User talk:Lupin/archive5

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[edit] Navigational popups

[edit] ActiveX and link separators

Amazing, just amazing.

However, I have two minor questions.

  1. Is is possible to use a different character to seperate the links?
The middle dot tends to become a hollow square. It may be just the way the default monobook font interacts with IE, but it would be nice to be able to choose a different character.
  1. Do you know how to enable certain ActiveX objects, and for Wikipedia only?
Currently I have disabled all ActiveX, but apparently I need "Msxml2.XMLHTTP" or "Microsoft.XMLHTTP". Which one do you advise? By the way, would it be possible to show a message if the objects cannot be created? I couldn't figure out what was wrong without looking at the source file.

I hope you can answer my questions.

Cordially yours, Shinobu 00:11, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

Hi, glad the script is useful. To address your questions:
  1. yes, you can use a different character: set the variable popupNavLinkSeparator as described on Wikipedia:Tools. If you find

a nice one then please let me know and I'll make the default for IE.

  1. I don't have access to a copy of IE (I am rather severely unix-bound) so please tell me what you have to do to get this working so that I can add it to the installation instructions! I'm afraid I don't know which ActiveX thing is better as I don't understand all that stuff really. Lupin 01:26, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the link to The Manual. I see it has lots more interesting options. As for the dot problem, the following works for me, both in IE and in Firefox:

popupNavLinkSeparator = ' · ';

Cordially yours, Shinobu 04:47, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

There seems to be a little flaw in the code. You see, I got the ActiveX working by assigning wikipedia.org to it's own security zone and activated safe for scripting ActiveX. That works, apart from the fact that the code breaks on the following line:

this.send = this.http.send;

Maybe because for ActiveX objects member functions are native, not JS, this line generates a "property does not exist"-error. Perhaps it is best to use a proxy in this case:

function httpProxySend(name)
{
    return this.http.send(name);
}

Assuming send returns anything that is. And use

this.send = httpProxySend;

in the case of an ActiveX. Maybe I'll toy around with it a bit and send you the solution if I get it working (if you want, that is). What do you use, a local copy on your own p.c., or have you got a scratch version somewhere else?

Cordially yours, Shinobu 06:34, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. Please could you try using User:Lupin/popupsdev.js instead of User:Lupin/popups.js? I've made something like your suggested change regarding "proxy" functions. Lupin 02:17, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Okay, I'll check if it works; if it doesn't I'll try to toy around with a debugger. Actually being able to see on what line the script staggers and being able to look at variables, change them and continue, makes for easier problem fixing than having an other user execute it and asking "Does it work?". Shinobu 21:46, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

It works like magic. It doens't seem to have broken in Firefox either, always a good sign. I can only think of one minor improvement (very low priority though): a message of some kind in the case neither ActiveX nor standard HttpRequests can be created.

I would like to say again that it's an amazing script, and thanks for taking the trouble to make it work for me! Cordially yours, Shinobu 22:08, 25 August 2005 (UTC)

Shinobu, Is there a difference between · (middot) and ⋅ (sdot)?
Lupin, this is a great tool! — Omegatron 01:44, September 8, 2005 (UTC)
Glad you like it! I can see the difference in Firefox on Linux, so they are distinct. I suspect that you may get a better response from Shinobu on his talk page. Lupin 01:48, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
I really like it! :-)
I was specifically talking about whether the two dots have different effects in IE, since that seemed to be the problem. (Although I didn't know the difference until recently, and have been using middot for both. Oops.) — Omegatron 15:59, September 8, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Parensplit bug

I think there should be extra brackets in the following bit of code (I've coloured them red):

String.prototype.parenSplit=function (re) {
    var m=re.exec(this);
    if (!m) return [this];
    return [this.substring(0,m.index)]
        .concat(m.slice(1))
        .concat(this.substring(m.index+m[0].length).parenSplit(re));
};

If I understand this correctly this function should emulate split (only not broken).

The result of the split method is an array of strings split at each point where separator occurs in stringObj. The separator is not returned as part of any array element.

So if re is not matched, an array with a single element should be returned, not a string. Otherwise code that depends on the result being an array fails, crashing the script to the debugger.

As for the second part, given string "abcdefghi", re /def/ this would yield:

m[0] = "def"; m.index = 3;
return ["abc"].concat(["def"]).concat("ghi".parenSplit(/def/));
== return ["abc", "def", "ghi"]

Note that ordinary split on IE or Firefox would return ["abc", "ghi"]. But I assume returning "def" also is intentional, so that's okay - only the red brackets should be added.

Cordially yours, Shinobu 03:06, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

Yes, you're right. Thanks for finding this bug and providing the fix! I've put this and another fix to parenSplit in popupsdev.js and will transition it to popups.js if it proves to be stable. Lupin 14:32, 26 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Redundant code in parenSplit?

for(var i=0; i<m.length; ++i) {
    if (typeof m[i]=='undefined') m[i]='';
}

This code might not be needed, since you're only using m[0] and m[0] is always a string: the re match.

