User talk:Fæ

for older archives, see User talk:Fæ/2021, User talk:Fæ/2020, User talk:Fæ/2019, et seq.

Welcome back

As you probably have worked out, I've been following this talk page, checking whether DRs of your uploads are valid or not, and responding to the DR with a rationale if I think something should be kept. May I assume you are sufficiently "back" that I can let go of monitoring that?

Welcome back, in any case. - Jmabel ! talk 14:06, 3 June 2026 (UTC)

If you wish, though I'll probably continue to ignore most DRs and let others chip in. After your first million images, the DRs that matter are ones that are a meaningful case study for thousands of others and could be collated with some automated method.

I have noticed your patient work and very much appreciate it! Fæ (talk) 15:21, 3 June 2026 (UTC)

• Yes, welcome back! So glad to see this. Krok6kola (talk) 16:06, 3 June 2026 (UTC)
• It's been almost 5 years. I hope you had a good time! Welcome back. - Alexis Jazz ^{ping plz} 10:03, 5 June 2026 (UTC)

@Fæ Yes, happy to see you here again :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 09:32, 8 June 2026 (UTC)

Good to see you again, also from me. -- Deadstar (msg) 10:27, 9 June 2026 (UTC)

Marvellous to see you editing again. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:15, 9 June 2026 (UTC)

Happy you are back! Nosferattus (talk) 18:15, 29 June 2026 (UTC)

It is great to have your presence here again on Commons Fæ. All the best -- Ooligan (talk) 16:12, 11 July 2026 (UTC)

• +1 welcome back! -- Tuválkin ✉ ✇ 20:24, 30 August 2026 (UTC)

Only noticing now you are finally back, but it's never too late to join the welcoming. Welcome back! :D Darwin ^Ahoy! 13:53, 25 September 2026 (UTC)

Welcome back!

Russian Empire 1883 genealogy interest, 1.16gb, mediawiki struggles at this size.

Looks like you were gone for a bit. Are you working on any new large chunks of uploads? RAN (talk) 21:44, 17 June 2026 (UTC)

Slightly updated the internetarchive PDF uploading, so these are being refreshed:

Category:Scans from University of Toronto

Category:Old books from American Libraries - this in particular needs contributors to surf the content and imagine categories which can better break up the 150,000 books.

Category:David Rumsey Historical Map Collection - new content but a few thousand jpegs of interesting maps. Some review will be needed as the source library curators may have presumed their collections are public domain by age when it can be more complicated.

Category:Images dezoomed by Fæ is being ever so slowly populated by overwriting the small versions from IA. This is probably why this was not done years ago. Hopefully the maps will not be moved before this dezooming task finishes in several days time.

Category:Books in the Prelinger Library

Category:Genealogy books from the Internet Archive modest number of IA books under this collection but some are eye wateringly large, one has been having an upload attempt of over an hour for a 1,781.2 MB PDF; it may continue to fail though several that succeeded are at the 1gb size.

Category:IA books documents with one page is retrospectively populating. As far as I know, over several years, no volunteers have ever investigated these exceptions...

Quietly restarted the slow job of trimming Google cover pages off pdfs which is harder and slower on local processing. Also been experimenting with nccommons, behind the scenes that's been the ghastly issue of getting timedtext to work on videos and battling anti-bot tools for a site that in theory wants you to take their publications.

There is plenty of gnomic work, so for the moment not looking for anything controversial or technically too challenging. Little projects that do not mean sitting at a keyboard for more than an hour at a time are best. Fæ (talk) 05:20, 18 June 2026 (UTC)

• Are we ever going to get something like "search inside this book" when you are at the pdf page, like we get at Google Books? The only time is see the ASCII text is when I do a general search for all of Commons and I see a snippet, or when the book is transcribed at Wikisource. --RAN (talk) 18:59, 18 June 2026 (UTC)

  The search can be used to find PDF contents matches and is a quick way to find prospective matches if doing copyright or cover page statement testing. For example ("This is a digital copy of a book that was preserved for generations" filetype:pdf intitle:IA) will find PDFs with google cover pages. However there's no way of using the mediawiki to tell you what pages the text is on, or do anything else really smart with it. Well no easy designed way; vaguely remember doing something smarter but can't remember how that worked.

