Wikinews:Water cooler/technical/Archive/7

=Up to December 10=

DPL2
Is the latest version of the dynamic page list going to be implemented anytime soon? Checking out WikiNews today I'm impressed by its steady progress; but the regional portals would be vastly improved if the 'OR' statement was allowed with categories, which is avaliable with DPL2. Compare North America and the United States and it is clear that articles for the United States are not automatically given the category North America. With DPL2 it would be possible to use an OR statement in the North America category, e.g. North America OR United States OR Canada OR Mexico and it would pick up the latest content; making the North America page much more up to date and saving duplication of categories. Obviously this applies is just as relevant for Europe and the other regions. Currently I would imagine readers only check the main page; but via this method the regional portals would start being useful access points as well. --ChrisG 13:21, 26 October 2005 (UTC)

'merging' template was missing
According to Wikipedia's article on duplicate articles, the merging template can be used when a story is being merged or has been merged, and contributions should continue to be added to new story. However, the merging template didn't seem to exist when used in the story: New_Delhi_terrorist_attacks


 * I've just imported the template from Wikipedia, and modified to suit Wikinews. Template:Merging It should be working for you now. - Amgine / talk 04:53, 30 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Template is working fine now -- Thank you very much for installing!
 * Looking back on this, I probably should have posted to the Assistance section, but I initially thought it was a technical issue. Karen 17:59, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

Upload link broken
The link "Upload fair use media" in the toolbox is broken. It points to Name of current page/1 instead of Special:Upload --Deprifry | +T+ 15:15, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Public Domain Tagging Bot
I would like to start tagging all of stories that were created before our switch to CC-BY with This will be done by a bot using Datbot and running under the user account Craig's Bot. All edits will be monitored by me and it will never be running unattended. To be able to edit protected pages I have granted it temporary admin status, assuming no other task that requires admind status is found for the bot this status will be removed. To prevent it from cluttering up Recent changes I have applied for it to be marked as a bot. --Cspurrier 03:18, 12 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I support the the bot flag for this bot. --Chiacomo (talk) 04:47, 12 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Can I suggest that the text also point out that all articles after Sept 25, 2005 are under a different copyright?  I know the section where PD applies will become increasingly smaller, but someone browsing the early articles could get the impression all content on the site was PD if they didn't notice that more recent articles carry a different copyright. Brian McNeil / talk 15:44, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

CC logo
I just noticed the CC logo that appears on most pages. Unfortunately, for me with Firefox 1.0.7 it floats over the plain text copyright message and neither can be clearly read. Brian McNeil / talk 09:21, 21 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Same here. Trying to fix that... --Deprifry|+T+ 10:23, 21 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Failed miserably. I've removed the image now altogether. --Deprifry|+T+ 10:35, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

Sorry about that. its now fixed. see mediaWiki talk:copyright for more info. Bawolff ☺☻ 01:44, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

User talk page editing for blocked users enabled
I've enabled a MediaWiki feature that allows blocked users to edit their own talk page. This has been tested on the English Wikipedia for some time and generally has not led to problems. Should there be any objections to this, please let me know.--Eloquence 16:05, 26 November 2005 (UTC)
 * As long as they are able to edit only their talk page, I'm fine with it. --MrMiscellanious (talk) (contribs) 16:08, 26 November 2005 (UTC)
 * I'm fine with that aswell. --Deprifry|+T+ 16:21, 26 November 2005 (UTC)
 * I think that is a great idea. -  Amgine | talk 19:37, 26 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Great idea. just out of curiosity, how do you go about doining that? Bawolff ☺☻[[image:smile.png]] 00:52, 28 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Eloquence is a developer --Cspurrier 01:05, 28 November 2005 (UTC)


 * ahhh. Bawolff ☺☻[[image:smile.png]] 01:09, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Special:Cite
What do you guys think about asking for the activation of Special:Cite? It already been activated throughout the Wikipedias and I think it would be useful for us aswell. --Deprifry|+T+ 10:49, 28 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I fail to see how it would be useful for us. I cant picture anyone "citeing" us. Bawolff ☺☻[[image:smile.png]] 23:36, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Well, we should be aiming for that, don't you think? --Deprifry|+T+ 06:09, 30 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Thats not what I ment.☻ What I meant to say is that generally, (I think at least, I never really pay close attention to the bibliography if I'm reading something), people don't cite/use news sites in writing documents(I'm most likely wrong and news sites get cited all the time). If people actually do cite news sites then I have nothing against it. And i'm off to my wikibreak. Bawolff ☺☻[[image:smile.png]] 06:26, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Newssites do get cited in academic papers, see . And enjoy your wikibreak. :) --Deprifry|+T+ 08:52, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

= November 11 =

Infoboxes
Infoboxes may be discussed some where on the Wikinews site but I can not locate an explanation regarding:  Is there is a list of available infoboxes which can be incorporated into a news article? Can a wikinews contributor create a infobox, and if so, how? Can a wikinews contributor modify an existing infobox, and if so, how?  --Psusen 12:22, 29 October 2005 (UTC)


