---
name: wikimedia-page-assessment
description: Query Wikipedia article quality (FA/GA/B/C/Start/Stub) and importance ratings from WikiProject assessment banners on any Wikimedia wiki with the PageAssessments extension
license: MIT
compatibility: opencode
depends_on: [wikimedia-database]
last_verified: 2026-06-10
skill_discovery_hints:
  - keywords: ["WikiProject", "WikiProject assessment", "article quality", "GA", "FA", "page assessment", "content assessment"]
  - keywords: ["popular pages", "WikiProject popular pages", "Assessment subpage", "quality matrix", "importance rating"]
---

> ⚠️ **User-Agent required:** While this skill primarily uses SQL via SSH tunnel, any direct API calls (e.g., for checking WikiProject subpages via the Action API) must include a descriptive `User-Agent` header. See the **[wikimedia-api-access](../wikimedia-api-access/SKILL.md)** skill for the correct format.

Enables the agent to retrieve quality and importance ratings for Wikipedia
articles. This data is derived from WikiProject banners on talk pages and is
stored in the `page_assessments` and `page_assessments_projects` tables in
Wikimedia database replicas.

### Which wikis have PageAssessments?

PageAssessments is **not** deployed on every language Wikipedia. It requires
active opt-in per wiki (via a Phabricator request to WMF). As of 2026, the
following wikis have it enabled, with subproject/task-force support noted:

| Wiki | Subprojects enabled? | Phab ticket |
|---|---|---|
| **English Wikipedia** (`enwiki`) | ✅ | T146679 |
| **English Wikivoyage** (`enwikivoyage`) | ❌ | T142056 |
| **French Wikipedia** (`frwiki`) | ❌ | T153393 |
| **Arabic Wikipedia** (`arwiki`) | ❌ | T185023 |
| **Turkish Wikipedia** (`trwiki`) | ❌ | T184969 |
| **Hungarian Wikipedia** (`huwiki`) | ❌ | T191697 |
| **Chinese Wikipedia** (`zhwiki`) | ✅ | T326387 |
| **Nepali Wikipedia** (`newiki`) | ✅ | T328224 |
| **Test Wikipedia** (`testwiki`) | ✅ | T137918 |

This means the `page_assessments` tables will be **empty** on other language
Wikipedias (dewiki, eswiki, jawiki, ruwiki, etc.). Most queries and examples
in this skill target **English Wikipedia** (`enwiki_p`), which has the most
comprehensive assessment coverage by far.

## **Prerequisites**

* **Database access:** Requires an active SSH tunnel to Toolforge per the
  `wikimedia-database` skill.
* **Credentials:** `TOOLFORGE_USER`, `TOOLFORGE_SQL_USER`, `TOOLFORGE_SQL_PASSWORD`
  in `.env` or environment.
* **SSH keys:** Added to `ssh-agent` for non-interactive tunnel connections.

## **Database Schema: `enwiki_p`**

Three primary tables:

1. **`page_assessments`** — One row per assessment (page × WikiProject pair).
   | Column | Type | Description |
   |---|---|---|
   | `pa_page_id` | int | Page ID of the Subject article (namespace 0) |
   | `pa_project_id` | int | Foreign key to `page_assessments_projects` |
   | `pa_class` | varbinary(20) | Quality grade: `FA`, `GA`, `B`, `C`, `Start`, `Stub`, `List`, `FL`, `A`, `Book`, `Category`, `Disambig`, `File`, `Portal`, `Project`, `Redirect`, `Template`, `NA` |
   | `pa_importance` | varbinary(20) | Priority: `Top`, `High`, `Mid`, `Low`, `NA`, `Unknown` |
   | `pa_page_revision` | int | Revision ID when this assessment was last updated (join with `revision` table for timestamp) |

2. **`page_assessments_projects`** — WikiProject name mapping.
   | Column | Type | Description |
   |---|---|---|
   | `pap_project_id` | int | Primary key |
   | `pap_project_title` | varbinary(255) | WikiProject name, e.g. `"Chemistry"`, `"Medicine"` |
   | `pap_parent_id` | int | Parent project ID for subprojects/task forces (NULL if top-level) |

