User talk:MPelletier (WMF)

Help new user with WMFLabs, please
Hi Marc. Sorry for the difficulties you've had with committee stuff recently. You've done a lot of great work for the project over the years and I appreciate your efforts.

There is a new user at enwp, en:User:JohnMarkOckerbloom, who needs some help with WMFLabs. John is digital library architect at the University of Pennsylvania who has some Perl scripts that help users find books at their local library and wants to share it with Wikipedians. See en:Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2013-03-18/Interview. At my suggestion, John would like to run the scripts on WMFLabs and he needs some help. See en:Template talk:Library resources box Could you please contact him and provide some assistance? John is new to the project and still trying to find his way around. Thanks very much for any help you can provide. 64.40.54.81 16:18, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Sure thing, thanks for the pointer. &mdash; MPelletier (WMF) (talk) 17:29, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks very much, Marc. Your help is always greatly appreciated. Best regards. 64.40.54.225 03:43, 24 March 2013 (UTC)

Help again, please
Hi Marc. I hope you don't mind me bugging you again. I know you have your hands full with the migration to WMFLabs, but I was hoping you might find some time to help another user.

This is another user at enwp, en:User:Jackson Peebles has a grant from the WMF to create some interactive video tutorials to teach users how to contribute to Wikipedia (see meta:Grants:Jackson Peebles/Video and Interactive Tutorials and also en:WP:VIDTUT for more info). He is using the Adobe flash SWF filetype for the tutorials, but it's currently not supported by enwp or commons (see en:Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)). Somebody suggested he might be able to host the files at WikiMedia Labs, so he's looking in to that. Could you please join the discussion at en:User talk:Jackson Peebles and give your input? (i.e. can that filetype be hosted at WMF Labs, is there another filetype that could be used, other alternatives etc.) Thanks very much. I appreciate the help. 64.40.54.14 04:01, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Tool Labs
For some reason, my account  on Tool Labs does not have a replica.my.cnf file in the home directory. Do you think you could provide me with this file, and also investigate why I didn't get a copy? Thanks, This, that and the other (talk) 02:59, 22 July 2013 (UTC)
 * I had temporarity disabled the process that creates those credentials while we were debugging issues with the NFS server... and forgot to turn it back on afterwards.  Sorry about this – it's been restarted and you should now have them in your home.  &mdash; MPelletier (WMF) (talk) 03:34, 22 July 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks for fixing that up. This, that and the other (talk) 05:31, 22 July 2013 (UTC)

Template on En.WP
You edited the Copy to Commons template in October see: diff. Your edit removed the functioning Commons Helper bot, and replaced it with a non-functioning WMFlabs bot. Prior to the edit, I could move files to the Commons very easily using that link/template. Now, Although the bot outputs as successful, no image is ever uploaded appropriately, nor is any information given. The new link, claims that Commons:User:Upload Bot (Rich Smith) will upload the file, but that bot account hasn't edited since March 2012. The original bot user was Commons:User:File Upload Bot (Magnus Manske) which was successfully uploading images from en.wp to commons within 40 mins prior to your edit. Now, the original bot is only being used for flickr images. Is there any way we can get the old bot link back, or get the new bot link working correctly? (I don't contribute here, so please ping me with a response at en.wp or commons). ТимофейЛееСуда (talk) 21:29, 2 November 2013 (UTC)

FYI
Have you seen that you're mentioned on en:User:Dispenser/Toolserver migration? GoingBatty (talk) 23:03, 27 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Yes. Just to make matters clear: .  So, while he's being - strictly speaking - accurate, that does not paint the whole picture.  &mdash; Coren (talk)/(enwp) 23:31, 27 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you would like to paint the whole picture? Timtrent (talk) 12:36, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
 * That link I pointed to is the whole picture. Dispenser had a number of tools that were (at least in part) proprietary; or (in the case of Reflinks) violated our privacy policy.  He was given the opportunity to correct the matter, and has refused to.  &mdash; MPelletier (WMF) (talk) 19:19, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Perhaps MPelletier/Coren could've given a thought to the hundreds if not millions of users who use Dispeners tools before disabling them but ofcourse as per usual WMF doesn't give a toss about its editors, Davey2010 (talk) 17:09, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
 * We (the Foundation) have given a lot of thought to the many editors who use tools like Dispenser's; this is why we are not allowing proprietary tools that can be abandoned or held hostage on Labs and insist on Open Source. This way, should a volunteer upon whose tools the community depend leave for any reason, then the tool can continue to be maintained and be made available (either by taking it over, or forking it).  &mdash; MPelletier (WMF) (talk) 19:16, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Your inability to make a deal now leaves me with no tool at all, proprietary or otherwise. Perhaps you think you beat Dispenser in the contest of wills. I and my ill-informed opinion blame you for making the tools go away. Chris Troutman  ( talk ) 22:15, 30 August 2014 (UTC)
 * "We (the Foundation) have given a lot of thought to the many editors who use tools like Dispenser's" I suppose this is why you shut it down entirely, without any working replacement, opensource or not.  Konveyor   Belt  18:02, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
 * @Konveyor Belt: It doesn't work that way. The Terms of Use aren't "optional until someone else comes up with an alternative".  There is a strict prohibition against non-open source tools being made available to the community specifically to avoid incidents like this one happening.  Again. Open Source on Labs isn't a nice-to-have, it's a sine qua non condition of being able to host your tools here, period.  We all appreciate the work of volunteers who do tools that the community finds of use, but we will not encourage nor support taking tools hostage or creating dependencies on external tools that are unmaintainable or unsupportable. If you want to do closed source tooling for our projects, you're welcome to do so on your own infrastructure and to convince the community that it is in their interest to depend on it.  &mdash; MPelletier (WMF) (talk) 22:19, 31 August 2014 (UTC)
 * If the TOU is specifically designed to avoid these incidents, why do they keep happening? It seems like circular logic to me.  Konveyor   Belt  18:52, 1 September 2014 (UTC)
 * They kept happening, before Tool Labs and its TOU. Dispenser's tools come from the Toolserver, which didn't have an Open Source requirement.  The spat around Reflinks is a direct consequence of those lax standards, and perfect illustration why those rules were indispensable.  &mdash; MPelletier (WMF) (talk) 01:37, 2 September 2014 (UTC)
 * That aside, can the Foundation put some of its firepower into making a new dabsolver? I see that the new VE linkmaker has some of the selection capabilities of that tool - if it could just highlight all the disambig links on a page and expand those selection capabilities to include tagging links that need fixing, that would be peachy. Cheers! BD2412 (talk) 01:50, 3 September 2014 (UTC)

It's high time WMF develops tools to replace Dispenser ones. His unwillingness to open source his tools keeps hurting the community, and I, for one, and long fed up with his attitude. If he doesn't want us to play with his toys, perhaps its time we thank him for his service and switch to an alternative that less dependent on the whims and moods of a single individual. --Piotrus (talk) 02:34, 5 September 2014 (UTC)