark this page when I get home, though you can also leave requests for me directly at User:PepeGoesWikibotting. MisterPepe talk 23:33, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

image needed
Just thought I'd drop a quick note here to ask whether or not it would be possible to use a bot to check the NPC articles and add the image needed template when the articles point to a non-existent image. I've been going through and tagging the boss articles and have stopped for the moment (after doing about half of them). I'm not overly familiar with the capabilities of the wikibots, but thought i'd ask. --Indecision 10:55, 26 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Just went through the rest of the boss articles, will do the other NPCs this evening. --Dirigible 14:20, 30 June 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks, I've been chipping away with screenshots here and there (think I'm up to 100 or so now), but the sheer size of the remaining job is somewhat daunting. I was wondering if we should draw Emily's attention to the category to help get renders for NPCs that don't have any image available as opposed to replacing already taken screenshots. However, I noticed that she seems to be pretty busy with the lead up to GW:EN, so I don't want to bother her. --Indecision 14:27, 30 June 2007 (UTC)
 * Any render of a subject with 5+ npc's using the model is likely to hit at least one without an image I have found. -- Lemming [[Image:User Lemming64 sigicon.png]] 03:23, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
 * We got quite a few users who are doing this as their main project, so I don't think it is bad enough that we need a bot to do it. Also, I don't think it is possible with a bot, correct me if I am wrong though. &mdash;  ク  Eloc  貢  04:14, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Everything that can be abstracted can be done by a bot. I'm not sure what you want to do here, but whatever it is, it should be possible :P poke | talk 18:34, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Well you could make a bot that checks... every page? to see if there is a red linked link to a .jpg or .png and add the image needed tag if not present. You could also get it to remove tags on pages where an image is present and the image needed tag is still present but shouldn't be. I don't know how necessary this is as I have never trawled through the category to check, but it is a thought. Definitely a tedious repetitive task. -- Lemming [[Image:User Lemming64 sigicon.png]] 20:38, 22 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Yeah, that would be possible :P Not with the standard pywikipedia but with my own bot framework it does work (presumed that I finally finish that framework :P) poke | talk 20:41, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Bot Request
So i heard mudkip brains told me to come here to ask about bot status? I'm planning on running a bot for community stuff using the AWB. Brains told me to come here so.. Here I am :p -- Warw/Wick 20:29, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Tbh, I still don't feel comfortable with you having bot status. At least not yet, the edits you made on GW with your bot were wrong and you did not even tell ppl u were doing it; I think u would do the samething here.  This is why we need the bot policy ppl ;) -- Shadowphoenix   [[Image:User Shadowphoenix Necromancer.png|19x19px|Please, talk to me; I'm so lonley ;-;]] 20:40, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * After looking over some of your bot edits at GW, I have to concur. (e.g. destubbing articles is not bottable because human judgement is required.)  --Valshia 21:05, 30 April 2008 (UTC)
 * As AWB is an indirect bot framework, you can always use it on your main account without marking the edits as bot edits. Prove that you know what you do when working with a bot and that you actually do useful things and a bot status could be applied in future. poke | talk 21:12, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

activity
which of these bots are active? i only see poke's doing stuff from time to time, so probably merging with his talk page would be best XD - Y0_ ich_halt  20:58, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Dir and Pepe are a bit inactive lately, so they probably don't even look for this; Mike's bot was probably a one-time setup everything bot for the game integration. poke | talk 21:01, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

User space edits
