Hi,

The latest technical newsletter is now available at < https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/2018/51%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 Johan or I 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/2018/51 are available.

*Tech News*

- Because of the holidays https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:Christmas_and_holiday_season the next issue of Tech News will be sent out on 7 January 2019.

*Recent changes*

- Some templates that show notices about the content of the page will now be shown on the mobile website. In many cases they were hidden before. [1] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Reading/Web/Projects/Mobile_Page_Issues [2] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T210553 - Admins can no longer unblock themselves, except for self-blocks. A blocked admin can block the user who blocked them but no one else. This is so no one can block all admins on a wiki without being stopped. [3] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T150826 - [image: Advanced item] The ParserMigration extension https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Extension:ParserMigration has been removed. It compared the result of two versions of the MediaWiki wikitext parsing pipeline. It was used when we moved to the Remex parsing library https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/RemexHtml instead of Tidy https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Parsing/Replacing_Tidy.

*Problems*

- <ref> tags can use parameters such as "name" or "group". For example <ref name="adams" group="books">. If a <ref> tag has more than two parameters all parameters are ignored. You don't get a warning that they don't work. This will soon be fixed. [4] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T211576

*Changes later this week*

- [image: Recurrent item] The new version https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.33/wmf.9 of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 18 December. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 19 December. It will be on all wikis from 20 December (calendar https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.33/Roadmap).

*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 19 December at 16:00 (UTC) https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?iso=20181219T16. See how to join https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Technical_Advice_IRC_Meeting.

*Future changes*

- The Wikimedia Foundation Android app team https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Wikimedia_Apps are working on making it easier to edit on mobile phones. You can read more https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Android_editing_features about these plans. If you have an Android phone and speak at least two languages you can help testing in English. Tell Dchen (WMF) https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Dchen_(WMF) you want to be part of the testing by writing on her talk page or email her. - [image: Advanced item] tiles.wmflabs.org and wma.wmflabs.org will stop working. They have no maintainers and run an old operating system. Tools which use it could stop working. This includes the mapnik gadget https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:Mapnik, hill shading, and hike and bike layers. New maintainers could help out and keep it going. [5] https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2018-December/091216.html

*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/2018/51 • 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.*