Cordially yours, Shinobu 02:33, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

True - for my purposes at the moment, it doesn't do anything. But it does make parenSplit behave more like (exactly like?) the ECMA String.split function, and I don't think it imposes a huge performance hit (if you disagree then I'd be happy to take it out). Basically I added it so that I don't get bitten by differences between String.split and String.parenSplit in the future. Lupin 02:38, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

Yes, that makes a lot of sense. I should have thought of that.

// without this, we have 
// 'ab'.parenSplit(/a|(b)/) != 'ab'.split(/a|(b)/)

I've tested this, and it returns ["", "", "", "b", ""].

I've tested normal split with Firefox in JS1.2 mode, and it returns ["", "", "", "b"].

Either Firefox's JS1.2 is broken (while still returning the correct anser to your "abc".split(/(b)/) test) or you're not 100% there (although I wouldn't bother too much about that if it doesn't impact the rest of the script).

I have had the new script running for a while now, and it doesn't seem to crash any more. By the way, I'm working on a (small) watchlist tool. It's primary function is to show only the new edits since the tool was last run. Should I post it somewhere, or is this a) not useful to anyone but me or b) done before?

Cordially yours, Shinobu 04:05, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

Interesting. My observations were that ["", "", "", "b", ""] is returned by both parenSplit and split in firefox. I don't know how to put firefox into js1.2 mode, though. Also I think that this is the correct result. The array is split in two places and the regex has one set of parens, so should have 3 elements (since it's split at two places) plus one element for each split point, and 3+2=5. In general, a string which is split at N places by a regex with n bracketed expressesions should yield and array with N+1 + Nn = N(n+1)+1 elements.
Your tool sounds interesting and useful. I would encourage you to post it. I don't know if it's been done before, but Wikipedia:Tools is a good place to check. Lupin 17:57, 27 August 2005 (UTC)

@correct result: I agree.

One source of the confusion is a difference between what Firefox claims to do in the docs, and what it does in reality.

docs: <1.2 → ["", "", ""]; >=1.2 → ["", "", "", "b", ""] assuming I read it correctly…
reality: <1.3 → ["", "", "", "b"]; >= 1.3 → ["", "", "", "b", ""]

Modern version uses 1.5 by default, I think, and your script doesn't specify a version, so it'll be allright. Shinobu 16:44, 28 August 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Barnstar!

Working Man's Barnstar

Here's a working man's barn star...for your uhm...work ;) --Phroziac (talk) 03:15, September 5, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks! Lupin 22:35, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Night cap

I noticed you tagged, it under the verify tag. I afterwards put it under Template:Empty because little can be drawn from the article. I thought I should post it here in case you objected. Falphin 23:41, 6 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Wikicities popups

I put the code you gave me in my javascript on RC wiki, but...the background on it is CLEAR! Heh, maybe you could fix that? By the way, please archive your talk. Additionally, I turned the admin features on, and I like it! :) --Phroziac (talk) 02:33, September 7, 2005 (UTC)

Yes, talk archival is a chore I had to get around to soon :) The transparent popup happens because monobook.js sets tables to transparent and the popups are essentially tables. If you remove or override that line (I did it in the object inspector in firefox to check but I don't know enough CSS to know how to remove the transparent declaration in my user CSS) then it should work. Lupin 02:55, 7 September 2005 (UTC)
Oh, heh. Another problem now though, it seems when i roll over User:Fabartus's signature, my firefox locks up. *ugh* I disabled the script for now. --Phroziac (talk) 02:37, September 8, 2005 (UTC)
Thanks a lot for finding and reporting that bug. It crashed for me too, and I think I've fixed it in the latest versions of popups.js and popupsdev.js. It appears that complex regexes can confuse firefox :-( Lupin 03:10, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
You're welcome. Hmm, sounds like that's a firefox bug. --Phroziac (talk) 03:17, September 8, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] thanks

  • thanks for making of aware of the popups js script I'm really surprised that I haven't heard of it before and even though I can't think of any immediate uses for it I'm sure I'll be using it in the future. Jtkiefer T | @ | C ----- 02:18, September 8, 2005 (UTC)
  • My thanks also, which should offset the inevitable guilt you should be feeling over all those wasted minutes people (especially me :-) are going to waste simply playing with your new gadget because it is simply so cool...nice to see LivePreview being leveraged so neatly too, I've been using that one for ages. Looking at my .js file, maybe we someone should work on some coding standards for installing these things :-) —Phil | Talk 07:08, September 8, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Pop-ups

Hmm...I'm not a new bureaucrat, but what's funny is that I just recently was looking at this and considering doing this :D — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 02:43, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
BTW...are you sure it works in firefox? — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 02:47, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
The tool was developed in firefox and has only been tested much in that browser by me. So I jolly well hope so :-) If you have access to other browsers (especially IE, as I don't have a windows computer) and can test it out there then I'd be interested in any problems. Lupin 03:13, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
Saw you hawking your tools on everyone's talk pages & tried it out. I like it - works fine on Firefox for me. Thanks. Guettarda 03:02, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
Tried it with IE, WinXP, the only difference I saw was that the second part of the pop-up, the part with the text and pic, is almost full-screen width, while with Firefox it's just a small box. Guettarda 15:48, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

Umm...looks like it's giving me a js error in IE and not working in firefox...I think it may be the rest of my monobook.js...will look into it later. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 22:38, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Hi there!

