explain xkcd - User contributions [en]

explain xkcd:Community portal/Admin requests

2025-06-02T07:07:02Z

162.158.8.190: /* ExplainXKCD.com needs admin help */ comment

<noinclude>{{Community links}}
__NEWSECTIONLINK__
{|-
|valign="top" width="100%"|[[File:Mop.svg|left|120px]] <big><big>Admin requests</big></big>

 Welcome to your mother's basement! Problems requiring assistance from an [[explain xkcd:Administrators|admin]]. User problems, changes to protected pages, more user rights etc. {{AddNewSection|Page=Explain XKCD:Community portal/Admin requests|Text=(+post)}}
|}
{{cot|List of current admins}}
These users currently have the admin status: 
{{Special:ListUsers/sysop}}
Please note that only [[User:Kynde]], [[User:Jacky720]], and [[User:Theusaf]] are active admins as of April 2025. All other listed admins, including the owner of the wiki, [[User:Jeff]], have been inactive for a long time.
{{cob}}</noinclude>

==ARCHIVED DISCUSSIONS==
<div class="plainlinks" style="background:#edf6ff; border:1px solid #a7d7f9; margin:1em auto 1em auto; width:100%; font-size: 120%; padding: 0.5ex; text-align: center;">Most of the discussions on this page have been archived. The archive is available at '''[[explain xkcd talk:Community portal/Admin requests]]'''.</div>

== Racism on Main Page ==
There are some extremely racist comments on the main page. See https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page. Please remove immediately!
Can admins please delete the racist comments on the main page?
The user who wrote these racist comments has the IP address of 162.158.146.163. Please block!

Edit: Resolved. Thanks :)

== Convert to real X-Forwarded-For IP addresses? ==

Can you admins do the https://serverfault.com/a/526551 thing so you can block by real IP addresses and ranges? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.134|172.70.211.134]] 15:45, 22 July 2022 (UTC)
:That is out of my league. But maybe some of the other clever admins may know what if that can be used? [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 17:07, 22 July 2022 (UTC)

==Install anti-spam programs==
I think it’s time to install some sort of automated anti-spam programs that can catch these spammers fast.[[Special:Contributions/172.70.130.91|172.70.130.91]] 06:30, 24 July 2022 (UTC)

I don't want to be disrespectful, but it seems that the current set of admins lacks the collective time or ability to upgrade Mediawiki/MySQL and install widely available anti-vandalism and anti-spam measures. But you have perhaps the most technically inclined, supportive, and motivated audience you could hope for here. Why not use the main page top banner to ask for expert Mediawiki volunteers or if that doesn't work, funds to hire such a consultant to upgrade blocking and filtering tools or a new hosting solution if needed? I believe you'd be surprised with the extent of community support you can muster, and manually chasing vandalism is becoming tiresome. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.90|172.70.211.90]] 07:28, 24 July 2022 (UTC)
:I've been chasing jeff for months now because he's the only one with access to the server. I know he's alive and still active online, but he clammed up partway through the previous wave of heavy spam and the email chain is just 20 of my own emails, I'll get through eventually. '''[[User:Davidy22|y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 18:10, 24 July 2022 (UTC)
::[https://twitter.com/jeff_underscore @jeff_underscore] tweeted four days ago. Would it help if we launched a Twitter campaign to get him on board with a server update fundraiser, or something? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.214.43|172.70.214.43]] 03:36, 25 July 2022 (UTC)
::: Anyone with the skills and experience should tweet him to take him up on [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User_talk:Jeff&diff=211706&oldid=211700 his offer,] IMHO. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.118.39|162.158.118.39]] 04:12, 25 July 2022 (UTC)

::::wait, don't we already have reCAPTCHA? that should at least stop the bots and slow spams. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.146.216|172.71.146.216]] 00:35, 24 February 2025 (UTC)
::::: We do, but users who are autoconfirmed don't have to do the captcha, which is something like 50 edits. It probably does slow them down, having to do most things manually, but I don't doubt that there are ways to automatically circumvent a captcha. [[User:Firestar233|guess who]] ([[User talk:Firestar233|if you desire conversing]] | [[Special:Contributions/Firestar233|what i have done]]) 04:56, 24 February 2025 (UTC)
:::::: I tend to never say any details about ''what'' the autoconfirm thresholds are, on the basis that anyone trying to game the system doesn't have an idea of "Ah.... now just twenty more manual 'edits' to go and I can fire up my VandalBot script!". Especially the ones who are likely to attain the achievement by making inoccuous and actually useful-looking edits, who then need to be really dedicated to keep on doing this, even though they have the ultimate aim of subverting the whole lot. But it takes all sorts, so obviously there are those who wouldn't find that a problem at all. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.69|162.158.74.69]] 22:06, 24 February 2025 (UTC)
:Yeah, and also, what are these spam edits anyways? Some are just [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Prescriptions&action=history redirects to random comics] added to obscure pages like [[Prescriptions]]. What's the point in vandalising a page that's not advertised anywhere? --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 16:36, 24 February 2025 (UTC)
::It's bored idiots who have nothing better to do with their life. ''Possibly'' (in certain events in the past) there ''were'' organised vandalisms that might have had people, on some obscure forum in the grey areas of the web, chatting about their particular contribution to the 'raid' that their particular group of saddos had decided to send against the latest target''--du-jour''. But there's always going to be people happy to despoil someone else's work just because "they can", who might find this place and decide that they can get their 'shitz'n'giggles' from it. I've seen other places completely overrun (either a completely overwhelming individual or a raid), because there weren't enough valid anti-vandals (whether fellow users or, where they can't do enough, a constant moderation team). Luckily, we're not in danger of that; generally we more than handle it, and even a particularly rough period (like on occasion) tends to get a major pushback from the 'regulars'. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.69|162.158.74.69]] 22:06, 24 February 2025 (UTC)

== Basic punctuation standards ==
Can we please have some agreement that <code>."</code> is better than <code>".</code>? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.150.29|172.71.150.29]] 07:08, 24 August 2022 (UTC)
:That would depend.
When asked "How do you deal with endquote punctuation in quoted speech?" he answered "Yes," with a definite nod of his head, "I would always try to put the punctuation before the quote."
:...that is how I was taught to do it, <mumble>fumphty-fumph</mumble> years ago, and when it is clear quoted speech (with 66s, 99s) then that's probably best. Except when it might confuse, but then a rewrite (or clearly indicated paraphrase/part-quote) might be useful. You'll note I example-quote 'wrongly' in some places below, to accomodate other factors. Like an exclamation point as a feature of the holding sentence that makes no sense at all to be translated to within the quoted sentence(-fragmant).
On the other hand providing "a set of words", with no clear quotation to them, ellicits no such compunction.
:...it gets a bit hazy, because a partial quote of a real full sentence (or an incomplete/incompleted quote) could go either way. But I would not consider "a set of words," to be sensible.
If you give a "list", "spread" or "set" of singular terms then no, or even compounded ones if they are ultimately the "be-all" and "end-all".
:...noting that I might personally single-quote in this case (I know not why I have adopted this principle, exactly), though I've often seen such things changed by others and it may be more contested than even the terminator punctuation. I might say that the 'true' difference is whether it is a definite "literal", insofar as meaning, or somewhat 'ad hoc', 'foreignish' or just plain constructed.
:But this is just my opinion. And, regardless of my preference to quote-punctuation ordering, I've seen several recent occasions where paren-punctuation ordering was totally off (IMO). Either "...at the end of a sentence (an aside.)", which should have been "... (an aside)." instead, or "(As a whole aside of its own)." for which it ''must'' surely be "(As ... of its own.)"
:Now, obviously too much ()ing is awkward, especially if nested, but I prefer the clearer in/out indication than other methods — like the mdash — which seem to be the favoured method by some editors — and, even more confusingly, often without spacing both sides. (Like "...by some editors—and, even more confusingly..."! Looks more like a hyphen, despite "—” and "–”-users changing hyphens-used-as-dashes to one or other of the dashes to try to differentiate them.)
:Ultimately, though, the people here will have learnt (or redeveloped) their own typographical standards over a wide range of educational eras (or under teachers/mentors whose own learnt-preferences might themselves be several decades passed into history) and with additional localisation/localization complications as well. I tend to agree with you (with caveats as mentioned) but it won't be universally acceptable. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.13|172.70.85.13]] 21:34, 24 August 2022 (UTC)
: Better? No. Correct (at least in American English)? Yes. [[User:Elektrizikekswerk|Elektrizikekswerk]] ([[User talk:Elektrizikekswerk|talk]]) 13:25, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

== Propose block of (an?) IP user(s?) and suppression of their edits ==

I don't mind being insulted but I think it's clear they're bad for the community:

* https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User_talk:NotaBene&diff=296485&oldid=203158
* https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User_talk:NotaBene&diff=296486&oldid=296485

--[[User:NotaBene|NotaBene]] ([[User talk:NotaBene|talk]]) 14:15, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

: As the IP who subsequently reverted those back out of existence (wasn't sure you'd seen it, but was clear to me it wasn't a useful/good-faith commentary, and now I find that you had and had certainly ignored it in-situ) I have mixed opinions. I could not have done my (good faith) edit if somehow restricted, in a way someone had previously gotten around. Bearing in mind the idiotic vandal(s) we have had before, and always ended up dealing with through sheer force of the more righteous and honest userbase, I think that drastic actions aren't necessary. But I can think of a few minor tweaks that maybe the current adminship can still hold in reserve and occasionally employ, without preventing the likes of me (long time contributor, but not yet decided to make it 'official') occasionally poking registered users' Talk pages with genuine queries or comments under most circumstances that may actually warrant it.
: That said, we have indeed had a spate of vandalism, recently, which I'm inclined to believe is 'our old friend' who probably decided he(?) was bored again. A few novel tricks (nonsense 'cat on keyboard' edits with no clear pattern to the nonsense or what it replaces) but in association with some of the old ones (global word replacements throughout an article). Quickly recorrected in all cases, SFAICT, so not a big problem.
: The above insertion (...insertions... seeming to care about punctuation typos!) I might have left for you to blue-pen out of your own Talk page (whatever the intent behind it) except for my spidey-sense saying it really was ''just'' trolling and that you had no reason to even consider a dismissive reply, never mind argue your defence against such an accusation. (But could always restore and reply to it if you really wanted to!) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.137|172.71.178.137]] 17:57, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

:: To be clear, I'm not proposing a site-wide restriction of all IP users, just those specific addresses. --[[User:NotaBene|NotaBene]] ([[User talk:NotaBene|talk]]) 18:41, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

::: Understood, but that'd mean inconveniencing even legitimate readers routing through the same Cloudflare gateways. Which are in bunches, such that any given region of the world is served by not necessarily contiguous IP ranges, thus false-positives and false-negatives. Until you blanket-ban enough to just make for a whole lotta false-positive blocking for a segment of real users once the instigator of the mess just moves on (or enjoys the mess he made, if self-aware enough of it).
::: I won't even know, until I submit this, if I'm this time listed even in the same IP/8-block as the above (172.71.178.137), but if it turns out that I'm a 141.* this time (or maybe 142.*, I forget what I occasionally show up as) then obviously had you reason to IP-block me because of my own actions then you'd have accomplished little by even banning the whole 16-/24-block of my original. And that's without any conscious intent to bypass the default allocation system...
::: So, not that you should take my own opinion as gospel, just thought I'd mention this. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.3|172.70.90.3]] 20:23, 12 October 2022 (UTC)

== Hey ==

I cleaned everything up. You should probably restore the newest 3 topics.

:It could definitely do with a cleanup (not the only page like this!), but in a positive and considered manner, not just wiping and expecting unwarrented deletions to be restored after your removal. Archival sub-pages (restricted/fully-protected) should be involved, perhaps, for reference/history (on top of the History view itself).
:Not just wiping by an unisigned contributor, as you did. I'm a hairbreadth from just reverting it all back again, on principle, and maybe someone else will do that anyway.
:But defering to known named users (esp. the admins) and their decision on how to procede. (Please do delete this contribution if you see fit to do any restoration and make my opinions moot.) [[Special:Contributions/172.68.138.79|172.68.138.79]] 20:26, 23 October 2022 (UTC)
::I agree that it needed cleanup, and also agree that wiping everything was not the best way to go about doing it. I've moved most of the deleted content to the "talk"/archive page, and put back some discussions. [[User:Theusaf|theusaf]] ([[User talk:Theusaf|talk]]) 23:22, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

== Complaint transcluded from [[user:ArthurGreenham]] ==
:(Ok, so, the above transclusion is subject to change at any time, as proven by While False going in there and 'wikilinking' everything since I first saw the transclusion inserted here, so perhaps a little less ephemeral explanation is needed..?)
:Point the first: I have no issues with While False, in general. Seems to be a good editor in general. As I recall, did a lot to counter that particularly recurring bad-faith editor who the current expanded admin set will recall. And regular editing from you, mate..? As good as anyone else, I would say. No bad-faith detected in you at all.
:Point the second: You do seem to be a bit too gung-ho with new pages, and similar experiments with markup. Just because you can, it seems. If those with the power to remove pages choose not to, then I'm not complaining, but I still think it's a bit... self-indulgant. Not that a mere IP like me can rightfully complain.
:Point the third: Clearly, among the mass of newly registered users (who never then contribute) there is a large cohort generated by some external script(s) for the intention of SEO/propogation of linky-links. I suspect that they're set to do this on any wiki that they can create accounts upon, mindlessly and with the initiating 'intelligence' not bothered how well they do it (economies of scale, as per spamming/etc) because some will do it and fulfil whatever purpose.
:Point the fourth: But, back a long time ago, our chief admin here (and his then current peers/etc?) set it up so that new users just did not so easily create brand new pages. Without overly restricting the spamming of user-registration (or, more importantly, legitimately interested actual contributors) it stymied the scripts that were creating users that then could not create (and write their spam upon) the pages they were programmed to create.
:Point the fifth: But if someone who is an autoconfirmed user looks at the accounts created (I'm guessing here, so corrects me if I'm wrong) and decides to make the pages that new and heretofor uncontriutive users ''cannot'' create for themselves, there are times (at least two, that I know of) that the mindless spam-script has not given up and moved on from putting their random link-spam upon RandomNewname's user page. And as RandomNewname ''has'' a page, it does its preprogrammed stuff.
:...and the world does not stop turning, if that happens. But it does just marginally increase the benefits vs costs of the spam-engine technique (which are probably already breaking even and more, across all speculative spam-destinationa) and I'd suggest we shouldn't be helping with that any more than we already have to.
:Maybe theusaf could add to their own bot some sort of detection of a suspicious level of linkspamming upon a user's own pages (to neuter these that leak through, like the ones that it deals with in other circumstances), but that'd be difficult without having false-positives upon genuine new users with (once they can) a genuine reason to populate their userspace with various external links.
:Instead, perhaps hold back upon feeding the spambots the fresh ground that they seem to like to make use of. Perhaps a page for "please create my userspace!" if we want genuine users (or at least ones that can find and read instructions) to get a userspace more quickly than the normal limits apply, so any established (named) editor can give them their Welcome-templated editspace.
:We can't so easily protect against conscious bad-faith editors (we will just have to deal with them, as we have done), but we seem to have sufficient anti-bot defences. If misguided editing doesn't open up cracks in the walls.
:...Ok, that looks like a rant, but was just intended to cover (much of) the issue as I saw it in a way that explained my accumulated thinking on the matter. And I clearly think too much. This is not a diatribe against anybody (except the spambot originators), just a plea for action (or, rather, inaction) in a key way. And perhaps some moderator-level cleanup, so that the above transclusion is now effectively red-linked (then delete/archive this horribly overblown entry). Leaving it up to you lot. Have fun! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.3|172.70.90.3]] 10:34, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

==2696: Accuracy and precision==
This is my first edit/post here. Could someone please include the Wikipedia link to "Accuracy and precision" [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accuracy_and_precision], which is a separate article from 'accuracy' and 'precision'? Thanks! {{unsigned ip|172.71.98.97|16:04, 9 November 2022}}
:If someone else hasn't done already, it's trivial enough to do yourself in a similar way to how you edited here, in any one of a number of ways.
:*By bare URL (shows the URL, like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accuracy_and_precision but not really suitable here)
:*As you did it above, with [] around the URL, giving a 'reference'-like link. Occaisionally useful, but a little impersonal in most cases.
:**Or use URL and alternate text in the []s (space-separated) <nowiki>[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accuracy_and_precision like this]</nowiki>, which looks [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accuracy_and_precision like this] and is most useful for non-wiki links that you can describe well, or associate into the flow of text.
:*An internal wiki link is defined like <nowiki>[[2696: Precision vs Accuracy]]</nowiki> and renders as [[2696: Precision vs Accuracy]], which is common site practice (you could alse link to [[2696]] or [[Precision vs Accuracy]], in most cases, which are redirects) but doesn't help in the above link's case.
:**If you wanted to internally link with [[2696: Precision vs Accuracy|other text]] then using <nowiki>[[2696: Accuracy and precision|other text]]</nowiki> is the way to do it (use the pipe delimiter).
:*When it comes to wikipedia links, though, we have a nice template for it. By using <nowiki>Accuracy and precision}}</nowiki> (or with the underscored version of the title, if you wish) you get a link to {Accuracy and precision}}, with the nicer aesthetic. '''Probably what you wanted.''' You can lowercase the "A" and it will still link (usually... always good to check) and linking to something like a w|noun}} can generally be written as <nowiki>|noun}}s</nowiki> should you wish the flow of text to seemlessly render the link as being for multiple noun}}s, thanks to a little more background trickery.
:**If you want to use more <nowiki>Accuracy_and_precision|replaced text}}</nowiki> then you get aAccuracy_and_precision|replaced text}} rendering. '''Another possibility for what you'd wish to use, here.'''
:**Similar templates exist for linking the likes of emplate|wiktionary}} and evenemplate|tvtropes}}, should you need them.
:**...noting that the latter needs the NoSpacesVersion of the title and because tropes|TVTropesWillRuinYourLife|TV Tropes Will Ruin Your Life}}, it has a slightly more forboding format, even though it isn't really ''that'' much worse than [[214: The Problem with Wikipedia]]. ;)
:In case that's of any use to you, or anybody else. There are a few more tips and tricks, but this covers a lot of the usage-cases.
:Also, in discussion pages and ones like this, it's useful to sign your contribution with the four tildes. But it's easy to forget and there are templates to mark unsigned contribution. As I did above. Don't worry about it. It just lets you datestamp and demarkate elements of conversation in a useful manner. As a first edit, you can be forgiven, but just so you know for future! [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.57|172.70.91.57]] 18:21, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

** "'it's trivial enough to do yourself in a similar way to how you edited here'" Those options do not seem to be open to me if I do not set up an account; I'm not ready to take that step, so it looks like I can only edit behind-the-scenes pages, not comic pages. Thanks for the advice! I do enjoy the site when I check in! [[Special:Contributions/172.71.182.17|172.71.182.17]] 18:35, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
** Never mind. I found the option. I didn't realize the new comic page was separate from the main page. I was trying to edit the main page. Thanks! [[Special:Contributions/172.71.182.17|172.71.182.17]] 18:39, 9 November 2022 (UTC)
:...I must say, I never thought about that, or I might have not concentrated on the link-formatting stuff (which I hope was just as useful, in its own way).
:As you see, I'm also not 'ready' to set up an account. But I rarely go via the main page, which is locked against trivial vandalism, plus know that the useful editing occurs only in the transcluded source page anyway. And now so do you, happily.
:I don't know if that confusion catches out many potential editors, but at least now you know yourself. And, from one IP to another, Welcome! I hope you now find yourself productively editing away in the future, if you have anything else useful to include. No obligation, of course, except to play nice if you do. ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.11|172.70.86.11]] 19:20, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

==There's a lot of vandalism going on==

See the page history of any recent comic page. Not sure what to do about it. [[User:Equites|Equites]] ([[User talk:Equites|talk]]) 00:57, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

:Ban 162.158.107.56 and 172.71.150.83, they seem to be the perpetuators. [[User:Starstar|Starstar]] ([[User talk:Starstar|talk]]) 02:15, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

As of the 22nd, the users ChuddyCobson and CobsonTheGemson are responsible for a large amount of attacks and image vandalism, most of them NSFW (inappropiate and/or gore). Can something be done about them? [[User:Gyozaplanet|Gyozaplanet]]

I noticed the image for 1460 has been vandalized. But, in looking at the history it shows an old vandalism that was fixed. But following the link in the alleged fix gets the vandalized image. I'm out of my depth for fixing this, but couldn't find a better place to report it. It's getting too late and I'm far too tired to do more... (As an aside to what I came here for, are the above two things vandalism here? That's a rathole I'm not continuing down.) [[User:MAP|MAP]] ([[User talk:MAP|talk]]) 09:37, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

A few hours ago I decided to visit this wiki, and got quite the surprise on the front page, in that it was heavily vandalized. Decided to make an account after looking at recent changes and saw how much there was.

The accounts involved seem to be these;
* CobsonTheGemson
* ChuddyCobson
* Cobson
* Stinkycobbypoopoo
* Chud
* GotTheJakkyDoe

Kinda confused since they don't seem to be bots but I assume they're using a script or something to automate their vandalism. As far as I know, A few other people and I reverted more or less everything those accounts have done but it's possible some stuff fell through the cracks.

Also some of the gifs I reverted (most notably the gif for 381) seem to still have the same image so I'm hoping that's just a cache thing that'll sort itself out in time.