A solution for the IA uploads alone would be to navigate from the commons IA upload, back to IA and then interrogate either the djvu.txt file there, or the xml version. If one needed to filter through, say, 100,000 files, that would be way more efficient than having to download each one and run it through another OCR. Fæ (talk) 19:13, 18 June 2026 (UTC)

There is another way of using a wikimedia tool to do it, but not leaving breadcrumbs for it, as if overused it might get switched off. It solves specific issues of examining a page, but is not intended for a million entire books. --Fæ (talk) 13:15, 27 June 2026 (UTC)

+1. Very good to see you back. Jheald (talk) 13:10, 27 June 2026 (UTC)

Purging thumbnails

Due to old glitches with uploads and other inscrutable problems with WMF operations, some of the very large categories of upload projects have multiple un-thumbnailed files with apparent 0x0 dimensions. These are fairly easy to search and repair individually by purging the cache, forcing a thumbnail refresh, but mass finding and repairing does not have an easy tool for non sysop users. Here's my current pywikibot based solution for fast purging given a category name from a terminal prompt. You just need to know how to install pywikibot, or have a toolforge session.

• User:Fæ/code/thepurge

Fair warning, this is deliberately very fast but API throttling *probably* does not count purge actions as they are non-edits. Worth noting that in the example of incategory:Old_books_from_American_Libraries filewidth:<1 before the programme there were 2,433 files with zero width and after running (a couple of minutes duration) the same files show a correct thumbnail but the search results on-wiki incorrectly show the same number of 0x0 thumbnails. Presumably the database lag takes several minutes or maybe hours. Fæ (talk) 08:35, 29 June 2026 (UTC)

Removing "Historic, Archive Document" cover pages

This cover page should be removed in a few weeks time.

The refresh of Biodiversity Heritage Library documents from the internet archive has highlighted again the old scans with an extra unattractive cover page with this warning notice. These cover pages were not used at the BHL original archive site, but seem to have been added by the scanners for the IA transfer. When the links to IA are followed, interestingly the cover page is skipped and the document is displayed from the real first page. Policies on these warning notices also seem to have changed and it probably fell out of fashion 9 years ago. Faebot is running through what will be around 100,000 of these pdfs to attempt to trim these manually added cover pages which vary in colour, size and even text between documents. It carefully tries to see if there is a blank second page, often faded to a cream colour, to trim off based on shade and the absence of text, but due to caution may leave these in place in around 25% of cases. The end result is that categories like Category:Henry G. Gilbert Nursery and Seed Trade Catalog Collection/1929 are made fantastically more attractive to volunteers and the pdfs far more likely to be used in articles or elsewhere as is.

The task is attempting a batch to process daily via toolforge in alphabetical order and may take, say, 6 weeks. Fæ (talk) 09:03, 29 June 2026 (UTC)

For 'technical' reasons, this is no longer running in alphabetical order. It was simpler to let the housekeeping run on a random walk basis. --Fæ (talk) 14:55, 12 July 2026 (UTC)

DPLA bot concerns...

The method used for certain meta-data doesn't seem to be compatible with the previous style of finding copyvios.

A serach query like - deepcat:"Media contributed by the Digital Public Library of America" insource:/Date\=19[6-8][1-9]/ hastemplate:NoC-US will not produce results, because the DPLA bot is using SDC exclusively.

Not a deal-breaker, but it means a more complex search enquiry..

The IA uploads by comparison were easy to check by a simple regex.. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 17:36, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

Correct. As said about ten times now, the DPLA bot has no consensus to erase file page text. If in doubt raise for deletion, it seems to be what the DPLA want as they have given us little choice. Frankly it's bizarre as it literally costs less to leave old text on the page, even marking it as superseded by SDC info if they wish or even hiding it from view with html tags but staying visible in searches.

Terrible, I have zero interest in helping the project. Fæ (talk) 17:38, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

I am just a long-term contributor, and using "tabloid tactics' would be below the academic decorum required by the code of conduct. SDC is a good idea, if it can be queried.. For example: File:Mr._Bryan_in_1899-"I_Stand_Just_Where_I_Stood_Three_Years_Ago."_-_DPLA_-_9e31b287474bfea2ed2ca8f76a335ff7.pdf for example - is Public Domain, the source instiution feels it is. However, there is no simple date in the metadata, (nor indication of which original publication it came from.) As I said elswehere expecting Commons contributors to do academic level bibliogrpahic competence, which would be reasonably expected of a respected GLAM organisation, is a big ask.

(It's also a single page PDF, only containing raster data) which is generally discouraged on Commons.). ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 18:04, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

Courtesy : User_talk:DPLA_bot#This_bot_removed_metadata_to_replace_it_with_SDC. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 18:23, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

With regard to the Bryan cartoon, I have added the cartoonist to the file text page. I haven't a clue what the DPLA expects volunteers to do once all the file text page has been replace by their custom template. Commons is not a DPLA project, and should not be run as if it is. diff Fæ (talk) 21:57, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

1p PDF

@Fae: Do you have a means of scanning a category for singe page PDF? and categorising, I know you don't like the DPLA appraoch, but we can at least attempt mitigation of one of the concerns. You'd already started looking into single page IA pdf.. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 20:08, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

Category:IA books documents with one page has been filled using a simple file.info check in pywikibot. This scanned a million files, so it's not fast at that scale. If you can state the use case it should not take a lot of effort to create but it's also best to constrain the filter in some way as scanning everything the DPLA has mass uploaded would probably take weeks rather than days.

