Thanks to all who sent me Gmail invites.
I'll set up an account there and see how much better it is for word wrap and threaded reading.
Thanks again.
Michael Turley User:Unfocused
_______________________________________________ No banners. No pop-ups. No kidding. Make My Way your home on the Web - http://www.myway.com
I guess I wasn't the only person with that idea then... -Mgm
On 6/24/05, michaelturley@myway.com michaelturley@myway.com wrote:
Thanks to all who sent me Gmail invites.
I'll set up an account there and see how much better it is for word wrap and threaded reading.
Thanks again.
Michael Turley User:Unfocused
No banners. No pop-ups. No kidding. Make My Way your home on the Web - http://www.myway.com
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
No, you weren't :-)
Dan
On 24/06/05, MacGyverMagic/Mgm macgyvermagic@gmail.com wrote:
I guess I wasn't the only person with that idea then... -Mgm
On 6/24/05, michaelturley@myway.com michaelturley@myway.com wrote:
Thanks to all who sent me Gmail invites.
I'll set up an account there and see how much better it is for word wrap and threaded reading.
Thanks again.
Michael Turley User:Unfocused
No banners. No pop-ups. No kidding. Make My Way your home on the Web - http://www.myway.com
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
On Fri, 24 Jun 2005 13:31:50 +0100 Dan Grey dangrey@gmail.com wrote:
No, you weren't :-)
Dan
On 24/06/05, MacGyverMagic/Mgm macgyvermagic@gmail.com wrote:
I guess I wasn't the only person with that idea then... -Mgm
On 6/24/05, michaelturley@myway.com
michaelturley@myway.com wrote:
Thanks to all who sent me Gmail invites.
I'll set up an account there and see how much better it is for word wrap and threaded reading.
Thanks again.
Michael Turley User:Unfocused where the hell is my Gmail invite? _______________________________________________ No banners. No pop-ups. No kidding. Make My Way your home on the Web -
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
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An admin called RickK has blocked 62.252.192.8 (for what seems to me to be a really poor reason: Autoblocked because your IP address has been recently used by "Abortion". The reason given for Abortion's block is: "troll, offensive user name".)
As can be readily seen from a reverse DNS query, this IP address is a transparent proxy server, use of which is forced upon NTL users (a large UK telco). manc-cache-5.server.ntli.net
a) Could somebody please remove the block, and b) Could we please discuss establishing a policy that requires checking DNS before setting a block, to ensure that this situation does not arise? It is not the first time, and it is irritating to say the least, especially as it only takes a few seconds to check.
Thanks.
[[User:Jakew]]
I couldn't find the IP block. Anyway, autoblocks are done automatically even though they are contributed to the user who blocked the the user that was originally attached (in this case Abortion.
I think he was quite right to block someone with the username Abortion. such a name is only going to cause problems.
As for forced proxies, I'll leave those to someone else to discuss.
--Mgm On 6/24/05, Jake Waskett jake@waskett.org wrote:
An admin called RickK has blocked 62.252.192.8 (for what seems to me to be a really poor reason: Autoblocked because your IP address has been recently used by "Abortion". The reason given for Abortion's block is: "troll, offensive user name".)
As can be readily seen from a reverse DNS query, this IP address is a transparent proxy server, use of which is forced upon NTL users (a large UK telco). manc-cache-5.server.ntli.net
a) Could somebody please remove the block, and b) Could we please discuss establishing a policy that requires checking DNS before setting a block, to ensure that this situation does not arise? It is not the first time, and it is irritating to say the least, especially as it only takes a few seconds to check.
Thanks.
[[User:Jakew]] _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
On 6/25/05, Jake Waskett jake@waskett.org wrote:
a) Could somebody please remove the block, and b) Could we please discuss establishing a policy that requires checking DNS before setting a block, to ensure that this situation does not arise? It is not the first time, and it is irritating to say the least, especially as it only takes a few seconds to check.
Thanks.
[[User:Jakew]]
As MacGyverMagic noted, the autoblocks are automatic - there was no opportunity for anyone to check whether anyone else was using the IP. I know it's a pain - I've got caught in at least two blocks because someone has been vandalising from somewhere else in my university, but it's easy enough to drop an admin a line and get the block undone if you're being innocently caught in it.
-- ambi
Jake Waskett (jake@waskett.org) [050625 00:46]:
An admin called RickK has blocked 62.252.192.8 (for what seems to me to be a really poor reason: Autoblocked because your IP address has been recently used by "Abortion". The reason given for Abortion's block is: "troll, offensive user name".) As can be readily seen from a reverse DNS query, this IP address is a transparent proxy server, use of which is forced upon NTL users (a large UK telco). manc-cache-5.server.ntli.net
Trouble is that admins can't actually see what IP a username is coming from. So there's no indication until someone calls it to their attention.
