from_name: Thomas Gries

body:
I have a script for this, call editpage.php
Please put your name to the mailinglist on
http://bugzilla.wikimedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=831

Jim Higson schrieb:

>I'm trying to programatically submit edits to my wiki via a http post, using
>XMLHTTP. However, I am unable to 'persuade' the server to accept them. The
>server always responds as if I'm asking for a preview.
>
>Either:
>* I'm not making the upload requests correctly
>* There is a server side security model that forbids this
>* I'm going mad :)
>
>You can see the form-data I'm sending by going here:
>
>http://81.5.150.113/wysi/Very_small_test?debug=yes&action=edit
>then change the wikitext and click save, the request and response body will
>be shown on the right (which I use as a debugging area)
>
>Any help would be really appreciated, this is a real show-stopper for my
>project.
>
>Thanks,
>Jim
>
>_______________________________________________
>Wikitech-l mailing list
>Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
>http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>
>
>
>


list: wikitech-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Jim Higson

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Help needed using POST to submit changes to my wiki

body:
Jim Higson wrote:

> Tomer Chachamu wrote:
>
>> On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 15:07:50 +0000, Jim Higson <jh at 333.org> wrote:
>>> I'm trying to programatically submit edits to my wiki via a http post,
>>> using XMLHTTP. However, I am unable to 'persuade' the server to accept
>>> them. The server always responds as if I'm asking for a preview.
>>>
>>> Either:
>>> * I'm not making the upload requests correctly
>>> * There is a server side security model that forbids this
>>> * I'm going mad :)
>>>
>>> You can see the form-data I'm sending by going here:
>>>
>>> http://81.5.150.113/wysi/Very_small_test?debug=yes&action=edit
>>> then change the wikitext and click save, the request and response body
>>> will be shown on the right (which I use as a debugging area)
>>>
>>> Any help would be really appreciated, this is a real show-stopper for my
>>> project.
>>
>> Are you loading the edit page first and taking the wpEditToken? You
>> need it. (It's used for various things, including detection of edit
>> conflicts.)
>
> I wasn't aware of such a thing - this is obviously the problem.
>
> Is is possible to request a token from the server without it generating a
> page? (since the page will never be displayed) Or any another way that a
> thick(er) client can submit edits.
>
> I could just request an edit page in the background to get the token, but
> doing so would defeat the object of a low-bandwidth, low-cpu wiki.
>
> As an aside, what do people here think of this project? Personally I see a
> lot of potential in this kind of 'half-thick' interface - the very quick
> feedback when editing should make contributing a lot easier for those
> starting to learn the wiki syntax.

Having thought it some more, I'm pretty sure the only way this can be solved
is to add recognition for &action=getedittoken to mediawiki. This would
return a tiny http response with just the token as text/plain. When the
server gets the token back, it would send back an "ok" or "collision"- this
is editing equivalent of action=raw.

This would be useful for anyone who is trying to write a thick interface to
mediawiki, or any other kind of alternate edit tool.

Does this sound like an acceptable addition?

Jim


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Tomasz Wegrzanowski

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Retrospective

body:
On Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 12:28:34PM -0800, Sean Barrett wrote:
> > How many
> > days does it take us to add 19,000 articles now? :)
>
> How many different cards are used in collectible trading card games?

About 7-8k in MTG alone. Bot-adding 'em would be easy, but not quite copyright-clean.


list: wikien-l

from_name: Deathphoenix

subject: [WikiEN-l] Preloaded new article forms to help the newbies?

body:
That sounds like a great idea. Since the "well-meaning awful" often
comes from people who might not know where to look for such templates,
maybe it would be a good idea to provide a link in the "Wikipedia does
not yet have an article with this exact name" template, to the edit
page, or maybe provide a button that inserts that template (similar to
the buttons that help you insert bolded text, italicised text,
signatures, and so on).

Cheers,

James

David Gerard wrote:

> I wrote this in passing on wikitech-l and thought I might run
> it past wikien-l as an idea.
>
> Go on new article patrol. You'll see decent stuff from old hands,
> but a lot of new stuff is awful. Well-meaning awful, but awful.
>
> When the page for creating a new article comes up, would it be
> useful to include an article skeleton? Something like the
> following:
>
>
>   '''Article name''' is ...
>
>   Detail on Article name ...
>
>   Further detail on Article name ...
>
>   ==References==
>
>   *List your sources here.
>
>   ==External links==
>
>   *List relevant external links that are not already references.
>
>
> The idea is that this isn't compulsory at all - but may be a
> helpful starter for newbies.
>
> An analogy is writing bug reports in Bugzilla. You can more or
> less write something freeform, but the avg. quality of Mozilla's bug
> reports went way up when they started using a default reporting form
> (Bugzilla Helper) which set out a good bug report step by step.
>
> The above resembles my idea of how to write a short article (see my
> recent creations [[Federated Naming Service]] and [[LBX]] for how I
> write new short articles). Others will doubtless have their own ideas.
>
> Is this a useful idea? Do new article patrollers think it will help?
>
>
> - d.
>
>
> ps: both articles named above were cases of "I wonder what that actually
> is, oh! there's no articles yet, I think I'll find out and write them
> up."
> Helped by being temporarily stuck on dialup, which gives one more writing
> time than reading time.
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [Wikipedia-l] derivative works (Galoob v. Nintendo)

body:
David Gerard wrote:

> Remember that the situation is not "OH NOES VAGUELY POSSIBLE (C)
> VIOLATION WE MUST FOLD TOMORROW!!1!" If you're talking about a
> possible battle, one should look to past battles, and particularly
> on contentious and politically charged issues like such an attack on
> Wikipedia would be.
>
> It's worth considering that, as an academic work produced by
> a nonprofit, we have considerably greater scope for fair use. See
> the considerable quantities of quotes and fair use images in
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenu ? Not a squeak from the notoriously
> litigous Church of Scientology.

Of course scientology was on the losing end of a fair use case that is
at the most permissive end of what is allowed under fair use. See
http://www.publaw.com/fairuse.html and
http://www.amquix.info/scientology_v_FACTNet.html

> Furthermore, we have an active policy of aggressively removing copyright
> violations once notified, and even before being notified, which would
> get us
> many points in an actual courtroom. And the clock only starts ticking
> when
> you have been notified.

Effectively yes, although there is a strong argument that that is what
should be done as soon as you become aware of a clear violation through
any source.  But many violations are not clear, and that leaves room for
taking the benefit of the doubt.  There are some clear rules about what
goes into a takedown notice.  It must clearly identify the material that
is being infringed.  It must clearly identify the infringing material.
Most importantly, the person requesting the takedown must have the
authority to make the demand; in other words, the order cannot come from
some disinterested third-party meddler.  Then the clock starts ticking,
at which time the putative infringer has the opportunity to consider
available options.

Beyond that, it is not easy for a plaintiff to mount an effective
lawsuit, and unless substantial damages can be proved it may not be
worth the expenditure.  There are criminal law provisions for copyright
infringement, but in such cases the standard of proof is much higher,
and there must be an element of wilfulness in the infringer's actions in
addition to the characteristics of a civil infringement.  This would
reflect an atitude where the infringer knew it was wrong, but did it anyway.

> Furthermore, for the egregiously overbroad infringement suit Gregory
> Maxell hypothesises, the battle also goes out to the media. Imagine
> something more mediapathic. Suing cute fluffy kittens, perhaps? Not
> to mention that such a case would promptly bring to our aid ten
> thousand First Amendment ninja attack lawyers.

Absolutely!  Publicity heaven!  I would love it if the BC government
started an action over its maps.

> That is: we may well in fact be in a position to say "That's utter
> bullshit.
> Bring it on."
>
> This is the reasoning behind [[Wikipedia:Avoid copyright paranoia]].

Those who suffer from copyright paranoia are a part of the problem.  The
fear that many people have of seeing the inside of a courtroom goes
beyond reason.  As long as people are unwilling or afraid to accept the
responsibility of standing up for their rights, governments and the
monied classes, who have no such fears or compunctions, will be
empowered to cast their rights in an ever wider net.

Ec


from_name: Tomer Chachamu

subject: [Wikitech-l] Help needed using POST to submit changes to my wiki

body:
Oh, how about http://sourceforge.net/projects/phpmediawikibot/ ?
That's in PHP! :) I wrote it myself.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Retrospective

body:
On Sun, 20 Mar 2005 18:15:26 +0100, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> Each point reported could be either
>
>      * a link, which could be self-sustainable or be accompanied with
> one sentence explanation (example : link to Larry Resignation on the
> mailing list. Example : a link to an old version of the project)
>      * an image, with a legend or no legend at all (example : the first
> wikipedia logo. Example : a screen shot of Lir chess game)
>      * a short story (Example : a summary of the spanish fork). This
> could be proposed by the oldbie himself
>      * A citation

But please don't take or handmake a screenshot of the goatse on the
front page. :)


from_name: Anthere

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: New Wikistats

body:
I am delighted the stats are back. Thanks a huge lot Erik. Ant

Erik Zachte a ?crit:
> Finally, new wikistats.
>
> It took a couple of weekends to get the scripts up to date for the new
> database format.
>
> You may have to refresh the page in your browser to see new stats (Ctrl-F5)
> Stats are generated from newest dump (March 9)
>
> The layout has been improved in some places (newest stats on top, language
> names in comparison tables).
>
> New features:
>
> Records counts per namespace:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wikistats/EN/TablesWikipediaEN.htm#namespaces
>
> Percentage categorised articles (same url as above)
>
> Hierarchical category trees per Wikipedia (some are huge!):
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wikistats/EN/CategoryOverviewIndex.htm
>
> Not entirely new but not yet advertised here:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wikistats/EN/TimeLinesIndex.htm
>
> EasyTimeline charts are collected per Wikipedia and listed together with the
> script code. This may serve as a source of inspiration and help to learn the
> syntax. Also this can help to find real gems on other Wikipedias that
> deserve to be translated. Although starting a timeline from scratch is not
> completely trivial, expanding, correcting or certainly translating an
> existing chart is really where the plug-in earns its name.
>
> Tech notes on script update:
>
> Decipering the serialized compressed info was not a major hurdle, although
> the Perl equivalent (http://hurring.com/code/perl/serialize/ )was unusable,
> way too slow (goes through a state machine for each character), so I had to
> cook something myself.
>
> Keeping everything within reasonable memory boundaries was more difficult,
> wherever possible data are written to disk in several bins (e.g. one
> intermediate file per month history), sorted per bin, then merged before
> readback.
>
> Erik Zachte


subject: [WikiEN-l] Everyone's favorite FUD-master is at it again

body:
Fastfission wrote:

>Wikipedia alone isn't behind the problems (current or looming) faced
>by print encyclopedia manufacturers. The internet as a whole is behind
>that. Wikipedia's just one aspect of a greater shift in the
>technologies of communication and representation which makes massive
>tomes less likely and makes expensive subscriptions seem unnecessary.
>I doubt print encyclopedias will go the way of the dinosaurs, but I
>can understand their dis-ease. The die has been cast -- their
>authority has been questioned and directly challenged by a legion of
>people willing to work for nothing at all. It's an understandable
>concern, but it's far too late at this point.
>
>
Agreed, what we are witnessing (or better still experiencing) is a major
paradigm shift in the full sense that Kuhn had forseen.  It is as great
as anything seen since Gutenberg.  Gutenberg laid the way for unilateral
mass communication.  The present shift lies in what has made two way
mass communication technologically possible.  That can be pretty brutal
on those who had invested in the permanence of unidirectional
communications.