Can I add a request for edits on my userpage too? &lt;HORSEDROWNER&gt; 13:42, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I think the bots are more for mass-repeatable simple edits. One userpage would be too much work for too little wiki-benifit. --[[Image:User Wandering Traveler Oie User Wandering Traveler Sig2.png|19px]]  Wandering   Traveler  13:44, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I meant User:Horsedrowner/skills. Except for one or two pages, all subpages have a Skill infobox. I would like to move those pages to /skills/%profession%/%skillname%. &lt;HORSEDROWNER&gt;  14:44, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't see a problem with such a request. poke | talk 15:29, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Do I need to add a request then? Or can you just do it now? &lt;HORSEDROWNER&gt;  15:31, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * I will take a look at it later, so no need for an additional request now ^^ poke | talk 15:35, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks in advance! :D This will help me to organize my skill page a bit ^^ &lt;HORSEDROWNER&gt;  15:55, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Moved. Here is a list of what was done: User:Wikichu/list. poke | talk 19:31, 14 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks ;) &lt;HORSEDROWNER&gt;  21:02, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Bot for unsigned comments
IMO we should consider getting a bot to handle unsigned comments, like Wikipedia's SineBot. -- Gordon Ecker 02:47, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Hmm, I'll think about how it would be possible in an easy way to do that. poke | talk 11:52, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I thought a bit about it and would like to get some input on the basic idea of automating unsigned comments. I read a bit on Wikipedia about that and found some issues: Based on this, I have thought of 3 different approaches: To reduce the possibility of edit conflicts or the addition of unsigned templates where they are not needed, there might be some limitations in which edits there are to check: Thanks for any input. poke | talk 13:11, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
 * If unsigned comments are marked as unsigned too fast after the initial post, users might not get the possibility of signing their posts themselves because they noticed it after posting.
 * For vandalism and disruptive comments the edit that adds the unsigned template can make reverting difficult. So instead of reverting the bad comment, you revert the bot but the comment stays where it is.
 * If the bot operates too slow, topic moves (for example from HELP:WIKI to HELP:GAME) are hard to track and it might be not possible for the bot to find the new location of the post to add the unsigned template.
 * Also if the bot is too slow, maybe someone else already added the unsigned template which would require that the bot checks all following revisions if the signature or an unsigned template was added later.
 * 1) Adapting the idea of Wikipedia's SineBot, the bot would run from an external server and check recent changes in a very short interval, like every minute or even less, for unsigned comments and adding them as soon as possible (maybe after a short time the user has to fix it on his own). This could result in not less bandwidth and could even be difficult for me to maintain on one of my webservers (actually, I have no idea how many bandwidth it would require).
 * 2) Based on the current bot framework for Wikichu, I would make a script that is executed manually, maybe twice a day, and checks all edits since the last execution for unsigned comments. I would require that the script is intelligent enough to check all following revisions of an edit and to track all changes to a specific comment. The bot could add multiple unsigned comments on one page in one edit resulting in less entries on the history (gives a cleaner look) and reducing the possibility of edit conflicts.
 * 3) A mix between both options would be a program that, as long as it runs, checks recent changes in a short interval (#1) but also offers the possibility to check for older unsigned comments since the last execution (#2). This would allow having the bot run during phases with a lot of comments (like yesterday's update) and checking every comment directly after it is saved but still allows to shut the bot down and saving bandwidth when it is not required to mark unsigned comments as unsigned that fast. So it would basically check all old edits when it starts and then checks recent changes for new comments until it is shut down.
 * One idea is to only check anonymous edits. As most registered users know that they should sign, the most unsigned comments come from anonymous users. Checking only those would again reduce the bandwidth and the rate in which recent changes would need to be checked. Also it would allow users to fix comments on their own and still allow to make fun with someone who forgot it once.
 * Another idea would be to check only unpatrolled edits. While this would only check edits from users that are not admins, it would require admins to add unsigned templates manually when they check a new edit. Based on the implementation of the bot, it could require sysop status for the bot to be able to mark the edits as patrolled (or a server-side change to give that right to bots).
 * Apart from these two limitations we would also need to decide which namespaces should be patrolled for unsigned comments, or how to implement something that prevents the bot from adding unsigned templates to specific pages or users.
