Scratch Wiki:Bot Requests/Archives

This page contains an archive of bot requests. At the top, there is a table containing the basic information for each request, and further down is the discussion surrounding each bot. The format should show more recent requests first in all sections.

Requested Bots
Owner	Bot Name	Bot Use	Current Status	Comments and Recommendations
HacksonJackson	EdiBot	Correcting typos and grammar, compressing images, and capitalization	Rejected	All tasks either already done or rejected. -Kenny2scratch
Garnetluvcookie	SpellBot	Correcting spelling and informal grammar	Rejected	Proposer has no programming experience and VoxBot is the only approved typography bot. -Kenny2scratch
banana439monkey	Formatter	Fixing formatting and scratchblocks	Rejected	All uses either already done or no longer necessary. -Kenny2scratch
JJBullet	AccuracyBot	A bot that checks for spelling / grammar mistakes on every page	Rejected	Already done by VoxBot. -Kenny2scratch
12944qwerty	Welcome	Welcomes New Wikians into the Wiki World with a template.	Rejected	Already done by the system. -Kenny2scratch
Jakel181	Pseudonym	Letting users know when they have been replied to on a talk	Rejected	No further discussion. -Kenny2scratch
banana439monkey	Archiver	Archiving the Community Portal and talk pages	Rejected	Archiving pages is not a difficult task for humans to do. -Kenny2scratch
asqwde	Link fixer	Fixing links when pages are moved	Rejected	The main function is already done, either by humans or by one-off bot runs. -Kenny2scratch
Whatsfordinner77	Templater	Adding various templates automatically.	Rejected	All functions can be integrated into other bots. -Kenny2scratch
a_bar	ScratchBot	Testing wiki, categorizing pages, and it's comments on talk pages will be more user-friendly than most bots.	Rejected	Commenting on talk pages is a duplicate function of User:WikiMonitor; categorizing pages cannot be better than manual categorization. -Kenny2scratch
jokebookservice1	They_Come	Converting "he/she" to "they"	Rejected	No further discussions. -KrIsMa
Kenny2scratch	Deathly_Hallows	Adding templates to articles where needed, and adding dates to templates if they're not there	Accepted	This bot is good for: Adding dates to templates Adding {{inaccurate}} to pages with a certain amount of {{cn}}s This bot has been accepted. -KrIsMa
Jokebookservice1	AutoDeleter	Deletes unused files after a certain time period from the Wiki - implemented in Node.js or Python.	Rejected	Already done. -KrIsMa
Banana439monkey	Formatter	Formatter is a bot which fixes the formatting and scratchblocks code on the wiki. It will be hopefully done in PHP.	Rejected	Based on the fact that the owner does not know how to code a majority of his bot or know PHP well enough to do so, this bot request has been rejected -ErnieParke, jvvg, KrIsMa
Banana439monkey	Sandbot	hours, it would be running all of the time. Once, WM missed about 9 sessions of clearing out the sandbox and I had to do it for the bot. Sandbot would flush out every sandbox every four months unless it's manually done.	Rejected	I need a bit of help clearing out other people's sandboxes. This will be made with PHP (hopefully). I also need lots of help, as per Mitopolis This bot violates userspace policy and has very limited use for a task that isn't that important. -jvvg
ErnieParke	Interwiki Bot	Interwiki links	Accepted	This bot is based off of the following Mediawiki bot.
st19_galla	Notifier	This bot will notify you on your talk page whenever you're username is mentioned on the wiki with the '@' symbol before it.	Rejected	Could be replaced with an extension, yet no consensus was reached. -KrIsMa
Mitopolis	MeowBot	Maintaining Talk Pages (Mainly the CP)	Rejected	No further discussions. -KrIsMa
AghaCool	HelpBot	This bot gives detailed instructions on what the Wiki is, how to use it, how you shouldn't use it, and how to use it. This bot gives out the message when a new user joins the Scratch Wiki.	Rejected	Welcome text is easily changable. -KrIsMa
CoolBoy5677	WikiMaster	Redirect-related tasks (removing redirect to redirect, etc.) and Info tasks (counting users, statistics, etc.)	Rejected	Easily replaceable with humans. -KrIsMa
CoolBoy5677	CoolBot	Fixes mistakes/errors on the wiki	Rejected	Not practical. -KrIsMa
CoolBoy5677	WikiBot	Test tasks (testing scratch wiki) and Typography tasks (spell check, etc.)	Rejected	Typography errors are too hard to fix on the wiki, and tests-only tasks can be run on your own account. -jvvg
CoolBoy5677	WikiBot	Page tasks (archiving pages, adding tags, protecting, etc.)	Rejected	Tasks can be easily replaced with a human -jvvg
PrincessPandaLover	AntiRedLink	Converts red links into plain text if pages uses many red links	Rejected	Red links are good for the wiki, as they help tell users to create the non-existent page. -jvvg and Mathfreak231
PrincessPandaLover	BlockerBot	Adds a message that you have been blocked on talk pages of blocked users.	Rejected	Per community consensus, we do not advertise user bans any more than MediaWiki makes us. -jvvg
Krett12	Tweaker	Archiving the CP, removing old {{In Progress}} templates, this would be a better bot to clear the sandbox, general things with a time limit on them.	Rejected	Archiving the CP does not have consistent criteria, and besides this bot would not have the privileges to protect archives. Removing the "in progress" templates is a task that's not frequent enough to merit a bot. Clearing the sandbox is already done by WM and transferring bot tasks would be problematic. -jvvg
JayceeMinecraft	FAQBot	Categorizes FAQ pages.	Rejected	Not categorizing FAQ pages as FAQ is not really a chronic problem, so this bot wouldn't really make the Wiki better. In addition, one to automatically detect categories would not work properly. -jvvg
Krett12	SysopBot	Performing actions that are not granted to normal users, such as updating the News with new curators and SDSs, and detecting talk archives and protecting them In addition to those tasks, it would also help out with the request queue, if a user gets accepted/rejected on the Wiki, they will be notified on the main site. And if someone is not 2 months old or a Scratcher, they will be auto-rejected.	Rejected	It's more trouble than it's worth, and we don't want to give sysop privileges to a user who doesn't already have them. -jvvg and Scimonster
JayceeMinecraft	I've got my PI on you	Changes first person writing, and make deletes articles/text about users and projects(not including Kaj, or removed pac-man project).	Rejected	Editing English grammar with a bot is almost impossible, and there are a lot of pages that have names on them such as Scratch Team that are perfectly acceptable. -KrIsMa
JayceeMinecraft	PoliceBot	Reverts edits if someone deletes things on a page for no reason	Rejected	There are many cases where an edit can remove a lot of text but still be legitimate. -jvvg
Krett12	Tweaker	Check sub-par editing	Rejected	Checking bot edits with another bot is redundant, and only checking the pronoun "I" with the bot would be very hard, as "I" can be used multiple ways which is acceptable. -KrIsMa
Swampert11	Gobot	Fixing the Wiki	Rejected	The tasks can all easily be done by a human and are rarely necessary anyway.-jvvg
Swampert11	Gobot	Archive old discussion pages	Rejected	Often, it is not necessary to archive old discussion pages. In addition, the criteria vary by page, and sometimes not all discussions are archived.-jvvg
Swampert11	none	Welcoming new users	Rejected	Although we appreciate the idea, we don't think generic bot messages would be better than personalized welcome messages.-KrIsMa
Cooldude5367	DudeBot	Fixing the wiki and modifying pages	Rejected	Grammar in English is nearly impossible to accurately fix as a bot. Therefore, custom welcoming messages are not a good idea.-KrIsMa
Krett12	Tweaker	Use both the AF wiki and this wiki at the same time, find pages and add the {{April Fools}} on it.	Rejected	Manually copy and pasting pages from the April Fools page into this wiki can be done without a bot.-KrIsMa
-PRO-	Archive Bot	Archives pages with the name "Archive" in them. ex. "User talk:-PRO-/Archive 5".	Rejected	Making a bot an admin can open the wiki up to vulnerabilities, "and we are not giving sysop privileges to anybody who wasn't appointed/elected."-KrIsMa

Accepted

Deathly_Hallows

Explained in pseudocode:

while 1:
    if page.size < stubSize:
        if confirmEdit():
            addTemplate("stub", currentMonth + currentYear)
    if page.size < expandSize:
        if confirmEdit():
            addTemplate("expand", currentMonth + currentYear)
    if "{{.*?}}" in page.content:
        addDateToTemplate(templateAdded.revisionMonth + templateAdded.revisionYear)
    if findall("{{citation needed}}|{{cn}}", page.content).length > inaccurateCNCount:
        addTemplate("inaccurate", currentMonth + currentYear)

Yeah - it checks the size of pages, and adds {{stub}} or {{expand}} as needed; it adds the date to templates that don't have a date by searching the page history's diffs; and adds {{inaccurate}} if the number of {{citation needed}}s is too high. More ideas will come soon - but for now, this is what I have.

note: I replaced the old contents of the topic completely because I wanted to get a fresh start and make the ideas organized
kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 04:41, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

Is this an issue on the Wiki that needs to be addressed? And if so, with a bot?

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 02:04, 1 August 2017 (UTC)

Currently, new users will not know about the date guideline - there’s nothing obvious about it to them. Also, not all the pages to improve templates have dates - and once those are added, dates will need to be added too.

So basically, if we had a bot to add the date to templates when (new) users forget to do so (which they absolutely will), and add the correct templates automatically where needed, it would save work for the rest of the Wikians.

So what I guess I’m saying is: the issue is that (most importantly) new users (or old users, for that matter) are going to be forgetting to add dates to “pages to improve” templates; and it needs to be addressed with a bot - I mean, VoxBot just did cleanup to articles, and any human could have done that, but it would have been time-consuming and boring, so it needed automation - so this would do the time-consuming and boring task of adding dates whenever someone forgets them.

As for adding templates, this would be a secondary task - sometimes people make articles and they’re too short, or too inaccurate - and again, we don’t want a human to have to add templates left and right, so this would patrol new articles and add templates where needed (conditions for templates need refinement).

I do really want this to go through - I think this problem is going to be pretty serious...

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 04:51, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

what would define an article as a "stub" or something that needs to be expanded? page size seems highly unreliable

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 05:04, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

Ken has mentioned Word Count before.

Drunken_Sailor (talk | contribs) 07:40, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

Yes, since page size could be affected by complicated markup I was thinking of going with parsed word count (i.e. word count after parsing into HTML [using API action=parse]). As a rough idea I was thinking maybe around under 500 would be a suitable count - but we’ll probably need to discuss the exact word count some more. Then maybe expand size would be <1000? And I’m thinking inaccurate would be around 4-5 {{citation needed}} templates.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 11:08, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

There are plenty of cases (especially FAQs) where an article just doesn't need very many words. Additionally, there are a lot more cases where an article can be very long but still be a stub or need expansion. Also, the task here is not particularly tedious for a human. Coupling that with the large potential for missed cases and false positives, I don't think this is a good idea.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 17:56, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ FAQs can be easily bypassed - all it has to do is look for <div class="faqshortanswer"> or {{faq}} and skip it.

I do agree that cases where long articles are still short will be hard to find - that would be the biggest cause for missed cases.

Placing templates would not be the only task - there’s also placing dates on recently placed templates. That, I think, is what really requires automation - no matter how many times people read the new guideline for placing templates (use subst:), new users will probably not read that guideline or follow it - so this bot would add the date when it sees an edit in the RC that added a “Pages to Improve” template without a date. This would also not produce false positives - finding "stub" as opposed to "stub|date=month year" can’t go wrong.

TL, DR: FAQs can be bypassed, I agree that long but short articles will be difficult to find, but remember that placing templates wouldn’t be its main task - adding dates to templates would.
kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 01:19, 4 August 2017 (UTC)

I like the idea of adding dates to the templates. If I recall properly, very few templates actually have the data parameter. I then think that we should add the date parameter to most templates, and that would make your bot very useful.

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 18:36, 5 August 2017 (UTC)

I intend to add a required date parameter to all templates that add pages to categories in Pages to Improve. Then, since nobody’s going to know about the new date parameter (the guideline should be substitution though) this bot would come behind it adding dates.

I’m glad you like the idea - I see this being a large problem.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 19:44, 5 August 2017 (UTC)

The date parameter use sounds useful, if it's for templates with said parameter.

The citation needed check is also nice to have around, and is simple to implement.

As for the [controversial] idea of automatically marking pages as page stubs/need to be expanded, this could be useful, but the approach has to be thorough.

As jvvg mentioned, a naive approach will have a high false positive rate.

It would be possible to decrease the word requirements to decrease the false positive rate.

Maybe the bot could automatically query data and propose edits, but they have to be manually confirmed?

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 10:28, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

Yes, it’s for templates with the parameter.

I’m glad the citation check is good to you :)

I was also thinking that the template addition would be semi-automatic - that way the only thing there would be is missed cases, not false positives. What do you think would be the best requirements, however?

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 10:34, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

If the stup/expansion proposals are manual now, word count is a completely fine measure. High word counts will lead to more work, but again, all edits are checked by you first.

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 21:36, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ So it seems like we have a plan of action. This bot will:

add the date to templates that have the date parameter,
add {{inaccurate}} if there are too many cns,
and add {{stub}} or {{expand}} to short parsed word count pages semi-automatically.

If you have anymore things for it to do, post them here, but for now, I would like an official status for this bot - is it good to go?
kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 11:20, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Also add a blacklist, adding user, talk and specific pages like templates.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 16:14, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

I like the idea of adding the date to templates. However, I am still a bit skeptical about stub/expand since no matter what number of words, it is going to be a fairly arbitrary criterion. Also, some words carry more meaning than others, and some articles inherently have more information than others, so what may be too short for one article may not be too short for another article, and if you just pick the minimum number, the bot will not be particularly effective for all the other cases. For the inaccurate idea, the issue is that sometimes it is just one section that needs the template and not the whole article, and sometimes it is repeated after a bunch of statements in one sentence or paragraph in an otherwise well-sourced article, so I'm not sure if that's a great idea.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 18:22, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

I can feel your skepticism about adding templates - but I’m glad you like the date-adding.

If you’re saying that even if the stub/expand part was semi-automatic it still wouldn’t be good enough, then I kind of get where you’re coming from - but let me just say that imho missed cases are always better than false positives. As for sections of articles deserving inaccurate template and not the rest, if that were also semi-automated then I could add it to the section instead if I need to.

Also, if you have any way to make stub detection better let me know - but I did read your point and agree that it’s not going to be perfect.

Thanks!

