... or I could drop the whole idea of rfcu being a "disappearing" link in user5 (take out the "cond=n" parameter), and just let it stay a redlink when there's no rfcu page. But this was why Ryulong reverted the change to user5 before, he found that "ugly", and the "disappearing" feature was the condition he demanded to allow the update back in. His other suggestion was the WP:SSP use a new template with rfcu in it, and leave user5 alone. So you may want to think that one over. -- Ben 06:14, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have decided to just try and put in the new {{user5}} code. As far as I can tell, it's working.. if it does start buggering SSP up again, please revert or let me know and I will do so. Neil (not Proto ►) 09:38, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Akhilleus, the GOOD news is that WP:SSP does not appear to have been hosed up. In fact, please tell me if it is any slower-loading than before, or the reverse. And the other GOOD news is that {{subst:user5|Mykungfu}} does not lose the auto-updating feature of "rfcu"; that will continue to show new pages created after the subst'ing. Example of subst'd template:
          Mykungfu (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log • rfcu)
So please recommend subst'ing if there's a slow load at WP:SSP, to reduce the transclusion overhead without losing any functionality. Yayyyy! -- Ben 02:36, 8 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'll try AN:I. The person in question ended his recent career in a lengthy series of direct attacks on me, and so I honestly can't set any punishment or suchlike, without my motives being called into question, and rightly so. Best I get others in. Adam Cuerden ^talk 18:48, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

On the other one you linked - I think I'd like an IP check to confirm Winkers and RJASE1 are the same, as the sockpuppet master claiming to be the same as the Sockpuppet reporter could just be a nasty attack that RJASE1 hasn't noticed yet. We'll take him at his word for all the other socks, though. Adam Cuerden ^talk 19:09, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Could be, but with RJASE1's userpage saying he's in Nashville, the source of the socks, we ought to check my reading anyway. Adam Cuerden ^talk 19:35, 7 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Take a look at Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/AndyCanada. If I click on "block log" for Prolancet‎ (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) or Firstocean (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log), I get taken to a log for User:Prolancet.E2.80.8E or User:Prolancet.E2.80.8E. Any idea why that is? --Akhilleus (talk) 20:29, 8 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not getting that result now, and (from resolving the code by subst'ing) I don't see anything that could have caused it. The template hasn't changed... could someone have been working on the blockuser page itself, to change how a username gets parsed? ".E2.80.8E" is a character encoding, I don't know for which characters without going to look it up, but since the problem's gone I doubt it's traceable any longer. — Ben ^TALK/_HIST 21:48, 8 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The difference between the first and second times Prolancet's name was typed was that on the first try an invisible character was put after the final T and before the first closing bracket.

Here's a cut-and-paste of that segment → Prolancet‎}

Go into edit mode, put your cursor just after the bracket, and backspace/delete (NOT left-arrow): first stroke, you delete the bracket; second stroke, nothing seems to happen; third stroke, you delete the final T. That second stroke deleted the invisible character.

I would guess that, in trying to type the first closing bracket, some almost-correct key combination like control or alt or fn, plus ] or }, got entered, resulting in no wrong visible character, no visible character at all. Anyone would naturally shrug and go on to type both closing brackets correctly. Everything else parsed the username without a problem, but block-log could not....

It's the "intermittent" problem that's the real headache, isn't it, like the car that squeaks except when the mechanic is there. At this point taking a sledgehammer to the car is generally a great stress-reliever, though perhaps a bit more expensive in the long term than two pints of Guinness at the local pub while grousing to the publican and your fellow drinkers. — Ben ^TALK/_HIST 01:44, 9 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

... I took it and ran with it. ... Working code for tryout on the talk page. ... Commented-out copy at the bottom of this section on the actual WP:SSP main page. If everyone's happy with it, remove the comment marks and let it run!

By the way, try subst'ing {{socksuspectnotice}} on your own talk page with no parameters, and hit Preview (don't save). Okay. Now try the same thing on User:Mykungfu, since his talk page's protected. Which evidence page gets linked? Neat trick, huh? A side benefit from {{ssp}}! -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 19:38, 9 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ben, thanks for your work on this. I'm in favor of implementing it, obviously; the only question is whether we should wait for comments. On the other hand, it seems like few people watch the SSP page, so we could reasonably claim that we two form a consensus... --Akhilleus (talk) 22:45, 9 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'm delighted to help, and to get a chance to do a working infobox. I'd struggled to make one work for WP:RFCN, but features like editintro and preload just don't work in post-a-comment mode, so what's the point? Then I thought of WP:SSP, and found you'd been five weeks ahead of me....

