Board Thread:Support Requests - Getting Technical/@comment-452-20140917000024/@comment-452-20160819214326

Dessamator wrote:

[...] prevents you from [...] using [...]: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/API:Iwbacklinks https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/API:Iwlinks Thanks, that is definitely something that cannot be used with my solution.

However since I'm not using it, nor have reason to use it, it's going in the "Reasons others might choose to use them which do not apply to me" pile.

I will definitely use |iwtitle&iwblprefix=w http:// /api.php?action=query&list=iwbacklinks&iwbllimit=1000&iwblprop=iwprefix|iwtitle&iwblprefix=w to find any relevant links I missed, thanks again!

Edit: Conversely, https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/API:exturlusage is the API version of Special:LinkSearch, so this can be used to find all external links to wikia:

http:// /api.php?action=query&list=exturlusage&eulimit=1000&euquery=*.wikia.com&* Dessamator wrote:

Which means either building a bot to enforce it, using abusefilter or going around edit-warring or manually editing it whenever someone adds a "normal" interwiki link. 452 wrote:


 * People might change external links to interwikia links.
 * The same thing applies to every template, so the response would be exactly the same as if someone were to change a template to a tag, which is: "Welcoming them to the wiki and politely informing them of local policies and linking to a page which outlines the reasons behind the policy".
 * If a user adds a new tag to an article, I will switch it to use the template the next time I edit that article. If a user is adding a lot of tags, I contact them and inform them of the benefits of using the  template.

There is no bot or abusefilter needed, it has been almost 2 years since I implemented the policy of using for interwikia links, and there have been no edit wars, nor anyone disputing the policy.

While some people still add either interwiki links or external links, there are also still some people who add external links instead of internal links. The cure for both is the same: education.