Have you seen the changes being made by Bot ForoTree?

Question

Many old gedcoms used span ID for sources.  Many of us have spent hours removing them and replacing them with embedded sources.

Now we have a Bot that seems to think, or more properly a programmer that seems to think, that the old style is right.

So we have a Bot that  is using this format <span id="census1871"></span>  - If a Bot is going to be used, and I have no problem with that, at least it could use the more approved formats as shown in the help sections of Wikitree.  

Why automate a process to go backwards in style?

I want a Bot to make improvements - not move us backwards.

Comments

Jonathan, I don't care about the proposal to use the method I came up with to help another member, in fact I don't use it much myself, and I am sorry that you feel that I am attacking you but the use of <span> tags has been discussed in depth on G2G and the general consensus is that they should be discouraged due to the fact that most on here do not understand them.  By making the changes, either by bot or on your own, to the source documentation that coulb confusing you have to be aware that anyone who has signed the honor code can make changes to any open profile and if the way of doing it is confusing then they probably will change it. I am sorry if you feel threatened by my comments but you should understand that most folks on here do not understand a lot of the things that you do and will "attack" you.  The <span> tags are allowed, but by using them others can and will remove them due to a lack of understanding them.  I hope that you do continue on WikiTree for a long time but don't confuse my short and blunt answers with me attacking anyone because I do that to minize mistakes due to my limited use of my fingers sometimes and also my limited use of the internet for about half of the year.

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Hi Jonathan, 

I guess the main ''problem'' people have with the Bot (that is if I understand it correctly) is that it automatically can change/or add things on/to many profiles at once ?

So my guess is many people are just afraid all profiles will in time automatically and without asking, have things changed they prefer to stay the way they are and that often took them many hours of work to have them the way they are ....

So maybe if you have ideas for things the Bot can do , just before letting the Bot run and automatically making all kind of changes or add things  to many profiles at once , you before that could ask in a G2G if people would be happy if these things were done. Gues it's more about this , people now are reacting like this:

http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Communication_Before_Editing

So I'm sure the Bot can be a great help/ asset and could be used for many different now often time consuming tasks if I understand it correct , and really do appreciate the Bot is here and supposed/trying to make our lives much easier and feel sorry for you you now get the idea/feeling people don't appreciate your work.

But hope you understand it's not people attacking you personally , guess people just don't like the idea/ are afraid the Bot is capable of changing things to many profiles at once and this without being informed or consulted ...

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Jonathan,

At your request for links to methods of formats.

I agree with you the help pages are not the best way to find the how to format a profile.  The best method seems to reveiw those that are examples - Category: Examples has a fairly good set.  I double checked a couple and they seem to follow the best Wikitree Practice.

Much of WikiTree is about best practice, not about rules.  As such - yes you can do souces and footnotes any way you wish - however if you wish to follow best practice your profiles should follow the examples shown above.

There has been extensive discussion on footnotes and souces in G2G and continues to be but the examples above seem to have it right.  There seems to be a genearal consensus that the best Wikitree Practice is the embedded source and the use of repeated footnotes using the <ref name="SourceOne"> Detail Source</ref>

The use of the span function is generally a hold over for those proifles that have not been edited or cleaned up after inport from a gedcom.

Note added later -

On every profile when in edit mode are links to Sources and Footnotes. 

On the footnotes page is this line.

Footnotes improve upon basic source citations.  It follows with instructions for footnotes. It should be clear that this is the best practice and is clear from the Help section of Wikitree.

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Hi Philip,

There have been several recent G2G discussions about using/not using <span> with sources:

Editing profiles that use Inline References for sources.

A technical discussion about WikiTree syntax and footnotes.

Is there a new style source citations which is not mentioned in the Style Guide?

Using free space pages for sources, with HTML tags not recommended?

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Style questions are tough. Very few members understand all the style rules.

 

The help pages and instructions certainly could be clearer. It's tough to keep them updated and clear because the rules evolve as WikiTree grows and as we learn best practices.

 

We do recommend ref tags instead of span or div for sources. But, we may actually still be using span in GEDCOM imports. My bad if so.

 

As probably mentioned in some of those G2G conversations Maryann references, the explanation for avoiding various HTML tags is here: http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/HTML_and_Inline_CSS

 

The only "officially" recommended tags are listed here: http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Recommended_Tags

 

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We really should keep thanking Jonathan for the work he is doing with bots and keep encouraging him. These bots are already doing good things, and they can do a lot more.

 

Very few people can do the work Jonathan is doing. He's a really talented programmer. More importantly, he's really generous and has been very responsive and helpful. Thank you, Jon.

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I totally agree with you Chris well said!!

