README

mwlpdel is a collection of two scripts written in bash and perl that make
it easy to delete a list of spam pages on a MediaWiki install.

./lonelypages.sh will get a list of (upto) 900 lonelypages (aka Orphaned
pages) from a MediaWiki install and then prompt you to verify that you want
to delete each one. If you type Yes/1 it will append the page to a file
(lonelypages_delete.)

The file (lonelypages_delete) can be read by a perl script (lonelypages.pl)
that uses MediaWiki::API to login to your MediaWiki install and delete the
selected pages.

Why did you write this crap?

Good question. I didn't have access to the box with the MediaWiki install
so deleting pages via SQL or a maintenance script was out of the question.
I also was not a member of the Bureaucrats group so I couldn't use
Special:DeleteBatch. Luckily, I was a member of the Administrator group,
which allowed me to delete pages one by one. This was taking too long so I
wrote these two scripts.

Todo?

* Write something to handle the configuration. Right now, users have to edit
the script manually. :)

In lonelypages.pl:

edit lgname to match your username and lgpassword to match your password

    18  $mw->login( { lgname => 'username', lgpassword => 'password' } );

edit wiki.example.org to match your wiki's domain name

    17  $mw->{config}->{api_url} = 'http://wiki.example.org/w/api.php';

In lonelypages.sh:

edit wiki.example.com to match your wiki's domain name

    11 wget --quiet -O - "http://wiki.example.com...

* I would like to make this a CGI script as I can envision a page with
pre-checked textboxes presented to the user. Unfortunately, for the MediaWiki
install I'm working with, most (611/613) lonelypages were spam pages. Going
through each title manually with this script is STILL a PITA.

* Get rid of the bash script. (Eh, maybe)

LICENSE

These scripts are not impressive. Please don't use them. If you still want
modify/distribute these files feel free to do so under the conditions of
the LICENSE file.