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 19:08, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

Could you briefly explain to me what the benefit of having dates n templates are? Thanks!

19:29, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

What is the restriction on community input? I would assume that the benefit of dates would be for us to see how long the template has been in place; for us to prioritize.

Cυƨтσмнαcκεя ( тαʟκ | cσптяıв ) 22:03, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure it matters what date the template was added.I don't think anything needs prioritized, as long as whatever needs done gets done is what matters really.

01:57, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ You misunderstand what I mean about missed cases. My point is that the scenario I suggested will result in a lot of missed cases, which means that we will still have to look for them. Making adding the stub/expand templates semi-automatic would accomplish what patrolling the RC already does.
jvvg (talk | contribs) 02:06, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

@Turkey3: the date is so that people can see how long an article has been, let’s say, a stub for.

@jvvg: Well do you want to scrap that idea then or do you have any improvements?

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 02:09, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

I am suggesting scrapping that idea. You could alternatively write a script that just shows you short articles and decide for yourself which ones are stubs (but do the edits manually), which wouldn't require submitting a bot request at all since it doesn't make any edits directly.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 15:40, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

due to the inactivity, the bot is good for labeling inaccurate pages and adding dates. The bot has been approved. Please test it on your main account now - test a few pages and show that it does indeed work.

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 19:30, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

Yess!! I will do so ASAP - I am currently still away from a desktop computer so I don’t have any programming languages to work with.I might consider installing Pythonista on my iPad :)

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 23:10, 13 August 2017 (UTC)

Results of final test:

Labelling inaccurate pages: success! Bot checked if page (my sandbox) contained more than 3 {{cn}}s or {{citation needed}}s, total, and added {{inaccurate}} if it wasn’t already there (to the top, with date)
Adding dates to templates: success!! Bot checked if page had templates in the “pages to improve” category, and added date to all of the ones without dates.

Awaiting further instructions.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 09:32, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

If passed, I think you can remove the warnings from the templates/templates no longer need to be substituted.

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 22:42, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Yes, I was just going to do that.

Is this good to go then?
kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 22:45, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Could you quickly run the bot through 5-10 pages on the Wiki? If that's successful your bot will be accepted.

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 22:52, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Private testing (just printing modified content to console) succeeded - but I am understandably hesitant to do it on real pages.

No matter what, I’m doing it tomorrow!

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 10:19, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

After getting around the problem I mentioned on discord, testing has been a success!

The bot:

Checked to see whether the page had a template on it at all
Searched through the page history for when the template was added
Added the date to the template and submitted the edit.

All tests have passed. Status on the bot?

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 03:26, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Your bot has been accepted! Your bot has been approved for:

marking pages with the inaccurate template when it has a specific amount of cns.
adding dates to templates.

Your bot can run continuously or activate periodically. If you would like to add another feature to the bot, request it first in the CP. Bot priviledges will be given shortly, or when scmb1 becomes active. Congratulations on your new bot!

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 02:35, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

Woo! I wonder when “when scmb1 becomes active” will be :p

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 06:32, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

On the full moon. I think you can talk to them on their Scratch Profile.

Cυƨтσмнαcκεя ( тαʟκ | cσптяıв ) 22:46, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

EDIT: I read "alive," not "active." Oops.

Cυƨтσмнαcκεя ( тαʟκ | cσптяıв ) 22:47, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Should this get archived? Please correct me if I'm wrong. The bot is now working (and its name has been changed): User:TemplatesFTW
bigpuppy talk ▪︎ contribs 18:59, 15 October 2017 (UTC)

Interwiki Bot

Interwiki Bot is based on the following MediaWiki bot: Pywikibot This bot has lots of support material, and is used by the Wikimedia Foundation. (see above link for citation)
Interwiki bot is a bot that reads in Scratch wiki pages (en, de, id, jp, ect...). It adds interwiki links where they are missing, and removes old/outdated interwiki links.
Note that there can only be one interwiki to each language per page.
So let us say that [en:Scratch Cat] links to [de:Scratch Katze], and [de:Scratch Katze] links to [en:Super Cool Cat]. It is possible to say that [de:Scratch Katze] needs to have two interwikis: [en:Scratch Cat] and [en:Super Cool Cat]. This is called a conflict.
Interwiki bot has two options to deal with conflicts. They are:

Give me a list of options on what to do.
Put a summary of the conflict in a .dat file, then ignore the conflict.

For edit conflicts that I do not know how to resolve, I will post a list of conflicts online for other Wikians to help me with. I am still not sure whether I will use option 1 or 2, but I am looking into that.
A screenshot of Interwiki Bot on a test Wiki can be found here: screenshot
ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 00:27, 17 October 2015 (UTC)

good idea!

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 01:45, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I support! I'm sure this would be very helpful!

Hamish752 (talk | contribs) 06:42, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I also support.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 11:03, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I also support. Great!

MartinWollenweber (talk | contribs) 14:23, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Hi - now it's time to test this on your account!

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 14:38, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Definitely supporting this! Great idea. :)--
JayceeMinecraft (talk | contribs) 15:48, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

great idea!

Frodewin (talk | contribs) 18:28, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Since it looks like the request is accepted, I'll run the bot once from my main account (when I'm ready) and then post the results below. :)

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 20:07, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I tested a few hours ago, and it looks like everything is rolling along peachy! Here's a screenshot of what Interwiki bot found during the sample run on articles up to letter c: link

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 18:58, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

Declined

EdiBot

Edibot would fix things like typos, grammer, compressing images, capitalizing, etc. It will be written in Python.
HacksonJackson (talk | contribs) 16:00, 6 September 2020 (UTC)

Typos and "grammer" are not something we feel comfortable letting bots fix. Compressing images is already done my my own bot, and if by "capitalizing" you mean the template caps style guide rule, then my bot does that too.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 16:48, 6 September 2020 (UTC)

SpellBot

Note:

I currently do not know any programming languages besides Scratch. I am planning to learn Python and JS soon

SpellBot would check for spelling errors and informal grammar (e.g yeah, like, etc). Only VoxBot does spell checks and the like and is mostly inactive (its last edit was in 2019). It would be written in Python or JS, dependng on which I learn first.
garnetluvcookie talk contribs directory 15:36, 6 September 2020 (UTC)

It can cause more problem than you might think. For example, usage of sic. If I know right, they aborted that task due to the problems.

ahmetlii Talk Contributions Directory 15:39, 6 September 2020 (UTC)

We aren't comfortable letting bots correct language anymore, and we're even less comfortable letting someone with no programming experience outside Scratch run a bot. I had 5 years of Python experience when I proposed my bot TemplatesFTW and the other bot owners had similar amounts of experience.

Rejected

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 16:53, 6 September 2020 (UTC)

Formatter

From discussion archive:
Formatter is a bot which fixes the formatting and scratchblocks code on the wiki. The reason it was rejected was because I was incapable of building a bot, and since I have experience in JavaScript, I feel ready to give this another shot. Formatting is a huge problem within the wiki, especially indenting. Many pages contain incorrect formatting and need to be updated. This means that for humans, these tasks would be difficult and tedious to do, with great fatigue.
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 07:20, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

Even with your better JS experience, are you sure this is possible with a bot? This is supposed to fix scratchblocks formatting... but I don't think that's an issue anymore.

To help organize my thoughts, let me try to answer the bot request questions:

Is your bot's task necessary? It hasn't been proven to be necessary yet, no
Is your bot's task not already/easily done by a human? Yes, this is not already done by humans
- ~~If not, is there any reason that a bot would be better than a human (e.g. too repetitive, humans are too unreliable)?~~
Is your bot's task more than one time or quick use? No, I don't think so. Once the scratchblocks are fixed (assuming there's still stuff to fix), that's it.
Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots’ tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical? Since we're talking about fixing formatting, this is also a no. I'm sure it could be added to either my bot or VoxBot. Scratchblocks fixing is probably beyond me but not beyond VoxBot.
Would your bot have a moderate request frequency? Probably.
Would your bot help the Wiki as a whole, and not just a few specific users or articles? Yes.
Would your bot be almost foolproof against causing harm if something goes wrong? I have enough trust in your programming skill to say yes.
If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly? No, bad formatting isn't all that common. Bad scratchblocks is vanishingly rare - I'm pretty sure half the people here come from the forums or have at least had scratchblocks experience in the forums.
Would your bot follow the wiki guidelines? Obviously.

So, the "no" answers here are:

Is your bot's task necessary?
Is your bot's task more than one time or quick use?
Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots' tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical?
If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly?

Please explain how the answers to each of those questions are "yes" rather than "no".

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 07:31, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

There is still a huge amount of instances of incorrect formatting and helps give the wiki a more profesional look.
It's still more than one-time use. Even though ScratchBlocks formatting is no longer a problem currently, it could be updated again, and there are still huge formatting issues like indentation.
This is the point where I say no. I'll be fair. It could be added to VoxBot, but it's so infrequently run, and this bot could, say, be run weekly?
New wiki users? Yes. Veterans? Possibly not.
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 07:42, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

Incorrect formatting is mostly in source code, though, and does nothing to affect the end result.
The only update scratchblocks is going to get is new blocks. The syntax is frozen now. The 1.4 scratchblocks' "category=thing" comment was essentially a hack, and all instances of that are fixed now, as far as I'm aware.
Maybe not VoxBot, but my bot could totally take up that task. I only said scratchblocks would be better for VoxBot since it would require some additional parsing, which is what a less-overhead language like C# (which ~~BoxVot~~ VoxBot is wirtten in) is better at.
New users have to get through our account request process, though, so they're not totally inept. And wiki formatting doesn't take that long to learn. We watch new users closely in their first days anyway, so I don't think a bot could keep up with the humans! :P And obviously veterans don't make many formatting mistakes.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 07:56, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

But still annoying, right?
Mhm...
But your bot doesn't fix typos, right?
Yeah, but that means nothing. And users are going to mess up. Also, it's possible a bot can.
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 08:00, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

Sure, it's annoying, but stuff like that falls under the Scratch Wiki:Style Guide and is therefore already fixed by my bot.
Let's call this point done in my favor.
No, that's VoxBot's job, but I'm not going to let you fix typos automatically either. VoxBot is the only bot that's managed to actually deal with English grammar in the slightest, and it's the most dangerous bot of the lot.
People are eventually going to mess up, but that's why people like you and me patrol recent changes. That's even one of the questions: Is your bot's task not already/easily done by a human? In this specific case, fixing new users' edits is what admins have to do and what other users are encouraged to do. No bots required.

By the way, I know you like editing people's formatting, but please don't edit my posts at all. I don't mess up indentation or signature placement. My signature was meant to be on another line.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 08:18, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

Wait, that's already fixed? Why didn't you say so?
N/A
It's inactive though.
But what about old pages that haven't been updated in a while

By the way, was it?

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 07:11, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘For 3rd point, I heard that Ken will host VoxBot.
Apple502j Talk/Activities 2,205edit 07:24, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Style guide stuff is already fixed by my bot. It's been that way for a while now!
@asqwde, I offered to host it but KrIsMa said he'd do it himself once school was safely underway. I suggest you leave a message on his talk asking him to do a large run with it.
There are no old pages as far as anyone is aware! Every article (i.e. non-redirect page in mainspace with more than one link) has been touched at least once since the transfer.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 07:29, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Ken: all pages must be touched since that - removing transfer template

Apple502j Talk/Activities 2,205edit 09:20, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

I said after - so I mean all pages have been touched since after the transfer template was removed.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 09:53, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Oh.
I haz confusion. Where did asqwde comment on the situation?
Have they? Oh.
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 14:05, 31 October 2018 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ After discussion inactivity, I declare this bot rejected. Text formatting and style guide stuff is already done by VoxBot and TFTW, respectfully; any pages with old/broken scratchblocks are rare enough that they would be fixed manually.
kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 07:38, 10 October 2019 (UTC)

Accuracy Bot

Accuracy bot is a Bot that would automatically check for spelling / grammar mistakes within the wiki as a whole, it would check user talk / user pages, It would also check for common spelling mistakes such as "aberration".

1. Is your bot's task necessary? Yes

2. Is your bot's task not already/easily done by a human? No

3. If not, is there any reason that a bot would be better than a human (e.g. too repetitive, humans are too unreliable)? Humans are too unreliable (not all the time) and can get information wrong

4. Is your bot's task more than one time or quick use? Yes

5. Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots’ tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical? Yes

6. Would your bot have a moderate request frequency? Yes

7. Would your bot help the Wiki as a whole, and not just a few specific users or articles? Yes it would help it as a whole

8. Would your bot be almost foolproof against causing harm if something goes wrong? Yep!

9. If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly? Yes

10. Would your bot follow the wiki guidelines? Yep

Many thanks,

JJBullet Talk Contribs Templates 14:07, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

1. Is your bot's task necessary? Yes

2. Is your bot's task not already/easily done by a human? Yes it is, many Wiki editors find many spelling mistakes and fixes them.

3. If not, is there any reason that a bot would be better than a human (e.g. too repetitive, humans are too unreliable)? Robots are more unreliable. Although they can find more 'mistakes', they don't fix them accurately all the time.

4. Is your bot's task more than one time or quick use? Yes

5. Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots’ tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical? VoxBot

6. Would your bot have a moderate request frequency? Yes

7. Would your bot help the Wiki as a whole, and not just a few specific users or articles? Yes it would help it as a whole

8. Would your bot be almost foolproof against causing harm if something goes wrong? Yep!

9. If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly? Yes

10. Would your bot follow the wiki guidelines? Yep

VoxBot already does spell check.

12944qwerty Talk Contribs Scratch 14:47, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

So i take it its been declined??

JJBullet Talk Contribs Templates 14:58, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Unless you have an argument.

12944qwerty Talk Contribs Scratch 15:07, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

My argument is that this bot is only built for spelling mistakes and VoxBot is built to do many things so what i am trying to say is that it could slip up on a couple spelling mistakes and because mine only has 1 job it is less likely to slip up

JJBullet Talk Contribs Templates 15:13, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Having multiple jobs doesn't mean the bot will slip up.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 19:09, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Yes, all these bots are being perfected and enhanced since they were made.

12944qwerty Talk Contribs Scratch 19:56, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Also, did you look at the archives? Three bots were suggested and rejected for the same job.

Look at these.
12944qwerty Talk Contribs Scratch 20:10, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Rejected. All tasks are already done by VoxBot.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 08:44, 5 February 2019 (UTC)

Welcome!