I left the above weirdness since I don't know the etiquette for deleting stuff in this section and it would remove some context to the above person's post. Hope I didn't break anything while cleaning up. [[User:Neerti|Neerti]] ([[User talk:Neerti|talk]]) 10:24, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

:Cleaned up some accounts '''[[User:Davidy22|Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 16:38, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

== Opening Certain Pages causes mediawiki errors ==

For example [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/explain_xkcd:Community_portal/Proposals Proposals] and [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/User:Dgbrt this user page] [[User:Starstar|Starstar]] ([[User talk:Starstar|talk]]) 02:10, 19 November 2022 (UTC)

== Apparent abuse of multiple accounts ==
For a few weeks (mostly the last few days) 51 accounts with the same soon-current name [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=newusers&user=&page=User%3ASadSanta&pattern=1&year=&month=-1&tagfilter=&subtype= have been created]. To me it looks like preparation for abuse of multiple accounts. —[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User:While False/explain xkcd museum|'''museum''']] | [[User talk:While False|talk]] | [[special:Contributions/While_False|contributions]] | [[special:Log/While_False|logs]] | [[Special:UserRights/While_False|rights]] | [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User:While_False&printable=yes printable version] | [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User:While_False&action=info page information] | [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere/User:While_False what links there] | [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special:RecentChangesLinked&days=30&from=&target=User%3AWhile_False related changes] | [https://www.google.com Google search] | current time: CURRENTTIME}}) 11:44, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
:Now, they’re 195. —[[User:While False|While False]] ([[User:While False/explain xkcd museum|'''museum''']] | [[User talk:While False|talk]] | [[special:Contributions/While_False|contributions]] | [[special:Log/While_False|logs]] | [[Special:UserRights/While_False|rights]] | [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User:While_False&printable=yes printable version] | [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User:While_False&action=info page information] | [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere/User:While_False what links there] | [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special:RecentChangesLinked&days=30&from=&target=User%3AWhile_False related changes] | a late contribution | current time: CURRENTTIME}}) 17:24, 19 December 2022 (UTC)
::With the exception of being 'topical', these are quite typical of numerous other "<commonroot><randomchars>" sets of never-ever-used usernames. It is good to be aware of them, but I think this 'common root' was just randomly grabbed by the algorithm (or its master) without any particular view to be used any more effectively than before.
::I leave it to those who can actually do something to decide ''whether'' to actually do something, but I'm currently not so concerned. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.127|172.70.91.127]] 01:06, 20 December 2022 (UTC)
::Addendum - alongside "SadSanta...", we're getting a lot of [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=newusers&user=&page=User%3ANatasha&pattern=1&year=&month=-1&tagfilter=&subtype= "Natasha"s], while around this time last year (as the first time glanced back at) we had [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=newusers&user=&page=User%3APellGync&pattern=1&year=&month=-1&tagfilter=&subtype= "PellGync"] and [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special%3ALog&type=newusers&user=&page=User%3ASnawlrab&pattern=1&year=&month=-1&tagfilter=&subtype= "Snawlrab"] as the common roots concerned. Which ultimately came of nought.
::I get the impression that the limited-success script (as being used to create spam-accounts, but overwhelmingly failing to then exploit them) is set up to randomly apply two such common roots at a time (or else there's two copies of the code running, wherever, each switching out 'exhausted' roots for the next enqueued one in their own list ...as and when necessary). A quick poke into other 'recent' historic points in the Account Creation log highly supports this, but it could do with a far more rigorous analysis to be more definite. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.118|172.71.242.118]] 01:31, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

There also used to be a lot of eight-letter usernames. Too many usernames are being created every day. --[[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 22:03, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

== Current troll(s) ==
There's trolls posting extremely obscene stuff on the homepage, and frankly I'm appalled. The Admins need to take several steps to lock down the main page so that it's not possible for readers to view such obscene content (for example, why are arbitrary images that don't come from xkcd.com allowed???) Why are random users allowed to post arbitrary images that are not filtered/scanned in any way? ([[User:bkayes|bkayes]])
: It's been like this forever. It's rare enough that the admins leave things fairly open, but lengthy stretches lead to the lockdowns you're asking for, usually for about a week which is usually sufficient. Mixed feelings. There are a lot of tools that could help a lot, but we can't get [[User:Jeff]] to upgrade because his hosting deal depends on some ad stuff that won't port to newer versions. :( [[User:Liv2splain|Liv2splain]] ([[User talk:Liv2splain|talk]]) 04:45, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
:: Image uploads being open is usually nicer for everyone, except in the scenario while children decide to use it as an avenue for vandalism. I got enough on my hands already to be dealing with but this probably demands some attention '''[[User:Davidy22|Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 16:38, 22 December 2022 (UTC)
::: (Rerationalised under a new header, as a different issue, though also related to a prior section's 'insertion/revival' in response to the idiot concerned, too.) Appreciated, David. Noting that the inability for me to correct the account-led vandalism, last night, is the one factor that might eventually push me to establish a non-IP presence. But we had other volunteer accounts reacting fairly well to the trouble, and I knew we'd settle down soon enough. Anyhoo, Merry Christmas to you and the others on the side of stability, while I'm here and chatting away. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.136|172.71.178.136]] 17:00, 22 December 2022 (UTC)

::: I find it unfortunate that "rarity" is any sort of excuse for allowing this to happen. XKCD is a fantastic source of quality STEM entertainment, and thus is a great resource to get younger audiences interested in such fields through humor. Many high school age and younger people regularly view xkcd content. However, some of the comics are quite obscure or contain a lot of depth, which is why explainxkcd has been such a great resource for everyone to learn things that are outside of their depth (including younger audiences). The knowledge that someone can open explainxkcd and have the slightest chance that they see extreme gore/porn is absolutely absurd and unacceptable for a wiki that is serving solely family friendly science content. I can no longer recommend explainxkcd to people I know (and especially not younger people) because of the lack of modern anti-trolling tooling, and that really sucks. I understand the issues surrounding locking down the text explanations, but the images should be a trivially solvable problem. Compare a checksum between the image found at *.xkcd.com and the image uploaded and reject an image that doesn't match, or better yet *use the official xkcd RSS feed* (https://xkcd.com/rss.xml) to download the images directly, and don't allow any user edits of the images. Then you can deal with vandalization of the text some other time, locking down the images is really the highest priority here I think. ([[User:bkayes|bkayes]]) 04:17, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

== [[2659: Unreliable Connection]] ==

Could probably do with some page protection here. Thanks. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.231|162.158.34.231]] 23:41, 29 December 2022 (UTC)
:If you mean for the thing that [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2659:_Unreliable_Connection&diff=prev&oldid=303665 gets reverted very quickly], I think that's already dealt with quite nicely. And it isn't the only page that is targetted, so where do you stop? Whole-site lockdown, when the occasonal automated spam is equally automatically reverted? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.21|162.158.74.21]] 00:05, 30 December 2022 (UTC)
::Over the past couple of weeks, the edit history of this particular page has consisted of nothing but vandalism and it's subsequent reversion. The vandal doesn't seem to be targeting (m)any other pages, so protection should make them go away. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.79.158|172.69.79.158]] 21:43, 14 January 2023 (UTC)
:::Nonetheless, the same tactic has been seen (and reverted, promptly) on other comics, like #976. ''edit: ...and #2503 suffered this vandalism/reversion, again, on 15 Jan 2023.'' Block 2659 and 976 from editing and someone may easily change the config for the script and hit any othe page they please, not really reducing the ultimate change/revert frequency, just where it is happening.
:::I'll accept gradual locking down of progressively more and more of the site, if it happens, but I'm not sure it'd be of any real benefit to do so. Not my call, so just giving my POV... [[Special:Contributions/162.158.34.74|162.158.34.74]] 23:47, 14 January 2023 (UTC)
Someone pointed out that the spams are more likely to occur on pages with "Connect" in their titles. [[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 10:49, 31 March 2023 (UTC)

The user talk page with the same name got spammed. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.134.242|172.69.134.242]] 06:18, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

== Announcement: online chat with Randall January 31 ==

Admins: would you please consider adding this blurb to the end of the [[MediaWiki:Sitenotice]] just for this month?

: [https://libraryc.org/mountainviewlibrary/22032 Register to attend an online chat] with [[Randall Munroe]] January 31 at 11am Pacific.

Thank you for your consideration. [[User:Liv2splain|Liv2splain]] ([[User talk:Liv2splain|talk]]) 06:23, 2 January 2023 (UTC)
:Done —[[User:Theusaf|theusaf]] ([[User talk:Theusaf|talk]]) 23:29, 4 January 2023 (UTC)
::Thank you! I'm very much looking forward to the well-attended zoom chat, let alone what should come from the large pool of questions from international fans. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.134.16|172.69.134.16]] 14:04, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

Archive of livestream: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAEutGwIQ9c [[Special:Contributions/162.158.166.173|162.158.166.173]] 19:03, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

==All community portal==
Would you mind semi-protecting [[explain_xkcd:Community_portal/All|this]] and [[explain_xkcd_talk:Community_portal/All|that]] page? They don't seem to need edits. --[[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 17:55, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

== Brief(?) and limited spate of vandalism. ==

It may be a flash in a pan, but there's some [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2293:_RIP_John_Conway&action=history misuse of multiple accounts] going on here as of this timestamp (with ColourfulGalaxy having mostly had to correct matters on their own, so far). FYI, on their behalf. With any luck the idiot involved will get bored soon, if not already, but making a note anyway. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.124|162.158.159.124]] 20:15, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

: He edited my user page just now. --[[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 20:17, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

: I tried to help them, but failed. I had to turn to you for help. [[User:ChristmasGospel|ChristmasGospel]] ([[User talk:ChristmasGospel|talk]]) 20:24, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

: EDIT: By the way, don't call him "idiot", or he may be angry.

::Given that someone [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User:ColorfulGalaxy&curid=25508&diff=304689&oldid=303399 seems to be stalking you], and even snuck in some activity before ''my'' post, above, I'm starting to suspect something more. I leave it to those who can do things to sort it out. As an IP, I don't think I have any say in the matter, but I'll let others consider the possibilities. (You've got to be an idiot to clearly log in with the wrong account, though, and then fail to pick up the changes with the 'right' one. And I knew While False wasn't truly finished trying to do stupid things to the site... You're not impressing anybody, WF.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.201|172.70.85.201]] 20:28, 12 January 2023 (UTC)
:::That’s not typical WF behaviour at all. —[[Special:Contributions/162.158.222.198|162.158.222.198]] 19:38, 27 January 2023 (UTC)

== The online chat s over ==

Please revert https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=MediaWiki:Sitenotice&diff=304122&oldid=239894 [[Special:Contributions/172.70.211.92|172.70.211.92]] 18:45, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

== Users involved in spamming. ==

There are at least three 'people' involved here, using trivial character differences/substitutions:
* https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:Contributions/ElisabethPacheco
* https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:Contributions/EIisabethPacheco
* https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:Contributions/EIizabethPacheco
(...in case not obvious, especially in sans-serif, the second two use capital-I (i) instead of small-l (L), and the s/z difference should be obvious. No obvious signs of anything like using cyrillic look-alike characters, yet.)

There may be others, or will be, but these ones have just recently popped up in spamming (and then obfuscating? ...hoping to be reverted back into the spam version?) the redirect pages [[Drama‎‎]] and [[Google Maps]] (see [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Drama&action=history here] and [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Google_Maps&action=history here]), though they are currently fully reverted. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.35|172.70.90.35]] 04:33, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
:One of these also interacted with a differently named suspicious-looking/acting account:
:* https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:Contributions/CipherGuide
:Could be a coincidence, but... For reference. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.190|172.71.242.190]] 13:18, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
:And now [[User:ElisabethPacheco (do not ban me)]]. [[User:AndroidTheLucario|AndroidTheLucario]] ([[User talk:AndroidTheLucario|talk]]) 03:54, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

Can someone block [[User:Email Trial 1]]? They're repeatedly adding comments on spamming other people's emails. Thanks! ~ [[user:megan|Megan]] she/her [[user talk:megan|talk]]/[[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 16:25, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

== Ongoing image vandalism ==

by [[User:Troonjak|this user]] ([[Special:Contributions/Troonjak|contributions]]). ~ [[user:megan|Megan]] she/her [[user talk:megan|talk]]/[[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 02:50, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

I suggest we raise the threshold for image uploads. After all, there's no reason for most editors to upload images. ~ [[user:megan|Megan]] she/her [[user talk:megan|talk]]/[[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 03:13, 11 March 2023 (UTC)

Bumping this since it happened again. —megan [[user talk:megan|talk]] [[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 07:54, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

== Fix obnoxious typo on the Editor FAQ ==

This page contains a typo and I can't edit it out: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/explain_xkcd:Editor_FAQ

It's highlighted in this sentence:

"You can use the Math markup <nowiki><math>...</math></nowiki>. The other known code from Wikipedia <nowiki><chem>...</chem></nowiki> is not supported yet. It's based on LaTeX syntax and a general overview can be found at '''''it's''''' Wikipedia help page. Don't use it unless you actually understand what you are doing." Edit: Whoops, forgot to sign: [[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 09:04, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

== Update MediaWiki ==

The current MediaWiki version is 1.30.0 which ended support mid-2019, please upgrade to 1.39.x or something due to security concerns. Instructions here https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Upgrading [[User:Cam1170|Cam1170]] ([[User talk:Cam1170|talk]]) 20:55, 29 March 2023 (UTC)
Make sure to upgrade to 1.35 first, from the Check Requirements section.
Actually, 1.31 then 1.35 then 1.39 for the smoothest transition. [[User:Cam1170|Cam1170]] ([[User talk:Cam1170|talk]]) 15:15, 5 July 2023 (UTC)

I would like to add that this is still an issue. I don't know a better way to bring this to admin attention. [[User:Cam1170|Cam1170]] ([[User talk:Cam1170|talk]]) 21:28, 9 November 2023 (UTC)

== user edits someone else's comment ==

https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2760:_Paleontology_Museum&diff=309970&oldid=309964 [[Special:Contributions/162.158.87.65|162.158.87.65]] 09:51, 8 April 2023 (UTC)
::That word is not spelled "Ye". It's "Þe". [[User:Omg Oriental Music Group|Omg Oriental Music Group]] ([[User talk:Omg Oriental Music Group|talk]]) 00:49, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
:::That would depend. We all (FCVO 'all') get your point, but is spelt (or, if you wish, "spelled", but I would like to use the other form) that way by the original commentator. And it was a signed Talk post, not an Explanation page that needs to be standardised(/standardized) by success revisions.
:::Can you also say for definite that it was not intended by the original author to be the second-person plural personal pronoun (nominative), correctly or otherwise, rather than the definite article (under a standard reduced typeset)? No reason to change it, not even if an actual tyop. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.207|172.71.178.207]] 11:56, 9 April 2023 (UTC)
:Yeah, bad practice, except where correcting clear mistakes or otherwise sanitising something best not left up in the open (for whatever good reason). Like if I'd misapplied a style "colour" tag, by accident, but not if I'd openly written "colour" in a Talk entry.
:But not necessary in this case of language-geek hyperconnection. I think a revert/re-edit to restore the original would be not an issue, but I won't do it myself.
:The best way to look smart with the "thorn" character would have been to say "You have 'Ye Olde blah-de-blah', but I hink you meant... [etc]" and own the joke and the smugness rather than try to 'improve' on the original in-situ. As one who has made typos (but also said exactly what I wanted to, perhaps deciding not to over-egg the pudding) I would prefer even a snarky "did you mean.." reply over an invisible 'improvement' that may not even be properly focused any more. Each to their own, but my suggestion, if the editor wants to revise their edit. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.65|172.71.178.65]] 15:54, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

== Deletion of wrongly-titled pages ==
Could you please delete [[:Category:Comics with small caps|this redirect]]? [[User:Memo Spike Connector|2503: Memo Spike Connector]] ([[User talk:Memo Spike Connector|talk]]) 06:18, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Could you delete [[:Category;Comics featuring real people|this page]]? [[User:ClassicalGames|ClassicalGames]] ([[User talk:ClassicalGames|talk]]) 03:29, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

[[Usertalk:Billstz]] turned into a redirect. It should have been deleted. [[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 21:10, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

== Repeated spam in user talk page ==
The page [[User talk:ClassicalGames]] got repeatedly spammed. Could you semiprotect it? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.134.242|172.69.134.242]] 02:07, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

:Hmmmmm, I think he really deserves the spam. He spammed in [[User:ColorfulGalaxy/Sandbox|someone else's user page]] without permission. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.154.228|172.71.154.228]] 03:56, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

:Easily reverted, to restore legitimate conversation. (Perhaps more such attention should go to where some people are [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2293:_RIP_John_Conway&curid=22901&diff=312913&oldid=312626 repeatedly making entirely useless and gratuitous edits]...) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.86|172.71.242.86]] 08:59, 12 May 2023 (UTC)
::Those spammers probably knew the CG rules, and appeared to have welcomed every CG group member with a spam. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.23.33|172.69.23.33]] 09:57, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

== The relevant xkcd comic from not xkcd ==

https://thomaspark.co/2017/01/relevant-xkcd/ This comic. A reference to xkcd, in the style of xkcd, about xkcd.

Can I make a page about it? Please? :)

== What's a "comic incarnate"? ==

[[User:Memo Spike Connector]] seems to have a friend group of users with the names of various comics. E's been changing their user pages ''and signatures'' to match the comic pages and titles. Is this some sort of cult? It sounds fun! Where do I sign up? --[[User:AndroidTheLucario|Your favorite aura doggo]] ([[User talk:AndroidTheLucario|talk]]) 03:18, 10 June 2023 (UTC)
:To answer the title, "incarnate"=="made flesh". Reincarnation is when you're given a new body, again, incarnation can therefore be taken as when the 'spirit' first assumes a tangible (or visible) form.
:To ponder on this fad of creating comic-related user accounts... pretty much unnecessary and has no reason to be encouraged, I suppose. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.62|172.70.162.62]] 03:52, 10 June 2023 (UTC)
::How do I join? I wanna be cool like them! --[[User:AndroidTheLucario|Your favorite aura doggo]] ([[User talk:AndroidTheLucario|talk]]) 03:59, 10 June 2023 (UTC)
:I think this needs to be taken more seriously now. [[User:Memo Spike Connector]] has had their page added to the *category* of Cursed Connectors, despite not being an official comic. It's starting to feel like a very unusual case of vandalism, but I'm not sure. [[User:Tsumikiminiwa|Tsumikiminiwa]] ([[User talk:Tsumikiminiwa|talk]]) 19:37, 14 June 2023 (UTC)
:: Addendum, [[User:Unreliable Connection]] has their page added to the Internet and Social Interactions categories. Everything else I said before still stands. [[User:Tsumikiminiwa|Tsumikiminiwa]] ([[User talk:Tsumikiminiwa|talk]]) 19:41, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

== Main page in phones category ==

The [[Main Page]] is now in the [[:Category:Phones]] category. [[User:ClassicalGames|ClassicalGames]] ([[User talk:ClassicalGames|talk]]) 03:25, 15 June 2023 (UTC)
:Surely because [[2789: Making Plans]], currently transcluded there, is legitimately given that category. I'd be more surprised if it wasn't. (Until Wednesday's new comic release changes this, if it does.) What's the problem, and how is it related to 'your' issue, above? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.146|172.71.178.146]] 10:04, 15 June 2023 (UTC)
::I moved this to its own section, but you can change the section title if you want. --[[User:AndroidTheLucario|Your favorite aura doggo]] ([[User talk:AndroidTheLucario|talk]]) 19:43, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

== please block u|Vandal (and many more)==

cf. [[Special:Contributions/Vandal]] 11 page blankings today. Thanks. [[User:JohnHawkinson|JohnHawkinson]] ([[User talk:JohnHawkinson|talk]]) 21:24, 4 July 2023 (UTC)

Actually, looking at [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special:Log/newusers&limit=500&type=newusers&user= Special:Log/newusers] is pretty ominous. Nearly all of the last 500 (within the past 4 days), and also the next few thousand, are suspicious. The CAPTCHA probably needs to be replaced with something more difficult that is perhaps not as trivially automatable? And all those users blocked? Not sure. [[User:JohnHawkinson|JohnHawkinson]] ([[User talk:JohnHawkinson|talk]]) 22:05, 4 July 2023 (UTC)
:As a regular checker of such things, I know for a fact that you get hundreds of 'suspicious' accounts created every day, and most of them 'go nowhere'. The account creation speedblocks may not be very good. Or, possibly, tens of thousands of accounts are ''tried'' to be created, with 'just' a small percentage of them getting past the CAPTCHA/etc to get noticed by us - the actual top-level site admins will have access to the 'failed to register fully' logs. ''But'', the actual page vandalism is very rarely any of these 'mechanised spam accounts'. I presume because the CAPTCHAs throttle down the 'lucky' accounts' abilities to do anything they were programmed to do ''once'' registered. And, no, the accounts aren't blocked (i.e. disabled accounts, except on very ''rare'' occasions when an Admin gets annoyed with a conspicuously used spam-login), if the actual Block Log is to be believed, but so many get created and ''never'' used so it looks like the "new user early posts" precautionary checks do a very good job.
:We're also getting that idiot (I presume the same idiot as we've had for a year or two now) who manually creates accounts, such as you have been dealing with (and me, and others) over the last 24 hours or so. As a stupid human rather than a 'smart' bot, the CAPTCHA is no block to him/her/them. And the occasional IP gets used in that way, too (and I mostly successfully revert vandalism as only an IP; usefully, I hope) which might just be lazy vandalism, on top of the baseline stupidity. But the precautions against them are different. As with the 'Eric's ("Hi, I see your website needs improving - Eric"-types of message), which also seem to be handled by the community (and/or our automated blocking/reverting).
:I don't see increasing the severity of the CAPTCHA to be a solution to much, honestly. Not from my perspective, certainly, though I know there's no reason to take my own unattributable word on that.
:Instead, we should keep on keeping on. The community handles these things as they need to be. The admins know the 'hidden fight' going on in the background, but won't (and shouldn't) reveal too much about the extent of the first-line defences against bad faith 'automated' edits and the rest. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.140|172.70.90.140]] 08:13, 5 July 2023 (UTC)

Vandalism appeared again in [[2800]]. [[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 20:07, 11 July 2023 (UTC)

== Ban fake IP ==

Could you ban [[User:172.68.102.XXX]]? His edits sound suspicious, and he seems to be fighting against us. [[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 19:41, 11 July 2023 (UTC)

== Vandalism by 172.69.214.158 ==

Large number of extreme vandalism, which ThatoneU is valiantly yet inefficaciously fighting:

example from https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1193:_Externalities&action=history

<pre>
(cur | prev) 01:04, 24 July 2023‎ 172.69.214.158 (talk)‎ . . (6,765 bytes) (-15,000)‎ . . (Undo revision 318344 by ThatoneU (talk)) (undo)
(cur | prev) 00:47, 24 July 2023‎ ThatoneU (talk | contribs)‎ m . . (21,765 bytes) (+15,000)‎ . . (undo)
(cur | prev) 00:46, 24 July 2023‎ 172.69.214.158 (talk)‎ . . (6,765 bytes) (-15,000)‎ . . (undo)
</pre>

== Vandalism on page 2805 ==

The latest comic page (2805) is currently being vandalized. Can an admin please look into it?

