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Huggle

Hi. If you have complaints or suggestions regarding Huggle – rather than the people who use it – I would love to hear them. Failing that, though, it's a little like saying web browsers should be banned because they are used for vandalism. And if you want Huggle banned, you can do that yourself, though you may have some explaining to do. Thanks -- Gurchzilla (talk) 07:03, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

In a sense, my attitude towards Huggle isn't a criticism of your writing it - which you did an excellent job of - but of the way it's used. I view Huggle (and to a far lesser extent, Twinkle and rollback) in much the same way as I view firearms; they have the potential to be extremely useful in the right hands, but given their potential both for abuse and for accidental misuse, should be banned from general distribution and only given to people who've demonstrated that they can be trusted with them. As I said on WT:RFA, which I assume is the discussion that led you here, any tool that enables a good faith and experienced user to rack up twelve separate complaints on their talkpage in a couple of weeks is seriously flawed. Even AWB, which is far slower, is restricted to users who've demonstrated some familiarity with editing and is regularly removed from users who abuse it, whereas Huggle and Twinkle access is given to brand-new users, some of whom openly admit to using in a "high-score" style edit-race. As User:Betacommand can tell you, even our most experienced users can come to grief using automated tools at high speed, and I'm starting to get thoroughly fed up with having to warn Huggle users for inappropriate reverts. — iridescent 13:27, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It is true that use of such tools by inexperienced users can be a problem. I have been wondering how, short of a process similar to adminship requests, it would be possible to identify such users; I would not, for example, have considered Aitias to be inexperienced (and certainly not a 'brand-new user'), yet it would seem his use of Huggle has been an issue. Do you have any suggestions? – Gurchzilla (talk) 15:19, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think it ought to have as a minimum the AWB criteria (500 mainspace edits, with those edits at least briefly reviewed to check appropriateness, and a demonstrated proposed need for it) before access is granted. As Huggle basically performs the same functions as Twinkle, albeit faster, I'd go further and have a criteria of at least a month's use of Twinkle/rollback and 500 Twinkle/rollback edits with no legitimate complaints about incorrect reversions in that time, to demonstrate that the proposed user understands just what they're dealing with. Take, for example, an obvious good-faith but misguided user of automated reversion tools; the collateral damage from users like this is very high, with inappropriate content re-added because all they see in the diff is content being deleted; knee-jerk reversions of anything containing the work "penis"; reverts to vandalism because they don't bother to read what they're re-inserting; deletions of appropriate content because it's being added by an IP] etc etc etc. For every reverted editor who bothers to get back to the reverter and discuss the matter, there are likely many more who are driven off the project in disgust when their good-faith contributions are reverted as vandalism, not to mention editors who didn't watchlist the page so aren't even aware the content has been reverted.

At the very least, I think it needs to be made clear (as AWB and rollback already do), that any abuse or incorrect use will result in immediate loss of the tool without warning and it will need to be reapplied for. I know this can already be done by blanking & protecting the .css page, but I (and I assume others) are reluctant to do so as there's not a clear policy on it. I've no idea if it's possible, but would there be a way to restrict Huggle to (perhaps) 1 edit every 30 seconds? This would force people new to it to actually read what they're reverting, and hopefully put a stop to the editcount-racing mentality. (When I see your users setting themselves edits-per-day targets, I freely admit that my finger hovers over the "block" button.) The speed restriction could be removed once they've made perhaps 1000 valid reverts with no legitimate complaints, thus demonstrating that they understand what they're doing.

And — while it will never happen short of a ruling by Jimbo — I don't think a Wikipedia:Requests for automated tools along the lines of the BAG would actually be a bad idea. — iridescent 15:57, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've sent out a new version of Huggle. In response to your feedback, I've added a notice displayed when the application starts up which states the need for care and the consequences of misuse. It also contains various small fixes which have recently been requested, which I wanted to get out quickly, as developing some sort of approval system will take much longer. It would, of course, have the same problem as AutoWikiBrowser – anyone can modify the application to not require approval.