3. **`page`** — Core page metadata for title resolution.
   | Column | Type | Description |
   |---|---|---|
   | `page_id` | int | Joins to `pa_page_id` |
   | `page_title` | varbinary(255) | Article title (underscores, e.g. `Albert_Einstein`) |
   | `page_namespace` | int | `0` for mainspace articles |

## **Core Data Model**

* **`pa_class`** — Quality grade. Standard values (ascending):
  `Stub` → `Start` → `C` → `B` → `GA` (Good Article) → `FA` (Featured Article)
* **`pa_importance`** — Priority within a WikiProject:
  `Top` → `High` → `Mid` → `Low` → `NA` / `Unknown`

## **Standard Implementation Pattern**

### SQL (via database tunnel)

```sql
-- Basic lookup: get assessment for a specific article
SELECT 
    p.page_title, 
    pap.pap_project_title AS wikiproject,
    pa.pa_class, 
    pa.pa_importance
FROM page_assessments pa
JOIN page_assessments_projects pap ON pa.pa_project_id = pap.pap_project_id
JOIN page p ON pa.pa_page_id = p.page_id
WHERE p.page_title = 'YOUR_PAGE_TITLE'  -- Replace spaces with underscores
  AND p.page_namespace = 0;
```

### Python (for programmatic use)

```python
import os
import pymysql
from dotenv import load_dotenv

load_dotenv()

conn = pymysql.connect(
    host='127.0.0.1',
    port=int(os.getenv('TOOLFORGE_DB_PORT', '3307')),
    user=os.getenv('TOOLFORGE_SQL_USER'),
    password=os.getenv('TOOLFORGE_SQL_PASSWORD'),
    database='enwiki_p',
    cursorclass=pymysql.cursors.DictCursor,
    charset='utf8mb4'
)

with conn.cursor() as cursor:
    cursor.execute("""
        SELECT pap.pap_project_title AS wikiproject,
               pa.pa_class, pa.pa_importance
        FROM page_assessments pa
        JOIN page_assessments_projects pap ON pa.pa_project_id = pap.pap_project_id
        JOIN page p ON pa.pa_page_id = p.page_id
        WHERE p.page_title = 'Albert_Einstein'
          AND p.page_namespace = 0
    """)
    for row in cursor.fetchall():
        print(f"[{row['wikiproject']}] Class={row['pa_class']}, Importance={row['pa_importance']}")
conn.close()
```

### MySQL 9+ compatibility

If you get `ERROR 2059: Authentication plugin 'mysql_native_password' cannot be loaded`
when using the `mysql` CLI, this is because **MySQL 9.x removed the
`mysql_native_password` plugin entirely** from the client — both as a loadable
`.so` and as a compiled-in implementation. Neither `--default-auth` nor any
other flag can work around this.

**The fix is to use `pymysql`** (pure Python). It implements the MySQL protocol
natively and handles `mysql_native_password` authentication without any
external plugins:

```bash
pip install pymysql python-dotenv
```

The scripts in this skill (`assess-project.sh`, `quality-gaps.sh`) will
automatically use `pymysql` if available, falling back to the `mysql` CLI only
if Python dependencies are missing.

## **Constraint & Guardrails**

1. **Talk Page Paradox:** Assessment templates exist on **Talk pages** (Namespace 1),
   but `pa_page_id` refers to the **Subject page** (Namespace 0). Always join with
   the Subject page ID for title resolution.

2. **Duplicate Titles:** A single page will have multiple rows if it is assessed by
   multiple WikiProjects. Use `GROUP_CONCAT` or your application-level grouping.

3. **Normalization:** Ratings are strings. Some projects use non-standard classes
   (e.g., `"Future"`, `"Current"`, `"Draft"`). The standard ordinal scale is:
   `Stub` → `Start` → `C` → `B` → `GA` → `FA`.

