Commons:Patrol

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This page in a nutshell:

1. Page patrolling is the act of verifying that a newly created page is in coherence with Commons guidelines.
2. Unverified newly created pages are marked with yellow till a patroller marks it as patrolled.
3. Users who aren't patrollers don't see the yellow marked pages in Special:NewPages.

How Special:NewPages looks like for patrollers. Unpatrolled pages are marked in yellow, while patrolled ones aren't.

The patrol user right is a specific user right in order to reduce the backlog of Special:NewPages. It exists to tell other patrollers that a new page has been reviewed by a patroller, that it's not vandalism and doesn't fall outside of our project scope. The right is given by default to any administrator, but can be given to trustworthy users upon request.

Users with the patroller right will see a link like “[Mark this page as patrolled]” in the right bottom corner of any new page that has not yet been patrolled. In addition, unpatrolled pages will be highlighted in yellow on Special:NewPages. Patrollers are supposed to check any new pages in order to see if they fall within our project scope. Acceptable pages should be patrolled, and non-acceptable should either be rearranged or deleted if not possible. The right is given to any administrator by default and can be requested by trustworthy users by request. It's possible to either ask a specific administrator for the user right or to formally request the right at Commons:Requests for rights.

[edit] How does it work?

The arrow points to the mark as patrolled button.

Any page highlighted in yellow on Special:Newpages has not yet been marked as patrolled. This means that it may not have been reviewed. When you check the page, you should mark it as patrolled if (a) you see that it is a good page or (b) before or after you tag it for deletion. If you are not sure about what to do with a page, do not mark it as patrolled; another editor will review it later.

To mark a page as patrolled, simply click the "[Mark this page as patrolled]" link in the bottom right corner of the page.

[edit] What to mark as patrolled

• Any page that is appropriate for Commons.

[edit] What not to mark as patrolled

• Pages you are not sure about and no one else supports keeping the page (other than the author/uploader).

[edit] Autopatrolled

The Autopatrolled user right is similar to the patroller right in that it is a specific user right in order to reduce the backlog of Special:NewPages. The only difference is that autopatrollers do not have the ability to mark pages as patrolled, instead only their page creations are marked as autopatrolled. This right is commonly granted to users who do not participate in patrolling pages at Special:Newpages, but create a high level of quality pages that do not require being patrolled by other users. Users with the patrol user right should not be granted this right, as they already have it and is redundant.

For a list of users with autopatroller, see Special:Listusers/autopatrolled

[edit] Other notes

• A log of all patrols can be seen at Special:Log/patrol. It includes usernames, articles, and the revision reviewed, and may be sorted by username or by article title.
• Pages created and modified by administrators, bots, and users with Autopatrolled are automatically marked as "patrolled (automatic)".
• You cannot mark your own page creations as patrolled.
• There is now a "Hide patrolled edits" option on Special:Newpages so that you can ignore pages that have already been reviewed.
• Even when the last few hours or even days have all been patrolled, there is still a big backlog. Pages expire from the unpatrolled queue after 720 hours (30 days).

[edit] CSS classes

There are two CSS classes related to patrolled edits:

1. The class for non-patrolled articles in Special:Newpages is .not-patrolled, so colorblind users or users who prefer a different style can, for example, add .not-patrolled { border: 2px solid black } to their user CSS files.
2. The class for the "Mark this page as patrolled" link in the lower-right corner of each new page is .patrollink, you can style it in your user CSS file, for example: .patrollink { font: bold small sans-serif}

[edit] See also

• Commons:Rollback - a similar user right to fight vandalism
• Special:Log/patrol - a log of any patrol

v • d • e Wikimedia Commons policies and guidelines Policies Content Project scope · Licensing policy · Deletion policy · Superseded images · When to use the PD-Art tag · General disclaimer · Language policy Behaviour Blocking policy · Page protection · De-adminship · Privacy policy Guidelines Content Non-copyright restrictions · Fan art · Nudity · Photographs of identifiable people · Derivative works · When to use the PD-scan tag · Galleries · Using ImageAnnotator Behaviour Ownership of pages and files · Talk page guidelines · User-specific galleries, templates and categories policy · Vandalism · Rollback · Patrol See also: Category:Commons policies · Commons:Community portal · Help:Contents