Ec


from_name: Till Westermayer

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Edit speed choking

body:
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . till we *) . . .

Hi Andre,

>Perhaps. It could also easily have the effect of getting them
>irritated and leave. "Let's make this wonderful article.... Ready,
>submit." "Oops, I made a typo... Let's correct it." "You have
>already made an edit this minute." "Okay, wait a minute... Let's
>load this other website in the meantime." "Ah, finally... Oooh...
>Another typo." "You have already made an edit this minute." "Ah
>well, if they don't want me, that's their problem. Let's go to
>that other cool website."

So the error message should make it clear that this doesn't happen when
you are logged in and that there is a preview function.
 __ .
 / / / /                            ... Till Westermayer - till we *)
. .
  . mailto:till at tillwe.de . www.westermayer.de/till/ . icq 320393072
  . Hirschstra?e 5. 79100 Freiburg . 0761 55697152 . 0160 96619179
  . . . . .


subject: [Wikipedia-l] no need to remove the article nor the chapter

body:
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . till we *) . . .

Hi Gregory,

>> Not because they have been 'contaminated' with the original text
>> once, but because they are using characters, situations,
>> etcetera from a copyrighted text. When someone starts claiming
>> copyright on characters, events etcetera from non-fiction texts
>> Wikipedia can stop working anyway.

>I guess we should turn off the servers now:

... or move them to some-other-place.

 __ .
 / / / /                            ... Till Westermayer - till we *)
. .
  . mailto:till at tillwe.de . www.westermayer.de/till/ . icq 320393072
  . Hirschstra?e 5. 79100 Freiburg . 0761 55697152 . 0160 96619179
  . . . . .


from_name: Lars Aronsson

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> Dictionaries have their own set of problems.  The Webster was
> frequently in court during the late 19th century over infringements
> of its copyrights.  It lost some significant cases.  Cookbooks also
> fall into this class of works that are really a reflection of a
> society's collective knowledge.  If I invent a dictionary definition
> that is identical to what is found in a published dictionary I am
> not infringing their copyright.

Swedish copyright is life+70 years, but for collections of data or
catalogs there is a special "catalog protection" (katalogskydd), which
lasts only 15 years after the publication.  Legislative texts
explicitly mention phone books, TV program listings, and compilations
of lunch menues of a city's restaurants as examples. It is unclear how
or whether this applies to dictionaries, and I haven't found any case
law.  (I should add that I'm not a lawyer.)  On the sliding scale from
simple lists of words (spelling dictionaries) to complete
encyclopedias, I guess it could be hard to draw the line exactly where
catalogs end and full copyright starts. German law makes no such
distinction, but seems to grant life+70 to all kinds of dictionaries.

I'm in the middle of this problem.  I want to digitize some
dictionaries, where the main editor died in 1922, but his two
assistants died in the 1950s and 1960s.  If these dictionaries are
covered by 15 years of "catalog protection" I could just go ahead, but
if they are covered by life+70 I must either ask the heirs for
permission or refrain from digitizing.  The only dictionaries that I
have digitized are old enough to be outside of life+70:

Swedish-Latin,    1875, http://runeberg.org/swelatin/
Swedish-German,   1919, http://runeberg.org/hoppe/
Swedish spelling, 1923, http://runeberg.org/saol/8/

Any pointers to case law (such as the Webster cases) would be
interesting to me.

--
  Lars Aronsson (lars at aronsson.se)
  Projekt Runeberg - freie nordische Literatur - http://runeberg.org/


from_name: Geoff Burling

subject: [WikiEN-l] [Ticket#: 115103-FW] Just wondering

body:
On Mon, 21 Mar 2005, David Gerard wrote:

> Geoff Burling wrote:
>
> > What is Lir's current status, out of curiousity? (I don't pay attention to
> > this editor's actions at all, so I'm not sure if Lir is banned,
rehabilitated,
> > or quietly making useful & valued contributions.) And if this is isn't one
> > of Lir's identities, why would this user bother behaving in a manner that
> > is at best annoying, & at worst self-destructively disfunctional?
>
>
> Currently banned for a year. Keeps coming back, acting like Lir, getting
> noticed and resetting the ban.
>
That was meant as a rhetorical question -- mostly. Although I have to wonder
why someone who wants to be annoying would adopt one of the least effective
tactics that has been attempted, refuted, & is well-known to those who know.
And if one does *not* want to be annoying & taken seriously, why not avoid
behaving like a known nuisence.

Then David Gerard wrote later that same day:

> I'm currently trying to flesh out my 'addiction' model of
> pathological behaviour on Wikipedia. You can see this in
> editors who are hardworking, but seem to love Wikipedia
> *just a little too much* and possibly in ways nature didn't
> really intend. And when they get banned, they go fucking
> batshit with junkie rage at being cut off from their fix,
> c.f. Wik and the vandalbot.

To David: You're familiar with Usenet. I'm sure it's the same
psycho-social dynamic.

To everyone else: There's a phrase that Spike Lee helped to circulate,
"Get a life; the one you have ain't no good." I suspect that for many
of these folks that Wikipedia *is* their life. However, this is how
they manage it.

Now consider that there are a fair number of folks on Wikipedia for
whom this is a major part of their life -- it is that important for
them. (And before anyone assumes I am being snarky or insulting here,
I consider myself one of them.) Their role at Wikipedia helps give
their life some meaning; it's the reason that they get out of bed in
the morning.

Some people take this identification very seriously, & treat their
relationship to Wikipedia seriously, hoping to leave something better
after their efforts. Vandalism is dealt with. Typos get fixed. They
take the time to introduce Wikipedia to potential users & contributors.
And some of us try to add content.

Some people act as if they were slovenly teenagers & Wikipedia was their
unkept bedroom. They do the equivalent of scattering their clothes over
the floor, leave the bedsheets unwashed for months, insist on covering
the walls with posters of their favorite music idols -- & get nasty
when someone tries to clean things up because Wikipedia isn't really
their own private bedroom.

Life, like Wikipedia, is what you make of it. Unfortunately some of us
not only are unable to make our life work, we can't make Wikipedia work
either. It becomes one more failure in an oppressive collection that
has become too heavy, & makes the person feel trapped like a animal, &
lashes out at everyone within reach. Only, unlike a trapped animal, this
person does not look for an opening & escape; this person fights to keep
hold of what she/he thinks is theirs -- only to find, in the end, they
have nothing.

FWIW, if I were kicked off Wikipedia for some reason, it wouldn't be
the end of my world. I wouldn't be happy being unable to make contributions
to Wikipedia, but I would find something else to fill the loss.

Geoff


from_name: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Help needed using POST to submit changes to my
	wiki

references:
<d1mns7$20b$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<9a878c4405032109141827f904@mail.gmail.com>
	<d1n0jp$46m$1@sea.gmane.org> <d1ndse$kj2$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 21:23:28 +0000, Jim Higson <jh at 333.org> wrote:
> Jim Higson wrote:
>
> > Tomer Chachamu wrote:
> >
> >> On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 15:07:50 +0000, Jim Higson <jh at 333.org> wrote:
> >>> I'm trying to programatically submit edits to my wiki via a http post,
> >>> using XMLHTTP. However, I am unable to 'persuade' the server to accept
> >>> them. The server always responds as if I'm asking for a preview.
> >>>
> >>> Either:
> >>> * I'm not making the upload requests correctly
> >>> * There is a server side security model that forbids this
> >>> * I'm going mad :)
> >>>
> >>> You can see the form-data I'm sending by going here:
> >>>
> >>> http://81.5.150.113/wysi/Very_small_test?debug=yes&action=edit
> >>> then change the wikitext and click save, the request and response body
> >>> will be shown on the right (which I use as a debugging area)
> >>>
> >>> Any help would be really appreciated, this is a real show-stopper for my
> >>> project.
> >>
> >> Are you loading the edit page first and taking the wpEditToken? You
> >> need it. (It's used for various things, including detection of edit
> >> conflicts.)
> >
> > I wasn't aware of such a thing - this is obviously the problem.
> >
> > Is is possible to request a token from the server without it generating a
> > page? (since the page will never be displayed) Or any another way that a
> > thick(er) client can submit edits.
> >
> > I could just request an edit page in the background to get the token, but
> > doing so would defeat the object of a low-bandwidth, low-cpu wiki.
> >
> > As an aside, what do people here think of this project? Personally I see a
> > lot of potential in this kind of 'half-thick' interface - the very quick
> > feedback when editing should make contributing a lot easier for those
> > starting to learn the wiki syntax.
>
> Having thought it some more, I'm pretty sure the only way this can be solved
> is to add recognition for &action=getedittoken to mediawiki. This would
> return a tiny http response with just the token as text/plain. When the
> server gets the token back, it would send back an "ok" or "collision"- this
> is editing equivalent of action=raw.
>
> This would be useful for anyone who is trying to write a thick interface to
> mediawiki, or any other kind of alternate edit tool.
>
> Does this sound like an acceptable addition?

Maybe I'm missing something (wouldn't be the first time) but couldn't
you just parse the page for the edittoken? It's pretty easy, for
example this Perl code which takes the scalar $editpage containing
page retrevied with action=edit would return the token as a variable:

(my $wpEditToken) = $editpage =~ m#(?<=<input).*([\w\d]{32}).*(?=wpEditToken)#g;

>
> Jim
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


from_name: Fastfission

body:
"Damned kids! A horseless carriage is pure nonsense! Dangerous, even!
Why, nobody will ever want to go more than 5 miles an hour! What
foolishness! Horse-and-buggy is here to STAY!"

Sure, Wikipedia has some issues that will never be easily resolved.
But so does every encyclopedia production system -- need I allude to
the troubles of Diderot and d'Alembert?

What's wonderful is the obvious threat he sees to his way of life, the
encyclopedia he cherishes. I mean, if he's right about its inaccuracy,
inconsequentialness, and inherently ridiculous nature, then what's he
got to fear? How's it any worse than any other of the million webpages
out there full of nonsense? Surely if it was so obvious how much
better EB was, he'd have nothing to fear! But all this bravado is
nothing more than howl of a shaken man.