Nice to see RickK blocking again though ;-)
- d.
On Friday 24 June 2005 17:53, David Gerard wrote:
Jake Waskett (jake@waskett.org) [050625 00:46]:
An admin called RickK has blocked 62.252.192.8 (for what seems to me to be a really poor reason: Autoblocked because your IP address has been recently used by "Abortion". The reason given for Abortion's block is: "troll, offensive user name".) As can be readily seen from a reverse DNS query, this IP address is a transparent proxy server, use of which is forced upon NTL users (a large UK telco). manc-cache-5.server.ntli.net
Trouble is that admins can't actually see what IP a username is coming from. So there's no indication until someone calls it to their attention.
Hmm. There seems to be a clash between anonymity and usability here, as is so often the case with security systems.
Perhaps we could allow admins to see part of the reverse DNS, but not all of it. If we strip off the last two parts of the name (in this example, leaving just "manc-cache-5.server"), we'd get something that nine times out of ten would identify a proxy or not, but would not be personally identifiable.
Reasonable?
Hmm. There seems to be a clash between anonymity and usability here, as is so often the case with security systems.
Perhaps we could allow admins to see part of the reverse DNS, but not all of it. If we strip off the last two parts of the name (in this example, leaving just "manc-cache-5.server"), we'd get something that nine times out of ten would identify a proxy or not, but would not be personally identifiable.
Reasonable?
In most cases we find out pretty fast and there are/were a few editors who I know if I block I'm going to have to kill the IP block. personaly I can't see the point of the ipblock at all.
On 24/06/05, Jake Waskett jake@waskett.org wrote:
On Friday 24 June 2005 17:53, David Gerard wrote:
As can be readily seen from a reverse DNS query, this IP address is a transparent proxy server, use of which is forced upon NTL users (a large UK telco). manc-cache-5.server.ntli.net
Trouble is that admins can't actually see what IP a username is coming from. So there's no indication until someone calls it to their attention.
Hmm. There seems to be a clash between anonymity and usability here, as is so often the case with security systems.
Perhaps we could allow admins to see part of the reverse DNS, but not all of it. If we strip off the last two parts of the name (in this example, leaving just "manc-cache-5.server"), we'd get something that nine times out of ten would identify a proxy or not, but would not be personally identifiable.
Hmm. Set recent-changes to show only anons; 250 edits comes to about 175 unique IPs (busy people, these - one was there four or five times). Converting them to names, then stripping off the two trailing sections, we get this list - http://www.generalist.org.uk/wiki.txt (somewhere along the line it went to 126 addresses. Buggered if I know why.)
Of those, only 20 have proxy or cache in the name.
Thoughts on how useful this sort of data would be, given the reasonably sized sample above?
Thoughts on how useful this sort of data would be, given the reasonably sized sample above?
not very because the IP blocks don;'t kick in until someone edits from them so the person who does the intial block may never know.~~~~
On Saturday 25 June 2005 00:55, Andrew Gray wrote:
On 24/06/05, Jake Waskett jake@waskett.org wrote:
On Friday 24 June 2005 17:53, David Gerard wrote:
As can be readily seen from a reverse DNS query, this IP address is a transparent proxy server, use of which is forced upon NTL users (a large UK telco). manc-cache-5.server.ntli.net
Trouble is that admins can't actually see what IP a username is coming from. So there's no indication until someone calls it to their attention.
Hmm. There seems to be a clash between anonymity and usability here, as is so often the case with security systems.
Perhaps we could allow admins to see part of the reverse DNS, but not all of it. If we strip off the last two parts of the name (in this example, leaving just "manc-cache-5.server"), we'd get something that nine times out of ten would identify a proxy or not, but would not be personally identifiable.
Hmm. Set recent-changes to show only anons; 250 edits comes to about 175 unique IPs (busy people, these - one was there four or five times). Converting them to names, then stripping off the two trailing sections, we get this list - http://www.generalist.org.uk/wiki.txt (somewhere along the line it went to 126 addresses. Buggered if I know why.)
Of those, only 20 have proxy or cache in the name.
Thoughts on how useful this sort of data would be, given the reasonably sized sample above?
Ok, so of 126 addresses, we have about 20 proxies. So about 16% of anonymous Wikipedias users are recognised as being behind a proxy, using this scheme. I don't know the answer to this question, but does anybody know roughly what proportion of web users go through a proxy server? Is it close to 16%? If so, we've got a pretty good scheme here.
Of course, a determined user could create a sub-domain with 'proxy' or 'cache' in the title, which would fool a simple software implementation, but perhaps not a human.
In reply to geni's comment, we're talking about a minor change to the software anyway, so all that's needed is to present the admin with this information at the time that he or she chooses to block a user.
