Welcome to the external links noticeboard
This page is for reporting possible breaches of the external links guideline. Post questions here regarding whether particular external links are appropriate or compliant with Wikipedia's guidelines for external links. Provide links to the relevant article(s), talk page(s), and external links(s) that are being discussed. Questions about prominent websites like YouTube, IMDb, Twitter, or Find a Grave might be addressed with information from this guide. Sections older than 10 days archived by MiszaBot. Click here to purge this page (For help, see Wikipedia:Purge) Shortcuts WP:ELN WP:EL/N If you mention specific editors, you must notify them. You may use {{subst:ELN-notice}} to do so.
Search this noticeboard & archives Additional notes: Concerns with links used as references should be handled at the reliable sources noticeboard. For cases involving blatant spamming, please file a report at the spam project. Obvious cases of corporate vanity can be tagged with {{db-g11}}. This board is not intended for generalized discussion about the external links guidelines themselves, which should be handled at the guideline talk page. To mark a report resolved, place {{Resolved|Your reason here ~~~~}} at the top of the section.
To start a new request, enter a report title (section header) below:

Indicators
Defer discussion:
Defer to WPSPAM
Defer to XLinkBot
Defer to Local blacklist
Defer to Abuse filter

How to get external link Alimohmed23 (talk) 13:56, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia. I do not understand what you want to do. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:20, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Does the info at WP:EL help? Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 12:18, 12 April 2024 (UTC)

I was trying to submit the text below at the spam: whitelist page. But no matter what, a small coloured error message popped up saying csrf token error. That's why I can't submit that new thread. It's very frustrating. How do I fix it? Would you be able to help with unblocking this specific WebLink into the whitelist for attaching a ref-link to a company on a page?

Here was my planned text entry in the spam whitelist request page.

Resolved

 – The relevant editor helped add a relevant text in another page for me. ObiKKa (talk) 22:55, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

www.xyz.com.sg

Moved to MediaWiki talk:Spam-whitelist § www.xyz.com.sg

 – Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:40, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

@ObiKKa, I think you're on the wrong page. Try posting this at MediaWiki talk:Spam-whitelist. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:16, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

<polite cough> Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:19, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

Hey. That is the exact page I tried submitting the text on with various edits many times today. It just doesn't work.

This error always popped up at top of page during publishing stage: "Error, edit not published. Invalid CSRF token.". ObiKKa (talk) 22:34, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

I've moved it there for you. No idea if you'll be able to reply with the Android app; it is, as you've discovered, buggy. Try using a browser if possible. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:40, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

Ooh, thank you. I have checked that new addition over there. I am surprised that it would only work in a desktop/laptop browser (or in difficult circumstances inside a mobile phone browser). Much pleasure. I'll try to add the resolved tag above this section. ObiKKa (talk) 22:54, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

I suppose it's WP:ITSTHURSDAY. JTanner (WMF), are you seeing problems with Android app edits? WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:28, 10 May 2024 (UTC)reply

Hi JTanner. I checked that bug report and feature request page link. Looks interesting. Should I ask over there for why the CSRF Token error keeps preventing me from posting text over in the spam whitelist request page in the Android app? I also tried to make another reply today after my request was accepted and I made the edit with the whitelisted reflink. But that CSRF Token error popped up again there in the app. So I logged into Wikipedia in a mobile browser (Brave) in the same phone and added the reply there.
I have one feature request too. I would like a finder tool during the preview stage of edits in the Android app, not only in the first edit stage. It's coz the huge pages would take a long time to scroll down on the thin portrait-style phone screen. ObiKKa (talk) 16:17, 10 May 2024 (UTC)reply

Hello @ObiKKa,

This is Amal Ramadan, I am a Sr.Movment Communications Specialist supporting the mobile apps team in the foundation. Can I ask you to send a screen recording video that shows how you det this error to our support email android-support@wikimedia.org and I will make sure to include our software engineers and update you on how this can be solved? Thanks. ARamadan-WMF (talk) 08:16, 27 May 2024 (UTC)reply

In this edit a SPA account replaced the correct external link – www.balboaacademy.edu.pa – with a gambling spamlink that is almost identical (in fact it looks at first glance to be more likely to be the real site).

