The following discussion is an archived debate. Please do not modify it. To request review of this BRFA, please start a new section at WT:BRFA. The result of the discussion was  Approved.

Operator: Naypta (talk · contribs · SUL · edit count · logs · page moves · block log · rights log · ANI search)

Time filed: 08:31, Wednesday, May 20, 2020 (UTC)

Automatic, Supervised, or Manual: automatic

Programming language(s): Golang

Source code available: https://github.com/mashedkeyboard/yapperbot-uncurrenter

Function overview: Removing ((current)) templates from articles that no longer require the template (no changes in an extended amount of time)

Links to relevant discussions (where appropriate): Wikipedia:Bot requests#Revival of User:TedderBot/CurrentPruneBot

Edit period(s): Hourly

Estimated number of pages affected: Very few per hour, but over time potentially unlimited

Exclusion compliant (Yes/No): Yes

Already has a bot flag (Yes/No): No

Function details: Scans articles that transclude ((current)), and examines the timestamp of the last revision.

If the article has not had any new revisions in over five hours, and the article allows the bot to edit it (i.e. no ((nobots)), no ((bot|deny=Yapperbot)), or a bot allow list that contains the bot name) then the ((current)) template will be removed. If it was on its own line, the entire line is removed; otherwise, only the tag is.

This task was previously performed by User:TedderBot/CurrentPruneBot, which did it if the last revision was over two hours ago. To stay on the safe side, at least at the start, I've set the threshold much higher at five hours, as I don't want the bot to step on editors' toes, but if needed, it can be adjusted down again in future.

Discussion[edit]

• Five hours seems like a very short timeframe - if something happens in a specific locality (for example, I note ((current)) is being used on a few articles related to a dam breaking in Michigan) the entire night could pass without an update if everyone is asleep. Wouldn't the editors then need to re-add the ((current)) template the next day? Seems like something more like 12 hours would be more appropriate. Primefac (talk) 17:54, 22 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  That's fair. I make no bones about the specific timeframe, it's easy to change - pinging in Thryduulf and Sdkb for any thoughts they might have on where they feel the bar should be, seeing as they were both involved in the discussion on BR. Naypta ☺ | ✉ talk page | 18:02, 22 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• As an unrelated note to the above, this template is currently being used on 8 pages, all of which appear to still be valid. Is removing the ((current)) template really such of a problem? Primefac (talk) 17:55, 22 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  I think the point is that ((current)) is designed to be a short-lived, temporary template, not just used because something is in the news but because lots of editors are simultaneously editing the page. That's a very easy thing for people to forget to do, by the very nature of its definition - if few people are editing the page, without people manually going through the category, there's little opportunity for people to check if it needs to be removed, if that makes sense If we're going to have people manually going through that category and "de-currenting" pages anyway, it seems to make sense to save them the bother and let a bot do it, given that it's a trivial task to instruct a bot how to do. Naypta ☺ | ✉ talk page | 18:02, 22 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  Primefac, your questions touch on the larger issue of what the purpose of ((Current)) is. That's very much an unresolved question (see e.g. here), but lacking a consensus elsewhere, I think we should go by the documentation, which is pretty clear that it's meant only for short-term use on articles receiving a high edit count. It wasn't meant for use on every article about a recent news item, and it's only drifted toward that usage likely because the old prunebot stopped working. Five hours is more than double the original span, so I'd say it's a plenty conservative place to start. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 18:14, 22 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  I tend to agree that 5 hours is more than long enough to wait. If a page hasn't been edited for 5 hours then things really aren't being updated rapidly and the article is stable enough that the prose can (and should) reflect what (if any) uncertainty there is in the real world. If things hot up again later then there is nothing stopping anybody readding the template.
  If there is a desire for a banner template to highlight articles about current events that are not being frequently edited, then it should be easy to get a consensus to that effect. Thryduulf (talk) 18:40, 22 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  Fair enough.

  Approved for trial (25 edits or 14 days). Please provide a link to the relevant contributions and/or diffs when the trial is complete. Whichever comes first. Primefac (talk) 16:13, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• One thing to note is that there are many spinoff templates of ((Current)). My personal view is that many of these should be wrapperified/merged, so it may not be worth setting up the bot to work on them. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 19:28, 22 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  Given how few watchers there are, I would suggest a TFD for suggesting a merge. Primefac (talk) 16:13, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  @Primefac: I certainly want to wrapperify/merge them at some point, but I expect there will be some opposition, so I'm not ready to embark on that quite yet. Since you're active at TFD, one question I have, is would you suggest nominating them all together or individually? For here, I just want to put it out there that the idea of this bot ought to be to eventually apply to the full family of current templates. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 18:35, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

  All at once; I find it very hard to imagine that one would be approved but the others wouldn't. Primefac (talk) 02:03, 25 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Agree 5 hours can be a problem when overnight editing slows down. Suggest first 24hrs is a grace period, after that it is on the clock so to speak. Could even have a sliding scale, third 24hr window is 3 hours etc.. it gets easier to remove the more days goes by. -- GreenC 18:41, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

If editing has slowed down, whether that is "overnight" in some relevant part of the world or not, then the template isn't needed. If it picks up again then the template can be re-added. Thryduulf (talk) 21:05, 24 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• Trial note - a) for transparency purposes, and b) because I know I'll forget otherwise, I've just squashed a bug where the bot would, on pages that had ((current)) but also another template with a name that started with the word "current", remove both templates. An example of this happening is here - but the bug is now fixed. Naypta ☺ | ✉ talk page | 18:33, 27 May 2020 (UTC)[reply]
• Trial complete. With the exception of the above noted problem, there don't seem to have been any other issues - it's worked exactly as expected, doing exactly what it's supposed to. Naypta ☺ | ✉ talk page | 12:09, 7 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

 Approved. Primefac (talk) 23:29, 15 June 2020 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. To request review of this BRFA, please start a new section at WT:BRFA.