Thanks for your link! I will most certainly take a look at it when I get a chance. Your message made my day today :-) --HappyCamper 03:18, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popups

Nice tool, but how do I prevent images from loading? User:Nichalp/sg 11:47, September 8, 2005 (UTC)

Great. Wikipedia will never be the same again. User:Nichalp/sg 12:03, September 8, 2005 (UTC)
Maybe you found the answer already, but one of popupImages=false; (disable images) or simplePopups=true; (disable all downloading of data) will probably do what you want. See the Configuration section of Wikipedia:Tools#Navigation_popups for details and more options. Lupin 12:11, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
Yeah, thanks. Kewl tools. Any idea how to change the visited link colours? User:Nichalp/sg 12:28, September 8, 2005 (UTC)
Something to do with CSS I think, although I don't know much about that side of things. If you're running firefox then you can run the object inspector while a popup is visible to see what's going on. If you'd like me to change the class (or whatever it's called in CSS) of the links in the popup then this shouldn't be too hard. Lupin 12:45, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
  • Awesome tool. Thank you! --Scimitar parley 15:56, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

Hi. Do I use

// User:Lupin/popupsdev.js - please include this line

or

// User:Lupin/popups.js - please include this line

in the opening line? Guettarda 02:35, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

Hey Lupin. Thanks for pointing out the popups script. --Ngb ?!? 07:51, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popups

Thanks for the info! I'll experiment with it once I get the chance. — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 10:45, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks...

...for the photo tip. I'm going to add those credits to the image pages now. paul klenk 16:22, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Background

Could you tell me where you got the background maps for all those dot maps you have created? Renata3 16:38, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

Sure, they're created dynamically by the Generic Mapping Tools. I think there's a blank one somewhere... Image:Gb4dot.png looks like a good one. Lupin 16:50, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popup tool

Hi,

I think the popup tool is a great idea. However, I found it to be a distraction, partially because I'm already used to doing most tasks very rapidly. Thanmks for the suggestion though :) --Pakaran 18:55, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popups: IE hack gone wrong

I'm not sure why you want to fix the width of the popup on exactly 300 px, since they work without it, but if you want to do this, keep in mind that expressions cannot be set this way.

(documentation follows)

[edit] setExpression Method

Sets an expression for the specified object.

[edit] Syntax

object.setExpression(sPropertyName, sExpression [, sLanguage])

[edit] Parameters

sPropertyName Required. String that specifies the name of the property to which sExpression is added.
sExpression Required. String that specifies any valid script (JScript, JavaScript, VBScript) statement without quotations or semicolons. This string can include references to other properties on the current page. Array references are not allowed on object properties included in this script.
sLanguage Optional. String that specifies one of the following values:
JScript Default. Language is JScript.
VBScript Language is VBScript.
JavaScript Language is JavaScript.

[edit] Return Value

No return value.

(my own comments follow)

I recommend not using the sLanguage parameter. Browsers seem to consider JScript a synonym for JavaScript anyway. I would further recommend a way to switch width fixing off, in case it's not wanted.

Cordially yours, Shinobu 19:00, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

Thanks again. I've hopefully fixed this in popupsdev.js. Please could you test it? I'll add an flag to control width-fixing if this works properly. Lupin 21:28, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

The width seems to get properly fixed now. Cordially yours, Shinobu 11:16, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Can't get popups working

I've just been trying and failing to get your popups thing working in firefox 1.0 on linux. This is the only thing in my monobook.js and its basically the default but with admin popups enabled. However no matter what I try I just cannot get it to do anything! Thryduulf 22:37, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

You haven't quite correctly pasted the code: the penultimate line is missing the last 3 characters,

');

The line should read

 + '&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript&dontcountme=s"></script>');

Thanks for (trying to) try the script out! Lupin 22:45, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for that - I hadn't spotted those character behind one of the screenshots - I guessed the ipt> of script but not know any javascript I didn't realise that wouldn't be the end of the line! Thryduulf 22:59, 9 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Your popup Javascript

Your popup Javascript seems to work fine. The only strange thing I have noticed is that it insists on previewing the first image it finds on a page, regardless of where that image appears. This causes the previews for the Wikipedia:Two-million pool and Wikipedia:Five-million pool to include a picture of the Canadian flag. This puzzled me for a moment, but then I noticed that some user who has voted in the pools has the flag in his signature, but at a much smaller scale. — JIP | Talk 12:32, 10 September 2005 (UTC)