Might I add Jon is doing this for "free", is a fairly new member, and has a full time job.

I have been helping Jon test these bots and he's doing a great job. He might of thought he was under attack due to the amount of negative posts to his profile and via private messaging. It would be better to ask questions about the Bots instead of is this a joke or other comments. Jon has think skin. I thought he might have ran for the hills after some of the complaints. But he did thank god. He was just busy with work. We don't want to loose him.

On another note, only members who have signed up for the forotree (via his website) can use the Bots. In order for the Bot to make a change to a profile Forotree has to be added to the trused list first. Bots cannot make changes unless this is done.

Just today Jon added another Bot for me to test that I've been bugging him about for week. Finally he has it ready. If it does as I requested it could be "extremely helpful"  to many projects and eliminate some of the manual input of information. For new projects with few members this could be a blessing!!

Jon is not putting these Bots out without Chris being well aware of what Jon is doing as he stated above. Chris would not allow Bots to run without prior discussion.

Sometimes you have to give a person a chance. This technology can truly benefit WikiTree. Let them work through any bugs, and improve on that initial idea. It's how technology improves. No company ever just puts out software without a bug or 2 and the same goes for anyone else. When a small bug was reported Jon immediately fixed it. If he's not available to fix something that's going haywire  Chris, sys/op or Leader can block the account until a fix is in place.

So, let's all thank Jon and give him a chance because he has the best intentions, is a super taleneted programmer and we want to keep his talents here. Wikitree only has a small # of paid programmers (like Brian). Jon and a couple others offering their services is aboslutely fantastic.

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Thanks, Michelle! I agree-Jon has been very generous with his programming. Like all things on WikiTree, we need to have patience with changes and be understanding. If something is awry, communication is key to fixing it, and kind communication as best we can manage.

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"Jon has think skin"

I certainly hope so!   {I like this typo Michelle, I may 'borrow' it on a kinda long term basis}

 

Jon's bots are potentially a geeks dream, I can foresee sending teams of them out to correct syntax issues throughout the WikiTree. That is maybe a point to stress, they will be working on syntax, not facts.

Is Jon capable of using his think skin to design a bot able to find and flag dead external links . . . maybe moving them out of biography and source sections and into a "Dead Links" section of the profiles? {I know, how would it be able to identify 'dead', right? Think skin, think! lol} And maybe something to find and flag links that lead to sites requiring paid subscritions?

It'd be good to have a guide of sorts detailing what these Bots can and cannot do, and guidelines defining what they should not do even if capable. While I appreciate the capability of reducing time and effort on tedious tasks, I also understand the risk of sending them out into the hands of the unskilled.

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Thanks for all the kind comments. Think skin... hehe!

I completely agree with the idea of getting some proper guidelines as to what bots can and can't do, like Wikipedia does.

A lot of things can actually be done without having to make any edits to profiles at all. For example, identifying profiles with dead links could be done as a tool. In other words, you click a link on ForoTree.com, and it shows you all the profiles you manage that have dead links in.

However, adding a dead links category to these profiles could also be useful, but I would first want to see this agreed as a general WikiTree policy (i.e., I would want to see agreement that a "Dead Links" category be created, into which profiles with dead links could be added).

The exciting thing about finding profiles with dead links is that it may be possible for the bot to identify what the correct link should be in a small number of cases. Again, this would probably work best as a tool, as editing profiles and changing links risks losing valuable sources.

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Ok guys very funny haha!! I hate that darn auto correct on my phone.

Answer 1

OK - I'm ready to jump in here and make myself into a target, if it so turns out.

I *am* a geek and I *do* understand a good deal of the technical issues involved here and I also understand the issues related to our standards, policies, best practices, etc. regarding coding style for sources.  This will be long, so buckle in, get a cup of coffee ( or something stronger if you think you'll need it for this) before you settle in for the rest!

First - what Jonathan is doing with bots has awesome potential for a wide variety of use that would automate many kinds of editing tasks.  Some example are:

• When category names need to be changed and the change needs to be propagated across all profiles that have the old category tag on them.  Jonathan could create a bot to do this automatically and wouldn't that be great?
   
• If a profile is deleted (which happens to private profiles managed by a person who leaves WikiTree or is declared unresponsive) then other profiles that have a link to the deleted one need to have the link removed or else it remains in the biography as a red (indicating broken) link.  A bot could be made to do this task automatically.
   
• A bot could be designed to search profiles for those that do not have any <ref> tag in them.  When it finds one, it could then look to see if the "Unsourced" template is on the profile and, if it is not, then the bot could add it to the profile.
   
• A bot could search for profiles with "Unknown" as LNAB and check to see if the "Unknown Names" or "Recycle Unknowns" category is on them and, if not, it could add the "Unknown Names" category tag to the profile.

