Page MenuHomePhabricator

IPInfo claims no edit was made from an IP that made edits
Closed, DuplicatePublicBUG REPORT

Description

When I review the edits an anonymous user made in a StructuredDiscussions board (also known as Flow) the "IP Information" panel shows up and offers additional information about the user. But when I try to get access to the information it says "IP information for this address cannot be retrieved since no edits have been made from it."

Screenshot from 2024-02-29 13-54-06.png (618×1 px, 107 KB)

I believe I know the technical reason. Echo barely interacts with core but stores everything in separate database tables. IP Info probably doesn't monitor these.

The problem is that the user experience in this situation is confusing, if not broken. The message is just not correct. The user made edits.

Possible improvements:

  • At least rephrase the error message so it makes sense in a situation like this. A minimal change is to make it say something like "there are no edits or the type of edit doesn't allow for IP information".
  • We can hide the "IP Information" panel entirely when we know there is no information anyway.
  • Ideally IP Info gets informed about the IP edits made in StructuredDiscussions and records the information.

Event Timeline

Restricted Application added a subscriber: Aklapper. · View Herald Transcript

There is another case when Special:Contributions IP Information has the confusing information. The edits are clearly visible on Special:Contributions page and in the Flow topic: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Topic:Xuaiglruugbkbmlu

Screen Shot 2024-03-05 at 2.13.49 PM.png (1×3 px, 385 KB)

However, the edits for the same IP user are not listed in Special:Log - could it be Flow-specific issue? If an IP user makes edits on non-Flow pages, the IP info works as expected.