Template loop detected: Wikipedia talk:Wikidata/Wikidatans

Please list interwiki link conflicts here

If you find an interwiki conflict, please list it here so that a Wikidata editor can investigate and clear up the issue. Sven Manguard Wha? 01:52, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Portal:Technology ([1])

Could probably create a temporary noticeboard or something for it. This page could get really long otherwise. --Izno (talk) 02:23, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There is one on Wikidata. Sven Manguard Wha? 02:42, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm still not sure it's necessary to list it here, or even on Wikipedia at all. Part of the point of Wikidata is to centralize the data; it makes sense to me to centralize the discussion of that data as well. --Izno (talk) 14:44, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If they're easy ones, I can knock them off right here, and if they're too difficult, I can forward them to the main board on Wikidata. Sven Manguard Wha? 18:13, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It wasn't an "interwiki conflict", we just had two pages that linked to the same page on another wiki. Wikidata doesn't handle that case so the guy removing the links was correct to just leave those ones behind. 86.44.163.139 (talk) 02:31, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

No, that's still a conflict. The Wikidata community will sort out which is the correct link. Sven Manguard Wha? 02:42, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

But there is no "Correct" link. It looks like to me that we have Portal:Science AND Portal:Technology, whereas they only have Portal:Science & Tech. If we want both English portals to link to that one portal, then one of the pages will have to keep a local interwikilink. In any case, the links that are working can still be removed just fine. It makes it easier to which links are causing problems and what (if anything) needs to be done. 86.44.163.139 (talk) 02:51, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Here is one to start with: Appomattox Court House National Historical Park is messed up with Appomattox Court House. I did not touch the second one, and in the first one, I added the note that the links should not be removed until the interwiki conflict has been solved.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:45, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, it's been handled and both pages are now cleared for Wikidata. Sven Manguard Wha? 17:44, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

One I tried manually correcting til I discovered this page (hence any bad edits may be my fault). Many other languages are linking with Open-pit mining instead of Surface mining. The former is a specific subtype of the later, but many of the other languages' pages (at least those I could understand or at least see the pictures of), covered all types of surface mining, and not exclusively open-pit mining. For example, the Spanish article title literally translates as "open-sky mining", its article page then mentions the narrow open-pit mining as indeed having a Spanish word of its own (albeit not an article of its own). (This may have derived from a mistranslation at some point of the German "Tagebau", which contextually means either the broader or narrower). The mislinking has affected both this wiki and on the Commons categories, resulting in title names that in English are actually factually inaccurate, and in turn photos bearing those translations being added to the wrong article. (the main problem is using open-pit mining when is meant the different concept of strip mining, which is not helped by mistaken lay usage.) Morgan Riley (talk) 15:52, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Can users who are removing interwiki links please link to this Wikidata project, it looks like vandalism otherwise. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:30, 15 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I started this page for precisely that reason. --Izno (talk) 15:33, 16 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This needs to be a priority. Removal of content without a valid reason will be treated as vandalism or inadvertent error unless clearly stated otherwise. JFW | T@lk 22:12, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've put in several hopefully prominent references to this, and I've also asked d:User:Yair Rand if he'd consider adding a default summary to his script. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 00:07, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, it's priority number one. There's no reason for Wikipedia editors to accept these Wikidata changes. Explain or be prepared to be reverted on sight. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:56, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've attempted to remain agnostic on whether this page should give the community guidance on whether actions should or should not be performed. My opinion is that the RFC (unclosed) was a no consensus on any policy or guideline, so we should attempt to avoid giving such guidance. --Izno (talk) 19:06, 16 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wikidata has been deployed to the English Wikipedia. Wikidata manages interwiki links on a separate project on pages such as this.

Further information: m:Wikidata/Deployment Questions and https://blog.wikimedia.de/?p=13892.

All interwiki bots that run on the English Wikipedia have now stopped adding interwiki links.

Removal of interwiki links on a page linked to a wikidata item that contains the links is NOT vandalism. Please use this script which can identify if the links are found on wikidata.

If you have any questions regarding wikidata please use the talk page Wikipedia talk:Wikidata. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 21:04, 16 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have made a fork of that script that handles language codes with hyphens. See [2] William Avery (talk) 00:42, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Perfect! :) ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 00:54, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would not have attempted it without your shared insight into the problem of underscores and hyphens. William Avery (talk) 00:57, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It is rather odd how the API uses underscores and the rest of the world hyphens! I hate javascript though ;p Glad you managed to fix it! ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 01:12, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

William: Would you mind contacting Yair on wikidata to see if your fix can be implemented in their script? Many users already have his/hers installed so it would be good if we can fix all of those. Legoktm (talk) 01:13, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's fixed now. William Avery (talk) 13:06, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I really would urge people to link to this page in their edit summaries. I've just seen links removed by an IP, who can't be using a script to run checks. William Avery (talk) 23:29, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Could someone please point me to a page that actually explains how to use this new "facility"? Deb (talk) 14:02, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would recommend d:Help:Editing – It Is Me Here ^{t / c} 10:38, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've seen some recent edits by User:Xqbot that initially looked suspicious and/or wrong. A little investigation revealed they are related this Wikidata project/initiative. This is probably a good thing, but seems a bit opaque right now in the early stages.

While there is the "edit links" thing over in the languages frame, these otherwise unexplained edits might catch editors unawares. Providing very explicit edit summaries along with a link to the associated wikidata page may be helpful during this transition. --Dfred (talk) 04:30, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, I just spotted a message on the users talk page about this and I have also had a message regarding my bot even when linking to the wikidata page explaining what wikidata is and the entry where the wikilinks can be found. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 11:37, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A useful thing to add might be advice on what Wikipedians are supposed to do to update Wikidata when there are page splits and page merges here -- what needs to be done to make interwiki links reflect the changed page scopes; and how much will or will not automatically be picked up by bots? Jheald (talk) 09:46, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've actually been wondering that as well. That might be worth a broader topic at Wikidata, because those are issues which other wikis will have to deal with also, if it hasn't been discussed there yet. --Izno (talk) 14:32, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• There is something seriously wrong with editing the interlanguage links on Wikidata for pages outside mainspace. I've started a thread at d:Wikidata:Project chat#Namespace ignored. --Redrose64 (talk) 13:40, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  This is a known bug per the thread there. --Izno (talk) 14:25, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  There is a fix, which will be backported during todays deployment. Legoktm (talk) 15:26, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