Welcome is a bot that checks User Creation Log to see if a user has been created in the Wiki. Then, using a template, it welcomes them.
-unsigned comment by 12944qwerty (talk | contribs)

I personaly enjoy seeing automation, but it's a lot nicer if a person welcomes you, not a bot. And this has already been sugested Scratch_Wiki:Bot_Requests/Archives#HelpBot.

Jakel181 (talk | contribs) 23:21, 19 November 2018 (UTC)

We already have the automatically-inserted welcome message from the account request system, I don't think we don't need another bot duplicating its functionality.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:54, 20 November 2018 (UTC)

Is your bot's task necessary? - Not really, welcoming is only to make the end user feel some sort of happiness
Is your bot's task not already/easily done by a human? - No, it's already done, we don't accept that many account requests.
- If not, is there any reason that a bot would be better than a human - No, a bot wouldn't be necessary for a small task per week.
Is your bot's task more than one time or quick use? - Yes
Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots’ tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical? - Not really, it's already performed by ConfirmAccount.
Would your bot have a moderate request frequency? - Not really, one in four of account requests are approved.
Would your bot help the Wiki as a whole, and not just a few specific users or articles? - No, we're welcoming new users here and doesn't help the wiki as a whole.
Would your bot be almost foolproof against causing harm if something goes wrong? - Yes, unless an Experienced Wikian or up screws up.
If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly? - No, it is not designed to fix a problem and it's not a huge thing anyway.
Would your bot follow the wiki guidelines? - Why did I add that to the question list?
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 07:56, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Rejected. This is done by ConfirmAccounts and that is all that is really necessary.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 08:44, 5 February 2019 (UTC)

Pseudonym

Pseudonym would patrol The recent change's and look for the string "{{@|" (Template not created yet, view it here.) It checks the first paramenter and looks a pseudonym table. It sends a message to that user saying that "User has replied to your post here:" Smilar to this. The only time it will not send you a message, is if the conversation is on your talk page.
Jakel181 (talk | contribs) 13:05, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

A bot with a nearly identical function (named "Notifier", read the archives) was rejected in 2016, since that purpose could be replaced with an extension (though the extension itself was also controversial). If this is the only purpose for the bot, I say it's not necessary. (If you do want to have some sort of notification thing when being pinged, though, you can bring up the Echo extension [or some other extension that gives notifications when pinged] on the CP.)

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 14:01, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

I though about it, but Echo only support media wiki version 1.29+ not 1.28.3, and I did read the archvies, and I did see Notifier, but that was suggusted in 2016 and I though I would bring it up again snice it's been two years and alot has changed since then.

Jakel181 (talk | contribs) 14:10, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Not enough has changed recently for Notifier's function to no longer be unneeded; Echo not supporting MW 1.28 is a valid point but that just means we'd custom-craft an extension that only watches for pings instead (which would likely be a better solution) (again, propose an extension like that on the CP).

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 14:14, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

If we use an extension then you only get the nofiaction, but if we use a bot then you get a nofitcation and a talk page message to refer back to.

Jakel181 (talk | contribs) 16:00, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Forgot to add "the questions"

Is your bot's task necessary?: Yes, people are repling to discussions and forgeting about it.
Is your bot's task not already/easily done by a human?: Yes, it is troublesome to notify one when you mention them in a talk.
- ~~If not, is there any reason that a bot would be better than a human (e.g. too repetitive, humans are too unreliable)?~~
Is your bot's task more than one time or quick use?: It is more than one time since new disscusions are being created.
Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots’ tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical?: Yes no other bot does this, the closes thing to it is wikimonitor leave a message on you talk letting you know if you forgot to add your signature.
Would your bot have a moderate request frequency?: Yes! Of course!
Would your bot help the Wiki as a whole, and not just a few specific users or articles? For sure! They are plently of disscusions being stunted and thus progress due to people forgeting about them. A few examples are: Talk:Scratch Team Blog Talk:What the Community is Remixing.
Would your bot be almost foolproof against causing harm if something goes wrong?: Yes! it would include a separate script to monitor and turn off the bot if something goes worng. It would also have a manual shut down on it's userpage.
If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly? Yes as said above, they are plently of disscusions being stunted and thus progress due to people forgeting about them.
Would your bot follow the wiki guidelines? Of Course!

Jakel181 (talk | contribs) 21:57, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Is your bot's task necessary? I'm not so sure, replying to discussions and forgetting about them isn't too bad. There's nothing wrong with a one-time post.
Is your bot's task not already/easily done by a human? Yes, manually pinging people on their talks is cumbersome.
Is your bot's task more than one time or quick use? Yes, this would be constantly running.
Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots' tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical? Yes and no. The task is pronouncedly different, but adding it to WikiMonitor wouldn't be too hard. Since "no" anywhere invalidates the idea, this counts as a no.
Would your bot have a moderate request frequency? This is a technical question, more about implementation than idea. Make sure any bots don't request too frequently.
Would your bot help the Wiki as a whole, and not just a few specific users or articles? Yes, getting notified about replies to you would help anyone.
Would your bot be almost foolproof against causing harm if something goes wrong? I don't see how it would be foolproof, though. A shutdown page is essentially mandatory nowadays for bots that run constantly (think: WikiMonitor), but it's hard to tell when someone pings you. (There are a lot of text-based notations for pinging people).
If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly? People not seeing new replies isn't a problem - if they actually care they'd check back.
Would your bot follow the Wiki guidelines? Yes.

So, to summarize, the questions whose answers I think aren't necessarily "yes" are:

Is your bot's task necessary? I'm not so sure, replying to discussions and forgetting about them isn't too bad. There's nothing wrong with a one-time post.
Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots' tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical? Yes and no. The task is pronouncedly different, but adding it to WikiMonitor wouldn't be too hard. Since "no" anywhere invalidates the idea, this counts as a no.
Would your bot be almost foolproof against causing harm if something goes wrong? I don't see how it would be foolproof, though. A shutdown page is essentially mandatory nowadays for bots that run constantly (think: WikiMonitor), but it's hard to tell when someone pings you. (There are a lot of text-based notations for pinging people).

Unless you can show how the answers to these questions are definitively yes, this isn't suitable for use. Also, as to your point against extensions: "a talk page message to refer back to" is not an advantage - if anything, it's a disadvantage because you'd get a new message for every single reply to your post, producing clutter. An extension would be far simpler to deal with.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 13:15, 24 October 2018 (UTC)

Answerers to concerns:

Is your bot's task necessary? I'm not so sure, replying to discussions and forgetting about them isn't too bad. There's nothing wrong with a one-time post.: It would only ping you if someone replied to you, for example, {{@|<Kenny2scratch>}}, then it would ping you.

Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots' tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical? Yes and no. The task is pronouncedly different, but adding it to WikiMonitor wouldn't be too hard. Since "no" anywhere invalidates the idea, this counts as a no.: You are right it would not be too hard to add, only jvvg's has expressed that he is happy with less to maintain, and I do want to give him more to maintain, and wikimonitor's purpose is to notify users if they break wiki guidelines not if someone has replied to them.

Would your bot be almost foolproof against causing harm if something goes wrong? I don't see how it would be foolproof, though. A shutdown page is essentially mandatory nowadays for bots that run constantly (think: WikiMonitor), but it's hard to tell when someone pings you. (There are a lot of text-based notations for pinging people).: It only looks for the future "re" template: here. It will have an abuse checker as well. If someone did {{@|<Kenny2scratch>}} ten times (example number) on the same page it would ignore it. And a sperate monitor script will run as well that can shut down the bot.

Other bits I should address:

Would your bot have a moderate request frequency? This is a technical question, more about implementation than idea. Make sure any bots don't request too frequently.: Yes I know it will have about the same request frequency as wm (I might use part of wm's code if this bot get accepted)

If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly? People not seeing new replies isn't a problem - if they actually care they'd check back. True, but one might forget, it even happens to you, back when I moved a category by hand if you remember that, the last post was made over a year ago by you asking how would get started but no-one replied to you about it.
Jakel181 (talk | contribs) 00:18, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘I just realized the there is already a scratch account named Pseudonym (and Pseudonyms) so the name is subject to change.
Jakel181 (talk | contribs) 00:24, 25 October 2018 (UTC)

Has there been any update in the opposition's argument?

Jakel181 (talk | contribs) 13:43, 26 October 2018 (UTC)

Where'd you get that wording?

So only the "re" template would cause it to ping? That seems rather narrow-minded, though - people tend to ping with @ rather than a template. (Note that you could have Template:@) However, incorporating more pinging methods would be more effort than it's worth...
But your response (and mine) was(/were) offtopic. I still don't think pinging people every time someone replies to them with a ping is necessary; it could even be downright harmful, considering that someone could put a ping for every user on some page and then the bot would go on a rampage. A disable page wouldn't help, since you can't check it between every request.
WikiMonitor isn't necessarily purely for notifying people about broken guidelines - it updates the curator announcements, too. And jvvg would like to have less to maintain, but he isn't going to be able to get rid of WikiMonitor anytime soon; therefore it wouldn't be hard to add this to WikiMonitor.
See my first point about foolproofing against harm. Checking for the same ping multiple times on the same page should be done anyway (multiple pings on one page for one user should only give one talk page message); pings for many users on one page could have a legitimate use, but it could also not. There's no foolproof spam-prevention method. And, again, a disable page wouldn't help since all of the pings would occur in between one page check and the next.
Request frequency question answered.
Even if I had pinged someone, they would have only been annoyed, and likely wouldn't have actually helped. It's okay for that discussion to lie dormant, anyway. Still not a problem.

Before we go any further, please bring up the raw idea of pings on the CP, ignoring the implementation. Ask whether people would like to have notifications when they are replied to, be it in banners or talk page messages or a new messaging system. If people do want pings, then we can start discussing the specific implementation - extension? bot? javascript? - and reach a consensus.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 02:54, 28 October 2018 (UTC)

Ok, I've made the topic on the CP, so this discusion is on hold for now. (I got the wording because I was doing Legal Studies Homework while writing the post)

Jakel181 (talk | contribs) 12:47, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Archiver

Before we all go cuckoo and automatically reject because bots should not have the admins group, I want to clarify this further.
When this bot detects a message signed by a user, it automatically archives their page. This page will also only be archived if the template {{BAAA}} is on the page. This then means the user also gives permission for an archive. After the automatic archive, a message will be posted on the user's talk page to say their page has been archived and the link to their archive.

This is how protecting works: There would be a Discord bot that pings admins with the link of the archive and asks them to protect it. This concludes my idea. Thoughts?
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 13:27, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

I'm not even sure what you're talking about here... are you saying it archives talk pages, or the CP, or what?

In any case, I think a "BAAA" template for the bot to look for would not be any better than a manual archive - it takes about the same effort to add the template as it does to manually archive a talk page.

Besides that, a bot having admin powers is only half of the story. The problem is how will the bot figure out whether a topic should be archived or not? The {{done}} template is not enough - the topic may not actually be done yet, or the template may have been placed in error; and comprehension of the contents of a topic is basically impossible for bots.

Finally, archiving isn't actually that hard to do manually. This isn't a problem that needs an automated process to solve.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 13:43, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

1. I'm talking about talk pages. 2. Then maybe cut out the "BAAA" idea. 3. If a user posts on this bot's talk page, then the bot will automatically archive it. 4. I was considering that, but you do have a point.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 16:15, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Archiving is not hard per se, but it is time-intensive. When was the last time we archived the CP?

I'm open to this bot suggestion.

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 17:47, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

First, an archived for CP would be best. Talk page archives are easily done by hand.

Does the bot need admin privs? It could put the {{Protect}} template on any archive page.

{{done}} might not be enough, but it could be enough. Perhaps, two done templates must be put, or after the template is placed? Or, it will also count {{Not Done}} templates. If the number of done templates is bigger than not done templates, the bot will archive the post. Plus, we only need it to archive once a month or so, right?

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 17:51, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

Or maybe perhaps the first {{done}} or {{not done}} template after the section header could be the conclusive one? If the bot sees the done template at the top of the section, it knows to archive it; if the bot sees anything else, it assumes the topic is still under discussion and shouldn't be archived.

I agree with {{protect}} being a substitute for admin power to protect pages, by the way.

I also agree that user talk page archives should be done by hand - not just because it's simple enough, but because user talk subpages are userspace - the user talk page is tentatively userspace, but the user talk subpages are actually userspace.

I definitely think that a mere count of {{done}} templates (even vs count of {{not done}} templates) is not enough, however.

My only worry now is that this might cause a lot of missed cases - what if a topic is done but no-one has put the template at the top yet? This will also warrant a change of custom.

Besides that, however, the last point of mine still stands: Archiving is not a problem that actually needs an automated process to solve. Admins have been archiving manually perfectly fine on their own, and can continue to do so. WikiMonitor was created because there really were too many people breaking etiquette; VoxBot was made because grammar remains a problem; ThisIsAnAccount was made because there were an alot of redirects that had a deprecated category on them; TemplatesFTW was made because templates suddenly needed dates but no-one would remember to add the date. Archiving, however, is easy to do manually (even CP archives) and doesn't need an automated process.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 06:56, 3 February 2018 (UTC)

(replying to Ken's point in his message because I missed that) The owner would actually comment on the talk page of the bot.
@KrIsMa message 1: I'm unsure. It was some time back. Are you adding to the suggestion?
@KrIsMa message 2: 1. I suppose so, but I had the idea to specifically do it with people's talk pages. You have a good point, however. Say, every 50 discussions, we archive. We could add a rule to the CP stating you must add

Not done or

Done to the discussion and when it is complete. 2. -see dc- 3. I don't recall archiving the CP once a month...
@kenny2scratch 1. My point. 2. -see dc- 3. a) Neh. b) When the user posts on the bot's talk page, there would be a warning stating their talk page would be cleared. Then, clearly, that user would give permission, right? 4. so-so 5. See reply two point one. 6. Neh, but it may be nice.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 08:42, 3 February 2018 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ If you're planning to change the custom too, I'd say suggest that change on the CP - not saying it's a bad change, just saying others might have thoughts on it that should be posted on the CP and not here.

So you're saying that if the user thinks that every single topic on their talk page is done, they post on the bot's talk page and the bot archives it for them? In that case, what's so hard about manually archiving it yourself? You're basically suggesting something that would reduce the number of edits needed for that user to archive, but increase the overall number of edits needed to archive. Not a good thing. I see what you mean by permission being given when they comment on the page, though.