There is no need to be reluctant in removing access; not everything has to be laboriously explained in policy, and /huggle.css subpages aren't used by anything else, so the protection is harmless. I am considering leaving a message on the administrators' noticeboard outlining the need to deal with abuse and the steps for doing so. Is there anything I should mention that isn't already covered here? -- Gurchzilla (talk) 16:27, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'd suggest putting an firmer warning on the WP:HUGGLE page as well, along the lines of the warning at WP:AWB and WP:TW ("Repeated abuse of these rules could result, without warning, in the software being disabled."/"Never forget that you take full responsibility for any action performed using Twinkle. You must understand Wikipedia policies and use this tool within these policies, or risk being blocked.) That way, not only does it hopefully make it clearer to the users that it's a privilege, not a right; it also means admins who come across someone using it inappropriately but aren't familiar with Huggle can see right away that the users have been warned. If it's possible, I'd love to see Huggle automatically add "using Huggle" to edit summaries (as Twinkle, Friendly etc do), to make it more obvious if any problem edits are coming via Huggle or normal point-and-click rollback. — iridescent 16:34, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have added such a notice. It is possible to tell that Huggle is being used by looking at the source text of user warnings -- as with the standard warning templates, the template name is given in a comment at the end of the message; Huggle's templates all have "huggle" in the name – Gurchzilla (talk) 16:49, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Good - hopefully that will clarify the situation to users. (By an odd coincidence, I've just revoked someone's Huggle access for the first time less than 10 minutes ago.) — iridescent 16:52, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Huggle -- Gurchzilla (talk) 17:19, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

May 2008

Hi, the recent edit you made to Edward Low has been reverted, as it appears to be unconstructive. Use the sandbox for testing; if you believe the edit was constructive, ensure that you provide an informative edit summary. You may also wish to read the introduction to editing. Thanks. Caltas ^(talk) 19:43, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This is getting ridiculous; this is the third one of these today. Please note that if I have any more false "vandalism" reports from you because you aren't willing to preview your edits, I will remove your Huggle/Twinkle access. — iridescent 19:46, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Caltas has just been granted Rollback. If he isn't going to be more careful in using it I think it ought to be removed. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 19:57, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I too had a word. We all make mistakes but this is a bit much. --John (talk) 20:01, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'll keep an eye on him. As per the long conversation with Gurch, creator of Huggle (at the top of this page), I think we need to be much more proactive with taking "power tools" away from even good-faith editors who are using them incorrectly. — iridescent 20:12, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As I granted the rollback right I take some responsibility I feel. I've also asked Caltas to slow down and be more careful, or the tools will be removed sans drama. Sorry Iridescent. Pedro : Chat 20:20, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No worries - these things happen. I've actually just installed Huggle (although I've no intention of becoming a regular user, I figured that I ought to know exactly what it entails) and am shocked at just how fast it goes, and at how easy it is to make this kind of mistake. Twinkle has all the prompts, "enter summary" fields etc; Huggle has a one-touch rollback-and-warn button, and one slip of the finger results in this kind of silliness. Me or you can just shrug these things off (as this is three warnings in a day, presumably the next one will auto-report me to AIV), but if I were a new user, things like this could easily send me sloping off in a sulk to Wikipedia Review. — iridescent 20:35, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hah, well I guarantee to treat you leniently if I see you at AIV! I have never used Twinkle, Huggle or anything else. I use manual edits so any mistakes are mine alone. I do sometimes use AWB, and know how easy it is to absentmindedly hit "save" when you have been doing hundreds of edits. Faster isn't always better I suppose. --John (talk) 20:51, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

←Twinkle's quite handy to have installed, as it automatically opens the talkpage of the last editor when you roll something back - since it's hard to think of any time you'd be rolling back without leaving a message, it's a good reminder. It's also very handy for AfD nominations, as it automates all the "finding the right place in the log" donkey-work. As I think I've said, I'm shocked at how fast Huggle is; in the time it's taken to watch "Dragon's Den" I've done 250 edits, and that's deliberately working slowly. — iridescent 20:59, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes. The thing about Huggle is it was designed with only one thing in mind – to be as fast as possible. At the time, over a year ago and developing it purely as a tool for personal use, I didn't anticipate problems like these. Having already contributed for a year and a half, and -- having written the software myself -- knowing its limits well, I made very few mistakes, and corrected the few that I inevitably did make. At the time, there were no anti-vandalism bots, so everything had to be done manually, and rollback was limited to administrators; one motive for making Huggle so fast was to try to allow me, as a non-administrator, to handle vandalism as efficiently as administrators.

