Hi,
The latest technical newsletter is now available at < https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/2018/18%3E. Below is the English version.
You can help write the next newsletter: whenever you see information about Wikimedia technology that you think should be distributed more broadly, you can add it to the next newsletter at < https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Tech/News/Next%3E.
More information on how to contribute is available at < https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Tech/News#contribute%3E. You can also contact me directly.
As always, feedback (on- or off-list) is appreciated and encouraged.
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Latest *tech news https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News* from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/2018/18 are available.
*Recent changes*
- The parameter for unpatrolled edits in recent changes filters changed name. You might need to update saved filters and links. [1] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T190408
*Problems*
- [image: Advanced item] We are migrating wikis from Tidy to Remex https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Parsing/Replacing_Tidy. Because of a bug the 250 wikis which do not yet use Remex were switched on 23 April. This is two months early. This meant that pages with broken wikitext showed wrongly to readers. The bug was undone the next day. You can help fix broken wikitext https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Parsing/Replacing_Tidy/FAQ#What_will_editors_need_to_do.3F to avoid this problem when your wiki switches. Tidy will be removed on all wikis before July 2018. You can follow the process on Phabricator https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T175706. [2] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T192855
*Changes later this week*
- You will be able use CodeMirror https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Extension:CodeMirror in the 2017 wikitext editor https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/2017_wikitext_editor on all wikis. CodeMirror helps with syntax highlighting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:Syntax_highlighting. It has previously been a beta feature https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Beta_Features and only available on wikis with scripts that are written from left to right. [3] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T191923 - When an administrator blocks someone they will have a calendar they can use to choose when the block ends. This is to make it easier to pick a specific date. [4] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T132220 - [image: Advanced item] You can soon turn on the Performance Inspector https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Help:Extension:PerformanceInspector in the Editing section in your preferences. It shows information about the performance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:Computer_performance of pages. This could be the size of modules in the page, how many CSS selectors are defined on the page and how many are used, or the size of the images on the page. This tool is intended to help editors fix pages that load slowly. [5] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T117411 - [image: Advanced item] There is a new abuse filter https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:AbuseFilter function called equals_to_any. You can use it to check if its first argument is equal ( ===) to any of the following ones. For example you can use it to check if the page's namespace is amongst a given set of values in a more compact way than you could earlier. You can read more on mediawiki.org https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:AbuseFilter/Rules_format#Functions . - [image: Recurrent item] The new version https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.32/wmf.2 of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 1 May. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 2 May. It will be on all wikis from 3 May ( calendar https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.32/Roadmap).
*Meetings*
- [image: Recurrent item] You can join the next meeting with the Editing team. During the meeting, you can tell developers which bugs you think are the most important. The meeting will be on 1 May at 18:30 (UTC) https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?iso=20180501T1830. See how to join https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Editing_team/Weekly_triage_meetings. - [image: Recurrent item] [image: Advanced item] You can join the technical advice meeting on IRC. During the meeting, volunteer developers can ask for advice. The meeting will be on 2 May at 15:00 (UTC) https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?iso=20180502T15. See how to join https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Technical_Advice_IRC_Meeting.
*Future changes*
- The Wikimedia Cloud Services team https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Wikimedia_Cloud_Services_team is working on a new project called Toolhub https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Toolhub. The goal is to make it easier for Wikimedians to discover software tools they can use. You can leave feedback on the talk page https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Toolhub or email jhare[image: @]wikimedia.org to leave private feedback. - [image: Advanced item] All wikis with fewer than 100 high-priority linter errors in all namespaces will switch to use the Remex parsing library https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/RemexHtml. This is to replace Tidy https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Parsing/Replacing_Tidy. It will happen on 2 May. Other wikis will be recommended to switch soon when they have fixed the errors that must be fixed. Wikibooks wikis with fewer than 100 high-priority linter errors in the main namespace will switch on 9 May. Tidy will be removed on all wikis before July 2018. [6] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T192821[7] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T192299[8] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Parsing/Replacing_Tidy/FAQ#What_will_editors_need_to_do.3F
*Tech news https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News prepared by Tech News writers https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/Writers and posted by bot https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/User:MediaWiki_message_delivery • Contribute https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News#contribute • Translate https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/2018/18 • Get help https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Tech • Give feedback https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Tech/News • Subscribe or unsubscribe https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Global_message_delivery/Targets/Tech_ambassadors.*
//Johan Jönsson --