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This is the discussion page for the AutoWikiBrowser (AWB) project. It is also the place to discuss using the AWB program (for help, questions, or general inquiries about AWB). Specific guidelines on where to make particular reports or requests are provided in the § Before you post section below. Before asking a question, please refer to the read the § Frequently asked questions below.
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Before you post
[edit]| Do you want to ... | Please use | ||||
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| Report a bug or request a feature in AWB? | Check reported bugs on Phabricator before filing a new bug report. You do not need to create another account there; just log in with your global Wikimedia account. See this MediaWiki wiki page on how to report bugs and request features on Phabricator.
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| Report an incorrectly fixed typo? | Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Typos | ||||
| Request approval to use AWB? | Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/AutoWikiBrowser | ||||
| Ask a question about AWB or ask for help? | This page |
Frequently asked questions
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Frequently asked questions
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Discussion
[edit]Adding Engvar tags and WP:MEATBOT
[edit]Last year I started adding {{Use New Zealand English}} tags to New Zealand articles in accordance with MOS:TIES using AWB because I noticed that a lot of NZ articles had American spellings in them and a vandal was changing words to American spellings. Using the hidden categories added by these tags I've completely rid NZ articles of American spellings as far as I can tell. In this discussion I asked how to add the tags to articles and asked if that would count as cosmetic, and GoingBatty nicely helped me and said that it isn't cosmetic because WP:COSMETICBOT says that adding hidden maintenance categories is not cosmetic. Later I found WP:CONTEXTBOT which says that for changes like this that require context, they need human oversight and bots should not do them because they can make errors. When I went ahead and added the tags to thousands of articles I got no opposition (apart from the vandal).
Because I realised that there are probably also vandals changing American spellings to British ones, for the past three months I've been adding {{Use American English}} tags to American articles. I want to use the hidden categories to make SauronBot which will see when people change English variations (accidentally or on purpose) so that editors can be alerted of this and can use their human judgement to fix the edit (if the edit has a problem at all).
The problem is that, unlike when I added the New Zealand English tags, I've had several people complain to me (e.g. here) telling me that I should not be using AWB to add the Use American English tags because it's cosmetic, and I should instead make/use a bot but I disagree with this because of WP:COSMETICBOT and WP:CONTEXTBOT as I've mentioned earlier. Most of these people have backed down but my edits are clearly controversial and I'd like to stop for now and follow rule 3 of WP:AWBRULES to ask the people here: is adding {{Use American English}} tags to articles in accordance with MOS:RETAIN problematic? ―Panamitsu (talk) 07:35, 5 March 2025 (UTC)
- It's definitely not a cosmetic edit, since it adds a category. That changes the appearance of the rendered page. – Jonesey95 (talk) 14:04, 5 March 2025 (UTC)
- So how would I achieve consensus for rule 3 of WP:AWBRULES? Is this the appropriate venue? ―Panamitsu (talk) 21:58, 5 March 2025 (UTC)
- It is a venue where consensus can be achieved, yes. Primefac (talk) 16:06, 10 March 2025 (UTC)
- How would I know if consensus has been achieved? Has it already been achieved considering that nobody has disagreed with me? If not, how could I get more people to comment on this without canvassing? ―Panamitsu (talk) 21:50, 14 March 2025 (UTC)
- If no one disagrees, then there is usually consensus (whether it be a "real" consensus or just SILENCE). Canvassing isn't canvassing if it follows APPNOTE, should you want to bring more people to this discussion. Primefac (talk) 15:02, 5 April 2025 (UTC)
- How would I know if consensus has been achieved? Has it already been achieved considering that nobody has disagreed with me? If not, how could I get more people to comment on this without canvassing? ―Panamitsu (talk) 21:50, 14 March 2025 (UTC)
- It is a venue where consensus can be achieved, yes. Primefac (talk) 16:06, 10 March 2025 (UTC)
- So how would I achieve consensus for rule 3 of WP:AWBRULES? Is this the appropriate venue? ―Panamitsu (talk) 21:58, 5 March 2025 (UTC)
Lowercase titles on custom wiki
[edit]I have lowercase titles in a namespace on my localhost MediaWiki like how it is done on Wiktionary. Unfortunately, when I try to use AWB on the wiki, it tries to edit "Dictionary:Test", not "Dictionary:test", even if the category source returns properly lowercased pages.
