Manual:Pywikibot/category.py

Syntax
The syntax is:

python pwb.py category action [-option]

where action can be one of these: * add         - mass-add a category to a list of pages * remove      - remove category tag from all pages in a category * move        - move all pages in a category to another category * tidy        - tidy up a category by moving its articles into subcategories * tree        - show a tree of subcategories of a given category * listify     - make a list of all of the articles that are in a category

and option can be one of these:

Options for "add" action: * -person     - sort persons by their last name * -create     - If a page doesn't exist, do not skip it, create it instead * -redirect   - Follow redirects

If action is "add", the following options are supported:

-catfilter       Filter the page generator to only yield pages in the specified category. See -cat for argument format.

-cat             Work on all pages which are in a specific category. Argument can also be given as "-cat:categoryname" or                 as "-cat:categoryname|fromtitle" (using # instead of |                  is also allowed in this one and the following)

-catr            Like -cat, but also recursively includes pages in                  subcategories, sub-subcategories etc. of the given category. Argument can also be given as "-catr:categoryname" or                 as "-catr:categoryname|fromtitle".

-subcats         Work on all subcategories of a specific category. Argument can also be given as "-subcats:categoryname" or                 as "-subcats:categoryname|fromtitle".

-subcatsr        Like -subcats, but also includes sub-subcategories etc. of                  the given category. Argument can also be given as "-subcatsr:categoryname" or                 as "-subcatsr:categoryname|fromtitle".

-uncat           Work on all pages which are not categorised.

-uncatcat        Work on all categories which are not categorised.

-uncatfiles      Work on all files which are not categorised.

-file            Read a list of pages to treat from the named text file. Page titles in the file may be either enclosed with brackets, or be separated by new lines. Argument can also be given as "-file:filename".

-filelinks       Work on all pages that use a certain image/media file. Argument can also be given as "-filelinks:filename".

-search          Work on all pages that are found in a MediaWiki search across all namespaces.

-logevents       Work on articles that were on a specified Special:Log. The value may be a comma separated list of these values:

logevent,username,start,end

or for backward compatibility:

logevent,username,total

To use the default value, use an empty string. You have options for every type of logs given by the log event parameter which could be one of the following:

block, protect, rights, delete, upload, move, import, patrol, merge, suppress, review, stable, gblblock, renameuser, globalauth, gblrights, abusefilter, newusers

It uses the default number of pages 10.

Examples:

-logevents:move gives pages from move log (usually redirects) -logevents:delete,,20 gives 20 pages from deletion log -logevents:protect,Usr gives pages from protect by user Usr -logevents:patrol,Usr,20 gives 20 patroled pages by user Usr -logevents:upload,,20121231,20100101 gives upload pages in the 2010s, 2011s, and 2012s -logevents:review,,20121231 gives review pages since the beginning till the 31 Dec 2012 -logevents:review,Usr,20121231 gives review pages by user Usr since the beginning till the 31 Dec 2012

In some cases it must be written as -logevents:"move,Usr,20"

-namespaces      Filter the page generator to only yield pages in the -namespace       specified namespaces. Separate multiple namespace -ns              numbers or names with commas. Examples:

-ns:0,2,4 -ns:Help,MediaWiki

If used with -newpages/-random/-randomredirect, -namespace/ns must be provided before -newpages/-random/-randomredirect. If used with -recentchanges, efficiency is improved if                 -namespace/ns is provided before -recentchanges.

If used with -start, -namespace/ns shall contain only one value.

-interwiki       Work on the given page and all equivalent pages in other languages. This can, for example, be used to fight multi-site spamming. Attention: this will cause the bot to modify pages on several wiki sites, this is not well tested, so check your edits!

-limit:n         When used with any other argument that specifies a set of pages, work on no more than n pages in total.

-links           Work on all pages that are linked from a certain page. Argument can also be given as "-links:linkingpagetitle".

-liverecentchanges Work on pages from the live recent changes feed. If used as                 -liverecentchanges:x, work on x recent changes.

-imagesused      Work on all images that contained on a certain page. Argument can also be given as "-imagesused:linkingpagetitle".