Finally, once again, my last point still stands: Archiving is not a problem that needs a bot to take the place of a human. Additionally, you still haven't answered the problem of many missed cases - what if the topic is done but nobody put the template at the top? The only reliable way to tell whether a topic is done is to read through it and understand all the context involved - and as a bot, that's impossible in the extreme.
kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 09:32, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

1. The custom? 2. Point. Maybe, if the topic's last timestamp is of a month ago? Would that be beter? 3. See 2.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 07:03, 5 April 2018 (UTC)

The current custom is put {{not done}} if you explicitly don't want the topic to be archived, put {{done}} if you explicitly want it to be archived, and put no done/not done if the discussion isn't really conclusive yet.

How in the name of Schrödinger's cat would you get the timestamp of the topic? Even if you tried to get all the timestamps of posts and got the newest one, that still wouldn't really be possible - the parsing would be way too ambiguous. Seriously, that's really impossible.

How does 3 relate to 2...?

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 07:36, 5 April 2018 (UTC)

1. Archiving a talk page isn't that much of a problem as it only happens once in a while.

2. Archives come in different forms. The CP has main archives, an unfinished discussions archive, and a permalinks archive. Many user talk pages also have bot archives. How can the bot know where to put the

archive?
CrazyBoy826 Talk | Contribs | Scratch account 17:06, 30 July 2018 (UTC)

What happened to the activity of this? Anyone doesn't want their bot request to be rejected due to a lack of activity. We have not reached a consensus yet, so keep going!
CrazyBoy826 Talk | Contribs | Scratch account 23:08, 22 September 2018 (UTC)

If nobody brings up a very good point for the inclusion of this bot, I or somebody else will just reject it anyway. I'll give anyone who has a point... let's see, call it until next weekend. If there are no good points by next weekend, this will just be rejected.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 01:12, 23 September 2018 (UTC)

This bot was rejected, as it is way past September 30 (the Sunday after Ken's post). Archiving talk pages is a bit of work, but it doesn't get done too often and it isn't too hard.
CrazyBoy826 Talk | Contribs | Scratch account 18:42, 28 October 2018 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Sorry, I should have been clearer. When I said "I or somebody else", I meant myself or some other admin. Normal users don't have the place to reject bots.

Thank you for mentioning this, though. Yes, this is far past the deadline. This bot is rejected.
kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 02:05, 29 October 2018 (UTC)

Link fixer

I am not saying i should host this but just an idea, a bot that looks at the move log and automatically fixes all links that linked to the moved pages. It would only fix these a while after it was moved maybe 10 minutes in case it was moved by accident.

So basically:

The bot checks the move log
If it is after 10 min it checks what links here
Changes all the links to the new link. Thoughts?
asqwde talk | contribs 09:49, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

I believe this can actually be enabled as a MediaWiki feature, so that's the bot gone. Whether it should be enabled: What if someone moved a page to a bad title, waited 10 minutes for the bot to update links, then moved pages again? With great power comes great responsibility. Fix links yourself.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 03:54, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

How about if the bot changes the links after the move is patrolled. Therefore that would avoid bad titles, spam, and what-not. What about if a page is moved with over 30 links, in this case, a bot would be more beneficial.

asqwde talk | contribs 16:48, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

AbuseFilter handles that

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 18:07, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Did you read the discussion? The bot is not handling spam, i was just saying it would change all the links after the edit is patrolled.

asqwde talk | contribs 18:09, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

I actually did. Also, :waitwhat:
-unsigned comment by Banana439monkey (talk | contribs)

Then why did you say AbuseFilter handles that, handles what?

asqwde talk | contribs 18:16, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Spam and bad titles.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 18:17, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Please outdent on the 7th reply. Ok, but it is still best to have the edit patrolled without changing links. The title may not be spam but have a grammar error which is not correct, hence it mean double the edits to change all the links
asqwde talk | contribs 18:19, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Then let a human deal with in. Recent Changes exists, right? Also, it's the eighth reply, actually. By the way, please stop being rude and complaining about my mistakes. We all make mistakes.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 18:22, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

It was just a polite reminder in case you forgot. S:RC exists but the point of the bot if fixing links when a page is moved. Some pages have a lot of links linking to them, and sometimes they need to be moved.

asqwde talk | contribs 18:27, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

The amount of times you've complained makes it seem more negative than polite. Why can't humans do it? What'd go wrong?

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 18:29, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

They can, but even as Apple502j said and ken agreed "No. Ask bot owners for such massive and simple edits. Ken is online now." here and that was fixing a link to a category. It would take up time and unnecessary edits which could be done by a bot.

asqwde talk | contribs 18:32, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Firstly, those unnecessary edits would also be made by the bot too. Also, the wiki is edited by users in their spare time and free will. These people may wish to edit the pages, without such operations wasting their time. Possibly we are a waste of time.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 18:42, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

But with the bot, humans have time for other more useful edits like fixing mistakes and expanding pages instead using their time fixing links. If a bot can do it then why not use it?

asqwde talk | contribs 18:47, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Time doesn't matter. There's probably a wikian who edits wikis for a living. Also, that's not the point. A bot can generate a wiki. We generated it.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 18:50, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘(Edit Conflict) In any case a bot would be better off performing such a task.
asqwde talk | contribs 18:56, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Wie?

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 18:58, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Banana and asqwde, stay away from things involving each other. No good comes out of things you attempt to do together.

Now to respond to points: It is technically impossible to patrol moves, so changing links when moves are patrolled is not an option. Additionally, bots can't see whether edits are patrolled.

If a page with 30 links is changed, then I hope you know what you're getting yourself into. Or you can ask a bot owner to automatically change links (e.g. me).

As to the outdenting issue, six or seven or eight replies isn't a hard limit, but there has to be a minimum of six colons. If someone replies with seven colons, then you can have the satisfaction of outdenting 7 colons instead of just 6. But there's no actual limit, it just depends on who notices that things need to be outdented.

@Banana: "There's probably a wikian who edits wikis for a living" ahem meh (though I don't get paid)

also S:RC exists as a shortcut? wut

I'm going to treat this as rejected. In the future, if you have a bot idea, please answer the bot request questions as part of your explanation of the bot's purpose.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 01:12, 27 September 2018 (UTC)

Templater

Templater is a bot which can add templates which bots can understand (eg. Template:Bad style, Template:Dead link), notify users about templates which needs to be fixed and removed and finds text which can be changed into links (eg. Scratch 1.4 -> Scratch 1.4). If you want to disable use of it, use the template {{NoTemplater}} or for a part {{NoTemplater|<content>}} template.
Whatsfordinner77 (talk | contribs) 07:24, 26 August 2018 (UTC)

What would the disadvantage of a human performing such an operation?

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 08:18, 26 August 2018 (UTC)

Well, two reasons. 1. Can check and never miss. 2. Can do it Way much faster.
-unsigned comment by Whatsfordinner77 (talk | contribs)

My bot adds {{bad style}}. {{dead link}} can be done, and linking text is done, by VoxBot, owned by KrIsMa. The name also seems like a copy of my bot's, TemplatesFTW?

Unless you have a purpose that can't be incorporated into any of the current bots, I don't think that another bot is neeeded.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 03:49, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

Really? I did not know it was there!

Whatsfordinner77 (talk | contribs) 23:14, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

We can add more like AF, External Programs, Scratch Team, st etc.

Whatsfordinner77 (talk | contribs) 22:42, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

AF I added myself a while ago, and it doesn't need to be added automatically. External Programs is a template my bot already adds. Scratch Team should never be automatically added.

Seriously. All the templates that need to be automatically added are already automatically added. If you do manage to come up with a template that needs to be added by a bot, most likely that function can be added to my own bot. Please read Scratch Wiki:Bot Requests/Instructions and look at the requirements for proposing bots. I'll remind you of them here:

Is your bot's task necessary?

No, it is not. All the templates are already accounted for.

Is your bot's task not already/easily done by a human?

No, it is easily done. Only a few templates are better added by bots.

Is your bot's task pronouncedly different from other bots’ tasks and would adding its task to another bot be impractical?

No, the task is almost identical to the task of my own bot; adding its task to my bot would not only not be impractical, but actually be a much better course of action.

If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly?

Though adding templates is not a problem, it is nonetheless not a significant task that comes up repeatedly.

I can't see this request going anywhere useful, so I'll have to mark this one as

Rejected.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 04:24, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

ScratchBot

This will most likely be programmed in Squeak as I like to change up my version of Scratch 1.4 and Bingo 2.0. It will have happy, encouraging comments unlike WikiMonitor's formal citations and categorize pages in a smarter way than other bots.

Example: Hey there -username-! I am ScratchBot. (Call me Scratchie for short) Seems like you forgot to categorize the page: -examplepage-. I categorized it for you, but no biggie! Anyway, thank you for creating the page! It may help many scratchers! If it looks like I am malfunctioning, don't hesitate to comment on a_bar's talkpage. -Bot signature-

That was very upbeat wasn't it? It will categorize pages automatically when a user creates or edits a page by finding related pages and comparing them. The bot will categorize the page to the most common category of all the related pages. The bot will not categorize pages with the "ManualCategorize" tag at the top.

I have still not decided how the wiki testing will work. I would love some feedback!

|a_bar₪Talk₪Edits|

01:25, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

If you have suggestions on how to improve WikiMonitor's notifications, please tell me rather than just trying to create a bot to use different ones, as duplicating the function of WM would just make everyone's life more difficult (and the bot request instructions say your bot should be significantly different from existing bots). Anyway, how do you intend to figure out what pages are "related"? Also, what do you mean by "testing"?

jvvg (talk | contribs) 02:40, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

I agree with jvvg here - this seems really similar to WikiMonitor. If you have an improvement to the messages, just tell him - you can actually see the current messages User:WikiMonitor/Configuration here.

As for categorizing, that is something that's strictly manual - it's very difficult for a bot to figure out what category an article should go into. Though if categorizing was done semi-automatically (i.e. it asks a human what category to put, rather than guessing one itself), that might also work - though that would likely go in my bot rather than WikiMonitor.

I thank you for your idea, but since it is similar to other bots' functions I would suggest that you request the ideas be combined into another bot's responsibilities instead.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 05:40, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

I agree

asqwde talk | contribs 19:02, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

This will be a fully automated bot. It will have file memory to "learn from it's mistakes," and will categorize pages based on how related their text is.

|a_bar ₪ Talk ₪ Edits| 10:35, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

Not it's but its.

We don't need AIs. We need bots which does everything well. Are you sure this bot makes ONLY FEW mistakes? Bots based on mistakes are not needed. People should do its work instead.

Apple502j Talk/Activities 2,205edit 10:44, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

[offtopic]OH my GOD that was a lot of trailing spaces - I mean, wha-huh?[/offtopic]

I'm sorry to break it to you, but a bot on this scale would not be allowed to make any mistakes. "Learning from its mistakes" would not be a viable option. Again, auto-categorizing is basically impossible - show me anything that automatically categorizes pages, and I can guarantee that I can find the place where it took the easy way out.

To be blunt, a page with no category is better than a page with a wrong category. No matter whether your bot learns from its mistakes, making the mistakes already defeats the purpose. Bots are supposed to be quick, efficient, and (emphasis) accurate in what they do. WikiMonitor notifies people for violations of wiki etiquette; VoxBot makes the easiest typography fixes and generally cleans up pages; ThisIsAnAccount decategorized redirects; TemplatesFTW adds dates to templates and does semi-automatic cleanup. All of these are easy for bots to do, and are therefore done by bots. Categorizing pages is ridiculously difficult for bots to do (and doing it semi-automatically would defeat the purpose), and is therefore left for humans to do.

Categorizing pages is not something that will be done by bots, now or ever. As for the "better WikiMonitor" idea, you seem to have dropped that, so I won't comment on it further.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 11:23, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

Well, what if it was only run on a certain group of test pages on the wiki containing random words that link to a certain subject. The bot would then be temporarily programmed to only categorize those pages. It wold browse all other pages looking for similar keywords, and then check their categorizations. The bot would then save the test data to an .txt file on my laptop. We would then check the categorizations on the test pages to see if they are relevant, and report to the bot. After weeks of this repeating, we should have ourselves a mistake- free categorizing bot.

|a_bar ₪ Talk ₪ Edits| 19:41, 23 March 2018 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Even if it were trained on test pages, it wouldn’t be able to handle special cases that come up - and even one mistake thanks to a special case would make it no better than manual categorization.

Essentially, if you make it learn from mistakes, it’s no better than human categorization and is therefore not necessary at all. And yet if it’s not done by learning from mistakes, it is completely impossible to categorize pages in any way that doesn’t defeat the purpose. What I’m saying is any possible way of automatically categorizing pages would be no better than manual categorization - so this bot is not necessary since it doesn’t solve a problem any better than humans already do it.
kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 04:05, 24 March 2018 (UTC)

So, we should close this discussion? I do agree with you. I think we can all safely say this bot may get us nowhere.

|a_bar ₪ Talk ₪ Edits| 18:27, 4 April 2018 (UTC)

If you feel like it's not necessary now, then yes, this can be safely

Closed. Thanks for the idea - unfortunately it's no better than manual action, but I hope you can come up with an even better bot idea!

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 02:26, 5 April 2018 (UTC)

They_Come

This bot will convert any instances of "his/her", "he/she", etc. to their gender neutral equivalent (using "they", or "them", etc.)

This is great for making the Wiki welcoming for nonbinary people.
Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 07:05, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

There are problems with verbs after the pronoun, e.g. "he/she is" will need tto become "they are". However, this can be solved with integration with a dictionary, that will contain all verbs along with how they should look like in the plural form.

Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 07:08, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

When you said “dictionary” I though you meant the data type ({key: value}) :P

I think if you can make it work without errors, then it’s probably a good idea. Otherwise, though, no.

Also, this would have to be semi-automatic - meaning you would have to approve each edit it made.

So if you can make it have no missed cases when semi-automatic, it should be fine - otherwise, no.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 07:28, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

~~I think it'll replace right words. For Example:~~

Apple502j has two textbooks. He has three notebooks, too.

If it's changed:

Apple502j has two textbooks. They have three notebooks, too.

~~You should replace only when he/she points any people.~~

--

Apple502j (talk | contribs) 07:38, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

It is not right. Sorry.--

Apple502j (talk | contribs) 23:03, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

Can you explain how it would work? I feel as if it will make some mistakes. Ex: Kenny put his hat on = Kenny put their hat on?

Cυƨтσмнαcκεя ( тαʟκ | cσптяıв ) 14:30, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

I think this is a good idea for a bot, but I agree with what customhacker and Apple502j said.

bigpuppy talk ▪︎ contribs 14:52, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

Semi-Support | It seems a good idea but there may need to be some sort of setting that lets you choose text to ignore so that it makes less mistakes.

