I have a bot called Interwicket which keeps itself busy adding and updating the language links for the wiktionaries (namespace 0); it is much more efficient for that than the "standard" pedia bot. It uses the API, and the maxlag parameter, and is a good citizen, backing off sharply as maxlag exceeds 5 seconds, and effectively stopping when it stays above that, until it is again around 5.

Yesterday the reported server lag suddenly became 9000+ seconds, and then slowly ran down, at about 200 sec/min, until it was normal again. A little while ago it was suddenly 80K+, and is now 40K-something. Now I understand why it runs down as something catches up, and why that is faster than "real time".

What I don't get is how the server lag can be < 5 seconds on one request, and 9000 (or 80,000 :-)) on the next request a few seconds later? Could someone tell me what does this; what is happening?

Robert (presently 45971, bot waits patiently ;-)