Caution, grabbing the single page from the pdf and creating a png or jpg from it could give poor results if a better original scan is available. The process of creating the pdf is likely to have compressed or reduced the resolution.

Fæ (talk) 06:57, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

It's actually remarkable that at least 2 Commons regulars are defending the idea that the DPLA is uploading 50+ page text reports as single jpg image files of each page, despite the source website having the ability to supply pdfs of each report as a single file. There seems to be *a lot* of these. Compare that to the IA upload tiny number of single page pdfs.

Surprising as it's very hard to imagine that most of the text documents seen being imported so far would be of much educational value or be of interests for volunteers to work on. If the "interest" rate of these might be one in a thousand, such as where photographs are on a page, some effort should have been put in by the paid DPLA team to do this in a way that attracts volunteers. --Fæ (talk) 07:31, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

I had a check of one of the pdfs in Category:IA books documents with one page and not sure I would want to automate anything. Versions can be extracted from the jp2 scans at IA, and this could make an unreadable pdf version a transcribable version, but as there are only a few thousand files and the automation would be a headache considering some of these have extracted crops, and IA might vary in how the tar files are set up, it may be more hassle than encouraging volunteers to do the most interesting ones manually. Fæ (talk) 12:05, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

I had in mind images like the Cartoon I linked above, as I was advised that uploading raster images as PDF over JPG , PNG or TIF was discouraged, if they did not contain text ( like the examples from the IA category you've linked.).

I appreciate this may take months, rather than days to populate a category. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 07:33, 15 July 2026 (UTC) ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 07:33, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

The quality issue is why raster only scans should not be PDF :)

deepcat:"Media contributed by the Digital Public Library of America" intitle:"pdf" has over 54,000 entries, checking by hand would be time consuming, (not implausible, just very time consuming). ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 07:43, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

That's fine, not many. Probably look after breakfast. Fæ (talk) 07:54, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

BTW rather than searching title filetype:pdf is probably more efficient. Fæ (talk) 09:27, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

See Category:DPLA uploaded pdf with one page. Due to the new WMF policy of throttling the blank out of volunteer actions, despite being a bot task this is taking over 3 minutes to save each categorization. Fæ (talk) 09:37, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

Having multi-page reports as JPG , also complicates matters for potential Wikisource contributors, as working with individual scan image collections is more difficult to set up compared, to 'archival grade' systems like DJVU ( for which Proofread Page was actively designed.) (I know your views about DJVU being niche though.). The other reason for having multi-page documents was so that additional tools at Wikisource, can make use of the page numbering to potentially access relevant IIIF endpoints. (When the relevant script works, this has meant somewhat lo-quality PDF, can still be transcribed at Wikisource.)..

2 sub-categories created. The titles of those categories should be self explanatory. If you wanted to expand with summaries feel free, no obligation. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 10:42, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

Category:DPLA uploaded pdf with one page Well it was less than expected (currently aroud 650) after I filtered , and I think it might have found some 'gaps' in collections of scans. If you want to into collating based on DLPA id's feel free. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 20:00, 18 July 2026 (UTC)

Re-running after a crash a couple of days ago. It is checking for subcats matching "DPLA uploaded pdf with one page/" and skipping if found, but may re-add to those where you removed any related cat (tweaked so this doesn't happen now). There should be 52,000 one page pdfs in total.

Note that a small number of DPLA uploads have no file.info so no page count, like File:Ecology_of_bald_eagles_wintering_near_a_waterfowl_concentration._-_DPLA_-_bacf16991536c73d4b277753c668ffe8.pdf. Any files that fail this way have been repeatedly purged as part of this process, but it failed to fix the file. This was raised with the DPLA but ignored as a problem. Fæ (talk) 03:30, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Converted to a sequential DPLA category hierarchy crawl rather than a search. Previously limited to 10,000 suspects, now should catch all of them. --Fæ (talk) 09:18, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Probably half way done. It's a lot of checks. Checked 4,627,600 (Edited 1492 files). Fæ (talk) 06:29, 1 August 2026 (UTC)

Files moved by DPLA that are not DPLA uploads

These moves of file uploaded years before the DPLA project started, created a number of problems. Falsely taking credit for the Commons upload, deleting all wikitext, arbitrarily changing information templates to DPLA unique templates, arbitrarily forcing volunteers to edit SDC to make changes. This list is only those which have been restored to their original upload file names and had file page test restored, as originally uploaded. Based on a SQL result, there may be 218 files that I uploaded several years ago that have been moved and wiped in this way, on 12 July 2026. The DPLA operator has been cordially invited to fix these moves.