They largely duplicate the actual content of the sections without adding substantially to understanding, in my opinion. I think the nutshell already captures the intent fine. --Izno (talk) 14:42, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I put the top one back because we really do need people to see the link to the conflict section so that these things can get fixed and not languish forever. Sven Manguard Wha? 17:39, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Please can all Wikidata editors ENSURE they place a link to this project in their edit summaries when they remove interwiki links. I mean a LINK, not just a passing nod to WIkidata. This roll-out has confused many editors and anything we can do to prevent unnecessary confusion is good. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:20, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The only ways to fix the problems are a) tell specific offending editors and b) explain to specific confused editors. There is nothing else that can be done by noting your problem here. --Izno (talk) 18:38, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Why aren't Wikidata editors paying attention to the concerns being raised here? Surely the project knew it was going to cause havoc (in a sense) and should have agreed on an approach which both educated and encouraged other Wikipedia editors to contribute to Wikidata rather than just telling them "There is nothing else that can be done by noting your problem here". This isn't Wikidata, this is Wikipedia, if editors continue to cause disruption by not adequately explaining their motives, then I suggest all Wikidata editors' edits should be reverted on sight. It's pretty clear there's no control, no quality control, no cohesive approach to rolling this out. Poor show. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:41, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is not the page to point out your problem. Period. Full stop. You need to WP:AGF with editors who are both removing links and reverting removal of links by talking to them. You should raise your issue at AN or ANI if you approach a specific editor and said editor proverbially spits in your eye. Anything less than that means that you have not followed the appropriate dispute resolution procedure to get the problem fixed. There is otherwise nothing that can be done here to fix editor behavior beyond what has already been done (which is to note here that edit summaries are encouraged but not required, in line with WP:Edit summary). --Izno (talk) 19:28, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, but what the fuck? I'm more than happy to see Wikidata edits being made, but all I'm saying is that this is WIkipedia, not Wikidata. Wikidata editors who start pissing about with Wikipedia pages need to explain what they're doing. I most certainly do assume good faith but those editors who are working on behalf of Wikidata need to realise that they should be clearly explaining their behaviour. I'm not going to dispute resolution or elsewhere, I'm asking really, really nicely that those people who have summarily decided to edit on behalf of Wikidata have some respect and tell us what the hell they're doing, even in the edit summaries. Now get over it and get on with it or expect your project edits to be removed as vandalism because they're causing issues, they're not being explained and they're disrupting this Wikipedia. I'm sure, if your project managed it better, it would be fine, but right now, it's a complete mess and Wikidata should be ashamed of itself. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:45, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Actually no, you're wrong. They're working on behalf of Wikipedia, NOT Wikidata. Because interwiki bots are disabled, the English Wikipedia is showing incorrect langlinks for many pages. By removing langlinks, Wikipedians are fixing the problem.

And if you think this is disruptive in any way, you're completely wrong. There's a mile long of list of interwiki conflicts that Wikidata is fixing. Legoktm (talk) 22:02, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Because editors are coming from all across the globe to remove links, even if enwiki isn't their homewiki. --Rschen7754 22:06, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm tempted to hat this section, because you're not making any sense. No, really, I've got no clue what you're trying to say which can even be solved at this page. If you have an issue with an editor, talk to them to fix it. If you have a problem with a class of editors, take it to AN/ANI. That's what it comes down to. If your simple problem is that you (and not the general you) don't understand what's going on, ask. Read the page to which this talk page is attached. Is there something you don't understand? Are there others who don't understand what is going on? Point them here, so that they can ask. It seems to me that solely reverting what are obviously to anyone who has read the description intended for Wikipedians as good faith edits would be disruptive and acting outside of consensus. --Izno (talk) 22:19, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, are we done creating drama about the most mundane type of gnomeish edit since... well I can't actually think of a good analogy, to be honest. This is about as gnomeish as it gets. Here's my 2₵: Everyone should use edit summaries for everything. Especially if they're removing large amounts of text. Especially if there's an edit filter tagging their removals, with anti-vandalism patrollers monitoring it. Especially when a good number of editors will really have no reason to AGF with a classic type of vandalistic edit. Anyone who even needs to be told to use an edit summary is lacking in clue, and anyone who still doesn't use one is just plain old stupid. But, TRM, with all due respect, you're way out in left field on this one. There's all sorts of stuff you can do to streamline the transition, and a lot of us are working damn hard to do just that. For instance, Addshore just edited the "removal of interwiki links" edit filter to reference this page. We've got that box at the top of this page listing users to contact for help with Wikidata. So, please don't tell us that we should be ashamed of ourselves, especially when enwiki has had months to prepare for this; by all means, go explain things to editors who aren't using edit summaries, and to editors who are reverting them too, but don't come here and tell us that we should all be reverted on sight or something. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 01:57, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A friendly note to both "sides". First, I think it is clear that this software/functionality change, implemented on the single busiest Wikipedia by far, was not communicated adequately. Where were the watchlist notices or something similar? (Apologies if there were--that would bolster your case.) Project coordinators or other highly involved people should take a lesson here for future improvement in communication. You can't expect people not to be confused, yes, even six days later. The confusion is very predictable.

On the other hand, there is no need to divide people by referring them to WP vs WD editors. Most of the people responding on this page (except me, ha, although I once edited WP more actively) are long-term WP editors as well. Kolophon (talk) 02:17, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I started a RFC on the whole thing, and people stated very clearly that they didn't want to bother reading the pages I linked to as background, or figure out how to use Wikidata in the first place. So this isn't my fault. --Rschen7754 02:22, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to clarify that I certainly am not implying you or anyone else in this discussion is at fault. Kolophon (talk) 04:35, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

How's this for an edit summary? --Redrose64 (talk) 20:37, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wow... pretty descriptive. The Anonymouse (talk | contribs) 05:10, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Just so it doesn't sound like this is an issue causing problems to a handful of eccentrics - I can't get on with wikidata at all. So far I've had zero success in adding interwiki links despite help from another contributor. Clearly it was not well-communicated and still isn't. Deb (talk) 12:44, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to make it clear (if I may be so bold to speak on behalf of an entire project) that we at Wikidata are very invested in making these transition work, and definitely don't have a problem with people complaining. We have a bit of a problem with off-hand dismissals of everything we've worked for, but we wouldn't have put that box at the top of this page if we weren't legitimately interested in helping. (Full disclosure: The box was a unilateral action on my part, but it's seen nothing but support on Wikidata.) Anyways, I just wanted to put that out there.

