Template talk:Bots

Syntax

It could have parameters except= or theseones=

e.g.

{nobots|except=werdnabot, RamBot}

or

{nobots|theseones=hangermanBot, smackBot}

Rich Farmbrough, 20:58 12 December 2006 (GMT).

Better idea from Hagerman on template page. Rich Farmbrough, 00:03 18 December 2006 (GMT).

Spec or test suite

I think it would be useful for either a spec (e.g. a syntax which is simpler than the full wikicode 'syntax') and/or a test suite to be created, somewhere, that includes usages that are supported, and where possible it should be simple for a bot to use the spec or test suite to verify conformance. We could then test each bot client and mark which tests they do not yet support.

For example, one rule I would like to suggest is the template must not be appear within parserfunctions or other templates, or some other similar restriction that ensures it can provably not be affected by phabricator:T101596. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 05:34, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

If database tables are out of date (for example, because the page uses {{#ifeq:{{CURRENTYEAR}}|2015|{{nobots}}}} and it becomes a new year), then bots would be required to purge all pages with the forcelinkupdate parameter before checking if they are allowed to edit, wouldn't they? How would this affect performance? --Stefan2 (talk) 12:52, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

Yes, that is an example of the the problems I am trying to avoid by having a specification. We can obtain a greater percentage of tools supporting most of the syntax if it is sane. If someone wants to set a date range, a more suitable approach would be to add a date= parameter with the date in a commonly accepted machine readable format, and wikitext around the template isnt the right choice for widespread adoption. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 08:17, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

[true, '{{nobots}} bla'],
[true, '{{bots|deny=Bob,CodexBot}} bla', 'CodexBot'],
[false, '<!-- {{bots|deny=Bob,CodexBot}} --> bla', 'CodexBot'],
[false, '{{bots|deny=Bob,FuBot}} bla', 'CodexBot'],

Mine. Irønie (talk) 14:43, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Placement on a page

Where is this tag placed on a page? At the very beginning, or somewhere else? Also, perhaps a stupid question, does the tag need to be placed explicitly on the page that one wants to deny a bot from, or can it being placed on a talk page also affect the bot's parsing of the associated article, or does it have to be placed on each page one wants to deny the bot from parsing? Its position is not explicitly mentioned in WP:SECTIONORDER. - Cameron Dewe (talk) 21:43, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

The placement of the template shouldn't matter as bots will, in general, scan all templates on the page for {{bots}} or {{nobots}}. Bots will likely not go out of their way to check the associated talk page of an main page and vice versa - only the page they are editing there and then will be checked. Aidan9382 _(talk) 09:14, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Is deny needed, if transclusion is embedded in a tl-series template?

I wasn't sure if the addition of deny=AnomieBOT in this edit at Template:Nth century/doc was necessary. I wanted to make sure the bot didn't subst my examples that run in the {{Tlg}} template and show the result; subst'ing them would defeat the purpose. But was it necessary, or does the {{tlg}} effectively protect it against transclusion to subst, because the template is now only a param passed to {{tlg}}, and not a transclusion of the subst-only template? Mathglot (talk) 22:02, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

This question would be better asked on the bot's talk page. But, to safe you the trip, it's not necessary (and should be reverted) for the reason you give. Anomie⚔ 22:48, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

Thanks! Mathglot (talk) 22:50, 25 August 2023 (UTC)