Which is actually rather puzzling, since the Two-million pool article actually has the Image:Radioactive.png as the first image, in someone else's sig. Jacoplane 13:16, 10 September 2005 (UTC)
Not too puzzling. My script only downloads the wikitext of articles and never attempts to decipher templates. The radioactive image is referred to in a user template; the canada image is the first bona fide [[Image:...]] in the wikitext. The alternative (interpreting templates) would unfortunately be prohibitive both in terms of programming time and bandwidth consumption. Lupin 13:40, 10 September 2005 (UTC)
Thanks for bringing this issue up! I'm working on a mechanism to exclude very small scaled-down images. Lupin 13:40, 10 September 2005 (UTC)
This should now be fixed. Lupin|talk|popups 02:17, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Adding a border

I'd like a dark border around the popup. If you don't want to do this for everyone, is there a way for me to do it to just my own? — Omegatron 21:04, September 11, 2005 (UTC)

There is no easy way at the moment (I can give you a hack if you're desperate). I want to understand CSS better, and when I do I'll give a way of controlling the appearance of the popup by editing your user CSS file (eg monobook.css). If you understand CSS then you can help: load the object inspector when a popup is displayed and figure out which objects' CSS I have to tweak to control the border, background colour, font(s) etc. Anyway, this is certainly something I intend to add. Lupin|talk|popups 11:30, 12 September 2005 (UTC)
I have something working now in the development version of my script, User:Lupin/popupsdev.js. To install it, replace popups.js with popupsdev.js in your monobook.js file (replace both occurences - there are two). Then you can change the popups' appearance using CSS. For example, I currently have the following in my monobook.css:
table.popupBorderTable { padding: 5pt; background: #00FF00 }
table.popupTable { background: #FFCCFF }
This gives the popups a 5 pixel wide lurid green border, and the popup itself has a soothing pink background. (When the mood takes me, I'll replace popups.js with popupsdev.js, so the first replacement step won't be needed). Lupin|talk|popups 23:38, 12 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Giant petrel

Hi! I see you moved Giant petrel to Giant Petrel. I'm fairly sure that it was in the correct places, as it refers not to a single species (like a Peruvian Diving Petrel) but a group (like the diving petrels), albeit a group with just two species. Sabine's Sunbird 01:47, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

Apologies - my mistake. Should it perhaps be at Giant petrels then? Lupin|talk|popups 01:56, 11 September 2005 (UTC)
No worries. It should go back to Giant petrel, the same as the two closely related fulmars are both at Fulmar. Sabine's Sunbird 02:06, 11 September 2005 (UTC)
Done. Lupin|talk|popups 02:15, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popups

Hello, Lupin! I had a quick question about the popups- I'm willing to give them a try, but I'm a bit hesistant. If I don't like them, can I just delete the my monobook page, and return everything to "normal"? Thanks! Flcelloguy | A note? | Desk 14:27, September 11, 2005 (UTC)

Yes, that's right, or you can blank the monobook.js page instead. Just make sure you do a hard refresh after deleting or making changes to your monobook.js file. Lupin|talk|popups 14:35, 11 September 2005 (UTC)
Well, I installed it, and it works great! However, when I click on "block" in the popup, it just takes me to Special:Blockip, without the filled-in username. Is this supposed to happen? Flcelloguy | A note? | Desk 15:00, September 11, 2005 (UTC)
No, that's a bug - thanks for reporting it! Hopefully if you purge your cache you'll find that it's now been fixed. Lupin|talk|popups 16:10, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

Were you on IRC at the time? Heh. I didn't notice you. Anyways...I haven't seen any patterns, but I haven't been paying attention. I'll let you know if I see anything. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 17:07, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Safari (Mac) and popups

hey Lupin... that OverLib library link you left me worked fine under Safari on Mac OS X. I don't know whether you've changed the Popup script significantly over the last month or so, but I've just tried it again, and it appears to work reasonably well on my PowerBook now. Frustratingly, it still doesn't work at all using my iMac, despite both machines runnign the same version of Mac OS X and Safari. Any ideas on that one?! Cheers, UkPaolo 19:25, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, I have nothing intelligent to suggest apart from trying each browser on each machine with a fresh profile (if such a notion exists). Lupin|talk|popups 21:47, 11 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Categories

Hi Lupin,

I don't normally edit other people's User pages, but in your watchlist you have a list of 318 categories, which made this page a member of each one of them...I'm sure that's not what you meant to do! If you want to have a link to a category without the page becoming a member of that category, you can use:

[[:Category:Analytic number theory]]

instead of:

[[Category:Analytic number theory]]

(as you probably already know...) I took the liberty of applying this change to your list. I hope that's OK with you.