4. **Case Sensitivity:** WikiProject titles in `pap_project_title` are case-sensitive.
   `"medicine"` will fail; `"Medicine"` will succeed.

5. **Safety Limits:** Every exploratory query **must** include a `LIMIT` (default 10-50).

## **Example Use Cases for Agent**

* "Find all 'Featured Articles' in the 'Computing' WikiProject."
* "Identify high-importance stubs that need immediate expansion."
* "Compare the average quality of articles in 'WikiProject Maryland' versus 'WikiProject Virginia'."
* "List every WikiProject that assesses articles about 'Chemistry'."
* "For the 'Physics' WikiProject, find all B-class articles with Top importance that haven't been assessed in over 5 years."

---

## **SOP: Finding Pre-built WikiProject Reports**

Many active WikiProjects maintain auto-generated subpages that summarize their
coverage and article statistics. These are often more accessible than running
SQL queries, especially for single-project lookups or when you don't have
database access.

### **`/Assessment` — Quality and Importance Matrix**

Most WikiProjects have an `/Assessment` subpage (e.g.,
`Wikipedia:WikiProject_Physics/Assessment`) that displays a color-coded table
of article count by quality × importance, updated weekly by WP 1.0 bot.

**URL pattern:**
```
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_<Name>/Assessment
```

Replace `<Name>` with the WikiProject name — **case-sensitive**:
- ✅ `Wikipedia:WikiProject Physics/Assessment`
- ✅ `Wikipedia:WikiProject Medicine/Assessment`
- ❌ `Wikipedia:WikiProject physics/Assessment`

**What the page contains:** A table with importance (Top/High/Mid/Low/???)
as columns and quality (FA/FL/A/GA/B/C/Start/Stub/List) as rows. Each cell
shows the count of articles at that intersection, linked to the corresponding
category page for deeper inspection.

**To check programmatically:**

```python
import requests

def has_assessment_page(project_name):
    """Check if a WikiProject has an /Assessment subpage."""
    headers = {'User-Agent': 'MyBot/1.0 (me@example.com) SkillsDemo'}
    title = f"Wikipedia:WikiProject_{project_name}/Assessment"
    url = "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/api.php"
    params = {
        'action': 'query',
        'titles': title,
        'format': 'json',
        'prop': 'info'
    }
    resp = requests.get(url, headers=headers, params=params, timeout=10)
    data = resp.json()
    pages = data['query']['pages']
    # Page key '-1' indicates a missing page
    return '-1' not in pages

print(has_assessment_page("Physics"))    # True
print(has_assessment_page("Chemistry"))  # True
```

### **`/Popular_pages` — Pageviews by Quality and Importance**

Many WikiProjects also have a `/Popular_pages` subpage (e.g.,
`Wikipedia:WikiProject_Physics/Popular_pages`) generated monthly by the
[Community Tech popular pages bot](https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Community_Tech/Popular_pages_bot).
Each entry lists an article with its rank, monthly pageviews, quality class,
and importance — a pre-computed intersection of traffic data and assessment
data that saves you from cross-referencing two separate APIs.

**URL pattern:**
```
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_<Name>/Popular_pages
```

**Master list of all Popular_pages reports:**
```
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Community_Tech_bot/Popular_pages
```
This page indexes every WikiProject that has opted into the popular pages bot,
grouped by topic category (Science, History, Geography, etc.). Browse it to
discover which projects have traffic data available.