To go to the trouble (and expense) of setting up a .org to hijack links to this one minor school in Panama seems excessive on the part of the spammer… unless they'll be back to add it again and again until it sticks. Would we blacklist for that risk, or is it too small a risk? Is there an edit filter it could be added to perhaps? 2A00:23C5:50E8:EE01:74C9:F21C:7D37:E976 (talk) 14:09, 10 June 2024 (UTC)reply

You can report this at MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist, where admins like User:Ohnoitsjamie can take a look. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:23, 10 June 2024 (UTC)reply

There's only been one attempt to spam it so far. We'd end up with a pretty massive blacklist if we blacklisted every site that was spammed at least once. Though I'm not a big baseball fan, I do subscribe to the "three strikes yer out" rule, though if the spammed link is connected to other blacklisted links or spam rings, I will blacklist on sight. OhNoitsJamie ^Talk 18:06, 10 June 2024 (UTC)reply

Hello. There is currently a dispute between myself and Hipal regarding the inclusion of certain links on the Human mitochondrial genetics page. The links in question are to scientific resources for visualising and analysing mtDNA. Ivan (talk) 04:19, 13 June 2024 (UTC)reply

I'm inclined to think that at least one of these should be included under WP:ELYES #3 (neutral and accurate information, but too much to put it directly in the article – my go-to example of this an online BMI calculator for Body mass index). Someone interested in Human mitochondrial genetics might also be interested in knowing what the gene sequences are. I'm not sure what the different capabilities are for each of these four websites. If they all have basically the same contents, then a smaller number would be appropriate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:15, 13 June 2024 (UTC)reply

Иованъ came here directly without explaining why the links belong.

Thank you, WhatamIdoing, for giving us an argument for inclusion.

The links are:

1. ISOGG YBrowse: A genome browser.
2. mitoWheel: A mitogenome browser.
3. mtDNAprofiler: An mtDNA sequence analysis tool.
4. mtDNAtool: Tom Glad's mtDNA analysis tool.

The subject matter seems far more complicated than BMI. I'm concerned that we're adding links that would be helpful to few at best. I suspect that people familiar enough with the topic to use such tools wouldn't be coming to the Wikipedia page at all, but instead would be working from far better materials. --Hipal (talk) 16:59, 13 June 2024 (UTC)reply

I will do my best to provide objective information for your assessment.

• ISOGG YBrowse is the only online resource of its kind. It is a linear mitogenome browser, which among other things breaks the mitogenome into individual genes. There is a learning curve, but it is rather mild for most applications and the resource is aimed at laypeople. Everyone who has been interested in mitochondrial genes themselves has used this tool at one point.
• mitoWheel is a simpler, graphically more intuitive, but far less capable mitogenome visualiser. No learning curve, but limited functionality.
• mtDNAprofiler and mtDNAtool are two resources that can take "raw" sequences and determine an mtDNA clade (and more) from it, each compatible with different formats. I suspect that people familiar enough with the topic to use such tools wouldn't be coming to the Wikipedia page at all, but instead would be working from far better materials. Genetic genealogy is a large branch of citizen science. None of these tools are geared towards professionals (any more). Excluding these links on the grounds that they would be too complicated to use is like excluding a link to eBird from a birdwatching page just because there is a learning curve to reporting a sighting reliably. Ivan (talk) 18:06, 13 June 2024 (UTC)reply

Thank you for the descriptions. Based upon them, I'd lean toward #2 as the sole link to add of the four, if we add any. --Hipal (talk) 01:51, 14 June 2024 (UTC)reply

Whereas I would lean towards deleting #3 and #4, if we delete any. Unless you write a separate article on YBrowse, an article on human mitochondrial DNA without an external link to it is like an article on free software without a link to Github. Ivan (talk) 02:02, 14 June 2024 (UTC)reply