== Problem with new accounts and IPs ==

So I'm sure many of you are well aware of the vandalism happening recently. But what concerns me the most is that all the edits were done by many, many different IPs, meaning that we can't just block one, and this site could get overrun by systematic IP vandalism. Also, the new accounts being created seem very suspicious. For such a small community, there's no way that there can be around 100 new users each day. The actual usernames of the users seem to follow a very repetitive pattern (generic first name + generic last name + random number). [[Special:Contributions/172.70.42.209|172.70.42.209]] 18:44, 24 July 2023 (UTC)
:As a fellow IP (and not a vandal myself, at least by intent) I find that the advantages of being able to leap in and correct (often 'named') damage outweigh the relatively small amount of IP-led vandalism. And the details of how the IPs represent the (limited, but geographically distributed) Cloudflare gateways has been noted before a number of times, together with what can be done about/with them.
:About the new accounts... Look back for ''years'', and you'll see the same (or similar) patterns. Almost all the truly rogue (presumably automated generation/'registering') then do nothing else as the site blocks the (still automated) attempts to do something with them.
:The worst danger this site is threatened by is the actual manually-posting individuals who (IPed or named) can do what they like so long as (like us legitimate editors) they are prepared to be sat at the keyboard and spend/waste the time in navigating the initial CAPTCHAs/etc to set down their changes. And there's not much more anybody can do about them without ruining everyone else's experience to a similar degree. Perhaps there's some adjustments possible, but none seem necesary to address the account-spam and other precautions are intercepting/reverting the lion's share of the edit-spam (with or without accounts).
:Not up to me, but I trust in those who it is up to. To continue with what is happening right now or to respond in new ways to anything that needs a new approach. Not saying that I don't have ideas of my own, for if I were able to intervene, but I doubt it'd be useful to voice them. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.158|172.70.162.158]] 21:12, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

== Large amounts of vandalism involving disturbing imagery. ==

Page 2805 has a huge vandalism problem. Vandals (it seems to be the same few people over and over, or maybe one person with multiple addresses) keep covering the page with weird, disturbing photos and way-too-bright colors.
A few people have been valiantly fighting back but that doesn't mean this isn't a problem.
I would like to please request that the page be locked to prevent further vandalism, and that you please ban all the people that have vandalized it in this way before (and/or take some other action to prevent future vandals) . Thank you very much! [[User:(insert name here)|(insert name here)]] ([[User talk:(insert name here)|talk]]) 01:20, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

There also seems to be a parser problem where instead of vandals replacing the page source, the vandalism is appended to the end, even though it isn't in the source. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.174.230|172.71.174.230]] 03:39, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

The optimal way to go would be to add bots that automatically replace questionable content like divs and detect image/word spam (like the one in Wikipedia). They would always be on so the vandals would get overwhelmed. Similarly I'd suggest monitoring the constant stream of IP addresses and created accounts. Most editors are IP addresses though, so you might want to watch out for that. Does ExplainXKCD have semiprotection capabilities? You would definitely want to do that, especially the important articles like [[xkcd]], [[Randall Munroe]], [[Cueball]], [[1:_Barrel_-_Part_1]], and ALL of the templates (the vandals were targeting those the most). [[User:84596Gamma|84596Gamma]] ([[User talk:84596Gamma|talk]]) 11:53, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

: I agree that the important pages (primary pages, plus all templates) need to be protected somehow so that this can't happen again. It's nice to have a low threshold to editing; it's nicer having a resource that can be depended on and doesn't require random volunteers jumping in to save. (Let's be honest; the images the vandal posted could have been much, much worse.) -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 12:28, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

:: What the heck is 'Explain XKCD Administrator' doing? He seems to also be doing some weird div BS, making it so that it's impossible to scroll or click on templates or some comics. Blocking would be heavily advised. [[User:84596Gamma|84596Gamma]] ([[User talk:84596Gamma|talk]]) 12:39, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

== Becoming an admin? ==

Hi. I've been contributing occasionally for eight years now, and I think I've been helpful. But, almost half of the edits were last night in that wave of vandalism. It was very frustrating knowing that I had the same tools as the (14-year-old?) vandal, and the only end-point to the fun would be one of us throwing in the towel, and it was probably going to me (bedtime).

I don't have the time and/or commitment to do regular moderation work, but I (think I) am a reasonable person, who deals with conflicts rationally and could help out in a pinch. Is there a chance I could be given some more powers to help out if (when) such a crap-storm happens again? Thanks for your consideration... -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 11:14, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

:I saw your efforts, early on in my own day, definitely looked to be amongst the helpful editors. I later picked up several cases (might have missed a couple, that others IDed before me) after I got online, and undid that latest form of vandalism in both templates (agree with above, they probably should be semi-protected) and pages. A simple Undo even at my level was sufficient to revert practically everything. What might have been handy was one of the top-moderators being around to use the mass-revert tools to streamline that, and keep on top of the account (or account''s'', as the problematic one would definitely open new accounts - we've seen them do this before) deserving to be blocked and banished. Unfortunately, the freedom of a wiki (which I value) doesn't really work well with over-administration. But that's a discussion to be had by those already at the top levels. I don't envy them. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.164|172.70.90.164]] 18:08, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

:: Well, the 14-year-old is back. I'm losing interest in fighting this mud-fest without real admin tools. -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 20:11, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
::: We really need to stop this wave of persistent vandalism with protection. When will the admins notice our suffering? [[User:84596Gamma|84596Gamma]] ([[User talk:84596Gamma|talk]]) 20:23, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
::: I feel your pain. I caught (and had to recatch) a few of them as he turned up whilst I was browsing/considering proper edits. nd then I noticed you had appeared and were also retroing them, just as I thought I was barely keeping pace. But he's slackened off, so maybe you arriving here has made the difference. (And I'm fed up with pictures of fire hydrants!) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.214|172.70.91.214]] 20:20, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
::::Me too... I'm coming to help. Hopefully we can fight that manchild off. Also I call death and destruction to Captcha. [[User:84596Gamma|84596Gamma]] ([[User talk:84596Gamma|talk]]) 20:22, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
:::: It's frustrating to watch the same few IP addresses wreak all this havoc. Being able to ban them would be a joy; why can't we have that power? -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 20:31, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
::::: OK: 2/3 of my contributions have been in the last 24 hours fighting Bozo-Man in all his flamboyant IP addresses. Without further powers, I'm done, because (unlike Bozo-Man) I have better things to do. Sorry... -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 22:39, 25 July 2023 (UTC)
:::::: What powers do you need? --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]])
::::::: I'm not looking for Super Duper Guru™ powers, just something that would even the battle a bit. No, that's not true: I'm looking for something that would make the battle ''unfair'' by making it easier to clean things up than it is to vandalize them. For instance, of the 123 vandalisms I reverted over the pat 24 hours, a third of them were from the top four IP addresses, and two thirds were from the top ten. If you only look at the first three quads of the IP addresses, half came from just two subnets. Block a few IP addresses, and the moderation load would go way down. (And that ignores the work the other users did.)
::::::: It makes sense that you wouldn't want to be handing out Thor's Hammer indiscriminately, but (IMO) something needs to change. If MediaWiki's moderation permissions aren't selective enough for your tastes, I'd be happy to follow your guidance (e.g. no blocking people for more than 24 hours). -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 01:16, 26 July 2023 (UTC)
:::::::: Congrats, you are promoted, thanks for helping out. See me in a week if you still want the powers. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]])
::::::::: Thank you. Any guidance for the newbie admin? Or should I just "moderate moderately"? -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 01:33, 26 July 2023 (UTC)
:::::::::: Block and move... block and move. Great power / great responsibility and all that. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]])

== Preventation of vandalism ==

I'll bet the entire budget of the Death Star II that the vandalizer is going to strike again in a few hours. We should be more prepared - I've already cut links to templates, and we should be vigilant about the pages they are going to attack: the current comic, templates, important pages. [[User:84596Gamma|84596Gamma]] ([[User talk:84596Gamma|talk]]) 00:06, 26 July 2023 (UTC)
: What do you need to help? Let me know. --[[User:Jeff|Jeff]] ([[User talk:Jeff|talk]])
:: Semiprotect all the templates. [[User:84596Gamma|84596Gamma]] ([[User talk:84596Gamma|talk]]) 00:52, 26 July 2023 (UTC)

== Username request ==

It looks like an impersonator registered an account under my name. Is it possible for me to get that username? [[User:Randall Munroe 2|Randall Munroe 2]] ([[User talk:Randall Munroe 2|talk]]) 04:41, 30 July 2023 (UTC)
:: To ask an obvious question: who are you? And, if you say you are the Randall Munroe of XKCD fame, how can we be sure? -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 12:41, 30 July 2023 (UTC)
::''May I have your attention, please?''
::''May I have your attention, please?''
::''Will the real Randall Munroe please stand up?''
::''I repeat''
::''Will the real Randall Munroe please stand up?''
::''We're gonna have a problem here...''
::(...but, in my assessmemt, Randall would have actual more direct ways of introducing himself to; if he suddenly decided to muddy the water by descending to our level when his interactions even with the forum were minimal; if he hasn't already been here/there/wherever all along, incognito and with/without the administrators knowing this. But Randall's technical and connected enough to not need to ask the above the way it was asked.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.181|172.70.162.181]] 15:36, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

== user page ==

how do i put stuff in my profile? others have done it but for mine it says that i don't have permission to create that page [[User:An user who has no account yet|An user who has no account yet]] ([[User talk:An user who has no account yet|talk]]) 16:01, 5 September 2023 (UTC)
: Don't know why you couldn't, but I now have created your user and talk pages; let us know if you now can't edit them. [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 16:08, 5 September 2023 (UTC)
:: There appears to be a rather restrictive page creation policy (it may be dialled up fairly high to age of account, possibly more so than any mere contributions-count), at least in regard to User-typed namespaces. Many account-creators have noted this, and had to be helped out. I suspect it's just their making that An User was ever prevented from. After all, even I can add things to User (and, more correctly and politely, User Talk) pages. And I'm not even a usernamed person. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.230|172.70.85.230]] 20:28, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

== Unable to edit ==
For the last two months, I was unable to make any edits. Is my account secretly locked? Also, I couldn't even post tweets. Did I offend you? [[User:ConlangGuide|ConlangGuide]] ([[User talk:ConlangGuide|talk]]) 23:38, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

:Also, I tried to post on ClassicalGames's talk page but it was messy. [[User:ConlangGuide|ConlangGuide]] ([[User talk:ConlangGuide|talk]]) 23:43, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

== cannot create user page ==

Like all the other instances of this, it just says "There is currently no text in this page. You can search for this page title in other pages, or search the related logs, but you do not have permission to create this page." At least it isn't just me [[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]] ([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk]]) 16:43, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

: Created your user and talk page with placeholder text (".") -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 19:20, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

:: much thanks! now to wait until i can make my own custom css page [[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]] ([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk]]) 19:38, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

:I didn't want to create yet another discussion topic for the same issue, so I put it here. Could someone create my user page as well? Thanks. [[User:Obwankenobi|Obwankenobi]] ([[User talk:Obwankenobi|talk]]) 20:14, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

=== Same here. ===

I'm almost glad I'm not the only one with this issue with the user and talk page. I was kind of asking myself what I've done not to be permitted a user page, you know. I remember trying to create one once upon a time, which included a link to my own webcomic. It didn't save for some reason and after that I wasn't permitted to create a user page. So if a link to your own hobbyist scribblings is considered illicit advertising, please let me know in order to avoid misunderstandings. [[User:PaulEberhardt|PaulEberhardt]] ([[User talk:PaulEberhardt|talk]]) 14:54, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
:With a dozen edits (up to and including the above), and a decent amount of time, I'd have expected you to be over the nominal threshold to give you the right to create your pages.
:(I'm not entirely sure what the criteria are, off the top of my head, though I know it's been discussed elsewhere. And if I were configuring it, I'd not put too much weight on "the number of edits" or "the net amount of added bytes"/whatever, as it could encourage pointless editing-for-the-sake-of-editing, rather than relying upon 'time served' to weed out those who are in a rush to create havoc... but there's arguments to make it a combination of criteria. And it's not up to me, anyway..!)
:Firstly, have you tried again recently, like right now? If you have, and it still won't 'take', or even let you get that far, then there's plenty of longer-term/higher-intensity users that ''might'' look kindly upon your participation and answer your plight. But do try again.
:And I'd say that (within reason, like avoid linking to anywhere dodgy or uploading masses of total junk) you're free to make your User page into anything you want. I'm pretty sure you aren't going to want to cross any 'line' (official or otherwise), so all the best. And bumping your request. (Also slightly sub-headering, because it is rather a reply to the above header. I might just have added an indented reply straight off, but... again... it's not really for the likes of me to say, so I'm only tweaking it, not merging it in.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.38.71|162.158.38.71]] 20:57, 16 June 2024 (UTC)

::Cheers for the info, and for the tweak! I didn't know how to make sub-headings (yes, I'm that wiki-illiterate - lol), or I'd have done it myself. Possibly I'm just not over this mysterious threshold, being a somewhat irregular visitor with a slight penchant for bad puns, but I certainly do intend to make contributions that actually contribute to something whenever I can (btw. my own webcomic, actually two webcomics by now, are both All Ages and hosted on a well-known webcomic community site, so it's certainly nothing dodgy from my point of view). I don't want to make a fuss about it all, either. If nothing works after a year or so, I'll just start over with a new account or something and see what happens. [[User:PaulEberhardt|PaulEberhardt]] ([[User talk:PaulEberhardt|talk]]) 18:24, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

== Small css-related changes to two templates ==

I've explained what changes I want made in the talk pages for [[Template:Comic]] and [[Template:Comic discussion]] already, but I think I might need to mention them here too. Changing the templates shouldn't cause any adverse effects, and allow for more versatility for users who create their own CSS. [[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]]([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk i guess]]|[[Special:Contributions/SomeoneIGuess|le edit list]])

: You should sign your comments with "-- ~~~~", which will insert your username. And, there's a very low chance that anyone with the power to change the CSS to wander by; we've been on our own for a while. -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 22:01, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

: Added the class names. —[[User:Theusaf|theusaf]] ([[User talk:Theusaf|talk]]) 15:39, 1 November 2023 (UTC)

:: THANK YOU!!! The face of pure shock and excitement i felt when seeing this was beyond my wildest dreams ˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶ [[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]]([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk i guess]]|[[Special:Contributions/SomeoneIGuess|le edit list]]) 15:46, 2 November 2023 (UTC)

== Math Module breaks all pages with it ==

[[2070]] and [[2034]] appear to be broken for some reason. They wont load at all with the following reason:

<code>
MediaWiki internal error.

Original exception: [ZUPRak3GkbeSokPCcKIp8AAAAJI] 2023-11-02 16:42:18: Fatal exception of type "MWException"

Exception caught inside exception handler.

Set $wgShowExceptionDetails = true; at the bottom of LocalSettings.php to show detailed debugging information.</code>

[[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]]([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk i guess]]|[[Special:Contributions/SomeoneIGuess|le edit list]]) 16:42, 2 November 2023 (UTC)
:: [[2295]] also broken. Must be related to the Math module. [[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]]([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk i guess]]|[[Special:Contributions/SomeoneIGuess|le edit list]]) 16:44, 2 November 2023 (UTC)
:: Full list of broken pages:
::* [[128: dPain over dt]]
::* [[687: Dimensional Analysis]]
::* [[849: Complex Conjugate]]
::* [[899: Number Line]]
::* [[969: Delta-P]]
::* [[1047: Approximations]]
::* [[2028: Complex Numbers]]
::* [[2034: Equations]]
::* [[2048: Curve-Fitting]]
::* [[2059: Modified Bayes' Theorem]]
::* [[2070: Trig Identities]]
::* [[2117: Differentiation and Integration]]
::* [[2295: Garbage Math]]
::* Possibly more [[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]]([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk i guess]]|[[Special:Contributions/SomeoneIGuess|le edit list]]) 00:14, 3 November 2023 (UTC)
:::On further analysis, it seems to be related to the MathML setting. [[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]]([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk i guess]]|[[Special:Contributions/SomeoneIGuess|le edit list]]) 19:23, 9 November 2023 (UTC)
i might be able to read the error if someone turns that setting on - [[User:Bb777|;)]] ([[User talk:Bb777|talk]]) 00:48, 22 March 2025 (UTC)
the proposals page also went. :00:24, 23 March 2025 (UTC)[[User:Bb777|((([...]((((((((]] ([[User talk:Bb777|talk]])

update:[[User:dgbrt|dgbrt user page]] has the same error- [[User:Bb777|me]] ([[User talk:Bb777|talk]]) 17:45, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

== Way to contact the site hosters? ==

I have tried posting at Jeff's talk page to no avail. Maybe yáll admins have a red phone hotline to Jeff? See reasons at [[explain xkcd:Community portal/Technical#Way to contact the site hosters?]]. [[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 01:34, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

== Escape speed is no longer incomplete ==

Can you delete the text at the top of every page except the main page that says ''"We still need to complete some explanations like this one: 2765: Escape Speed. All incomplete explanations are here."''? Escape speed is no longer incomplete, so that is wrong.[[User:B_for_brain|B for brain]] ([[User_talk:B_for_brain|talk]]) ([https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCg4bo-hj-mDyOOUp_Yp0pug youtube channel] [https://bforbrain.weebly.com/ wobsite (supposed to be a blag)] 14:03, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

This keeps happening with other comics too [[User:Moderator|Moderator]] ([[User talk:Moderator|talk]]) 21:44, 18 April 2024 (UTC)

== Vandal Issue ==

we've got vandals all over [[2875: 2024]], and they're getting persistent [[User:SomeoneIGuess|someone, i guess]]([[User talk:SomeoneIGuess|talk i guess]]|[[Special:Contributions/SomeoneIGuess|le edit list]]) 16:50, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
:At least one vandalism per minute. Even with Someoene and I both reverting, it's showing the racist message most of the time. Can Explainxkcd protect a page? [[User:Nitpicking|Nitpicking]] ([[User talk:Nitpicking|talk]]) 17:54, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
::Deleting the vandal's ignorant... let's call it "self-defense" to be generous. What exactly is supposed to be "not racist" about a derogatory term for black men - which features prominently in the edit summaries is left as an exercise for the reader. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.146.181|162.158.146.181]] 18:35, 2 January 2024 (UTC)
:Preferably also rev-del the revisions and summaries. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.71.13|172.69.71.13]] 18:40, 2 January 2024 (UTC)

== XKCD Browser ==

I made a [https://github.com/kristianbenoit/XKCD XKCD browser] in python with pygame and think it could be useful to others. The idea was to popup a comic the morning after it was published from a crontab. There could be a hotkey to point to todays discussion on explainxkcd. I wonder where/how would be the place to advertise it ? [[User:Kbenoit|Kbenoit]] ([[User talk:Kbenoit|talk]]) 15:36-40, 20 February 2024 (UTC)
:Here's a good start. Perhaps on the comic discussions for similar things ([https://uni.xkcd.com/ unixkcd], etc). As and when you get a User page here then you can perhaps expound on it there (assuning you aren't leaving the explanation to the github webspace. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.172|172.71.178.172]] 16:01, 20 February 2024 (UTC)
::You (other IP, in the 160s.*) meant well, but [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=explain_xkcd:Community_portal/Admin_requests&diff=prev&oldid=335412 the person who linked my text] was not me and that link isn't directly useful for K's purpose. Maybe indeed I should have pointed at [[UniXKCD]], or [[Talk:UniXKCD]], but I wasn't sure that was even the best place on here. Look around the [[:Category:Interactive comics]], and/or ones featuring browsers lrominently, maybe.
::I repeat that you (Kristian, with our help at bumping the contribution here) have already now made it known/knowable, at least to those who browse this site widely, but once you get a Userspace page you can perhaps do a little bit more in your own free space and also push people there through subtle pointers or signature-links in further on-context contributions. This isn't really a place for random advertising, but definitely contextual links to offsite xkcd 'fandom' is not something I'd personally have issues with (certainly compared to some other things that might get snuck on here). [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.62|172.70.91.62]] 13:43, 21 February 2024 (UTC)

== Vandalism-related Ban Request ==

Hey, if any of the admins see this, can you please ban Jupitale? They’ve made 11 vandalism-related edits, within the time frame of about 21 hours. Even though they haven’t ben active since February 28, I feel like it’s better to err on the more cautious side. Thanks! ^_^ [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 01:09, 5 March 2024 (UTC)
:It'd be even more cautious not to [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User:Ash123&action=history create userpages] for a user that [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:1211:_Birds_and_Dinosaurs&diff=prev&oldid=336532 was only here to spam us].. (Note to admins: add Ash123 to that todo list, if we're calling them out, and I know I've reverted some other single-spamming usernames recently.) But you just know that a ban for anyone like 'Jupitale' (as much as they'd deserve it) is going to be of no actual consequence to them.
:And hold off on all those other userpages, 42. It's not your job, and you might not be right about the usefulness of the ones you're (seemingly randomly) creating. Without even being asked. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.194.217|172.69.194.217]] 01:55, 5 March 2024 (UTC)

== Countdown ==

Can we please have an xkcd-like countdown on the top of every page for how many days left till the next april fool's comic? (Eg. today it would say "7 days untill the next april fool's comic!") [[User:B_for_brain|B for brain]] ([[User_talk:B_for_brain|talk]]) ([https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCg4bo-hj-mDyOOUp_Yp0pug youtube channel] [https://bforbrain.weebly.com/ wobsite (supposed to be a blag)] 10:26, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
:What certainty is there that there'll be one? If/when get the April Fool, or past it, do we reset for the next, or start counting down to the next hypothetical New Year, Christmas, Halloween comic or "Two/Seven/Ten Years" reanniversary? We need to know a few more details to the idea.
:And I presume you meant "a countdown in a suitably xkcx-ish manner, as there have been countdowns for books/etc but not a consistent approach, just some wide ranging but apt creative teasers [[Special:Contributions/172.69.194.225|172.69.194.225]] 11:32, 25 March 2024 (UTC)
:Shhhh, it's supposed to be a surprise! I mean, in my opinion, I'd rather want to see people caught off guard in the comments rather than warn them. [[User:Asdf|Asdf]] ([[User talk:Asdf|talk]]) 12:35, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

== Unblock request ==

Hello! I tried to sign up for an account a couple years ago, but I happened to sign up during a major vandal attack, and an admin blocked me based on a mistaken accusation of vandalism and sockpuppetry. I had used the account [[User:Danny E. Corchado]], then I used [[User:Danny Corchado]] to attempt to appeal my block shortly afterwards; both accounts are now blocked. I no longer have the password to the former, but I can log in to the latter account. Can someone please unblock [[User:Danny Corchado]]? If someone creates [[User talk:Danny Corchado]], I should be able to edit that page to prove I do control the account. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.151.21|172.71.151.21]] 02:26, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
:ill give you the benefit of doubt-done and done [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 04:19, 1 April 2024 (UTC)
::Really? You actually think this could work like that? Both(/'both'?) of you? I wondered why you (42) randomly created that user's page from (from 'your' perspective) the mists of time. Which doesn't help unblock anyone, there's not even any logic in that request. (Once unblocked, whoever controls the account can prove that ''they control the account''. But where does that lead anyone?)
::And why would you associate ''in any way'' with an account 'of no account' that was linked with vandalism? You can only be judged by your actions, as you can choose any name (within reason) that you want. "Mr Corchado" still has uncounted options left if he absolutely must post, in all good faith, as 'Dan Corchado' or similar. You've been here long enough (longer than your current username) to know all this. Sheesh... [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.77|172.70.85.77]] 11:03, 1 April 2024 (UTC)

== Adding images from 2916: Machine ==

I created most of the page for 2916: Machine, but do not have permissions to upload images to embed for each object/character, could someone either upload all the images I have linked on the page, or allow for me to upload the images? Thanks [[User:Claire Kholin|Claire Kholin]] ([[User talk:Claire Kholin|talk]]) 18:56, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

== Main Page Deletion ==

Hi. When I logged in today, I saw that the Main Page was deleted just 2 minutes before by Mark Hurd. If I remember correctly, he was confirmed to have passed on Wikipedia, and other Admins were talking about de-sysopping him. Can someone please explain this? Thanks, [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 15:44, 11 April 2024 (UTC)
:After Kynde restored the Main Page, he didn't protect it. Could someone please protect it so that trolls and vandals can't mess with it, like last time? Thanks. [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 00:18, 13 April 2024 (UTC)

