Project:Bots

Bots are automated or semi-automated processes that edit pages with reduced or no direct human supervision. Because bots may potentially strain server resources or accidentally disrupt the project, bots must follow special policies and guidelines. Additionally, as bots can be used to intentionally create vast amounts of damage very quickly, bots editing very quickly without permission (a bot "flag") or in a questionable manner, will be immediately blocked. Running a bot on a normal (human) account is not allowed, a bot must have its own account, generally including the word "bot" in the name and preferably some way to connect it to the operator (e.g. User:RobBot operated by User:Robchurch). MediaWiki.org generally follows the policy stated at Bot policy; however, as a development project, user trustworthiness and experience are of greatest importance and little to no discussion may take place before granting, or denying, a bot flag. Inactive bots may have their flags summarily removed for security purposes, the bot flag is merely intended to indicate that the bot is allowed to make relatively high speed direct edits for the purposes for which it was approved. Because this is a development project, the normal rules for bots on other WMF projects may not apply here, especially to developers.

There is some use for bots on mediawiki.org, but it is not the same as on community content based WMF projects, such as Wikipedia. Please post a request at Project:Requests if you plan to run a bot on MediaWiki.org. You may also speak to a 1>Special:MyLanguage/Project:Bureaucrats|bureaucrat directly via talk page or IRC, though requests from new, inexperienced, or unknown users will generally be denied.

Registered bots
A full list of approved ("flagged") bots can be viewed here: Special:Listusers/bot. Note that "MediaWiki default" is the account used internally by the MediaWiki software when it needs to make content changes as part of the installation/upgrade process, and is not a real bot and is not a blockable (although the account has been ostensibly blocked on some projects as an inactive or unapproved bot, this should have no effect). Also note that at times, the bot flag may be used by developers and other highly trusted users as a Flood flag.

Active bots
 This list does not include any declared bots that are active but do not have a flag 
 * Hazard-Bot - Operator: Hazard-SJ - periodic clearing of Project:Sandbox. [//www.mediawiki.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=rights&user=&page=User%3AHazard-Bot&year=&month=-1&tagfilter=&hide_patrol_log=1&hide_review_log=1 Flagged on 13 May 2012].
 * ReleaseNotesBot - Operator: TCipriani (WMF) - release changelog on different MediaWiki version. [//https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:Log?type=rights&user=&page=User%3AReleaseNotesBot&wpdate=&tagfilter= Flagged on 5 January 2019]
 * Bawolff bot - Operator: Bawolff - Updates Module:ExtensionJson. Flagged on 20 May 2019

Bots defined by the software

 * Abuse filter - This is an automated account that performs actions specified by Extension:AbuseFilter. It will automatically block users triggering filters configured to block.
 * MediaWiki message delivery - Account used by Extension:MassMessage.
 * FuzzyBot - This special user account is part of the Translate Extension. This account is part of the MediaWiki software and it is not owned by any user. It performs automatic tasks as a result of the actions of the Translation administrators
 * Flow talk page manager - This account is used by the Extension:Flow software to initialize Flow boards.

Inactive bots
'' Bot inactivity may not mean the bot is not needed, bots belonging to trusted and active users may be inactive for extended periods of time. This list only includes bots that are or were flagged. Bots active elsewhere on Wikimedia Foundation Projects may have SUL accounts on mw.org but may have never edited. ''
 * RobBot - Operator: Rob Church. Flagged by the operator on 25 April 2006.
 * RobBot was created and flagged in preparation for performing various bot tasks during the revival of MediaWiki.org as a feasible documentation alternative to Meta, although no tasks were ever devised for it and no code was thus written; it never performed automated edits. robchurch | talk 11:16, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Inactive since 16 July 2007. Operator inactive since 4 March 2008.
 * FearowBot - Operator: TheFearow - Apparently an interwiki bot. Flagged on 15 July 2007, removed on 18 July 2007 for malfunctioning, reflagged on 24 July 2007.
 * Inactive since 15 July 2007 (less than 8 hours after getting the flag the first time). Operator inactive since 19 October 2008.
 * DuesenBot - Operator: Duesentrieb - Automatic updates to the Extension Matrix. Flagged on 6 March 2007.
 * Broken. :(
 * Inactive since 11 June 2008
 * Diego Grez Bot - Operated by a user who has since vanished. Apparently for language tags and language categories. Flagged on 7 July 2010
 * Inactive since 13 July 2010 (6 days after being flagged)
 * ExtensionListBot - Operator: Benjamin_Garn - Update the AutoExtensionList, an interim measure while the Extension_Matrix was unmaintained due to a broken bot.
 * Inactive since 2 March 2009. Operator inactive since 12 April 2011.
 * MiszaBot - an archive bot, see w:User:MiszaBot/Archive HowTo. Operator is Misza13, but user is inactive on all projects, so malfunctions may require a replacement bot. Flagged 27 May 2009.
 * Bot dead.
 * MyBot - Operator : IAlex, Flagged on 8 September 2010
 * Inactive since 16 June 2015
 * KrenairBot - Operator : Krenair, Flagged on 6 May 2012
 * Inactive since 14 August 2012
 * (1.VSNCT)Bot - Operator : TeleComNasSprVen, Flagged on 7 February 2011
 * Inactive since 8 February 2012
 * SieBot - Operator : Siebrand, Flagged on 10 May 2008
 * Inactive since 19 January 2010
 * Extension matrix bot - Operator : Alterego, Flagged on 10 May 2008
 * Inactive since 16 October 2013
 * Ebrambot - Operator : Ebraminio, Flagged on 10 November 2010
 * Globaly locked since 25 December 2018
 * DougBot - Operator : Doug, Flagged on 5 December 2011
 * Inactive since 11 December 2011
 * Translation Notification Bot - Bot not working since 23 November 2018, so notifications probably don't work. Please ask question on T144780 ticket on phabricator. As of June 2020, this task is now performed by User:MediaWiki message delivery.