Huggle's combined revert-and-warn button, which you've mentioned a couple of times, is indeed proving something of a problem. It's intended for use only to deal with blatant vandalism, and of course when I was using it myself, I knew this, because I put it there in the first place. To be honest, now that there are anti-vandalism bots and non-administrators have rollback, Huggle's speed is not necessary except during peak times when there are only a handful of people watching for vandalism; however, I'm reluctant to intentionally slow down something written to be as fast as possible.

I do find it somewhat disturbing that you've recieved three warnings in one day. I've only recieved one warning from a Huggle user (though plenty more from other tools, I should note); it is somewhat weird being yelled at by your own tool, I have to say. While I am not sure whether the greater share of the blame lies with the user or the software, I do believe some of these incidents, particularly the one to which the warning at the top of this section relates, are the result of a common problem which could be alleviated by changes to the software. Huggle shows new edits to the page (by default, this can be disabled) in order that you can see immediately if a page is edited. This is useful in several situations; it lets you see your own edits as they're made, it lets you see that someone else just reverted a vandal so you don't have to bother, and it lets you see if the vandal (or someone else) edits the page again. However, it seems that legitimate users are sometimes reverted. You are, like most established users, on Huggle's whitelist. This whitelist can be manually edited, but is for the most part maintained by the software itself, a task that it seems to do quite well. It is, at least in theory, impossible to use the revert-and-warn button on a whitelisted user; indeed it should not be possible to warn them at all, without manually de-whitelisting them. (It is possible to revert a whitelisted user, without issuing a warning, in order that mistakes by other users can be corrected).

The probem seems to be that if one is looking at an instance of vandalism, and tries to revert-and-warn at exactly the moment someone else reverts the page, that person ends up on the recieving end of the warning, in addition to having their reversion reverted back. I have not experienced this myself since I rewrote the software for general release; however, I am probably naturally cautious in such situations as I know the internal workings of the software and am aware of potential faults such as this one. I am currently working on changes that should hopefully reduce incidents like these. Let me know if you have further suggestions for improvement of Huggle -- Gurchzilla (talk) 22:26, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As I said somewhere above, I've just been deliberately using Huggle to see what it actually entails; while I doubt I'll make a habit of it (I never spent much time in vandal-fighting) I do agree that it's a beautiful piece of design; less "clunky" than, for example, AWB or Twinkle, and (hopefully) by catching vandals early, will deprive them of the satisfaction of seeing their changes stay live and with any luck discourage them from staying.

As regards changes I'd like to see made, these are the ones that spring to mind. Bear in mind that any programming knowledge I have is 20 years out of date, so I've no idea how easy these would be to implement:

Have it default to checking changes in article-space only. I can't imagine there's any template, portal etc that isn't being watched - and seeing Hugglers revert changes other users are making in their own sandboxes, for example, is not really defensible and leads to bad-faith accusations flying;
Instead of the current "Q to revert and warn", have it revert the change, but bring up a menu of possible warning messages (as the current Twinkle "warn" menu does), with "no message" as the default — this would force users to think about the appropriate message to leave. At the moment, I strongly suspect a lot of good-faith but invalid contributions are leading to editors being tagged as vandals. I appreciate it would slow things down slightly, but I don't think it would slow things down significantly. Possibly keep the "Q" key for only blatant vandalism, and a separate key to bring up the warning menu, with a clear warning that one misuse of the blatant-vandalism tag would result in loss of access? As I said on the AN thread, ideally I'd like to see it open the talk window of the user in question (as Twinkle does), as that allows you to see other warnings, discussions, explanations etc;
Have a minimum-time for the first (say) 1000 edits - perhaps a "please confirm you want to make this edit" box which disappears after x number of edits. Having played around with it, it's very easy to find yourself reverting mindlessly at high-speed. My "human-bot hybrid" jibe at RFA wasn't bad-faith - this editcount racing really is a problem. (Can you imagine even six months ago, someone with 35,000 edits failing an RFA for lack of mainspace experience)?
As I (and others) have said, I don't know if it's possible, but I would love to see a formal approval process for Huggle users. The AWB approval process seems to work fine at filtering out the "people who want a toy to play with" from the "people who have a genuine use for it", and doesn't seem unduly bureaucratic; also, because an admin would have to approve every user, hopefully that admin would take the flak for any misuse, rather than everyone shouting on your talkpage. It does seem bizarre that the (slow and not much use) rollback function requires approval, while the far more powerful Huggle & Twinkle don't...