== "Interesting" Account Creations ==

Hi. So I was looking at the user creation log, and I noticed a suspicious number of accounts-at least 90% of them-are being created using a <Semi-generic first name> <semi-generic last name> <usally two or three numbers>. This would be kinda weird in the first place, however, almost none of the accounts are active. That and the fact that these accounts are being created no less than 10 minutes from each other made me think somethings a little weird. Maybe I'm just dumb. Just wanted to bring it to your attention in case this wasn't a normal thing.[[User:Apollo11|Apollo11]] ([[User talk:Apollo11|talk]]) 17:17, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
I looked a bit further, the exact same thing happened two months ago as well, but the names were random letters instead [[User:Apollo11|Apollo11]] ([[User talk:Apollo11|talk]]) 17:34, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
:It's been happening (in various forms) for years. Maybe a decade, if not more. For as long as I've been paying attention, certainly, which might well be that long.
:Without access to the whole admin logs, it seems to reflect the intention of 'bots to spam, spam and spam again, automatically, creating accounts they will use to do so but then hitting the actually rather effective anti-bot defenses, so they do absolutely nothing (well, maybe they're lucky every now and again, but practically insignificant successes, and IP-only spams seem to dominate, at maybe twice a week for who-knows-how-many wctual attempts).
:Amongst the current bunch randomly created names, I see a few that are clearly created around the word "Ingredients" (rather than a feedstock to create 'FirstnameLastname', which has long been the main default). I take it that each meta-pattern we see as indicative of a different bot-farmer's efforts, so this might have been started up for a particular spam-theme. Which maybe we'll get an idea of if it gets lucky. Though I'm in no hurry to find out such details. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.13|172.71.242.13]] 12:39, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
Awesome, glad that its under control then :) [[User:Apollo11|Apollo11]] ([[User talk:Apollo11|talk]]) 14:32, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
:Recently created a public-facing wiki and I can confirm these accounts are would-be spambots (they started spamming my wiki until I made it impossible to register an account without already having one). —Megan [[user talk:megan|talk]] [[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 09:07, 16 July 2024 (UTC)
::Not to question your decision on how to do this, but idly wondering how many people who already have an account would want to register a new one, and why... RPing with alts actively encouraged, and nobody new joining in? Sounds interesting, but I feel I've misunderstood somehow. (And solving the problem however you want to is your perogative.) [[Special:Contributions/172.69.195.123|172.69.195.123]] 10:35, 16 July 2024 (UTC)
:::It's a small wiki mostly for me and my friends; I was silly and thought nothing could go wrong if I left account creation wide open since the wiki isn't linked from anywhere . I guess it must have been someone scanning the IPv4 address space. I don't need anyone registering anymore unless I make new acquaintances/friends, in which case I'll make an account for them. —Megan [[user talk:megan|talk]] [[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 14:41, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

==Block request==

Can someone block 42.book.addict on my profile and vice versa? We're having issues and I wanna stop with them. 19:34, 29 April 2024 (UTC)

== Problem with email verification. ==

I'm not getting the verification email. I checked everywhere in my inboxes, and dodecatuple-checked the email address I provided. Can anything be done? Although I guess it doesn't seem to be strictly necessary. Thank you. [[User:Paintadot|Paintadot]] ([[User talk:Paintadot|talk]]) 17:10, 2 May 2024 (UTC)

== Reclaim user account "rosuav" ==

I tried to sign in to make a small edit to #2954, but I can't create an account with my standard user name "Rosuav" due to one already existing; yet there's apparently no email address on file for that username. Is there a way to prove that I am that person, and request that it be unlocked? I use the same name everywhere eg GitHub, Twitch, Discord, Twitter (if that's at all relevant any more), and am the owner of the rosuav.com domain as well. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.144.144|172.68.144.144]] 06:10, 4 July 2024 (UTC)
:My instinct is that it could be done, but won't be. Even demonstrably owning the domain (with provable history) doesn't really trump the rights of any person who may have equally logical reasons for having beaten you to choosing 'their' username here. Yes, it leaves the way open for malicious cybersquatting/cybergazumping (haven't checked the history of this interloper account, to see if it's been unused/abused in 'your' name), but otherwise it sets an awful precedent of claim and counterclaim.
:I think you might just have to accept that you'll need a (totally, or slightly) different username here. Or do without, as you and I currently are.
:...not wishing to speak for the 'admins' here, who may suggest otherwise, but fairly safe in thinking that the hoops needed to be jumped through to 'correct' things in the fairest way are too untrivial, compared to the relative importance of task and any vital need. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.163.120|172.70.163.120]] 11:56, 4 July 2024 (UTC)

::Are the admins able to rename accounts? [[Special:Contributions/172.71.147.86|172.71.147.86]] 12:46, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

:::I think I've seen it done, maybe once, definitely a long time ago, unless I'm thinking of a completely different wiki(-like) server. But for totally different reasons than shuffling usernames in and out of use (in ways that didn't involve just account deletion, which is the clearer 'first step' that could possibly be justified).
:::Think about it, there's potentially a completely separate existing 'owner' of the contentious username. There's no pre-existing presumption that "<n> years of idleness" ever makes an identity forfeit, certainly not explicitly stated. Unlike various other login-mediated services, there's no real 'private space' to argue over ownership (and legitimate access) for, which saves some problems but then renders moot various possible reasons for making exceptional admin-changes.
:::For any purpose that mattersz it doesn't matter if you sign up as <code>JoeBloggs</code> or <code>Joe Bloggs</code> or <code>The Real Joe Bloggs</code> or <code>JoeyBloggs2008</code> or <code>JB003½</code> or <code>The Name's Bloggs, Joe Bloggs. Licenced To Kill, And Drive A Heavy Goods Vehicle</code>. Look at the [[Special:Log/newusers]], and see how meaningless any given username is, and not worth directly contesting in this sort of circumstance.
:::This is just my observation. I'd defer to any actual Admin who might have a more refined opinion (possibly quite different), Or actual community decisions, by ''named users'', that firmly suggested otherwise. But it looks like there's only three/four of us IPs who have anything to say on the matter. Or it's just me, pointlessly arguing with myself. ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.60|172.71.242.60]] 14:44, 8 July 2024 (UTC)

== [[Category;Comics featuring real people]] ==

Can someone please delete this? It's obnoxiously showing up as an autocompletion whenever I'm about to search for categories (i.e. when I type "Category" into the search bar, it shows up). It's a main-space article and a cross-namespace redirect. It was probably created as an accident based on the fact that the person who created it soon redirected it to the correct name. It is not linked from any page except this one. —megan [[user talk:megan|talk]]/[[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 00:26, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

== Removal of administrator permission for [[User:Markhurd|Markhurd]] ==

''Note that this request requires a bureaucrat, but for almost a year neither of our two bureaucrats have been active.''

[[User:Markhurd|Markhurd]] ([[User talk:Markhurd|talk]]) ([[Special:Contribs/Markhurd|contribs]]) has been inactive since 2016 and is blocked because he has passed on. Yet his account still has administrator privileges which may be dangerous, since blocked administrators can still perform certain actions (e.g. blocking the administrator that blocked them). Thus, the account should have its administrator privileges removed. —megan [[user talk:megan|talk]]/[[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 05:56, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

Actually, on this wiki, per [[Special:ListGroupRights]], administrators have the <code>unblockself</code> user right, allowing them to unblock themselves. So blocking an administrator doesn't really do anything at all. —megan [[user talk:megan|talk]]/[[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 06:05, 16 July 2024 (UTC)

== The crapper is back ==

And eir username is [[User:💩💩💩💩💩]]. [[User:AndroidTheLucario|Your favorite aura doggo]] ([[User talk:AndroidTheLucario|talk]]) 13:41, 16 July 2024 (UTC)
:Looking through the search archives, I see now. Maybe it's the person I had a brief revert skirmish with on 11 March 2023. Seems like that account stopped vandalizing a while ago, though their vandalism of a highly transcluded template makes me worried. —Megan [[user talk:megan|talk]] [[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 10:06, 20 July 2024 (UTC)
::Never rule out copycats, who did a bit of basic research. Or who were around the two or three times that this particular pattern occured, before, perhaps they weren't bored enough to join in then, or suddenly their hormones kicked in and they decided now was the time to rebel. Motives aren't easy to establish, beyond "because I can" and some strange urge to act out. For a number of minor reasons, that I'll not go fully into (because explaining would take more time than I place value on their actual correctness), I don't think it was "the crapper" seriously trying to revive their art.
::One other (broad) guess I have is that it's just a 'tagging' exercise/dare concocted by the off-site group from whom the original came, to have a new member fulfil initiation. I'm all but certain that certain lessons learnt by the original individual(s) weren't remembered, yet the choice of blindingly obvious emoji-username does seem like a relatively 'new' thought, so probably a different mind behind the implementation.
::Maybe they've even now got a sweepstake on how long it takes for the offending username to be banned? (Really should have been, already, though it doesn't matter in the long run if/when...) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.19|172.70.85.19]] 11:05, 20 July 2024 (UTC)
New crapper: [[Special:Contribs/The crapper is back]]. For some reason these users aren't really doing much - they seem to edit a bit and then back off. —megan [[user talk:megan|talk]] [[special:contribs/megan|contribs]] 05:46, 22 July 2024 (UTC)
:Interesting to note that the crapper reappears at very close to the point in time that a number of CGs become active, by the way. Which is absolutely not the first time they both coincide (sometimes 'helping de-crap').
:Also CG accounts have a nasty habit of reverting an error recently added by (usually) an IP, and, if they can't find enough actual useful typos to correct (the spate of searching for rogue "the the"s was actually mostly useful and correct, but didn't take enough care about it). Also, CGs tend to revert any things that even ''suggest the CGs are linked'' as if to try to erase that idea from everyone's memory, rather than laugh it off or ignore it or say "yeah, and..? ...your problem is?" and I rather expect that this comment will get the same treatment. Which doesn't link 'them' to the crapper, but does become rather tedious in its own right. So perhaps 'they' should take the hint to stop that. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.160.249|172.70.160.249]] 10:44, 22 July 2024 (UTC)
:Addendum, an IP (other than me, obviously) has reverted CG's genuine (or at least correct) "the the"-like corrections several more times than the one that you (Megan) did. I re-reverted them. So that nobody else needs to. Nobody. (It could also be a game being played, or some weird steganographic alteration, but I'm defering back to just being 'helpful' but careless behaviour on behalf of a genuinely non-CG and otherwise CG-unaffiliated IP address.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.163.121|172.70.163.121]] 11:07, 22 July 2024 (UTC)

==Ba'al the Soul Eater==
Hi, so I didnt know wether this should go on admin requests or feature suggestions, so i put it here. I think Ba'al the Soul Eater needs a character category (and I dont know how to make one). They've been in more comics than many named other characters, droptablestudents is one example, and yet they dont have a character page. [[User:Apollo11|Apollo11]] ([[User talk:Apollo11|talk]]) 16:52, 12 September 2024 (UTC)

== Some IP editor keeps erasing my user pages. ==

The same happened with 42.book.addict earlier. Please send help. [[User:CalibansCreations|'''Caliban''']] ([[User talk:CalibansCreations|talk]]) 16:05, 25 October 2024 (UTC)
:I’ve come to accept that vandals will be vandals and trolls will be trolls. Honestly, if an admin protects your page, then they’ll just go to another user’s page. There’s not much that we can do, since they’re an IP. Just revert and move on, until you see it again. We do have strength in numbers, so there shouldn’t be much interference other than annoyance. [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 16:12, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

== Adminship Needed ==

Hi all, it's [[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]] here. I forgot my password, and my email confirmation isn't working. I'm not able to recover my account, and I need my adminship rights back. Could someone please help me out? Thank you! [[User:Davidy21|Davidy21]] ([[User talk:Davidy21|talk]]) 02:38, 15 November 2024 (UTC)
:Pull the other one. It's got bells on it. (I'd say "nice try", but it really wasn't.) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.26.106|172.71.26.106]] 04:06, 15 November 2024 (UTC)

== Hide the red and green numbers ==

I recently found that my talk page has been spammed. The red and green numbers in the history page are really offending. Please hide the numbers if possible. I know that admins can hide titles, edit summaries and usernames, but I don't know whether they can hide numbers. [[User:ChristmasGospel|ChristmasGospel]] ([[User talk:ChristmasGospel|talk]]) 19:40, 29 November 2024 (UTC)
:As gone into length after your similar request in TheusafBOT's Talk page, for all kinds of reasons I predict that this will not happen. Yes, they could ''perhaps'' hide the edits (vandalisms and the autoreversions), but not the numbers. And the justification to upend the edit histories for anything this trivial (I'm not convinced it isn't!) is severely lacking. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.130|172.70.86.130]] 20:40, 29 November 2024 (UTC)

== RSS Feed Broken ==

The RSS feed has been broken since xkcd 3015, I believe due to the ampersand in the comic title.

XML Parsing Error: not well-formed
Location: https://explainxkcd.com/rss.xml
Line Number 71, Column 18:
<title>3015: D&D Combinatorics</title>

I assume this requires an admin's intervention, so I'm posting it here even though it's also more directly a technical issue. There are a couple recent posts about it there as well.[[User:Tolozen|Tolozen]] ([[User talk:Tolozen|talk]]) 00:08, 14 December 2024 (UTC)
:I will email [[User:Davidy22]] and send a message to [[User:Theusaf]] '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 16:07, 16 December 2024 (UTC)
::I'm unsure if I can do anything about this, since `/rss.xml` is likely controlled by software external to the wiki, which I do not have access to. The title of the comic might need to be changed as a workaround for this issue --[[User:Theusaf|theusaf]] ([[User talk:Theusaf|talk]]) 00:46, 17 December 2024 (UTC)
:::I have emailed [[User:Davidy22|Davidy22]], here’s what he had to say: '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 18:06, 17 December 2024 (UTC)
:::{{quote|My server login doesn't work. I actually wrote the RSS script, would be able to figure it out if I can get jeff to respond to me}}
:::Additionally, I have emailed [[User:Jeff|Jeff]] about this issue. '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 18:06, 17 December 2024 (UTC)
:To All Technical Users: I’ve been doing some research on how to fix the ampersand issue and I’ve come up with 2 solutions that don’t require server access intervention: either we rename the page to have & instead of & and use [https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Display_Title display titles] to make it look normal, or have the page renamed without the ampersand and put a disclaimer, just like in [[1482: NowPlaying]]. Could someone smarter than me try to figure out if these two ideas would work? Thanks! '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 02:21, 10 January 2025 (UTC)

::::I opened a bug with Mediawiki: https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T385938. I'm a bit embarrassed to have wasted their time. Here's there response:
::::[Explain XKCD's] "MediaWiki version is 1.30.0 which was released 86 months ago".
::::Please can the version be upgraded? {{unsigned|141.101.98.244|13:10, 8 February 2025‎}}
:::::heh. nobody can update the wiki because server access is locked by [[User:Jeff]], who is also the only ‘crat on this wiki ([[User:Lcarsos]] doesn’t count, he hasn’t edited in 4 years) and the owner of this wiki. if you have a bug, '''suck it up'''. '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 16:46, 8 February 2025 (UTC)

== Vandalizing user ==

[[User:KikeUNTERMENSCH]], as one might guess from his name, has done nothing but vandalize templates, sometimes to post racist comments on the main page and other times to post pictures of a dead goat. Please block him. Thanks! --[[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.209|172.68.54.209]] 04:43, 17 December 2024 (UTC)
:copied this request to [[User talk:Kynde|Kynde's]] talk page, as he is more likely to respond to that page. '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 05:28, 17 December 2024 (UTC)

== Vandalism ==

Hello, there is vandalism here.

https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Template:reflist&action=history
{{unsigned ip|162.158.10.130|05:03, 19 December 2024}}
:Noting that this has been sorted, already. But there seems to be a "change comic-info" IP vandal and a "derogatory username vandal" (probably the same moron, switching tactics) that has been operating in the short time before the above report. Mostly dealt with (automatically and with manual assistance) but I'll mop up any other instances that I see.
:Obviously, the DUV instance needs blocking, at least so we get to see a completely different idiotic username next time they decide that their next net contribution to the world is going to be just as futile. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.119|172.70.90.119]] 12:28, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
::I would recommend sending Kynde a message on his talk page, as he checks that more often than this. '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 17:55, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
:::Note that it has been sorted (by Kynde), by the time you made this suggestion.
:::Also, while it's trivially true that an appeal direct to Kynde may currently produce the (joint-?)quickest response time, that may be less true if there are other admins around and checking their own pages (and this) somewhat more directly than those of their brethren/sistren/othren amongst the admins.
:::In the current reality, it probably doesn't matter much at all. Practically any obvious 'note', in any namespace at all, will get probably a near identical response. And, in that circumstance, perhaps best to uphold the expectation that someone, who doesn't know exactly ''who'' to go to, might find the Admin Requests page the most logical destination. If only because future editors might learn more about past reports than having to stumble over whatever might have been posted to who-knows-who's userpages as were suitable for the time.
:::...it ''might'' be good to have a bit of a clean-out (cut'n'paste things into an archival page, at Admins' discretion only) to leave only current/long-standing 'needs'. But that's a job-and-a-half! [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.70|141.101.99.70]] 18:22, 19 December 2024 (UTC)

== Petition to add comic 404 to homepage ==

In the mainpage, it has a banner that says <nowiki>We have an explanation for all [[:Category:All comics|'''{{#expr:{{PAGESINCAT:All comics|R}}-1}}''' xkcd comics]],
</nowiki>, and it excludes [[404: Not Found| comic 404]] from the calculation. However, even Randall himself calls it a "real comic" (see the quote at the top of the page). So, can you please change the equation to re-add comic 404? [[User:B_for_brain|B for brain]] ([[User_talk:B_for_brain|talk]]) ([https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCg4bo-hj-mDyOOUp_Yp0pug youtube channel] [https://bforbrain.weebly.com/ wobsite (supposed to be a blag)]) 12:23, 26 December 2024 (UTC)
:Agreed! Ironically the -1 was useful because it actually displayed the real number, because of the [[Papyrus]] clone page that counted as two (see trivia). But recently i fixed that so 404 should definitely be counted! [[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 09:04, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
::It would be even better if it were made editable by more users, or if more active admis were added. Right now basically nobody updates it [[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 09:06, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

I have removed the number 1. I'm as far as I know the only active admin at this time. I have reached out to others, but have so far not received and reply. I cannot make other in to admins. But agree it would be great with more. [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 14:52, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
:Thank you! You might want to get in touch with [[User:42.book.addict]], she's been hard at work trying to get a hold of the owners of the wiki. Maybe you two together, an admin and a very active editor, can create an unstoppable owner-contacting force? [[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 17:10, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

== Uncooperating User ==
I have been feuding for a couple days with [[User:Lettherebedarklight]], asking them to first change their username from being a YouTube link to a {{w|Rickroll}} to something else that wouldn't confuse users in talk pages, as it had confused me. I will admit that although I wrongly cited {{w|WP:PROMONAME}}, as it applies to usernames, not signatures, my point still isn't incorrect. Instead, I should've cited {{w|WP:SIG#EL}}. After this, they changed their signature to some random mish mash of gibberish, singing off as <code>[[user talk:lett‪herebedarklight|(CTU) 4202 rebmeceD 12 ,61:70 [[</code>, <code>[[user talk:lett‪herebedarklight|(CTU) 4202 rebmeceD 42 ,24:41 [[</code>, and <code>[[user talk:lett‪herebedarklight|(CTU) 4202 rebmeceD 52 ,74:60 [[</code> respectively. How exactly they managed to flip the date and wikilink I don't know, but I ''do'' know that this sig is in violation of {{w|WP:SIGPROB}} in regards to the broken date format and {{w|WP:SIGLINK}}. After going back and forth with the user, I have decided to ask for help. Could one of the admins please have a talk with them? Thanks, '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 22:12, 26 December 2024 (UTC)
:I have written to him now.[[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 08:56, 29 December 2024 (UTC)
::I noticed he has kept deleting his own talk page. I have just given him a [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User_talk:Lettherebedarklight&oldid=362972 final warning]. Let me know if he deletes it once more! I might forget to check it out. [[User:Kynde|Kynde]] ([[User talk:Kynde|talk]]) 15:00, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

== Creating new pages ==

To whom it may concern

Does anyone know how to create new pages? I'd like to make a page about Santa since we seem to be missing one. Thanks.

