Watchlist changes

Question

Yesterday, Oct. 12, about 50 profiles on my watchlist showed a latest edit date of Oct 12.  Today, nearly 500 profiles show a latest edit date of Oct. 13.  Yet, none of these profiles have any edits logged in the change list.  It's especially annoying to me because I use the last edit date to keep up with what I'm working on currently, profiles I added during the 3 connect-a-thons, and to watch to see if someone else has added to these profiles.

What is going on?  An example of a profile I keep on my watchlist and was last really edited on 4 March 2022, but shows a latest edit date on my watchlist now of 13 Oct 2022.

Comments

By linking to the profile, it actually does have a change now, that of question here.  Can you give another example? Just post the ID

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Fisher Gaskins

Of course,-- thanks for pointing that out Coen.  

Answer 1

I had the same question and asked on discord--apparently there was an update to a template yesterday (the findagrave one, maybe others) and so any profiles with that in it will now be updated in the list but not on the page.  And that was in fact the case with the ones I looked at.

Comments

Thanks Celia. This is indeed disruptive for anyone who works on their watchlist using the edited date. I wonder what the change was to the Find a Grave template. As far as I can remember, it doesn't look any different. Was it worth it, in that case?

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Thanks, Celia.  I really thought it had something to do with FindAGrave sources/templates.  I knew the cemetery categories had a bunch of updates and I've been very careful to make sure I add those whenever I run across a profile with those, but didn't realize all my managed profiles with the template would be affected.

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It must have been a background change to the underlying code or such since it did not update the actual profile itself.  I don't know if it would be possible to exclude such automated updates from the date updated in the watchlists, but it certainly would get my vote.

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Me too -- and I'll bet Jim and Jelena would agree.  Sadly, I spent a lot of extra time putting the template on the connect-a-thon profiles in April, but at least I didn't for a bunch in January.  Oh well, I was working through those profiles anyway.  Now I just don't have a good way to see which are which.

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Aleš removed some old, unused parameters from the template. It should be the last update to the template (unless Find A Grave changes its URLs).

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Regardless of who/what makes the change, it would be nice to have a record in the change log.  In this case, the entry could have been EditBot making changes to the Find a Grave template.

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But the change is to the template, not individual profiles.

Maybe it would make sense to post to g2g when such changes are made, so those of us who monitor watchlists and g2g will be alerted that way.

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There is a change entry for the change to the template page, and all changes made by Editbot are logged. The underlying mediawiki software updated the last "touched" date in the database for each of the profiles that contained the template -- that sort of stuff isn't in the change log.

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It would seem that the underlying mediawiki software should update who/what updated the last "touched" date.  Is that something that can be changed?

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Please tell me how to get to the template page, FindaGrave especially. Thank you.

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@Suzanne, I sent you a private message as this is a little off-topic.  but the help page is here FindAGrave WikiTree help page.

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@Jamie:  Thanks for the more technical explanation.  I also agree Melanie that I'd like to see a notice in G2G if possible.

@Tommy: I agree with you, but is this another question to ask separately in G2G?  I definitely would like to see the last touched date -- not updated for this kind of behind the scenes change.

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Thank you, Kathy. I have just sent you a response. Have a blessed night.

Answer 2

I also consider that highly annoying. Had the same this morning. This does not happen often, but when it does, it is making me "grrrrrrr" in front of my laptop.

Comments

Grrrr is a kind way of describing this Jelena.  I now see that October 12ths updates were a lot closer to 250.  Errrgh, indeed.

Answer 3

I just noticed that too! Makes it look like I've been updated profiles when I haven't worked on any today. :(

Answer 4

I was the one editing FindAGrave Template. I finally removed the two parameters that were deprecated for a few years. In the past EditBOT did extract those two parameters for the mayority of profiles, but there were many mistakes and reported suggestions. And last week I corrected the remainig ones (cca 100). Now the usage count on those parameters finally got to 0 and I removed the underlaying coding for it from the template.

WikiTree server needed almost a day to update 1.500.000 profiles using the template.

Now there are no planned edits on the template unless they change the domain name. I hope I will never edit that template again.

Now to the problem you have with dates. I think those dates are changed if there is a G2G message connected  to the profile or if there is a comment added to the profile or if any used template is edited. I think also when a profile is badged or a relative is connected. Maybe there are other cases.

But what you actually need there is the last date when a profile was saved. Maybe you should request a change for the report so the actual save date is listed there. I think it might be technically possible to do that.

Comments

Thanks Aleš, I knew you were doing a lot of work and I really appreciate much fewer generated suggestions.  That's a really big deal.  

I think having the last date that the profile was actually saved is a great idea and I'll suggest that in another question.

Again -- I don't know what we'd do without you and the Tech team dealing with all the background stuff.  Thank you!

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New question is here: Watch list changes -- last date saved