Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Lowercase sigmabot

The following discussion is an archived debate. Please do not modify it. To request review of this BRFA, please start a new section at WT:BRFA. The result of the discussion was

Approved.

Lowercase sigmabot[edit]

Operator: Σ (talk · contribs)

Time filed: 08:54, Sunday December 11, 2011 (UTC)

Automatic or Manual: Automatic unsupervised

Programming language(s): Python

Source code available: Custom code using Pywikipedia. Still under development, and will be available here when completed (Warning: It's not pretty).

Function overview: Add protection templates to protected pages, and remove them if page is unprotected

Links to relevant discussions (where appropriate): This and this.

Edit period(s): Every 30 minutes, whenever I'm on the computer. I plan to put it on a server, though.

Estimated number of pages affected: Any page that gets semi-protected or unprotected. [0, ∞)

Exclusion compliant (Y/N): Y

Already has a bot flag (Y/N): Y (see WP:Bots/Requests for approval/SigmaBot)

Function details: The bot gets pages from Special:Log/protect, and checks the protection details of the page.

If the page was protected, it checks whether there are protection templates on the page or not.

If there are protection templates, it skips the page.
If there are no protection templates, it checks whether the page is a redirect or not.

If the page is not a redirect, it adds {{subst:User:LikeLakers2/SWP/sync-pp}} with parameters under the following conditions:

If the page is semiprotected indefinitely, it uses the parameters: |expiry=indef|reason=long-term|small={{subst:X1/sandbox/is not talk}}
If the page is move protected indefinitely, it uses the parameters: |moveexpiry=indef|movereason=generic|small={{subst:X1/sandbox/is not talk}}
If the page is both semi and move protected indefinitely, it squishes the two above bullets together.
If the protection times are not indefinite, it uses the parameters: |expiry=(edit expiry date)|moveexpiry=(move expiry date)|small={{subst:X1/sandbox/is not talk}}

If the page is a protected redirect, it adds {{R protected}} to the bottom of the page.

If the page was:

completely unprotected, it searches the text for "\{\{pp-[A-Za-z-]+\|?[^}]*\}\}" and removes the protection templates.
partly unprotected (TT&O's example of "[edit=sysop] [move=sysop] => [move=sysop]" for instance), it:

Checks the move and edit protection levels of the page.

If there is no move protection, it removes "\{\{pp-move-?(dispute|vandalism|indef|)+\|?[^}]*\}\}" from the text.
If there is no edit protection, it removes "\{\{pp-(dispute|vandalism|template|office|reset|semi)-?[a-zA-Z]*\|?[^}]*\}\}" from the text.

The bot will not edit userpages, user talk pages, images, create-protected pages, or categories.

I don't think this needs to be an adminbot (in any case I couldn't use it) because when articles get full-protected they almost always come with a full-protection template.^[1][2]

Discussion[edit]

Don't we already have a bot that does this? --Chris 09:23, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think there is. If there were a bot, it probably would've beaten me to this edit.

Could you be thinking about User:DumbBOT, which removes protection templates by checking Category:Wikipedia pages with incorrect protection templates? →Σ τ c. 10:01, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, here's what's giving me déjà vu Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/ProtectionTaggingBot. However, that bot is now inactive, so I don't see a problem with this. --Chris 13:05, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I've beaten DumbBOT to the protection template thing a crap-ton of times. If you check my contribs, most of my article edits with no summary now-a-days are just me doing just that.

Also, mind perhaps letting it give some leeway to allow regular users to do this as well? Just wondering. LikeLakers2 (talk | Sign my guestbook!) 13:15, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Also, what about pages that have their protection level changed (e.g. [edit=sysop] [move=sysop] => [move=sysop])? Can the bot handle it? — This, that, and the other (talk) 09:49, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I haven't tried that, so I'm not sure. Let me check. →Σ τ c. 10:01, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

OK, it didn't work. I'll get to work immediately. →Σ τ c. 10:02, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

As a note, Σ, I DID set specific defaults for each template. Depending on how important it may be be to display it, it may be set, by default, to no, like it is in {{pp-dispute}}. I'd assume you'd be better off not having it set the small param. LikeLakers2 (talk | Sign my guestbook!) 12:50, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The bot will not be editing full-protected pages, so there is no need to be concerned about small=yes on pp-dispute. →Σ τ c. 23:26, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, and by the way, This, that and the other, the template does a lot of work. All the bot does is check the expiry times, and subst my template with the corresponding params. LikeLakers2 (talk | Sign my guestbook!) 12:53, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ideally, would be nice having it as adminbot to take care of full protections too, but under the circumstances, could it like list fullprotected pages that aren't tagged somewhere so that admins can manually fix it? Snowolf ^{How can I help?} 17:38, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I do not think interaction with full-protected pages is at all necessary, because in the rare occasion that a page is full-protected, a template is almost always added. →Σ τ c. 23:26, 11 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Suppose you come across a semiprotected page, which already has pp-semi or pp-protect on it. Are you going to add your template anyway? Some admins add comments in their protection templates. I am not clear on the value of putting expiry times in the template because they are already in the protection log. Admins who are working fast can get confused anyway (they might clear move protection by mistake etc. when removing regular protection) and adding clutter to the templates is not an unalloyed benefit. Some pages may already have pp-semi-blp. One guy drove me crazy by changing pp-semi to pp-semi-blp on every BLP article regardless of the true reason for protection. An over-helpful bot might be worse than the disease. I certainly would not like the bot adding or removing small=yes. If the bot were to add pp-semi|small=yes with no other parameters to *articles* (not talk pages) that currently have no template it would be harmless, though. Thank you, EdJohnston (talk) 03:39, 13 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Now that I read it over, the function details were a bit vague. I have clarified above. And no, it won't change any protection templates like that; only if the protection levels do not match the templates. →Σ τ c. 07:02, 13 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Looks like a good task Approved for trial (7 days). Please provide a link to the relevant contributions and/or diffs when the trial is complete. --Chris 12:02, 13 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Looks good to me, although I don't think the long "brought to you by User:Lowercase sigmabot" comments are necessary. —SW— ^speak 16:49, 19 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Removed. →Σ τ c. 04:25, 21 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Trial complete., although I was without access to Wikipedia for a few days. Hopefully enough information has been collected from the past week. →Σ τ c. 04:25, 21 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Approved. --Chris 03:41, 22 December 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. To request review of this BRFA, please start a new section at WT:BRFA.