Help:Log
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A Wikipedia log is an automatically generated list of actions of a certain type, showing when they were performed, by what user, and with respect to what page or other user. Logged actions include page deletions and restorations, page moves (renames), user blocks and unblocks, page protections and unprotections, user account creations, abuse filter reports, and others.
Logs can list actions done by a user (or IP editor), actions done to a user (or IP editor), and actions done to a wiki page.
Viewing logs
To view Wikipedia's logs, go to Special:Log. From there you can decide which actions you wish to see logged, and filter by certain other parameters, such as date and time, user and affected page. You can also provide a parameter straight away, as in Special:Log/block, which displays the block log. Other parameters that can be used in a similar way include "delete", "rights", "protect", "upload" and "patrol".
A link to the log of actions relating to a particular page can be found on the "View logs for this page" link on the "history" tab immediately under the title. A link to the log of actions by a particular user can be found on the left-hand side when the user's talk page or user page is opened. Remember, however, that these are actions performed by that user; for actions affecting a given user (such as blocks), the username (preceded by "User:") must be entered in the "Title" field of the log page, not the "User" field. (This configuration can be accessed directly from the "history" tab of the user's userpage.)
Other sources of logged information
Log files which are not automatically generated can be found in Category:Wikipedia logs. Old log files of actions which have now switched to automatic logging can be found in Category:Wikipedia obsolete log pages. Some of these old files are listed by type at WP:Block log, WP:Bureaucrat log, WP:Deletion log, WP:Protection log and WP:Upload log. (These actions moved to automatic logging in December 2004.)
Several other pages in the "Special:" namespace (such as Special:RecentChanges) serve similar functions to those of logs. For these, see Help:Special pages.
Still more information is provided by Wikipedia:Database reports. For example, Wikipedia:Database reports/Users by log action contains a list of users ordered by number of logged actions performed.