Thanks! Owen× ☎ 03:13, 12 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, thanks for doing that. It's something I forgot to do when dumping my old watchlist. Lupin|talk|popups 11:35, 12 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popup bug report

I have posted a bug report here which seems more appropriate: obviously feel free to move it if you prefer...—Phil | Talk 09:59, September 12, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popup looks great

Thank you!

My computer usually causes a lot of problems with scripts, but I got your popup script to work at once. It's looking great. Thanks! - Mgm|(talk) 10:56, September 12, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Another idea?

Hey Lupin, I love your pop-ups so much, they have literally changed the way I use Wikipedia. Not only that, I'm starting to get annoyed when I can't get such useful information out of ANY link I hover over, out there on the Interweb. :)

Anyway, I wanted to draw your attention to a question I posted at MediaWiki talk:Licenses, which is the source page for the new Licensing Selector on the Special:Upload page. Is it possible to create a javascript plug-in to easily insert image copyright tags, selected from a prepared list, into an image description page?

Please join the discussion if you have time. Thanks! — Catherine\talk 04:42, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popups

Thanks for the congrats, and up to now, the popups look great...Lectonar 07:11, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Effect of your popups on the servers

As many have said before, your popups are great. However, I turned on the simplePopups option, because I feared the popups would put too much strain on the server. Do you have an idea how much the popups cost? I assume that every popup generates a request to the wikipedia servers, under my own user name. If this is true, then I'd prefer to use the simple popups: most of the time when a popup is generated, I do not actually want it, but my mouse pointer just happen to hover above a link. However, it might be nice to include an extra link in the simple popup, which can be used to expand it to the complete popup (containing the first paragraph of the target etc.). I hope I'm making sense; otherwise, ask me and I'll clarify. Cheers, and thanks for your work! -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 11:59, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

I don't know about server load. The script never gets full HTML pages, only wikitext (with action=raw) and images. (Incidentally, without traffic analysis, I don't think that these requests should be directly linked to the logged in user. May be wrong though). This is a feature I want to add: a link which toggles simplePopups and remembers the choice in a cookie (or you'd have to reset it each time you change page). Thanks for prodding me about this - it may actually happen now :-) Lupin|talk|popups 13:09, 13 September 2005 (UTC)
I've put these features into the development version of my script (which will be broken now and again, so is probably not ideal for everyday use). To use this and enable the features, you need to (1) change popups.js to popupsdev.js (twice), and (2) set the option popupLiveOptions to true and (3) if you want the options you set to be remembered between pages, set popupCookies to true. I'll migrate this feature to popups.js when I get the urge to do so. Lupin|talk|popups 23:35, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. I tried it out, but unfortunately, it is not quite what I was thinking of. I just want a one-time toggle: if I hoover the mouse above a link, I want to get the simplePopup with links to edit, history, etc., and an extra link, which when I can click on it (or perhaps just touch it), expands the popup with a preview of the first paragraph. When I then move to a different link, I should get the simplePopup again.

I should also clarify my question about whether the scripts uses one's own account to get the wikitext. As I understand it (and my understanding is very incomplete), the bottleneck when the servers are under strain is the database. Every HTML request sent by a user results in at least one database query, but requests sent by an IP address without account can be served from a cache without any database query. So, I think the script would load the servers a bit less if the requests were made anonymously (the distinction between logged-in and anonymous is made based on cookies). I don't know whether action=raw changes this.

PS: You are making me very curious about how you discovered so fast that I was trying it out. Does that have to do with the mysterious comment that is perhaps not quite a comment? -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 00:30, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

OK, I'll think about that approach. There would be a perhaps considerable delay between you clicking that link and the preview appearing; at the moment, this is somewhat hidden by the fact that downloading attempts start as soon as the mouse hovers over the link, and continues until it succeeds even when the mouse is not on the link (I think!). This is somewhat wasteful of bandwidth, but makes things faster, at least when the servers aren't slower than a pickled slug.
I would be surprised if action=raw made more work for the database than non-logged in queries. Indeed, sometimes I get old copies of the script (which you'll notice is called with action=raw in your monobook file) when I first refresh, which I put down to being served a stale cached copy. If logged-in action=raw queries do entail a lot of overhead then it seems to me that this is a bug.
It's quite strange about your edit - I just happened to load your monobook.js wondering if you'd given it a try yet and there it was; I didn't actually realise it was so "fresh". If it makes you happier though, I could have written a script to monitor changes in the irc channel and alert me for any juicy ones. Not that I have, but....
The "mysterious comment" lets me see (roughly) who's using the script by looking at Special:Whatlinkshere/User:Lupin/popups.js. Lupin|talk|popups 00:40, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

By the way, the editOld link when hoovering over diff links is extremely useful; thanks. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 01:15, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

I've implemented a feature which I hope is more like what you wanted. Check it out in the latest popupsdev.js by setting popupsUnsimplify=true.