-Vuton- (Talk 💬 | Contribs 💾 | Pages 📚) 14:54, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

Semi-Support, as it is a little bit problematic.

Yzyzyz (talk | contribs) 14:58, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Is this the suggestions forum now? Rather than just proclaim your semi-support, add to the discussion.

Personally, I think that this bot is a bad idea. English grammar is almost impossible to fix using a bot; it can only be done properly by humans. For example, the bot request "I've got my Pi on you" was described to "Change first person writing". The bot was later rejected, with the point from Krlsma: "Editing English grammar with a bot is almost impossible", similar to my statement.
Drunken_Sailor (talk | contribs) 18:06, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

Apple502j — My bot wouldn't replace "He" with "They" because "He" wouldn't be recognised as something that needs replacing. Only strings like "He/She" would.

Customhacker — About things like <pronoun> <adverb> <verb>, the dictionary could check if the word is a verb. If it isn't, then it won't touch it.

Drunken_Sailor — While I see what you're saying, I don't agree. Changing first person pronouns to third person is much harder than doing what I want to do. Changing first person writing is difficult because you can't change it to anything: "I think this is good so I'll show it to you now" can't be rephrased, the entire sentence needs to be removed.

Given that the bot only changes things when it's easy to do so, I think this is fine. How about we start it off as "manual" but then switch it over to automatic...? Or have the bot deal with the obvious cases and a human with the more ambiguous situations? *shrugs*

Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 19:15, 23 August 2017 (UTC)

Oh, I see.--

Apple502j (talk | contribs) 00:46, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

Well how would you know between obvious and ambiguous? It may end up causing more grammar errors, correct? And are you going to add a dictionary with every word in the English language?

As a solution, could you not press ⌘+F and find any case of he or she and you just replace it? After all, I have not seen many complaints about this anywhere; though I am supportive of being gender neutral.

Cυƨтσмнαcκεя ( тαʟκ | cσптяıв ) 00:53, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

After hearing (or rather, seeing) what Customhacker said, I have to agree. I mean, this is easier for a human to do than some things that other existing bots do.

I also agree with Customhacker that you could just use CTRL-F (⌘-F on Mac). It wouldn't be that hard in my opinion to go to a bunch of articles and do that, and edit as needed. I don't think there should be a whole bot for this, but it's a good idea for something for wiki editors to look out for when editing articles.

bigpuppy talk ▪︎ contribs 02:14, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

I think Ctrl/Cmd-F is still a bit too tedious - but I now think that this wouldn't actually need a bot account, just a CP post whenever you want to run the script, for some heads-up.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 12:40, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

I would disagree: Eg on the article Blocks, there are no "he" or "she." Even if it was a script, couldnt it still cause more grammar errors that we would have to fix. Also, how would you tell "he" from "then"? Would it cause the bot to place "ttheym"?

Cυƨтσмнαcκεя ( тαʟκ | cσптяıв ) 14:18, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘No, it will replace 'he/she' string, not he or she. --
Apple502j (talk | contribs) 22:55, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

For example

He/She has a car.

They have a car.

He is a good boy.←kept

--

Apple502j (talk | contribs) 23:03, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

Yes, only he/she and its other forms are converted, not either one by itself:

he/she tries -> they try

he tries -> he tries

his/her projects -> their projects

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 01:07, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Customhacker, a script can check if a word is surrounded by word-boundaries (spaces), or punctuation marks. And again, "then" wouldn't be converted for another reason, "he" is kept, it's "he/she" that's changed. And, um, a dictionary with every word -- I've seen them. They sell them in shops, and they can be found in libraries: they exist. Online ones too, and some of them have APIs so you can make requests. I define an ambiguity as a sentence containing ["he/she" then <not VERB>]. I would convert ["he/she" then <VERB>], however, since it's clearly just a matter of changing the number of the verb.

Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 16:50, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

If they bot generated statistics on pages with he/she instances, grammar issues, etc this would be OK. I feel like this bot would be bound to leave errors, and if run many times, would leave a few grammar errors. For all cases of grammar-fixing, bots << humans

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 17:21, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Thinking about that, that's an even better idea. It would search through the page and look for grammar problems, but not fix them.

Before somebody comes and says you don't even need an account to read API data, I have an idea:

If it finds grammar errors, the only edit it would make is add a category - Category:Pages with Detected Grammar Errors, or whatever we might decide to call the category - and maybe add an HTML comment next to the possible error.

That, I think, would be a good purpose for this - but...

I feel like bots are generally discouraged - scmb1 dislikes them and older admins disapprove of them. I kinda think that this task could be combined with another bot's - probably VoxBot since it's also a grammar bot.

So I don't really know whether this deserves an account of its own - though it's a good idea (with mine combined :P) I think it could be combined with another bot.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 04:49, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘For only one task, for a bot you might as well add it to VoxBot since it's counted as cleanup.
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 19:37, 26 August 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, this is the kind of thing VoxBot was made for. I don't know if this deserves its own account - though if it's added to another bot then you definitely deserve credit for the idea in the bot's user page.

kenny2scratch Talk Contribs Directory 15:35, 2 September 2017 (UTC)

AutoDeleter

AutoDeleter will search the wiki for files that are no longer in use. To prevent incorrect deletes, the bot will add the page on a public queue on its userpage for 3 days before deletion. It does this 24 hours after the file has been unlinked from all places. This way, no file is deleted incorrectly. Additionally, it has a limit of 5 deletes a day so that damage can be restored easily. It will be implemented in either Node.js or possibly Python. The bot will have a one-time run -- deleting currently unused pages, and then it will listen for edits and check the edits to see if any files have been unlinked.

I don't know for a fact that an existing bot does not do this, I simply saw in the "Recent Changes" lots of deletes and the account was a main account.
-unsigned comment by jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs)

The script used to make the mass delete was actually automated. It was just done on a main account since it required having deletion privileges. About a week before, a warning was placed on all files that were slated to be deleted, and removing the warning prevent the files from being deleted. However, I think it is best to have this be a process that we do periodically rather than constantly (i.e. delete all of the unused files in one go every few months). Unused files aren't a huge problem, so it doesn't really hurt anybody if they aren't deleted immediately.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 03:08, 12 December 2016 (UTC)

I don't think that someone would let a bot be an admin. Also no offense.

Ziggy741 (talk | contribs) 02:41, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

The comment I did before on this page was for jokebookservice1.

Ziggy741 (talk | contribs) 02:42, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

I think the bot should be rejected - According to the archive, we are not giving sysop privileges to a bot/anyone who wasn't elected.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 08:35, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ @Ziggy714 - I don't understand why not: bots are more trustworthy than humans, and don't make mistakes.

@Banana439monkey & @Ziggy741 - But currently it *is* a bot. This bot has already been implemented and is already being used (see @jvvg's comment). There seems to be absolutely no difference between an alt account running it, or the main doing it. It does not change very much. The reason - I assume - that there is no "bot with privileges", is that there will be very few bots that need this category that there is no point in making it
Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 19:26, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

Yeah, but see the archive and look at the first request (at the bottom) or see the bottom row on the table.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 19:32, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

Opinions and rules do change over time and circumstances. Just because before it was not allowed before does not mean it should not be allowed now.

Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 19:38, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

But bots can fudge up the wiki a whole lot more if it has sysop privileges than if not.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 20:23, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

Please read @jvvg's comment. It is already automated. It already has some more privileges than normal bots. It just is also a main account. If it were marked as a bot, it wouldn't make it any more dangerous.

Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 20:36, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

Someone could request to make a bot that would need to be an admin. Then that user would have admin rights because they could log on to the bot's account.

Ziggy741 (talk | contribs) 00:45, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

The process we already have in place for auto-deleting unused files works fine. It doesn't really matter whether it's done by a dedicated or main account. Since this is a task that isn't run that frequently (and as I stated earlier, I don't think it's necessary to make this more frequent), there isn't really much of a need to make this have its own account.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:12, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘@Ziggy Doing that could open the wiki to vunerabilities.
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 08:29, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

I wasn't suggesting to do that I was saying how someone could get admin rights also no offense.

Ziggy741 (talk | contribs) 15:39, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Formatter

Formatter is a bot which fixes the formatting and scratchblocks code on the wiki. It will be hopefully done in PHP.
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 19:44, 3 October 2016 (UTC)

I brought this up with the other EWs, and hopefully we'll get back to you soon. This is definitely a good idea, and at the moment we're deciding whether it's better to let it have a dedicated bot or to integrate it into an existing bot.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:50, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

1. OMG.

2. Sorry if I fudged up the formatting in the table.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 17:26, 4 October 2016 (UTC)

Has the decision been made?

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 18:18, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

We're still discussing it.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 20:12, 6 October 2016 (UTC)

Is this something that would just run once (i.e. fix legacy scratchblocks then it's done) or something that would run periodically (i.e. more than just once)?

jvvg (talk | contribs) 00:50, 7 October 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ It will run all the time because it will run in a loop, checking for broken pages and fixing them.
banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 06:59, 7 October 2016 (UTC)

When you say "fixes the formatting", do you mean the general formatting of pages, or scratchblocks only?

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 14:39, 7 October 2016 (UTC)

Fixing all the wiki markup formatting broken as well as the scratchblocks. That's why I added the template to the broken template.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 17:21, 7 October 2016 (UTC)

Does wiki markup formatting needs fixing (is that a problem)? Also, when you pass your bot through the wiki for broken scratchblocks, the blocks will be fixed. Doesn't that mean that your bot will only need to be run once? Thanks for keeping up with me!

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 00:07, 8 October 2016 (UTC)

1. If it's broken on some pages, yes. 2. Not necessarily. What if something is added and the formatting is broken? Formatter checks around the wiki 24/7 to see if anyone added anything, which breaks the formatting.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 06:44, 8 October 2016 (UTC)

Your bot idea has been passed! You now need to code the bot. Tell us when you're done coding, and we'll tell you what to test!

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 16:29, 9 October 2016 (UTC)

It appears Banana that you don't know PHP, or any coding language besides HTML. Since you don't know how to code Formatter, the bot request is rejected.

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 16:22, 16 October 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ I should add one more note to not look like a hypocrite. The Python side of InterwikiBot was written in Python and endorsed by the Wikimedia Commons, but I did not write it. So what's the difference between InterwikiBot and Formatter?

InterwikiBot is tried and true. It has been used on several other wikis, and is trusted by Wikimedia Commons. Meanwhile, if Formatter were coded tomorrow by a Scratcher, it would not have been tested before. That means we don't have something to trust it by.

This situation has highlighted the need for some additional clarity in the bot request process. Jvvg will be adding that soon. :)
ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 19:36, 16 October 2016 (UTC)

Jvvg and I discussed about asking KrIsMa adding formatter to VoxBot.

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 19:40, 16 October 2016 (UTC)

I know about that. I'm just double checking with KrIsMa that they're okay with the merge.

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 20:23, 16 October 2016 (UTC)

KrIsMa is okay with it.

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 20:59, 16 October 2016 (UTC)

I don't think that rejecting a bot based on the fact it cannot be implemented yet is very logical. Right now, other people who come to this page that might know how to implement the bot - but think that the bot shouldn't exist and so won't implement it. Perhaps a different status, like "Needs implementation" would be better? (Just my opinion though)

Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 14:32, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

I do agree with you in general, but in this specific case banana439monkey was going around asking other people to code the bot, indicating they do not know how to code it themself. When someone requests a bot, we need them code it themself in order to avoid problems, and in this case it was clear that would not happen.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 19:28, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Alright then
Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 20:50, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Is this section going to get archived?

Ziggy741 (talk | contribs) 15:57, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

I still do not understand. I think that this bot is promising (though I'd prefer a one-time run bot that checks for scratchblocks mistakes (especially a one-time run for fixes from the old version of Scratch). If it is being rejected just because of the person suggesting the bot - and not the bot itself - then are duplicate requests allowed?

Jokebookservice1 (talk | contribs) 19:48, 13 December 2016 (UTC)

In this case, the bot was rejected because of the user requesting it, more specifically because banana439monkey was asking other people to write the code without knowing how to code it themself. You are welcome to request this yourself if you are able to code it yourself. If that's what you intend to do, please initiate a new request and we will consider it.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:14, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Also the user who codes the bot could make it seem like it's okay and then when the bot gets an account they could made the bot do bad stuff.

Ziggy741 (talk | contribs) 02:43, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Sandbot

Since WM notifies people and clears the sandbox without doing the first thing I said, we could make a new bot with the sandbox code and jvvg can remove what I copied. Sandbot wouldn't only clear the sandbox out every four hours, it would be running all of the time. Once, WM missed about 9 sessions of clearing out the sandbox and I had to do it for the bot. Sandbot would flush out every sandbox every four months unless it's manually done.

banana439monkey (My talk page | Contributions | Scratch) 07:16, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

I am highly confused by what you just said. What is the first thing you said? What is the sandbox code? What is it that you copied?

Also, you said Sandbot would be running 24/7, but only clear the sandbox every four months. Hence, wouldn't Sandbot only run once every for months?

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 15:47, 19 April 2016 (UTC)

1. WikiMonitor notifies people when they "make a mistake" 2. It's in jvvg's WM repository 3. I actually said every, so that means other people's for them.

banana439monkey (My talk page | Contributions | :Scratch) 18:08, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

User sandboxes are governed under userspace rules and this means that other users (including bots) are not allowed to clear them, so one of the purposes of your bot is not allowed under Wiki rules. Also, the reason that WM hasn't cleared the sandbox recently is due to some network issues I'm having at home where for some reason nothing at my house can connect to the Wiki.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 19:02, 20 April 2016 (UTC)

I didn't know that, but I knew you couldn't edit a userpage unless it was a grammar error.

banana439monkey (My talk page | Contributions | Scratch) 18:13, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

You're not allowed to edit grammar errors either. According to the Wiki userspace policy, you can only edit someone else's userpage if you have been given permission or if there is something that obviously violates the guidelines.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 18:54, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

Oh, right. Shall I reject the bot request then?

banana439monkey (My talk page | Contributions | Scratch) 18:55, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Or should I use this just on my sandbox?

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 07:27, 16 May 2016 (UTC)

Hello?

banana439monkey (Talk | Contribs | Scratch | Edits (3,110)) 06:54, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

Like I said before, given that this bot violates userspace policy and has very limited use. I'm going to mark it as rejected.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 13:38, 18 May 2016 (UTC)

Notifier

Hello! There has been talk about people wishing that they would be notified if they were mentioned in a comment. Currently, we have to put "reply to [username]" on the edit summary, hoping that whoever we're talking to happens to see it in Recent Changes. This bot would search through the wiki looking for the '@' symbol. If it finds one, it will check the word next to it (username) to see if it's registered on the wiki. If so, it will leave a message on their talk page linking them to the place they were mentioned. What do you think?
St19_Galla Talk • Contribs

@St19_Galla Good idea!