Not sure this is really the best place to be discussing this, as only those (hopefully) few users who have me watchlisted will see it; feel free to cut-and-paste any of the above to AN, VP etc if it comes under discussion elsewhere. — iridescent 22:59, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just to clarify, Huggle uses rollback if it is available; if it isn't available, Huggle will still work, but will revert much more slowly -- Gurchzilla (talk) 23:07, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Checking only articles by default is simply a configuration change so I've done that. This won't affect user who have already customised their configuration, though -- Gurchzilla (talk) 23:11, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, the "delete" function doesn't seem to work - nothing happens to the page, and I get a "failed to delete page" message in the log at the bottom. Don't know if it's a fault in the software, a fault on my account or if my settings are wrong; the block function works so it's not that it doesn't recognise me as a sysop, and pages still delete from the browser so it's not that MediaWiki has a flaw. — iridescent 23:13, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As I'm not an administrator, implementing the delete function has been something of a challenge. In the next version, however, it should actually work. (You may wish to look at the list of changes in the next version -- Gurchzilla (talk) 23:18, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've also made a change to the way the configuration pages work. Usually settings listed at Wikipedia:Huggle/Config serve as the defaults and settings in user configuration subpages override those (with the exception of some things that can't be overridden). Future versions will store the version number in the user's configuration and, when the user upgrades to a newer version, Huggle will be forced to re-write the configuration in order to update the version number. This allows me to make a particular version invoke particular configuration changes at that point, if I so wish. In other words, I have fixed things so that when a user upgrades to the next version their namespace filter will switch to articles only, but if they then subsequently change it it will stay changed -- Gurchzilla (talk) 23:59, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Also, as it happens I can imagine someone with 35,000 edits failing an RfA six months ago. In fact, I can imagine someone with 35,000 edits failing an RfA fourteen months ago, as that's what would have happened had I accepted one of the many nomination offers I got while editing as User:Qxz and doing little other than dealing with vandalism -- Gurchzilla (talk) 23:18, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(Frantically checks to make sure I didn't oppose you - phew!) That was a weird RFA though, you have to admit, looking at the "characters" who came out of the woodwork for it; if you ran it again, you'd probably sail through. Although if Malleus is still reading this conversation, he can probably confirm that my nose for these things is not good... — iridescent 23:28, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That was, yes; though I'm not referring to my last RfA, which failed because I was considered too controversial, but to the hypothetical RfA that never happened but which I was offered when I was editing as User:Qxz. Arguably had such a thing come about then I should have failed for use of alternate accounts rather than lack of mainspace contributions, but the latter is what would probably have happened since nobody knew it was me. And opposing me on an RfA would be the right thing to do, so don't feel bad about it :) -- Gurchzilla (talk) 23:37, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

While I certainly understand "doesn't do any mainspace edits" opposes, I never understood "does trivial stuff as well" opposes. When I clogged RecentChanges for a month recategorising Category:Railway stations in the United Kingdom nobody complained. — iridescent 23:48, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm moving this section up the talkpage so it's with the other Huggle conversation, as they follow on from each other. — iridescent 23:48, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How does it work?

How do you get that pretty flashy pattern to appear behind the Wikipedia logo, on your user and talk pages? I can't figure it out. The ''Gorgeous Girl''!!! (talk) 04:01, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Paste <span style="background:#ffffff;position:absolute;top:-45px; left:-165px;z-index:-3">[[Image:name of the image you want behind the WP logo|164px]]</span> at the top of the page. Don't use any large files (I'd say 120kb maximum) as it'll make the page lag horribly on a dialup connection otherwise. There are plenty of animated images here to pick and choose from.

