User talk:Butlerblog

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Bot error on date

Hello, just fixed a bot error at Home (Battlestar Galactica). Maybe take a look at its edit here when you have a chance. I hadn't seen this situation before, and to me, it looks like Butlet was (rightly) confused by there being two start dates in the same field, only one of which had "start date" formatting. There's probably no way to avoid this issue in future, since the original formatting was so mismatched, but as always, just wanted to give you a heads up. Cheers! Jessicapierce (talk) 15:32, 16 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Jessicapierce: Thanks for catching that. It's a little bit disconcerting because what I've done is rebuild bot "Task 2" from the ground up and took out all of the list cleanup actions. I built a new bot task for that (Task 5), which just came out of bot approval after its test run. So... I'm glad you caught this. The closing "}}" markup should only be coming into play when it's removing "{{Plainlist" on the front of the items. So I need to figure out why that one triggered without the first part. ButlerBlog (talk) 16:56, 16 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, wrangling the fine points of this stuff must be infuriating sometimes... kudos to you for doing it, honestly! Jessicapierce (talk) 21:37, 16 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It's not all that bad. Sometimes frustrating if I think I had it licked or if I can't find something - but overall, it appeals to the tinkerer in me. It's like working on a mathematical puzzle (which I like). ButlerBlog (talk) 11:29, 17 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Bot feedback

Good job on the new bot run. Here is another painful way editors added plainlist. Gonnym (talk) 17:57, 17 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

this is an error. The bot shouldn't touch the title parameter. Gonnym (talk) 14:17, 19 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, @Gonnym for both of these notes. I have seen a few of the plainlist. Not quite sure how those are going to get handled. Currently they are ignored. I'll make sure the title is excluded. Currently, I think it checks all parameters, but I think that needs to be tightened up to only specific params. That type of issue didn't show up in any of the test runs, but this edit does show a present weakness in the regex (but I can fix that now that it's obvious). ButlerBlog (talk) 14:57, 19 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

In the tracking category I listed the parameters that it should be removed from (you can also check the infobox code to see). Gonnym (talk) 13:34, 22 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks - I updated the script to only check the params that are listed in the maint cat. ButlerBlog (talk) 14:08, 23 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Gonnym: I've done two runs through the Category:Pages using infobox television episode with unnecessary list markup, first keying in on break tags, and the second looking primarily for {{Plainlist}} or derivatives of it. The next run through will key in on {{ubl}}. As I'm setting up for that, I'm noticing that it looks like infoboxes that use {{Work by author}} are included in the maintenance category, even though the list markup is OK. Example: 4 Days Out. Should these instances be excluded (and if so, is there an adjustment that can exclude them from the category)? ButlerBlog (talk) 15:41, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion at User talk:50.48.57.227

You are invited to join the discussion at User talk:50.48.57.227. wizzito | say hello! 20:01, 17 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure if you got my ping, but for reference, this is the same IP user you attempted to teach about categorization back in 2023 (including here, here, and here). They are finally open and willing to discuss what went so wrong with their past edits. I welcome you to join the discussion. wizzito | say hello! 20:01, 17 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Also here User talk:2601:184:C401:AC60:648A:8A29:122A:772 wizzito | say hello! 20:02, 17 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I weighed in with some thoughts on the IP's TP. ButlerBlog (talk) 00:25, 18 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

wizzito | say hello! 00:49, 18 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Pilot (Legends of Tomorrow)

Hey, got a weird one for you... this edit at Pilot (Legends of Tomorrow). Butler stripped a lot of plain list formatting, but also duplicated a "startdate," but with a new error (missing brackets). Fixed, no biggie, just a heads up as always. Cheers, hope you're well! Jessicapierce (talk) 14:56, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

And another one at My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic finale, where Butler removed the end brackets of a hidden list in the infobox, but not the beginning ones. Jessicapierce (talk) 14:59, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Jessicapierce: Thanks for catching those - on each type, I knew there was at least one instance I did not catch. The bot task has just finished a complete run through of Category:Pages using infobox television episode with unnecessary list markup. It has done this in two separate phases. First, it went through seeking break tag markup (using <br> tags in the parameters). The second run was primarily looking for instances of {{Plainlist}}. Both were run "attended" (meaning, the bot wasn't running by itself - I was monitoring edits as it went through the list).

I caught a couple of instances late in the run that were the same as the type you noted, and when I noticed them, I recalled seeing something similar earlier that I had OK'd. So I knew there were at least a couple that slipped through unnoticed. Hopefully, it's only these two you already caught. There were not many "outliers" in markup - most were very straightforward instances {{Plainlist}} (often, just a single instance of it - i.e. only one parameter in the infobox).

There are slightly more than 800 articles left in the maintenance category now. Most of those are using instances of {{ubl}}, which is more tricky than the other two list types. I'll probably begin running through those tomorrow. That will require a monitored run just like the previous two. It has a higher probability of an increased error rate, but by monitoring the output that should be kept to zero or as near zero as possible. The current two runs have removed around 2800 articles from the main cat so far, so this last run has a lot less to go through and will run a lot slower (due to the higher potential for errors). ButlerBlog (talk) 15:26, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Makes sense (as much sense as it's going to make to a nonspecialist!) - thanks as always, you have my true admiration for knowing how to finesse all these fine points. Cheers, Jessicapierce (talk) 15:30, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Also, this literally just occurred to me - when I do these occasional fixes, should I be removing the plainlist formatting? I confess to not really knowing when it should be removed. Thanks, Jessicapierce (talk) 17:58, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I would say yes, if you can (or if you think of it). It's not a huge deal either way because if not, the bot will just pick it up at a later point again (and hopefully get it right this time). The {{Infobox television episode}} is not supposed to use {{Plainlist}} or {{ubl}} in most of the parameters because the infobox applies plainlist to the parameter values automatically (see Category:Pages using infobox television episode with unnecessary list markup) ButlerBlog (talk) 23:13, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Will do, thanks! Jessicapierce (talk) 23:31, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Jessicapierce: I thought of this later... This is only true for {{Infobox television episode}}. {{Infobox television}} does need to use {{plainlist}} for multiple entries in a parameter. ButlerBlog (talk) 12:33, 25 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Ooh, thank you for that distinction - noted! Jessicapierce (talk) 14:16, 25 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Another at The Last Temptation of Barry Allen, same as at the Pilot article - duplicate "startdate" formatting with missing brackets. (Sorry for the slew of notifications, I didn't expect to find so many - I've finished my sweep, and this should be all the errors, at least with regard to broken infoboxes.) Jessicapierce (talk) 15:14, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

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