In general, almost any kind of mind numbing, time consuming, repetitive task that needs to be done in the name of aiding cleanup up profiles is a candidate for one of Jonathan's bots.  I am thrilled that he has freely offered his time and high level skills to do the development effort on bots to help with all the very heavy time consuming tasks that need doing ... or that would achieve improvements to the quality of WikiTree profiles and would like to express my admiration and gratitude for all that he has done and is STILL offering to do for us, despite a less than gracious receiption on the part of some members.

Second - I believe the reference Jon requested to a place where the currently "approved", "recommended", "best practice", (or whatever you want to call it - I'm an engineer, not a semantics expert) is the Sources Style Guide - this help page documents the "official" way that source citations are to appear and also includes instructions on how to code them to make it happen.  I am sure that all WikiTree members are very much aware that profiles here have a VERY wide variety of ways in which source citations are displayed in profiles, plus the vast majority of profiles have no sources identified.  There is certainly no lack of G2G topics related to sources - good ones, bad ones, even invalid ones, how they are displayed, as well as how to code them correctly for disiplay.  As near as I can tell, the lack of uniformity of style of source citations across all the profiles is the result of two main impediments: 

1. There have been many changes over the years in the "official", "recommended", whatever style of entering source citations.
    
2. There are many members who do not understand the instructions that are provided on how to enter source citations.  I see a big communication disconnect here, with the documentation provided not representing adequate explanation for the non-tekkies to truly understand the system.  I believe that an explanation - without any technobabble - of what tags are and how they work, specific to the <ref>, </ref> and <references /> tags is desperately needed and should be included with the instructions for how to do it.  I have personally explained this to several people who asked how to fix the tags they had entered that did not work and ALWAYS saw the big light bulb flash for them.  Understanding HOW the tags work is the key to being able to use them correctly, in my opinion!

Bottom line - The current style of source citations being performed by the bot that Jonathan created for this purpose is not a good thing to do.  I don't want to go into the variety of reasons why I happen to think the currently "approved" style is the best, with a tweak that is STILL within the same style (the tweak, by the way, was the absolutely brilliant brainchild of Dale Byers) and addresses the concerns of some members with "bloat" resulting from the "approved" style.  I don't know whether it will be a feasible application for a bot to bring source citations in line with the "approved" style, with or without the extra tweak - that would take some analysis to determine.

I really think that Jonathan's efforts are deserving of a much warmer welcome than they have received, to date - in fact, I'd go beyond that and say they are deserving of celebration of all that he is willing and able to do for WikiTree.  I also think that some group - probably a subset of leaders who are tech-savvy - should be identified to work with Jonathan in formulating a list of taskd that would be suitable for bots.  If non-leaders are invited to join such a group, you can put me at the head of the line to volunteer!

Comments

Gaile there was nothing brilliant about my approach to the problem that another had with sources.  I have been blessed with the ability to "think like a CPU" as one of my college professors put it and also the ability to visualize the image of the result proir to it's completion and for that reason I never used flow charts or coding forms when I was activly writing programs.  I am lucky to still have that ability even when the nerve damage is making typing dificult.  I only did that to provide help for a member who had problems with editing the biography's when the sources are entered as footnotes and have them still comply with what I understood the style guide for sources said.  I never was a professional programmer, unless you want to count about 30 years of editing the work of others to make sure the end result was what was originally planned, because it was just too boring for my taste.

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Dale, With all due respect .... STUFF IT!!!!!

YOU conjured up the concept that is simple, elegant, and a brilliant solution to the problem we were trying to address.

Please just accept that you have done something great and wonderful and deserve credit for having done so ... and if we can move on from there, how about applying your awesome cognitive capabilities to positively oriented cogitation on the potential ways that Jonathan's bots can be applied to good purposes here.

Could you do that, pretty please????

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Not too likley for a long time,:)  I only made the club 100 badge last month and I am now looking at the probability of moving in the next month so my WikiTree time is going to bee very limited for the forseable future.

Answer 2

The real problem is the profile used as an example is managed by the person who created Bot ForoTree and he is a very new member here who has not taken the time to find out what WikiTree is about and how things are done here.

Comments

I'm sure this is an honest mistake, but that answer sounds a lot like a personal attack against me.

Point III of the Honor Code states:

"We know mistakes are inevitable. We don't want to be afraid to make them. We assume that mistakes are unintentional when others make them and ask for the same understanding."