-newimages       Work on the most recent new images. If given as -newimages:x, will work on x newest images.

-newpages        Work on the most recent new pages. If given as -newpages:x, will work on x newest pages.

-recentchanges   Work on the pages with the most recent changes. If                 given as -recentchanges:x, will work on the x most recently changed pages. If given as -recentchanges:offset,duration it                 will work on pages changed from 'offset' minutes with 'duration' minutes of timespan. rctags are supported too. The rctag must be the very first parameter part.

Examples: -recentchanges:20 gives the 20 most recently changed pages -recentchanges:120,70 will give pages with 120 offset minutes and 70 minutes of timespan -recentchanges:visualeditor,10 gives the 10 most recently changed pages marked with 'visualeditor' -recentchanges:"mobile edit,60,35" will retrieve pages marked with 'mobile edit' for the given offset and timespan

-unconnectedpages Work on the most recent unconnected pages to the Wikibase repository. Given as -unconnectedpages:x, will work on the x most recent unconnected pages.

-ref             Work on all pages that link to a certain page. Argument can also be given as "-ref:referredpagetitle".

-start           Specifies that the robot should go alphabetically through all pages on the home wiki, starting at the named page. Argument can also be given as "-start:pagetitle".

You can also include a namespace. For example, "-start:Template:!" will make the bot work on all pages in the template namespace.

default value is start:!

-prefixindex     Work on pages commencing with a common prefix.

-subpage:n       Filters pages to only those that have depth n                  i.e. a depth of 0 filters out all pages that are subpages, and a depth of 1 filters out all pages that are subpages of                 subpages.

-titleregex      A regular expression that needs to match the article title otherwise the page won't be returned. Multiple -titleregex:regexpr can be provided and the page will be returned if title is matched by any of the regexpr provided. Case insensitive regular expressions will be used and dot matches any character.

-transcludes     Work on all pages that use a certain template. Argument can also be given as "-transcludes:Title".

-unusedfiles     Work on all description pages of images/media files that are not used anywhere. Argument can be given as "-unusedfiles:n" where n is the maximum number of articles to work on.

-lonelypages     Work on all articles that are not linked from any other article. Argument can be given as "-lonelypages:n" where n is the maximum number of articles to work on.

-unwatched       Work on all articles that are not watched by anyone. Argument can be given as "-unwatched:n" where n is the maximum number of articles to work on.

-usercontribs    Work on all articles that were edited by a certain user. (Example : -usercontribs:DumZiBoT)

-weblink         Work on all articles that contain an external link to                  a given URL; may be given as "-weblink:url"

-withoutinterwiki Work on all pages that don't have interlanguage links. Argument can be given as "-withoutinterwiki:n" where n is the total to fetch.

-mysqlquery      Takes a Mysql query string like "SELECT page_namespace, page_title, FROM page                 WHERE page_namespace = 0" and works on the resulting pages.

-wikidataquery   Takes a WikidataQuery query string like claim[31:12280] and works on the resulting pages.

-sparql          Takes a SPARQL SELECT query string including ?item and works on the resulting pages.

-sparqlendpoint  Specify SPARQL endpoint URL (optional). (Example : -sparqlendpoint:http://myserver.com/sparql)

-searchitem      Takes a search string and works on Wikibase pages that contain it. Argument can be given as "-searchitem:text", where text is the string to look for, or "-searchitem:lang:text", where lang is the langauge to search items in.

-random          Work on random pages returned by Special:Random. Can also be given as "-random:n" where n is the number of pages to be returned.

-randomredirect  Work on random redirect pages returned by                  Special:RandomRedirect. Can also be given as                 "-randomredirect:n" where n is the number of pages to be                  returned.

-google          Work on all pages that are found in a Google search. You need a Google Web API license key. Note that Google doesn't give out license keys anymore. See google_key in                 config.py for instructions. Argument can also be given as "-google:searchstring".

-yahoo           Work on all pages that are found in a Yahoo search. Depends on python module pYsearch. See yahoo_appid in                 config.py for instructions.