Edit: Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Your assistance has been appreciated. --Albert McGee {{unsigned|Albert|10:20, 31 January 2025}}
:You're a new user (created less than an hour before you posted, with just <s>two</s> three(+?) edits, all of them with the above), and you don't get Page Creation rights for... a small while.
:Maybe somebody will see this and decide that you're right and use their longer experience to get Santa his own page, and integrate that onto the Characters page (under "Real people"? ;) ), or perhaps you'd have to be a new user for a while and learn the ropes until (at some point) you discover you can fulfil your aim yourself.
:Until either of these happy events, maybe you could prove your case by justifying the need. I suspect that most of his appearances are to be found in [[:Category:Christmas]] (but not all of them, which could be reason both for or against a "Comics with Santa Clause" page), but listing them and also finding any of his appearances (including under his various alternate names?) in ostensibly non-Christmas contexts would be interesting info to start off with.
:In short: earn your stripes, and you'll be okay (one way or another). Always good to see new and enthusiastic users getting to know the ropes. If in doubt, have a look around at other edit( historie)s and user contributions. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.86.129|172.70.86.129]] 11:01, 31 January 2025 (UTC)
::I’ll do it! Same question as him though, how? (I’ve haven’t been able to figure out that particular skill yet.) [[User:Apollo11|Apollo11]] ([[User talk:Apollo11|talk]]) 16:36, 31 January 2025 (UTC)
:::You can just go to the link you want the page to be in, but I do not think we need such a category. We already have [[:Category:Christmas]], as IP said, and it could be hard to draw a line that defines a "Santa" eligible to be included in that category. If a user wants to browse Christmas comics, they already can. You'd also likely need to create a profile for Santa, and create the category by following the [[:Category:Characters|naming norms for characters]]. Or, you'd have to debate whether to consider Santa as a character or not, since they're neither a person nor an animal. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 16:56, 31 January 2025 (UTC)
:::If you search up the title of the page you want to make, there will be a line of text saying something along the lines of "<page> does not exist on this wiki, but you can create the page", with a link you can click. At least if you have the rights. [[User:Firestar233|guess who]] ([[User talk:Firestar233|if you desire conversing]] | [[Special:Contributions/Firestar233|what i have done]]) 03:08, 1 February 2025 (UTC)

== 3074 Image upload permissions ==

I've downloaded all the missing images of "3074 Push Notifications" but can't upload them because of missing permissions.
The placeholder images are all the same, so I can't replace them.
I could replace all existing images with higher resolution ones.
Can I have permissions please to upload the missing images? {{unsigned|Etwas|21:50, 11 April 2025 (UTC)}}
:You could put them all into a Google Drive (or any other file sharing website) link so that someone can upload them for you, or you could link the original xkcd links that you got the images from so that I can upload them. You ''should'' be able to upload them now, since you have exactly 50 edits and registered your account 1 week+ ago, automatically giving you [[explain xkcd:Autoconfirmed users|autoconfirmed]] rights. Additionally, please sign with <code><nowiki>~~~~</nowiki></code> after commenting. Cheers, '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 21:58, 11 April 2025 (UTC)
::Actually, you’ve already uploaded files before. Are you ''sure'' you can’t upload them? '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 22:00, 11 April 2025 (UTC)
:::Yes, I have uploaded images before, but I can't now, just tried it again. "You do not have permission to create new pages." [[User:Etwas|Etwas]] ([[User talk:Etwas|talk]]) 22:15, 11 April 2025 (UTC)
::I have put the links to the images in a comment after the missing images with a suggestion of a filename so the one who fixes this has less work to do. I hope somebody can upload them. It's a little frustrating for me...[[User:Etwas|Etwas]] ([[User talk:Etwas|talk]]) 03:42, 12 April 2025 (UTC)
::Sorry, another thing. I have replaced the turtle with a much more complete version, but something went wrong. The thumbnail is wrong (from the previous version) and now the image is skewed. No idea how to fix it. Maybe delete it and upload again with a new file name? But alas, I can't upload new files...[[User:Etwas|Etwas]] ([[User talk:Etwas|talk]]) 04:35, 12 April 2025 (UTC)

:::Don't worry, the turtle upload worked. Your browser was fooling you. If you check [[3074: Push Notifications]] now it should look good.
:::I don't see a comment made by you on [[Talk:3074: Push Notifications]], could you specify where exactly you put the links? Sorry you can't upload files, but we need these restrinctions to fight spammers. We'll do it for you. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 10:37, 12 April 2025 (UTC)
::::The comments with the links are in the source code of the ===Comic images=== galery.[[User:Etwas|Etwas]] ([[User talk:Etwas|talk]]) 16:21, 12 April 2025 (UTC)
:::::Thanks! All of your images have been uploaded! If you check [[3074: Push Notifications]] now it should be complete, except maybe one that might still incorrectly show the old one.
:::::I think we could do something with the links, do you also happen to have te links for all the other images? Idk how the process of getting these links works. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 16:54, 12 April 2025 (UTC)
:::::: Links to all images are in [https://xkcd.com/3074/marconi/static/js/index.js?v=1 index.js]. You can easily identify them they look like this: static/xyz.png[[User:Etwas|Etwas]] ([[User talk:Etwas|talk]]) 18:26, 12 April 2025 (UTC)
:::::::Whoa thanks! Is it possible there are actually more images that are undocumented on this wiki? I saw a lot of /static/ links on that page! (I changed your comment to hyperlink "index.js", since markdown doesn't work in wikis.) --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 15:36, 13 April 2025 (UTC)
::::::::No, the others are buttons, the notifications, and the promt to enter a word. [[User:Etwas|Etwas]] ([[User talk:Etwas|talk]])
:::::::::Ok thanks! --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 19:29, 13 April 2025 (UTC)

== ExplainXKCD.com needs admin help ==

Recently, a majority of my page loads on Explain XKCD have resulted in a "Sorry! This site is experiencing technical difficulties (Cannot access the database)" error. If I'm editing a page, and the above error doesn't happen, I also sometimes get "Sorry! We could not process your edit due to a loss of session data."

We need someone with (at least) admin permissions to figure out the problem and fix it. I'd be happy to do so, but as a vanilla user there's nothing I can do. (I've failed 39 times and counting to add this comment due to one of the above errors; hopefully it will eventually work.) -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 22:38, 27 May 2025 (UTC)
:Noting that it seems that several people have already said what the problem is. Also noting that somehow failing 39 times sounds like ''you're'' not helping things. Take their advice, and the advice given one of the errors (that I only occasionally get) and wait a minute before retrying. (Loss of session data, though? That's never been an error of mine. Which browser are you using?) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.58.6|172.70.58.6]] 22:59, 27 May 2025 (UTC)
::39 tries over two hours. What should I have done instead? Given up? (Latest Brave on latest MacOS, BTW.) (And, this is try 18 at adding this comment. Started trying at 12:50 AM UTC; the timestamp and count will show when it succeeded.) -- [[User:Dtgriscom|Dtgriscom]] ([[User talk:Dtgriscom|talk]]) 01:06, 28 May 2025 (UTC)
:::Seems like you're being particularly unlucky (can't believe I'm somehow more lucky than average). Or there's something else at play. But the only obvious thing is that the server needs to check your login credentials, while I'm happy not to need that added complication. Every now and then I'm getting pages that are clearly unstylsheeted (HTML, i.e. the .php, got composed ok, but the .css appears not to have been retrieved/checked as the same as that last cached), so I can only imagine what your background handshaking will do to establish your cookie-held login identity, or however it's done. ''Perhaps'' the small chance of failure is multiplying when it has to go "Page please":[OK]:"Here's my identity":[OK]:"And I need those resources":[OK]:"And, to repeat, these are my credentials":[OK]:"And can I have...":...etc. A few percent chance that any state of the session gets messed up could become a near certainty. (Depending upon how well a connectivity session can be kept as more persistant and get past the need to re-establish a check every time.)
:::Whatever happens, neither Chrome for Android nor Firefox for Windows (as an IP only) has been causing me anything like your stated issues. And unless it's because my default Cloudflare proxy gateway is a lot less harried by the problem-traffic than yours is (and thus with the double problem of a hard-hit server plus a hard-hit ''gateway''), I can't think of too many other reasons to explain the discrepancies of experience here. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.186.43|172.68.186.43]] 18:40, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

::::Oh ffs, why you keep purposefully missing the point? You keep replying to ''every'' comment about this by saying "Just wait a few minutes, I don't see this issue, maybe it's your machine, it's actually BETTER for us because we don't get spam bots, it's much better if you log out, YOU'RE causing this because you keep reloading the site..."

::::This site IS breaking down right now, and downplaying the problem is not helping it. Active users are even fewer than before, and it WILL get worse despite your skewed view of the problem.

::::You aren't required to write a pointless wall of text on every post about the site's performance. Please. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 10:02, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::I wrote the above, and the thing about what other people had said, but I wasn't personally the other people. Just in general agreement with them, and pointing out that multiple questions and multiple 'answers' had already happened. Apologies for seeming like a "this is fine" meme, not my intention. Only to not leave the OP seemingly ignored because it was already being discussed elsewhere. I've stayed out of other conversations, exactly to avoid repeating what others have said (that I consider either correct or likely to be). Walls of text are a recurring theme here — perhaps blame the kind of people you attract here, perhaps blame the complexity of what is being talked about.
:::::Unless I've missed it, this is the only "loss of session data" report I've seen, and sounds like it's more a client-side thing. There was a one-off SSL error to be had, by someone. Which maybe adds to the "how can we fix this?"/"what needs fixing?" narrative slightly, if it happens again, as more server-side (but maybe partially a gateway issue). Good luck fixing it, of course. Seems better, today, but probably for reasons outside either our control ''or'' the absent server-wranglers'... [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.131|141.101.99.131]] 16:38, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

:::::Dearest FaviFake,
:::::I believe that ''you'' are missing the point. The site is crashing a lot, but what do you want to do? We’ve already had the “oh no! The site is crashing-better contact the admins” conversation before. I volunteered to contact them, and we've learned that nothing can be done. Since there is nothing much to do, waiting patiently, as the person above said, is the best course of action.
:::::Sincerely, Tori. '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 18:55, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

: See discussion on the technical section of the portal. It's mostly smooth now.

explain xkcd:Community portal/Technical

2025-05-29T08:02:59Z

162.158.8.190: /* Special:ContributionScores on Main Page busts caching, causing load */

<noinclude>__NEWSECTIONLINK__
{{Community links}}

{|-
|valign="top" width="100%"|[[File:Crystal Clear app package settings blue.png|left|120px]] <big><big>Technical</big></big>

Technical issues ''about'' the [[explain xkcd]] wiki, including bug reports or MediaWiki extensions requests. {{AddNewSection|Page=Explain XKCD:Community portal/Technical|Text=(+post)}}
|}</noinclude>

==ARCHIVED DISCUSSIONS==
<div class="plainlinks" style="background:#edf6ff; border:1px solid #a7d7f9; margin:1em auto 1em auto; width:100%; font-size: 120%; padding: 0.5ex; text-align: center;">Most of the discussions on this page have been archived. The archive is available at '''[[explain xkcd talk:Community portal/Technical]]'''.</div>

== Unable to view "what if?" page ==

The link to the page for the [[what if?]] blog displays an error: "No input file specified." [[User:JBYoshi|JBYoshi]] ([[User talk:JBYoshi|talk]]) 03:38, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

:This also happens to me on [[1205: Is It Worth the Time?]] Must be something with the ?s in the titles. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.22.66|172.69.22.66]] 15:46, 25 August 2020 (UTC)

::I've noticed that as well. I made a page in my userspace that redirects to the what if page, and for some reason that seems to work. ([[User:Blue screen of life/whatiflink|here is the link to the page]]) [[User:Blue screen of life|Blue screen of life]] ([[User talk:Blue screen of life|talk]]) 20:09, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

:::I have also noticed this but it is not just on pages with questions marks. Both [[259]] and [[1705]] show the same thing. A full list (as of 22 June 2020) of the ones i found is in the last reply to my report found here [[#2138_page_issues]] [[User:TomW1605|TomW1605]] ([[User talk:TomW1605|talk]]) 12:20, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

::::Both [[259]] and [[1705]] have an ({{w|E acute|e-with-accute-accent}}, Unicode U+00E9) in the URL, so for those pages, I wonder if that has anything to do with it?
::::For the "what if?" page, I had recently added a redirect from [[what if (blog)]] to get to it, and the [[What If]] disambiguation page has been updated with it, so at least we can get to it that way; and for the comic explanations, at least we can get to them by linking to their number-redirects (as [[58]] instead of [[58: Why Do You Love Me?]]); but not sure how to fix it overall. At the following page, it suggests tweaking an {{w|Apache HTTP Server|Apache}} {{w|Rewrite engine|rewrite}} directive in {{w|.htaccess}} (or a {{w|Common Gateway Interface|CGI}} setting in {{w|PHP}} if it's running on {{w|Internet Information Services|IIS}}):
::::* https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Topic:Vmaw1tu5kkhyon0n
::::So maybe something about that has changed recently? Documentation:
::::* [https://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/mod/mod_rewrite.html#rewriterule Apache mod_rewrite <code>RewriteRule</code> directive]
::::* [https://www.php.net/manual/en/ini.core.php#ini.cgi.force-redirect php.ini <code>cgi.force_redirect</code> directive]
::::Summarizing a few points from [[User talk:SlashMe#Homeopathic Wiki|this related discussion]]:
::::* Only one of the site's [https://explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:ListUsers?group=sysop 10 administrators] has made recent edits ([[Special:Contributions/SlashMe|SlashMe]]).
::::* Neither of the site's [https://explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:ListUsers?group=bureaucrat 2 bureaucrats] ([[Special:Contributions/Jeff|Jeff]] and [[Special:Contributions/Lcarsos|Lcarsos]]) have made any edits recently.
::::* For admin access to the ''server'' itself, my limited understanding is that [[Special:Contributions/Jeff|Jeff]] might actually own the server, but may have also given admin access to [[Special:Contributions/Dgbrt|Dgbrt]]; however, neither of them have made edits recently.
::::But "most recent edit" might not be a good indicator, so I wonder of some of these folks are still involved in the project?
::::– [[User:Yfmcpxpj|Yfmcpxpj]] ([[User talk:Yfmcpxpj|talk]]) 05:10, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
: Looks like it happens for any page that has a percent-encoding in the title. [[User:PoolloverNathan|PoolloverNathan]]<nowiki>[</nowiki>[[Special:Contributions/PoolloverNathan|s]][[User talk:PoolloverNathan|talk]] [[Wikipedia:WP:SEAOFBLUE|the blue seas]]<nowiki>]</nowiki> 16:32, 16 March 2021 (UTC)

=== Known broken pages ===
(Redirects work, whereas links to the actual page are broken.)

Title containing e-accute-accent:
* [[259]] ↳ [[259: Clichéd Exchanges]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=259:_Clich%C3%A9d_Exchanges What links here])
* [[1705]] ↳ [[1705: Pokémon Go]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=1705:_Pok%C3%A9mon_Go What links here])

Title ending with question mark:
* <del>[[what if (blog)]] ↳ [[what if?]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=What_If%3F What links here])</del> <ins>fixed – content now exists at [[what if]], and [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special:WhatLinksHere/what_if&limit=500 broken links] are in the process of being updated (see below)</ins>
* [[58]] ↳ [[58: Why Do You Love Me?]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=58:_Why_Do_You_Love_Me%3F What links here])
* [[111]] ↳ [[111: Firefox and Witchcraft - The Connection?]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=111:_Firefox_and_Witchcraft_-_The_Connection%3F What links here])
* [[1205]] ↳ [[1205: Is It Worth the Time?]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=1205:_Is_It_Worth_the_Time%3F What links here])
* [[1841]] ↳ [[1841: Who?]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=1841:_Who%3F What links here])
* [[1913]] ↳ [[1913: A ?]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=1913:_A_%3F What links here])
* [[2065]] ↳ [[2065: Who Sends the First Text?]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=2065:_Who_Sends_the_First_Text%3F What links here])
* [[2138]] ↳ [[2138: Wanna See the Code?]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=2138:_Wanna_See_the_Code%3F What links here])
* [[2236]] ↳ [[2236: Is it Christmas?]] ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=2236:_Is_it_Christmas%3F What links here])

=== Moved ===
I moved the [[what if?]] page to the [[what if (blog)]] page which I then changed to simply [[what if]] to fix this issue and because anyone new to this site would type that any way to see it. — [[User:Sqrt-1|The 𝗦𝗾𝗿𝘁-𝟭]] [[User talk:Sqrt-1|talk]] [[Special:Contributions/Sqrt-1|stalk]] 06:47, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

:Still trying to wrap my head around it – so just to summarize, we currently have:
:
:* '''[[whatif]]''' ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=whatif&redirect=no no-redirect link])
:** ↳ ''redirects to'' '''[[what if?]]''' (see below)
:* '''[[What If?]]''' – page broken ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=What_If%3F&redirect=no no-redirect link]) ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=What_If%3F What links here])
:** ↳ ''also redirects to'' '''[[what if?]]''' – page broken ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=what_if%3F&redirect=no no-redirect link]) ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=what_if%3F What links here])
:*** ↳ ''redirects to'' '''[[what if]] – actual content'''
:*** ''content manually moved from'' ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=what_if%3F&diff=198070&oldid=197859 diff]) '''[[what if?]]''' ''to'' ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=what_if&diff=198071&oldid=197486 diff]) '''[[what if (blog)]]''' ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=what_if_(blog)&redirect=no no-redirect link]) (''[https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=what_if%3F&action=history previous revision history] remains at'' '''[[what if?]]''')
:**** ⇒ ''moved to'' '''[[what if]] – actual content'''
:
:For completeness, we also have...
:
:* '''[[what if book]]''' ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=what_if_book&redirect=no no-redirect link])
:** ↳ ''redirects to'' '''[[what if#The book]] – actual content'''
:** Suggestion: for consistency, also add a '''[[what if (book)]]''' page that redirects here?
:
:...and the disambiguation page...
:
:* '''[[What If]]''' ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=What_If&redirect=no no-redirect link])
:** ⇒ ''moved to'' '''[[What If (disambiguation)]]''' – disambiguation page
:*** ''links to'' '''[[17: What If]]''' (↲ '''[[17]]''' redirects here ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=17&redirect=no no-redirect link]))
:*** ''links to'' '''[[what if]] – actual content'''
:*** Suggestion: mention the ''book'' here as well, and link to its section in the [[what if]] page?
:
:...and these troubleshooting pages from [[User:Blue screen of life]]:
:
:* '''[[User:Blue screen of life/redirecttest]]''' – test page ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User:Blue_screen_of_life/redirecttest&redirect=no no-redirect link])
:** ⇒ ''moved to'' '''[[User:Blue screen of life/whatiflink]]''' – test page ([https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=User:Blue_screen_of_life/whatiflink&redirect=no no-redirect link])
:*** ↳ ''redirects to'' '''[[What If?]]''' (see above)
:
:Given that the actual content of the "what if?" article now lives at '''[[what if]]''', I've started updating pages <ins>(except for Talk pages)</ins> to link directly there instead of the other redirect pages. All that's left to do are pages that link to the '''[[what if?]]''' redirect-page (which is broken). <del>Its [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere/what_if%3F "What links here"] special page is broken too, so it's difficult to find what pages link there – but now that it redirects to the [[what if]] page, you can see them indirectly from ''that'' page's [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special:WhatLinksHere/what_if&limit=500 "What links here"] special page.</del> <ins>[https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:WhatLinksHere?target=what_if%3F These] are the pages that still link there.</ins> There are still a lot of them to go.
:
:Also, should the following redirect-pages be simplified to have them redirect straight to the new [[what if]] page, instead of redirecting through the intermediate '''[[what if?]]''' page (which itself redirects there anyway)?
:* '''[[whatif]]'''
:* '''[[What If?]]'''
:– [[User:Yfmcpxpj|Yfmcpxpj]] ([[User talk:Yfmcpxpj|talk]]) 17:20, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
:: Fixed the double redirects, don't ask me why we have so many pages for the same thing. [[User:PoolloverNathan|PoolloverNathan]]<nowiki>[</nowiki>[[Special:Contributions/PoolloverNathan|s]][[User talk:PoolloverNathan|talk]] [[Wikipedia:WP:SEAOFBLUE|the blue seas]]<nowiki>]</nowiki> 16:29, 16 March 2021 (UTC)

== Discussion not displaying with comic ==

I am using FireFox on a Win10 machine. When I come to the site I can see the comic, explanation and transcript. But the discussion section is hidden. Even when logged in.

Any ideas?

: You say "when I come to the site". If the address bar says you are on Main_Page and you see the heading "Latest comic", then it's simply working as designed. Above the comic, click on "Go to this comic explanation" and you will see the comic plus discussion.

: Also, Steve, please sign your comments every time, with four tildes. That expands into your user name and a timestamp. Like this -- [[User:JohnB|JohnB]] ([[User talk:JohnB|talk]]) 10:10, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

== Random page sometimes takes me to an invalid address ==

Sometimes, when clicking on "Random page" in the left sidebar, the site will be blank apart from the text "No input file specified. ".

An example of such an URL is: https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/111:_Firefox_and_Witchcraft_-_The_Connection%3F

:I've noticed this happens for ''all'' URLs to comics that end in a question mark (or possibly any special character). Interestingly, this doesn't happen if you go to the comic from the search bar. [[User:Danish|Danish]] ([[User talk:Danish|talk]]) 23:04, 27 January 2021 (UTC)

== Bug on the main page ==

Bug Enviroment(Might work on other enviroments):
Ubuntu 20.04LTS
Firefox85.0
2021.2.7

Bug:
The front page reads: `Welcome, Main Page, to explain xkcd!` with `Main Page` formatted as a username,can someone fix this?

[[User:Xkcdjerry|Xkcdjerry]] ([[User talk:Xkcdjerry|talk]]) 09:48, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

== Occasional error via Cloudflare ==
Just a note that I'm getting Cloudflare errors of "origin not reachable" (sounds wrong to me, in my head it should be 'destination', but never mind) three times now in the last ten to fifteen minutes - of maybe a dozen general site-requests.

I've also been getting seemingly .CSSless formatted pages over the past few days, which I've been putting down to slightly dodgy wifi at my end (not unknown) but if I'm getting Cloudflare's error cleanly then perhaps it's been entirely upstream/downstream/however-you'd-describe-the-Explain-server. (Obviously CSS resource requests, as with images, are additional HTTP calls, but I still lump it into the single site-request ''per page'' in my 'dozen' estimate above. No obviously lost images, though, in incomplete pages - not that can't be explained by .CSS non-following, anyway.)

I had copy-buffered some of the exact info, but due to incompetence I recopied over it before coming here. If it happens again, I'll try to bring it over here. But (the way these things go) maybe it won't. FYI, though. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.52|141.101.98.52]] 12:04, 5 March 2021 (UTC)
: Not a Cloudfare error (looks like an error of the actual explainxkcd server) but every now and then (like just a few minutes ago) I get an error page that generally goes away if I immediately refresh. To whit:
Service Unavailable
The server is temporarily unable to service your request due to maintenance downtime or capacity problems. Please try again later.

Additionally, a 503 Service Unavailable error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.
: Not really a problem (occasionally happened while submitting an exit, and I have to confirm to the browser that I wish to repost the data, but this particular copied instance was through a more 'read-only' link-click, like most of the instances) but... in case someone finds this to be new and useful information... here you are! [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.192|141.101.98.192]] 03:45, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
:OP, here, of the above 503 error report/casual mention. Obviously this is the same message that happened for an ''extended'' period of time over a number of days, but I've only just happened to find the site responding again and have not yet looked to see if it is explained as the same or different cause to the old intermittent issues (at root). I hope things are resolved from the major outage (server quota? bill payments? renewal/reconfiguration blips?) but wonder if I should report any future minor outages? I'm still smarting from the total loss of the fora.xkcd.com platform, a few years back, and while I'm not active enough here to consider a proper login (lurking as a freeloading anon-IP is good enough, usually, for my intellectual enjoyment, with all due apologies) I did have a slight pang of emptiness while it was out-of-order. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.79|141.101.99.79]] 15:48, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

== Add TemplateData ==

Add the {{mw|Extension:TemplateData|TemplateData}} extension to allow setting data for templates. This will help editors because they will be able to see the data of templates.

== MediaWiki 1.30.0?! ==

This wiki is [[Special:Version|currently]] on [[mw:MediaWiki 1.30|MediaWiki 1.30.0]] ([[mw:Release notes/1.30|release notes]]), the first of three releases of a version of MW that reached end-of-life in June of 2019 ([[mw:Version lifecycle]]). It's thus missing multiple important security updates from 1.30.1 and 1.30.2, not to mention the two years' worth of security updates since 1.30.x reached end-of-life. Even 1.31.x will be reaching end-of-life in just over a month.

If the sysadmins here update to [[mw:MediaWiki 1.35|MediaWiki 1.35.2]] ([[mw:Release_notes/1.35|release notes]]), that version will be maintained till September of 2023, with only a few security updates in the meantime. I would '''strongly''' encourage y'all to update to 1.35.2; to promptly update if there's a .3, .4, etc.; and to make sure you switch to the next LTS release (which will presumably be 1.39) well in advance of September of '23. (Note that this will also require updating to PHP 7.3.19 or later.) [[User:PinkAmpersand|PinkAmpersand]] ([[User talk:PinkAmpersand|talk]]) 07:17, 30 April 2021 (UTC)

== Uptime ==
Did the website just go down? [[User:Beanie|Beanie]] [[User talk:Beanie|talk]] 13:06, 28 May 2021 (UTC)

It was definitely down this weekend!
https://www.reddit.com/r/xkcd/comments/nxrm65
[[User:ProphetZarquon|ProphetZarquon]] ([[User talk:ProphetZarquon|talk]]) 16:21, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

== Comic template lappend breaks for standalone comic links ==

For example, https://xkcd.com/blue_eyes.html is changed to https://xkcd.com/blue_eyes.html/ which isn't valid [[Special:Contributions/172.69.90.15|172.69.90.15]] 15:51, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Template here, I think it needs to be changed to solve this https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Template:comic

exkcd page here https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Blue_Eyes

== May not be your problem, but FYI. ==

My typcal setup: Android tablet, with Chrome for Android (latest update), but also Firefox for Android (ditto), using default Gboard (likewise) for input.