Now, as to your actual point: Could you please specify what it was you were having a problem with? Maybe you had the bad luck to stumble onto an interwiki conflict on your first attempt. Or any number of other things. I'd love to help, but I'll need a bit more to go off of than that. Thanks. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 06:21, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

For info, something I've logged here. My watchlist currently states it has 949 items on it, but there's probably only 100 in total. Lugnuts ^{Dick Laurent is dead} 08:48, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

While we do our best here to reduce the occurrence of improperly done link removals, if people would like to help clean up the ones that happen anyways, please see User:Addbot/log/wikidata. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 19:48, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

He was logging stuff there where the bot was not removing all the links but now he's not since it generates thousands of entries which apparently weren't getting help. See also User talk:Addbot#A new log for Addbot?. --Izno (talk) 20:13, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I will periodically turn the loging section of the bot back on after the page clears up a bit!·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 22:59, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A bot would be able to solve most of the problems in the log. Most of the problems arise because the Wikidata item has not had its links imported from English Wikipedia. All the bot would need to do would be to go to the Wikidata item, run slurpwiki gadget with English selected, then try to remove the interwikis on the en.wiki article again. This resolves the problem 70% of the time. The ones that are not by this point fixed can then be added to a log that is sorted out manually. Del_♉sion23 (talk) 01:20, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As an example, a problem at Kerguelen Islands was solved by these two edits in this order: import interwikilinks from English Wikipedia and Checkwikilinks removes the newly imported links. Del_♉sion23 (talk) 01:26, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That might be true, but a bot to fix those leftover links probably would not be supported by the community at its bot request. --Izno (talk) 01:49, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Bots will be removing interwiki links anyway. I'm not sure why they also wouldn't be supported in doing them more thoroughly. Del_♉sion23 (talk) 02:18, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

People can be weird here about the value of bots. Besides, in your test instance, judgement needed to be made. People, for whatever reason, don't like it when a bot gets to choose (aside from ClueBot, but even the mighty ClueBot has been limited to only 1% or 0.1% false positive rate [or something smaller] at the cost of nearly 30% of vandalism edits missed). Shrug. --Izno (talk) 02:22, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Legobot 28. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 05:38, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hopfully I will work on a wikidata side to my bot but will not be able to until monday at the earliest! ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 12:31, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

In an earlier edit[3] I added a TL;DR hatnote:

{{hatnote|TL;DR: the Wikidata project removes interwiki links from Wikipedia articles, and replaces them into a central database that is centrally updated.}}

This has now been removed[4] on the basis that a nutshell template already covers this. I don't believe it does; three-quarters of the "nutshell" is bright red text that appears to be directions for bot operators. This gives little to a first time reader/encounter of any mention of "Wikidata" and what it might be. Links to this page are the only overview being given in the summary for bot edits performing the associated mass cull/migration of the interwiki links. This hatnote would not need to stay forever; however right at this moment it would, if allowed to remain in-place, give a succinct high-level overview in a way that reading the entire rest of the page does not. If the wording in the {{hatnote}} above is inaccurate, please can somebody suggest a better wording rather than simply removing it. Please bear in mind that while some people here are intimately involved with the details of WP:WIKIDATA, 99% of Wikipedia editors are not (yet), and 95% of editors have not even heard of WP:WIKIDATA. I would like to restore this until such a time as those percentages are more balanced. —Sladen (talk) 12:52, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The addition of more content which is not located in the nutshell doesn't make any sense to me. Plainly, the purpose of a nutshell is to TLDR, and if it is not sufficiently doing so, then it needs to be fixed. --Izno (talk) 15:02, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Lets try the following then, (1) swap the top two info boxes. (2) move the Red information (which is aimed at bot operators already highly fairly with the subject) into the body. (3) try to reword the nutshell text and WP:LEAD to be more approachable to somebody with zero familiarity. How does that sound? —Sladen (talk) 15:06, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've now tried[5]. Please review. The reason for just doing this rather than waiting a week or two and discussing, is because the removal of interwiki links is happening now. Today, this minute and this hour. There has been no announcement or public project-wide hatnote this is the first information that most editors will encounter about Wikidata, and as it stood/stands the article is not accessible to people unfamiliar. The unfamiliarity is demonstratably clear from the huge number of comments raised on the Talk: pages of bot operators performing interwiki link removal/migration. —Sladen (talk) 15:22, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

1. I'm not against that, but I don't think that's consistent with any other Wikipedia space pages. See for example the WP:LEAD you linked, in fact!
2. Except the red information isn't meant for bot operators. There have been a number of editors which have been working to remove the links as well, some of whom have been careful and some of whom have not been careful...
3. I am not disagreeable to the thought (nor is anyone here) but obviously the devil is in the details. Be bold, keeping in mind the first two numbers. --Izno (talk) 15:21, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Additionally to point #2, there have been numerous requests here which have resulted in that addition, meant for users and not bot ops. --Izno (talk) 15:24, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

*nod*, so it seems to me to what's needed is accessible "Howto" section (using the data that was in the red section). I appreciate that this information maybe targeted more widely, but as a first-time reader I did read it as a section targetted for bot operators (who are the people going to be performing high-speed/mass deletions and currently getting the feedback from doing so). Can you suggest some wording for such a Howto section, or should I just try to write something approachable? —Sladen (talk) 15:30, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The intent of the "Editing interlanguage links" was supposed to fill that need. You can probably start from there and refactor as necessary. --Izno (talk) 15:33, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, third attempt has been straight reverted.[6]. Bearing in mind that large-scale edits are continuing (right now) and this is where people are being directed, please can somebody else try something. I'm loathed to keep trying this in the face of repeated straight reverts (in case it annoys people further). Perhaps another editor would be willing to try and add something they are comfortable with, and I can offer to assist with copy-editing/tweaking afterwards. —Sladen (talk) 15:40, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It wasn't a straight revert; I incorporated your changes to the nutshell in an attempt to get to the middle ground. --Izno (talk) 15:44, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, this is constructive and I'm sorry for my mis-characterisation, I have avoided any further changes to the text for the moment. I've tried three[7][8][9] further simple formatting-only changes to (try to) make the text that is already there easier to absorb. —Sladen (talk) 15:51, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I moved the line back up but left the paragraphing in place (this is also true of other guidance pages). I removed both the color and the small. Maybe that will fix any upstaging problems? --Izno (talk) 15:53, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ta. This is an improvement over what was there before. Thank you. —Sladen (talk) 15:55, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have yet to find a template with a Wikidata entry, but I am curious as to how it would work, since most templates have the interwikis on the documentation page. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 13:19, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The short answer is that "it just works". I fixed up {{Infobox mineral}} the other day, and it works fine. This also means that interface pages like MediaWiki:Titleblacklist (d:Q4885851) can have interwiki links since it isn't stored in the page text. Legoktm (talk) 13:23, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Have to see if any of the tools check doc pages. I hate this laptop keyboard. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 14:56, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Just consider that in the background, the Mediawiki software is looking for an entry in Wikidata that corresponds to the page you're currently on: en:Template:Foo, and displays all links that it finds. Removing the documentation sub-page links has no bearing on that operation. (The Wikidata page for the template Legoktm mentioned is d:Q52491.) I suppose you could go the extra step of adding the doc subpages across Wikipedias, if they exist, to Wikidata as well. Kolophon (talk) 15:09, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The addition of the /doc pages makes me nervous. That might be something to float on Wikidata first. --Izno (talk) 15:35, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

