Special:Recentchanges and Special:Recentchangeslinked now display the number of characters added to or removed from a page for each edit. This will hopefully allow simple vandalism, such as page blanking, to be more easily spotted. Third-party vandalism-fighting tools have included such counts for some time. (Leon Weber, bug 1085, r18237–8)

Redirects to sections now work, using text such as #REDIRECT [[Main Page#Other areas of Wikipedia]]. The feature should be used cautiously, because users may be confused by being sent to the middle of a page when clicking an ordinary-looking link, and the redirect notice will be obscured by the jump. (Tim Starling, bug 218, r18220)

A new extension by Travis Derouin, Extension:ImportFreeImages, was checked into the code repository. The extension allows users to import appropriately-licensed images into their wiki from Flickr. A live test is available here. The extension has not yet been enabled on any Wikimedia Foundation wikis, but it has already been suggested that it might be useful for the Wikimedia Commons.

MediaWiki installations will no longer attempt to "break out" of HTML frameset elements by default. This allows them to be embedded in other Web pages without any problems. (Tim Starling, r18220)

A bug in the autoblock whitelist (see archived story) that prevented it from functioning was fixed, so it should now work. (Andrew Garrett, r18222)

A few interface changes were made:

• Sortable tables no longer use the Unicode arrow characters ↓ ↑ ↕ for sort direction buttons, but rather use icons taken from Semantic MediaWiki. These should be overridable by changing the JavaScript variables UP_ARROW, DOWN_ARROW, and NO_ARROW to the URL of a desired image (which may be an uploaded file). (Simetrical, r17986)
• Diffs over multiple revisions now note the number of revisions they cover. Previously it was impossible to determine from the diff page alone whether the changes were made in a single edit or in multiple edits. (Ilmari Karonen, bug 5485, r18194)
• There is no longer a shortcut key to log out of the wiki. Formerly the key was "o", but logging out is relatively rare but inconvenient if done by accident, and the key is right next to "p" (the shortcut key for preview). The change will not take effect on wikis that have customized MediaWiki:Monobook.js, such as the English Wikipedia. Where the change does take effect, users can add ta['pt-logout'][0] = 'o'; to Special:Mypage/monobook.js to restore the change, and likewise users of any wiki can add ta['pt-logout'][0] = ''; to Special:Mypage/monobook.js to enact it. (Simetrical, bug 8203, r18248)

A number of page-specific JavaScript variables were renamed. (Tim Starling, r18220) Anyone who had been using them in a custom script will have to update it:

• 'skinname' => 'skin'
• 'articlepath' => 'wgArticlePath'
• 'scriptpath' => 'wgScriptPath'
• 'serverurl' => 'wgServer'
• 'nscanonical' => 'wgCanonicalNamespace'
• 'nsnumber' => 'wgNamespaceNumber'
• 'titleprefixeddbkey' => 'wgPageName'
• 'titletext' => 'wgTitle'
• 'articleid' => 'wgArticleId'
• 'currevisionid' => 'wgCurRevisionId'
• 'isarticle' => 'wgIsArticle'
• 'username' => 'wgUserName'
• 'userlang' => 'wgUserLanguage'
• 'lang' => 'wgContentLanguage'
• 'jsmimetype' and 'stylepath' were removed.

Some updates were made to non-English messages, specifically:

• Cantonese (thanks to Shinjiman)
• German (thanks to Leon Weber)
• Hebrew (thanks to Rotem Liss)
• Italian (thanks to BrokenArrow)
• Japanese (thanks to kaikkd)
• Lingala (thanks to Denis Jacquerye)
• Russian (thanks to Alexander Sigachov)
• Portuguese (thanks to 555)
• Slovak (thanks to Helix84)

Internationalization help is always appreciated! See m:Localization statistics for how complete the translations of languages you know are, and post any updates to Mediazilla.

The next Wikimedia Foundation fundraiser is expected to begin during the upcoming week, according to Board of Trustees chair Florence Devouard. This is slightly delayed from the anticipated start date of Friday, 8 December, as the final preparations are still being made. Among these, the Foundation has released the results of its recent audit (see related story).

The second steward elections of 2006 will end on Friday, 15 December, with both the voting for new stewards and the confirmation of current stewards concluding. As of press time, according to a bot-updated page developed by Gurch, all of the candidates had at least 30 votes in support, and 14 of the 15 current candidates had at least an 80 percent support ratio, including one candidate with exactly 80 percent support. The other candidate had 78 percent support. Any candidate who garners at least 30 support votes and a minimum of 80 percent support is eligible to be appointed by the Board of Trustees. Though the exact number of new stewards that will be appointed is uncertain, it is expected to be between 10 and 20; all nine of the candidates who met the criteria in the January 2006 steward elections were appointed.

A resolution was passed by the Board on Thursday, 7 December with four votes in favor and none in opposition. The resolution approves an agreement that clarifies the role between local Wikimedia organizations and the Wikimedia Foundation; the agreement covers the use of the Wikimedia name, utilization of the Foundation logo, and conduct and activity by each local organization.