Occasionally (notably within the last few weeks/maybe a month or so), when going in to edit an explainxkcd page through Chrome (it's how I divide up my browsing), I'm getting the cursor in the textarea box which ''can'' be used to Cut/Copy/Paste (as applicable and useful), but the on-screen keyboard isn't popping up. Page is fully loaded (can be refreshed, doesn't have the "stop loading" alternative), can go back (page viewing) and try to go back to the page editor (often to same result). Sitting and waiting doesn't pop the keyboard up, either (sat there for minutes). Happens both on home wifi and mobile connection.

If I transfer my attentions to the page to Firefox (copy URL, to use there... but I don't use that by default for expxkcd stuff) there's no problem, but then if I come back to Chrome again it seems to start working again ''anyway'' so not sure if it's just avoiding/flushing a transient problem that would also initially crop up with Firefox if I used that more.

Because editing is a different (mobile-optimised) process on Wikipedia and I can't be sure about any the equivalence of any other wiki out there (and it doesn't happen with anything else I regularly key into on Chrome) it's not something I've reproduced outwith this site, and of course desktop page-editing doesn't require touch-screen keyboard because there's a physical one.

Not getting much feedback with Chrome (really can't get on with their bugrep processes, it's too huge a project to make headway, IME), not even tried to pester the Gboard team and I've not ''seen'' anything said on here about this being a site-issue (not sure how it could be, as it's outside the remit of the core web-page rendering process and more an Android or App level of incompetence), but I thought I'd make a note of it here for future reference. Make of it what you will. Annoying but not game-breaking. And I just wanted to vent a little. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.147|172.70.162.147]] 16:54, 25 December 2021 (UTC)

== [[special:interwiki]] ==

where'd it go? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.68.200|172.69.68.200]] 05:07, 7 January 2022 (UTC)

== Please update MediaWiki + AbuseFilter ==

Seriously. Many scripts and such built for modern, supported versions of MW do not work here because it is so unbelievably undated. PinkAmpersand above basically covers the reason why. I also highly recommend adding the extension AbuseFilter (https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:AbuseFilter) as it immensely makes removing vandalism easier (by straight up disallowing or blocking those that do, esp if it's like the current formulaic massive-replacement vandalism.) [[User:CRLF|CRLF]] ([[User talk:CRLF|talk]]) 00:48, 21 May 2022 (UTC)

:Ditto. I feel like the main problem is that the sole person who has access to the backend either doesn't have time to update, doesn't have interest, or doesn't have the technical knowledge necessary. But yes, I agree - updating and installing an extension to help control vandalism would help this wiki tremendously. [[User:Obwankenobi|Obwankenobi]] ([[User talk:Obwankenobi|talk]]) 20:09, 9 February 2024 (UTC)

== ↑ ? ==

Why do some pages have ↑ at the very start? They can all be spotted by searching ↑
Is it a technical thing, vandalism, some sort of glitch? Maybe I'm just uninformed or being an idiot.
:Edit logs tell me that an IP user manually reverting vandalism somehow inserted one or more extra characters while manually reverting vandalism. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 13:59, 22 May 2022 (UTC)
::Should it be removed? It's not necessary and might be confusing for screenreaders... [[User:Mushrooms|Mushrooms]] ([[User talk:Mushrooms|talk]]) 09:00, 23 May 2022 (UTC)
:::Maybe not en-mass, I'd say. But I've dove in to delete a rogue leading <nowiki> </nowiki> tag left from a part of a prior vandalism (likewise, just before the {{template|comic}}-element) and I've promised myself that I'll remove any more that I spot (and now that arrow) in any future whole-page edit I make. Plus a small shopping-list of inessential but useful edits like making {{template|Citation needed}}s flow better when they're mispunctuated/etc.
:::But that's my solitary opinion. I'm sure hunting out and squishing this isn't a problem at all. I'm just balancing my own peculiar brand of OCD with what is somehow my also my own version of casual apathy towards other details. (Also, it probably looks better for a named account of recognised good standing to start editing potentially hundreds of pages in a session, rather than myself... potentially indistinguishable from the IP who seems to relish worn out memes in a general page-trashing.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.159.121|162.158.159.121]] 12:20, 23 May 2022 (UTC)

== Is there anything else we can do to prevent vandalism? ==

There's been quite a significant uptick in vandalism recently, and I don't feel we have any effective tools to combat it. I believe one of the biggest issues here is due to the way logged-out editing works on this wiki. Blocks are completely ineffective at slowing vandals, and IP editors can vandalize with basically nothing we can do to thwart them other than revert-warring. '''Is there a better way?'''

There's been some discussion of installing AbuseFilter, but I'm not sure anything became of it. We could disable logged-out editing, but that would likely be counterproductive as we get lots of legitimate contributions from logged-out users. If there's a way to switch to location-based IPs, we could rangeblock problematic users as well as proxies. Does anyone have any ideas? [[Special:Contributions/162.158.78.145|162.158.78.145]] 16:11, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
:I'm sort of making server side changes via telegraph so an extension is probably going to take a while to get installed. Takes a bunch of emails and followups to get single variables changed in the mediawiki settings file. There is an email verification option, and some edit frequency variables that could be set to make spam more time consuming. Don't love range blocks but wouldn't mind getting the CDN IPs dealt with so we can actually use the IP bans again. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 17:16, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
::I'm very grateful that you're working on changes under the hood. What do you think is the best way to deal with disruption in the meantime? [[User:Vandalbane|Vandalbane]] ([[User talk:Vandalbane|talk]]) 17:19, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
:::Could borrow a patrol bot like the ones people on main wikipedia have, could ask around. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 18:53, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
::::There's not really a drop-in solution that you can use, especially since the server's MediaWiki version is not in sync with Wikipedia's (so a lot of the APIs etc have completely changed; when initially reverting vandalism I tried importing some scripts from enwiki but they failed as a result), but also because the bots have gotten pretty complex (using machine learning provided by the Wikimedia Foundation, for example). [[User:CRLF|CRLF]] ([[User talk:CRLF|talk]]) 03:56, 2 June 2022 (UTC)
:::::Oh I do notice mediawiki hasn't been upgraded in a while. Looks like new version of mediawiki should be dropping extremely imminently, would be nice timing for an upgrade '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 04:45, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

== Rollback ==

Does the rollback permission exist on this wiki? [[User:Vandalbane|Vandalbane]] ([[User talk:Vandalbane|talk]]) 17:00, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
:The rollback permission of course exists but there's no group called "rollbacker" like you'd find on Wikipedia (limited to admins). You'd need the sysadmin to change the configuration to add one, which as established is not really an option right now. [[User:CRLF|CRLF]] ([[User talk:CRLF|talk]]) 03:58, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

== What happened to custom JavaScript? ==

I put some code in <code>[[User:Some user/common.js]]</code>, but it is not alerting 'hi' every time I load a page. Why can't we execute JavaScript anymore? Is it in response to the [[Project:Crap|crapping]] incident? [[User:Some user|Some user]] ([[User talk:Some user|talk]]) 21:16, 27 June 2022 (UTC)
:Entirely because of that, yeah. '''[[User:Davidy22|{{Color|#707|David}}y²²]]'''[[User talk:Davidy22|<tt>[talk]</tt>]] 04:51, 28 June 2022 (UTC)

== My IP ==

Why is my IP address a Cloudflare address in Norway? Is this a joke of some kind that I'm missing?

Other wikis like Wikipedia are showing me my actual IP when I go to [[Special:MyContributions]], so I suspect this is a wiki misconfiguration. It changed again while I was typing this. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.222.194|162.158.222.194]] 16:55, 19 November 2022 (UTC)
:All IPs (as this one will be) are from Cloudflare gateway IPs, because that's the default IP that the Wiki understands as the source. Cloudflare mediates all the traffic, and perhaps to some advantage (not being privvy to the logs, I can only guess how much it insulates the true server from extreme problems, but I bet it does in some way).
:There have been suggestions before to change some setting (in the MediaWiki implementation? ...can't recall exactly) to have it pick up and use the IP that the gateway reports (in its meta-request) was the origin, but that's not been enacted for Idunnowhat reason.
:Because the black-box that is the Cloudflare traffic shapes in various ways, you will find that a single user will jump around 'apparent' IPs, and I've also been in the relatively embarassing situation of replying to another IP's info and finding that I've registered on the exact same IP so that it looks like I'm stooging myself, or something.
:On the whole, though, it's a harmless quirk. And given the trivial nature of deliberately spoofing origins (even on top of assuming you get an effectively static NAT from your ISP in the first place) I don't personally see it as a problem to 'solve' this. But neither would I complain if the 'fix' were implemented if this query reminds someone that they ''were'' going to try and do the necessary tweak.
:As a lay-answer, I hope that fills you in a little. ''If'' those who have more knowledge/control of the process want to add anything or correct me, I'm sure they'll do so as soon as they can, but here's a reply to keep you going for now... [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.24|172.70.85.24]] 01:19, 20 November 2022 (UTC)
:fyi it is supported in MediaWiki through <code>$wgCdnServers</code>. See [https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Cloudflare#Integration_with_MediaWiki MediaWiki’s introduction]. {{unsigned|物灵|06:58, 6 April 2025}}

==Main page in categories==
{{notice|'''This discussion is marked as duplicate.''' See [[#Main Page|this discussion]].}}
[[Main_Page]] was found wrongly appearing in some newly-created categories, such as [[:Category:Cosmology]]. Could you fix it? --[[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 17:49, 12 January 2023 (UTC)
:Never noticed this myself, but I'll take it as read. Before checking myself, I'm wondering if this could be when the main page 'inherits' tags from the Current Comic that it features. And thus solve itself (whilst gaining others) upon a newer Current Comic. (Must surely inherit "Monday Comics"/etc, on schedule every week.)
:If it is that, perhaps the solution lies in the details contained within https://m.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Categories#Categories_and_templates_(transcluded_pages)
:Or maybe I'm wrong about it. But I have no rights to edit (thus at least examine the 'code' of) the Main page, to check my snap theory, as with most people. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.46|172.70.162.46]] 19:21, 12 January 2023 (UTC)

This happened again in [[:Category:Airplane banner]]. [[User:I27.O.O.I|I27.O.O.I]] ([[User talk:I27.O.O.I|talk]]) 09:00, 28 February 2023 (UTC)
:Yes, and it lasted as long as the latest comic was still one with particular categories. I don't intend to worry about it. If someone goes to a category that interests them and looks at the main page, as temporarily advertised, they're likely to find (as part of it) a comic which is indeed in that category. Doesn't sound like a big problem to me, except for determinin why some cats (e.g. Friday Comics) ''don't'' link to the Main page when they might be expected to...
:(PS, I know for sure that I27.O.O.I isn't the same person as ColofulGalaxy (and various others, beyond even those with the bloomin' obvious "CG" initials or other recent spoofs on the RFC1918 addresses), and I don't think I mind too much, but faking disagreements between your various IDs isn't helping, anyone... smells too much of trying to establish alibis in advance of your next attempt to vandalise the site with stupid stuff. And doesn't impress me, so I doubt it impresses anyone else either. As long as you're just doing sane things, however, I'll accept your little idiosyncracies.) [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.32|162.158.74.32]] 19:37, 5 March 2023 (UTC)
:(PPS: You left your fingerprint on this latter attempt to 'rescue' [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Talk:2659:_Unreliable_Connection&curid=25530&diff=307289&oldid=307282 this page]. - Spammer a few minutes before midnight, my IP reversion happened shortly after. A little later "Elisabeth" then re-spammed (modified), then another IP immediately jumps on it to restore it but with the modified undo-summary line clearly indicating that some sort of a game is being played. Please don't, it's not clever.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.34|172.70.90.34]] 02:22, 7 March 2023 (UTC)

This doesn't happen to date categories, but it happens in manually added categories such as [[:Category:Statistics]]. [[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 21:49, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

==Cannot create user page==
It says: There is currently no text in this page. You can search for this page title in other pages, or search the related logs, but you do not have permission to create this page. [[2659: Unreliable Connection]] ([[Talk:2659: Unreliable Connection|talk]]) 22:56, 26 March 2023 (UTC)
:(Removed alternative text in the link involved, to not hide behind trickery.) I think you know that there's no problem with [[2659: Unreliable Connection]] itself, except that it had become one of several pages targeted for spamming, the only one then locked down, then finding that the spammers just retargeted to its Talk page, etc.
:I'm torn between "not assuming bad faith" and "don't feed the trolls", as competing principles, so I'm spelling out the situation. However much a tribute you might think it could be, I don't think there's a future in having a new username that's directly referencing a comic which has become so frequently seen in the recent history of this wiki's edits.
:Obviously any genuine contributions are more than welcome. So prove me wrong, why don't you? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.151|172.70.91.151]] 03:20, 27 March 2023 (UTC)

::Could you help now? [[User:Unreliable Connection|2659: Unreliable Connection]] ([[User talk:Unreliable Connection|talk]]) 09:13, 29 March 2023 (UTC)

: I've created your talk page. I guess that what you intended is to have a backup or mirror page for comic [[2659]]. Am I right? [[User:ColorfulGalaxy|ColorfulGalaxy]] ([[User talk:ColorfulGalaxy|talk]]) 20:16, 2 April 2023 (UTC)

== Fanmade comics ==
A fanmade comic appeared on xkcd. Could you edit the template? [[Special:Contributions/172.69.23.100|172.69.23.100]] 07:21, 28 April 2023 (UTC)
:You're going to have to say more about it, at least for me. Apart from the Sandbox attempt to make a page, I haven't seen the comic you're describing anywhere. Certainly not anywhere official. Link, for our benefit? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.85.66|172.70.85.66]] 10:04, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

==Why doesn't this code block work?==
Does anybody know why the code block at the end of [[Transcript on xkcd|this page]] doesn't work? I've tried everything and it still looks like plain text

== Can't add RSS feed because of pubDate value on 27 Nov 2015 ==

When I try to add the RSS feed in Nextcloud News feed reader I get an error <code>Impossible to convert date : Fri, 27 Nov 2015 17:24:34 Pacific Standard Time</code>.

[https://validator.w3.org/feed/check.cgi?url=https%3A%2F%2Fexplainxkcd.com%2Frss.xml W3C Feed validation] says that <code>pubDate must be an RFC-822 date-time</code> and points "Pacific Standard Time" portion as the cause of the error: <code><pubDate>Fri, 27 Nov 2015 17:24:34 Pacific Standard Time</pubDate></code>. Can you please fix the timestap for this?

== Admin request posted here because of vandalism ==

I can not currently access the admin requests page because it has been vandalized... can someone please protect the latest comic page (2805). There is some pretty childish vandalism going on there right now. Thanks!
:It's not the latest, seems like ALL. I went back to 2804, 2803, jumped back like 15 comics, all the same thing. To me the most offensive part is doing it with a nonsensical image. And why pipe it through Archive somehow? [[User:NiceGuy1|NiceGuy1]] ([[User talk:NiceGuy1|talk]]) 02:33, 24 July 2023 (UTC)
::UGH. the vandals are back at it again... we need to lock xkcd pages @NiceGuy [[Special:Contributions/172.70.39.2|172.70.39.2]] 00:59, 25 July 2023 (UTC)

== Way to contact the site hosters? ==

As many have pointed out the software this wiki runs on is horribly outdated. WikiEditor also isn't here for some reason. Quite a bit of messages here have seen no action. Is there some kind of contact form to reach the hosters? {{unsigned|Aaron Liu|00:36, 10 October 2023}}
: There are various levels of admin who do intervene, as and when jecessary, but I understand that the (active) ones closest to the actual hosting level of intervention are not really ready to do the (increasingly greater) degree of uprooting necessary to get a "working" system to be "marginally better working", by way of that very dangerous middle-ground of potentially being ruined entirely.
: I appreciate and anticipate the counter-arguments regarding letting it go totally unupdated, of course, just I've personally seen enough failures (participated in some, or been the actual invokee, myself) to be very sympathetic to the "if it aint (too) broke, don't fix it" tendency. But that inertia is not the only factor, of course, and the full motivations (or lack of them) of those involved is not for a lowly IP like me to explain, even if I think I know... [[Special:Contributions/172.69.195.42|172.69.195.42]] 01:24, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
:: Have they posted some sort of statement? It also is most definitely not “marginally” better working, compare the source editor to that of Wikipedia and look at topic subscription etc features. Not to mention a lot of security fixes haven’t been added and this version has reached EOL long ago. Updating also would not ruin this entirely…[[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 17:22, 12 October 2023 (UTC)
:: Some have also said that quite a bit of assistive scripts for modern versions don’t work. Visual Editor, while horrible, is still easier for new people to get started with. [[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 17:23, 12 October 2023 (UTC)
I've found a new reason: This wiki doesn't even allow loading userscripts! [[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 01:34, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
:That might actually have been a conscious decition, after a 'certain user' caused chaos here, not so long ago. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.25|162.158.74.25]] 19:01, 9 December 2023 (UTC)
::It was about a year and a half ago. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have done that. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.174.143|172.68.174.143]] 06:41, 10 December 2023 (UTC)
::Huh? What happened? Is there a place to request gadgets then? [[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 02:04, 10 December 2023 (UTC)
:::"What happened" involved automated vandalism (from someone who been doing it manually, then found the "better way") though I couldn't tell you the exact details, there were automated 'unvandalism's made in response, and theusafBOT/etc does some of that still, in response to non-automated(/off-site scripted) vandalism/errors that it can actually catch before ordinary users (or IPs like me) can. But certainly a certain brand of scripting was turned off to curtail the 'high intensity' vandalism phase.
:::You're more or less in the best place to request things, right here. Whether updates, (re)adding functionalitu or tweaking site settings. Can't tell if those who ''can'' do these things can't or won't do them... Or are actually absent, instead of just not replying. The cavalry has been known to come running in when necessary (e.g. when "what happened" happened) so it could be any manner of non-response (until you get one). Not necessarily the best state of affairs, but better than being confirmed absentees.
::::I ran a bot to mass-edit pages by replacing their content with the word "crap" repeatedly. I was 15 then, and I thought it was funny. It wasn't. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.174.143|172.68.174.143]] 06:41, 10 December 2023 (UTC)
:::As an occasional but infrequent actual-Wikipedia editor, too, I must say that if the Visual Editor is what I currently have to use for that (at least as an anonIP when using a mobile device, which tends to be when I get the urge most) then I like the unaugmented editor here more. Straight up, honest, un'wizarded' interface, where you only have to get used to markup details and not a WYSIWYG editing environment (as well?). Not sure I'd be happy with an even ''more'' 'assistive' script imposed upon me, like I dislike modern generations of Windows (and 'user friendly' linux dists). So can I just ask that functional/visible changes of the kind you seem to be asking for, if made available, aren't overimposed/left as options rather than the default (or only) choice...? Ok, so I can (or would have to) adapt, but I'd rather not. Of course, I have no weight to pull in this matter, it's just an afterthought (even as I wish you good luck with raising an admin's eyebrow, in some useful manner). [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.135|141.101.98.135]] 05:14, 10 December 2023 (UTC)
::::I am not asking for VisualEditor, which no one likes on Wikipedia either. For some blasted reason they made it edit HTML instead of Wikitext and it’s clunky and loads for a very long time.
::::I’m asking about the WikiEditor, aka Wikipedia’s source editor. In VE, click on the pen next to the publish button and click on “source editing”. That editor makes this one look like freaking Stone Age, syntax highlighting is especially a game-changer. [[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 16:03, 12 December 2023 (UTC)
: There’s also the annoying ReCaptcha v2 every single edit… it seems like it would be relatively easy to switch to v3 which only makes you do the challenge when you’ve visited a bit too much. [[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 16:32, 12 December 2023 (UTC)
:: Unfortunately, that would make things easier for someone who wanted to do mass vandalism like I did. If it didn't do it every time, someone could still edit quite quickly. [[Special:Contributions/172.68.174.192|172.68.174.192]] 18:32, 12 December 2023 (UTC)
::Well, I can tell you that it doesn't always demand that I fulfil more than a tickbox (most trouble I have is when it fails to connect to give me the tickbox (or respond with anything useful when I do), for which I'm forced into one or more Previews until it will. When it ''does'' ask me to do something about it, I do often get forced through two or more request to identify traffic lights, motorbikes, stairways, bridges, hills, tractors, buses, etc, etc, etc... But I think that's more the Tesla-training Algorithm being nust greedy for my attention than the Robot-sentry having a less casual attitude to my attempt to edit. (I believe I'm on a usually untroublesome source IP/Cloudflare gateway, but it could also depend on how many others try to do things via (part of) the same route. Very, very rarely I get Google Search requesting something similar of me ((It: "You have made a lot of searches", me: "Of course I'll have play your little game, but this is my first lookup today...")), which I'm sure isn't Cloudflared, so it might reach back to my ISP's gateway and what fellow users are currently getting up to.)
::As for the guy above (and you, Liu), can't speak for how well or badly others on your own 'choice' of gateways behave. Or yourselves. Luck of the draw? For the first part, at least. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.195.174|172.69.195.174]] 20:31, 12 December 2023 (UTC)
:::MediaWiki 1.40 automatically tags all edits that remove over 90% of page text with "mw-replaced". You could block all edits in mainspace with that tag, either if MediaWiki has it or through the AbuseFilter extension. While I can complete the CAPTCHAs, it's very annoying to need to Captcha every edit on a place where the main focus is edits. [[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 03:06, 13 December 2023 (UTC)
:::Plus, v3 doesn't just do nothing. It tracks how your cursor moves to see if it's robotic, while v2 annoyingly gives you the challenge every time. [[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 20:01, 8 January 2024 (UTC)
::::Presumably for touchscreen control (like mine, right this moment), it does something else than track a nonexistent mouse-pointer's passage across the monitored elements of the display... ;) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.190|172.70.90.190]] 12:26, 9 January 2024 (UTC)
::There are a few MediaWiki plugins that help keep vandalism/spam under control without requiring users to solve a Captcha every time they make an edit. I use https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Extension:Moderation on the wiki I maintain, and it works very well. However, it does require that there be enough active moderators to approve edits, as it basically requires every single edit to be approved before it's posted. Thus, it also introduces some "lag" between when stuff is written and when it can be seen by others. I think it could work if the extension could be installed (I'm not even sure if it's supported on this version of MediaWiki) and if a good list of moderators could be put together. [[User:Obwankenobi|Obwankenobi]] ([[User talk:Obwankenobi|talk]]) 20:02, 9 February 2024 (UTC)
:::I disagree with requiring edits to be approved. Unless we have extremely high vandalism, just filtering out the above tags I mentioned and using ReCAPTCHA v3 would be enough. [[User:Aaron Liu|Aaron Liu]] ([[User talk:Aaron Liu|talk]]) 23:16, 16 February 2024 (UTC)
::::Ok, fair point. However, that wouldn't stop human vandalism, just vandalism from bots. I'm not sure how much human vandalism there is, though, so it might not even be a problem. [[User:Obwankenobi|Obwankenobi]] ([[User talk:Obwankenobi|talk]]) 12:35, 22 February 2024 (UTC)
:::::It's hard (for us 'civvies') to know how much bot-vandalism is stopped but [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=Special:Log/newusers&offset=&limit=500&type=newusers&user= probably a lot], most of which we never see, with [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=2503:_Memo_Spike_Connector&diff=335487&oldid=335486 occasional ones] we might see having be dealt with. (I'm guessing these things are rare (temporarily-)successful 'bots, because flesh-and-blood vandals wouldn't be occasionally doing essentially the same insta-reverted thing on a thematically-small set of pages, over several ''years'' without moving on. It has to be a lucky unattended script-based effort that just keeps trying the same things over and over with an easily revertible but tangible result happening only infrequently.)
:::::More obvious human vandalism tends to rumble on, with occasionally a spate of it as someone gets short-term kicks for it. Though some of them seem may repeat themself after a break. Friendly humans and friendly 'bots both tend to provide the main anti-vandalism responses fairly quickly, though, depending upon what kind of a mess they caused. I've seen worse places, definitely, and it's by no means a losing battle against chaos, just regular skermishes.
:::::Not wanting to tempt fate, of course. I guarantee that there'll be some fool that takes all this as a challenge, so I just have to trust to the Good Guys keeping on keeping on. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.71|172.70.90.71]] 14:21, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