How can I fix this? A diehard editor (talk | edits) 10:00, 9 March 2025 (UTC)
- AWB sets a CapitalizeFirstLetter property which is read from the siteinfo from the mediawiki API. Compare en-wiki and wiktionary, you need to get your localhost version to report "case": "case-sensitive". Rjwilmsi 09:09, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- Alright, I got it to work by setting $wgCapitalLinks = false; in LocalSettings.php before starting the edits and then commenting it back out afterward. Thank you. A diehard editor (talk | edits) 19:31, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
Named refs genfix issue
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Moved from User talk:PrimefacSpecial:Diff/1222731766/1280896552 .. it included an entire URL as part of a named ref(!). I assume because it wanted the page number, and the |page= contains a URL. Would it be possible to squelch URLs when creating a named ref? -- GreenC 02:31, 17 March 2025 (UTC)
- That would be a question for WT:AWB, since the change in question was as a result of doing genfixes. Your logic seems sound, though. Primefac (talk) 11:31, 17 March 2025 (UTC) moved from my talk page. Primefac (talk) 11:33, 17 March 2025 (UTC)
- rev 12986 Will fix that in next release of AWB. Rjwilmsi 09:20, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
Still not working
[edit]Ever since August 2024 I have been unable to use AWB. When I try to run it, I get this error message:
**description**:
**workaround**:
--------------------------
<table><tr><th>Exception:</th><td>`UnauthorizedAccessException`</td></tr>
<tr><th>Message:</th><td>`Access to the path 'C:\Program Files (x86)\AutoWikiBrowser\AWBUpdater.exe' is denied.`</td></tr>
<tr><th>Call stack:</th><td><pre> at System.IO.__Error.WinIOError(Int32 errorCode, String maybeFullPath)
at System.IO.File.InternalCopy(String sourceFileName, String destFileName, Boolean overwrite, Boolean checkHost)
at System.IO.File.Copy(String sourceFileName, String destFileName, Boolean overwrite)
at WikiFunctions.Updater.UpdateUpdaterFile()
at AutoWikiBrowser.MainForm..ctor()
at AutoWikiBrowser.Program.Main(String[] args)</pre></td></tr>
</table>
**OS**: Microsoft Windows NT 6.2.9200.0
**version**: AutoWikiBrowser (6.3.1.0), WikiFunctions (6.3.1.0), revision 12623 (2024-08-08 17:34:31)
**net**: 4.0.30319.42000
**duplicate**:
**site**: https://en.wikipedia.org
As I said last August, the fix suggested then was not usable. By trial and error, I have just found that I can run it if I do so as adminstrator. Please advise. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:18, 18 March 2025 (UTC)
- So if you ran AWB as an administrator once then perhaps Windows requires it thereafter. Perhaps you could try downloading AWB again to a User/Documents folder etc. rather than Program Files? Rjwilmsi 15:49, 18 March 2025 (UTC)
- Thank you. I'll try that when I finish my current task. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:30, 28 March 2025 (UTC)
WIR March 2025
[edit]When the Wikipedia:WikiProject Women in Red newsletter for March 2025 was sent out, it contained a <ref>...</ref> tag but no {{reflist}}/{{reftalk}}, so the ref shows at the bottom of the talk page. Would a change like [1] be something uncontroversial I can do a run on without needing consensus? Thanks. ~ Rusty meow ~ 00:33, 19 March 2025 (UTC)
- Go for it. Primefac (talk) 02:09, 19 March 2025 (UTC)
- How would you even do that with AWB? I'm curious. ―Panamitsu (talk) 03:05, 19 March 2025 (UTC)
- That newsletter was sent to 1580 pages—1550 of which are user talk pages. Are you sure you want to send a new message notification to that many users? People generally dislike new message notifications for cleanup purposes, so I recommend using a bot instead. My bot, DreamRimmer bot III, is approved for this task, and I can help if needed. – DreamRimmer (talk) 05:55, 19 March 2025 (UTC)
- @DreamRimmer: Sure! I didn't know you had a task for that. I just wish to have a {{reftalk}} added to the bottom of the section. ~ Rusty meow ~ 17:27, 19 March 2025 (UTC)
Done – DreamRimmer (talk) 08:12, 20 March 2025 (UTC)
- @DreamRimmer: Sure! I didn't know you had a task for that. I just wish to have a {{reftalk}} added to the bottom of the section. ~ Rusty meow ~ 17:27, 19 March 2025 (UTC)
Infobox display in preview mode
[edit]Some time back, I noticed a change in how articles appear in preview mode. Specifically, the infobox is shown at the top of the screen, and I have to scroll down to see the lead text. Previously, the lead and the infobox were displayed side-by-side, just as they appear in the article. This change happened a long time ago, and I didn't bother to ask about it at the time, but I am wondering if there is a setting that would allow me to preview articles in AWB with the lead text and the infobox displayed beside one another. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 18:43, 21 March 2025 (UTC)
Creating list of project articles
[edit]Hello, I am trying to create a list of pages that have been tagged with a project tag. I used to be able to use the "List comparerer" with "What transcludes page (all NS)" and give it the template name, but now that the resultant list is over 25,000 is there a way of achieving this? May be some way to just get the article talk page list or the non-article talk page list? May be there is another tool to generate such a list as I do not need to actually process the list using AWB. Keith D (talk) 16:07, 25 March 2025 (UTC)
- See WP:AWB/NL ~ Tom.Reding (talk ⋅dgaf) 16:15, 25 March 2025 (UTC)
- Thanks - that works fine. Keith D (talk) 11:26, 26 March 2025 (UTC)
Skipping redirects
[edit]I have nearly completed a mass template replacement on Wikispecies; however AWB has not changed the transclusions on pages like Wikispecies:Neolloydia, where the first line is #REDIRECT [[Cochemiea]] and the template is in the wiki-code that follows that.
Have I missed a default setting, that says to ignore such redirects? I've looked, but can't find one.
Is AWB looking on the redirect target? If so, how can that be overridden? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 17:40, 31 March 2025 (UTC)
- @Pigsonthewing: In the menu at the top, there's
Options > Follow redirects, and on the "Skip" tab, there'sPage is redirect. You should have both of those turned off. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:52, 1 April 2025 (UTC)- Thank you. The former was what I'd missed.
This section is resolved and can be archived. If you disagree, replace this template with your comment. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:19, 1 April 2025 (UTC)
Request for new genfix for weird linebreaks in wikilinks
[edit]I was informed about my bot making a bad edit; upon looking it appears that it was because there was a linebreak in the middle of the wikilink. Is there (or can there be) a genfix created to mitigate this issue? All that would be needed is anything linebreak-related to be removed out of any wikilinks. Primefac (talk) 15:27, 5 April 2025 (UTC)