So far we haven't addressed subpages much. Technically speaking, something like a specific AfD, RfA, or SPI would pass d:WD:N, but clearly that wouldn't really be in the spirit of Wikidata. Anyways, one caveat for everyone: Last I checked, Yair's script doesn't work on templates. (By the way, there definitely are items for templates, though pretty much any non-mainspace items have been manually created, so there's less coverage there in the mainspace. For instance, though, I created d:Q4844001, since that's a template I find invaluable in cross-wiki work.) Now, if you want, what you can do is:

1. Copy all the links from the /doc page to the template proper. (Just don't press save!!!)
2. Press "remove interwikis"
3. If that's removed them all, you're golden. Remove them from the /doc page with the same summary you'd normally use, and be done with it. If that hasn't removed them all, then either copy over the links to Wikidata (I believe slurpInterwiki will work), or just go back to the /doc page and remove all the links that Yair's script removed, leaving the ones it didn't remove.

— PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 05:51, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wikidata will be read-only from 19:00 UTC today through 02:00 UTC tomorrow (February 21) in order to upgrade the database schema. During that time the site will not be editable, and it will not be possible to add or remove language links. --Rschen7754 18:10, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The read-only time will be starting soon and ending a few hours late due to some delays in San Francisco. --Rschen7754 21:07, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Apparently, already started--Ymblanter (talk) 21:35, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I can't find instructions on that anywhere. Thanks, Renata (talk) 00:07, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Two options:

• First you'll need to check if the topic already exists on Wikidata. For example, if you know there is a French Wikipedia article on the topic, you may be able to find it using this. If you can find the right item, add the new article to the item.
• If no item can be found, you have to create a new item on Wikidata here. Then you can add all the interwikis to the item.

Del_♉sion23 (talk) 01:45, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

My understanding is that one can still add them in the old way and wait till bots notice interwiki links and bring them to Wikidata.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:10, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The side image with the comments starting with "To use Checksitelinks"... is cut by "mw.loader.load".... If it matters, am using Google Chrome on Ubuntu Linux. John W. Nicholson (talk) 03:49, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Could you expand a bit? Is it on Wikidata? What is exactly cut? (I will probably not be able to help myself, but there are more experts around here, or we can invite them from Wikidata).--Ymblanter (talk) 08:13, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

C'mon guys... the nutshell box keeps getting bigger and bigger! It shouldn't be any longer than a few sentences, and certainly, two paragraphs and a bulleted list is just excessive. Add additional boxes if you need to, but please don't stick it in the nutshell box. — This, that and the other (talk) 05:49, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If anything it's the second sentences to delete not the first. Thank you for shifting the bot guidance out to a separate box. The text now is still not accessible to first-time readers (who are seeing the mass changes and being directed here). —Sladen (talk) 09:51, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

What is "collaboratively edited knowledge base" supposed to mean here? How is that concept any different from Wikipedia itself? Too vague, too empty. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 06:42, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia; Wikidata is a database which keeps data in a structured way.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:11, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Having read this talk page and the associated article, I feel I have to comment, if only in the hope we can learn from this experience.

• Firstly, let me say that now I've worked out what it is all about, I think the concept of Wikidata and using it to record interwiki links is a very good one. In trying to work it out, I looked at the 'language' list of several dozen articles I've created in the last few months, and noticed that while most had the 'edit link' link, a few didn't. Digging into why, I realised it was because I had made an error in setting up the links (essentially to the wrong foreign article which already linked back to a different WP:EN article). I even eventually, by a process of trial and error, worked out how to fix this on Wikidata. So it is already adding value to Wikipedia.

• But here comes the but. The advanced warning was non-existent. If you were involved in the project of rolling out the use of Wikidata to provide inter-wiki links on WP:EN and you think it was well publicised, you are deluding yourself. I'm a fairly frequent WP:EN and Commons contributor, but until yesterday I'd never even heard of Wikidata. You may well have written RFCs, but they never came across my event horizon. And from I hear above and elsewhere, that is probably true of a lot of WP:EN editors.

• So does that matter?. You could argue that many (most?) WP:EN editors are profoundly uninterested in RFCs for other Wikimedia projects. And the process that is going on seems to be largely automated. Maybe we don't need to know. I think that is profoundly wrong. The changes do impact editors, both by unsettling them with strange bot edits, but also by sowing seeds of confusion, eg. 'how do i create new interwiki links', 'how do i correct interwiki links', etc.

• Even now, there is no decent 'how to' documentation to answer a lot of simple questions. For example, in correcting the interwiki mislinks described above, I've ended up leaving 'orphaned' Wikidata items with no interwiki links. Is this ok; desirable; if not what else should I do. We desperately need that level of guidance.

• And the danger is that WP:EN editors are going to say "I don't understand how to do it, so I don't bother creating interwiki links", or even "This is getting too complicated, I'm going somewhere else".