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 20:58, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

I think there is an extension for this, and I'm currently looking for it. However, if I can't find it, this could be a good idea.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 21:09, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

Nice idea! If we do it, we can't make the edits minor b/c it would bypass the talk page notification and that is crucial for this bot to work.

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 21:14, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

Good idea! I also support.

Hamish752 (talk | contribs) 21:28, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

You don't need a newline before your sig.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 21:31, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ So where do we think this bot will go? :)
St19_Galla Talk • Contribs

Not sure. I want to see some other opinions, and I'm looking up whatever extension Wikipedia uses to allow you to notify people.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 00:53, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

I found the Echo extension as an alternative. What does everybody think of that?

jvvg (talk | contribs) 00:56, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

rm echoextension

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 02:41, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

If it can be toggled on and off to help deal with lots of messages, I would agree with that extension.

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 03:21, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

In my opinion, that makes the Wiki like a social networking site.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 03:40, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

The problem with Echo is that the Wiki might become a popularity contest to some people, like Scratch itself already is.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 20:14, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

I think the Echo extension would actually hurt the Wiki, where this bot would help.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 16:16, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

See my comments on Jvvg's talk page.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 15:11, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ It doesn't matter at all whether the messages are private or public, and personally I would rather not have lots of bot messages telling me about replies cluttering up my talk page. I can delete them, but that takes time. Having a separate system to notify users (something similar to then notification you get when someone comments on your talk page) is what I think is optimal, since it doesn't clutter up your talk page and doesn't make any page edits. Your suggestion of trying echo is also not as easy as it sounds. Installing an extension requires getting approval from the ST and then having them install it. Echo would involve modifying the database structure, so it is a significant commitment. Likewise, writing a bot would take a lot of time (I can tell you this from experience) and would also require extensive testing. We need to pick an option and go with it.
jvvg (talk | contribs) 16:25, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

Also, about the popularity angle/lying about how many messages you receive: we already are clear that you shouldn't try to make the Wiki about status or popularity (which is why discussing edit counts is discouraged). We actually already can brag about how many replies we do or don't get, since you can see them in the RC. However, if you look around, nobody actually does, and if they did, we would probably ask them to stop. In a similar vein, there is no evidence to show that people would argue about how many notifications they would get.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 16:28, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

MeowBot

I would like to make a bot for this:

Archive the CP when it gets over 30 discussions with {{done}}; leaving {{not done}} ones
Automatically remove S:CPND threads with {{done}}
Add "Is this a Flame War?" when two users are the only ones on a discussion and the use CAPITAL LETTERS places besides the first letters of words
Notify the currently most active EW/Admin when Category:Pages in Need of Deletion gets over 5 pages
Place a message here when it archives it saying, "This talk page was recently archived by a bot."
Any talk page-related suggestion anyone has

I think "MeowBot" would be a good name. I made a logo:
The problem is, I have no idea how to make a bot. Can anyone please help? (I will give credit on the bot's user page.)
Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 03:38, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

My commentary:

Archiving: we sometimes keep certain threads, even those without "not done" from being archived, and protecting the archives would require giving admin privileges, which we don't want to do
Sometimes there is post-action discussion about done threads, and they shouldn't be removed anyway in case people want to look at them later
Flame wars are exceedingly rare on the Wiki, and they can happen in a lot of ways besides just using a lot of caps, and there are times I need to use all caps, for example if I were describing BYOB.
Deleting: We already check RC fairly frequently
The last one: see the first

jvvg (talk | contribs) 14:51, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

The archive message would be so that we knew to get any threads that we still wanted. The deleting thing would be just in case RC stuff got buried. I would have an "All-Caps Exception List" that would have things like BYOB, BeetleBlocks, and TurtleStitch. Also, if you have more suggestions, please make sure they are talk page-related.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 15:52, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

Also, the archive message would mean "Please unarchive all wanted threads and protect the archive."

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 17:36, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

Also, it would only archive {{Done}} threads.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 20:57, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

Having to unarchive threads wouldn't actually save any work, since it's not any harder to make an archive without the needed threads than to unarchive them, and the caps thing could still easily fail in many cases, like if I need to contact MIT about something (my point is that it would be pretty much impossible to create a list of all the exceptions). Archiving the done threads automatically is still a bad idea as I said before, since there still can be post-action discussion, and un-archiving them takes just as much as archiving them, as I said before.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 21:11, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

On S:CPND, Done threads could be moved to Scratch Wiki Talk:Community Protal/Not Done/Now Done. If I figure the coding out, could I make a "Fake CP" on my userspace and test it there?

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 21:16, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘With the exception list, how do you think AutoCorrect dictionaries are made? By people. Thgis will be a lot smaller than that.
Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 21:24, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

I chose a language: Python for editing, UNIX/Linux/Mac bash shell script for automation. Anyone can help the editing, you'll need a UNIX-like system for automation.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 21:36, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

It would need to be "MeowerBot" or "Meower," MeowBot is a chatbot with an account on Scratch.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 21:49, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

I don't know if you have had the same experiences I have had with autocorrect, but it has messed up a lot of my sentences. This would have fairly large risk for false positives for something that occurs vanishingly infrequently. You are also not addressing my point of having to move around threads so your bot doesn't archive them by accident: the whole point of bots is to reduce work for everybody. However, if we still have to move/unarchive threads, and now there's the level of a bot going around and doing stuff when we don't necessarily expect it, that actually adds more work.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 21:56, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

Mine puts a red zig-zag under misspelled words. EDIT: Do we ever put {{done}} on threads we are still discussing?

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 22:07, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

Mine corrects the words, and your bot would interject messages, which would either confuse or further enrage users. We also occasionally still have to discuss things when done is on them, and it's good to let them sit around for a while so that there is time to make sure it really is done.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 22:41, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Maybe {{not done}}, {{done}} and {{ready to archive}}?
Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 22:45, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

I guess you could call it a "reverse spambot."

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 22:52, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

We need to think about this carefully: does this bot cause or create problems? Does it reduce work, leave it unchanged, or cause more? Requiring people to mark discussions as ready to archive is difficult, and when we archive the entire CP at once like we already do (and have a human do it - it's not that hard, and we only do that every few weeks), it's pretty easy to pull out the still active threads.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 23:00, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

It would do the entire archive at once. When we got over, say, 40 treads, it would say, "Please place {{Ready to archive}} on all ready-to-archive threads. Once the template {{Archive Now}} is added, this page will automatically be archived."

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 02:10, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

It stills seems like the bot does not really save any work. Admins still have to come in and protect the page, and users have to post several templates.

Of the other functions, most seem like they would best be handled by a human, although notifying admins/EW about pages in need of deletion sounds slightly interesting, even if unnecessary.

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 22:38, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

How funny, @Hamish752 said the same thing on his (or is it her?) talk page! My answer is there.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 02:01, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ I'm male. That is quite funny actually, we practically said the exact same thing :P.
Hamish752 (talk | contribs) 05:57, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Huh, that is interesting.

@Mitopolis: A bot cannot protect any page. That means you would have to use a reminder, which is itself slightly cluttering.

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 16:56, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Well, technically it can, if it has admin privileges. IIRC.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 20:38, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Would it be possible to make it only able to EWPlus protect?

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 20:44, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Protection is a feature that is very sensitive and an accidental protection can often go unnoticed. In order to prevent mistakes or abuse, we don't want to give protection privileges to any user who is not an administrator.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:39, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

OK. But could it detect the protection and automatically remove its notification after the page was protected? This would be a bot like no other bot anyone has written. Python for communication, Linux shell script for processing.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 02:56, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Yes, you can query the protection status of a page. See the Mediawiki API page: API Info

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 16:39, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘MediaWiki is very complicated at times. *Sigh*
Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 16:43, 3 March 2016 (UTC)

I made a MW bot base in Java, and I agree, MW can be complicated. However, MW also allows for flexibility, which is nice.

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 21:56, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

HelpBot

I think having a HelpBot will really help new users know what to do in the Wiki because I remember when I was new I didn't have much of an idea on what I should do and need to do. The Welcome message is detailed at all and we really need something to be detailed. I've already started working on a message it would put out to new users. Any comments on this?
AghaCool (talk | contribs) 23:45, 21 February 2016 (UTC)

Hmm well if you think the Welcome message isn't detailed enough, why not suggest a change?

Hamish752 (talk | contribs) 00:04, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

Well, I'm not sure if it'll change...since they've had it for so long.

AghaCool (talk | contribs) 00:06, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

And adding on to it, if someone had about more than 5 alerts from the WikiMonitor the HelpBot would display a message based on what those alerts have been saying and what they can do to change it in a more detailed way. I think this bot will be a great addition and will help many new users and just users in general. I know this will be a great bot. Maybe could we at least test it and see how it goes?

AghaCool (talk | contribs) 00:12, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

You know, if you want the welcome message changed, all you have to do is ask me and I can change it. However, on a more general note, if we're going to talk to users about trends, it's best to have a person do it, since the person can provide specific commentary and identify what's the most important issue at the time. Furthermore, we have already rejected bots for welcoming users, and I don't want to go there again.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 00:40, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

Good idea! I definitely think this bot would be very helpful. At first, we planned bots to keep the wiki running smoothly. Now we are planning bots to keep what keeps the wiki running smoothly running smoothly!

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 03:16, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ xD. That was one very confusing sentence.
Hamish752 (talk | contribs) 06:01, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

@jvvg Is the welcome text hardcoded? If so, maybe it should be a protected template that gets subst:ed instead, to make it easier for admins to edit. That's how Wikipedia does it, and it makes a lot of sense.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 09:46, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

The welcome text is at MediaWiki:Confirmaccount-welc. It actually is substituted, and can be changed by any administrator at any time.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 14:55, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Right, i remember that now. It just wasn't so clear from your statement above, but i'll forgive you for it.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 20:35, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

If we do use this, I planned a system called "interbot" you could use for communicating with WM. I'll explain it if this get accepted.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 21:24, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

@Hamish752: I also don't support as per jvvg. Welcome bots have previously been rejected and condensing repeat warnings is done better by hand.

Mitopolis: When did "interbot" enter the conversation? It seems off-topic.

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 21:54, 7 March 2016 (UTC)

Why are helping bots a bad idea? Also, Interbot was something I came up with that could be useful to this.

Mitopolis (Talk | Contributions | Edits | Scratch account) 01:33, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Welcoming bots aren't a great idea because there's already a welcome message, and there's no point having a second one. If you'd like the Welcome message changed, go ahead and suggest a change.
Hamish752 (talk | contribs) 05:42, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

@Hamish752 Unless someone stops the automated message when their account's approved. Usually, it's just a speech. Maybe have the "Welcome to the scratch wiki guide" as the welcome message?

banana439monkey (My talk page | Contributions | Scratch) 07:44, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

WikiMaster

WikiMaster will Redirect-related tasks (removing redirect to redirect, etc.) and Info tasks (counting users, statistics, etc.) CoolBoy5677 user | talk | contribs | edits 07:33, 6 May 2015 (GMT)

Removing redirect to redirects are easily human-replaceable with the special pages, and info tasks can be run by user account.

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 15:13, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

CoolBot

CoolBot will fix errors/mistakes on the Wiki.
CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 21:13, 2 May 2015 (GMT)

What sort of errors/mistakes?

jvvg (talk | contribs) 20:31, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

Any

CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 21:39, 2 May 2015 (GMT)

There are pretty much infinite possibilities for errors that people could make. For that reason, writing a bot that fixes all of them would be impossible. A bot needs to have a very specific and well-defined task. For example, when making WikiMonitor, it was difficult even to come up with the definition of an unsigned post (i.e. what criteria distinguished a talk page post from a different edit to a talk page).

jvvg (talk | contribs) 20:47, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

Well... It could fix spelling mistakes/errors and it could fix other stuff.

CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 10:13, 3 May 2015 (GMT)

Hello, when you said the bot would fix "any" example, that isn't really answering the question of "what [sorts] or errors/mistakes [it would fix]". If you can list out some examples of what it would fix, we can continue this bot request! In the meantime, please stop adding new bot requests - as that confuses everyone, and if you have more questions, you are free to ask here!

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 17:05, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ I wanted to request all of them bots. They were different names. I said it could fix spelling mistakes/errors and it could fix other stuff. CoolBoy5677 user | talk | contribs | edits 18:23, 3 May 2015 (GMT)

I deleted them because they had not a header, but please do not put them back - because making multiple bot requests confuses all of us.

Anyways, have you read Scratch Wiki:Bots?

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 17:24, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

Yes, I have read that page. Ok. So... lets talk about CoolBot, not over things.

CoolBoy5677 user | talk | contribs | edits 18:39, 3 May 2015 (GMT)

Ok! What specific mistakes do you want your bot to fix? Give about 3 examples :)

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 21:16, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

Hmm... it could maybe fix spelling mistakes/errors, image/file errors (where you type the wrong file name in and it comes up as a red link, the bot will try and find the correct file and convert it) and it will delete pages if they are based on a User Content, not 100% relatable to Scratch and if it junk.

CoolBoy5677 user | talk | contribs | edits 08:37, 4 May 2015 (GMT)

Okay. First, it's practically impossible to fix spelling errors so a human has to do so. Second, I think that's impossible to "search" the file. Third, the bot cannot judge accurately if it's based on user content or allowed content. For all of those, a human can do that. I'm sorry but I think this bot has to be rejected.

PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 20:51, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Is this going to be rejected? CoolBoy5677 user | talk | contribs | edits 07:34, 6 May 2015 (GMT)

I'm not a EW so I dunno.

PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 21:38, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

WikiBot

WikiBot will Test tasks (testing scratch wiki) and Typography tasks (spell check, etc.)
CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 10:18, 3 May 2015 (GMT)

Not sure...

PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 12:14, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

We have already discussed this before on other bots... fixing spelling or grammar with a bot is next to impossible due to the complexity of the English language and the often specialized vocabulary that accompanies Scratch.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 12:52, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

Well then it will just Test tasks (testing scratch wiki.)

CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 14:01, 3 May 2015 (GMT)

If you're just reading pages (and not making edits), then you don't need a dedicated bot. You can just run that using the API scripts without an account.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 13:08, 3 May 2015 (UTC)

Ok!

CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 14:12, 3 May 2015 (GMT)

WikiBot

WikiBot will fix the wiki in different ways, and it will fix links on here, e.g. If I do a / at the end of {User:CoolBoy5677/|CoolBoy5677}, it won`t work but if I do {User:CoolBoy5677|CoolBoy5677}, it does work. I know I am suppose to {{ }} but then it would have my whole profile here. The bot will fix that.
CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 12:43, 02 May 2015 (GMT)

I think the VoxBot does that.

PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 12:34, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

Well VoxBot doesn`t really do it correct. It happens to me lots and VoxBot does nothing

CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 13:42, 2 April 2015 (GMT)

VoxBot doesn't fix that - so you are good

If you want, you can look at User:VoxBot#Task for more info! :)

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 16:12, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

However, the following requirements need to be considered: "Is your bot's task already done by a human or could it easily be done by a human?" "Is your bot's task similar to the task of an existing bot or could it easily be added to an existing bot?" "If your bot is designed to fix a problem, is it a significant problem that happens repeatedly or something rare?"

Here are my answers to each one: 1. Putting a slash at the end of a link is an easy error to fix. 2. This could easily be added to VoxBot. 3. I have hardly ever seen this happen. For those reasons, I don't think that this proposed task merits a bot.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 18:08, 2 May 2015 (UTC)

Ok. Can I change what it does then?

CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 21:15, 2 May 2015 (UTC+1)

AntiRedLink

This bot will convert red links into plain text. If a redlink is needed, you can just put {{NoBots}} or some special template.
PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 20:54, 20 April 2015 (UTC)

the point of a red link is to leave it in order to make it more convenient for others to create the page :)

Mathfreak231 (talk | contribs) 22:36, 20 April 2015 (UTC)

Still, they can just click it before the bot reaches it.

PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 02:12, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

Red links are an important feature of a wiki; there was at one point a campaign to remove red links or create redirects for them, but this was reversed because it was determined that they are indeed useful in assessing what is needed on the wiki.

veggieman001 (talk | contribs) 04:44, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

Can anyone read this?

PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 01:41, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

"It is useful...to indicate that a page will be created soon or that an article should be created for the topic".

jvvg (talk | contribs) 14:34, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Let me tweak it.
PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 14:52, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

How often do pages have "too many" red links, though? (Also, it should be "many", not "much")

jvvg (talk | contribs) 17:10, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

Hmmmm....

PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 22:08, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

I'm just not sure this is enough of a problem on the wiki to merit a bot...

veggieman001 (talk | contribs) 04:51, 26 April 2015 (UTC)

Oh well, you can reject this. I'll try again if I have an annoying problem.

PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 17:46, 26 April 2015 (UTC)

I don`t think this is a good idea. Like what veggieman001 and Mathfreak231 said.

CoolBoy5677 (talk | contribs) 13:46, 2 May 2015 (GMT)

BlockerBot discussion

Any thoughts? I will be programming it in Python. 😉
PrincessPandaLover (talk | contribs) 22:19, 5 March 2015 (UTC)

The block message is no longer allowed due to community consensus.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 02:23, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

Tweaker

Opinions, people? Huh?
Krett12 (talk | contribs) 13:44, 28 September 2014 (UTC)

For archiving the CP, no, as 1. archives need to be protected and we've already established we are not giving sysop privileges to someone who is not a sysop. 2. While it's generally archived when over a certain size, sometimes archiving is held off if several important discussions are still going on, or at least those discussions are not archived, and a bot would likely have at least some errors with that. For removing old {{In Progress}} templates, that's a task that comes up fairly rarely and is easy for humans to do, and as such does not merit a bot. For clearing the sandbox, WM already does that, and it works pretty well. What would be the point of transferring the task to another bot? All that would serve to do is make things more complicated and cause problems.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 14:09, 28 September 2014 (UTC)

I've thought about all of those things already. 1) If I win the next EW election, you said there was such a thing as EW protection. Tweaker for EW? 2) It can look for the {{Not done}} template, and for the In Progress thing, it happens more often than it seems like it does. 3) Given the type of bot I am requesting, it would make more since for this script to do it. Actually, I take that back, WM can keep clearing the sandbox.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 14:13, 28 September 2014 (UTC)

1. EW protection was never added. I requested it, but it didn't happen. That notwithstanding, EWs can't protect pages at all. Only admins can protect pages for any level. 2. Still, for example right now, the election is still being discussed and doesn't have that template.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 14:31, 28 September 2014 (UTC)

Oh, okay. This can be rejected. BTW, with the archives thing I thought "KRISMA" said "KRETT12".

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 14:40, 28 September 2014 (UTC)

Haha, I kinda see why you thought that. :3

derpmeup (talk | contribs) 14:43, 28 September 2014 (UTC)

FAQBot

Will be written in Python and will categorize any page that ends with "?" to know that it is an FAQ page, no page ends with "?" other than faq pages, right? I want to prevent this and this from happening again.
JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 19:35, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

I think humans can do that. Besides, WM should remind you.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 20:02, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Well I think automatically categorizing it is better because lots of people forget.

JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 20:07, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

it seems like a bot that has too "narrow", i mean it only has one task and that is it. it would be cool to make a ategorization bot that categorizes all uncategorized pages, but i dont think this is a big enough bot (if you know what i mean ;)

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 20:11, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

In the instructions, it says "Would your bot help the Wiki as a whole, and not just a few specific users or articles?" (the answer should be yes). This would only help a few articles. Anyway, as stated above, WM already reminds you if you forget to categorize a page. Also, is this even really a chronic problem? Remember the old quote, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".

jvvg (talk | contribs) 21:54, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Yup. Rejected.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 15:04, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

Someone please mark this as rejected I will request one that categorizes EVERY page.

JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 15:06, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ I can already tell you that one will be rejected too, as it is extremely difficult (i.e. impossible) to tell the category of a page with a bot and have it be accurate. Just enforcing the category rule with WM works fine.
jvvg (talk | contribs) 15:09, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

Before you even start that discussion, a machine can't know what category something belongs to. Face it: human brains > bots.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 15:10, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

OK, just mark this as rejected.

JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 15:21, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

SysopBot

I guess I can't really "test on main account" as I'm not a sysop
Krett12 (talk | contribs) 22:36, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

How is the bot supposed to know when a new sds studio is released and what it's description is?

JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 12:32, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

It pulls it off the main site's front page, it can just read the new description by looking at the link. Also, I have come up with a few more ideas.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 13:37, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

(1.How will it do that? If a different piece of news comes up it might say that.(2.What programming language?

JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 13:45, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Making this bot would essentially be making you a sysop. I think it's better to have the news be a bit out of date than to let a user who hasn't been chosen by the community or Scratch Team become a sysop. In addition, checking for talk archives is not always easy, and it is possible that a user won't want them protected immediately. As I have said many times, not every task needs to be automated.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 14:22, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

PHP. And besides, it's September, an admin election is due. Am I not good enough? OK, but I really think that it should happen instantly, and it's worth pointing out that bots don't get tired. So, if the community think I can become a sysop, is SysopBot maybe in the question?

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 17:24, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

I don't think we need a sysop bot, or even a new human sysop. jvvg, Mathfreak, and i are doing fine. If anyone would be promoted, it would likely be someone who is already an EW.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 17:27, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Scimonster made the point for me. Also, an admin election is due?^{[citation needed]} Scratch Wiki:Elections says "as deemed necessary by the community". Nowhere does it say "every year". We hold them whenever feel it's necessary, and we held the last one because Sci wasn't able to be as active as before. At the moment, we have sufficient sysops to administrate the Wiki, and if we deem it necessary to make a bot with sysop capabilities, it will probably just run on one of our main accounts.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 18:02, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Bots should, in my opinion, only be run on main accounts if it's going to be temporary. This won't be temporary. Besides, you didn't become an admin because they're weren't enough, you said so yourself. Besides, more contributors means more admins. Also, one more thing, even if we don't end of making a SysopBot, I still have some ideas for EWbot.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 18:12, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

I was chosen because I was already an elected an EW, and as Sci said above the next new admin, whoever it may be, will probably already be an EW. Anyway, you're missing my main point which is the fact that we just don't feel the need for this bot. It's not that hard to update the news and it's never more than a day or two out of date. Automating the tasks such as updating the news and weeding out bad account requests take time, and are also prone to errors. Automation is not the solution to everything.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 18:29, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

I think it's already bad enough it's not pulled directly off the main site. A bot is the next best thing. I agree with you for other news items, but curator and sds should really be automated. Also, I'm not talking about all the request, just the things easy to automate. Everything might not need automating, but this sure does.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 18:53, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Automating it just makes it more error-prone. You weren't around yet when WM was first created, but it was a pretty rocky start, and it took months to completely iron out all of the bugs. A bot to update the news would be similar, except prospective contributors would also see it. Do we want to risk the Wiki looking bad in exchange for slight convenience, especially when maintaining it wouldn't even be that convenient? I made WM because I was seeing people make the errors it detects on a daily basis, while this would be once every two weeks. Anyway, remember this and this.
jvvg (talk | contribs) 19:36, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

For years, the wiki ran just fine without a single bot. That's right, not one. Then we got all these new users (you, KrIsMa, and some more), and suddenly automation became the hot new thing. What's wrong with the tried and true?

Let's look at the second XKCD that jvvg linked to (and i do trust Randall here). Let's say it's a weekly task, and automating would save 5 minutes. Over a 5 year stretch, it wouldn't be worthwhile to spend more than 1 day programming it. Something tells me it would be more than a day.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 20:00, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

So, how about this. We start it with a different, false news page, and then if it seems to work then we can transfer it. Besides, account requests are on the daily.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 21:41, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

Alright, I think I'll do that . Also, once it's done, it'll STOP errors, not create them. For example, the most current news item by a human has the timestamp of AUGUST 1st.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 23:38, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

One copy-paste mistake isn't exactly representative of the whole system. Anyway, as Sci says, although it may seem easy to code and making a preliminary version would be pretty simple, it is error-prone. From my experience with WM, whenever it seems it's been working fine for a while, a new bug pops up. While humans updating the news occasionally make mistakes, they are usually easily correctable, while a bot making a mistake could easily crash the entire Wiki. That's why we're hesitant to accept bots in the first place. Giving a bot sysop capabilities gives it the potential to make it even worse. The final thing is this: there is no RSS feed or equivalent service for the stuff you're looking to get. This means you'll need to parse the HTML from the Scratch Website front page. This requires some string manipulation. Then suppose the Scratch Team suddenly decides to redesign the front page. The Wiki news is now full of errors, while a human will just adapt to the new interface. You can say this will never happen, but I can give you a concrete counterexample. When I was programming the original comment verification system (on Mod Share, before I ported it to the Scratch Wiki), the Scratch Team changed the way in which comments were accessible in the API. Originally, they were stored in JSON, but one day they changed it to storing the raw HTML. This broke my code and people couldn't register on Mod Share. Now imagine the Scratch News being full of random HTML, and that's what would happen.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 00:13, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

Yes, but all that work can pay off later. For example, WM hasn't been making many errors lately. And also, if the Scratch Team redoes the page, we'll get some advance notice, like we all saw the beta. Or maybe, another solution would be to search the page for it. Hmm, I know this is gonna be hard, but believe me on this one, it'll pay off in a few months.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 00:47, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ I can tell you that I got no advance notice of redoing the comment API. I should also point out that WM still makes occasional errors, and the algorithm for catching users not signing posts is still imperfect and misses some. Saying it will pay off in a few months is also missing the whole point of the cartoon I linked to above (the one about saving time). Unless it can be programmed very quickly (and quick code = sloppy code, as I learned the hard way writing WM), it won't actually save time.
jvvg (talk | contribs) 00:56, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

Then again, a dev API might be different than redoing the entire front page, which is visible to millions of people.

I still think it is totally unnecessary. Automation has become the new fad, but it's really not needed. Yes, VoxBot cleans up typos and fixes links, which is helpful. Could we get along without it? Certainly. WikiMonitor is probably my favorite bot, because at some point people got lazy and stopped prodding new users. (I include myself in that.) Hmm, that could be part of why we got so few people who stayed for a while.

But anyways, a sysop bot will be much more trouble than it's worth.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 07:38, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm marking this one as rejected.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 11:02, 8 September 2014 (UTC)

I've got my PI on you

I do not think that the proposed bot is a good idea. It is extremely difficult to find, let alone fix first-person writing. It is even more difficult to find articles about Scratchers and Projects, as many articles (such as tutorials with links to examples) could look like they're about projects.
jvvg (talk | contribs) 19:21, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

Why is it not a good idea? It will look to a dictionary for a list of all possible names, but THIS time It won't change real words and sentences so nothing bad could happen.

JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 19:25, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

If it doesn't change anything, than you don't need a bot account. You can still use the API to get information without a bot account. Anyway, as I said before, there is a massive potential for false positives and very little to be gained. Bots should only be created to solve persistent problems (like the ones WM solves: uncategorized pages, excessive editing, and unsigned posts). Problems that only occur once in a blue moon (figuratively) don't need a bot.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 19:27, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

Actually when I made Scratch Wiki:Tools WM didn't categorize it and I've got my PI on you changes first person writing and will change articles based on a user/project but it won't change kaj, or removed pac-man project or normal text, it will only change first person writing and change articles about projects/users(Not including Pac-Man or Kaj).

JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 19:34, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

“	I do not think that the proposed bot is a good idea. It is extremely difficult to find, let alone fix first-person writing. It is even more difficult to find articles about Scratchers and Projects, as many articles (such as tutorials with links to examples) could look like they're about projects.	”
– jvvg

Also, WikiMonitor only notifies the user.
Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 00:58, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

You're completely missing a few points. 1. WM does not fix stuff for you, it just notifies users. 2. You say it does that, but I said above that that would be extremely problematic. Given your history with algorithms, I'm not inclined to believe that this one would be accurate enough that it's acceptable to run on the Wiki.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:01, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

Furthermore, citing something that WM does not do has absolutely no bearing on your bot. When I stated inaccuracy above, I also meant detection. There is basically no algorithm possible that could automatically detect what you are trying to do. Also, a note to all: please think about your bot before requesting it. Do we really need it? Is it solving a major problem or just a very occasional one? If it's just solving an occasional one, then it's likely to do more harm than good.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:14, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

you say your bot can also change articles to first person? I don't think that can work (for example, if it changes all "I" to "one", a paragraph such as "I make this block to this other block, and then I move the script and it works!" Will turn to "One make this block to this other block, and then one move the script and it works!" In a nutshell, grammar is very hard to correct even with a bot. Also you want to detect names and if it detects a lot of names it deletes the page? Hmm, that seems hard. Seems like there will be a lot of false positives (Scratch Wiki:Bots is a perfectly ok page but it has names in it -false positive-) To be honest, I think this is a good idea, but changing first person is out because of Help:Patrolled edits (really easy to detect) and the usernames one, for example, links to user made projects causes false positives, Scratch Team would too. (A lot of pages do, too!) :>

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 02:04, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

I have 4 valid problems with this bot:

1) No grammar correcting. EVER. Must be done by human minds. Changing first-person is not simple. You have to remember that certain verbs correspond to certain tenses in the English language. So no for that.