Wait for comments? Your original suggestion on WT:SSP waited over a month for comments already, and nobody objected, so.... Inputbox added, and instructions substantially revamped to fit; items headlined, and put in a sensible order, like, oh, collecting evidence and opening your case before tagging the suspect accounts with links to that case. If this was silly of me, please move things around to where they should be. Enjoy! -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 06:11, 10 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Alright, way to be bold! Thing is, the instructions are still complicated, because of the unfortunate decision someone made at the beginning of SSP to have separate pages (2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc.) for each case on a particular user. Using the {{ssp}} template to discover previous cases is clever, but it will be beyond the capability of some users. Is there any way to have the inputbox run a script to see if a case has already been filed on a sockmaster? Or, the other thing to do is to steal another idea from RCU and have each sockmaster get a single case page, no matter how many times they're reported. Looking at the subpages of SSP ([1]) shows a pretty healthy number of sockmasters w/multiple cases, and there's always the danger that one of them (like Mykungfu) might get a new case filed, and then you'd have 5 Mykungfu cases, with new information getting added to the 1st case. I'm not sure how to solve this problem, but I wanted the reporting system to be as simple, and elegant, as the one at RCU, and unfortunately it isn't. --Akhilleus (talk) 15:48, 10 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Gahhh, what a long link to encode! Try Special:Prefixindex/Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/ next time! I've just added [[Special:Prefixindex/{{FULLPAGENAME}}/|subpages]] to the "Closed archives" box on WP:SSP.

I completely agree with you about the complexity of the case-filing system. I use the same simple-minded search engine, {{highrfc-loop}}, to search for RfAs, RfBs, RfArbs, RfC/Users, and SSPs, and it has to take account of not only the "_(2nd)" style of suffixes but also "_(2)", "_2", and "-2", because the different areas use different subpage-numbering formats, and sometimes more than one. I even thought about coding for Roman numerals, because some people have used those, but then I remembered actual usernames like "Giano II", and my brain began to hurt from trying to distinguish between "the second case involving 'Giano'" and "the first case involving 'Giano II'". It's bad enough that usernames might also end with "_2" or "-2", as it is.

Yes, it would be much easier all around to keep one file per username and just add to it over time, the way WP:RFCU does. Cross-indexing sockpuppet names would also be a wonderful feature to add, because right now it's not easy to find out whether someone's been investigated as a sockpuppet (rather than a puppetmaster) since the filenames don't cover puppets. You just have to hope the userpage got tagged at some point in its history.

The solution would be to adopt an RFCU-like system -- which would even allow cross-referring the cases between SSP and RFCU, as long as the two areas chose the same username to title the report on a group of IDs.

So, first step: propose the change. Second step: get it approved. Third step: revise the new-case creation system to match RFCU's, wherein a little outright theft of code seems appropriate. Fourth step, and here's the heartbreaker: go through all the existing files, and consolidate the multiples.

For investigation: Will we have to make any other changes in file format (once they're all singles) to let RFCU's system work for SSP?

My lovable and cuddlesome and bright little {{ssp}}, whom you'd take home to meet your mother, will handle either system, without changing any code. The system change would make things simpler, not harder, for templates as well as for human beings. {{rfcu}} is simpler than {{ssp}}, though I think earnestness of character counts for something too.

Now, just one more question, to make your brain hurt too: who gets to go revise all those {{socksuspect}} and {{socksuspectnotice}} templates that are currently linking to (2nd), (3rd), (4th), etc., cases, and redirect them to the new single files? (Since they've been subst'd, we can't just change the template code and have the posted copies all snap into shape.)

Well, I'm in favor, but we'd all better realize that the changeover will take hard work, and time. We'll need to build the new version of WP:SSP on a secondary page, copy over all the subpages too, make the changes to the copies, keep "mirroring" the updates to the main SSP, and test the new system thoroughly, so that on The Day we can just rename the main page to old, rename the new page to main (and thus with all the subpages -- we'll need to automate this step to make it happen fast), and there everything will be neatly in place to go on with. When we're sure it's solid, and nothing's missing, then delete the old versions.

I think this will take more than the two of us.

I, for one, don't have the system authorizations to do the moves and copies and deletes, or the skills (yet) to write the bots/scripts. At the speed I work, and the number of hours per day I can invest, I don't know how long it would take me alone just to consolidate multiples into singles.

The archives, oh my goodness, they're organized by month of case-closing, so the same-username cases aren't even filed together... and who the heck would know (or care) when an old case was closed, if all they've got is a suspect username, and all they're trying to find out is whether User:JohnDoe is a sockpuppet or sockpuppeteer? Where the heck is an index of cases by username, covering both puppetmasters and puppets? Thank goodness for the userpage histories, if people remembered to use appropriate edit summaries (did they?) at least the taggings should show up -- but if the evidence wasn't conclusive enough on earlier reports, there won't be anything shown on the block logs.