It is not ideal to leave it this late, but not too late to recover. What it needs is somebody who understands the innards to Wikidata and how its is linked to WP:EN to write an FAQ, and publicise it. Put a banner on the top of each WP page "Confused by the new Interwiki scheme; see the linked FAQ". -- Starbois (talk) 10:38, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Please list interwiki link conflicts here

If you find an interwiki conflict, please list it here so that a Wikidata editor can investigate and clear up the issue. Sven Manguard Wha? 01:52, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• Portal:Technology ([10])

Could probably create a temporary noticeboard or something for it. This page could get really long otherwise. --Izno (talk) 02:23, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There is one on Wikidata. Sven Manguard Wha? 02:42, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm still not sure it's necessary to list it here, or even on Wikipedia at all. Part of the point of Wikidata is to centralize the data; it makes sense to me to centralize the discussion of that data as well. --Izno (talk) 14:44, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If they're easy ones, I can knock them off right here, and if they're too difficult, I can forward them to the main board on Wikidata. Sven Manguard Wha? 18:13, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It wasn't an "interwiki conflict", we just had two pages that linked to the same page on another wiki. Wikidata doesn't handle that case so the guy removing the links was correct to just leave those ones behind. 86.44.163.139 (talk) 02:31, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

No, that's still a conflict. The Wikidata community will sort out which is the correct link. Sven Manguard Wha? 02:42, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

But there is no "Correct" link. It looks like to me that we have Portal:Science AND Portal:Technology, whereas they only have Portal:Science & Tech. If we want both English portals to link to that one portal, then one of the pages will have to keep a local interwikilink. In any case, the links that are working can still be removed just fine. It makes it easier to which links are causing problems and what (if anything) needs to be done. 86.44.163.139 (talk) 02:51, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Here is one to start with: Appomattox Court House National Historical Park is messed up with Appomattox Court House. I did not touch the second one, and in the first one, I added the note that the links should not be removed until the interwiki conflict has been solved.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:45, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, it's been handled and both pages are now cleared for Wikidata. Sven Manguard Wha? 17:44, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

One I tried manually correcting til I discovered this page (hence any bad edits may be my fault). Many other languages are linking with Open-pit mining instead of Surface mining. The former is a specific subtype of the later, but many of the other languages' pages (at least those I could understand or at least see the pictures of), covered all types of surface mining, and not exclusively open-pit mining. For example, the Spanish article title literally translates as "open-sky mining", its article page then mentions the narrow open-pit mining as indeed having a Spanish word of its own (albeit not an article of its own). (This may have derived from a mistranslation at some point of the German "Tagebau", which contextually means either the broader or narrower). The mislinking has affected both this wiki and on the Commons categories, resulting in title names that in English are actually factually inaccurate, and in turn photos bearing those translations being added to the wrong article. (the main problem is using open-pit mining when is meant the different concept of strip mining, which is not helped by mistaken lay usage.) Morgan Riley (talk) 15:52, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Can users who are removing interwiki links please link to this Wikidata project, it looks like vandalism otherwise. The Rambling Man (talk) 20:30, 15 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I started this page for precisely that reason. --Izno (talk) 15:33, 16 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This needs to be a priority. Removal of content without a valid reason will be treated as vandalism or inadvertent error unless clearly stated otherwise. JFW | T@lk 22:12, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've put in several hopefully prominent references to this, and I've also asked d:User:Yair Rand if he'd consider adding a default summary to his script. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 00:07, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, it's priority number one. There's no reason for Wikipedia editors to accept these Wikidata changes. Explain or be prepared to be reverted on sight. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:56, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've attempted to remain agnostic on whether this page should give the community guidance on whether actions should or should not be performed. My opinion is that the RFC (unclosed) was a no consensus on any policy or guideline, so we should attempt to avoid giving such guidance. --Izno (talk) 19:06, 16 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wikidata has been deployed to the English Wikipedia. Wikidata manages interwiki links on a separate project on pages such as this.

Further information: m:Wikidata/Deployment Questions and https://blog.wikimedia.de/?p=13892.

All interwiki bots that run on the English Wikipedia have now stopped adding interwiki links.

Removal of interwiki links on a page linked to a wikidata item that contains the links is NOT vandalism. Please use this script which can identify if the links are found on wikidata.

If you have any questions regarding wikidata please use the talk page Wikipedia talk:Wikidata. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 21:04, 16 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have made a fork of that script that handles language codes with hyphens. See [11] William Avery (talk) 00:42, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Perfect! :) ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 00:54, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would not have attempted it without your shared insight into the problem of underscores and hyphens. William Avery (talk) 00:57, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It is rather odd how the API uses underscores and the rest of the world hyphens! I hate javascript though ;p Glad you managed to fix it! ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 01:12, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

William: Would you mind contacting Yair on wikidata to see if your fix can be implemented in their script? Many users already have his/hers installed so it would be good if we can fix all of those. Legoktm (talk) 01:13, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's fixed now. William Avery (talk) 13:06, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I really would urge people to link to this page in their edit summaries. I've just seen links removed by an IP, who can't be using a script to run checks. William Avery (talk) 23:29, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Could someone please point me to a page that actually explains how to use this new "facility"? Deb (talk) 14:02, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would recommend d:Help:Editing – It Is Me Here ^{t / c} 10:38, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've seen some recent edits by User:Xqbot that initially looked suspicious and/or wrong. A little investigation revealed they are related this Wikidata project/initiative. This is probably a good thing, but seems a bit opaque right now in the early stages.

While there is the "edit links" thing over in the languages frame, these otherwise unexplained edits might catch editors unawares. Providing very explicit edit summaries along with a link to the associated wikidata page may be helpful during this transition. --Dfred (talk) 04:30, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, I just spotted a message on the users talk page about this and I have also had a message regarding my bot even when linking to the wikidata page explaining what wikidata is and the entry where the wikilinks can be found. ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 11:37, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A useful thing to add might be advice on what Wikipedians are supposed to do to update Wikidata when there are page splits and page merges here -- what needs to be done to make interwiki links reflect the changed page scopes; and how much will or will not automatically be picked up by bots? Jheald (talk) 09:46, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've actually been wondering that as well. That might be worth a broader topic at Wikidata, because those are issues which other wikis will have to deal with also, if it hasn't been discussed there yet. --Izno (talk) 14:32, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

• There is something seriously wrong with editing the interlanguage links on Wikidata for pages outside mainspace. I've started a thread at d:Wikidata:Project chat#Namespace ignored. --Redrose64 (talk) 13:40, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  This is a known bug per the thread there. --Izno (talk) 14:25, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

  There is a fix, which will be backported during todays deployment. Legoktm (talk) 15:26, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

