User:Eejit43/scripts/article-cleaner

This user script adds the ability to fix stylistic and other miscellaneous issues in articles, of which a list can be found below.

This script can possibly make unexpected changes, please make sure you check the diff before submitting edits.

• Cleans up section headers (fixes capitalization, depth, and spacing)
• Removes improper or unnecessary magic words
• Cleans up DISPLAYTITLEs/DEFAULTSORTs (converts templates magic words and removes unnecessary magic words)
• Cleans up categories (fixes category links or transclusions)
• Cleans up links (cleans up spacing, optimizes text after links instead of piping, moves punctuation out of alt text, and more)
• Removes improper characters (replaces smart quotes and ellipses with their standard counterparts, and replaces non-breaking spaces with their HTML tag for readability)
• Cleans up improper date ranges
• Removes stray markup (removes empty tags and toolbar markup filler text)
• Cleans up spacing (removes many types of excess spacing and adds extra spacing where needed)
• Cleans up references (fixes links in ref tags, corrects spacing, makes tags self-closing, and more)
• Cleans up templates (resolves certain aliases, aligns parameters in infoboxes and other templates, removes unnecessary templates, and more)
• Removes unnecessary comments (comments left over from article drafts, etc.)
• Automatically adds/removes {{Uncategorized}}/{{Improve categories}}

This script is be activated using a link in the "More"/"Tools" menu, visible when in editing mode on a page. On mobile, this script is instead activated by a new button in the editing toolbar.

For a more detailed changelog, see the script's GitHub commit history.

• August 3, 2026; 23 days ago (2026-08-03): Fix activation button not showing on Vector legacy (2010).
• July 9, 2026; 48 days ago (2026-07-09): Fix space removal inside timeline tags.
• June 25, 2025; 14 months ago (2025-06-25):
  • Move bold/italic markup outside of link alt text.
  • Prevent modifying leading spacing inside poem/pre/templatedata tags.
• June 24, 2025; 14 months ago (2025-06-24): Add support for mobile editing.
• June 16, 2025; 14 months ago (2025-06-16): Automatically resolve certain template aliases.
• June 14, 2025; 14 months ago (2025-06-14):
  • Remove punctuation in link alt text.
  • Automatically tag with {{Uncategorized}}/{{Improve categories}}.
• May 25, 2025; 15 months ago (2025-05-25): Strip weird invisible Unicode characters from article content.
• May 9, 2025; 15 months ago (2025-05-09):
  • Strip unneeded namespace prefix from and prettify template calls.
  • Automatically substitute {{PAGENAME}} and other magic words.
• May 8, 2025; 15 months ago (2025-05-08): Strip unnecessary template parameters when formatting.

Install Enterprisey's "script-installer" (at Preferences → Gadgets → Advanced → Install scripts without having to manually edit JavaScript files (documentation)), then come back to this page and click the "Install" button in the infobox on the right.

Add the following to your common.js (or a skin specific JavaScript page):

{{subst:install user script|User:Eejit43/scripts/article-cleaner.js}}

To install this user script globally, across all Wikimedia projects, add the following to your global.js on Meta-Wiki. See meta:Global user pages for more information.

This same method can be used to install the script on projects outside of the English Wikipedia, or even on MediaWiki wikis outside of Wikimedia.

mw.loader.load('//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Eejit43/scripts/article-cleaner.js&action=raw&ctype=text/javascript'); // Backlink: [[w:en:User:Eejit43/scripts/article-cleaner.js]]

Note: if you install this script here and globally, it will be double-loaded. Add a check in your global.js to prevent this from happening as seen in this permalink, or simply only install the script in one location.

Please leave comments or report bugs on my talk page, or file an issue on the GitHub repository.