Your assumption that another member has not taken time to find out about WikiTree is not the sort of courtesy I would expect from a signatory of the Honor Code.

http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Special:Honor_Code

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No attack was intended in fact I pointed out that you could be not aware of what is going on due to the fact that you are new here.  I even removed the best answer star as soon as I found out that it had ben selected because it is not the best answer.  It is unfortunate that others have not been willing to answer this question, which was posted by another member and not myself,

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"Your assumption that another member has not taken time to find out about WikiTree is not the sort of courtesy I would expect from a signatory of the Honor Code."

I would just point out that neither is the assumption that criticism of something you've done is automatically a personal attack.

Perhaps the current parties should step away for a while, and see if someone else responds?  It is Sunday morning (at least, in the U.S.), and some regulars may not be at their computers yet.

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I agree Nan and as I have already mentioned I have no personal interest in the question. I do hope that no other member selects my answer as best because I do believe that another could provide a better answer.

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Smile. :-)

Misunderstandings are so common online, where we can't see each other's smiling faces.

I try to put a smiley face in any message that might be misinterpreted. It's silly, but it usually works.

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He has taken the time to find out how things work here on WikiTree. When in doubt I get questions from him. Which is what I would expect of any new member.

At one point or another we have all been where Jon is and we really should try and think about our experience as a newby. Jon may not know all the ends and outs but he does know the techy side. There are many techy people here that aren't all that familiar with merges, styles rules, which NNS name is correct, do we use De Witt or dewitt and so on... We've all been there. We all have our specialties here on Wikitree. That's why it works. For example I'm good at finding all the profiles from  destructive merges and putting them back together, Jillaine is good at the Styleguide  and sources, Maggie Hungarian profiles, Lianne Canadian profiles, Abby Projects and many many others on WIkiTree.

So, just give the man a chance to do his thing because he's awesome at it.

Answer 3

Maybe we should have a WT help page (if  we don't have one already I'm unable to find ?)  to learn more and that explains all about the Bot , it's something 'new'  for most of us and a Bot that's capable of making a lot of changes at once to many profiles of course sounds pretty scary for people (WT genealogists) that  maybe have not a lot of knowledge (or ...no knowledge at all about Bots).

If you don't know a thing about Bots, you just think what if ..... things go terribly wrong to hundreds or more profiles at once, can things be corrected just as quick as they went wrong to all these profiles (so at once) or does this mean we have to spend many hours (again) changing things back the way they were .... and is this still possible or are these mistakes irreversible and can we start all over again...

So I personally think it's not just about using the ''ref '' or ''span'' , guess it's more the new and unknown (possibly ''scary'' ) things  the Bot is capable of , that's causing this 'confusion' and of course some information by G2G  would help as well ....tagging projects and everything else that needs to be tagged so most WT will notice it , this could prevent people getting upset by unexpected changes .

And Jonathan, I was the one who chose Dale's answer as best , because (there was no other answer) and I honestly think if the G2G was used more/earlier to let people know about some of the Bot things that were happening, people would have not been this surprised/ upset as some people were now ...but than maybe I / we just missed some important G2G's about the subject , so I truly apologize if that's the case . 

And of course Chris is right, so here's a big thank you Jonathan  and as I said before, really we do appreciate the good work you do , your generousity and of course that you are trying so hard (or possibly already are doing this ) to make our lifes here at WT more easy, so no need to take it personal because it really isn't meant that way ...

 

 

 

Comments

Thanks Bea!

There is a forum at forotree.com where you can post questions, read aout the bots.

There are some other questions about the Bot in the last month or so.

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Ok thank you Michelle am for sure going to check it out and learn someting about the Bot, guess it's just like with online banking , when that was introduced it took quite a while before people trusted using that ...

In Holland we have a saying : ''wat een boer niet kent dat eet hij niet'', meaning:'' what a farmer doesn't know he doesn't eat '' 

The real meaning :'' what people don't know / are not familiar with , they don't like / accept (that easy) ''.

So in time and if people get to know more about and get more familiar with the Bot and if they notice it really can do great things and make our lifes much easier, guess they, just like with online banking will start to try it  and maybe even get to love the helpfull Bot and it's creator of course  

And just scrolled down and discovered the G2G's  about the bot 

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Yes, let's get a page to explain the process and creation of a BOT!  Please!  Here's the best though, to quote Chris literally: 

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A Bot help page is currently under construction.

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Ok that's great and  I understand you're already trying things out Michelle, is it easy to work with and does it make our (WT) lives more easy ?  Would like to try as well, but hesitating because of the many profiles I manage.

Can you also instruct the Bot to just check , lets say, just one specific family (lineage)  or is it just going to check all profiles you ( and sometimes others as well) manage ?

Going on a holiday now for a few weeks and will be back somewher in August, if you all ( people that have some experience already with the bots) say it's great and does what it's supposed to do, guess I could safely start trying things out as well, would love some things to be done by a bot