They largely duplicate the actual content of the sections without adding substantially to understanding, in my opinion. I think the nutshell already captures the intent fine. --Izno (talk) 14:42, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I put the top one back because we really do need people to see the link to the conflict section so that these things can get fixed and not languish forever. Sven Manguard Wha? 17:39, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Please can all Wikidata editors ENSURE they place a link to this project in their edit summaries when they remove interwiki links. I mean a LINK, not just a passing nod to WIkidata. This roll-out has confused many editors and anything we can do to prevent unnecessary confusion is good. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:20, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The only ways to fix the problems are a) tell specific offending editors and b) explain to specific confused editors. There is nothing else that can be done by noting your problem here. --Izno (talk) 18:38, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Why aren't Wikidata editors paying attention to the concerns being raised here? Surely the project knew it was going to cause havoc (in a sense) and should have agreed on an approach which both educated and encouraged other Wikipedia editors to contribute to Wikidata rather than just telling them "There is nothing else that can be done by noting your problem here". This isn't Wikidata, this is Wikipedia, if editors continue to cause disruption by not adequately explaining their motives, then I suggest all Wikidata editors' edits should be reverted on sight. It's pretty clear there's no control, no quality control, no cohesive approach to rolling this out. Poor show. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:41, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This is not the page to point out your problem. Period. Full stop. You need to WP:AGF with editors who are both removing links and reverting removal of links by talking to them. You should raise your issue at AN or ANI if you approach a specific editor and said editor proverbially spits in your eye. Anything less than that means that you have not followed the appropriate dispute resolution procedure to get the problem fixed. There is otherwise nothing that can be done here to fix editor behavior beyond what has already been done (which is to note here that edit summaries are encouraged but not required, in line with WP:Edit summary). --Izno (talk) 19:28, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, but what the fuck? I'm more than happy to see Wikidata edits being made, but all I'm saying is that this is WIkipedia, not Wikidata. Wikidata editors who start pissing about with Wikipedia pages need to explain what they're doing. I most certainly do assume good faith but those editors who are working on behalf of Wikidata need to realise that they should be clearly explaining their behaviour. I'm not going to dispute resolution or elsewhere, I'm asking really, really nicely that those people who have summarily decided to edit on behalf of Wikidata have some respect and tell us what the hell they're doing, even in the edit summaries. Now get over it and get on with it or expect your project edits to be removed as vandalism because they're causing issues, they're not being explained and they're disrupting this Wikipedia. I'm sure, if your project managed it better, it would be fine, but right now, it's a complete mess and Wikidata should be ashamed of itself. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:45, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Actually no, you're wrong. They're working on behalf of Wikipedia, NOT Wikidata. Because interwiki bots are disabled, the English Wikipedia is showing incorrect langlinks for many pages. By removing langlinks, Wikipedians are fixing the problem.

And if you think this is disruptive in any way, you're completely wrong. There's a mile long of list of interwiki conflicts that Wikidata is fixing. Legoktm (talk) 22:02, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Because editors are coming from all across the globe to remove links, even if enwiki isn't their homewiki. --Rschen7754 22:06, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm tempted to hat this section, because you're not making any sense. No, really, I've got no clue what you're trying to say which can even be solved at this page. If you have an issue with an editor, talk to them to fix it. If you have a problem with a class of editors, take it to AN/ANI. That's what it comes down to. If your simple problem is that you (and not the general you) don't understand what's going on, ask. Read the page to which this talk page is attached. Is there something you don't understand? Are there others who don't understand what is going on? Point them here, so that they can ask. It seems to me that solely reverting what are obviously to anyone who has read the description intended for Wikipedians as good faith edits would be disruptive and acting outside of consensus. --Izno (talk) 22:19, 18 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, are we done creating drama about the most mundane type of gnomeish edit since... well I can't actually think of a good analogy, to be honest. This is about as gnomeish as it gets. Here's my 2₵: Everyone should use edit summaries for everything. Especially if they're removing large amounts of text. Especially if there's an edit filter tagging their removals, with anti-vandalism patrollers monitoring it. Especially when a good number of editors will really have no reason to AGF with a classic type of vandalistic edit. Anyone who even needs to be told to use an edit summary is lacking in clue, and anyone who still doesn't use one is just plain old stupid. But, TRM, with all due respect, you're way out in left field on this one. There's all sorts of stuff you can do to streamline the transition, and a lot of us are working damn hard to do just that. For instance, Addshore just edited the "removal of interwiki links" edit filter to reference this page. We've got that box at the top of this page listing users to contact for help with Wikidata. So, please don't tell us that we should be ashamed of ourselves, especially when enwiki has had months to prepare for this; by all means, go explain things to editors who aren't using edit summaries, and to editors who are reverting them too, but don't come here and tell us that we should all be reverted on sight or something. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 01:57, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A friendly note to both "sides". First, I think it is clear that this software/functionality change, implemented on the single busiest Wikipedia by far, was not communicated adequately. Where were the watchlist notices or something similar? (Apologies if there were--that would bolster your case.) Project coordinators or other highly involved people should take a lesson here for future improvement in communication. You can't expect people not to be confused, yes, even six days later. The confusion is very predictable.

On the other hand, there is no need to divide people by referring them to WP vs WD editors. Most of the people responding on this page (except me, ha, although I once edited WP more actively) are long-term WP editors as well. Kolophon (talk) 02:17, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I started a RFC on the whole thing, and people stated very clearly that they didn't want to bother reading the pages I linked to as background, or figure out how to use Wikidata in the first place. So this isn't my fault. --Rschen7754 02:22, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to clarify that I certainly am not implying you or anyone else in this discussion is at fault. Kolophon (talk) 04:35, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

How's this for an edit summary? --Redrose64 (talk) 20:37, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wow... pretty descriptive. The Anonymouse (talk | contribs) 05:10, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Just so it doesn't sound like this is an issue causing problems to a handful of eccentrics - I can't get on with wikidata at all. So far I've had zero success in adding interwiki links despite help from another contributor. Clearly it was not well-communicated and still isn't. Deb (talk) 12:44, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to make it clear (if I may be so bold to speak on behalf of an entire project) that we at Wikidata are very invested in making these transition work, and definitely don't have a problem with people complaining. We have a bit of a problem with off-hand dismissals of everything we've worked for, but we wouldn't have put that box at the top of this page if we weren't legitimately interested in helping. (Full disclosure: The box was a unilateral action on my part, but it's seen nothing but support on Wikidata.) Anyways, I just wanted to put that out there.