Wikipedia alone isn't behind the problems (current or looming) faced
by print encyclopedia manufacturers. The internet as a whole is behind
that. Wikipedia's just one aspect of a greater shift in the
technologies of communication and representation which makes massive
tomes less likely and makes expensive subscriptions seem unnecessary.
I doubt print encyclopedias will go the way of the dinosaurs, but I
can understand their dis-ease. The die has been cast -- their
authority has been questioned and directly challenged by a legion of
people willing to work for nothing at all. It's an understandable
concern, but it's far too late at this point.

FF

On Sun, 20 Mar 2005 07:05:21 -0500, Mark Pellegrini
<mapellegrini at comcast.net> wrote:
> Everyone's favorite FUD-master is at it again ---
> http://www.chicagotribune.com/technology/chi-0503200191mar20,1,26199.story?coll=chi-techtopheds-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true
> /
> /*...*
> / A similar hyperbole surrounds such projects as the Wikipedia, a free
> online encyclopedia open to all. The Wikipedia's apologists emphasize
> the great number of volunteers who have taken part in the project and
> the number of entries they have contributed. They emphasize also the
> communal nature of the undertaking, in which anyone with a better
> understanding of a subject, or a bigger ax to grind, can edit what
> someone else has created. Their prime article of faith is that this
> openness will inevitably lead to a high level of accuracy and quality.
> ...
>  ----------
> Robert McHenry is former editor of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and is
> the author of "How to Know."
>
> /This is the same guy who called us the Faith-based encyclopedia and
> compared us to a public toilet-
> http://www.techcentralstation.com/111504A.html
>
> --Mark
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


references:
<d1mns7$20b$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<9a878c4405032109141827f904@mail.gmail.com>
	<d1n0jp$46m$1@sea.gmane.org> <d1ndse$kj2$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<51dd1af80503211455354edc0a@mail.gmail.com>

body:
On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 22:55:50 +0000, ?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason
<avarab at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 21:23:28 +0000, Jim Higson <jh at 333.org> wrote:
> > Jim Higson wrote:
> >
> > > Tomer Chachamu wrote:
> > >
> > >> On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 15:07:50 +0000, Jim Higson <jh at 333.org> wrote:
> > >>> I'm trying to programatically submit edits to my wiki via a http post,
> > >>> using XMLHTTP. However, I am unable to 'persuade' the server to accept
> > >>> them. The server always responds as if I'm asking for a preview.
> > >>>
> > >>> Either:
> > >>> * I'm not making the upload requests correctly
> > >>> * There is a server side security model that forbids this
> > >>> * I'm going mad :)
> > >>>
> > >>> You can see the form-data I'm sending by going here:
> > >>>
> > >>> http://81.5.150.113/wysi/Very_small_test?debug=yes&action=edit
> > >>> then change the wikitext and click save, the request and response body
> > >>> will be shown on the right (which I use as a debugging area)
> > >>>
> > >>> Any help would be really appreciated, this is a real show-stopper for my
> > >>> project.
> > >>
> > >> Are you loading the edit page first and taking the wpEditToken? You
> > >> need it. (It's used for various things, including detection of edit
> > >> conflicts.)
> > >
> > > I wasn't aware of such a thing - this is obviously the problem.
> > >
> > > Is is possible to request a token from the server without it generating a
> > > page? (since the page will never be displayed) Or any another way that a
> > > thick(er) client can submit edits.
> > >
> > > I could just request an edit page in the background to get the token, but
> > > doing so would defeat the object of a low-bandwidth, low-cpu wiki.
> > >
> > > As an aside, what do people here think of this project? Personally I see a
> > > lot of potential in this kind of 'half-thick' interface - the very quick
> > > feedback when editing should make contributing a lot easier for those
> > > starting to learn the wiki syntax.
> >
> > Having thought it some more, I'm pretty sure the only way this can be solved
> > is to add recognition for &action=getedittoken to mediawiki. This would
> > return a tiny http response with just the token as text/plain. When the
> > server gets the token back, it would send back an "ok" or "collision"- this
> > is editing equivalent of action=raw.
> >
> > This would be useful for anyone who is trying to write a thick interface to
> > mediawiki, or any other kind of alternate edit tool.
> >
> > Does this sound like an acceptable addition?
>
> Maybe I'm missing something (wouldn't be the first time) but couldn't
> you just parse the page for the edittoken? It's pretty easy, for
> example this Perl code which takes the scalar $editpage containing
> page retrevied with action=edit would return the token as a variable:
>
> (my $wpEditToken) = $editpage =~ m#(?<=<input).*([\w\d]{32}).*(?=wpEditToken)#g;

P.s.: not that I wouldn't mind something like a general robot
interface, in fact, I voulenteer to (help) write one (if thats
something the people with CVS access would be willing to accept that
is).

>
>
> >
> > Jim
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
> >
>


body:
On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 23:00:25 +0000, ?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason
<avarab at gmail.com> wrote:
> P.s.: not that I wouldn't mind something like a general robot
> interface, in fact, I voulenteer to (help) write one (if thats
> something the people with CVS access would be willing to accept that
> is).

Traditionally, code for already-made robots has been difficult to find
- you actually have to email the bot author to recieve it. However,
bot frameworks are at http://sourceforge.net/projects/pywikipediabot
in Python and at http://sourceforge.net/projects/phpwikipediabot in
PHP. (The PHP thing is my own; I'm planning to release the cron
library soon, which has all the neat files I used to run
en:User:Grammarbot)

Please would people stop quoting whole messages including backlogs.
When I click on "Show quoted text" in gmail I have to scroll down to
see what people actually meant to quote.


subject: [Wikitech-l] Thks =)

body:
On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 14:34:46 -0300, Andre Costa
<costa at tecgraf.puc-rio.br> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> just wanted to thank you folks for MediaWiki. I just installed version
> 1.3.11 so that we could try to grow our knowledge base on top of it, in
> a collaborative manner. I was _very_ impressed with how easy it was to
> install it (IMHO it's as "turn key" as a software needs to be) and to
> use it (as a reader/ editor). Documentation is excellent.
>
> Many thanks and congratulations. Keep up the excellent work. I am
> looking forward to trying version 1.4 when it stabilizes -- please,

It became stable ~14 hours ago.

>
> Best,
>
> Andre
>
> PS: I am not subscribed to the list.
>
> --
> Andre Oliveira da Costa
> (costa at tecgraf.puc-rio.br)
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>


from_name: Kurt Roeckx

subject: [Wikitech-l] PostgreSQL Port

body:
On Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 08:46:17AM +0100, Kurt Roeckx wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 21, 2005 at 12:45:37PM +0800, Christopher Kings-Lynne wrote:
> > (Please CC me on responses as I'm not subscribed...)
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > Just wondering if anyone else is working on the PostgreSQL port?  I plan
> > to finish it off (hopefully), but I don't want to tread on anyone's toes.
> >
> > It looks like the PostgreSQL schema files are out of sync with the main
> > MySQL ones, so I supposed no-one's working on it?
>
> I'm working on it.  See my current patch in bugzilla.  It still
> needs some work.

To clarify a little.

I've been trying to get the installer working.  It currently
"works for me", but needs some clean up.  This also required me
to make the needed schema changes, you can find them in the
patch.

There are various other problems that needs to be taken care off.
One of the annoying things is that for instance they store a
timestamp in mysql in a special format.  It looks like this:

  page_touched char(14) binary NOT NULL default '',
Or:
  wl_notificationtimestamp varchar(14) binary NOT NULL default '0',

While the pgsql versions currently look like:
    page_touched timestamp without time zone DEFAULT '1900-01-01 00:00:00'::timestamp without time zone NOT NULL,
    wl_notificationtimestamp timestamp without time zone DEFAULT '1900-01-01 00:00:00'::timestamp without time zone NOT NULL,

For the wl_notificationtimestamp there is then code that either
wants to place a 0 in it, or check that there is a 0 in it, or
some other weird thing.  There are probably various other things
like this.

I really dislike the NOT NULL constraints with a default value on
such fields.  I would either like to drop the default, drop the
NOT NULL constraint (and default), or change the schema in such a
way that they are not needed.  In case of the watchlist this
should be rather easy. 	We could just drop the default and delete
the record instead of setting it to some state that doesn't make
sense.

It would be nice of someone could go over all such things.

Kurt


subject: [Wikitech-l] PostgreSQL Port

body:
>  wl_notificationtimestamp varchar(14) binary NOT NULL default '0',
>
>While the pgsql versions currently look like:
>    page_touched timestamp without time zone DEFAULT '1900-01-01 00:00:00'::timestamp without time zone NOT NULL,
>    wl_notificationtimestamp timestamp without time zone DEFAULT '1900-01-01 00:00:00'::timestamp without time zone NOT NULL,
>
>For the wl_notificationtimestamp there is then code that either
>wants to place a 0 in it, or check that there is a 0 in it, or
>some other weird thing.  There are probably various other things
>like this.
>
>I really dislike the NOT NULL constraints with a default value on
>such fields.  I would either like to drop the default, drop the
>NOT NULL constraint (and default), or change the schema in such a
>way that they are not needed.  In case of the watchlist this
>should be rather easy. 	We could just drop the default and delete
>the record instead of setting it to some state that doesn't make
>sense.
>
>It would be nice of someone could go over all such things.
>
>
Kurt: I am responsible for wl_notificationtimestamp . Please let us
together fix this (you patch, I'll check or the other way around.
I have *no* PostgreSQL running, but will be happy, if you help to fix
last problems, you mentioned.

Mag ook graag in het Nederlands oder auf Deutsch !
Tom


body:
> Traditionally, code for already-made robots has been difficult to find
> - you actually have to email the bot author to recieve it. However,
> bot frameworks are at http://sourceforge.net/projects/pywikipediabot
> in Python and at http://sourceforge.net/projects/phpwikipediabot in
> PHP. (The PHP thing is my own; I'm planning to release the cron
> library soon, which has all the neat files I used to run
> en:User:Grammarbot)

What I meant is an interface from the MediaWiki standpoint which would
upon request easy-to-parse data for the bot, rather than having to
scrape the html (which is 95%+ irrelivant to what one would want to do
with a  bot)


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Retrospective

body:
Tomer Chachamu a ?crit:
> On Sun, 20 Mar 2005 18:15:26 +0100, Anthere <anthere9 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>Each point reported could be either
>>
>>     * a link, which could be self-sustainable or be accompanied with
>>one sentence explanation (example : link to Larry Resignation on the
>>mailing list. Example : a link to an old version of the project)
>>     * an image, with a legend or no legend at all (example : the first
>>wikipedia logo. Example : a screen shot of Lir chess game)
>>     * a short story (Example : a summary of the spanish fork). This
>>could be proposed by the oldbie himself
>>     * A citation
>
>
> But please don't take or handmake a screenshot of the goatse on the
> front page. :)

Oh ? Euh... how did you guess ? (embarassing...)


from_name: Henry Tan-Tenn

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: New Wikistats

body:
Andre Engels ti 2005/3/21 ChS 07:50 sia-kong:
> I think Mr. Ivanov was not talking about getting another interface,
> but about getting the language (or languages, although I do not at
> first look see another important language missing at the moment) among
> the languages of which the statistics are shown.