Restored files
File:Newspaper extract, March 1, (1816).jpg File:Letter signed John Todd to Thomas Jefferson, August 16, 1779.jpg File:J. S. Fullerton, Lieutenant Colonel, Assistant Adjutant General, U.S. Volunteers, Brevet Brigadier General.jpg

Summary of all moves by DPLA which were originally uploaded by other accounts

original_uploader total_files_moved US National Archives bot 4106 RandomUserGuy1738 2711 Vanished Account Byeznhpyxeuztibuo 1911 Green Mostaza 344 Fæ 218 Mikey641 51 SecretName101 39 TaurusEmerald 34 Artix Kreiger 2 31 Artem.G 29 Neveselbert (mobile) 15 Denniscabrams 13 Frypie 13 Rhododendrites 12 EmiliaITČA 10 Dvaderv2 8 Kaiketsu 7 NATTOEAT 7 Svajcr 6 Animalparty 6 OceanAtoll 5 Thomas.R 5 Arnoseven 5 Joofjoof 5 Caddyshack01 5 PascalHD 4 Delaywaves 4 DinaHerbert 4 Érico 4 Abzeronow 4 Eyes Roger 4 Koavf 3 Iazyges 3 Lonparis 3 Infrogmation 3 S. DÉNIEL 3 Arbor to SJ 2 Huntster 2 Pandakekok9 2 Flickr upload bot 2 Ligunny 2 Spartan7W 2 Ltn12345 2 Victorgrigas 2 Srekcins 2 AbeautyfulMess06 2 Engelberthumperdink 2 Co9man 2 Hello32020 2 Kingofthedead 2 Numéro 1963 2 Colin 1 FelipeRev 1 Knightoftheswords281 1 Sikander 1 Cplakidas 1 Figureskatingfan 1 ITBF 1 Skulljujos 1 Tyler de Noche 1 Dan.g.nelson 1 Slick-o-bot 1 Found5dollar 1 Infoman99 1 Pitpisit 1 SnowyCinema 1 USSSequoia1 1 Asclepias 1 Free ori 1 Lpdrew 1 Quercusvirginiana 1 Uglemat 1 AsianStuff03 1 Detroit Stahl 1 Invaderchaos 1 RCraig09 1 Spintendo 1 Atomiccocktail 1 Fumikas Sagisavas 1 James.prideaux 1 M5 1 Spiralwidget 1 Bdblakley29 1 Dizzycheekchewer 1 FunnyMath 1 Jcmurphy 1 Mary Mark Ockerbloom 1 Rd232 1 VinceLeibowitz 1 BeeCeePhoto 1 Fuzzywuzzy123 1 Jengod 1 Maudslayer 1 Stv26 1 Wow 1 Bibliothecamex 1 Einstein95 1 JeremyNguyenGCI 1 Mike89 1 RoyZuo 1 Yann 1 Bizzarle 1 GRuban 1 Jo1971 1 Ruff tuff cream puff 1 Taro2968332 1 Box8087 1 Gamaliel 1 Moonreach 1 Taterian 1 方的1P 1 Cacen Gymraeg 1 Evrik 1 Moreau1 1 SDudley 1 Afernand74 1 HUDA ARABIA 1 Kaliforniyka 1 TeddyHuman 1 Chipmunkdavis 1 FSock 1 Happyme22 1 KatelynKat 1 Segagustin 1 TheImaCow 1 Apoxyomenus 1 FastilyClone 1 Shahzad 1 Themudmom1 1

--Fæ (talk) 07:52, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

Claiming other uploads into a non-WMF originated archival system, isn't good, ( generally the only reason you had been keeping the IA identifer in the filename on your uploads was to distinguish between editions or duplicatively named works AIUI?) It would have been better if the DPLA bot, flagged up an already uploaded file with the original uploader, instead of making a presumption, some might see as being w:WP:OWN like. I think you need to raise the issue at Village Pump, or directly with adminstrators. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 07:55, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

It's on the VP discussion. Nobody seems to care. Fæ (talk) 07:57, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

DPLA DR casebook

Colorado AES

• Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station annual report 2004
• Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station annual report 2003 (ee529fe81c7dd910309294607863653c)

  Deletion requests/Files found with c2812c8a355c4a36dd410c9ba6aa2520 - this is a second, meaningless, "unique identifier" from the DPLA, apparently for random pages from the report which effectively make half this report invisible to the other half. I wonder how common this type of error is?

• Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station annual report 2002
• Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station annual report 2001
• Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station annual report 2000
• Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station annual report 1999
• Colorado Agricultural Experiment Station annual report 1998

Colorado State University documents are not federal works, nor automatically covered by a state public domain statement.

