Hi,

MassMessage isn't working properly (see https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T195500 or https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T195782) so Tech News hasn't been delivered to the wikis, but I'll post it here anyway. Feel free to spread the news, and I'll make sure to get it out as soon as MassMessage works again,

You can read it at < https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/2018/22%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/2018/22 are available.

*Recent changes*

- You can now use global preferences https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Help:Extension:GlobalPreferences on most wikis. This means you can set preferences for all wikis at the same time. Before this you had to change them on each individual wiki. Global preferences will come to the Wikipedias later this week. [1] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T16950[2] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T189806#4221561 - It is now easier for blocked mobile users to see why they were blocked. [3] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T165535 - Wikidata now supports lexicographical data https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Wikidata:Lexicographical_data. This helps describe words. - There is now a checkbox on Special:ListUsers https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:ListUsers to let you see only users in temporary user groups. [4] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T174313 - Some rare invisible Unicode characters have recently been banned from page titles. This includes soft hyphens (U+00AD) and left-to-right (U+2066) and right-to-left (U+2067) isolate markers. Existing pages with these characters will soon be moved by a script. [5] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T121979 - [image: Advanced item] There's a new Wikimedia Foundation team to support the Wikimedia technical communities. It's called the Technical Engagement team. Most of the team members did similar work in other teams before this. [6] https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2018-May/090016.html

*Problems*

- Some translatable pages are showing old translations instead of latest ones. The cause of this issue has been fixed. We will update all pages automatically to show the latest translations. [7] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T195347

*Changes later this week*

- There will be a new special page named PasswordPolicies https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:PasswordPolicies. This page gives information about the password rules https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Manual:$wgPasswordPolicy for each user group on that wiki. [8] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T174812 - A new way to see moved paragraphs in diffs is coming to most wikis. This is to make it easier to find the moved paragraphs and the changes in them. [9] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T195375 - [image: Recurrent item] The new version https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.32/wmf.6 of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 29 May. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 30 May. It will be on all wikis from 31 May ( calendar https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.32/Roadmap). - [image: Advanced item] Wikis can enable Citoid https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Citoid/Enabling_Citoid_on_your_wiki to provide automatic reference look-up in the visual editor and the 2017 wikitext editor. This is complex. The tool will now disable itself if the configuration isn't correct. It has warned about this in the JavaScript console since February. Check that your wiki is configured correctly. You can ask for help https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Citoid/Enabling_Citoid_on_your_wiki if you need it. [10] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T186276

*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 29 May at 18:30 (UTC) https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?iso=20180529T1830. 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 30 May at 15:00 (UTC) https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?iso=20180530T15. See how to join https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Technical_Advice_IRC_Meeting.

*Future changes*

- Content Translation https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Content_translation drafts which have not been updated in over a year will be removed. This allows other users to translate those articles. [11] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T189088 - A survey is collecting information on what users think about how Wikimedia wiki pages are loaded. This information could be used in future development. [12] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T187299 - [image: Advanced item] Some wikis 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 30 May and 13 June. Wikis with fewer than 100 linter issues in the main namespace in all high-priority linter categories will switch. This includes Wikidata. Tidy will probably be removed on all wikis in the first week of July. [13] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Parsing/Replacing_Tidy/FAQ#What_will_editors_need_to_do.3F [14] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T195263

*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/2018/22 • 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 --