The stats for zh-min-nan are missing (though the page is generated)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wikistats/EN/TablesWikipediaZH_MIN_NAN.htm

most likely due to Bug 590
http://bugzilla.wikipedia.org/show_bug.cgi?id=590

The above not withstanding, the upgrade looks great.


from_name: David Gerard

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Why can't they learn? (was [Ticket#: 115103-FW] Just
	wondering)

body:
Rick wrote:

> I've never understood why somebody would keep
> committing obvious vandalism (like repeatedly
> vandalizing Raul's User page) so that they can get
> rebanned.  If Lir was ever interested in editing, he
> could just come in as an anon and make valid edits,
> but he seems more interested in disruption than in
> contribution.

I'm currently trying to flesh out my 'addiction' model of
pathological behaviour on Wikipedia. You can see this in
editors who are hardworking, but seem to love Wikipedia
*just a little too much* and possibly in ways nature didn't
really intend. And when they get banned, they go fucking
batshit with junkie rage at being cut off from their fix,
c.f. Wik and the vandalbot. I'll probably write it up as
a "ha ha only serious" page on meta, to go with [[m:MPOV]]
and [[m:Don't be a dick]]. In the meantime, it gives the
ArbCom considerable flexibility for more creative remedies
for bad behaviour than a mere ban, which the real addicts
tend to sockpuppet anyway. "You *really* want your fix?
Write two 500-word essays on why NPOV and No Personal Attacks
are good ideas. If we score each 9/10 or better, you can
edit again." I think there's a lot of scope there for really
*fixing* behaviour.

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Test case: policing content

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> Indiscriminate unreferenced tags could be a problem anywhere, not just
> in scientific articles.  The primary obligation for someone challenging
> a statement should be to put a polite question on the contributor's talk
> page and give him at least a week to respond.  Doing that would be prima
> facie evidence that you have assumed good faith.  If the wrong facts
> have been there for a year another week won't make a big difference.

It's not for indiscriminate use - it's for *nothing resembling a reference
of any sort*. You'll see a pile of these articles if you middle-click
"Random page" twenty times - four- to six-paragraph things which look like
okay articles, but have nothing resembling a source, reference or even
external link. That's what it's for. The debate on WP:TFD made it *very*
clear its use was to be for unambiguous cases. And not for stubs either.

- d.


subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Help needed using POST to submit changes to
	my	wiki

body:
Tels wrote:

> I hacked together something similiar. A lot of people new to wiki's
> stuggle with just creating a new article. It really isn't obvious. So I
> added a "new article" entry to the toolbox menu.
> When you press "preview" it will bounce you back to the wiki with:
> * "{{stub}}", some dummy headline/text and the category already included
> into the input box,
> * the preview already above it
> The user can then edit the new article and finally submit it.

Heh. I think Wikipedia could do with this.

'''Article name''' is ...

Further detail on Article name ...

==References==

*List your sources here.

==External links==

*List relevant external links that are not already references

- d.


body:
I wrote this in passing on wikitech-l and thought I might run
it past wikien-l as an idea.

Go on new article patrol. You'll see decent stuff from old hands,
but a lot of new stuff is awful. Well-meaning awful, but awful.

When the page for creating a new article comes up, would it be
useful to include an article skeleton? Something like the
following:

   '''Article name''' is ...

   Detail on Article name ...

   Further detail on Article name ...

   ==References==

   *List your sources here.

   ==External links==

   *List relevant external links that are not already references.

The idea is that this isn't compulsory at all - but may be a
helpful starter for newbies.

An analogy is writing bug reports in Bugzilla. You can more or
less write something freeform, but the avg. quality of Mozilla's bug
reports went way up when they started using a default reporting form
(Bugzilla Helper) which set out a good bug report step by step.

The above resembles my idea of how to write a short article (see my
recent creations [[Federated Naming Service]] and [[LBX]] for how I
write new short articles). Others will doubtless have their own ideas.

Is this a useful idea? Do new article patrollers think it will help?

- d.

ps: both articles named above were cases of "I wonder what that actually
is, oh! there's no articles yet, I think I'll find out and write them up."
Helped by being temporarily stuck on dialup, which gives one more writing
time than reading time.


from_name: Tom Haws

body:
Charles Matthews wrote:

> David Gerard wrote
>
>> There is that. OTOH, refs are a good way for a newbie stub not to take a
>> quick journey via Votes For Deletion.
>
>
> There is that too.  For me, though, a category on a stub is more
> likely than a page reference (to a college text, say) to make it
> prosper and grow. Trouble is, you just have to know whether it is
> [[Category:Greek islands]] or [[Category:Islands of Greece]].  One day
> our categories will redirect, I suppose.

In any case, it sounds like there is enough general support to
immediately implement *some* sort of helpful skeleton.  Its actual form
can evolve, especially if based on a standard template.

Tom Haws


subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Congratulations are in order (an overlooked
	milestone)

body:
On Sat, 19 Mar 2005 18:59:52 -0700, Mark Williamson <node.ue at gmail.com> wrote:
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Www.wikipedia.org_template/temp
> (preview of actual appearance:
> http://portal-test.mediawiki.org/extract2.php?template=Www.wikipedia.org_template/temp
> )
>
> I have received mostly positive feedback for the minor design
> modifications I made. A comment regarding the Cyrillic version of the
> name used in the background: it is intentionally based on the
> Ukrainian version rather than the Russian version because at the
> moment Ukrainian is higher in the list of largest Wikipedias. For the
> same reason, the Hebrew name instead of the Yiddish name, the Arabic
> name instead of the Farsi or Urdu names, etc.

The background is far too heavy. Lighten it a bit, maybe leaving blank
space around the circle of languages.


from_name: Sabine Cretella

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Show that there's a recorded word ...

body:
Hi, as many of you know we are adding pronunciations on commons and link
them wherever this is possible.

Now there's one thing I don't like when inserting the link to the
soundfile on commons.

Just have a look here:
http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush

After George Walker Bush we have this sign for outbound links, but
really it is not an oubound link - it is a pronunciation. We have the
same problems for the language courses on wikibooks and of course also
wiktionary.

Since the soundfiles are going to be more and more used it would be
great if we had a sign (maybe a music note or somethin similar) that
indicates that there is the pronucination. This will also help people to
immediately understand which one is the point to click on to "hear".

Do you see a solution for this?

Thank you and have a geat day!

Ciao, Sabine

--

Sabine Cretella
Translations
s.cretella at wordsandmore.it
Meetingplace for translators
http://www.wesolveitnet.com
*****
Vuoi la parola del giorno nella tua casella di posta?
Invia un'e-mail vuota a:
laparoladelgiorno-subscribe at yahoogroups.com


subject: [Wikitech-l] Show that there's a recorded word ...


list: wiktionary-l

subject: [Wiktionary-l] Show that there's a recorded word ...


from_name: Muke Tever

body:
Sabine Cretella <sabine_cretella at yahoo.it> wrote:
> Hi, as many of you know we are adding pronunciations on commons and link
> them wherever this is possible.
>
> Now there's one thing I don't like when inserting the link to the
> soundfile on commons.
>
> Just have a look here:
> http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush
> http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush
>
> After George Walker Bush we have this sign for outbound links, but
> really it is not an oubound link - it is a pronunciation. We have the
> same problems for the language courses on wikibooks and of course also
> wiktionary.

I don't see such a symbol in my browser - it is indistinguishable
 from an ordinary wiki link.  Though if I go into Firefox instead I
do see it.  Interesting.

The solution to remove the icon is to assign it to the class "plainlinks".
For example:
'''[[Media:En-us-George Walker Bush.ogg|George Walker Bush]]'''

> Since the soundfiles are going to be more and more used it would be
> great if we had a sign (maybe a music note or somethin similar) that
> indicates that there is the pronucination. This will also help people to
> immediately understand which one is the point to click on to "hear".
>
> Do you see a solution for this?

It may be possible to set up a special class for media links and set up a special
icon for it in your site's [[Mediawiki:Monobook.css]] -- look at the default
monobook (http://nl.wikipedia.org/skins/monobook/main.css) and see how it handles
the icons for different link types.

	*Muke!
--
website:     http://frath.net/
LiveJournal: http://kohath.livejournal.com/
deviantArt:  http://kohath.deviantart.com/

FrathWiki, a conlang and conculture wiki:
http://wiki.frath.net/


from_name: Domas Mituzas

subject: [Wikitech-l] PostgreSQL Port

body:
> There are various other problems that needs to be taken care off. One of the annoying things is that for instance they store a timestamp in mysql in a special format.  It > looks like this:

> For the wl_notificationtimestamp there is then code that either wants to place a 0 in it,
> or check that there is a 0 in it, or some other weird thing.  There are probably various other things like this.

At some point of time I traversed whole code and checked for timestamp usages.
All of those were replaced with $db->timestamp(), which chooses correct timestamp.
If some patches were commited later in, I could miss the review.

> I really dislike the NOT NULL constraints with a default value on such fields.
> I would either like to drop the default, drop the NOT NULL constraint (and default),
> or change the schema in such a way that they are not needed.  In case of the watchlist this
> should be rather easy. 	We could just drop the default and delete
> the record instead of setting it to some state that doesn't make sense.

Well, this is maybe wrong thing done, but using NULL's might need reviewing code again :)

Domas


body:
Geoff Burling wrote:

>On Mon, 21 Mar 2005, David Gerard wrote:
>
>
>>Geoff Burling wrote:
>>
>>
>>>What is Lir's current status, out of curiousity? (I don't pay attention to
>>>this editor's actions at all, so I'm not sure if Lir is banned, rehabilitated,
>>>
>>>
>>>or quietly making useful & valued contributions.) And if this is isn't one
>>>of Lir's identities, why would this user bother behaving in a manner that
>>>is at best annoying, & at worst self-destructively disfunctional?
>>>
>>>
>>Currently banned for a year. Keeps coming back, acting like Lir, getting
>>noticed and resetting the ban.
>>
>>
>That was meant as a rhetorical question -- mostly. Although I have to wonder
>why someone who wants to be annoying would adopt one of the least effective
>tactics that has been attempted, refuted, & is well-known to those who know.
>And if one does *not* want to be annoying & taken seriously, why not avoid
>behaving like a known nuisence.
>
It can probably be summarized in one word - "maturity" ... or lack thereof.

