[Wikipedia-l] Sysop status

Tue Jul 30 18:50:59 UTC 2002

tarquin wrote:
> Before I too jump on the application bandwagon ;) -- what can sysops do 
> that mortals can't?

As I wrote recently on [[User talk:Sjc]]

« ...if this isn't already documented in a central and accessible place, 
please feel free to do so. The "sysop" powers are:

     * Block and unblock IPs
     o Related to this, ability to see the last octet of IP addresses in 
edits by anonymous users, which is normally hidden to discourage random 
people haX0ring your IP. (No ability to see the IP address of logged-in 
users, as this is not stored in the database -- compare with the old 
usemod wiki software, where both anonymous and logged-in users had their 
full unfettered hostnames listed to any scmuck who wandered by.)
     * Delete pages (there's an etiquette to this, see policy pages; but 
people do sometimes take shortcuts, deleting empty pages with no history 
more freely)
     * Delete uploaded files
     o There's also a revert-to-previously-uploaded-version feature, I'm 
not sure if this is sysop or everybody.
     * Move/rename pages preserving the edit history (planned to be 
allowed for all or most users, I prefer all)
     * Protect and unprotect pages (locking them against edit by other 
users who are not also logged in as sysops). Traditionally this was in 
fact used only on the main page, but some of the policy pages are also 
locked, which I'm not sure I approve of. Here are all the pages 
currently protected:
           o Wikipedia:Upload_log
           o Wikipedia:Article_deletion_log
           o Wikipedia:What_Wikipedia_is_not
           o Main_Page
           o Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view
           o Wikipedia:Copyrights
           o Wikipedia:Policies_and_guidelines
           o United_States_Constitution/Article_One (I'm a little 
confused by this one; I've since unprotected it. It's just a redirect 
anyway...)
           o Wikipedia:IP_probation_watchlist
           o Wikipedia:Most_common_Wikipedia_faux_pas
           o Wikipedia:Wikipedia_policy_on_permanent_deletion_of_pages
           o Wikipedia:Blocked_IPs
           o Wikipedia:Naming_conventions
           o Wikipedia:Administrators
           o Wikipedia:Policy

If I left any "powers" out, it's by accident.

There are also a handful of 'developer' features available only to a few 
of the programmers for purposes of finding and fixing bugs: database 
queries, showing the PHP configuration variables, and enabling/disabling 
a read-only mode to prevent edits to the database in the middle of 
certain upgrades. --Brion VIBBER »

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)