Re: Etherpad cleanup, save your pads now!

This feels like it should be announced more widely, potentially in
Tech/News.

Regards,
Sohom Datta
---
Open-source contributor @Wikimedia


On Fri, Apr 17, 2026 at 8:26 AM Lukasz Sobanski via Wikitech-l <
[email protected]> wrote:

> To account for planned use of Etherpad for Wikimedia Hackathon 2026 as
> well as other scheduled events the Etherpad database truncation will be
> postponed until end of May (exact date to follow). This should provide
> enough buffer ahead of Wikimania in July.
>
> On Mon, Feb 23, 2026 at 10:15 AM Lukasz Sobanski <[email protected]>
> wrote:
>
>> Hi Pine
>>
>> Thanks again for the constructive feedback. As I mentioned before, the
>> communication step was missed here and I treat this as a learning
>> experience.
>>
>> On Mon, Feb 23, 2026 at 8:44 AM Pine W via Wikitech-l <
>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Netha, thanks for taking the initiative to make that list. There's a
>>> lively discussion in Phab ticket
>>> https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T415237, and I see that you posted
>>> the link there. Thank you.
>>>
>>> For others who are trying to figure out the best path forward, thank you
>>> for working on this, although I remain disappointed that the original
>>> announcement was made the way that it was. In my opinion, thinking about
>>> downstream impacts isn't optional, and such a thought process should have
>>> led to a decision that a communications plan was an essential component of
>>> this initiative. Also, allowing a pile of risk to accumulate, and then one
>>> day moving suddenly and disruptively to address it by treating the pileup
>>> as an urgent problem, isn't an approach that I'd recommend.
>>>
>>> Pine🌲
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, Feb 12, 2026 at 4:58 AM Netha Hussain via Wikitech-l <
>>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Hello!
>>>>
>>>> Many users and conferences have created Etherpads for collaboration and
>>>> then pasted the link to them to Metawiki. I ran code using Claude AI to get
>>>> a list of Etherpads mentioned on MetaWiki, then used the same program to
>>>> classify them by topic. Here is the output containing an inventory of
>>>> external links to Etherpads from metawiki:
>>>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Netha_Hussain/MetaWikiEtherpadLinks
>>>>
>>>> I hope this inventory helps you to find the etherpads that are valuable
>>>> for you and then archive them elsewhere.
>>>>
>>>> Regards
>>>> User: Netha Hussain
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On Thu, 12 Feb 2026 at 09:20, Pine W via Wikitech-l <
>>>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Hello,
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks to Lukasz & the SRE team for the date change and softening the
>>>>> plan for what will happen at the target date.
>>>>>
>>>>> I would suggest that the applicable engineering team(s) consult the Movement
>>>>> Communications Team
>>>>> <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation/Communications/Movement_Communications>
>>>>> regarding the communications plan.
>>>>>
>>>>> In the bigger picture, I'm concerned that detailed thought about
>>>>> communications may have been missed before making an announcement that
>>>>> amounts to a "breaking change" in the sense of potentially impacting other
>>>>> teams' and volunteers' plans. I would suggest that, if WMF doesn't already
>>>>> have a documented guideline or standard of practice for when to develop a
>>>>> formal communications plan & when to consult the Movement Comms team, that
>>>>> such documentation be created. Optionally, the document could be written as
>>>>> a learning pattern <https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Learning_patterns>
>>>>> .
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks,
>>>>> Pine🌲
>>>>>
>>>>> On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 7:37 AM Travis Briggs via Wikitech-l <
>>>>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Thanks Lukasz! An April 30th deadline sounds much more reasonable. I
>>>>>> would also suggest being flexible to extend it further based on needs
>>>>>> expressed by the community in response to posting notices wider.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> As mentioned, I posted on the Phabricator task (
>>>>>> https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T415237) with a suggested notice
>>>>>> to send to non-technical editors:
>>>>>> https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Etherpad#Etherpad_wipe/deletion/clean_slate_proposal
>>>>>>
>>>>>> At this point, anyone who is interested in helping work on the
>>>>>> wording of that notice should feel free. I would also welcome suggestions
>>>>>> on where the "canonical" version of the notice should live, though I think
>>>>>> the current talk page for the Etherpad instance itself isn't too awful.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Additionally, ideas, on specific email lists and wiki pages to notify
>>>>>> and link to the notice, are very welcome!
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Thanks,
>>>>>> -Travis
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 5:00 AM Lukasz Sobanski via Wikitech-l <
>>>>>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Hi,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Speaking on behalf of the SRE team that owns Etherpad I wanted to
>>>>>>> chime in here.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> The arguments for extending the deadline and broader communication
>>>>>>> are reasonable.
>>>>>>> - We can extend the deadline to April 30th, if there are still
>>>>>>> migration projects in progress at that point then we can revisit the date
>>>>>>> on a case by case basis.
>>>>>>> - I will follow up internally to identify the right groups to
>>>>>>> notify, if you have suggestions please send them directly to me (I already
>>>>>>> saw a proposed posting on a Village Pump in the related Phabricator task).
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I also agree that any planned future clean up should be communicated
>>>>>>> in advance.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> As for backing up information, after identifying the pads they can
>>>>>>> be exported in txt or html using appropriate public endpoints:
>>>>>>> - http://etherpad.wikimedia.org/p/<pad_title>/export/txt
>>>>>>> - http://etherpad.wikimedia.org/p/<pad_title>/export/html
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 10:57 AM Strainu via Wikitech-l <
>>>>>>> [email protected]> wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Hello Jetlo,
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I want to support the idea expressed by my fellow volunteers that
>>>>>>>> this decision does not adequately support the community's use-cases. I
>>>>>>>> fully understand that Etherpad was designed as a temporary collaboration
>>>>>>>> tool, but:
>>>>>>>> * it is not only used by the tech community, so such an
>>>>>>>> announcement *must* go out as widely as possible, especially on
>>>>>>>> the lists dedicated to conference organizers  and wikimedia-l
>>>>>>>> * *17 days is not enough* heads up for the community to organize
>>>>>>>> and sort/backup decades of meeting minutes. I believe that for the first
>>>>>>>> cleanup, *3 months* would a more realistic timeline
>>>>>>>> * future purges should also have a *predictable schedule and be
>>>>>>>> announced* at least a month in advance, to allow people to save
>>>>>>>> their work
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> I hope your team will reconsider their decision to cater for the
>>>>>>>> needs of the wider community.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Best,
>>>>>>>>   Strainu
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> În mar., 10 feb. 2026 la 14:57, Jelto Wodstrcil via Wikitech-l <
>>>>>>>> [email protected]> a scris:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Hello everyone
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> If you don't use etherpad, you can ignore this message.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> We will *delete all pads after 1st March 2026*! If you need any
>>>>>>>>> of your pads, please make a local backup. We will not be able to recover
>>>>>>>>> the data after 1st March.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> The pad cleanup helps to reduce the size of the database and the
>>>>>>>>> footprint on our infrastructure. After the cleanup, etherpad can still be
>>>>>>>>> used for real-time collaboration but please do not expect long term
>>>>>>>>> storage. Additional cleanups might happen after that unannounced.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> See also https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T415237 for
>>>>>>>>> more information.
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Greetings and thank you
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Jelto
>>>>>>>>>
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>>>>>>>>
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>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> --
>>>>>>> Lukasz
>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>>>>
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>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> Netha Hussain
>>>> (she/her)
>>>>
>>>>
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>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Lukasz
>>
>
>
> --
> Lukasz
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