Ideally, the software could give the admin a "no IP block" option, to exercise at his or her discretion (the software may already do this; I don't know). That would enable pests to be banned without banning others behind the same proxy. If I were to implement that, I'd also set a "banned user" cookie that would catch a change of username.
Pros: * Avoid blocking legitimate users * Preserves anonymity, to a reasonable extent * (If "no IP block" option is implemented) Grants more flexibility to admins in their work.
Cons: * Will take a couple of days to implement * Not 100% foolproof (or smart-but-malicious-proof)
Comments, anyone?
Jake
On 25/06/05, Jake Waskett jake@waskett.org wrote:
Of those, only 20 have proxy or cache in the name.
Thoughts on how useful this sort of data would be, given the reasonably sized sample above?
Ok, so of 126 addresses, we have about 20 proxies. So about 16% of anonymous Wikipedias users are recognised as being behind a proxy, using this scheme. I don't know the answer to this question, but does anybody know roughly what proportion of web users go through a proxy server? Is it close to 16%? If so, we've got a pretty good scheme here.
I've spoken to a friend working at one of the larger ISPs; the answer is that it varies quite a bit. Only a minority of ISPs use them, but those tend to be large ISPs (the canonical example is all the AOL proxies you see around).
The upside is that most people are pragmatic, and call their proxy servers things like "proxy-43765". So it looks like this is a fairly effective way of identifying *most* proxies.
[He notes that there's also a "forwarded" header through most ISP caches, which contains the "original" originating IP; I don't know if this is accessible in this context or not, but it's useful to know it exists]
[I also did another test on a larger sample - this brought it down to ~10% having "proxy" or "cache" in them. I may do further as resources and tuits permit.]
Of course, a determined user could create a sub-domain with 'proxy' or 'cache' in the title, which would fool a simple software implementation, but perhaps not a human.
In reply to geni's comment, we're talking about a minor change to the software anyway, so all that's needed is to present the admin with this information at the time that he or she chooses to block a user.
Ideally, the software could give the admin a "no IP block" option, to exercise at his or her discretion (the software may already do this; I don't know).
I'm not an admin, so can't really comment how the process actually works. Can I just check I have the mechanism right here? User:XYZ goes and vandalises an article; an admin bans them; the system then automatically slaps a short ban on the associated IP address, to prevent them logging out and trying again?
It looks like in 80%+ of cases, telling people what the IP resolves to won't make any difference; it'll just be extra noise (with some occasional amusement, as when you notice a .gov domain). How does this sound -
a) Admin goes to block a user. System does a check on IP address, resolves it to 473a.residence.some.edu, doesn't flag it as a proxy, keeps quiet, IP blocked.
b) Admin goes to block a user. System does a check on IP address, resolves it to usercache.admin.some.edu, and flags it because it contains *cache*. Puts up a signal to the user - "The associated IP address identifies as USERCACHE.admin.some.edu, and blocking it may affect multiple people. Do you wish to block it anyway?". Admin makes the call.
This would leave us with the functionality we have now, but give an option for a simple override when it's likely the IP address isn't "personal". The fact that the display only comes up when it contains one of the keywords means that the privacy implications are low - and if you want it trimmed further, you can have it say that "...identifies as USERCACHE.admin.*.*" or the like. It also limits the amount of time wasted by admins, since it seems to be the case that without one of the keywords, in most cases, a cache/proxy server won't be apparent from the address alone.
Thoughts?
On Monday 27 June 2005 11:14, Andrew Gray wrote:
On 25/06/05, Jake Waskett jake@waskett.org wrote:
Of those, only 20 have proxy or cache in the name.
Thoughts on how useful this sort of data would be, given the reasonably sized sample above?
Ok, so of 126 addresses, we have about 20 proxies. So about 16% of anonymous Wikipedias users are recognised as being behind a proxy, using this scheme. I don't know the answer to this question, but does anybody know roughly what proportion of web users go through a proxy server? Is it close to 16%? If so, we've got a pretty good scheme here.
I've spoken to a friend working at one of the larger ISPs; the answer is that it varies quite a bit. Only a minority of ISPs use them, but those tend to be large ISPs (the canonical example is all the AOL proxies you see around).
The upside is that most people are pragmatic, and call their proxy servers things like "proxy-43765". So it looks like this is a fairly effective way of identifying *most* proxies.
[He notes that there's also a "forwarded" header through most ISP caches, which contains the "original" originating IP; I don't know if this is accessible in this context or not, but it's useful to know it exists]
[I also did another test on a larger sample - this brought it down to ~10% having "proxy" or "cache" in them. I may do further as resources and tuits permit.]
Seems a shame that Wikipedia (rightly) doesn't allow original research. This is very interesting reading. :-)
I seem to remember that Wikipedia had it's millionth edit (or something like that) not long ago. 10-20% might not seem much, but it helps put it in perspective.
