Topic on 2017 wikitext editor/Feedback

Tracked in Phabricator
Task T156196

My favorite function of wikEd is the "find and replace"-tool.

feature	wikED	new Editor
Regexp	implemented	implemented
find and replace field	always visible (switch on/off via localstorage for all tabs)	not visible, need Ctrl+F for each open tab
remember old searchstrings and replacementstrings	via local storage, last used string is default for all following tabs	no systematic storage, simple replacement are partly stored via browser autofill?
replacement only in marked text	support	not supported

features I really need/want

• turn on/off visibility of find and replace from for all following tabs (i.e. by usage of local storage)
• remembering search and replace strings (internal as "s/find/replace/flags"), use local storage or indexeddb
• last used strings are default for next tab/article
• if some text is selected, replace only in selected text
• enable "secure" replacements. look at de:user:TMg/autoFormatter.js ( backup/restore nowikis/filenames-functions)
• Diff-function (I use wikEd-Diff and and de:user:TMg/autoFormatter/autoDiff.js as hook for userscripts like de:User:Boshomi/ARreplace.js, autoFromatter, Boshomi/externalURLform.js (shows diff direct after replacement)

Use case

1. Find pages with cirrus search
2. open 50 tabs of found pages in edit mode (I use API to generated worklist like de:Benutzer:Boshomi/worklist1, but a "edit-link" like special:whatlinkshere, would do the same)
3. perform regexp-replace in all tabs
4. watch the diffs
5. save page if the diff looks good.

do this as fast as possible, avoid mistakes. (I should be possible within 200 seconds or less then 4 seconds per tab, without additional userscripts. If you fail improve the features!)

AWB

no, AWB is no solution. I do not have any .NET on my Linux-Workstation, and I don't like to use external software.

I do edits like de:special:Diff/161935840 only with Browser, and I do it fast.

This is in fact work for an automated tool or a bot, not humans.

There are tools that fit this purpose:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WPCleaner - opensource https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser#See_also - "internal" software.

Doing such edits quickly is a problem in and of itself because reverting them becomes complicated if there are problems, and if someone else edits after it. It seems like a good reason to add better throttling to mediawiki, as 50 open tabs is by no definition of the word normal editing, and is exactly why the bot flag was invented.

Most other suggestions relate either to mediawiki itself, or can be incorporated using [[[gadgets]], as they aren't needed for the wikitext editor.

I've filed task T156196 for find in selection, but I'm hesitant to consider features designed for bot-like edits, as that should not be our focus.