Manual:Pywikibot/archivebot.py/setup
The archivebot.py is a script to archive discussion pages. This document explains how to set up discussion pages on-wiki for the automatic archiving done by this bot. For a documentation on how to operate the bot, please see Manual:Pywikibot/archivebot.py.
How to set up for a discussion page
This bot only processes pages that are explicitly marked by transcluding a marker template, and archives sections inactive for a specified duration.
A commonly used marker template is {{User:MiszaBot/config|...}}.
The template may have parameters described below.
(Most of them are optional.)
{{TEMPLATE_PAGE
|archive =
|algo =
|counter =
|maxarchivesize =
|minthreadsleft =
|minthreadstoarchive =
|archiveheader =
|key =
}}
For a section to be archived, it must be a level 2 section, marked with ==. It is possible to opt-out some sections: see the explanation below.
Template parameters
Meanings of the template's parameters are:
| Template parameter | Description |
|---|---|
archive |
name of the page to which archived threads will be put. Must be a subpage of the current page. Variables are supported. |
algo |
specifies the maximum age of a thread. Must be in the form old(delay) where delay specifies the age in hours or days like 24h (24 hours) or 5d (5 days). Default is old(24h).
|
counter |
The current value of a counter which could be assigned as variable. Will be actualized by bot. Initial value is 1.
|
maxarchivesize |
The maximum archive size before incrementing the counter. Value can be given with appending letter like K or M which indicates KByte or MByte. Default value is 1000M (1000 megabytes).
|
minthreadsleft |
Minimum number of threads that should be left on a page. Default value is 5.
|
minthreadstoarchive |
The minimum number of threads to archive at once. Default value is 2.
|
archiveheader |
Content that will be put on new archive pages as the header. This parameter supports the use of variables. Default value is {{talkarchive}}.
|
key |
A secret key that (if valid) allows archives to not be subpages of the page being archived. |
Variables for page name patterns
In the archive parameter in the template, following variables can be used.
| Variable | Expands to... |
|---|---|
%(counter)d |
the current value of the counter
|
%(year)d |
year of the thread being archived |
%(quarter)d |
quarter of the year (1-4) of the thread being archived |
%(month)d |
numeric month (1-12) of the thread being archived |
%(month)02d |
two-digit numeric month (01-12) |
%(monthname)s |
English name of the month |
%(monthnameshort)s |
first three letters of the name of month |
How to prevent archiving
To prevent a section (thread) from being archived for a finite time, you can edit the section and insert a signature with a future timestamp. The bot will not archive the thread until that time. Make sure that the signature is well-formatted; it must include a user name and a date exactly in the same format as a proper signature, otherwise it will not be recognized by the bot.
You can block a thread from being archived effectively indefinitely, using a very distant future timestamp, such as "08:11, 21 October 2044 (UTC)".
To not confuse readers, the dummy signature may be written as a comment only with the dummy user name "DoNotArchiveUntil". Other comments will be ignored by the bot.
You might want to have on your wiki a substitutable template for this particular purpose. See English Wikipedia's template for an example: w:Template:DNAU.
See also
- w:Help:Archiving a talk page#Automated_archival - most of what is written there is not specific to English Wikipedia.
- w:User:MiszaBot/config