Of course, a determined user could create a sub-domain with 'proxy' or 'cache' in the title, which would fool a simple software implementation, but perhaps not a human.
In reply to geni's comment, we're talking about a minor change to the software anyway, so all that's needed is to present the admin with this information at the time that he or she chooses to block a user.
Ideally, the software could give the admin a "no IP block" option, to exercise at his or her discretion (the software may already do this; I don't know).
I'm not an admin, so can't really comment how the process actually works. Can I just check I have the mechanism right here? User:XYZ goes and vandalises an article; an admin bans them; the system then automatically slaps a short ban on the associated IP address, to prevent them logging out and trying again?
I'm not an admin either, so at the risk of this becoming the "uninformed users speculate about admins thread", let me offer my 2c.
My *understanding* is that the IP blocks (aka autoblocks) are added by the system at a later time, for exactly the reason you suggest. However, their implementation is very odd indeed. Instead of expiring when the original block did, they add the duration of the block to the time that the IP concerned last accessed Wikipedia (as opposed to the last attempt to edit). As I once discovered when legitimately blocked for a 3RR violation, this has the consequence that merely refreshing the list of currently blocked users to check whether the block has expired will keep you blocked indefinitely.
This shouldn't be a a problem, however. The system must be storing the last IP used by a user, since this autoblock-on-access mechanism cannot operate without that data, so it can easily be checked at the time of an admin setting a block.
It looks like in 80%+ of cases, telling people what the IP resolves to won't make any difference; it'll just be extra noise (with some occasional amusement, as when you notice a .gov domain). How does this sound -
Logical.
a) Admin goes to block a user. System does a check on IP address, resolves it to 473a.residence.some.edu, doesn't flag it as a proxy, keeps quiet, IP blocked.
b) Admin goes to block a user. System does a check on IP address, resolves it to usercache.admin.some.edu, and flags it because it contains *cache*. Puts up a signal to the user - "The associated IP address identifies as USERCACHE.admin.some.edu, and blocking it may affect multiple people. Do you wish to block it anyway?". Admin makes the call.
Again, logical. We'd need to have a list of words to scan for, but this is easy enough and the load on the server minimal.
In this case, I think it would be useful for an admin to have the facility to set a user block but prevent autoblocks from being applied. This just means setting a flag in the block table. As I explained before, there are other ways of achieving proxy-friendly autoblock-equivalents, but that might be too complicated.
This would leave us with the functionality we have now, but give an option for a simple override when it's likely the IP address isn't "personal". The fact that the display only comes up when it contains one of the keywords means that the privacy implications are low - and if you want it trimmed further, you can have it say that "...identifies as USERCACHE.admin.*.*" or the like. It also limits the amount of time wasted by admins, since it seems to be the case that without one of the keywords, in most cases, a cache/proxy server won't be apparent from the address alone.
Thoughts?
Seems entirely logical to me. It would be nice to hear from somebody who *is* an admin, and can comment on that basis. How would such a facility affect you people?
Seems a shame that Wikipedia (rightly) doesn't allow original research. This is very interesting reading. :-)
I seem to remember that Wikipedia had it's millionth edit (or something like that) not long ago. 10-20% might not seem much, but it helps put it in perspective.
600,000 articles would be the latest milestone for the english wikipedia.
This shouldn't be a a problem, however. The system must be storing the last IP used by a user, since this autoblock-on-access mechanism cannot operate without that data, so it can easily be checked at the time of an admin setting a block.
It's storeing more than the last. It is not uncommon to see strings of auto blocks appearing
On 6/24/05, Jake Waskett jake@waskett.org wrote:
An admin called RickK has blocked 62.252.192.8 (for what seems to me to be a really poor reason: Autoblocked because your IP address has been recently used by "Abortion". The reason given for Abortion's block is: "troll, offensive user name".)
As can be readily seen from a reverse DNS query, this IP address is a transparent proxy server, use of which is forced upon NTL users (a large UK telco). manc-cache-5.server.ntli.net
a) Could somebody please remove the block, and
It should be clear now. Problem users fromNTL are anoying.
On Friday 24 June 2005 17:58, geni wrote:
On 6/24/05, Jake Waskett jake@waskett.org wrote:
An admin called RickK has blocked 62.252.192.8 (for what seems to me to be a really poor reason: Autoblocked because your IP address has been recently used by "Abortion". The reason given for Abortion's block is: "troll, offensive user name".)
As can be readily seen from a reverse DNS query, this IP address is a transparent proxy server, use of which is forced upon NTL users (a large UK telco). manc-cache-5.server.ntli.net
a) Could somebody please remove the block, and
It should be clear now. Problem users fromNTL are anoying.
Thank you.
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