 * 1: Yes. See Template_messages/Infoboxes
 * 2: Certainly. I would recommend looking at the source of existing infoboxes like Template:Avian_Flu_infobox to figure out how it works. The basic structure of most infoboxes is roughly the same. You got a DPL at top which lists articles in a certain category and then a picture, followed by links to Wikipedia.
 * 3: Yes. If you want to add stories to the list of an infobox, you just have to add the corresponding category to an article, in the case of the example above  , or simply add the infobox (   in this case ) to that article, should work in most cases aswell. If you want to change the image or external links  just edit the existing infoboxes listed in 1. --Deprifry | +T+ 12:39, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
 * By the way shortcut to infoboxes is at WN:IB. All infoboxes have edit links there and new one's are very easy to create via changing an exsisting one. Bawolff ☺☻[[image:smile.png]] 23:33, 29 October 2005 (UTC)

&lt;Link/&gt;...
How about making a couple more of them.

what about adding the following (this is relative to this page):
I realize this may not be possible, but since when we changed to CC-BY the copyright link was changed, therefor at least some of it should be doable. list based on the following pages:

So here end my endless ramble on links...
 * http://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/use-links
 * http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml-modularization/abstraction.html#dt_LinkTypes

Bawolff ☺☻ 18:55, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

= Previous to November 11 =

My Contributions
How do I assign a story I posted without being logged in (ip logged) to my post. So I can track it in my contributions. Crickett 18:55, 1 September 2005 (UTC)


 * If you go and make a minor change to the story, this time logged in, then it should be listed under your contributions. If the article is "perfect", you can add an extra blank line, save it, then take the blank line back out.  This would be enough to have it listed as one of your contributions.  The alternative is just to add it to your watchlist and look for it there. StuRat 16:16, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

Double redirects
Please could someone who knows, step up and document how to fix double redirects. I gather that it is a problem as I have just got a stern message after changing a headline, but it's not clear what I need to do. A link to this needed instruction along with the "Read This!" message would help a lot.

"You can lead a Norse to water, but you can't make him sink" (John Cleese, I think)

--Crockett 23:05, 3 September 2005 (UTC)


 * Edit all links and make sure they point directly to the current name, not a previous name. A cut-and-paste is the best way to do this. If someone will tell me how to edit the "Read This!" message, I would be glad to add that info there.


 * "You can lead a horse to water, but you cannot make him drink,
 * you can lead a horticulture, but you cannot make her think."


 * StuRat 16:23, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

New Article Inputbox
I'm fiddling with Australia, trying to make it such that people can work on local articles and never have to see the rest of the world (we're very introspective down here). I've added the New Article inputbox, and it works perfectly. I'd like it to create articles that already have Category:Australia added to them. I see that I can do this by creating another template such as Template:New page Australia, however then the date won't be automagically updated by Uncle G's 'bot. What is the best way to approach this? Is it easy for Mr G to update a second template every day (preferably at the correct time), or should there be changes to the inputbox code? - Borofkin 00:09, 7 September 2005 (UTC)
 * You can use the (new) function preload in the edit line to include a template (like in ). About the date or you have it managed by Uncle G's bot also in your template, or you just use the variable like  AnyFile 20:00, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

Rename bug
If you look on the history for the article News Corp acquires IGN for US$650 million, you will see this (unless the bug has been fixed):


 * (cur) (last) 15:16, 9 September 2005 StuRat m (News Corporation takes over IGN for 50 million moved to News Corp acquires IGN for US50 million)

However, the actual rename was:


 * (cur) (last) 15:16, 9 September 2005 StuRat m (News Corporation takes over IGN for $650 million moved to News Corp acquires IGN for US$650 million)

The "$6" was apparently dropped in both the "from" and "to" names. The same error showed up in the "rename results panel". This appears to just be an error in reporting the results of the rename, it looks like the actual rename worked correctly. Is "$6" being interpretted as a special character, perhaps the English pound symbol or something like that ? Any suggestions on how to fix this ?

StuRat 16:12, 9 September 2005 (UTC)


 * That looks suspiciously like a MediaWiki bug. You should report it to Bugzilla. &mdash;Brent Dax (talk) 04:00, 10 September 2005 (UTC)


 * You may not use the currency sign in an article title. There are also other restricted characters. See Help:Page name. This is not a bug, but a security issue. - Amgine/talk 04:36, 10 September 2005 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I should point out that while not allowing the symbol may not be a bug, the way in which it is handled is a bug.  That is, the user should be notified and the character stripped out, instead of no notification and the character left in the title, but stripped out, along with the following character, of the rename confirmation panel and the history. StuRat 12:36, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

Index.php
I have noticed that here and on the italian site (and maybe somewhwere else) somebody (presumably a bot) i swriting (and modifing) a non-sense (at least to me) page Index.php. Please check it and delete it. If you have any information about that can you post me a message (on my tal page her on en or on my talk page on it AnyFile 09:56, 21 September 2005 (UTC)
 * isn't index.php the main php script for mediawiki? Bawolff 06:07, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
 * It is, but a user was creating a page called Index.php. --Cspurrier 14:59, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
 * I suspect this is a problem with WeatherChecker. It was run by User:David_Vasquez who's no longer with the project, but was running the tool. It seems like MediaWiki 1.6alpha changes broke page edits. -- IlyaHaykinson 06:57, 6 October 2005 (UTC)
 * No, it's a bot. And it's hitting every mediawiki site listed on the Meatball list. The links posted there are pr0n. - 24.85.85.76 06:59, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

Wikinews as NNTP news
Wouldn't it be nice if wikinews were also available as NNTP news?
 * de.wiki.(topic)
 * en.wiki.(topic)

There seem to be easy rss to nntp converters (e.g. nntprss) --Fasten 16:19, 10 October 2005 (UTC)