>Then David Gerard wrote later that same day:
>
>
>>I'm currently trying to flesh out my 'addiction' model of
>>pathological behaviour on Wikipedia. You can see this in
>>editors who are hardworking, but seem to love Wikipedia
>>*just a little too much* and possibly in ways nature didn't
>>really intend. And when they get banned, they go fucking
>>batshit with junkie rage at being cut off from their fix,
>>c.f. Wik and the vandalbot.
>>
>>
>
>Now consider that there are a fair number of folks on Wikipedia for
>whom this is a major part of their life -- it is that important for
>them. (And before anyone assumes I am being snarky or insulting here,
>I consider myself one of them.) Their role at Wikipedia helps give
>their life some meaning; it's the reason that they get out of bed in
>the morning.
>
>Some people take this identification very seriously, & treat their
>relationship to Wikipedia seriously, hoping to leave something better
>after their efforts. Vandalism is dealt with. Typos get fixed. They
>take the time to introduce Wikipedia to potential users & contributors.
>And some of us try to add content.
>
For some the recognition and ownership of their efforts is important.
I've remarked how on some user pages there is a very long list of the
articles on which they have worked.  They are often dilligent about
keeping it up to date.  When they stop keeping it up the list it's a
good sign that they have begun learning to submerge their ego.

Most of us can't be bothered to go through somebody else's list unless
we are trying to track down POV warrioring.

>FWIW, if I were kicked off Wikipedia for some reason, it wouldn't be
>the end of my world. I wouldn't be happy being unable to make contributions
>to Wikipedia, but I would find something else to fill the loss.
>
For some of us that reality doesn't even get close.  We know that there
is probably some room for edit wars and personal comments, but we don't
carried away with it.  Even more importantly, we know when to stop and
take time to listen to others.

Ec


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Communication Channels on for wiki-researchers

body:
Cathy Ma wrote:

>As a researcher who is interested in the sociology of the wikipedia I
>am writing to see if you can suggest links or leads on information
>concerning research on wiki.  Is there any central hub for 'wiki
>analysts' whether academic or media-related?
>
Sounds like a "Wikipsych" project could be interesting. ;-)

Ec


from_name: Andreas Kasenides

subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Downtime Error messages translation

body:
Am I asking the wrong people for this?
Anyone?

Andreas

Andreas Kasenides wrote:
> Would a kind soul direct me to the procedure in translating
> the error messages which appear when the Wikipedia servers
> have problems. These apparently always start with "We are Sorry"
> and are coming from http://wikimedia.org/errors/.
> I thought it would be nice if we had some of those errors in Greek.
>
> thankx
> Andreas
> http://el.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Ank


list: foundation-l

from_name: Yann Forget

subject: [Foundation-l] Participation of Wikimedia Foundation to the WSIS

body:
Hi,

Here are the details for the participation of the foundation to the World
Summit on Information Society (WSIS).?So in short, if the foundation wants to
have a booth in Tunis, application has to be sent soon.

Regards,
Yann

======================
The Tunis phase of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) will
consist of two parts: the Summit that will take place from 16 to 18 November
2005 at the "Parc des expositions du Kram" in Tunis, and the Parallel events,
consisting of a series of meetings, discussions, workshops and exhibitions
that will also be held in the Kram Centre.

More information on the Format of the Summit and the Agenda are available at
http://www.itu.int/wsis/tunis/index.html .

Parallel events consist of an exhibition and a partnership area
events like  meetings, discussions and workshops, etc. events of global nature
The exhibition will be open to the public. Exhibitors do not necessarily need
to be accredited to WSIS, but they should respect the non-profit character of
the parallel events. Requests for exhibition space can be made in electronic
format at   http://www.expo.ict4all-tunis.org/ . The below mentioned deadline
does not apply to requests for exhibition space. The exhibiton will open on
15 November and will last till 19 November 2005.

Events in the Kram Centre can be organized by all accredited stakeholders,
between 14 and 19 November 2005. Limitations may apply due to room
availability. More information about parallel events is contained in the
"Guidelines for Organizers of Parallel events during the second phase of
WSIS",  jointly established between the host country Tunisia and the
International Telecommunication Union (ITU).
The document is available in English at
<http://www.smsitunis2005.tn/plateforme/docs/guidelines.doc>
and in  French at
<http://www.smsitunis2005.tn/plateforme/docs/guidelines-fr.doc> .
Please note that the deadline for submissions  of requests for the
organisation of events is 30 April 2005. Requests for rooms for meetings,
discussions and workshops have to be submitted using the form indicated in
the Guidelines
(<http://www.smsitunis2005.tn/plateforme/docs/formulaire.doc>) .

Sincerely yours

Charles  Geiger
Executive Director WSIS

--
http://www.non-violence.org/ | Site collaboratif sur la non-violence
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http://www.forget-me.net/pro/ | Formations et services Linux


list: wikimedia-l


from_name: Jim Higson

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Re: Help needed using POST to submit changes to my
	wiki

body:
?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason wrote:

> On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 21:23:28 +0000, Jim Higson <jh at 333.org> wrote:
>> Jim Higson wrote:
>>
>> > Tomer Chachamu wrote:
>> >
>> >> On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 15:07:50 +0000, Jim Higson <jh at 333.org> wrote:
>> >>> I'm trying to programatically submit edits to my wiki via a http
>> >>> post, using XMLHTTP. However, I am unable to 'persuade' the server to
>> >>> accept them. The server always responds as if I'm asking for a
>> >>> preview.
>> >>>
>> >>> Either:
>> >>> * I'm not making the upload requests correctly
>> >>> * There is a server side security model that forbids this
>> >>> * I'm going mad :)
>> >>>
>> >>> You can see the form-data I'm sending by going here:
>> >>>
>> >>> http://81.5.150.113/wysi/Very_small_test?debug=yes&action=edit
>> >>> then change the wikitext and click save, the request and response
>> >>> body will be shown on the right (which I use as a debugging area)
>> >>>
>> >>> Any help would be really appreciated, this is a real show-stopper for
>> >>> my project.
>> >>
>> >> Are you loading the edit page first and taking the wpEditToken? You
>> >> need it. (It's used for various things, including detection of edit
>> >> conflicts.)
>> >
>> > I wasn't aware of such a thing - this is obviously the problem.
>> >
>> > Is is possible to request a token from the server without it generating
>> > a page? (since the page will never be displayed) Or any another way
>> > that a thick(er) client can submit edits.
>> >
>> > I could just request an edit page in the background to get the token,
>> > but doing so would defeat the object of a low-bandwidth, low-cpu wiki.
>> >
>> > As an aside, what do people here think of this project? Personally I
>> > see a lot of potential in this kind of 'half-thick' interface - the
>> > very quick feedback when editing should make contributing a lot easier
>> > for those starting to learn the wiki syntax.
>>
>> Having thought it some more, I'm pretty sure the only way this can be
>> solved is to add recognition for &action=getedittoken to mediawiki. This
>> would return a tiny http response with just the token as text/plain. When
>> the server gets the token back, it would send back an "ok" or
>> "collision"- this is editing equivalent of action=raw.
>>
>> This would be useful for anyone who is trying to write a thick interface
>> to mediawiki, or any other kind of alternate edit tool.
>>
>> Does this sound like an acceptable addition?
>
> Maybe I'm missing something (wouldn't be the first time) but couldn't
> you just parse the page for the edittoken? It's pretty easy, for
> example this Perl code which takes the scalar $editpage containing
> page retrevied with action=edit would return the token as a variable:
>
> (my $wpEditToken) = $editpage =~
> m#(?<=<input).*([\w\d]{32}).*(?=wpEditToken)#g;

The problem here is I'm trying to build a low bandwidth interface. If the
edit token is 32 bytes it seems a terrible waste to have to download 40k or
more of HTML to get at it!

If you goto http://81.5.150.113/wysi - it looks pretty much like the normal
wikimedia, but NONE of the html you see was generated on the server. It's
difficult to get this across sometimes because to the user it looks just
the same.

The other issue is creating pages that are never shown is a huge waste of
server-side CPU time. My interface uses only static content on the
presentation tier. Potentially an Apache machine could serve an order of
magnitude more pages using this project.

Jim


from_name: Daniel Mayer

subject: [WikiEN-l] Half a million articles is rather big, eh?

body:
--- "Poor, Edmund W" <Edmund.W.Poor at abc.com> wrote:
> How many words are there in the English Wikipedia's article base?  And
> how many volumes (formatted like the Britannica or Americana) would it
> take to publish them all?

I'd tell you, but Special:Statistics does not seem to work right now.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Statistics

-- mav

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Small Business - Try our new resources site!
http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/resources/


from_name: Stan Shebs

subject: [Wikipedia-l] The value of Pronunciation

body:
David Gerard wrote:

> Gerard Meijssen wrote:
>
>> The idea is that you cannot reliably pronounce a word as it it should
>> be pronounced just by seeing the characters when the word originated
>> from another language. By making these resources available, it is
>> clear how they should be pronounced in the original language. Having
>> pronunciations available is important because they help people study
>> a language and, the wikipedia articles are a great resource to learn
>> a language; they are short, cover a subject well and many of the
>> related words related to a subject can be found in the article.
>
>
>
> This could be nightmarish in English - accents are widely variant and
> in Britain are used as markers of social status to a ridiculous degree.
> This is of course highly politicised. I confidently predict ten or more
> sound files per word.

It used to be said that an experts in English could get to within
50 miles of a person's birthplace just by listening to the dialect.
Dunno if that's still true in this more mobile age. In any case,
supplying the life background of the speaker is critical, just
like identifying the location of a picture, and I hope everybody
is doing that for uploaded pronunciations.

Stan


body:
?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason wrote:

>>
>> Maybe I'm missing something (wouldn't be the first time) but couldn't
>> you just parse the page for the edittoken? It's pretty easy, for
>> example this Perl code which takes the scalar $editpage containing
>> page retrevied with action=edit would return the token as a variable:
>>
>> (my $wpEditToken) = $editpage =~
>> m#(?<=<input).*([\w\d]{32}).*(?=wpEditToken)#g;
>
> P.s.: not that I wouldn't mind something like a general robot
> interface, in fact, I voulenteer to (help) write one (if thats
> something the people with CVS access would be willing to accept that
> is).

This would be a huge help to me, since I have very little experience with
PHP. I'm thinking some kind of webservices-like API that follows REST
principles (ie not SOAP!)

I can already do most things on the client, but a few things are needed to
allow alternative interfaces to fly:

* action=getedittoken - returns just an edit token
* Special:Random&action=raw gives the raw content of a random page
* Special:Export?title=RecentChanges gives an XML list of recent changes

None of these things need any major architectural changes.

Jim


from_name: csherlock at ljh.com.au

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Everyone's favorite FUD-master is at it again

body:
I received this in my email (I'm disguising parts of my mail header).