Strange - you're the third person to ask me that this week, yet it's been like this for a year now. I've obviously somehow come to notice... — iridescent 04:11, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks!!! The ''Gorgeous Girl''!!! (talk) 04:16, 22 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/619 in Ireland

If you're going to make subjective and highly contentious annotations to another user's comment signature, please sign them as per convention. Doing it in this manner was not only misleading as to their authorship, but you had applied formatting (which I can only assume was deliberate) to make the annotation appear to be automatically generated, thus some supposedly objective comment spawned from MediaWiki, in a manner that can only appear to be a deliberate unattributable attempt to slur the person commenting.

If you accuse this account of being a sock/meatpuppet, then please say so, and say so openly.

I make no comment as to the wisdom or civility of making the comment in the first place.
Andy Dingley (talk) 16:04, 23 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Don't be ridiculous. The user in question had made seven edits prior to this comment. I did not "misleadingly apply formatting" - {{spa}} is a template and always appears this way, and there are no circumstances in which the MediaWiki software adds any comment to a conversation so I don't see how you can accuse me of "impersonating the software". By convention, {{spa}} (along with {{unsigned}} and {{interrupted}}) aren't signed, to stop discussions from becoming unnecessarily long. And the reason {{spa}} is worded as it is - "this account has made few or no other edits" - is precisely because we work on the principle of assuming good faith and don't go around making accusations - a core policy which I think you could possibly benefit from re-reading, as a glance at my history would show that I have no interest whatsoever in your edit-war and apply tags when appropriate throughout XfD. — iridescent 15:07, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would also add that since then, the account I was "unfairly accusing" has been indefinitely blocked for sockpuppetry... — iridescent 15:37, 24 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was previously unfamiliar with the existence of {{spa}}. I have to say I'm aghast that it exists, and appalled at how it formats its output. Output which can only be judged as being intended to look like the automatic signature. The trouble is that {{spa}} looks like objective automatically-generated content, when in fact it's one editor's (not even an admin's) subjective opinion to choose to use it. This ability to take one editor's gripe (which we know isn't always well-intentioned) and make it appear as something with more authority than it warrants is a bad thing.

If this user was a sockpuppet, then they're a sockpuppet because of how they're controlled, not because of their interests. There are tools to spot socking, tools based on IP addresses. If we wish to accuse someone of socking, it should be bold enough to say "sockpuppet" rather than "single interest", and it should be obviously attributable to the editor making it.

My real concern here is that we start to conflate single-interest editors (hopefully not yet forbidden) with sockpuppets.
Andy Dingley (talk) 15:04, 25 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This discussion has been going on a long time... My personal opinion (and I think the general consensus) regarding {{spa}} is that single purpose editors are fine - so someone who only writes on steam locomotives, for example, shouldn't be penalised for only participating in discussions on steam locomotives - but that accounts such as this, which have made few or no other contributions prior to participating in the AfD/RFA/etc in which they're contributing, are not "a part of the wikipedia community" and thus their opinions should be discounted (albeit not ignored altogether) when closing discussions such as this. On a related point, to repeat what I said above; there are no circumstances in which messages are automatically generated, other than error messages for incorrect formatting (even {{unsigned}} is added by someone, not automatically generated), so "looking like an automatically generated message" doesn't apply.

For better or worse {{spa}} (and its close relative, {{not a ballot}}) are currently part of the process; the place to discuss changing them is Wikipedia talk:Articles for deletion, not here. — iridescent 15:38, 25 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia downloadable tools and the such

Hello Iredescent

I dont know if your the best person to ask but what is th best one? How many of them are their and if so what are they and what do they do best? And how would I go about downloading it and if I did would it bugger things up? Many thanks. Yours, [[::User:Police,Mad,Jack|Police,Mad,Jack]] ([[::User talk:Police,Mad,Jack|talk]] · [[::Special:Contributions/Police,Mad,Jack|contribs]])☺ 19:47, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Depends what you want to do, really. The best for vandal-fighting is HUGGLE (just follow the link), which shows all the changes that are being made to Wikipedia, as they're being made, and gives you the option to revery them. However, if you read the conversation near the top of this page (and the large flashing warning at the very top), because it works at ultra-high speed, it's VERY easy to accidentally misuse and get yourself blocked; LUPIN does much the same thing, slightly more slowly, but it's easier to use without making mistakes.