 * I don't have any strong opinions about this, but regarding #3 -- "This would allow having the bot run during phases with a lot of comments (like yesterday's update)". The wiki was slow enough last night; a bot checking every revision and entering those templates would just make things that much slower. I'm sort of leaning towards #2 (turning it on in intervals and checking each revision since it was last turned on, marking unsigned comments in one edit); of course, that would rely on you being on every day in order to turn it on. --[[Image:User Brains12 Spiral.png|18px|]] Brains12 \ talk 14:20, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Actually I don't think the bot would slow down the wiki more than it is already; in the end it is just one user and I never experienced problems when I ran the bot before.. Of course, based on the implementation, it requires me to be online, or to at least have the computer running - or to put the script on a server than runs it periodically.. poke | talk 14:29, 22 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Just a quick thought, I'll read it more carefully later. Is the problem with unsigned comments really so big that we need to bot them? I've never really experienced a problem with them, except maybe on highly active talk pages, where a bot would still have the same troubles as a human (edit conflicts, lots of edits to sift through). Frankly, I don't understand this frantic "And please sign your comments!" as soon as a new user shows up. It's not like we can't read what they say if they don't sign. - anja  [[Image:User Anja Astor sig icon.png|talk]] 14:41, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
 * That's a good point :P poke | talk 14:46, 22 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Individual editors not signing generally aren't a problem. Multiple editors not signing or indenting (or indenting inconsistantly within the same post) in the same topic are a problem because they make it hard to distinguish one comment from another. What about if the bot only checks the most recent edit, and only does so if it was unregistered? -- Gordon Ecker 23:32, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I haven't read anything you've written other than the caption so if I'm out of context that's why, but I remember this being brought up before. I was supposed to look into writing one, and I did. At that time it wasn't possible since the wiki was running a too old version of mediawiki and the API wasn't fully developed at that time. It could very well be possible now though, but I'll leave that for someone who has interest and time to write one. &mdash; Galil 01:00, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
 * In response to poke though, I would say go for #1. It would in my eyes be the most beneficial. The bandwidth usage wouldn't be a whole lot if you refresh the recent changes list once every minute or so. This page with the edit box takes 8 kB with images and all, for example. You wouldn't need to download javascripts, styles, images, etc, but let's exaggerate and suppose you would fetch 8 kB per minute. That's 0.13 kB/s. Not exactly server-killing. For #2, you wouldn't "hammer" the server with your insane 0.13 kB/s constantly, but on the other hand you would use ALOT of bandwidth when you actually ran the script. Potentially enough to slow down the wiki to a crawl with those edits, since if you put a bit of sleep interval in between edits you'll never catch up to the recent changes list. There's also the "human factor" involved in #2, since you actually have to go click it when it's supposed to start. If you go on vacation for a week the automatic unsigned-thingies go bye bye. The 3rd, while it looks good on paper, would have the same problem if you haven't ran it for a day or so, or even half a day. I say, let it look at a certain interval automagically and if the bot goes down for a day or so we'll just have to manage without it that day. It's worked so far, so I don't see why we would die from doing it manually every now and then. Just my 2€ (can't be arsed looking for the cent-sign so euro will have to do.) &mdash; Galil [[Image:User Galil sig.png|Talk page]] 01:11, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, thanks for that comment, but the others that replied here seem to disagree with the idea at all, so ... :P poke | talk 12:27, 20 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I don't know batshit about wiki maintenance coding. But since no one brought it up, i guess it isn't possible to code this into the wiki instead of making a bot? - J.P.[[Image:User J.P. sigicon.png| ]] Talk  13:09, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Unsigned bot
I'm considering picking up the sinebot-clone goal... has anyone been working on it yet? (Or, has it been made, the page isn't clear on it) Dime Cadmium ! 20:34, 9 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Was about to mark your comment as unsigned (oh the irony!).
 * Actually, there have been quite a lot discussions about a unsigned bot before, one being directly above and somewhere else which I don't remember at the moment. However it seems that consensus is rather against having an unsigned bot. Also we usually don't have too many problems with missing signatures. poke | talk 20:38, 9 June 2010 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I clicked submit and immediately "crap!"... okie! [[File:User DimeCadmium sig.jpg]] Dime Cadmium ! 20:48, 9 June 2010 (UTC)