Received: from xxx [999.999.999.999] by mail.whatever.com.au
(SMTPD32-7.13) id ABFFAF640142; Tue, 22 Mar 2005 07:18:07 +1100
Received: from smtp3.hushmail.com(65.39.178.135) by medusa.ljh.com.au
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Mon, 21 Mar 2005 20:18:19 +0000 (UTC)
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	by mailserver1.hushmail.com (8.12.8p1/8.12.8/Submit) id j2LKKLof055924
	for csherlock at ljh.com.au; Mon, 21 Mar 2005 12:20:21 -0800 (PST)
Message-Id: <200503212020.j2LKKLof055924 at mailserver1.hushmail.com>
Date: Mon, 21 Mar 2005 12:20:18 -0800
To: csherlock at blah.com.au
Cc:
Subject: [WikiEN-l] Test case: policing content
From: <debussy at cyber-rights.net>
X-RCPT-TO: <csherlock at blah.com.au>
Status: U
X-UIDL: 409887403

"Can anyone say irony? The Encyclopedia Britannica uses an even
smaller number of people to write their articles. Through the
years, the EB has proven wrong in many of their editions. That they
are more correct in their latest works shows that they have the
same issues as Wikipedia. TBSDY "

You utter moron. The difference is they're a proper encyclopedia
and the wikipedia is just a web noticeboard. (The worst of all the
web's trash boards for geeks and flamers and dirty arrogant
morons.)

csherlock at ljh.com.au wrote:
> Mark Pellegrini wrote:
>
>> Everyone's favorite FUD-master is at it again ---
>> http://www.chicagotribune.com/technology/chi-0503200191mar20,1,26199.story?coll=chi-techtopheds-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true
>>
>> /
>> /*...*
>> / A similar hyperbole surrounds such projects as the Wikipedia, a free
>> online encyclopedia open to all. The Wikipedia's apologists emphasize
>> the great number of volunteers who have taken part in the project and
>> the number of entries they have contributed. They emphasize also the
>> communal nature of the undertaking, in which anyone with a better
>> understanding of a subject, or a bigger ax to grind, can edit what
>> someone else has created. Their prime article of faith is that this
>> openness will inevitably lead to a high level of accuracy and quality.
>> ...
>> ----------
>> Robert McHenry is former editor of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and is
>> the author of "How to Know."
>>
>> /This is the same guy who called us the Faith-based encyclopedia and
>> compared us to a public toilet-
>> http://www.techcentralstation.com/111504A.html
>>
>> --Mark
>
>
> "In each of these examples, a small and self-selected group convinces
> itself not so much that it represents the greater world beyond the
> computer screen but that it is in some ineffable way superior to it,
> that it has transcended the need for the hard lessons the rest of us
> have learned about how things actually work."
>
> Can anyone say irony? The Encyclopedia Britannica uses an even smaller
> number of people to write their articles. Through the years, the EB has
> proven wrong in many of their editions. That they are more correct in
> their latest works shows that they have the same issues as Wikipedia.
>
> TBSDY


from_name: Ray Saintonge

subject: [WikiEN-l] Preloaded new article forms to help the newbies?

body:
David Gerard wrote:

> Deathphoenix wrote:
>
>> David Gerard wrote:
>
>>> When the page for creating a new article comes up, would it be
>>> useful to include an article skeleton? Something like the following:
>>> Is this a useful idea? Do new article patrollers think it will help?
>>
> > That sounds like a great idea. Since the "well-meaning awful" often
> > comes from people who might not know where to look for such templates,
> > maybe it would be a good idea to provide a link in the "Wikipedia does
> > not yet have an article with this exact name" template, to the edit
> > page, or maybe provide a button that inserts that template (similar to
> > the buttons that help you insert bolded text, italicised text,
> > signatures, and so on).
>
> If they don't know how to format an article, they wouldn't know what
> a button meant, though ...
>
> The only downside I can see is the possibility for function creep, and
> idiots using this inappropriately as a hammer to use on others.

A big factor in Wikipedia's success has been the ease of editing.
No-one should be discouraged from editing because they are unfamiliar
with categories, templates, tables or inter-wiki links, nor should they
need to know about special accomodations for math or music unless they
are directly involved in those topics.  The list of what a beginner
needs to know to start editing should fit on one screen without
scrolling.  Even something as simple as four-tilde signatures doesn't
need to be there.  It is not essential to basic editing, but when told
about it a few days later the newbie appreciates this information that
makes his work easier.  (One can even say it's a bit like giving him a
free joint to encourage him on the road to Wikiholism. :-) )

Pandering to idiots can be a terrible waste of time, and most technical
solutions to the idiot problems can be more damaging than the problems
they are trying to solve.

And what's so awful about "well-meaning awful"?  That lot of people is
often willing to discuss and take advice when they are approached
politely.  Why should we make life more difficult for them?

What could be more simple than that blue means there is a linked
article, red means there isn't?  When I joined up we didn't have those
buttons, so I still don't use them.  Is it really ergonomically simpler
to take your hands off the keyboard to point your mouse at a button,
click, and put your hands back on the keyboard than to type three
apostrophes (no shift key required) without moving your hands away from
the keyboard?

I personally like to avoid most templates if there is an equally valid
way of doing things available.  I find it difficult to reconcile the use
of complications intended to make my life simpler with making my life
simpler.

Ec


from_name: Alison Russell

subject: [Wikitech-l] Table of contents

body:
Hi, can anyone tell me where to find the code for the automatic creation of
the table of contents based on the headline text within a page?

What page is it contained in?

Thanks in advance,
Alison


body:
David Gerard wrote:

> Geoff Burling wrote:
>
>> FWIW, if I were kicked off Wikipedia for some reason, it wouldn't be
>> the end of my world. I wouldn't be happy being unable to make
>> contributions
>> to Wikipedia, but I would find something else to fill the loss.
>
> Yes, but that's why such a thing is unlikely.
>
> It'll need a link to a "Dealing with wikiholism" article, if there
> isn't one
> already. I'll add this to it:
>
> * Stop looking at your watchlist.
>
> My wikistress went *so far down* after that.

It all depends on how you use your watchlist.  If it contains more than
200 items it probably needs trimming.  Maybe we should each have two
watchlists.  One normal watchlist would have the things we like to do,
or the routine tasks for which we accept responsibility.  The other,
probably much longer, would be the "idiot watch" where we keep an eye on
certain topics that are in constant need of high-Wikistress repair.
A person who enjoys dealing with idiots could still have everything on
one watchlist.

Ec


body:
Charles Matthews wrote:

> David Gerard wrote
>
>> There is that. OTOH, refs are a good way for a newbie stub not to take a
>> quick journey via Votes For Deletion.
>
> There is that too.  For me, though, a category on a stub is more
> likely than a page reference (to a college text, say) to make it
> prosper and grow. Trouble is, you just have to know whether it is
> [[Category:Greek islands]] or [[Category:Islands of Greece]].  One day
> our categories will redirect, I suppose.

Sure.  Having [[Category:Greece]] and [[Category:Islands]] that could be
searched with a Boolean "AND" would even avoid having redirects because
the order would not matter.

Ec


body:
Deathphoenix wrote:
> David Gerard wrote:

>> When the page for creating a new article comes up, would it be
>> useful to include an article skeleton? Something like the
>> following:
>> Is this a useful idea? Do new article patrollers think it will help?

 > That sounds like a great idea. Since the "well-meaning awful" often
 > comes from people who might not know where to look for such templates,
 > maybe it would be a good idea to provide a link in the "Wikipedia does
 > not yet have an article with this exact name" template, to the edit
 > page, or maybe provide a button that inserts that template (similar to
 > the buttons that help you insert bolded text, italicised text,
 > signatures, and so on).

If they don't know how to format an article, they wouldn't know what
a button meant, though ...

The only downside I can see is the possibility for function creep, and
idiots using this inappropriately as a hammer to use on others.

- d.


from_name: Angela

body:
On Tue, 22 Mar 2005 16:23:35 +0800, Cathy Ma <cathyma at gmail.com> wrote:
> As a researcher who is interested in the sociology of the wikipedia I
> am writing to see if you can suggest links or leads on information
> concerning research on wiki.

There isn't one central place for this, but the following links are
some good places to start:

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Research
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Wikidemia
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedistik

Angela.


body:
Geoff Burling wrote:

> FWIW, if I were kicked off Wikipedia for some reason, it wouldn't be
> the end of my world. I wouldn't be happy being unable to make contributions
> to Wikipedia, but I would find something else to fill the loss.

Yes, but that's why such a thing is unlikely.

It'll need a link to a "Dealing with wikiholism" article, if there isn't one
already. I'll add this to it:

* Stop looking at your watchlist.

My wikistress went *so far down* after that.

- d.


from_name: Zoney

body:
On Tue, 22 Mar 2005 11:27:19 +0000, David Gerard
<fun at thingy.apana.org.au> wrote:
> Deathphoenix wrote:
> > David Gerard wrote:
>
> >> When the page for creating a new article comes up, would it be
> >> useful to include an article skeleton? Something like the
> >> following:
> >> Is this a useful idea? Do new article patrollers think it will help?
>
>  > That sounds like a great idea. Since the "well-meaning awful" often
>  > comes from people who might not know where to look for such templates,
>  > maybe it would be a good idea to provide a link in the "Wikipedia does
>  > not yet have an article with this exact name" template, to the edit
>  > page, or maybe provide a button that inserts that template (similar to
>  > the buttons that help you insert bolded text, italicised text,
>  > signatures, and so on).
>
> If they don't know how to format an article, they wouldn't know what
> a button meant, though ...
>
> The only downside I can see is the possibility for function creep, and
> idiots using this inappropriately as a hammer to use on others.
>
>
> - d.
>
>

Indeed. For a start, many new articles are stubs, and for stubs, I
prefer the following format, rather than sections on a short article:

:''See also:'' [[Article a]], [[Article b]]

:''External links:'' [[site a]], [[site b]]

For an example of this format, check many of the towns listed on
[[List of towns in the Republic of Ireland]] (the talk page to-do list
lists the stub ones specifically).

Also, I would consider it optimistic at best to expect references for
the more humdrum stub articles. I'm not discouraging the practice of
encouraging references - but for stubs - which mostly just relate
basic information, contributors shouldn't be beaten with the "provide
references" mantra.

Even beyond stubs, to shorter/average size articles, this may be the case.

Zoney

--
~()____) This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds...


from_name: Matt R

body:
--- Zoney <zoney.ie at gmail.com> wrote:
> Also, I would consider it optimistic at best to expect references for
> the more humdrum stub articles. I'm not discouraging the practice of
> encouraging references - but for stubs - which mostly just relate
> basic information, contributors shouldn't be beaten with the "provide
> references" mantra.
>
> Even beyond stubs, to shorter/average size articles, this may be the case.

Perhaps, but for stubs, providing "References", "External links" or "Further
reading" brings a practical benefit that doesn't apply quite the same way for
more mature articles: namely, recording the location of useful material can be
very helpful to subsequent editors looking to expand the article.

