Hi,
The latest technical newsletter is now available at < https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Tech/News/2019/18%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/2019/18 are available.
*Recent changes*
- The Wikipedia app https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Wikimedia_Apps for Android now invites users to add Wikidata descriptions to Wikidata objects that have Wikipedia articles but no Wikidata descriptions. It will only invite users who have added a number of Wikidata descriptions in the app without being reverted. This is to avoid spam and bad edits. [1] https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Apps/Team/Android/AppEditorTasks [2] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T205125
*Problems*
- Tech News was late last week because of a MassMessage https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Extension:MassMessage bug. Other newsletters had the same problem. [3] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T221570
*Changes later this week*
- You will see when you last refreshed the recent changes page. This is so you can see how recent the changes are. [4] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T200353 - When you write a comment in Structured Discussions https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Structured_Discussions but have not posted it yet your web browser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:Web_browser will save it in local storage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:Web_storage#Local_and_session_storage instead of session storage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/en:Web_storage#Local_and_session_storage. This means you do not lose them even if you close your web browser. Structured Discussions used to be called Flow. [5] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T93612 - You will be able to turn off milestone notifications https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Special:MyLanguage/Help:Notifications/Notifications_types#Milestone. Milestone notifications congratulate you when you have made certain numbers of edits. [6] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T169924 - [image: Recurrent item] The new version https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MediaWiki_1.33/wmf.3 of MediaWiki will be on test wikis and MediaWiki.org from 30 April. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis and some Wikipedias from 1 May. It will be on all wikis from 2 May (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 1 May at 15:00 (UTC) https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?iso=20190501T15. See how to join https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Technical_Advice_IRC_Meeting.
*Future changes*
- [image: Advanced item] The Wikidata wb_terms table will be dropped. This will affect some Wikidata tools. They need to be updated. The table has become too big which is causing problems. This will happen on 29 May. You can read more https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikidata/2019-April/012987.html. You can ask for help if you need it. - [image: Advanced item] Wikimedia wikis will soon use a token when you log out. This changes how the API works. Some tools might need to be updated. [7] https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T25227
*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/2019/18 • 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
wikitech-ambassadors@lists.wikimedia.org