I assume that you mean popupUnsimplifyLink=true. Now, I get a "Get preview data" button but nothing happens when I click it. Perhaps it's just that the server is too slow. I'll try again tomorrow when it should be better. Thanks anyway. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 17:13, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

Okay, turns out I also have to set simplePopups to false. Now it works, great! Yes, this is what I was thinking of, though the delay is unfortunate. I'll try it out and let you know how useful it is. -- Jitse Niesen (talk) 17:30, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

One thing you might try is setting popupLiveOptions to true, either in your user Javascript or by entering javascript:void(popupLiveOptions=true) in the address bar. Then you can turn the click-to-preview behaviour on and off as you please. (If you turn cookies on then it should remember the setting across pages and browsing sessions too). Lupin|talk|popups 20:50, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popup script and Safari

Hey Lupin, the popup tool looks to be a really great idea, however I think it might keep crashing my browser (latest version of Safari on OSX 10.4). I can email you the bug report, if it would help. Any ideas how to fix? Thanks, Joolz 22:30, 14 September 2005 (UTC)

Yes, please send me anything that you have. Another thing that you might like to try if you have (lots of) time is to try old versions of the script (look at the history of User:Lupin/popups.js, find the oldid= in the url and copy that into your monobook.js) and see if they cause crashes or not. If you find two versions which are relatively close chronologically, one of which crashes and one doesn't, then there's a good chance of finding out what's gone wrong. (By the way, javascript being able to crash your browser is a bug which you should report to your browser vendor/developer, I believe). Lupin|talk|popups 22:50, 14 September 2005 (UTC)
I only activated the script earlier today (actually not quite true, it only began working once my cache was properly refreshed earlier today) so as far as I'm aware it's not a bug introduced by a recent change, I will send you the bug report in a few days because I deactivated the script earlier, wikipedia was pretty much unusable whilst it was working. Thanks for your reply, Joolz 00:49, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popups, again!

Hey, that css change looks great. I stuck it in the sidewide monobook.css. And haha, I see you got sucked in and made an edit while you were on the rc wiki. :D --Phroziac (talk) 14:42, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks!

I'm sure this will come in very useful. Incidentally, you might consider protecting the page with the javascript - it would be a very unwelcome surprise if someone went in and changed it out from under you. Nandesuka 16:58, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

Cool, glad to hear it. I believe that only admins can change javascript in the user namespace, so this shoudn't be a problem. Lupin|talk|popups 17:02, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] left -> right image

Just curious:

Why did you shift the image on Shallow focus from left to right? --Jeremy Butler 12:35, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

Heh. It looked odd and out of place, so I "fixed" it. Just a matter of taste. Lupin|talk|popups 12:49, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
Ah, I see. So there's no general Wikimedia styleguide "rule" that suggests putting illustrations on the right? Either way is fine by me. --Jeremy Butler 00:56, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] External link/links

Hey Lupin,

I've always wondered about this and I think you may have the answer (or at least an answer); if an article only provides one reference or external link, is it then proper to head them as "Reference" and "External link" or as "References" and "External links"? I noticed you just changed this over at West Africa (and don't worry, I'm not asking because I intend to change it back--I've just always wanted to know! Much obliged, --Dvyost 14:51, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

I don't think there is an official policy on this - if there is one link or reference, then the singular or plural form is (officially) OK. But my own strong personal preference is for the plural always. My reasoning is that
  1. people often add items to the section without bothering to change the heading, which looks terrible
  2. if the heading is singular then people may be dissuaded from editing it and adding more, because they think that there should only be one in such a section
  3. a section titled "External link" looks jarring and wrong to me, probably because most mature articles have more than one external link, and I expect section headings to be consistent across articles. Lupin|talk|popups 15:03, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
Thought I had already posted a response to this, but I guess for whatever it didn't "take." Anyway, thanks! You've answered a long-standing question for me. Cheers, Dvyost 17:07, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Jimbo's new untagged image policy

Can you give me a link to the page with jimbo's new untagged images policy? --Thanks Nv8200p (talk) 22:52, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

I read about it on his talk page. Lupin|talk|popups 22:56, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
I cannot find any reference to this do you have a date as his talk page is constantly changing. --Nv8200p (talk) 23:20, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
It's the first two paragraphs that I'm referring to. Sorry, I should have said. Lupin|talk|popups 23:22, 17 September 2005 (UTC)
Got it! This great, it will save so much work not having to go through the IFD process. -- Cheers Nv8200p (talk) 23:25, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] External link(s)

I've noticed a convention to title it "External link", singular, when there is only one link. I was going to correct your edit to Rhythmbox on that but I can't find anything in the WP:MOS and its linked pages that confirms this convention. Am I and the editors I've seen doing this just mistaken? — Saxifrage | ☎ 23:37, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

I've just added a stanza to Wikipedia:External links explaining why I do this (see a few pars up for a more opinionated version). As far as official editing style guidelines go, there is no guideline one way or the other. Personally, I have a strong preference for always using the plural. Lupin|talk|popups 23:43, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Hello

Thanks for your wishes, and I shall surely give a try. --Bhadani 12:40, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Headline text

Hi you were asking about a picture that I uploaded ;Image:Noora.JPG.I am a photographer and I took that picture please go to my website below .I will be loading more of my own photographs in future as well.I recently joined wikipedia and look forward to contributing to it extensively.