Out of scope books uploaded as single page images rather than a PDF

Also see Category:DPLA deletion cases

1. History of Boone county, Indiana volume II; Volume I.
2. Deletion requests/Text only pages of A Twentieth Century History and Biographical Record of Laporte County Indiana
3. Deletion requests/Blank pages of A Twentieth Century History and Biographical Record of Laporte County Indiana
4. Selected pages from A_twentieth_century_history_and_biographical_record_of_Laporte_County,_Indiana
5. State Teachers College Duluth
6. War-Time Strikes and Their Adjustment
7. Journal of the Indiana State Senate, during the forty-fifth session a 1,102 page document, already on Commons as PDF.
8. The code of the state of Georgia another 1,000+ page work.
9. History of St. Joseph County, Indiana 1,131 out of scope pages.
10. address index for the President's Commission on the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy
11. Schoolbook:
    1. Muse 1882
    2. Muse 1884
    3. Muse 1904
    4. Muse 1916,
    5. Muse 1918
12. Scottonian school yearbooks 1914 - 1922

Non-US works

1. • Deletion requests/Files found with intitle:dpla "ministry of war"
   • Deletion requests/File:British Weapons to Defeat Hitler - DPLA - 60fc07e23f31bd27efdad8872f722bc7.jpg
   • Deletion requests/File:Women clerks wanted at once - DPLA - ff5bf79f44581d6c688183826d464793.jpg
   • Deletion requests/File:Les ouvriers des munitions des allies... ripostent a Hitler... par les fabriques Britanniques! (Munition workers of allied countries... are hitting back at Hitler... through British - DPLA - 1b056d85ad6b97b3ff53cecb565884fd.jpg
   • Deletion requests/File:The Voices of freedom live. Newspapers of the allies published in Britain - DPLA - e0160ad69fa2bacda32652b2f4b86482.jpg
   • Deletion requests/Files found with intitle:dpla "postage stamp" soviet

   Bot mass default US-NoC license is limited to USA publications, not other countries. This requires a mass change not volunteer created deletion requests.

2. Deletion requests/Files found with Nazi Germany Fire Police Shoulder Insignia Patch Collected by Winfred Kenner

   Reich ministry work, not a US publication.

3. Commons:Deletion requests/Files found with intitle:DPLA German "Bank Note" -Morgenthau

   German bank notes are not US publications.

   • Deletion requests/File:Postage stamp commemorating German emergency aid - DPLA - cb16a6920cda164f2467f594157e4e60.jpg
   • Deletion requests/File:Canadian postage stamp depicting chemical industry - DPLA - 3d491f5268e570ace6ca1eed5795c18c.jpg
   • Deletion requests/File:First Day Cover commemorating Japan's use of the metric system - DPLA - 43f6254020e7e545e868c90290d9a6fa.jpg

   Noting that postage stamps are likely to be kept on the basis that government agencies are unlikely to make a claim under the URAA, however the DPLA default copyright licenses are factually incorrect.

Side note, I'm slightly concerned about the numbers of single pages being categorized by the DPLA against a book title which they are from. The numbers appears slightly low. This has not been investigated but may be a pattern that results in 'floating' pages that get missed in deletions or recategorizations. - Update for anyone needing breadcrumbs, this was down to the VFC going dodgy once over 400 or 600 results. By avoiding relying on search queries and using temporary categories instead, this will solve the problem.

Fæ (talk) 06:38, 26 July 2026 (UTC)

---

As the numbers of DRs have grown, it's better to examine Category:DPLA deletion cases for cases as I'll save time by not maintaining this section. --Fæ (talk) 05:54, 7 August 2026 (UTC)

Category:Early prints from the internet archive

• File:Characters and Caricaturas (IA mma characters and caricaturas 392602).jpg

Duplicate File:Characters and Caricaturas (IA mma characters and caricaturas 392602).jpg (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) Nutshinou (talk) 16:34, 10 August 2026 (UTC)

Interesting. These are hard to avoid as the file header data has been changed, so the SHA1 values are not the same. If they were, the API would flag them as duplicates before being posted to Commons. Fæ (talk) 21:36, 10 August 2026 (UTC)

Perhaps it would be worth ignoring files coming from metropolitanmuseumofart-gallery... so far only 5 files (out of ~700) from that collection weren't exact duplicates, and their potential usefulness is left to be desired:

• File:A Hungarian Cavalier (IA mma a hungarian cavalier 375777).jpg (a glitched copy of File:A Hungarian Cavalier MET DP819602.jpg)
• File:A Thick Night Off the Goodwins (from "The Illustrated London News") (IA mma a thick night off the goodwins from the illustrated london news 626346).jpg (a slightly different crop of File:A Thick Night Off the Goodwins, from the "Illustrated London News" MET DP834445.jpg)
• File:Christ Presented to the People (IA mma christ presented to the people 360048).jpg (many similiar copies on Commons but not this particular scan as far as I could tell)
• File:Contes et nouvelles en vers- Le Savetier (IA mma contes et nouvelles en vers le savetier 369364).jpg (cropped version: File:Contes et nouvelles en vers- Le Savetier MET DP813954.jpg)
• File:Fear (IA mma fear 286250).jpg (blank page)

