As of r41652 [1], action=protect allows the user to specify different expiry timestamps for different protections, something the UI has supported for a while.

To support this, the expiry parameter has changed to accept multiple values, and even duplicate values. The first expiry timestamp will apply to the first protection, the second to the second, etc. The number of values in the expiry parameter must be equal to the number of values in the protections parameter, or an error will occur (for details on the new error message, see [2]). To preserve backwards compatibility, setting a single value in the expiry parameter is always allowed: in that case, all specified protections will have the same expiry timestamp.

Example requests: api.php?action=protect&token=123ABC&title=Foo&protections=edit=sysop|move=sysop&expiry=infinite Will add the protections edit=sysop and move=sysop, both of which will never expire api.php?action=protect&token=123ABC&title=Foo&protections=edit=autoconfirmed|move=sysop&expiry=20081104000000|infinite Will add the protections edit=autoconfirmed and move=sysop; the first will expire on November 4, 2008, the second will never expire api.php?action=protect&token=123ABC&title=Foo&protections=edit=autoconfirmed|move=sysop|read=user&expiry=20081104000000|infinite Will cause an error, because 2 expiries were given for 3 protections api.php?action=protect&token=123ABC&title=Foo&protections=edit=autoconfirmed|move=sysop&expiry=20081104000000|infinite|infinite Will cause an error, because 3 expiries were given for 2 protections

The output format has also been changed, so multiple expiry times can be listed.

Old format: <protect title="Foo" reason="" expiry="infinite"> <protections edit="sysop" move="sysop" /> </protect>

New format: <protect title="Foo" reason=""> <protections> <protection edit="sysop" expiry="infinite" /> <protection move="sysop" expiry="infinite" /> </protections> </protect>

Additionally, the invalidexpiry and pastexpiry error messages have been changed to mention the expiry timestamp they're referring to. In the new messages, EXPIRY is replaced by the faulty expiry timestamp.

Old messages: * code: invalidexpiry ** info: Invalid expiry time * code: pastexpiry ** info: Expiry time is in the past

New messages: * code: invalidexpiry ** info: Invalid expiry time ``EXPIRY'' * code: pastexpiry ** info: Expiry time ``EXPIRY'' is in the past

For the newly added error message toofewexpiries or more information about action=protect, see the documentation at www.mediawiki.org [2].

[1] http://svn.wikimedia.org/viewvc/mediawiki/?view=rev&rev=41652 [2] http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/API:Edit_-_Protect