Sohail Anjum Photography--Yazid97 19:29, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] External link versus External links

m 18:58 Wikipedia:External links (diff; hist) . . Lupin (Talk | block) (→"External links" vs "External link" - presidence -> precedent)

Whoops. Thanks Lupin. Stewart Adcock 20:13, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Arlington Stadium photo

This is a scaled-down scan of a photo I bought at the Texas Rangers souvenir shop over 30 years ago. How would YOU tag it? Wahkeenah 21:04, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

Without further information, I don't think that there is a valid tag that you could confidently put on such an image. In fact, without knowing its copyright status, I wouldn't upload such an image in the first place as it may very well be a violation of copyright to do so. Lupin|talk|popups 21:11, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
You probably care a lot more than they do. Fine, delete it. >:( Wahkeenah 21:16, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
You may be right. Thing is, having such images around potentially opens Wikipedia up to legal attack, which is a Bad Thing in my opinion. It also makes distributing material in other forms such as a paper or DVD edition much more problematic. Lupin|talk|popups 21:22, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
There is an endless list of reasons that this site could be attacked on legal and other grounds. I am not much impressed with this site. Registered logons get hassled by the likes of you, and anonymous yahoos at their local libraries are allowed to waste everyone's time by posting junk and vulgarities. This site has very little credibility. But that's par for the course with the Internet. And don't quote me stats on how highly rated this site supposedly is. It means nothing. Wahkeenah 21:46, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
I'm sorry if the likes of me has offended or riled you; that was not my intent. I agree that this site has major problems, including credibility, but I see the potential for many of these problems to be fixed. Among these problems is that of copyright violations, and this is one which I am trying to do a little bit to lessen. I hope that you continue to contribute to this project despite this incident. Lupin|talk|popups 21:57, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
You're the first "super user" I've run into who will own up to the site's credibility problem, so you get a gold star. :) Wahkeenah 22:03, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] image of Lutoslawski score excerpt

Hi Lupin—Thanks for adding the fair-use tag to the info page for this image; I'm only learning how to do this stuff. I notice that the new info table on the right side overlaps with the tag. Any way of fixing this?

Also, since I took the photo, do I need to add my own release in addition to the claim of fair use for the content of the photo?

I should add that I'm using my learning curve to add to the Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Composers page.

Tony 03:17, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Hi Tony. For your first question, you could try putting
<br clear=all />
before the license tag. I'm afraid I don't know the answer to your second question; my feeling is that the answer is yes, and a simple statement to that effect on the image page would suffice, but I can't say for sure. Lupin|talk|popups 23:12, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] from Paul Klenk

Lupin, I have posed a question for you at this page: Talk:New York's Village Halloween Parade. When you have a moment, would you kindly take a look? Thanks in advance. paul klenk 21:55, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

Thanks, Lupin. paul klenk 23:31, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Yet more about your popup tool

Your popup tool does not handle article titles containing colons properly. Hovering over Team America: World Police and clicking Talk goes to Team America talk:World Police when it should go Talk:Team America: World Police. It should only do the namespace switching trick for prefixes that actually are namespaces. — JIP | Talk 11:35, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

Thanks! I think I've nailed this in the dev version, popupsdev.js. Lupin|talk|popups 12:35, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popups and dynamic navigation box

Today we borrowed Template:Dynamic_navigation_box from the .de wikipedia. It uses a nice javascript to hide the box, just like the TOC. But, when someone has your popup js set up, the show/hide button never appears. --Phroziac (talk) 16:20, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

I cannot see this with your popups disabled either, only when I log out of my account. Bah. Maybe you can look at our code and figure it out? It's in MediaWiki:Monobook.js and MediaWiki:Monobook.css. :) --Phroziac (talk) 17:45, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
I have a version in my monobook.js file which seem to work for me. I don't understand what the template is for, though. Lupin|talk|popups 22:58, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
Ah. I've taken a look at the source of the template and see that I've got completely the wrong end of the stick. The script I've written hides the navigation bar at the left of the page.... :-) Lupin|talk|popups 23:04, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
OK, take 2. I've replaced the rather silly onload business with a function (which will probably only work in not-too-ancient browsers, but fails silently otherwise) that loads things properly. The old code from de uses window.onload which I think may interact poorly with other scripts that want to do stuff when the page has finished loading, such as my script. Lupin|talk|popups 23:25, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] popup tool

I find it quite helpful. Thanks. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 00:05, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

Still testing the potential - but it looks good. Thanks. --Doc (?) 08:51, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Have a barnstar!

Awarded for a jolly clever idea from a happy user!
Awarded for a jolly clever idea from a happy user!

