Re: Etherpad cleanup, save your pads now!

Hi Sohom,

I wrote a semi non-technical explanation/write-up here (
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Etherpad#Etherpad_wipe%2Fdeletion%2Fclean_slate_proposal)
which links to the phab ticket.

It was cross posted to village pump miscellaneous here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_(miscellaneous)/Archive_87#etherpad.wikimedia.org_cleanup:_April_30,_Save_your_pads
!

Feel free to "be bold" and announce more widely. You can link to my
explanations or just copy/paste them. You might want to update some of the
information first, but that's totally up to you.

Cheers,
-Travis

On Sat, Apr 18, 2026 at 1:36 PM Sohom Datta via Wikitech-l <
[email protected]> wrote:

> 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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>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> --
>>>>>>>> Lukasz
>>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> --
>>>>> Netha Hussain
>>>>> (she/her)
>>>>>
>>>>>
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>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Lukasz
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> Lukasz
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