I personally think the most useful all-round tool to have is AWB, which allows you both to make the same change to a large number of articles in one go (eg, correcting a name), and to run a spell-check on a large batch of articles. TWINKLE and FRIENDLY are both quite useful; Twinkle makes it quicker to revert changes and issue warnings, and Friendly makes it easier to perform "welcoming" tasks.

There are quite a lot more about - see Wikipedia:Cleaning up vandalism/Tools and Category:Wikipedia tools, but the above are ones I'm familiar with.

Be warned that all these tools (with the possible exception of Friendly) can do significant damage, even if used with the best of intentions (have a look through the archives of User talk:Xp54321 for the last week or so to see just how quickly well-intentioned misuse of automated tools can take you from "the verge of adminship" to "the verge of an indefblock" in just a couple of days); the warning for use of ALL these tools is not to make any edit you're not sure of, and not to treat anything as vandalism unless you're 100% sure it couldn't possibly be good faith.

Hope that helps! — iridescent 20:05, 26 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi yeah it did, I've got a few of them up you know report vandal and etc but none of them is things I do alot so i'll just leave them alone. Using them few and far between. But thanks anyway, for taking the time to read and reply. Thanks again. [[::User:Police,Mad,Jack|Police,Mad,Jack]] ([[::User talk:Police,Mad,Jack|talk]] · [[::Special:Contributions/Police,Mad,Jack|contribs]])☺ 21:03, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually, saying that I am finding the warn one alot quicker than all the previous going to that page and copying them. You know when people say right to create multiple accounts and all that what does it mean? Like one user has a thing and it says " 268 account creations " whats that all about? [[::User:Police,Mad,Jack|Police,Mad,Jack]] ([[::User talk:Police,Mad,Jack|talk]] · [[::Special:Contributions/Police,Mad,Jack|contribs]])☺ 08:31, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Depends. If it's an admin, they're probably just talking about Wikipedia:Request an account/Administrators, where fresh accounts are created for new users. They might actually mean multiple accounts, where one user operates under more than one name - but I can't imagine any legitimate reason to have 200+ accounts. — iridescent 11:18, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok thanks, I was thinking and reading requests for admin coaching and I am intending putting my name down on it. Would you be interested in coaching me? Its no worries if your not, but I thought i'd ask because you strike me as someone who knows what they are doing. Many thanks. Yours, [[::User:Police,Mad,Jack|Police,Mad,Jack]] ([[::User talk:Police,Mad,Jack|talk]] · [[::Special:Contributions/Police,Mad,Jack|contribs]])☺ 11:33, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Reply re admin coaching

Although I'm certainly willing to answer any questions, I'm probably not the best person to act as admin coach, since — although I do have admin status — I tend to focus in fairly specialised areas, and there are large chunks of Wikipedia I don't really spend any time with. Also, given the nature of my work, I'm quite often away or busy for long periods of time; there's also a conflict of interest situation (both on Wikipedia and in the real world) if I were to edit and/or discuss at length many of the articles you work on.

Of the current coaches, the ones I think would best suit you are Balloonman or Pedro. I think LaraLove would also suit you very well, but she's in Texas so (I'm guessing) would probably never be online at the same time as you.

When you go for RFA, the participants will generally look at your history for the last couple of months. A few things I'd recommend doing now — to make sure any problems are well in the past by the time of the RFA - are:

At the moment, your edit summary usage is unacceptably low. I'd strongly recommend ticking "Prompt me when entering a blank edit summary" under "Editing" in your preferences;
While by-and-large you've worked in a reasonable variety of areas, you've virtually no Wikipedia Talk edits — only 39, and all but 15 of them are to WikiProject pages. Because Wikipedia Talk is where policy is discussed, it's good (although not essential) to be able to demonstrate you've participated in policy discussions so you understand how consensus is formed, and also to show that you understand the high levels of abuse that admins get subjected to;
You've a lot of userboxes on your user page; while there's no policy at all against this, you might want to trim them down quite substantially. The people who vote at WP:RFA tend to be strongly against people using Wikipedia as a social networking site, and a lot of information about yourself — as opposed to what you bring to Wikipedia — can (fairly or not) swing people against you. In particular, I'd get rid of "This user is not a Wikipedia administrator, but would like to be one someday", which a lot of people hate; adminship on Wikipedia isn't any kind of promotion, it just means a few more technical powers.
Although you've created a fair few articles, some of them are a bit messy (as you can see by the assorted cleanup tags people have put on them), and none of them are very long. As one question that is always asked at RFA is "What is your best contribution to Wikipedia", I'd suggest picking one or two and expanding them into long, informative articles. They don't have to be masterpieces of writing, but they ideally should: cover everything a casual reader without specialist knowledge who stumbled on the article would be interested in knowing; have inline citations for each piece of information; be from a neutral point of view. Have a look at the (now slightly out of date) article I wrote on Central Communications Command for the sort of thing I mean in a police-related context; I freely admit that it's messy and deathly dull, but if you didn't know anything about the subject, it tells you everything a non-specialist is likely to want to know.
Stop giving out level 4 warnings unless the vandal has already received earlier warnings or the vandalism is really serious! Because AGF is part of the fourth of the Five pillars, even if you're perfect in every other way, an RFA will be shot down in flames unless you show you're willing to give everyone the benefit of the doubt, as nobody will trust you with the protect & block buttons. I'd strongly recommend making a habit of reading WP:AN, WP:ANI and WT:RFA every day, even though they're generally dull as ditchwater, to get a feeling for the way admins "behave" on Wikipedia.
You've very little experience in deletions, and deletion policy is such a core theme that people will expect you to have demonstrated that you understand it. Read (and make sure you understand) WP:CSD and WP:DEL as people will ask you questions about them. Read through the the current deletion discussions whenever you get the chance, to see what sort of things are discussed; once you feel confident that you understand policy — but not until then — start to join in at least the occasional discussion there.
The same few questions are asked at RFA each time. Read the questions-and-answers at the most recent successful RFAs to get a feel for what questions you're going to be asked, and what the people who answered them successfully said.

Hope all that helps! Sorry it's a bit long-winded... When you do find an admin coach, I'd suggest you point this conversation out to them, so they can see what I've already told you (and disagree if necesary). One thing I can't emphasise enough is don't nominate yourself for RFA; self-nominations almost always fail. Your admin coach(es) will nominate you themselves when they think you have a reasonable chance of passing. — iridescent 16:01, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok thank you very much, I'll take in all those things. Thanks again =]. [[::User:Police,Mad,Jack|Police,Mad,Jack]] ([[::User talk:Police,Mad,Jack|talk]] · [[::Special:Contributions/Police,Mad,Jack|contribs]])☺ 16:24, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

Hello again.

(Further up, I asked you how one gets images in the top left corner of their userpage (Thanks again!)) Now, regarding that user Joeboyferret-something, it seems to me that he is that IP user who was vandalizing Ferret a little earlier; now he has registered. He made similar changes to the article, compared to what the IP did, after all. What do you think? The ''Gorgeous Girl''!!! (talk) 02:23, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Likely - but assume good faith... There's not enough vandalism to warrant sending him to WP:RFCU yet; I'll keep an eye on his contributions and rest assured, if he carries on vandalising he'll be blocked soon enough... — iridescent 02:25, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

And there he goes... — iridescent 02:33, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well done!!!

		The RickK Anti-Vandalism Barnstar
		For a good catch before the damage was too severe! The ''Gorgeous Girl''!!! (talk) 02:38, 27 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 166: / Line 166: @@
 |style="vertical-align: middle; border-top: 1px solid gray;" | For a good catch before the damage was too severe! [[User:Wilhelmina Will|The &#39;&#39;Gorgeous Girl&#39;&#39;!!!]] ([[User talk:Wilhelmina Will|talk]]) 02:38, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
 |}
-Hi your recent edit to the sickles high school page has been reverted. Use the sandbox for testing. [[User:Pauljr231|Ceasar Du Coudray]] ([[User talk:Pauljr231|talk]]) 18:43, 27 May 2008 (UTC)