-- Matt

Send instant messages to your online friends http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com


from_name: Charles Matthews

body:
Matt R wrote

> Perhaps, but for stubs, providing "References", "External links" or
> "Further
> reading" brings a practical benefit that doesn't apply quite the same way
> for
> more mature articles: namely, recording the location of useful material
> can be
> very helpful to subsequent editors looking to expand the article.

Providing an _optional_ template might not do a lot of harm; but given the
way stubs operate, thought should be given as to which 'fields' are really
compulsory.  I've been seeing quite a number of Indian/Chinese music and
dance articles recently - do we really expect references and web sites for
these?  From the point of view of increasing Wiki-en's reach, we do need the
stub that simply points out a gap.  WP is founded on stubs, after all.

There is a tension: the more complete WP is on things about which being
fairly complete is not so hard, the more difficult it is to make articles in
the less-favoured areas match up.  I don't want to see this develop into a
your-reach-is-greater-than-your-grasp faultline.

Charles


from_name: Rick

body:
--- David Gerard <fun at thingy.apana.org.au> wrote:
> I'm currently trying to flesh out my 'addiction'
> model of
> pathological behaviour on Wikipedia. You can see
> this in
> editors who are hardworking, but seem to love
> Wikipedia
> *just a little too much* and possibly in ways nature
> didn't
> really intend. And when they get banned, they go
> fucking
> batshit with junkie rage at being cut off from their
> fix,
> c.f. Wik and the vandalbot. I'll probably write it
> up as
> a "ha ha only serious" page on meta, to go with
> [[m:MPOV]]
> and [[m:Don't be a dick]]. In the meantime, it gives
> the
> ArbCom considerable flexibility for more creative
> remedies
> for bad behaviour than a mere ban, which the real
> addicts
> tend to sockpuppet anyway. "You *really* want your
> fix?
> Write two 500-word essays on why NPOV and No
> Personal Attacks
> are good ideas. If we score each 9/10 or better, you
> can
> edit again." I think there's a lot of scope there
> for really
> *fixing* behaviour.

That's a creative approach.  I can't wait to see what
you come up with.  :)

RickK

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Make Yahoo! your home page
http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs


references:
<20050320040349.D57371AC19E9@mail.wikimedia.org>	<423D6701.7000904@comcast.net>	<d1lkgo$vh0$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<d1nmkn$f7u$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
Well look at that! Gmane disguises email addresses automatically for
you. I didn't know it would do that...

TBSDY

csherlock at ljh.com.au wrote:
> I received this in my email (I'm disguising parts of my mail header).
>
> Received: from xxx [999.999.999.999] by mail.whatever.com.au
> (SMTPD32-7.13) id ABFFAF640142; Tue, 22 Mar 2005 07:18:07 +1100
> Received: from smtp3.hushmail.com(65.39.178.135) by
> medusa.ljh.com.au              via smtp id
> 353d_5d4abf3c_9a46_11d9_9d27_00304811e5bb;
> Mon, 21 Mar 2005 20:18:19 +0000 (UTC)
> Received: from smtp3.hushmail.com (localhost.hushmail.com [127.0.0.1])
>     by smtp3.hushmail.com (Postfix) with SMTP id A4816A332F
>     for <csherlock at blah.com.au>; Mon, 21 Mar
> 2005 12:20:22 -0800 (PST)
> Received: from mailserver1.hushmail.com (mailserver1host.hushmail.com
> [65.39.178.45])
>     by smtp3.hushmail.com (Postfix) with ESMTP
>     for <csherlock at blah.com.au>; Mon, 21 Mar
> 2005 12:20:22 -0800 (PST)
> Received: (from nobody at localhost)
>     by mailserver1.hushmail.com (8.12.8p1/8.12.8/Submit) id j2LKKLof055924
>     for csherlock at ljh.com.au; Mon, 21 Mar
> 2005 12:20:21 -0800 (PST)
> Message-Id:
> <200503212020.j2LKKLof055924 at mailserver1.hushmail.com>
>


body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> For some the recognition and ownership of their
> efforts is important.
> I've remarked how on some user pages there is a
very long list of the
> articles on which they have worked.  They are
often dilligent about
> keeping it up to date.  When they stop keeping it
up the list it's a
> good sign that they have begun learning to
submerge their ego.

The reason why I do it is because I'm always getting
idiots claiming that I do nothing but Recent Changes
trolling and making minor changes.  It's for self
defense.  There have been several times when these
people try to claim that I don't contribute to
Wikipedia, and all I have to do is to point to that
page.

RickK

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Small Business - Try our new resources site!
http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/resources/


from_name: Poor, Edmund W

body:
How many words are there in the English Wikipedia's article base?  And
how many volumes (formatted like the Britannica or Americana) would it
take to publish them all?

Ed Poor


from_name: David Gerard

body:
Zoney wrote:

> Indeed. For a start, many new articles are stubs, and for stubs, I
> prefer the following format, rather than sections on a short article:
> :''See also:'' [[Article a]], [[Article b]]
> :''External links:'' [[site a]], [[site b]]
> For an example of this format, check many of the towns listed on
> [[List of towns in the Republic of Ireland]] (the talk page to-do list
> lists the stub ones specifically).

It's a matter of taste, yes.

> Also, I would consider it optimistic at best to expect references for
> the more humdrum stub articles. I'm not discouraging the practice of
> encouraging references - but for stubs - which mostly just relate
> basic information, contributors shouldn't be beaten with the "provide
> references" mantra.

If they know what a stub is, they can remove the template. Remember that
I'm just thinking of some preloaded wikitext here.

> Even beyond stubs, to shorter/average size articles, this may be the case.

That I would question, actually. I don't write a three-para new article
these days without at least an external link. The template doesn't force
a section to be filled in, it just tries to get across that this is a
good idea.

Hmm. How would you write such a preloaded text? I was thinking in terms of
an outline for beginners to write something that wasn't crap, not something
to be used as a constraint on those who know what they're doing.
"The format below is suggested but not compulsory."

- d.


body:
Charles Matthews wrote:

> Providing an _optional_ template might not do a lot of harm; but given
> the way stubs operate, thought should be given as to which 'fields' are
> really compulsory.  I've been seeing quite a number of Indian/Chinese
> music and dance articles recently - do we really expect references and
> web sites for these?  From the point of view of increasing Wiki-en's
> reach, we do need the stub that simply points out a gap.  WP is founded
> on stubs, after all.

If they know what a stub is and to put in {{stub}}, they don't need the
template.

> There is a tension: the more complete WP is on things about which being
> fairly complete is not so hard, the more difficult it is to make
> articles in the less-favoured areas match up.  I don't want to see this
> develop into a your-reach-is-greater-than-your-grasp faultline.

There is that. OTOH, refs are a good way for a newbie stub not to take a
quick journey via Votes For Deletion. It depends whether the ego bruising
from the VFD process is worse than the effort to say where they got some
piece of information.

- d.


from_name: Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Re: Help needed using POST to submit changes to
	my wiki

references:
<d1mns7$20b$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<9a878c4405032109141827f904@mail.gmail.com>
	<d1n0jp$46m$1@sea.gmane.org> <d1ndse$kj2$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<51dd1af80503211455354edc0a@mail.gmail.com>
	<51dd1af805032115001cee8ab2@mail.gmail.com>
	<d1osu9$4gp$1@sea.gmane.org>

body:
> > P.s.: not that I wouldn't mind something like a general robot
> > interface, in fact, I voulenteer to (help) write one (if thats
> > something the people with CVS access would be willing to accept that
> > is).
>
> This would be a huge help to me, since I have very little experience with
> PHP. I'm thinking some kind of webservices-like API that follows REST
> principles (ie not SOAP!)
>
> I can already do most things on the client, but a few things are needed to
> allow alternative interfaces to fly:
>
> * action=getedittoken - returns just an edit token
> * Special:Random&action=raw gives the raw content of a random page
> * Special:Export?title=RecentChanges gives an XML list of recent changes
>
> None of these things need any major architectural changes.
>
> Jim

Rather than having some quick hack made just for you it would probably
be better to consider well how to make a standard interface for
something like this, something like action=robot which would return
something in an easy-to-parse format, is there a bug open for this
already where something like this could be brainstormed?

In the meantime, as I understand it what you need *now* is to just
implement this on your own wiki, would it not be an option to just
modify the code you use to not require the token?


from_name: Tom Haws

body:
Ray Saintonge wrote:

> The list of what a beginner needs to know to start editing should fit
> on one screen without scrolling.

Exactly.  I think David's original proposal was perfect with additions
below.  Just getting the bold name in the first sentence does a lot.

'''Article name''' is ...

  Detail on Article name ...

  Further detail on Article name ...

  ==References==

  *List your sources here *or delete this section*.

  ==External links==

  *List relevant external links that are not already references *or
delete this section*.


body:
David Gerard wrote

> There is that. OTOH, refs are a good way for a newbie stub not to take a
> quick journey via Votes For Deletion.

There is that too.  For me, though, a category on a stub is more likely than
a page reference (to a college text, say) to make it prosper and grow.
Trouble is, you just have to know whether it is [[Category:Greek islands]]
or [[Category:Islands of Greece]].  One day our categories will redirect, I
suppose.

C


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Help needed using POST to submit changes to
	my wiki

body:
Jim Higson wrote:
> Actually, where is the token on the edit page?
> This sounds like a silly question, but I've just saved the HTML of an edit
> page and greped for 'token' without any hits!

The edit token is presently only used for logged-in users.

a) It's purpose is to prevent offsite form submissions from hijacking
users' login credentials to perform actions on the wiki; an anonymous
visitor has the same rights as the attacker would

b) It relies on having an open session to store the master token in,
which will fail for an anonymous editor not accepting cookies.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Nicolas Weeger

subject: [Wikitech-l] Thanks to everyone working on the servers

body:
Hello :)

I've noticed the wiki (seems) much much faster since yesterday. I wish to thank everyone working on the servers and the software for their work on that essential part of the project.

Ok, this mail doesn't bring any new information, but I've often complained of slowness, so the least I can do is thank people when it's working nicely :)

Keep up the good work!

Nicolas "Ryo" Weeger

Acc?dez au courrier ?lectronique de La Poste : www.laposte.net ;
3615 LAPOSTENET (0,34?/mn) ; t?l : 08 92 68 13 50 (0,34?/mn)


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: New Wikistats

body:
James R. Johnson wrote:
> For :ang, I need to use the accented ash character "?" - how would I
> encode that so it shows up?  Can I simply use the accented
> characters, or must I use the html or numerical equivalents?

"...onfind in ??re  [[Wikipedia:Sandbox|sandboxe]]..."

Seems to be working fine.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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from_name: Silas Snider

subject: [Wikitech-l] DB Problems

body:
Forgive me if this is the wrong place to post this, but recently I have
been getting DB errors like the following when trying to access pages in
the Wikipedia namespace (such as Votes for Deletion and Rquests for
Comment) If I refresh the page, it will load correctly. Just thought
someone should know.

