Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Yetanotherbot

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

Request Expired.

Yetanotherbot

Operator: X! (talk · contribs · SUL · edit count · logs · page moves · block log · rights log · ANI search)

Time filed: 22:06, Wednesday January 2, 2013 (UTC)

Automatic, Supervised, or Manual: Automatic

Programming language(s): Java, using a modified version of MER-C's framework

Source code available: XBot framework (bot task)

Function overview: Clone for User:HBC AIV helperbot.

Links to relevant discussions (where appropriate):

Edit period(s): Continuous

Estimated number of pages affected: 5 pages, listed at the top of User:HBC_AIV_helperbot/source.

Exclusion compliant (Yes/No): Yes, although it's not really necessary.

Already has a bot flag (Yes/No): No

Function details: This is a clone for HBC AIVHelperBot. There are currently only two instances running, and they have occasionally gone down, leaving the pages to fill up. Having another instance running would be beneficial to the stability of the page. The code has been ported from Perl to Java, and thus, will need a trial before approval.

Discussion

Two identical tasks running simultaneously makes me nervous. How will it handle potential bot conflicts?—cyberpower _Offline^{Happy 2013} 22:58, 2 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Three, actually. It's far less than there have been in the past, actually. There are no real conflicts, bots are just removing reports that should be removed. If two try to do it at the same time, it's the same as if one did. (X! · talk) · @001 · 23:01, 2 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  - Ok thanks.—cyberpower _Offline^{Happy 2013} 00:06, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Question out of curiosity: Why aren't you using SoxBot?—cyberpower _Offline^{Happy 2013} 00:11, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- Mainly because 1) that name was created long before my name change, and it's out of date now, 2) after the account was accessed last year, I changed the password, but it wasn't saved in LastPass, so the account was lost. I've got it reset by developers now, but I'd like to start fresh, considering that the bot won't be running any of its old tasks. (X! · talk) · @052 · 00:15, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Established and uncontroversial task, run by a sane botop -- lets get this moving. Approved for trial (7 days). Please provide a link to the relevant contributions and/or diffs when the trial is complete. --Chris 03:01, 3 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Can this bot be given a bot flag, at least for the trial duration? It keeps popping up in Huggle. Thx - Happysailor ^(Talk) 13:30, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As far as I know, bot flags can only be given to approved first.—cyberpower _Offline^{Happy 2013} 13:49, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Normally we wait until after the bot is approved, but sometimes it is necessary to flag it for a trial. Can't the bot simply be added to Huggle's whitelist? Or has that changed since I last used it. --Chris 14:10, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There is a huggle whitelist but I don't remember where it's located.—cyberpower _Offline^{Happy 2013} 14:24, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Same here, had a look, not sure where it's kept. (it's about 400 edits short of being whitelisted itself) - Happysailor ^(Talk) 16:24, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've added Yetanotherbot to the Huggle whitelist linked from WP:Huggle/Whitelist. - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 18:24, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thought i'd point out that there's a bit of odd in-fighting with the HBC bot, +2 - Happysailor ^(Talk) 16:24, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This rings up the concern that I stated above. I assume the issue is caused by it calling the un-noted revision and the three bots submitted the revision at three different times. This could possibly cause an accidental deletion of an unanswered report. I think the bot should double check before submitting.—cyberpower _Offline^{Happy 2013} 17:16, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I added a check for the bot that it doesn't submit if the page changed since it started processing, but it appears to have failed. I'll have to look deeper into this. I'd also note that it's occurring with the two already approved HBC bots as well. (X! · talk) · @764 · 17:19, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

SO they are (and i just saw a recent one where HBC7 commented, HBC5 overwrote the signature, then YetanotherBot came along and overwrote the signature again. I think i'ts only been noticed because this bot keeps appearing on my screen (b/c of no flag as above) - Happysailor ^(Talk) 17:29, 4 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

That should be fairly easy to resolve, you can detect edit conflicts via the API by using the 'basetimestamp' parameter --Chris 02:38, 5 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's not a "typical" edit conflict, it's just that the bot is operating off an old version of the page. (X! · talk) · @157 · 02:45, 5 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Unless I misunderstand, what's happening is:

Your bot gets the latest revision of the page and starts doing its thing
One of the other bots is already processing the page, and saves
Your bot finishes doing its thing and saves, overriding the previously saved content

Hence, if you set the 'basetimestamp' to be the timestamp of the revision that your bot gets, the API should detect the conflict and stop the edit going through. --Chris 03:17, 5 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with Chris here. It shouldn't be an issue to fix. If the revision it has stored is outdated, utilizing the API is merely one way to stop an edit conflict. There's also different ways to check this and avoid it.—cyberpower _Offline^{Happy 2013} 13:00, 5 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Trial complete. (X! · talk) · @878 · 20:03, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

What's this? It seems to have re-added a report it removed.—cyberpower ^Chat_Online 20:15, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
- It appears to be fighting with itself in separate threads. It's loading the page in one thread, checking users, and removing them if necessary. In another thread, it's loading the page, checking for categories, and adding if necessary. It seems that they are colliding, causing one to overwrite the other. I'm adding some fixes to lock an article while those tasks are running. It also appears that the old bots do this occasionally, they just went ignored. (X! · talk) · @895 · 20:28, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  It appears to not only be the only incident your bot is fighting other bots completely overwriting actual reports. i suggest every bot fix this before we proceed here. I'm looking at random contributions and I keep seeing these incidents. I would recommend getting these fixed and running another trial before getting this task approved. The same goes for the other bots too.—cyberpower ^Chat_Offline 21:09, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  
  Overwrite and fighting itself. I would say they're simultaneously running separate AIV tasks at the same time which is what it appears to be when I'm looking at your source.—cyberpower ^Chat_Offline 21:17, 16 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Just wondering -- why have separate threads? I can't really see the benefit --Chris 14:29, 17 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's mainly the way the original bot was written. It'd probably be easier to make it 1 page per thread, and call it a day. (X! · talk) · @900 · 20:36, 17 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

{{OperatorAssistanceNeeded|D}} Are we ready to approve? MBisanz ^talk 18:01, 27 January 2013 (UTC)[reply]

{{OperatorAssistanceNeeded|D}} Nudge. MBisanz ^talk 00:41, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ouch! Yeah, I haven't had a lot of time to finish this, and with exams this week, I won't have much time until after the 23rd probably. Then I'll be able to finish it. (X! · talk) · @128 · 02:05, 17 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I've consolidated all processing for a page into a single thread, and it is ready for another trial. (X! · talk) · @217 · 04:12, 26 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Approved for trial (7 days). Please provide a link to the relevant contributions and/or diffs when the trial is complete. Maxim_(talk) 04:30, 26 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A user has requested the attention of the operator. Once the operator has seen this message and replied, please deactivate this tag. (user notified) Poke. MBisanz ^talk 23:01, 19 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It seems to me that X! is a bit too busy at the moment to deal with this request. I recommend marking it expired for now. X! can reopen this request when he is ready run his bot.—cyberpower ^Chat_Offline 14:34, 29 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I agree.

Request Expired. MBisanz ^talk 21:13, 31 March 2013 (UTC)[reply]

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