I’ve painstakingly tagged everything else, but it would be great if no one had to check for any future duplicates considering how many files would be yet to be uploaded. Thank you. Nutshinou (talk) 22:00, 10 August 2026 (UTC)

I've paused the run to take another look, it's actually over half way through so the total number will probably be 'small' in comparison to other collections. The filter of file size made a big difference, plus it's focusing on tif versions which decreases numbers a lot. As you suggest we probably have everything possible from the Met, so that could be usefully filtered for too. It was notable that some of the prints have genuinely different scans which probably have sufficient value to justify the variations. Fæ (talk) 22:46, 10 August 2026 (UTC)

Review notes

Checking some examples as I go along. It may take a while, but the uploads can stay paused while it's thought through:

Crops

• 
  IA
• 
  MET

There's a good case to keep the uncropped page as this is how it's shown in the book and how the image appears in different archives. The cropped version only appears this way now, because the MET version was overwritten rather than creating a separate crop file. In theory we could discover that the MET file has a fully matching uncropped version in the filehistory, but the API does not do this for us, it feels like over-egging match finding to build this in. If this went to a DR I suspect the result would be to keep as it's not a true duplicate.

• 
  IA
• 
  MET

It looks like a trivial difference and we probably should delete the duplicate. The extra printing bars (maybe) are a weird difference to come across. Presumably there's only a few of these odd cases, and these could be quietly deleted as duplicates without needing a DR discussion?

Blank

• 
  IA (back)
• 
  MET (front)

This is mildly interesting so should be kept. Where we have the backs of historical artworks, in this case there's a curator's pencil mark on the back with an apparent accession number, those can be quite interesting for researchers.

Christ presented

• 

That's definitely worth uploading, it's a pity we might miss other MET stuff by blanket excluding if there's other images of good value like this one. It appears to be a unique sketch variation that was missing from the collection on Commons. Initially I thought the difference was just the scan lightness, but the lines in the sketch are distinct from other versions.

MET on IA

Luckily all the MMA uploads to IA are easy to filter on, they all have 'mma' in the ID. The upload run can filter all those out. If there are specific images runs we would like, remembering that the MET uploads to Commons were 9 years ago, so there might be later stuff on IA, we could return to those as an exception.

Conclusion: Thanks for the examples, we'll exclude the MMA images from the rest of the run, but otherwise it should be okay to restart later today. --Fæ (talk) 06:31, 11 August 2026 (UTC)

Rerun complete. There were very few additional files that met the extra criteria, the category has 840 images. --Fæ (talk) 10:43, 12 August 2026 (UTC)

Question about Library of Congress files

As you probably know, we have a Category:LC TIF images with categorized JPGs for the files that have duplicates. My question is about requests to rename Library of Congress jpg files. The request is to change the name to one that may or may not be correct (from my perspective). Further, a name change may alter the relationship between the TIFF and jpg files. What is your opinion (if any) on this issue? Thanks, Krok6kola (talk) 00:23, 31 August 2026 (UTC)

Generally, it's hard to find originals uploaded by my upload programme that have poor filenames, thanks to the LC having reasonable catalogue pages. There's no issue with a credible rename to correct errors, make the filename more readable, or to reword a confusing filename. However the LCCN itself should stay intact and in position at the end of the filename. This makes things like mass searching, matching or editing much easier and reliable. A similar rationale applies to the tif + jpg name pair, they should match to make future searching easy. If in doubt we should default to the original name which matches the LC database; i.e. if the rename is for 'soft' reasons like readability, then the threshold for making the change needs to be high, probably higher than normal rename cases.

I do not recall LC catalogue errors, but like any library catalogue there are going to be errors. I would hope that LCCNs remain unique, but if there are conflicts on that, we should refer to the LC database to see if they have made changes and reflect those. Fæ (talk) 07:55, 31 August 2026 (UTC)

Thanks, I agree completely. You brought us a wonderful, huge batch of information that still opens my eyes when I look through the photos occasionally just for the joy of it. (And just the idea that Abraham Lincoln may have written to European kings and queens is tantalizing.) Krok6kola (talk) 22:19, 1 September 2026 (UTC)

• I have been declining requests to rename LOC files, but there is no formal policy regarding their renaming. What are the procedures on the Commons to request such a policy? Krok6kola (talk) 21:38, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