Stumbled across the Popup tool, haven't really played with it much yet, but you deserve a "Thank you!" (and hence, a barnstar) for an excellent idea. Completely beyond me how it works, but it does! Cheers, Silverhelm 23:03, 23 September 2005 (UTC).

Thanks, much appreciated. Lupin|talk|popups 23:42, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popup disambigation tool

Lupin - The popup disambiguation tool is truely great, so far its worked like a charm! Thanks a lot! The only thing I've noticed is that it lets you try and fix disambiguation links on Special Pages (like "What links here"). I haven't tried it to see what happens. --best, kevin ···Kzollman | Talk··· 00:23, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

Okay, I found another one. I use FireFox 1.0.6. Here's how to reproduce the error. Edit a new page, click to get a cursor in the edit box, place the mouse over one of the links above the edit box (causing a popup to appear), start typing. For me, this causes the title of the page (as it appears at the top of the window) to grow with each new key I press. Strange. --best, kevin ···Kzollman | Talk··· 00:58, 24 September 2005 (UTC)
Copy that - these should be problems no more :-) Thanks for taking the time to let me know. Lupin|talk|popups 01:27, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks

Barnstar of Diligence
Barnstar of Diligence

On RC patrol I often see meagre little articles on English villages which aren't deletable, but in themselves just look sad and unloved. Adding one of your "dotty maps" invariably makes a "what is this article doing here?" article look like an article which, given some TLC, could go places. Have a well-deserved barnstar, and keep up the good work! Tonywalton | Talk 21:36, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

Thanks! Lupin|talk|popups 22:53, 24 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] tl:verify

Just a note about the use of this template. It is generally intended for articles that are specifically problematic, not just any that are missing references. Adding it to every unreferenced article has been rejected in numerous discussions. Also it is not meant to go at the top of articles. If yu look at the talk page of the template, it is universally agreed that it belongs either on the talk page or at the bottom of articles. - SimonP 14:07, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for bringing me up on this. I'll place this template at the bottom of articles in the future. I don't actually see the distinction between a "specifically problematic" article and one which lacks references - our own guidelines says that lacking references is a problem. Having read the template talk page, I think that I will reserve the use of this tag (and its companion, {{primarysources}} which I just created) for non-stubs, though, and I like the idea of putting this in the References or section, or creating one if it doesn't exist. Lupin|talk|popups 14:30, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Koç Holding

I changed the subtitle "External links" to "References" in the hope to satisfy your complaint. Please check it again and remove your insertion if it is OK. Otherwise let me know what else to do. Thanks. CeeGee 14:11, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Evan Luard

The sources for the information contained in the Luard article will essentially be verifiable from the articles that the Luard article will link to, most notably the Oxford West and Abingdon and Oxford (UK Parliament constituency) pages. The Oxwab article is already sourced, and as I build the Oxford article, it will also be fully sourced. Is this sufficient to qualify as "referenced"? --New Progressive 15:47, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

I would suggest copying the relevant references to the article itself rather than relying on other articles. After all, they may be deleted from the articles which Evan Luard links to or replaced with other references at some stage in the future. Lupin|talk|popups 15:49, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Globalise Resistance

Hi, just wondering why you removed critisms from Globalise Resistance page?[1]--JK the unwise 17:40, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

Hm, I don't remember doing that. I probably did something stupid with an edit conflict. Sorry! Lupin|talk|popups 17:44, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
No worries, I think it was 84.9.38.26.--JK the unwise 18:10, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Popup nav tool

Thanks for that, it's a really cool tool. IceKarmaॐ 20:56, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] References?

You placed a {{verify}} notice on the article for the book "Exterminator!". Could you please explain what references you require? The book is the reference. (Please reply on my talk page). Cheers. 23skidoo 00:20, 26 September 2005 (UTC)


Likewise, I'm curious what references you think need verifying in the Angel of the Morning article. Song recordings are not generally sourced here on Wikipedia (maybe they should be), and the reference to Jerry Maguire is self-evident by seeing the film. Reply via my Talk page or yours, as you see fit. Nae'blis 08:30, 26 September 2005 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for dropping me a note. I believe that every article should be fully referenced, which means that every assertion made should be verifiable by reading references which are listed in the article. For example, in the Angel of the Morning article, several assertions are made which I would not immediately know how to verify. These include
  • the original song-writer
  • Juice Newton's version met with "further success" compared to Simone's
  • Shaggy's Angel song was indeed a reworking of this song as claimed
  • Tom Cruise sings the original , and does so badly (remember, no original research; even this should be sourced)
I'll admit now that this is not the most egregious case of unbacked assertions on the 'pedia, but still I think that the article would be greatly improved if it could, in principle, be independently verified by consulting references listed in the article rather than by using some unspecified "common sense" resource for songs. Even if there's a standard well respected reference work or resource for song recordings, then it should appear in the article. As a non-expert, I shouldn't have to know what this is - I should be told. Lupin|talk|popups 11:33, 26 September 2005 (UTC)
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