Wikipedia talk:Requests for history merge

Copy/Paste move warning?

Is there a standard user talk page warning for copy paste moves? I know {{uw-copying}}, but I wasn't sure if there was a more specific one. Ada Twist, Scientist (TV series) and Karma's World look to be two such copy/paste moves in a row by User:Agosn from their respective Draft pages. -2pou (talk) 20:20, 12 November 2021 (UTC)

It makes sense now that I see it, but {{Uw-c&pmove}} is probably what you're looking for. Primefac (talk) 20:33, 12 November 2021 (UTC)

Appropriate action for drafts created as copy-paste moves of articles nominated for deletion

What would be the appropriate action for cases where a draft is created as a copy-paste move of an article which was subsequently deleted? Should the history of the original article be merged into the draft? Should the draft be nominated at MfD? For examples, I have noticed MSport1005 has in a few instances done this. Two such cases I found are still in draftspace but were deleted at AFD: Draft:Alex Connor deleted at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Alex Connor and Draft:Levente Révész deleted at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Levente Révész. It would seem a minor issue but these drafts have been nominated at AFC (in the case of Alex Connor) and have even been added back into mainspace missing their page history (as was the case with Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Joshua Dufek (2nd nomination), where a second such copy paste draft was deleted along with the article). A7V2 (talk) 10:04, 21 January 2022 (UTC)

If it's a straight-up copy/paste, and the article is deleted shortly thereafter, then I think it would be reasonable to do a temporary-undelete-and-histmerge to preserve attribution. The undeletion and re-deletion would be noted in the page logs so it would be fairly clear what happened. Primefac (talk) 10:11, 21 January 2022 (UTC)

But what if it wasn't shortly after? I was under the impression that it was necessary for attribution purposes, especially considering that some of these drafts can, and have been, moved into mainspace again and will lack their original history. Also, I wasn't aware that history merging requires undeletion. Does it then cause a problem if, for example, you want to merge (as an example) the original Joshua Dufek and the second one, had it not been deleted at the second AfD? Does the old history even exist anywhere anymore if it was recreated? A7V2 (talk) 23:29, 22 January 2022 (UTC)

But what if it wasn't shortly after? Then you run into the possibility of parallel histories, though in theory all that would be needed would be the revisions before the copy/paste. Honestly, I don't really feel like any blanket statement will cover all cases, as they really do need to be dealt with as they pop up.

I wasn't aware that history merging requires undeletion - it does if the source page has been deleted (Special:MergeHistory only finds live revisions).

Re: Dufek - probably; the last revision before deletion and the first after recreation are identical save for the addition of a single reference, so restoration of the old diffs would likely have been appropriate. Primefac (talk) 21:35, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

The user should be cautioned against such copying, per the last item of WP:Guide to deletion#You may edit the article during the discussion (shortcut WP:EDITATAFD). Flatscan (talk) 05:21, 28 January 2022 (UTC)

And per WP:COPYWITHIN. Primefac (talk) 08:02, 28 January 2022 (UTC)

Thankyou for your help. I have put a note on their talk page. A7V2 (talk) 23:36, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

Best practice for reversing the direction of a merge?

I'm not sure where best to ask, but I've looked in a few places and the thread above about Étienne de Perier is the most relevant discussion I've found.

The article on the dragonfly genus Hypopetalia and it's only species, Hypopetalia pestilens, and were created on the same day in 2007. Hypopetalia was merged into Hypopetalia pestilens in 2011. Hypopetalia pestilens has 38 revisions, 26 of them after the merge; Hypopetalia has 15 revisions, 5 of them after the merge.

Per WP:MONOTYPICFAUNA, when a genus has a single species both genus and species should be covered in a single article with the genus name (typically) as the title.

What is the best practice to reverse the direction of the merge? A standard move would destroy the history of one of the pages, and round-robin would swap the histories in a confusing way. I'm thinking I should just do what is essentially a cut-and-paste move (with some modifications in phrasing) and history merge (or partial history merge) would just result in making it more confusing to understand the histories of each page. Should I cut-and-paste and add {{copied}} to the talk page? Is there a better solution? Plantdrew (talk) 02:17, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

No, I think a round-robin is called for here. Izno (talk) 03:06, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

Agree with a swap; as long as the move from Hypopetalia pestilens to Hypopetalia clearly states why the page is being moved, it will explain any complexities in the history. Primefac (talk) 08:00, 13 November 2023 (UTC)

Same timestamp splits now possible

As of the next MediaWiki version it will be possible to use Special:MergeHistory (but not selective undeletion) to split two revisions with the same timestamp. Posting here to let any other history mergers know. * Pppery * _{it has begun...} 00:38, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Spiffy. Primefac (talk) 15:05, 6 January 2024 (UTC)

Backlog

With Anthony Appleyard sadly gone, there seems to be a lack of admins checking Category:Candidates for history merging, with pages tagged since 1 September still unaddressed. Should the threshold be reduced for the backlog template on the category page? --Paul_012 (talk) 07:08, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

It's 13 pages, not the worst I've seen. Been a little busy with work recently but I'll shuffle this back into my routine. Primefac (talk) 10:24, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

I don't think changing the backlog threshold would help. Unknowing admins stumbling into history merging can tend toward... hard to fix. Izno (talk) 16:36, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

I left one for you Primefac. Izno (talk) 17:29, 13 September 2024 (UTC)

Hah! Thanks. Primefac (talk) 11:54, 14 September 2024 (UTC)