The sixth team bulletin from the Wikimania 2007 Taiwan team was released this week. Bulletins are released about once every week and a half, although there is no exact schedule. The current bulletin announces the opening of a bank account for donations to Wikimania, the creation of pages to place web banners, as well as a volunteer training session, which is open to anyone interested, for Wikimania volunteers that will be held on Saturday, 9 December in Taipei; a meetup will occur after the session.

The Quechua Wikipedia reached 1,000 articles this week, becoming the first Wikipedia of an indigenous language of the Americas to reach the milestone. Quechua, the language of the Inca Empire, is spoken predominantly in South America and is also the most widely spoken American Indian language with nearly 10 million speakers. The Nepali Wikipedia also became the second language edition of Wikipedia, after the Nepal Bhasa Wikipedia, to enable a JavaScript-based input method editor. The editor allows users to type directly in Devanāgarī and attempts to make typing in non-Latin based languages easier.

• The Turkmen Wikipedia has reached 500 articles.
• The Irish Wikipedia has reached 500 registered users.
• The Marathi Wikipedia has reached 42,000 edits.
• The Macedonian Wikipedia has reached 1,000 registered users.
• The Finnish Wikipedia has reached 90,000 articles.
• The Sanskrit Wikipedia has reached 1,000 articles.
• The Occitan Wikipedia has reached 6,000 articles.
• The Arabic Wikipedia has reached 40,000 registered users.
• The Waloon Wikipedia has reached 8,000 articles.
• The Galician Wikipedia has reached 20,000 articles.
• The Afrikaans Wikipedia has reached 6,000 articles.

The Arbitration Committee opened one case this week, and closed five cases, leaving only six still in arbitration.

• Hkelkar: A case involving the actions of Hkelkar, a probable sockpuppet of Subhash bose, on various articles. The case was expanded to consider the behavior of a number of other editors including BhaiSaab, User:TerryJ-Ho and Bakasuprman. As a result of the case, Hkelkar and sockpuppets, TerryJ-Ho and BhaiSaab were banned for one year, and placed on probation when they return.

• Konstable: A case involving the actions of Konstable, an administrator who left the project, but then returned and created an alternative account, which some allege was used for disruption. This was then blocked, and he used his sysop tools to unblock it, causing some to call for his desysopping. As a result of the case, Konstable (who had already resigned adminship) was formally desysopped, in a manner similar to the formalising of the resignations of Tony Sidaway and Kelly Martin in the Giano case. Fred Bauder proposed a motion recusing Dmcdevit from the case, but it was defeated.

• ScienceApologist: A case brought by User:Asmodeus alleging that User:ScienceApologist and others are harassing him in regards to Asmodeus' real life identity, as well as biased editing of Christopher Michael Langan and related articles. Several editors alleged that Asmodeus is an aggressive editor and that Asmodeus and User:DrL have conflicts of interest regarding Christopher Michael Langan and related articles. As a result of the case, Asmodeus and DrL are banned from editing articles related to Christopher Michael Langan and his ideas and placed on probation. User:Haldane Fisher is banned indefinitely as an attack account. ScienceApologist is counseled to be more diplomatic when dealing with editors who may be advancing their own original research, and FeloniusMonk is counseled to consult with other administrators regarding disruptive users.

• Elvis: A case involving the actions of Lochdale and Onefortyone on the Elvis Presley article. As a result of the case, Lochdale was be banned from the article indefinitely, and Onefortyone kept on probation.

• Protecting children's privacy: A case involving a policy proposal on the Wikipedia:Protecting children's privacy page. The committee was asked to determine whether the proposed policy has consensus and should be adopted, but declined to rule on this issue. Instead, they encouraged the community to continue working on the proposal with the goal of achieving consensus, and voted to affirm the practice of counseling children not to disclose personal information and to delete such information in appropriate cases.

• Brahma Kumaris: A case involving the actions of avyakt7 and 195.82.106.244 (.244) on the Brahma Kumaris article. Avyakt alleges that .244 has defamed Brahma Kumaris in the article, but .244 claims that avyakt has misinterpreted the reliable sources policy.

• Sex Tourism: A case involving a revert war on the Sex tourism article.

• Waldorf education: A case on Rudolf Steiner, Waldorf education and related pages.

• Iran-Iraq War: A case referred by the mediation committee regarding a dispute on the Iran-Iraq War page. Arbitrator Fred Bauder has proposed a motion dismissing the case for lack of evidence.

• Seabhcan: Various parties, principally MONGO, allege that Seabhcan has engaged in repeated incivility, but he claims that the incidents occurred such a long time ago as to be moot, and that MONGO and others have acted aggressively in the course of the dispute, alleging that "what they want is blood". At the present time, 5 arbitrators have voted to desysop both Seabhcan and MONGO, and to place Seabhcan on personal attack parole.

• RPJ: Various users allege that RPJ edits disruptively (although in good faith) on various articles related to conspiracy theories, such as John F. Kennedy Assassination. In response, he denies the allegations, and raised some "practical concerns about arbitration", which seem to regard the legitimacy of the Arbitration Committee bindingly to resolve disputes. Fred Bauder has proposed findings of fact that RPJ engages in original research and has few contributions that are not disruptive edits to Kennedy assassination articles, and has proposed a one year site ban followed by indefinite probation.