Page MenuHomePhabricator

Make toolforge reliable enough (tracking)
Closed, ResolvedPublic

Description

It isn't atm, and it should be.

Related Objects

StatusSubtypeAssignedTask
ResolvedNone
Resolvedyuvipanda
ResolvedAndrew
Resolvedcoren
Resolvedyuvipanda
Declinedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedbd808
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Declinedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
DeclinedNone
DuplicateNone
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Resolvedyuvipanda
Declinedyuvipanda
Declinedcoren
Resolvedscfc
InvalidNone
Resolvedyuvipanda
DeclinedNone
Resolvedbd808
ResolvedArielGlenn
ResolvedArielGlenn
Invalidvalhallasw
Resolvedyuvipanda
OpenNone
OpenNone
OpenNone
Resolvedtaavi
OpenNone
DeclinedNone

Event Timeline

yuvipanda raised the priority of this task from to Needs Triage.
yuvipanda updated the task description. (Show Details)
yuvipanda subscribed.

Just some comments about why this important:

  • Tool Labs is supposed to be more stable than Beta Labs.
  • Tool Labs is supposed to be stable enough that bot operators can consistently rely on it. While I'm not a bot coder, my understanding is that some very important bots like Cluebot rely on Tool Labs to function. When Cluebot goes down, significant volunteer time is required to clean up vandalism, and until that vandalism is cleaned up the quality of Wikipedia for our readers is lower than it would be if Cluebot was working normally.
  • Tool Labs is supposed to be better than Toolserver was. I'm not sure how we measure "better", but in any case repeated unscheduled downtimes are problematic.
  • I believe (correct me if I am mistaken) that Wikimetrics is dependent on Tool Labs. Wikimetrics is important for the functioning of the WMF Learning and Evaluation Team and Wikimedia organizations that are attempting to analyze their effectiveness under Global Metrics.
  • Rare unscheduled downtime for Tool Labs is understandable. Frequent unscheduled downtime incidents, like we've had recently, are problematic in many ways.

Thank you for working to improve the reliability of Tool Labs.

Just some comments about why this important:

  • Tool Labs is supposed to be more stable than Beta Labs.

Beta Labs and Tool Labs are completely unrelated, except for running on the same infrastructure.

  • Tool Labs is supposed to be stable enough that bot operators can consistently rely on it. While I'm not a bot coder, my understanding is that some very important bots like Cluebot rely on Tool Labs to function. When Cluebot goes down, significant volunteer time is required to clean up vandalism, and until that vandalism is cleaned up the quality of Wikipedia for our readers is lower than it would be if Cluebot was working normally.

+1

  • Tool Labs is supposed to be better than Toolserver was. I'm not sure how we measure "better", but in any case repeated unscheduled downtimes are problematic.

@scfc tells me we are still doing much better than Toolserver, but I completely agree that we aren't doing well enough.

  • I believe (correct me if I am mistaken) that Wikimetrics is dependent on Tool Labs. Wikimetrics is important for the functioning of the WMF Learning and Evaluation Team and Wikimedia organizations that are attempting to analyze their effectiveness under Global Metrics.

Nope, wikimetrics isn't dependent on toollabs.

  • Rare unscheduled downtime for Tool Labs is understandable. Frequent unscheduled downtime incidents, like we've had recently, are problematic in many ways.

Agreed. Hopefully we'll be able to kick out each of the subtasks of these one by one and improve reliability.

Thank you for working to improve the reliability of Tool Labs.

:D

@yuvipanda I was told by a Wikimetrics user that the reliability of Wikimetrics depends on Labs, so you may want to check with someone in Wikimetrics to verify whether or not there are any Wikimetrics dependencies on Labs and/or Tool Labs.

JFC. @yuvipanda wrote (probably based on some deeper knowledge) "Nope, wikimetrics isn't dependent on toollabs", you report hearsay by an unnamed user that Wikimetrics depends on Labs (and not Tool Labs), and now IYHO the onus lies on @yuvipanda to disprove your unfounded speculation?

My intention was to ask for confirmation. I was not making an accusation.

Yes, that's the problem. No facts at all, just spreading fear and doubt. Why don't you ask "someone in Wikimetrics" if their service depends on Tool Labs?

Agree with @scfc. You need to ask "someone in Wikimetrics". Maybe it is just wikimetric's scripts...
This (Tracking)-Bug is not the right place to discuss such things/issues.

@Pine @scfc since this seems to be a common enough confusion, I've created a page at https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Labs_labs_labs with some rudimentary information about what different people call 'labs'. Edits welcome.

As for wikimetrics, it runs on *Labs*, and is unrelated to *Tool Labs*.

scfc triaged this task as Medium priority.Apr 6 2015, 11:26 AM
scfc moved this task from Backlog to Waiting for code review on the Toolforge board.
scfc moved this task from Waiting for code review to Tracking on the Toolforge board.

@Pine @scfc since this seems to be a common enough confusion, I've created a page at https://wikitech.wikimedia.org/wiki/Labs_labs_labs with some rudimentary information about what different people call 'labs'. Edits welcome.

As for wikimetrics, it runs on *Labs*, and is unrelated to *Tool Labs*.

Thanks for the clarifications, Yuvi.

yuvipanda closed subtask Restricted Task as Resolved.Apr 14 2015, 7:38 PM

When will I be able to delete "check all my Tool Labs webservices" from my daily to-do list?

Do not worry. Tools is a very liberal environment, so as you have been able to ignore bigbrother since July 2014 when @coren set it up, the use of @yuvipanda's service manifests will not be mandatory either, so you will always be able to find an excuse to keep unproductive tasks in your daily routine.

Do not worry. Tools is a very liberal environment, so as you have been able to ignore bigbrother since July 2014 when @coren set it up, the use of @yuvipanda's service manifests will not be mandatory either, so you will always be able to find an excuse to keep unproductive tasks in your daily routine.

Sorry if my comment sounded offensive. I am grateful for the hard work the team is putting at Labs, and I wanted to know if we can already profit from it. :-)

Nemo_bis renamed this task from Make toollabs reliable enough (Tracking) to Make toollabs reliable enough (tracking).Jul 19 2015, 9:57 AM
Nemo_bis set Security to None.
Nintendofan885 renamed this task from Make toollabs reliable enough (tracking) to Make toolforge reliable enough (tracking).Oct 16 2020, 6:16 PM
taavi subscribed.

I'm boldly closing this task. There isn't a clear definition for "reliable enough" but it's certainly improved after this task was filed.