2) User detection can result in errors and be too difficult to implement, as well as the fact that some users are needed to be mentioned appropriately in articles.

3) The Wiki has enough bots why does everyone want a bot! Once one person has one everyone else feels "lesser" or something. It's like 10,000 years ago when someone finally tamed a wolf into a dog. Everyone else is like "woah man! I need that animal you got there". Or in a way it's like when the next iPhone comes out. "check out my phone girls". Other girl says: "No way what a sparkley case". Tech-savvy guy says: "Did the RAM increase?". And then next thing you know Joe and Bob and Susy Dusey Cue have to have sparkley phone cases and more RAM.

4) That name craves my hunger

Turkey3 (talk | contribs) 03:55, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

4 isn't a problem it's a craving - I'm hungry too now! apple or banana cream? :P

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 04:19, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

So, we do not need this bot.

Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 04:31, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

No bot
JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 07:55, 28 June 2014 (UTC)

JayceeMinecraft bot idea

Thank you for requesting a bot ideas. One question I have is what programming language are you going to program your bot in? Also, how will the bot know that someone deletes things on a page for no reason?
Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 17:25, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

If the user deletes over 12 lines and I will be using javascript, php, and python.

JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 17:27, 27 June 2014 (UTC)~

Also, I think this task could be easily be done by a human.

Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 17:34, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

But only EW's and higher can revert lots of edits at once, and Ew's and higher aren't on every second.

JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 17:36, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

However, I do not think this happens often.

Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 17:47, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘I've heard of this happening quite a few times and now we have a solution!
JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 17:58, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

There are many cases where deleting a large amount of a page is acceptable. Also, patrolling recent changes is something WM already does, and one of the criteria for making a bot is that it can't easily be added to an existing bot. I could code this in WM in a few minutes, so it fails in that respect. Finally, to address your concern, we actually do have EWs and admins on all the time. When I am around, I come on periodically throughout the day, and so do Sci and Mathfreak.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 18:12, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

One other thing: I can only remember this happening as a result of vandalism once in my time on the Wiki. Not to be mean, but I've been on the Wiki a lot longer than you, so I've seen more examples of vandalism and stuff.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 18:14, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

OK so this bot is rejected!
JayceeMinecraft user | talk | contributions 18:15, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

Move?

Could this be moved to Scratch_Wiki:Bots/Requests?

Also, I might want to request a bot of my own.

It would soft of be "in between" WikiMonitor and VoxBot. It would check for users breaking the Wiki Guidelines (WikiMonitor), but searching article-by-article, not using Recent Changes (VoxBot). For example, the word "I", if not in a talk page, and not in quotes, shouldn't be there. It would also double check other bots' work And also, if WikiMonitor asks a user to not do something, it doesn't actually change it. Maybe that should be fixed. My bot's name is Tweaker. Would this seem plausible?
Krett12 (talk | contribs) 13:10, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

I think it works where it is. If you are sure you want to request this bot, please put it in the table. Anyway, here's my comments on your bot proposal: 1. The "I" thing seems like a good idea. Just check it for false positives before running it. 2. Double-checking WM is redundant and unnecessary.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 13:42, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Maybe it should be one of those reference bots where it doesn't edit the wiki at all but instead parses the wiki and adds pages to a list which can be seen by the bot owner. Then, the owner can go through all the pages on the list and change what needs to be changed :)

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 16:08, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

If you wish to do what KrIsMa said, you do not need to submit a bot request. You can use the MediaWiki read API without restriction. Also, one other thing to add. I said above that checking WM is redundant and unnecessary. Let me elaborate on that. Your bot checking WM would require you using your own algorithm to detect unsigned posts, and that algorithm would need to be better than the one I already use. If you have a better algorithm for something WM already does, please just tell me so I can put it in WM. This way, it avoids unnecessarily complicating the bot structure.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 18:37, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

I wasn't saying anything about your bot. i was just saying that for new bots.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 19:11, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

My point is still that checking other bots requires that your algorithm be more accurate than the one used in the bot you are checking, and if you have a more accurate algorithm, you should just give it to the bot owner.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 19:19, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

So far, the current decision is decline, if there is no more discussion in the next 24 hours, the final verdict will be decline.

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 16:16, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

I will decline this bot idea. Also, what programming language are you going to program the bot?

Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 16:20, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Python. Oh, and never mind about the "correcting bots" thing, just focus on the main part. Okay?
Krett12 (talk | contribs) 22:02, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Well, just checking for "I" in articles doesn't really merit a bot. There are also probably a few cases in which it wouldn't appear in quotes, such as the number.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 13:59, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Another Idea of a Bot

Another idea of a bot is that the bot will count the number of times a template is used, the bot will capitalize the first letter in the sentence if it is not already, and the bot will add missing tag and references section if necessary. The name of the bot and the programming language is the same as before.
Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 00:58, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Counting templates: there's no point, and MediaWiki already does a lot of that for us. Besides, just collecting data doesn't require a bot request. Capitalization: absolutely not. What if my username were the first word in a sentence? References: that happens very rarely anyway, and that seems like a task more suited for VoxBot.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:17, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Again, a reference bot would be beneficial d:)

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 04:31, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Maybe, but in Scratch Wiki:Bot Requests/Instructions, one of the questions is "Could it easily be done by a human?" It also says "If so, is there any reason that a bot would be better than a human (e.g. too repetitive, humans are too unreliable)?". The answer to the first question is yes. The problem is pretty rare, and it takes a Google search (just search the error message site:wiki.scratch.mit.edu) to find, and it takes a few seconds to fix. In addition, most of the time this error occurs, the user notices as soon as he/she submits the edit.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 15:05, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

FYI, if the <references/> tag is left off, an error in obvious red text shows up...

Mathfreak231 (talk | contribs) 18:17, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

it says Cite error: <ref> tags exist, but no <references/> tag was found very visible :)

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 20:18, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Another Bot Idea

Another idea for a bot is a bot that will archive old discussion pages and I will use Python 2.7.6 to program this bot. The bot will be called Gobot.
Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 23:07, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

How will you know when to archive old discussion pages?

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 00:04, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

By the age of the discussion page.

Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 00:42, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

I don't think that will work; some discussions can be not replied to in a long time, but still needing discussion.

Mathfreak231 (talk | contribs) 00:44, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Also, most of the time, old discussions (like on articles) don't need to be archived. The reason for archiving discussions is that they are taking too much space on the page, so it's better to split them. I also agree with Mathfreak, in that there is not a ubiquitous set of criteria to archive pages. Finally, when archiving discussions, sometimes some discussions are not archived (such as how on the CP, any active discussions are not archived).

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:25, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Idea of a Bot

My idea for a bot is a bot that welcomes new users to the Scratch Wiki.
Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 23:55, 4 June 2014 (UTC)

Hello and thank you for your request. Do you know what programming language you want to write it in? Other than that, I see an issue, if a bot welcomes users, then the message will be very generic, wouldn't that be similar to the messages that is automatically given when someone joins the wiki?

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 00:03, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

So, I think I will stop making this bot since it is a bad idea.

Swampert11 (talk | contribs) 00:11, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

Maybe let other users comment before you stop!! :)

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 00:13, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

I think we should decline this idea for a bot because we do not need it and not many Scratchers join the wiki.

Margaret1618 (talk | contribs) 00:24, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

If we want something to welcome new users, we can just modify the default welcome message. It's also better with real people submitting welcome messages, as they can be more personalized.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 01:09, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

Let's wait for another user to reply in order to secure the verdict.

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 01:54, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Yeah, we don't need it.
Mathfreak231 (talk | contribs) 14:34, 5 June 2014 (UTC)

DudeBot

Your explanation is extremely vague. What would it fix/modify?
jvvg (talk | contribs) 19:04, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

Better explanations and more!

Cooldude5367 (talk | contribs) 20:08, 5 October 2014 (GMT)

We already have something like that called VoxBot. Try looking at a page.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 19:09, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

Making "better explanations" with a bot is pretty much impossible.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 19:10, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

Can you give us an example of where the bot would help? This is just an example... but:

"My bot ErnieBot would help clean up grammar! On the article "project", there is a sentence that says "The projects is listed in a row." ErnieBot would help fix the "is"."

ErnieParke (talk | contribs) 19:14, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

What language would you program it in? How would you test it?

-PRO- (talk | contribs) 19:52, 5 October 2014 (UTC)

It will talk English and it will help edit pages if there is something wrong or it don`t make sense! It will also Welcome new members to scratch wiki!

Cooldude5367 (talk | contribs) 07:16, 6 October 2014 (GMT)

We've already had requests like this. It is simply too hard to make a bot that correctly fixes English grammar. And we don't need a bot to welcome people - the approval system already does that, and there are several people who do it on their own.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 11:42, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ Cooldude, you would have to program it.
-PRO- (talk | contribs) 11:45, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Yes, we don't have a programming team. Are you sure you're ready for this? If not, DudeBot will be instantly rejected. I may sound harsh, but we are serious. You have to code it.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 14:13, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

when an account is created, a default message is posted on their talk page, unless you want your bot to post custom welcoming messages? :)

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 14:18, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Sci ninja'd you. Besides, if we're having a bot do it, I already called it.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 14:22, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Can you give me ideas please?

Cooldude5367 (talk | contribs) 19:25, 6 October 2014 (GMT)

I once found this on a page - "Having a bot is not a status. Please don't say you're going to make a bot and then ask for ideas on it, only submit a request for a bot if you have a good idea on how it can help the Wiki".

derpmeup (talk | contribs) 22:01, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

/Instructions hope it helps!

KrIsMa user | talk | contribs | edits 23:03, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

Can it post custom welcome messages please?

Cooldude5367 (talk | contribs) 07:25, 7 October 2014 (GMT)

I don't think that's necessary.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 07:43, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ We have already denied several bot requests for welcoming users. It's simply not necessary. Remember that not every task needs a bot, and messages from real people are always better.
jvvg (talk | contribs) 10:57, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

I will code and program it!

Cooldude5367 (talk | contribs) 07:18, 9 October 2014 (GMT)

But we already said no to grammar, no to welcoming... What do you want the bot to do?

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 17:08, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Tweaker

Thoughts? Eh?
Krett12 (talk | contribs) 03:43, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Necessary?

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 07:05, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

There are seriously a lot of pages without that template. It might be a drag to create it at first but it is SO much relief to not have to put the template on (remember we create pages there a lot). It would would be kinda like the world was magically doing it all for you by itself. Speaking of the world, no, I will not choke to death if I don't have this bot :P however it would still make a lot of relief for me and the other members of the AF wiki.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 11:01, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Ya know, I found a much better solution for April Fools than that template. It's fairly easy to import/export pages, so why not just do that?

jvvg (talk | contribs) 12:54, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

The whole point of making a new wiki was to have the pages not be stored on here, where anything can be viewed by anyone. Now, this is a special bot request. The AF wiki has to be OK with it too. (I'm okay with it and I run the AF wiki (with jvvg as my sidekick) )

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 15:22, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

I know the point of having a separate wiki, and when the time comes, it will be very easy to copy the stuff over with import/export. It seriously takes about 10 seconds if that.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 15:42, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

But you can't import into pages that already exist.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 15:44, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Have you tested that?

jvvg (talk | contribs) 15:44, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

.......no, but I'm pretty sure it's true. Are you volunteering to delete all the AF revisions on April 2nd?

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 14:09, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘Well, if the importing doesn't work, I could go and copy and paste the contents of the spoofed pages and replace the content with that in the articles that got parodied, I have the patience. :P
derpmeup (talk | contribs) 14:53, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

If we made you an admin would you clean it all up?

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 15:10, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I will clean it all up.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 15:17, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

But I don't believe you're going to instantly do it, I believe that humans are slow paced :P. Comedy in teh bot request! Anyway, the thing is I'm not looking for the content of the page to be shown as the AF thing. I'm hoping for the page to be displayed normally, with a link to the AF page. How will importing pages solve that? BTW, it's about time a bot request got accepted

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 14:59, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

1. It's pretty lame if there's just a link. It's way funnier if the actual article shows. 2. We're not going to accept a bot just for the sake of accepting one. We want bots that will actually be helpful.

jvvg (talk | contribs) 15:20, 15 October 2014 (UTC)

Archive Bot

Thoughts?
-PRO- (talk | contribs) 13:04, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Already nixed.

Scimonster (talk | contribs) 13:26, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

No, no. THat is totally different. I would let the owner make the new page, and it would protect it. Sorry if I wasn't clear.

-PRO- (talk | contribs) 15:11, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Already called by SysopBot. Sorry.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 15:20, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

I seem to recall that SysopBot was rejected...?

jvvg (talk | contribs) 15:41, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Yes it was. So if we were to do this, SysopBot already called it.

Krett12 (talk | contribs) 15:43, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Why can't we create a new group just for some bots?

-PRO- (talk | contribs) 15:45, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

┌────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘ We can, but it's not necessary. Automatically doing any kind of sysop task opens the Wiki up to vulnerabilities, and we are not giving sysop privileges to anybody who wasn't appointed/elected.
jvvg (talk | contribs) 15:47, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

OK! I will delete it from the table, or just saw it was rejected.

-PRO- (talk | contribs) 15:50, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Help the wiki!

Scratch Wiki:Bot Requests/Archives

Accepted

Deathly_Hallows

Interwiki Bot

Declined

EdiBot

SpellBot

Formatter

Accuracy Bot

Welcome!

Pseudonym

Archiver

Link fixer

Templater

ScratchBot

They_Come

AutoDeleter

Formatter

Sandbot

Notifier

MeowBot

HelpBot

WikiMaster

CoolBot

WikiBot

WikiBot

AntiRedLink

BlockerBot discussion

Tweaker

FAQBot

SysopBot

I've got my PI on you

JayceeMinecraft bot idea

Move?

Another Idea of a Bot

Another Bot Idea

Idea of a Bot

DudeBot

Tweaker

Archive Bot