Now, as to your actual point: Could you please specify what it was you were having a problem with? Maybe you had the bad luck to stumble onto an interwiki conflict on your first attempt. Or any number of other things. I'd love to help, but I'll need a bit more to go off of than that. Thanks. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 06:21, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

For info, something I've logged here. My watchlist currently states it has 949 items on it, but there's probably only 100 in total. Lugnuts ^{Dick Laurent is dead} 08:48, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

While we do our best here to reduce the occurrence of improperly done link removals, if people would like to help clean up the ones that happen anyways, please see User:Addbot/log/wikidata. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 19:48, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

He was logging stuff there where the bot was not removing all the links but now he's not since it generates thousands of entries which apparently weren't getting help. See also User talk:Addbot#A new log for Addbot?. --Izno (talk) 20:13, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I will periodically turn the loging section of the bot back on after the page clears up a bit!·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 22:59, 19 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A bot would be able to solve most of the problems in the log. Most of the problems arise because the Wikidata item has not had its links imported from English Wikipedia. All the bot would need to do would be to go to the Wikidata item, run slurpwiki gadget with English selected, then try to remove the interwikis on the en.wiki article again. This resolves the problem 70% of the time. The ones that are not by this point fixed can then be added to a log that is sorted out manually. Del_♉sion23 (talk) 01:20, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As an example, a problem at Kerguelen Islands was solved by these two edits in this order: import interwikilinks from English Wikipedia and Checkwikilinks removes the newly imported links. Del_♉sion23 (talk) 01:26, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That might be true, but a bot to fix those leftover links probably would not be supported by the community at its bot request. --Izno (talk) 01:49, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Bots will be removing interwiki links anyway. I'm not sure why they also wouldn't be supported in doing them more thoroughly. Del_♉sion23 (talk) 02:18, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

People can be weird here about the value of bots. Besides, in your test instance, judgement needed to be made. People, for whatever reason, don't like it when a bot gets to choose (aside from ClueBot, but even the mighty ClueBot has been limited to only 1% or 0.1% false positive rate [or something smaller] at the cost of nearly 30% of vandalism edits missed). Shrug. --Izno (talk) 02:22, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Legobot 28. — PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 05:38, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hopfully I will work on a wikidata side to my bot but will not be able to until monday at the earliest! ·Add§hore· ^{Talk To Me!} 12:31, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

In an earlier edit[12] I added a TL;DR hatnote:

{{hatnote|TL;DR: the Wikidata project removes interwiki links from Wikipedia articles, and replaces them into a central database that is centrally updated.}}

This has now been removed[13] on the basis that a nutshell template already covers this. I don't believe it does; three-quarters of the "nutshell" is bright red text that appears to be directions for bot operators. This gives little to a first time reader/encounter of any mention of "Wikidata" and what it might be. Links to this page are the only overview being given in the summary for bot edits performing the associated mass cull/migration of the interwiki links. This hatnote would not need to stay forever; however right at this moment it would, if allowed to remain in-place, give a succinct high-level overview in a way that reading the entire rest of the page does not. If the wording in the {{hatnote}} above is inaccurate, please can somebody suggest a better wording rather than simply removing it. Please bear in mind that while some people here are intimately involved with the details of WP:WIKIDATA, 99% of Wikipedia editors are not (yet), and 95% of editors have not even heard of WP:WIKIDATA. I would like to restore this until such a time as those percentages are more balanced. —Sladen (talk) 12:52, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The addition of more content which is not located in the nutshell doesn't make any sense to me. Plainly, the purpose of a nutshell is to TLDR, and if it is not sufficiently doing so, then it needs to be fixed. --Izno (talk) 15:02, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Lets try the following then, (1) swap the top two info boxes. (2) move the Red information (which is aimed at bot operators already highly fairly with the subject) into the body. (3) try to reword the nutshell text and WP:LEAD to be more approachable to somebody with zero familiarity. How does that sound? —Sladen (talk) 15:06, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've now tried[14]. Please review. The reason for just doing this rather than waiting a week or two and discussing, is because the removal of interwiki links is happening now. Today, this minute and this hour. There has been no announcement or public project-wide hatnote this is the first information that most editors will encounter about Wikidata, and as it stood/stands the article is not accessible to people unfamiliar. The unfamiliarity is demonstratably clear from the huge number of comments raised on the Talk: pages of bot operators performing interwiki link removal/migration. —Sladen (talk) 15:22, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

1. I'm not against that, but I don't think that's consistent with any other Wikipedia space pages. See for example the WP:LEAD you linked, in fact!
2. Except the red information isn't meant for bot operators. There have been a number of editors which have been working to remove the links as well, some of whom have been careful and some of whom have not been careful...
3. I am not disagreeable to the thought (nor is anyone here) but obviously the devil is in the details. Be bold, keeping in mind the first two numbers. --Izno (talk) 15:21, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Additionally to point #2, there have been numerous requests here which have resulted in that addition, meant for users and not bot ops. --Izno (talk) 15:24, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

*nod*, so it seems to me to what's needed is accessible "Howto" section (using the data that was in the red section). I appreciate that this information maybe targeted more widely, but as a first-time reader I did read it as a section targetted for bot operators (who are the people going to be performing high-speed/mass deletions and currently getting the feedback from doing so). Can you suggest some wording for such a Howto section, or should I just try to write something approachable? —Sladen (talk) 15:30, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The intent of the "Editing interlanguage links" was supposed to fill that need. You can probably start from there and refactor as necessary. --Izno (talk) 15:33, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, third attempt has been straight reverted.[15]. Bearing in mind that large-scale edits are continuing (right now) and this is where people are being directed, please can somebody else try something. I'm loathed to keep trying this in the face of repeated straight reverts (in case it annoys people further). Perhaps another editor would be willing to try and add something they are comfortable with, and I can offer to assist with copy-editing/tweaking afterwards. —Sladen (talk) 15:40, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It wasn't a straight revert; I incorporated your changes to the nutshell in an attempt to get to the middle ground. --Izno (talk) 15:44, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, this is constructive and I'm sorry for my mis-characterisation, I have avoided any further changes to the text for the moment. I've tried three[16][17][18] further simple formatting-only changes to (try to) make the text that is already there easier to absorb. —Sladen (talk) 15:51, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I moved the line back up but left the paragraphing in place (this is also true of other guidance pages). I removed both the color and the small. Maybe that will fix any upstaging problems? --Izno (talk) 15:53, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ta. This is an improvement over what was there before. Thank you. —Sladen (talk) 15:55, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have yet to find a template with a Wikidata entry, but I am curious as to how it would work, since most templates have the interwikis on the documentation page. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 13:19, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The short answer is that "it just works". I fixed up {{Infobox mineral}} the other day, and it works fine. This also means that interface pages like MediaWiki:Titleblacklist (d:Q4885851) can have interwiki links since it isn't stored in the page text. Legoktm (talk) 13:23, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Have to see if any of the tools check doc pages. I hate this laptop keyboard. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 14:56, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Just consider that in the background, the Mediawiki software is looking for an entry in Wikidata that corresponds to the page you're currently on: en:Template:Foo, and displays all links that it finds. Removing the documentation sub-page links has no bearing on that operation. (The Wikidata page for the template Legoktm mentioned is d:Q52491.) I suppose you could go the extra step of adding the doc subpages across Wikipedias, if they exist, to Wikidata as well. Kolophon (talk) 15:09, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The addition of the /doc pages makes me nervous. That might be something to float on Wikidata first. --Izno (talk) 15:35, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