heyo, is there a way to add actual citations to explainxkcd instead of the template citation needed? couldn't find anything, but i'm pretty new here - thanks in advance. [[User:Nigga|Nigga]] ([[User talk:Nigga|talk]]) 21:47, 17 March 2024 (UTC)
:Not that I have much faith in your usernae lasting long (you're 'that guy', aren't you? ...in which case you know anyway), but for the sake of anyone else who needs to know:
:*If you mean "add an actual 'citation needed' tag", then it's {{template|Actual citation needed}} that you'll use.
:*If you mean "add an actual citation link to somewhere", then:
:** Link to URLs with [].
:*** A link such as [<url>] will give you a superscript-number link, which isn't pretty, IMO.
:*** A link such as [<url> <text>] (that's a space between the two) will link <text> to the URL, just work it into the sentence you're writing, fairly easy
:** Link to internal (or cross-wiki) pages with [[]].
:*** [[<page title>]] will make a literal link to <page title>.
:*** [[<page title>|<text>]] (with a pipe) is how you make the <text> your link.
:** You can use the last to link specifically to wikipedia's cross-site format, but for that it's best to use {{template|w}}
:*** <nowiki>{{w|<page title>}}</nowiki> (w-pipe...) uses the page title
:**** It will use the link as if the first character is uppercase, so you don't need to capitalise that. Other case-sensitivity is preserved.
:**** <nowiki>{{w|<singular page title>}}s</nowiki> will link the obvious pluralisation of the page title, just to save you effort
:*** <nowiki>{{w|<page title>|<text>}}</nowiki> (w-pipe and pipe) lets you use entirely alternate text.
:** There's also templates that shortcut (or make easier on the eye, or add appropriate warnings) for some other commonly referenced external sites, from xkcd's own what-if to TVTropes.
:...hope that helps everyone that doesn't already know these few simple bits as relate to wikis in general or this wiki in particular. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.242.218|172.71.242.218]] 22:24, 17 March 2024 (UTC)

== Confirmation Email Bug ==

Hi. I've been trying to get my email confirmed so that I can get pinged when pages are edited, but I just can't find it, even after trying multiple times. I use Gmail, and yes, I have checked my spam folder. Has anyone else had this issue? EDIT: I see that others have had this issue, but the admins haven't done any action to solve it, except for one sarcastic comment by Davidy22 back in 2014. [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 00:43, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

== Lack of Userpage ==

Hey, I joined a few years ago, but I still do not have a Userpage. Can you make one for me? I do not have the permission to do so. [[User:GreyFox|GreyFox]] ([[User talk:GreyFox|talk]]) 22:47, 15 May 2024 (UTC)
:This is actually your very first post, after joining a bit more than a year ago ("18:35, 14 November 2023 User account GreyFox (talk | contribs) was created"). I'm sure someone can oblige (not me, for obvious reasons), but you've not done much to contribute (at least under this account), which would have then eventually brought you to the point where you ''can'' just self-create your Userpages/etc. So your request is a bit out of the blue.
:Just so long as we all know where we stand, though. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.194.227|172.69.194.227]] 09:42, 16 May 2024 (UTC)
::Oh, thanks! Do you know the exact number of edits I need to create it?
:::50 to be autoconfirmed. Also, please sign your comments. [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 15:23, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

== server errors ==
is anyone else constantly getting 503 errors? [[user talk:lettherebedarklight|youtu.be/miLcaqq2Zpk]] 17:14, 21 May 2024 (UTC)
:yup, been seeing those all the time. Also seeing that the server is down a lot of time-it suggests me to Google for what I’m “looking for” [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 17:18, 21 May 2024 (UTC)
::503s are fairly common (often when I'm in a rush), and have been for... well, certainly years, maybe more than a decade (though more common during major vandalism/anti-vandalism surges). I had, however, noticed a recent blip (during the last day or so) of the Server Down/Try Google page that you refer to, which I haven't seen for a ''long'' time (not really sure when, but maybe five years or so ago). In fact, I probably got Cloudflare 'rejections' more, during aformentioned vandal-overloading.
::Without any access to the admin logs, I can only speculate as to what might be sparking it. But service (notwithstanding the brief page-refusals themselves) seems to be happily unaffected. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.160.249|172.70.160.249]] 20:29, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

== Allow new users to edit their own page ==

I found someone asking if we could change this in the proposals page (Community portal/Proposals: Allow Users to Edit their own talk page if not auto confimed (not a typo)). [[User:PDesbeginner|PDesbeginner]] ([[User talk:PDesbeginner|talk]]) 14:39, 19 June 2024 (UTC)

== Technical difficulties? ==

I keep getting a message that says: "Sorry! This site is experiencing technical difficulties.Try waiting a few minutes and reloading. (Cannot access the database)"
It's happened a lot so I was wondering if there was a specific cause behind it and perhaps a way to fix it.
[[Special:Contributions/172.68.54.65|172.68.54.65]] 00:17, 17 September 2024 (UTC)
:yeah, I’ve been getting those errors too. I can’t even log into my account before it says that there’s an error again. I’ve been steadily receiving them for a couple months, but never like today. From Recent Changes, it doesn’t look like anyone is spamming the wiki, so maybe it’s an attack of some kind. You’ll need to contact the admins who have access to the server and can poke around, but good luck getting [[User:Davidy22]] or [[User:Jeff]] online. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.135.130|172.69.135.130]] 17:16, 17 September 2024 (UTC)
::update: I’ve been poking around a lot of websites, trying to see if the website is being attacked. The websites all say that the server is down. I’ll try to ask Jeff on this and pray that he checks his email. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.135.129|172.69.135.129]] 17:21, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

== The site is collapsing ==
503's are to be expected, but i've got them and the "Sorry! This site is experiencing technical difficulties. Try waiting a few minutes and reloading." error way, way too much. it's actually getting really hard to edit stuff because of them. [[user talk:lettherebedarklight|youtu.be/miLcaqq2Zpk]] 01:58, 19 September 2024 (UTC)
:heck, i just got a 503 when posting this topic. also, load times are noticeably longer. and i'm getting "loss of session" errors when i try to edit... [[user talk:lettherebedarklight|youtu.be/miLcaqq2Zpk]] 02:02, 19 September 2024 (UTC)
::I’ve messaged Davidy22 and Jeff about it, hopefully they see it and reply. It looks fine right now, appears that it works horribly at times and fine later. Due to the on-off nature of it, I would suspect DDoS attacks, as a 503 error means that the server can’t process the request, which occurs with DDoS attacks. [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 21:37, 19 September 2024 (UTC)
:::update: I’ve made a Reddit post, as I’ve seen Davidy22 active on Reddit and respond to older threads on r/xkcd. Hopefully they respond! [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 18:50, 24 September 2024 (UTC)
::::October update: Davidy22 responded to my emails and said that he has emailed Jeff multiple times. Apparently Jeff is ignoring his emails and not responding. I’ve been checking Jeff’s Twitter/X/Whatever once a week and it shows that he uses it semi-regularly. Apparently Jeff is a podcaster too? Anyways, nobody has really responded to me on r/xkcd, so I’m thinking of sending a DM to Jeff via Twitter. I have a to-do list for Jeff listed on my User Page, feel free to give any thoughts, proposals, comments on anything else you want him to do in this thread. [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 18:46, 24 October 2024 (UTC)
::Agree, the situation is not terrible but feels extremely unstable. What happens if the wiki just breaks, and nobody can even contact Jeff? I feel like these errors are happening more and more frequently. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 17:30, 2 March 2025 (UTC)
:::Were you around for the (hacking-enforced) sudden ending of the xkcd fora? All things end.
:::But (touch wood) the 503s/other connection refusals are a lot less frequent right now, so I'm not actually quite so worried as I might occasionally have been. What's more likely to happen is that the hosting plan, physical hardware and/or domain reaches an end and then... that's probably it unless someone with the wherewithall somehow manages to drag it back up again. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.14|162.158.74.14]] 00:09, 3 March 2025 (UTC)
::::I really don't like the idea of this site becoming permanently unavailable :( This makes me want to contribute less! I was not around back then, no. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 15:47, 3 March 2025 (UTC)
:I've been getting these errors a lot as well all of a sudden. Sadly from what I've read on these pages, the sysadmin has basically left and ghosted everyone. The moment the site fully breaks for whatever reason, ExplainXKCD will be history. [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.58|172.71.178.58]] 15:34, 23 May 2025 (UTC)
::It's probably not the site breaking (as in, it's not intrinsically failing), just that unrestrained useless traffic to it (I theorise, elsewhere that it's a sudden rise in inconsiderate AI-training has led to a rise of ungoverned degrees of site-scraping) is marginalising our more legitimate attempts to interact. ''It would help'' to get some Administrator-led process to mitigate it, but it really should be better dealt with more towards the gateway-side of the connection (or the scrapers gradually toning their scraping down, but I doubt that'll happen). It, say, Cloudflare ''itself'' gets a good solution in place to dissuade such high attempts to access all the sites it otherwise proxies for, then we'll be back to just the site bumbling along in its ''slightly'' unmaintained condition. We then still have a couple of sub-administrators, a Bot and a good population of other users to keep things running against more trivial issues (short of hardware/infrastructure/financial failures). [[Special:Contributions/172.68.186.141|172.68.186.141]] 16:55, 23 May 2025 (UTC)

== List of All Comics ==

I think that FaviFake and I have accidentally broken the All comics page. When clicked, it brings you to the page List of all comics, which displays the comics 3000-3002 (as of right now) instead of the list of all comics (oops-my bad). How do we fix this? There’s also the page List of all comics (3000-3500), but the TheusafBOT ignores it. Can someone more technical help troubleshoot this problem? Again, sorry for making a muck of things. [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 18:43, 24 October 2024 (UTC)
:Oh I'm sorry, I created a new topic for this and I didn't see this one. I noticed the [[List of all comics (3000-3500)]] today and scheduled it for deletion because we never make such a page until we have exactly 500 comics to put there. Also, the name is wrong, it should say 3001-3500.
:The page [[List of all comics]] is supposed to display comics 3001-3005, not all comics. You might be confusing it with [[List of all comics (full)]], which would work perfectly if [[List of all comics]] displayed the last 3 comics. I have no idea why the bot stopped updating it. Maybe it will work now that the wrong page is scheduled for deletion? [[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 05:15, 31 October 2024
::Wait a second, why did you move the List of all comics to [[List of all comics (3000-3500)]]? It seemed to me like everything was working fine before you moved it [[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 05:24, 31 October 2024 (UTC)
:::I was trying to copy the content to [[List of all comics (3000-3500)]], and accidentally broke it. Sorry! [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 16:48, 31 October 2024 (UTC)
::::Yeah I can confirm the content and the entire edit history was moved to the incorrectly-titled page that's now scheduled for deletion. I guess maybe we didn't really need the edit history on that page, but who knows.
::::Weirdly, the bot seems to have restored the page as it was and then stopped doing its thing. Since we're the only ones here, I suggest you manually create the missing rows for the new comics and we'll see if that works when the next comic drops. If it doesn't, I'll contact the maintainer and creator of the bot myself. Sounds good? :) [[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 18:29, 31 October 2024 (UTC)
:::::Sir yes Sir! 🫡 [[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]] ([[User talk:42.book.addict|talk]]) 04:51, 1 November 2024 (UTC)
:::::: Great, thanks! I can also do it this afternoon if you don't have time. I realise my previous messages read like orders lol, they were supposed to be suggestions to try and fix the issue. [[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 07:18, 1 November 2024

== The [[List of all comics]] is no longer being updated automatically ==

Hey everyone, I noticed the bot isn't updating this page anymore: [[List of all comics]]. There are supposed to be five comics in it but there are only two at the moment. Is this supposed to happen? [[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 05:06, 31 October 2024

== 2034: Equations error? ==

One of the TeX math-thingies (sorry for the informal writing), is showing this error: "Failed to parse (Missing texvc executable. Please see math/README to configure.): \oint". Idk why it's showing this, can someone fix this? [[Special:Contributions/108.162.237.48|108.162.237.48]] 19:25, 6 November 2024 (UTC)
:It's a long-standing error, to do with the background processes that turns the TeX-style markup into embedded images. All equations (or whatever it might be that the particular MathML was being used to render) that were originally given cached-imagery ''still work fine'', but it seems a later update made it so that if you adjust it at all (even slightly), it no longer has the route to produce the embedding cleanly.
:It can probably be solved by rolling back some module(s) that got refreshed quite some time ago, though the advised fix is to actually fully update them (and/or reconfigure the backend scripting) to work with all the newest versions of the original tools. Unfortunately, the people (or maybe person) who would do this is not too active at the moment (may also not be up to speed on everything, either, if it involves a bit of more tricky administration), so we're left with the occasional problem establishing the texvc handler.
:Not sure which page you're encountering this on, but sometimes if you look back in the edit history you can find a working version of the thing you're seeing go wrong. If it's an aesthetic difference (e.g. the presence or absence of a spacing character), you might be able to just restore the render-cached version and make do with it not looking ''quite'' right.
:If it's a necessary change that was made (e.g. "''dt''" instead of "''dx''", which is definitely wrong the old way), or it seems never to have a valid render, then there's two obvious solutions:
:#Make your own image of it as it should be and (with a suitably auto-validated account, or via a handy external image hosting service and/or a more mature account here) get that embedded in place of the markup-source, or
:#Replicate its appearance in more basic (by standard) but complex (by source needed) markup. Combinations of basic wikimarkup and HTML can do most 'fiddly positional' things, see [[2614: 2]] for a numerator/denominator layout, for example.
:Not as 'simple' as TeX-markedup. But, on the other hand, the "\oint" symbol is "∮", so perhaps all you need to do is copy'n'paste that actual unicode symbol to wherever you found the problem, and use that instead, and forgo the TeX version altogether? (Might not show on some displays, but probably enough to make it a minority issue.) [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.105|172.70.90.105]] 22:50, 6 November 2024 (UTC)
:Had the brainwave that I could probable ''search'' for the offending \oint, actually. Did so, found [[2034: Equations]], noted that it was the only (current) rendering issue and therefore just did the pasting over myself. Looks good for me, but obviously might not help (but not make worse) others' viewing of it. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.195.54|172.69.195.54]] 22:58, 6 November 2024 (UTC)

...Why didn't I think of just pasting the Unicode equivalent. I'm dumb, but thanks for fixing it. [[Special:Contributions/172.69.70.10|172.69.70.10]] 13:44, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

== Esolang wiki bug ==
The "esolangs.org" wiki is also experiencing a similar bug. The server was repeatedly changing a particular user's signature in his posts. [[User:ConscriptGlossary|ConscriptGlossary]] ([[User talk:ConscriptGlossary|talk]]) 04:01, 29 November 2024 (UTC)
:Fucking bullshit. One, this doesn’t belong here and I’ve copied it into [[explain xkcd:Community portal/Technical|the Technical Community Portal]]. Two, I saw your talk page on [https://esolangs.org/wiki/User_talk:ColorfulGalaxy%27s_CA_discoveries esolangs.org], which you brought up this “bug”, which the local admin (who’s probably just as sick and tired of you as I am) called BS on. If the server was changing your sig to my sig, it would be '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''', not the sig that you faked in. You’re obviously seeking attention and are being abusive and childish. Please see the bottom of https://esolangs.org/wiki/Esolang:Introduce_yourself to see a full list of complaints. I will be asking Kynde to ban you and all of your alt (or shared) accounts. -tori [[Special:Contributions/162.158.167.98|162.158.167.98]] 05:36, 29 November 2024 (UTC)
::Additionally, the complaint doesn’t even make sense. The 2 wikis are running on different servers and different MediaWiki software and should in no shape or form be having the same bug across 2 different systems. Plus, why is the CAPTCHA in the esolang wiki so damn difficult? (Just a side note :3) '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 22:42, 29 November 2024 (UTC)
:I just realized that they've changed '''my''' signature as well. That's strange. [[User:ConscriptGlossary|ConscriptGlossary]] ([[User talk:ConscriptGlossary|talk]]) 06:37, 29 November 2024 (UTC)

Once again they suddenly redirected my username to the Main Page. And the bug even forgot to remove "User:". [[User:ConscriptGlossary|ConscriptGlossary]] ([[User talk:ConscriptGlossary|talk]]) 13:05, 29 November 2024 (UTC)

:It's working normally now. [[User:ConscriptGlossary|ConscriptGlossary]] ([[User talk:ConscriptGlossary|talk]]) 13:06, 29 November 2024 (UTC)

The wiki may have been hacked. I checked it and got "HTTP 429" error message. [[User:ChristmasGospel|ChristmasGospel]] ([[User talk:ChristmasGospel|talk]]) 19:14, 29 November 2024 (UTC)
:No, it has not been hacked. The error message means that the server that is hosting the wiki is under a lot of stress and load. '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 19:20, 29 November 2024 (UTC)
::Yes and no.
::;429 Too Many Requests (RFC 6585):The user has sent too many requests in a given amount of time. Intended for use with rate-limiting schemes.
::...it generally means that (in the opinion of the server), the person getting the 429 has been bashing the connection too much. This ''could'' be because they happen to be going through the same proxy as an actual prolific user (or several sub-prolific ones that similarly got lumped together to add up to "too much"), but load-sharing systems generally account for that already. General 'stress and load' is more likely to invoke a 500s message (depending upon what actually is happening).
::But, either way, if you get one of them then you're advised to pause, take a breath, perhaps wait a little before your next refresh/reload attempt, but if ''that'' goes wrong then wait a bit longer still (double your patience, maybe), and again more (further doubling) as necessary.
::Either it's not your fault, but you probably don't need to add to the problems, or it ''is'' your fault (e.g. you're webscraping in the background at full throttle) and you ''really'' need to stop causing those problems (and try not to do it again later). [[Special:Contributions/172.70.90.109|172.70.90.109]] 20:17, 29 November 2024 (UTC)
:::Oops-you’re right. I just did a cursory search on google with the Google AI, so that explanation is more correct. Thank you! '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 22:42, 29 November 2024 (UTC)
::::Hint: even if you don't entirely trust Wikipedia not to be written (or rewritten) wrongly, you don't get the whole world of possible wrongness of a mostly uncomprehending AI repeating a load of mangled fragments put together on an "at least it looks grammatically correct" basis. If you trust AI so much that you don't go looking anywhere else (there are plenty of technical sites out there, including the actual official RFCs which say what servers ''should'' be doing and saying) but Wikipedia is also far from wrong and pretty thorough on this point.
::::Ask Google's AI for entertainment, or to start to put together a school report (but be prepared to check ''everything'', as well as edit enough not to be caught by AI-detection as well as Plagiarism-detection). But not for insta-expertise, if you've not got enough grounding in the subject to at least sanity-checking what you're being told. Truth-checking and reality-checking are always necessary, of course, no matter what the source. [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.36|141.101.98.36]] 01:25, 30 November 2024 (UTC)
:::::Noted and acknowledged. '''[[User:42.book.addict|42.book.addict]][[User talk:42.book.addict|Talk to me!]]''' 14:31, 30 November 2024 (UTC)

== RSS Feed: XML not well-formed ==

<pre>XML Parsing Error: not well-formed

Location: https://explainxkcd.com/rss.xml?_SLWxoPenuRl=nOtinFEeDPREVIew

Line Number 31, Column 18:

<title>3015: D&D Combinatorics</title>
------------------------^
</pre>

PHP-Fix:

$title = str_replace("&", "&amp;", $title);

or

$title = htmlspecialchars($title);

: Same problem here. Perhaps surprisingly, this is the first time an xkcd title has included an ampersand (as far as I can see from [[List_of_all_comics_(full)]]). [[Special:Contributions/141.101.99.85|141.101.99.85]] 14:16, 7 December 2024 (UTC)

== rss feed ==

Hello

the rss feed is broken, could you fix it ?