  The policy is COM:FR, it's mostly okay but presumes the renamer has some experience of how to avoid unnecessary file moves. In particular this case is covered by the phrase used "harmonizing names", as if there is a precedent of 100,000 other files from the same source, then there would have to be an incredibly good rationale to break from that naming format. Fæ (talk) 07:38, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

File is empty - Kirchengeschichte

File:Beyträge zur ältesten Kirchengeschichte- so wie zur Einleitungswissenschaft in die Schriften des Neuen Bundes. 1 (IA 10136677bsb).pdf is empty. There was an error while uploading you may want to check out :) --PantheraLeo1359531 😺 (talk) 18:17, 7 September 2026 (UTC)

@PantheraLeo1359531: The bug is not what it seems, the file is hosted on Commons, I get duplicate errors from attempting to re-upload. See file log where you can see the file thumbnail; or even readable large thumb. Give it at least 24 hours as it could be a mediawiki caching problem that will clear. Fæ (talk) 06:52, 8 September 2026 (UTC)

Yes, it took 24 hours, but it's now live without any fix needed. It's a mystery why this happens or what volunteers might do about it. Fæ (talk) 14:30, 8 September 2026 (UTC)

DPLA Bot

Given Special:Diff/1282028098, I think it would make more sense to stop doing individual DPLA Bot deletion requests for now. You've certainly done enough to lay out the general case, and it sounds like Aplucas0703 may be on track toward a more general solution. It can't be good use of your time to keep seeking out individual instances, especially since you've been clear in your (appropriate) resentment of the inappropriate impact of this on your time. In your shoes, I'd definitely drop it for a week or two and see what happens (and, if you haven't already done so, ask Aplucas0703 to keep you in the loop). - Jmabel ! talk 08:26, 1 October 2026 (UTC)

I did see the comment. There are now over 250 deletion cases which can be used as a case book for review of constraints to be agreed on the DPLA project, such as what counts as a credible copyright assessment, or why PD-US or NoC-US should only be "mass applied" on US publications. Pausing a week is fine, however there has been 3 months without engagement and an off-wiki conversation is itself problematic and is not a way to establish a consensus, considering the uploads themselves have been public over a period of the last 6 years, so it's hard not to be skeptical that in a week all past issues will be resolved and a consensus agreement for new mass uploads spelled out (which may usefully establish a general policy for future 'large' funded upload projects).

In practical terms, it's probably true that there has never been a deletion request for over a ½ million files, so we have no firm path on how DPLA GSA DRs is best handled, however in terms of volunteer time used to do the analysis, around 3 FTE days, this way of setting out a request is probably as efficient as we can imagine. Fæ (talk) 09:24, 1 October 2026 (UTC)

Woodrow Wilson's A History of the American People

Maybe I'm missing something, but did you ever upload the fifth volume of Woodrow Wilson's A History of the American People to Wikimedia Commons? Or only the first four volumes? And if the latter, would you mind uploading the fifth volume in the near future? ~2026-51481-49 (talk) 06:53, 4 October 2026 (UTC)

Aren't there only four volumes of this book here (with two volumes of this book posted twice, separately)? https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:A_history_of_the_American_people_(1902) ~2026-51481-49 (talk) 06:55, 4 October 2026 (UTC)

• 
  Volume 5
• 
  Volume 5
• 
  Volume 5

When these became public domain varies. There are multiple editions on the Internet Archive, so duplicates are normal, and desirable. Fæ (talk) 10:35, 4 October 2026 (UTC)

That makes sense. And thank you very much for uploading it! By the way, I have a question: Why didn't you upload them before? Were you simply unaware that there was a fifth volume to this book? ~2026-51481-49 (talk) 17:07, 4 October 2026 (UTC)

By the way, you can also upload these versions of this book from HathiTrust: https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/012280868 Their page coloring (white) is different, so it might be valuable to do so! ~2026-51481-49 (talk) 17:15, 4 October 2026 (UTC)

The date filter can be a bit unreliable, at the time of original uploading I think the cut-off was 1926 for public domain, it's now 1931, so the date of the edition can be the reason some were automatically skipped based on internet archive dates. The Hathi site feels scammy, it pushes you to subscribe and then after allowing you to download a page wants you to pay a subscription before downloading the rest. For obvious public domain materials, this is not something we should encourage, so I'm happier never having "HathiTrust" branding on my upload projects. --Fæ (talk) 10:07, 5 October 2026 (UTC)

Out of curiosity, what is the subscription fee? But Yeah, if they actually require it for public domain materials, then it's definitely a very rude and extremely unpleasant move on their very own part. In an ideal world, they should only require such a fee for downloading non-public domain materials. ~2026-51481-49 (talk) 22:31, 5 October 2026 (UTC)

Copernicus Sentinel Satellite Imagery

Hello, I hope you're doing well. I found your name through Category:Copernicus Sentinel Satellite Imagery and User:Fæ/Project list/ESA.