So far we haven't addressed subpages much. Technically speaking, something like a specific AfD, RfA, or SPI would pass d:WD:N, but clearly that wouldn't really be in the spirit of Wikidata. Anyways, one caveat for everyone: Last I checked, Yair's script doesn't work on templates. (By the way, there definitely are items for templates, though pretty much any non-mainspace items have been manually created, so there's less coverage there in the mainspace. For instance, though, I created d:Q4844001, since that's a template I find invaluable in cross-wiki work.) Now, if you want, what you can do is:

1. Copy all the links from the /doc page to the template proper. (Just don't press save!!!)
2. Press "remove interwikis"
3. If that's removed them all, you're golden. Remove them from the /doc page with the same summary you'd normally use, and be done with it. If that hasn't removed them all, then either copy over the links to Wikidata (I believe slurpInterwiki will work), or just go back to the /doc page and remove all the links that Yair's script removed, leaving the ones it didn't remove.

— PinkAmpers&^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 05:51, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wikidata will be read-only from 19:00 UTC today through 02:00 UTC tomorrow (February 21) in order to upgrade the database schema. During that time the site will not be editable, and it will not be possible to add or remove language links. --Rschen7754 18:10, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The read-only time will be starting soon and ending a few hours late due to some delays in San Francisco. --Rschen7754 21:07, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Apparently, already started--Ymblanter (talk) 21:35, 20 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I can't find instructions on that anywhere. Thanks, Renata (talk) 00:07, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Two options:

• First you'll need to check if the topic already exists on Wikidata. For example, if you know there is a French Wikipedia article on the topic, you may be able to find it using this. If you can find the right item, add the new article to the item.
• If no item can be found, you have to create a new item on Wikidata here. Then you can add all the interwikis to the item.

Del_♉sion23 (talk) 01:45, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

My understanding is that one can still add them in the old way and wait till bots notice interwiki links and bring them to Wikidata.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:10, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The side image with the comments starting with "To use Checksitelinks"... is cut by "mw.loader.load".... If it matters, am using Google Chrome on Ubuntu Linux. John W. Nicholson (talk) 03:49, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Could you expand a bit? Is it on Wikidata? What is exactly cut? (I will probably not be able to help myself, but there are more experts around here, or we can invite them from Wikidata).--Ymblanter (talk) 08:13, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

C'mon guys... the nutshell box keeps getting bigger and bigger! It shouldn't be any longer than a few sentences, and certainly, two paragraphs and a bulleted list is just excessive. Add additional boxes if you need to, but please don't stick it in the nutshell box. — This, that and the other (talk) 05:49, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

If anything it's the second sentences to delete not the first. Thank you for shifting the bot guidance out to a separate box. The text now is still not accessible to first-time readers (who are seeing the mass changes and being directed here). —Sladen (talk) 09:51, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

What is "collaboratively edited knowledge base" supposed to mean here? How is that concept any different from Wikipedia itself? Too vague, too empty. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 06:42, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia is an encyclopedia; Wikidata is a database which keeps data in a structured way.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:11, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Having read this talk page and the associated article, I feel I have to comment, if only in the hope we can learn from this experience.

• Firstly, let me say that now I've worked out what it is all about, I think the concept of Wikidata and using it to record interwiki links is a very good one. In trying to work it out, I looked at the 'language' list of several dozen articles I've created in the last few months, and noticed that while most had the 'edit link' link, a few didn't. Digging into why, I realised it was because I had made an error in setting up the links (essentially to the wrong foreign article which already linked back to a different WP:EN article). I even eventually, by a process of trial and error, worked out how to fix this on Wikidata. So it is already adding value to Wikipedia.

• But here comes the but. The advanced warning was non-existent. If you were involved in the project of rolling out the use of Wikidata to provide inter-wiki links on WP:EN and you think it was well publicised, you are deluding yourself. I'm a fairly frequent WP:EN and Commons contributor, but until yesterday I'd never even heard of Wikidata. You may well have written RFCs, but they never came across my event horizon. And from I hear above and elsewhere, that is probably true of a lot of WP:EN editors.

• So does that matter?. You could argue that many (most?) WP:EN editors are profoundly uninterested in RFCs for other Wikimedia projects. And the process that is going on seems to be largely automated. Maybe we don't need to know. I think that is profoundly wrong. The changes do impact editors, both by unsettling them with strange bot edits, but also by sowing seeds of confusion, eg. 'how do i create new interwiki links', 'how do i correct interwiki links', etc.

• Even now, there is no decent 'how to' documentation to answer a lot of simple questions. For example, in correcting the interwiki mislinks described above, I've ended up leaving 'orphaned' Wikidata items with no interwiki links. Is this ok; desirable; if not what else should I do. We desperately need that level of guidance.

• And the danger is that WP:EN editors are going to say "I don't understand how to do it, so I don't bother creating interwiki links", or even "This is getting too complicated, I'm going somewhere else".

It is not ideal to leave it this late, but not too late to recover. What it needs is somebody who understands the innards to Wikidata and how its is linked to WP:EN to write an FAQ, and publicise it. Put a banner on the top of each WP page "Confused by the new Interwiki scheme; see the linked FAQ". -- Starbois (talk) 10:38, 21 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]