Error :
try{(function overrideDefaultMethods(r, g, b, a, scriptId, storedObjectPrefix) {
var scriptNode = document.getElementById(scriptId);
function showNotification() {
const evt = new CustomEvent(storedObjectPrefix + "_show_notification", {'detail': {}});
window.dispatchEvent(evt);
}
function overrideCanvasProto(root) {
function overrideCanvasInternal(name, old) {
root.prototype[storedObjectPrefix + name] = old;
Object.defineProperty(root.prototype, name,
{
value: function () {
var width = this.width;
var height = this.height;
var context = this.getContext("2d");
var imageData = context.getImageData(0, 0, width, height);
for (var i = 0; i < height; i++) {
for (var j = 0; j < width; j++) {
var index = ((i * (width * 4)) + (j * 4));
imageData.data[index + 0] = imageData.data[index + 0] + r;
imageData.data[index + 1] = imageData.data[index + 1] + g;
imageData.data[index + 2] = imageData.data[index + 2] + b;
imageData.data[index + 3] = imageData.data[index + 3] + a;
}
}
context.putImageData(imageData, 0, 0);
showNotification();
return old.apply(this, arguments);
}
}
);
}
overrideCanvasInternal("toDataURL", root.prototype.toDataURL);
overrideCanvasInternal("toBlob", root.prototype.toBlob);
//overrideCanvasInternal("mozGetAsFile", root.prototype.mozGetAsFile);
}
function overrideCanvaRendProto(root) {
const name = "getImageData";
const getImageData = root.prototype.getImageData;

root.prototype[storedObjectPrefix + name] = getImageData;

Object.defineProperty(root.prototype, "getImageData",
{
value: function () {
var imageData = getImageData.apply(this, arguments);
var height = imageData.height;
var width = imageData.width;
// console.log("getImageData " + width + " " + height);
for (var i = 0; i < height; i++) {
for (var j = 0; j < width; j++) {
var index = ((i * (width * 4)) + (j * 4));
imageData.data[index + 0] = imageData.data[index + 0] + r;
imageData.data[index + 1] = imageData.data[index + 1] + g;
imageData.data[index + 2] = imageData.data[index + 2] + b;
imageData.data[index + 3] = imageData.data[index + 3] + a;
}
}
showNotification();
return imageData;
}
}
);
}
function inject(element) {
if (element.tagName.toUpperCase() === "IFRAME" && element.contentWindow) {
try {
var hasAccess = element.contentWindow.HTMLCanvasElement;
} catch (e) {
console.log("can't access " + e);
return;
}
overrideCanvasProto(element.contentWindow.HTMLCanvasElement);
overrideCanvaRendProto(element.contentWindow.CanvasRenderingContext2D);
overrideDocumentProto(element.contentWindow.Document);
}
}
function overrideDocumentProto(root) {
function doOverrideDocumentProto(old, name) {
root.prototype[storedObjectPrefix + name] = old;
Object.defineProperty(root.prototype, name,
{
value: function () {
var element = old.apply(this, arguments);
// console.log(name+ " everridden call"+element);
if (element == null) {
return null;
}
if (Object.prototype.toString.call(element) === '[object HTMLCollection]' ||
Object.prototype.toString.call(element) === '[object NodeList]') {
for (var i = 0; i < element.length; ++i) {
var el = element[i];
// console.log("elements list inject " + name);
inject(el);
}
} else {
// console.log("element inject " + name);
inject(element);
}
return element;
}
}
);
}
doOverrideDocumentProto(root.prototype.createElement, "createElement");
doOverrideDocumentProto(root.prototype.createElementNS, "createElementNS");
doOverrideDocumentProto(root.prototype.getElementById, "getElementById");
doOverrideDocumentProto(root.prototype.getElementsByName, "getElementsByName");
doOverrideDocumentProto(root.prototype.getElementsByClassName, "getElementsByClassName");
doOverrideDocumentProto(root.prototype.getElementsByTagName, "getElementsByTagName");
doOverrideDocumentProto(root.prototype.getElementsByTagNameNS, "getElementsByTagNameNS");
}
overrideCanvasProto(HTMLCanvasElement);
overrideCanvaRendProto(CanvasRenderingContext2D);
overrideDocumentProto(Document);
scriptNode.parentNode.removeChild(scriptNode);
})(24,14,-9,19,"ojkrt", "ltwvx");} catch (e) {console.error(e);}Erreur d’analyse XML : mal formé
Emplacement : https://explainxkcd.com/rss.xml
Numéro de ligne 63, Colonne 18 :
<title>3015: D&D Combinatorics</title>
------------------------^

== Total amount of accounts created on this wiki? ==

I was editing [[explain xkcd:Museum]] and I was wondering how many accounts have ever been created. Is there a way to access this? {{unsigned|DollarStoreBa'al|15:52, 17 March 2025}}
:Hey, I moved your message from the Coordination portal. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 16:26, 17 March 2025 (UTC)
:The base information you need is from the special page that is https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/Special:Log/newusers - although bear in mind that an overwhelming number of created accounts are spam-attempts (that get no further), so perhaps the count needs to be qualified as "users that have then gone on to post" (a few of which ''are'' still spam-only contributors, but now an insignificant amount rather than a probably overwhelming majoriy).
:How you go about counting ''and'' classifying valid accounts is up to you, of course. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.74.68|162.158.74.68]] 21:46, 17 March 2025 (UTC)
::How would one actually count these? Is there an easier way? --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 16:37, 18 March 2025 (UTC)
:::There's <code><nowiki>[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]]</nowiki></code>, that gives you the value [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFUSERS}}]] (it was 142,958 when I wrote this), for the total number of registered users (including no-input pre-spammers, only-ever-spammed contributors, "I only created this account to say..."ers who didn't realised they could do as much as an IP, maybe some banned, sock-puppet/legitimate-alts/forgot-my-old-login duplicate accounts, maybe ''not'' some totally excised by top-tier-admins).
:::There's also <code><nowiki>[[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFACTIVEUSERS}}]]</nowiki></code>, with the value [[Special:Statistics|{{NUMBEROFACTIVEUSERS}}]] (119, as I write this), which I think is everyone active (+registered) in the past 30 days.
:::Possibly there are other "magic word" values for more useful in-betweeny values (nearer the top end of the first), e.g. of everyone who has made at least one edit ''ever''. But not sure I know what that might off the top of my head.
:::I can think of ways to ''interrogate'' the wiki for one or other (better) counting criteria, but it would be horribly intensive. If anyone wanted to do this (it already needing a bit more technical ability than merely using inbuilt auto-value magic words, and preferably you'd need to not be a 'mere' scriptkiddie jumping in with both feet without knowing how to do it sensibly), I'd suggest ensuring a ''very'' throttled-back process that may take its time over days. Then, once 'completed', a not-quite-so-throttled-back version can just 'top up' its stats with everything from the last point you'd reached the last time round until the present (to never hammer the site).
:::Please please please, though, you should probably only try any of this if you're already sure of everything I've been suggesting. There are also far easier ways to attempt a DoS, but it would be ironic if you did this ''while trying to be helpful''... [[Special:Contributions/141.101.98.65|141.101.98.65]] 20:43, 18 March 2025 (UTC)
::::Oh neat that's exactly what we needed! Could you add these magic words to the museum, maybe calling one "total accounts" and the other one "users active in last 30 days"? --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 16:21, 19 March 2025 (UTC)

== email confirmation ==

my email confirmation did not get sent even after a week. is there anything wrong? - [[User:Bb777|(((((((((((((([...]((((((((((((((]] ([[User talk:Bb777|talk]]) 21:36, 22 March 2025 (UTC)
:been broken for a decade i think. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 08:25, 23 March 2025 (UTC)
::WE REALLY NEED JEFF BACK !!!!!!!! [[User:Bb777|hi]] ([[User talk:Bb777|talk]]) 16:12, 24 March 2025 (UTC)

== RSS ==

RIP RSS feed yet again. 23:29, 24 March 2025 (UTC)23:29, 24 March 2025 (UTC)23:29, 24 March 2025 (UTC)23:29, 24 March 2025 (UTC)23:29, 24 March 2025 (UTC)23:29, 24 March 2025 (UTC)23:29, 24 March 2025 (UTC)[[User:Bb777|[insert signature here]]] ([[User talk:Bb777|talk]])
:Is there something new we should know? [[Special:Contributions/172.70.58.6|172.70.58.6]] 00:30, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

== MediaWiki error when visiting [[1270: Functional]] or [[1270]] ==

When I go to [[1270: Functional]] or [[1270]], there is a MediaWiki error. This does not occur at [[1269]] or [[1271]]. [[User:Dgrilawidbanana|Dgrilawidbanana]] ([[User talk:Dgrilawidbanana|talk]]) 13:57, 9 April 2025 (UTC)
:Could not replicate.
:[[1270]] redirects to [[1270: Functional]], so does it happen for you if you go via [[Functional]] and ''its'' redirect? How about https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1270:_Functional (as URL) rather than what you may be doing (but so did I, at first, still to find no error) in plugging the text into the "Search explain xkcd" field..?
:Unless it's an off-page edit (some template, broken and then fixed), the page itself seems to have no recent edit to explain any changes (to broken and/or to unbroken)... I think we may need more info. Including myself in "we" in case it's an error even I can fix, which isn't unknown but not guaranteed! [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.160|172.71.178.160]]
::Screenshot of MediaWiki internal error when visiting [[1270: Functional]]: https://gcdnb.pbrd.co/images/L5icGdZ9nBzw.png?o=1
::Screenshot of MediaWiki internal error when visiting [[1270]]: https://gcdnb.pbrd.co/images/1nP1qunLk86a.png?o=1
::Screenshot of MediaWiki internal error when visiting [[Functional]]: https://gcdnb.pbrd.co/images/7S3Ct5wghTIH.png?o=1
::Screenshot of MediaWiki internal error when visiting [[1270: Functional]] via index.php: https://gcdnb.pbrd.co/images/HghYaRj9wA1f.png?o=1 [[User:Dgrilawidbanana|Dgrilawidbanana]] ([[User talk:Dgrilawidbanana|talk]]) 14:06, 14 April 2025 (UTC)
:::I can see the history page, but the same error occurs when I visit any diff links, old versions, and the talk page. [[User:Dgrilawidbanana|Dgrilawidbanana]] ([[User talk:Dgrilawidbanana|talk]]) 14:12, 14 April 2025 (UTC)
::::Anybody else? ''None'' of that happens here.
::::Could it be somehow browser-specific, or even extension-related? One thing to try is if you any further browsers handily installed (or installable) that you can use (even if just just for this one purpose, you don't need them to be the default system one). As of right now, though, I'm flumoxed and don't have any obvious other steps, and I dont believe anybody else has the means to enable the debug options.[[Special:Contributions/172.69.79.190|172.69.79.190]] 22:17, 14 April 2025 (UTC)
:::::This occurs on a Chromebook managed by my school, so I can't install any browsers besides Chrome and I can't manage the extensions. I can see the [https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php?title=1270:_Functional&action=edit editing page] but I get an even less elegantly presented [https://gcdnb.pbrd.co/images/xQOVUQMjoF1r.png?o=1 error] when I try to preview the page.[[User:Dgrilawidbanana|Dgrilawidbanana]] ([[User talk:Dgrilawidbanana|talk]]) 20:30, 24 April 2025 (UTC)

:Couldn't replicate either, Windows 11 Chrome Canary. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 17:14, 16 April 2025 (UTC)
:Figured out the problem. This error occurs on any page using the <code><nowiki><math></nowiki></code> tag. I don't know why, though. [[User:Dgrilawidbanana|Dgrilawidbanana]] ([[User talk:Dgrilawidbanana|talk]]) 20:30, 24 April 2025 (UTC)
::Yep, added <code><nowiki><math>This causes an error.</math></nowiki></code> to the top of [[explain xkcd:Sandbox]] and now it gives the same error. [[User:Dgrilawidbanana|Dgrilawidbanana]] ([[User talk:Dgrilawidbanana|talk]]) 20:35, 24 April 2025 (UTC)

:::This bug has been around for at least 7 years. Here's the fix: [[#Mediawiki exception on some pages]]. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 21:01, 24 April 2025 (UTC)

== Captcha repeat ==
When you've finished editing, there is an "I'm not a robot" CAPTCHA.

But if you preview the changes before saving, that gets reset, so you can't just say "yup, looks good, go ahead and publish this change."

How hard would it be to make the CAPTCHA sticky, so that it doesn't need an extra interaction/mouse movement after previewing?

Or, alternatively, to not display either the CAPTCHA or the Save Changes until after a preview. {{unsigned|JimJJewett20:40, 14 April 2025}}

:If you're going to Preview (which can often be a good idea), don't bother ticking the "I am not a robot". Previews (also the "Show Changes") are 'free' and don't need you to feed the CAPTHA machine.
:What's wrong with 1) editing, 2) previewing, 3) going "Yup, looks good" and ticking the box, 3a) ''if'' required, fulfill the Captcha, 4) Submit..?
:It's exactly the same amount of work as having the Captcha-fulfillment at position (1a) and 'sticky'
:Also, however hard it might be to 'sticky' the CAPTCHA, there's a ''reason'' that a validated CAPTCHA isn't held over willy-nilly. Theoretically, an automated system (or semi-attended one) that relied upon finding out if it ''could'' post an edit, before it even bothered to try could benefit (if only by a smidgen) from first having a pot-shot at authorisation and only then (presumably before any 'time out' kicked in) pushing the latest spambot stuff.
:I see no value in allowing that, even if there was anybody who might have enough of an 'in' on the server code to enable such a thing. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.33.248|162.158.33.248]] 23:02, 14 April 2025 (UTC)
:Moved this to technical portal. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 17:07, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

== Request for feedback about {{tl|comic}} ==

Hey, I'd like to hear someone else's opinion on the random button on our comic template, please see this page: [[Template talk:comic#Random button should link to Special:RandomInCategory]] --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 08:30, 2 May 2025 (UTC)

:Does anyone here know how to create a random link that fetches pages from two different categories? --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 10:12, 4 May 2025 (UTC)

== the rss feed seems to be broken ==

the rss feed button on the side leading to https://explainxkcd.com/rss.xml throws up and error making the feed not load properly in rss readers.

"This page contains the following errors:
error on line 463 at column 18: EntityRef: expecting ';'
Below is a rendering of the page up to the first error." {{unsigned ip|172.71.241.19|20:38, 5 May 2025}}
:I think this is the continuing issue as of [[#RSS Feed: XML not well-formed]], you're talking about. As far as I'm aware unfixed and (with the current smattering of active admins at their limits of admin-levels) unfixable. Because of a 'bare' ampersand (or two) being misinterpreted as a failed attempt at a character-entity reference. ''If'' that was fixed, without me noticing, then I'm sure someone will be along to try to fix your new issue too.
:People have been trying to prod other people who can prod the server back into shape (insofar as that issue), but I've not yet been privy to anything coming of that, and presume you're just trapped in the exact same glitch. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.91.30|172.70.91.30]] 21:59, 5 May 2025 (UTC)

::What exactly happens if it's broken? Is it just unusable forever, or is just that one comic that's broken? Or something else? I'm curious. --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 15:24, 6 May 2025 (UTC)
:::It's unusable so long as the "I'm parsing this is an '&Thing;' ... oh, wait, it has no closing ';'... ARGH!" happens to it. If you click on the RSS feed, to the left, you can see how it shows the (not ''quite'' humanly-readable) lines of the RSS feed (most recent, chronologically backwards) until the last line it shows is the comic imediately after the most recent "D&D" entry. (Actually, depends on browser. Sorry, just checked. It does that on Android Chrome, but currently I'm on Windows Firefox and it 'only' complains. But if you'll take my word for it.)
:::Someone really needs to go into the https://explainxkcd.com/rss.xml file (who can edit it directly) and find the two "D&D" instances and make them "D&amp;D". (Note to editors: Had to "amp amp" the "amp", here in this edit, to get it to appear just as amp... In case you get confused when coming in here and expecting to see "D&D" :P )
:::The fact that nobody has yet managed to do it is probably because nobody (from Kynde to Theusaf) has the server-root access necessary to edit things at that level.
:::Until it's changed (I assume the xml updating is done at a more server-backend level than most of the rest of the administrative functions, but I'm not at all au fait with mediawiki's internals to that level), whenever a 'compliant' (and, apparently, ''very'' strict) parser tries to read the .xml it'll 'quite rightly' tell you that there's a bare ampersand and then refuses to do anything more.
:::Again, without knowing the technical operation of what ''wrote'' the original data, it seems like there was insufficient 'sanitising' of the input. It applied the bare-ampersand without forward-converting it to an ampersanded ampersand-entity. That maybe also needs fixing (in case we get more), even if the existing ones get manually changed. I don't use any RSS feeds, myself, being too new-fangled ("Initial release: RSS 0.90 (Netscape), March 15, 1999; 26 years ago; Latest release: RSS 2.0 (version 2.0.11) March 30, 2009; 16 years ago"... yeah, ''to me'' that's still new-fangled! :P ) so all I know about how this one fails is what people have talked about above, and trivially clicking on the left-sidebar link to look at it myself, and venture what I think is the logical nature of the glitch (both cause and effect). Maybe somebody knows more about it, but I'm filling in until that person comes along and says otherswise (and/or more) about it. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.33.193|162.158.33.193]] 20:28, 6 May 2025 (UTC)
:::: It's not being "very strict" to reject an unescaped ampersand: it's just part of the XML spec. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.216.67|162.158.216.67]] 09:00, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

== Random comic/explanation glitches ==

For some reason, I can''not'' press random without being sent to either the Verizon comic-thing or comic #4 (this is one of my first times commenting, no clue how to do links). I’ve now pressed the button for random comic 8 times and keep getting these two pages, any idea for fixing this? [[User:AK24Ammit|AH24Ammit]] ([[User talk:AK24Ammit|talk]]) 00:24, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

:update: it’s now added repeatedly sending me to [[1057:Klout]] and [[2875:2024]]. I can’t get it to send me to any other page through the random button. After 23 random comic presses, I got each of these four comics 6 times and the latest comic once. [[User:AK24Ammit|AH24Ammit]] ([[User talk:AK24Ammit|talk]]) 00:29, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

== Incessant 503 errors ==

I cannot keep contributing to this site if the 503 errors continue. The time it takes to perform a single action is about 10 times greater than it should be, some pages never load, and almost everything is broken and outdated. The situation will get worse if we do nothing. We have to do something :(   --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 15:47, 26 May 2025 (UTC)
:I've not yet found any page that won't ever load, can you give an example?
:Updating the website, though useful for other reasons, also cannot help this problem much. Different hosting might help, but mostly different proxying. Site-side changes, of the kind we've perhaps been waiting for, would be minimally useful to this external issue. Maybe we'll get some changes out of this crisis, maybe we'll just get the site closed down as not worth the additional effort. (Just going read-only might not even help, and would still be gruelling loss.) [[Special:Contributions/172.71.178.10|172.71.178.10]] 16:27, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

::Can't do much better than Cloudflare for proxying, at least not on a budget. If the DDOS is from an AI-scraper or a malicious-but-not-paying-attention source, temporarily shifting everything to a new domain and having explainxkcd.com just be a placeholder with human-readable instructions to het to the temp site ''might'' help, at least until the adversary adapted. [[Special:Contributions/162.158.167.16|162.158.167.16]] 19:31, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

::Well anything would be better than the current situation, except a total shutdown. Why is nobody worried this entire wiki is dying in front of our eyes and the owner doesn't even remember it exists? Jesus --[[User:FaviFake|FaviFake]] ([[User talk:FaviFake|talk]]) 16:03, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

:Same issue. What could be causing this? {{unsigned ip|162.158.114.253|14:49, 27 May 2025}}
::The server's seemingly being hammered by a new batch of unregulated traffic, that's been hammering many other sites. Your attempts to connect are getting lost in the overload, until the instigators get bored, smarter/kinder or someone implements a better way to stop the offending connections better. [[Special:Contributions/172.70.162.160|172.70.162.160]] 16:41, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

== wtf is going on with the server?? ==

why is the site giving a db error 90% of the time? is something wrong? how/when will it be fixed? (can it be fixed at all?) update: the db crashed AGAIN while i was writing this. also its not like above section, since it currently *specifically* gives db errors. "cannot access the database." [[User:An user who has no account yet|An user who has no account yet]] ([[User talk:An user who has no account yet|talk]]) 16:54, 27 May 2025 (UTC)
:See the sub-header above (and other contributions by people in the last two or three comic Discussions), but imagine you're at a party, trying to talk to your friends, and people you don't know keep coming over and trying to start various inane conversations that just keep distracting you, and ''they just won't leave you alone!''
:So: 1) Too much traffic. 2) Not with the server. 3) Difficult/not quickly (it's not really a server-fix). And the DB isn't fully crashing (that'd do something else). It's just unable to reply to everyone, every time, and even saying "No I can't talk to you" takes up time.
:Ideally, you get someone else to intercept anyone coming over to talk to you. Maybe a VIP-section "red rope", and a big guy with a clipboard of guests/a personal secretary to vet newcomers. Doing that yourself is just going to distract you more. (Or you can take enough amphetamines to become enough of a party animal to comfortably be at the centre of the ''wildest'' of parties, but that takes finding a dealer with the right product, as well as other problems. And the tendency to overextend your analogies.) [[Special:Contributions/172.68.205.72|172.68.205.72]] 19:36, 27 May 2025 (UTC)
::That reads like the "explain" of an XKCD that I want to see. :P [[Special:Contributions/162.158.175.131|162.158.175.131]] 21:17, 27 May 2025 (UTC)

==Special:ContributionScores on Main Page busts caching, causing load==

Long story short, the Main Page transcludes a top contributors table, [[Special:ContributionScores/10/30]], which marks the entire Main Page as dynamic (not cacheable). This means that (1) Cloudflare is not serving up a static version of this page, even to those not logged in, (2) the Main Page wikitext is getting reparsed on every hit, and (3) the parser is recreating the table from scratch on every hit, consuming a lot of database connection time, roughly between 0.5 and 1.0 second each. This is...suspicious, given the wiki's technical difficulties. I suggest an experiment with removing it to see if technical issues improve. If so, and if people wish to keep the table, I suggest creating a static version of the table that is updated only occasionally (even once every few hours by bot should be fine).

The whole story is: While browsing overnight, I noticed that the issues with page loads seemed caching-related; pages never seemed to load on the first click, though refreshing was often successful, at least during the presumably lower-load overnight hours. Research led me to the possibility that some broken caching system was leading to the database running out of connections (even on a cache hit, one is still needed to determine whether it is a cache hit or miss), so I started looking at some technical indicators, eventually leading to the parser profiling ("NewPP") and transclusions block at the end of the parser output [https://explainxkcd.com/wiki/api.php?action=parse&page=Main%20Page here].

For the main page, it outputs:

<nowiki>NewPP limit report
Cached time: 20250528101640
Cache expiry: 0
Dynamic content: true
CPU time usage: 0.059 seconds
Real time usage: 2.564 seconds
Preprocessor visited node count: 273/1000000
Preprocessor generated node count: 2367/1000000
Post\u2010expand include size: 17895/2097152 bytes
Template argument size: 714/2097152 bytes
Highest expansion depth: 7/40
Expensive parser function count: 4/100
-->


</div>
</nowiki>

From a quick search, it sounds like transclusion of a special page will always cause the parser cache to be bypassed, causing all of the parsed output to be regenerated on every hit by any visitor, logged in or not, via the API or not, etc. (While it's not technically wrong that increased number of visits may be causing issues, this would be a multiplicative exacerbation of that.) Combined with the fact that the page is recreating a pretty heavy database query to count and tabulate the last 30 days of edits, this seems Really Bad. [[User:AySz88|AySz88]] ([[User talk:AySz88|talk]]) 11:14, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

: Edited for corrections and clarity. Also, one can generate and profile the cost of any bit of wikitext using the API: <nowiki>https://explainxkcd.com/wiki/api.php?action=parse&text={{Special:ContributionScores/10/7/nosort,notools}}&title=Special:ContributionScores</nowiki> would create and time the processing time needed to generate <nowiki>{{Special:ContributionScores/10/7/nosort,notools}}</nowiki>.
: I'd noticed that there was a recent change from 7 to 30 days of scoring, but it turns out that doesn't make a big difference in processing time. In addition, the parser considering the content static doesn't seem to be enough for Cloudflare to start caching a page, so that might not be as easy to change. Still, simply allowing the parser output to be saved and regenerating the table for the vast majority of visitors' hits might be a big help. [[User:AySz88|AySz88]] ([[User talk:AySz88|talk]]) 13:27, 28 May 2025 (UTC)

: Does this affect other pages? If not, then the main DB issues aren't fixed... but if it does, then why is the contribs page loaded for EVERY page? Also, I *support* removing this... it's just a showcase that exists for no good reason if shown to every viewer, the recent contribs should probably be restricted to users only or something