**To check programmatically:**

```python
def has_popular_pages(project_name):
    """Check if a WikiProject has a /Popular_pages subpage."""
    headers = {'User-Agent': 'MyBot/1.0 (me@example.com) SkillsDemo'}
    title = f"Wikipedia:WikiProject_{project_name}/Popular_pages"
    url = "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/api.php"
    params = {
        'action': 'query',
        'titles': title,
        'format': 'json',
        'prop': 'info'
    }
    resp = requests.get(url, headers=headers, params=params, timeout=10)
    pages = resp.json()['query']['pages']
    return '-1' not in pages

print(has_popular_pages("Physics"))     # True
print(has_popular_pages("Medicine"))    # True
```

**What the page contains:** A multi-column table:
| Rank | Page | Views | Quality | Importance |
|------|------|-------|---------|------------|
| 1 | Article Title | 1,234,567 | B | Top |
| 2 | Another Article | 987,654 | GA | High |

The data is pre-sorted by pageviews descending. The bot has already handled
the cross-API join of pageviews data with assessment data.

### **Finding All WikiProjects (Discovery)**

To discover which WikiProjects exist, use one of these approaches:

- **Manual directory (curated):**
  `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Council/Directory`

- **Automatic directory (bot-updated):**
  `https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Directory`

- **Category-based API query:**
  WikiProjects are listed in `Category:WikiProjects` and its subcategories:
  ```
  action=query&list=categorymembers&cmtitle=Category:WikiProjects&cmtype=page&cmlimit=max&format=json
  ```

### **Use Cases for Agents**

* "Find the Assessment page for WikiProject Chemistry and report the quality distribution."
* "Get the top 10 most-viewed articles in WikiProject Physics from its Popular_pages report."
* "Browse the master Popular_pages index to find which WikiProjects have traffic data."
* "Check whether WikiProject Medicine has both an Assessment page and a Popular_pages page."

### **Guardrails**

1. **Case sensitivity:** WikiProject names in URLs are case-sensitive.
   `Wikipedia:WikiProject_physics/Popular_pages` returns a 404;
   `Wikipedia:WikiProject_Physics/Popular_pages` works.
2. **Not all projects opt in:** Only projects that opted in to the bot-generated
   reports have `/Assessment` and/or `/Popular_pages`. Always check existence
   before attempting to fetch.
3. **Data lag:** Popular_pages data is generated monthly; the most recent
   report may be 1–2 months behind. Assessment pages are refreshed weekly.
4. **Red links are normal:** A WikiProject page may exist while its subpages
   are missing. Handle 404s gracefully via the API check above.

---


## **Tooling**

This skill includes helper scripts, reference docs, and templates:

### 🔧 Assess Project (`scripts/assess-project.sh`)

Get quality and importance distribution for any WikiProject.

```bash
./scripts/assess-project.sh "Chemistry" [limit]
./scripts/assess-project.sh "Medicine" 100
```

### 🔧 Quality Gaps (`scripts/quality-gaps.sh`)

Find high-importance articles with low quality — the highest-ROI improvement targets.

```bash
./scripts/quality-gaps.sh "Physics" [limit]
./scripts/quality-gaps.sh "Biology" 50
```

### 📚 Schema Reference (`references/assessments-schema.md`)

Full reference of the `page_assessments` and `page_assessments_projects` tables
with column descriptions, join patterns, and edge cases.

### 🧩 Sample SQL Queries (`assets/sample-queries.sql`)

20+ pre-built SQL queries for assessments organized by category:
project-level summaries, article lookups, quality gaps, importance distributions,
multi-project intersections, and maintenance workflows.

### 🧩 Environment Template (`assets/.env.example`)

```bash
cp assets/.env.example .env
# Edit .env with your credentials
```

---

## Cross-References

| Related Skill | Why |
|--------------|-----|
| **[wikimedia-database](../wikimedia-database/SKILL.md)** | Database connection and pymysql patterns |
| **[wikipedia-page-anatomy](../wikipedia-page-anatomy/SKILL.md)** | Article structure context for assessment ratings |
| **[wikipedia-talk-page](../wikipedia-talk-page/SKILL.md)** | Assessment banners appear on talk pages |
| **[wikimedia-ml-services](../wikimedia-ml-services/SKILL.md)** | ML-based quality scoring (complementary to human assessments) |
| **[wikimedia-pageviews](../wikimedia-pageviews/SKILL.md)** | Article traffic data — Popular_pages bot combines pageviews with assessments |