2009/3/25 Brion Vibber brion@wikimedia.org:
David Gerard wrote:
The "usermerge" procedure is presently irreversible. Are there plans for a way to make it reversible in case of error? I'm assuming error (and a great deal of tedious mucking about to go back) is inevitable, since the action is taken by humans.
I assume this is about the UserMerge extension? (Note we're not currently using this at Wikimedia.)
Oh, good!
I say "oh, good!" because such a merge without unmerge has just too much potential for messes, and it was being discussed on functionaries-en-l (the latest incarnation of the Cabal), and I thought from the discussion it was switched on.
It would probably be tricky to implement, but not impossible. Basically would need to record which revisions, log entries, etc got reassigned (potentially many tens of thousands in a single merge event) and their original assignment.
Yeah. Before such a thing is switched on for WMF wikis, we'd need a way to avert the obvious hilarity ensuing from an error. Perhaps not keeping the records forever, but certainly enough for a week or a month's leeway to revert pressing the wrong button.
- d.