Yechh. I hope you're well-and-truly daunted by the prospect. I sure am. We need the advice of some seriously skilled and experienced gurus here. They may know ways to make this a much simpler conversion. For one thing, let's ask the people who set up RFCU for advice. It would be in their best interests, because the better SSP works, the less workload overflows into RFCU. -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 21:59, 10 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• I didn't answer this before: "Is there any way to have the inputbox run a script to see if a case has already been filed on a sockmaster?" I didn't see that option in the documentation, and have never seen the underlying code -- I assume it involves Javascript, but I don't really know even whether that's all it's written in. It would be a nice feature to suggest to the author, but I suspect the answer will be: "If you enter a pre-existing file name and click the button, you'll find the pre-existing file in front of you instead of the preload (unfilled-out form), and the editintro header won't be at the top of the page. Doesn't that already tell you whether a case has been filed?" -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 22:20, 10 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ben, I think you've demonstrated that the SSP filing system won't change soon. To merge all the Mykungfu cases, just as one example, would require merging page histories--the kind of thing that has to be done manually by an admin. And there are at least 55 suspected sockmasters that have multiple SSP cases. In contrast, changing the links in the subst'd {{socksuspect}} and {{socksuspect}} notice cases wouldn't be that difficult--as long as you know how to code a bot. I don't.

As a stopgap, though, one of the other kinds of inputbox is a search box. Maybe we could put one on the SSP page, so one of the steps in filing a case would be a search for "Special:Prefixindex/Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/PUPPETMASTER". Try this:

Put "Mykungfu" in there, and you find his cases; put "Akhilleus" in there, and you find that so far, I'm clean...

BTW, I'm pretty sure that the inputbox won't allow scripts to be run. Code is here. --Akhilleus (talk) 00:40, 11 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Wouldn't it be easier on everyone to just give the subpages link and say "go look"? It's an alphabetized list. Everyone who's ever used a telephone directory or a book index, or found their scores on a class roster, knows how to look up names in alphabetized lists. It doesn't even require typing anything: you click the link, you scroll the page. Along the way, maybe you see other names than the one you were looking up. "Him? HE does sockpuppets? I once argued with him -- and then all these new names piled in on his side! Hey, that was -- he -- they -- that was a scam!" And a little more truth comes out than from only seeing the name you asked for.... -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 01:02, 11 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Say, did you try clicking those buttons with the text kept as is? Left-hand-button successfully finds the file I created for those who click the "Start a case" button on WP:SSP without changing the text. Right-hand button finds nothing, and suggests trying Google instead.... oh, that doesn't look good. Wikipedia's own search engine sends customers elsewhere, and here it isn't even Christmas. (Macy's, Kris Kringle, oh, if that has to be explained then it isn't funny.) -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 01:24, 11 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Gahhhhh! Picture me running in tight circles in the middle of the room, bashing my head with a discarded tabletop that is rapidly splintering and beginning to shed pieces of itself along my trail. At last I slow to a stop, fling the few remaining shards away, and turn to you with a bleeding forehead, a mad gleam in my eyes, and a frighteningly calm voice with which I tell you:

I, sir, am a blithering idiot.

And you, sir, are a blooming genius.

I should have taken the clue from your being five weeks ahead of me on the SPP case-creation inputbox idea, and before that from your bringing up to me the niche for templates like {{rfcu}} and {{ssp}}:

... that I function best when I listen carefully to your suggestions, and just try to figure out how to push them the last step, from design concept or prototype/mockup to fully functioning gadget.

You were right about using inputbox to search as well as create. And I even thumped on the detail that would make that idea work prettily... but didn't realize it.

Yes, Special:Prefixindex/Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/ was the detail... or, rather, it was one little trivial fact about the "Special:" pages in general. The simplest thing.

The search mode of inputbox, with those two buttons, was just the wrong mode.

We can use the create mode instead. Just one button, which we can custom-label.

We can even use the same default you specified above:
          Special:Prefixindex/Wikipedia:Suspected_sock_puppets/PUPPETMASTER

"But but," you object, "we just want to read the page; we don't want to edit it."

I grin through the thin trickles of blood gently running down my face, and assure you with a tone of very possibly mad glee: that's quite all right; we can't edit "Special:" pages; if we try, we just get put into "read" mode anyway.

So here's WP:SSP/Search, transcluded below using its full name. Enjoy! -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 22:00, 11 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Say, why doesn't {{socksuspect}} carry with it the "suspected sockpuppet" category, the way {{sockpuppet}} does? That'd be a list to read through.... -- Ben ^TALK/_HIST 22:08, 11 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have been accused of having sockpuppets here without a usercheck. I want to dispute this. Wiki Raja 01:48, 12 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the advice. As for the other three that were blocked, there is no connection between and those users. Once again, this is just another tactic by this particular interest group to be used against me. They saw that they were losing in this vote to keep a particular Category, so they went on a witch hunt to try to disqualify people. Thanks anyways for your help. Wiki Raja 01:58, 12 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Page moves actually never show up on people's watchlists, which is something I've never quite understood. Maybe you could leave a note on Cretanforever's talk page. I've deleted the redirect, so you can move it back now. Khoikhoi 05:20, 13 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've never been there either, you can see more pictures at User talk:Khoikhoi/Gallery. Khoikhoi 05:29, 13 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the notice, I needed a good laugh ;-). I've left a note on WP:AN/I that will hopefully get another admin to take a look. I'm leaving in the morning (7 hours from now actually) for Spring Break so hopefully somebody will get to this soon. This benjiwolf guy has reached a new level of strange with all the images... auburnpilot talk 03:08, 17 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]