Sincerely,
Silas Snider
--Error (This one when trying to access RFC) Follows--

*Warning*: mysql_query(): Unable to save result set in
*/usr/local/apache/common-local/php-1.4/includes/Database.php* on line *324*
Unable to free MySQL result

Backtrace:

    * Database.php line 469 calls wfdebugdiebacktrace()
    * User.php line 455 calls databasemysql::freeresult()
    * SkinTemplate.php line 254 calls user::getnewtalk()
    * OutputPage.php line 417 calls skinmonobook::outputpage()
    * OutputPage.php line 614 calls outputpage::output()
    * Database.php line 360 calls outputpage::databaseerror()
    * Database.php line 309 calls databasemysql::reportqueryerror()
    * Parser.php line 3005 calls databasemysql::query()
    * Parser.php line 195 calls parser::replacelinkholders()
    * OutputPage.php line 243 calls parser::parse()
    * Article.php line 795 calls outputpage::addprimarywikitext()
    * index.php line 127 calls article::view()

--End of Error--


from_name: Sj

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Latest wikinews : Wikimania, Wax

body:
Wikimania is looking for speakers, workshop/tutorial proposals, and
suggestions for discussion panels.  If you don't want to speak
yourself, but there is someone you would really like to see speak or
present at Wikimania, you can suggest this as well.
      Send abstracts or suggestions to :  cfp at wikimedia.org

Please distribute the call for papers widely :
     http://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/Call_for_papers

On a separate note, SurfWax, a metasearchenging, released a
Wikipedia-index tool this week with some cute autocompletion features:
     http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Wikiwax_released

--
+sj+


from_name: Peter Lofting

body:
At 8:58 PM +0000 3/22/05, Arwel Parry wrote:
>Stan Shebs wrote:
>
>>David Gerard wrote:
>>
>>>Gerard Meijssen wrote:
>>>
>>>>The idea is that you cannot reliably pronounce a word as it it
>>>>should be pronounced just by seeing the characters when the word
>>>>originated from another language. By making these resources
>>>>available, it is clear how they should be pronounced in the
>>>>original language. Having pronunciations available is important
>>>>because they help people study a language and, the wikipedia
>>>>articles are a great resource to learn a language; they are
>>>>short, cover a subject well and many of the related words related
>>>>to a subject can be found in the article.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>This could be nightmarish in English - accents are widely variant and
>>>in Britain are used as markers of social status to a ridiculous degree.
>>>This is of course highly politicised. I confidently predict ten or more
>>>sound files per word.
>>
>>
>>It used to be said that an experts in English could get to within
>>50 miles of a person's birthplace just by listening to the dialect.
>>Dunno if that's still true in this more mobile age. In any case,
>>supplying the life background of the speaker is critical, just
>>like identifying the location of a picture, and I hope everybody
>>is doing that for uploaded pronunciations.
>
>50 miles? Even in these more mobile days that's nothing. For some
>communities, real experts could locate a persons' accent down to a
>few streets.

FWIW

In England, within the first 30 seconds of someone opening their
mouth, its still possible to place a person to within half a county
or less purely from pronouciation.

With longer listening that picks up key marker vowels its also
possible identify what class of person they spend their time with -
via either community, work or travel. That is particularly true of
immigrants who learn their English from different classes of contact.

e.g.  an Australian who lived in Canada and then moved to S. London
bears the footprints in their accent.

Peter


from_name: Jim Higson

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Re: Re: Help needed using POST to submit changes
	to my wiki

body:
?var Arnfj?r? Bjarmason wrote:

>> > P.s.: not that I wouldn't mind something like a general robot
>> > interface, in fact, I voulenteer to (help) write one (if thats
>> > something the people with CVS access would be willing to accept that
>> > is).
>>
>> This would be a huge help to me, since I have very little experience with
>> PHP. I'm thinking some kind of webservices-like API that follows REST
>> principles (ie not SOAP!)
>>
>> I can already do most things on the client, but a few things are needed
>> to allow alternative interfaces to fly:
>>
>> * action=getedittoken - returns just an edit token
>> * Special:Random&action=raw gives the raw content of a random page
>> * Special:Export?title=RecentChanges gives an XML list of recent changes
>>
>> None of these things need any major architectural changes.
>>
>> Jim
>
> Rather than having some quick hack made just for you it would probably
> be better to consider well how to make a standard interface for
> something like this, something like action=robot which would return
> something in an easy-to-parse format, is there a bug open for this
> already where something like this could be brainstormed?

Yes, I agree. However, it should not be assumed that the agent is a robot,
it may be a thick client written (like mine) in AJAX, GTK or some other
thing.

I'm not sure what you mean by an easy to parse format? Just sending the
token as 32 plaintext chars seems as easy as it could possibly be.

> In the meantime, as I understand it what you need *now* is to just
> implement this on your own wiki, would it not be an option to just
> modify the code you use to not require the token?

Well, yes, but for my project, not for my wiki. My intention is to provide a
mediawiki interface that can be used on any interface. My wiki is really
only for the purpose of testing and demonstrating that interface.

What I am really trying to do is bring down the number of Apache machines
needed to serve a big wiki to maybe a quarter what it is now. Serving
static content is really, really cheap.

--
Jim


subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: Help needed using POST to submit changes to my wiki

body:
Tomer Chachamu wrote:

> On Mon, 21 Mar 2005 15:07:50 +0000, Jim Higson <jh at 333.org> wrote:
>> I'm trying to programatically submit edits to my wiki via a http post,
>> using XMLHTTP. However, I am unable to 'persuade' the server to accept
>> them. The server always responds as if I'm asking for a preview.
>>
>> Either:
>> * I'm not making the upload requests correctly
>> * There is a server side security model that forbids this
>> * I'm going mad :)
>>
>> You can see the form-data I'm sending by going here:
>>
>> http://81.5.150.113/wysi/Very_small_test?debug=yes&action=edit
>> then change the wikitext and click save, the request and response body
>> will be shown on the right (which I use as a debugging area)
>>
>> Any help would be really appreciated, this is a real show-stopper for my
>> project.
>
> Are you loading the edit page first and taking the wpEditToken? You
> need it. (It's used for various things, including detection of edit
> conflicts.)

Actually, where is the token on the edit page?
This sounds like a silly question, but I've just saved the HTML of an edit
page and greped for 'token' without any hits!

According to the DOM inspector form#editform fields are:

        "wpTextbox1"
        "wpSummary"
        "wpSave"
        "wpSection"
        "wpEdittime"

Is the edit time used as the token?

--
Jim


from_name: Cathy Ma

body:
Hi everyone,

As a researcher who is interested in the sociology of the wikipedia I
am writing to see if you can suggest links or leads on information
concerning research on wiki.  Is there any central hub for 'wiki
analysts' whether academic or media-related?

I have been looking for links within wikimedia but it seems that the
information is quite scattered.  Has anyone tried compiling a
wiki-page for wiki researchers that is similar to the MIT opensource
research center (http://opensource.mit.edu/)?  Or is there any email
list for wiki-related researchers?  I'll definitely appreciate any
advice or suggestion as I am still at a very preliminary phase of
research.  Thanks a lot for your attention in advance.

Best,
Cathy

--
MA, P.S. Cathy
MPhil student,
Department of Sociology
The University of Hong Kong
http://cathyma.blogspot.com


from_name: Tomer Chachamu

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Re: Help needed using POST to submit changes to my
	wiki

body:
On Tue, 22 Mar 2005 15:58:30 +0000, Jim Higson <jh at 333.org> wrote:
> Actually, where is the token on the edit page?
> This sounds like a silly question, but I've just saved the HTML of an edit
> page and greped for 'token' without any hits!
>
> According to the DOM inspector form#editform fields are:
>
>         "wpTextbox1"
>         "wpSummary"
>         "wpSave"
>         "wpSection"
>         "wpEdittime"
>
> Is the edit time used as the token?

I believe wpEditToken was added in 1.4. wpEdittime is easily
calculable if you know the server time. (Well, it *is* the server
time.) Perhaps you could load a page with the server time on it when
the client opens, then keep track. One second out won't hurt.


body:
Gerard Meijssen wrote:

> The idea is that you cannot reliably pronounce a word as it it should be
> pronounced just by seeing the characters when the word originated from
> another language. By making these resources available, it is clear how
> they should be pronounced in the original language. Having
> pronunciations available is important because they help people study a
> language and, the wikipedia articles are a great resource to learn a
> language; they are short, cover a subject well and many of the related
> words related to a subject can be found in the article.

This could be nightmarish in English - accents are widely variant and
in Britain are used as markers of social status to a ridiculous degree.
This is of course highly politicised. I confidently predict ten or more
sound files per word.

- d.


body:
>> If you goto http://81.5.150.113/wysi - it looks pretty much like the
>> normal wikimedia, but NONE of the html you see was generated on the
>> server. It's difficult to get this across sometimes because to the user
>> it looks just the same.
>
> Well, it may be because it doesnt work (for me :)
>
> I can do some things at your site, but of the buttons are nonfunctional,
> or I get wierd renderings etc. Firefox 1.01 (no privoxy this time) on
> linux.
>
> I DO have some problems with the new kernel, so maybe it is just me :)

This is very strange - not least because as far as I can remember the string
"error uploading" is'nt in there!

Let's see... I'm tesing Firefox 1.0 preview (not the latest version I know).
It sounds as if XMLHTTP is failing for some reason. Do services such as
Google complete work on your Firefox.

Could you visit the site with ?debug=yes added to the URL and report what
(if anything) is printed on the right of the window? And also what (again,
if anything) is sent to the console. Remember to clear the cache first to
make sure you get the latest version (shift+click refresh).

There are still a few interface things that aren't implemented, but they
should be rendered struck-through.

{snip}

--Jim


body:
Jaroslaw Fedevych (UALUG wrote:

> On Tue, Mar 22, 2005 at 03:58:30PM +0000, Jim Higson wrote:
>> Actually, where is the token on the edit page?
>> This sounds like a silly question, but I've just saved the HTML of an
>> edit page and greped for 'token' without any hits!
>>
>> According to the DOM inspector form#editform fields are:
>>
>>         "wpTextbox1"
>>         "wpSummary"
>>         "wpSave"
>>         "wpSection"
>>         "wpEdittime"
>>
>> Is the edit time used as the token?
>
> No, the field is called precisely "wpEditToken" and contains a MD5 sum.
> Good time to tell us which version of MediaWiki you are using, maybe there
> is a bug?..

Thanks for the help, I'm using 1.4beta6. There is definitely not any
"wpEditToken" in the HTML. Maybe this is a known issue with beta6? When I
get time I'll upgrade to 1.4rc1 and see if it persists.

--
Jim