-page            Work on a single page. Argument can also be given as                 "-page:pagetitle", and supplied multiple times for multiple pages.

-pageid          Work on a single pageid. Argument can also be given as                 "-pageid:pageid1,pageid2,." or "-pageid:'pageid1|pageid2|..'" and supplied multiple times for multiple pages.

-grep            A regular expression that needs to match the article otherwise the page won't be returned. Multiple -grep:regexpr can be provided and the page will be returned if content is matched by any of the regexpr provided. Case insensitive regular expressions will be used and dot matches any character, including a newline.

-ql              Filter pages based on page quality. This is only applicable if contentmodel equals 'proofread-page', otherwise has no effects. Valid values are in range 0-4. Multiple values can be comma-separated.

-onlyif          A claim the page needs to contain, otherwise the item won't                  be returned. The format is property=value,qualifier=value. Multiple (or                 none) qualifiers can be passed, separated by commas. Examples: P1=Q2 (property P1 must contain value Q2), P3=Q4,P5=Q6,P6=Q7 (property P3 with value Q4 and                 qualifiers: P5 with value Q6 and P6 with value Q7). Value can be page ID, coordinate in format: latitude,longitude[,precision] (all values are in decimal                 degrees), year, or plain string. The argument can be provided multiple times and the item page will be returned only if all of the claims are present. Argument can be also given as "-onlyif:expression".

-onlyifnot       A claim the page must not contain, otherwise the item won't                  be returned. For usage and examples, see -onlyif above.

-intersect       Work on the intersection of all the provided generators.

Options for "listify" action: * -overwrite  - This overwrites the current page with the list even if                  something is already there. * -showimages - This displays images rather than linking them in the list. * -talkpages  - This outputs the links to talk pages of the pages to be                  listified in addition to the pages themselves.

Options for "remove" action: * -nodelsum   - This specifies not to use the custom edit summary as the deletion reason. Instead, it uses the default deletion reason for the language, which is "Category was disbanded" in                 English.

Options for "move" action: * -hist       - Creates a nice wikitable on the talk page of target category that contains detailed page history of the source category. * -nodelete   - Don't delete the old category after move * -nowb       - Don't update the wikibase repository * -allowsplit - If that option is not set, it only moves the talk and main page together. * -mvtogether - Only move the pages/subcategories of a category, if the target page (and talk page, if -allowsplit is not set) doesn't exist. * -keepsortkey - Use sortKey of the old category also for the new category. If not specified, sortKey is removed. An alternative method to keep sortKey is to use -inplace option.

Options for "tidy" action: * -namespaces   Filter the arcitles in the specified namespaces. Separate -namespace    multiple namespace numbers or names with commas. Examples: -ns           -ns:0,2,4 -ns:Help,MediaWiki

Options for several actions: * -rebuild    - reset the database * -from:      - The category to move from (for the move option) Also, the category to remove from in the remove option Also, the category to make a list of in the listify option * -to:        - The category to move to (for the move option) - Also, the name of the list to make in the listify option NOTE: If the category names have spaces in them you may need to use a special syntax in your shell so that the names aren't treated as        separate parameters. For instance, in BASH, use single quotes, e.g. -from:'Polar bears' * -batch      - Don't prompt to delete emptied categories (do it                  automatically). * -summary:   - Pick a custom edit summary for the bot. * -inplace    - Use this flag to change categories in place rather than rearranging them. * -recurse    - Recurse through all subcategories of categories. * -pagesonly  - While removing pages from a category, keep the subpage links and do not remove them * -match      - Only work on pages whose titles match the given regex (for                  move and remove actions). * -depth:     - The max depth limit beyond which no subcategories will be                  listed.

For the actions tidy and tree, the bot will store the category structure locally in category.dump. This saves time and server load, but if it uses these data later, they may be outdated; use the -rebuild parameter in this case.

For example, to create a new category from a list of persons, type:

python pwb.py category add -person

and follow the on-screen instructions.

Or to do it all from the command-line, use the following syntax:

python pwb.py category move -from:US -to:"United States"

This will move all pages in the category US to the category United States.