Do you know of any active or inactive WikiProjects dedicated to uploading Sentinel satellite images of national and sub-national divisions, or of natural features? For example:

• 
  File:Marjat Baor from Sentinel-2, cloudless true-color quarterly mosaic, 1st quarter 2026.jpg
• 
  File:Marine Protected Areas of Bangladesh from Sentinel-2, cloudless true-color quarterly mosaic, 1st quarter 2026.png

Do you also know of any tool that can import satellite imagery directly from the Copernicus Browser to Commons and connect the image to wikidata? I'm thinking of building one that lets users either select an area on a map or provide a polygon from OpenStreetMap or Google Maps. For Google Maps, a place search sometimes shows a red dotted boundary and a simple bounding rectangle could be generated from the link.

Before I start, I'd like to know whether a tool like this already exists or whether you know someone who might. Thank you in advance! Tausheef Hassan Auntu ✉Talk? 13:28, 5 October 2026 (UTC)

The ESA projects were 9 years ago, so I've forgotten how it was done. However as a general rule I find it easier to create my own programmes after researching the API, if it exists, or how they have implemented an IIIF service. After that everything can be done with some python coding. The complex bit is dealing with internet drop-outs and brown outs. OSM is probably an easier place to start and it would be worth looking at how others have created programmes to do interesting things there. There might be something to reuse but it's not my specialty. Fæ (talk) 15:48, 5 October 2026 (UTC)

Thanks a lot. I will start looking into these and start working Tausheef Hassan Auntu ✉Talk? 15:56, 5 October 2026 (UTC)

File:Boletim da Sociedade Archeologica Santos Rocha (IA boletimdasocieda01soci).pdf

File:Boletim da Sociedade Archeologica Santos Rocha (IA boletimdasocieda01soci).pdf (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)
Commons:Deletion requests/File:Boletim da Sociedade Archeologica Santos Rocha (IA boletimdasocieda01soci).pdf FingerWiki (talk) 23:54, 5 October 2026 (UTC)

File:Quality Time (Unsplash).jpg

File:Quality Time (Unsplash).jpg (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)
Commons:Deletion requests/File:Quality Time (Unsplash).jpg Lazyfrog96 (talk) 10:22, 7 October 2026 (UTC)

File:Washington 6476 (7144716743).jpg

File:Washington 6476 (7144716743).jpg (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)
Commons:Deletion requests/File:Washington 6476 (7144716743).jpg 19h00s (talk) 20:22, 9 October 2026 (UTC)

File:Destruction of the packet-ship John Rutledge by an iceburg, Feb. 20, 1856 The only survivor, Thomas W. Nye, of New Bedford (with others in lifeboat). LCCN96505501.jpg: Revision history

Fae, is it possible to add the two images in File:Destruction of the packet-ship John Rutledge by an iceburg, Feb. 20, 1856 The only survivor, Thomas W. Nye, of New Bedford (with others in lifeboat). LCCN96505501.jpg separately. Am currently writing an article on the John Rutledge and it would be better to be able to use both images one in the infobox and one in the body of the article. Mjroots (talk) 09:32, 11 October 2026 (UTC)

• 
• 

Unfortunately there does not seem to be a higher quality scan available. Someone could dial it up in the archives and snap a photo on their mobile that would be better... --Fæ (talk) 09:47, 11 October 2026 (UTC)

Thank you. Those images are of a sufficient size and quality to use. Mjroots (talk) 15:34, 11 October 2026 (UTC)

Help

Hi, can you help me to search and upload other files for these categories: Category:Mushanokōji family ( for all subcategories), Category:Tomimoto family ( for all subcategories), Category:Koyata Yamamoto, Category:Nakano clan (for all subcategories), Category:Zenbē Kawakami, Category:Einosuke Obata, Category:Ogata Kenzan VI, Category:Katsushi Murata, Category:Nagano Wakamatsu, Category:Komakichi Torii, Category:Chōichi Yoshikawa, Category:Sōta Ichida, Category:Tōjirō Kitade, Category:Terukazu Ōishi, Category:Asahara family (for all subcategories), Category:Sanjirō Sawaguchi, Category:Shōgo Nagaoka, Category:Kiku Yamane, Category:Kusuo Kobayashi, Category:Hidesaburō Ueno, Category:Seibē Nakagawa, Category:Heikichi Yamamoto, Category:Masao Maruyama, Category:Takuya Takahashi, Category:Tatsujirō Satō, Category:Takeshi Suzuki (1904-1945), Category:Isoroku Yamamoto's family (for all subcategories), Category:Kakunosuke Nakamura, Category:Tairei Uchino, Category:Torikai family (for all subcategories), Category:Satayo Ishiwata. Thank you very much.