Bot flag as a flood flag
 Analogous to m:Meta:Flood_flag, these are restricted to developers and other highly trusted users who have a real need for them, these are not bots 
 * Peachey88 (Flood), an alternate account of Peachey88, has a bot flag to avoid flooding the recent changes log. Apparently mainly for LQT maintenance tasks, this is a human account with a bot flag because of the frequency it edits. Flagged on 14 May 2011.

Requests for bot jobs
Here are some things that it would be useful to set up a bot to deal with. If adding to this list then please include your signature ( ) so that any potential bot writers can contact you for more info if needed:

Requests for ongoing bot jobs

 * A bot that checks all links from this site to meta (both using the meta: interwiki prefix, and by full URL ), and if that page is a redirect to MW.org replaces the external link with the correct internal one. Ideally (though it's not a requirement) the bot should follow redirects if the meta redirect is out of date.  Even more ideally, it would fix meta to skip the redirect too, but perhaps that is too much to ask of a single bot. --HappyDog 19:53, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
 * A bot that checks through all pages that contain Template:SettingSummary and updates Manual:Configuration settings and Manual:Configuration settings (alphabetical). This is probably not quite possible at the moment, due to extra info on the page that shouldn't be lost by an update.  If there is someone interested in writing this bot then we will need to do a bit of a clean-up first, I think. A simple version of the bot would extract the 'summary' field from the individual pages and update the main page with the correct summary. --HappyDog 19:53, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
 * A bot that checks categories of non-English pages (which you can tell by the sub-page part), and if the page is categorised into the English category tree, to fix the category link so it points to the same place in the appropriate language tree (, where cc is the country code. Or more generally, if it is in the wrong category tree, fix it (as translations may not always come from the English original). --HappyDog 22:10, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * This is being done as part of the migration to Translate extension. --Nemo 05:12, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Requests for one off bot jobs

 * Add  to ~200 template transclusions
 * The historical template had translation markup added, and now breaks in ~200 pages. Fixing it, just requires adding  like this diff for example. Would this be a reasonable bot job? Thanks! (Possibly there are additional now-translatable-templates, which need the same fix? I'm not sure. List 'em if you've got 'em.) Quiddity (WMF) (talk) 21:57, 9 December 2015 (UTC)
 * Replace raw tabbed window markup with templates
 * Special:Search/insource:mw-gadget-tabbedwindow lists the pages which use raw HTML instead of the dedicated templates TabbedWindowBegin and TabbedWindowEnd; they should be updated to use the template, both for self-documentation and to make it easier to improve the tabbed window interface in the future. Typically these are dedicated subpages using the same pattern so it would involve replacing the first two lines and the last line of the page (but I haven't reviewed if every single page follows the same pattern). Thanks! --Tgr (talk) 02:33, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

Bot permission request archive

 * ExtensionListBot - Operator: Benjamin Garn - This bot will update the AutoExtensionList until the Extension Matrix-Bot is working again.
 * Bot flag granted.  i Alex  10:10, 9 February 2009 (UTC)


 * User:TisaneBot &mdash; As a one-off task, create redirects from mainspace to Manual: space for all configuration settings and all hooks. As an ongoing task, fulfill HappyDog's third bot request above. Also, the bot will fix double redirects. Tisane 03:01, 9 June 2010 (UTC)
 * This request was apparently overlooked because it was originally placed in the section above for ongoing bot jobs. This page was confusing as it wasn't clear whether the prior sections were for requested bot jobs or for requesting bot flags.  The request is more than one year old so I'm closing it as not acted on and it should be reopened at Project:Requests if the operator still wants to run this bot.--Doug.(talk • contribs) 12:27, 5 December 2011 (UTC)