Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 23:00, 10 January 2008

This page's designation as an agreed process is disputed. Please see the relevant discussion on the talk page for further information. The use of this tag is itself controversial.

• WP:RFR
• WP:RFRB
• WP:ROLL

The rollback feature allows intentionally nonconstructive contributions (vandalism) to be reverted more quickly and more efficiently than with other methods. User scripts have been written that mimic the functionality of rollback, but they merely automate the multi-step process, and are much less efficient, both in terms of bandwidth and time. Rollback links are displayed on page histories, user contributions pages, and diff pages.

Clicking on the link reverts to the previous edit not authored by the last editor. An automatic edit summary is provided and the edit is marked as minor. (An error message is returned if there is no last editor to which to revert).

The rollback option will not be displayed for revisions on pages that you do not have permissions to edit. e.g. Only administrators can rollback edits to fully protected pages.

Rollback is currently available to administrators and any user may request that an administrator add the right to their account. Rollback should not be used in content disputes. Rollback is not an honor or a sign of community trust; it is merely a technical feature and getting it is no more momentous than installing Twinkle, which is capable of providing similar functionality.

Process

Any administrator is able and permitted to grant rollback to a user in good standing. Administrators in Category:Misplaced Pages administrators willing to grant rollback requests have indicated a specific openness to being approached directly for rollback, without using this page. You may particularly wish to consider approaching them if a request here has not received any attention at all for a while.

Any editor in good standing may request the rollback feature on this page. To request rollback here, type {{subst:rfr|Your Username|Short reason for wanting rollback}} ~~~~ under "Current requests", below. Please do not copy and paste from existing requests.

Any editor may comment on the requests.

Learn about how to use the rollback feature at Misplaced Pages:New admin school/Rollback. Read up on it at Misplaced Pages:Rollback feature.

Requesting removal of rollback

If an editor is using the rollback tool for edit warring, it is generally more productive to deal with the fact that he is edit warring, rather than with the precise fashion in which he is doing that. We have several dispute resolution mechanisms that deal with edit warring (e.g. WP:3RR, WP:RFC), and people who edit war with the rollback tool may have that tool revoked in addition to whatever other sanctions may be imposed (such as 3RR blocks).

If you wish the rollback tool to be removed from your own account, just ask any administrator.

Administrators

Administrators should not grant rollback to editors with a history of abusing the revert process. To grant rollback, go to Special:Userrights and add the rollback permission to the user's account. If there is misuse of the tool, it may be revoked by the same method. Consider leaving a note on the user's talk page regarding proper usage of rollback, you may use {{subst:rfr/granted}} for this.

Once an administrator has granted rollback or decided to reject a request, they should add {{done}} or {{not done}} respectively. The request should then be archived: approved requests for this month to here, and for previous months to here; similarly, declined request for this month are sent to here, and for previous months, to here.

Current requests

User:Ilkali

• Ilkali (talk · contribs · deleted · count · AfD · logs · block log · lu · rfar · spi) | give rollback

Most of what I do is reversion of bad edits, whether vandalism or POV or something else. I use Twinkle at the moment, and it has the annoying habit of cutting out mid-send and truncating articles (eg: ). Ilkali (talk) 08:30, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

• I think you are currently overusing TW rollback for content disputes. I'm not very comfortable with this. Any other thoughts? Spartaz 09:31, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
• I'd agree with that assessment. --Woohookitty 09:32, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
• I agree. Rollback should not be used for content removal that is disputed. I am minded not to approve at this time, without prejudice to re-application at a later date. Pedro :  Chat  09:34, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

 Not done. Sorry but you need to show a better understanding of what rollback is for before we can grant you the tool. Spartaz 09:35, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

To be fair, his Twinkle reverts all have reasonable edit summaries. In most cases, rollback would have been wrong, though. Can't say whether the user would use rollback instead of Twinkle-with-good-edit-summary for non-vandal reverts. Kusma (talk) 09:38, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Its very early in their wiki-career (600 odd edits) to really know how they would react and the evidence is that they don't quite understand the reasons why rollback use is so restricted so. There is no reason the next application will not succeed if they stop rolling back content with TW. Spartaz 09:47, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

That's the problem. We should have had policy answers to that (and other outstanding issues) prior to launching this process. El_C 11:05, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure of that. This seems a good example of common sense working. Admin S isn't sure, seeks further comments and admins W and P weigh in and confirm doubts. Request not actioned. No doubt we will develop as we go along - in 20 years of working within a system that constantly reinvents itself I have yet to see a single example of something new following exactly along the predicted lines. Perhaps this should be better discussed at talk but I need to go to work and its probably not fair on the user to use this as a case in point to argue through the pros and cons of non-admin Rollback Spartaz 11:21, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Maybe I need to try TWB to see the difference in what they can do... Unless, it is only about rb's formal appearance. El_C 11:34, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry - maybe I'm being stupid but I'm afraid I don't understand the point you are making. Perhaps you can take this to talk as I'm going to work as soon as I save this edit and won't be able to look at this again for several hours. Spartaz 11:36, 10 January 2008 (UTC)