If the bug doesn’t reproduce without Parsoid as @Nardog says (Live Preview indeed doesn’t use Parsoid), this is a likely fallout of T429408: On wikis with Parsoid read views enabled, Parsoid isn't consistently used for previews.

@stjn You seem to have misinterpreted what I said. The bug is reproduced only when Parsoid is used for the preview.

Yes? I am saying that Live Preview doesn’t use Parsoid now (I tested it, see T429408#12085778), but regular preview does (I used it already so I know). So if Live Preview doesn’t have the bug yet, the regression is coming after my request to make it so Parsoid is used for previews.

Steps to show that the issue is wider:

Edit the lede section of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auckland in wikitext.
Click 'Show preview'.
Two types of error messages are displayed:

1. "Cite error: The named reference [...] was invoked but never defined". This message is not true, as the refs are defined in other sections of the article.
2. "Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template". The article does contain a {{notelist}} template, but it is at the end of the article, not in the lede section.

I've gotten the same error messages as Nurg. It's kind of a big deal, because I removed what I thought were cite errors before becoming aware of this. The only thing I can do now is ignore any cite-error messages I see. ~~~~

I am able to reproduce this issue: See https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Auckland&action=submit&section=0&useparsoid=1 (which says "this page was rendered with Parsoid" at the bottom of the page)

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Auckland&action=submit&section=0&useparsoid=0 shows the proper explanation along with the temp notelist and reflist. Make Parsoid behave like this link, please.

Please elevate the priority of this issue. The message shown should be the one on the right side of the image in the task description. The current messages are huge and red and are a false positive indicating a problem that needs to be fixed right away but which does not actually exist. Editors may be removing valid references because they are being misled by this erroneous message.

Seems like Cite shouldn't be emitting an error here when ParserOptions::isPreview() is true?

In T431137#12134782, @cscott wrote:

Seems like Cite shouldn't be emitting an error here when ParserOptions::isPreview() is true?

It should be. And the error should differ depending on whether what's being edited and previewed is a section or the whole page.

A tag at the top of this Phab page reads, "Needs Triage". I don't know much about how things work in Manifest, but in the real world, triage is done very promptly (admittedly we are not dealing with life and death here). I'm a bit surprised this bug slipped through testing before rollout on the EN WP, and surprised that triage apparently is taking so long. It is the only Parsoid-related bug that I am aware of, and it's a glaring one. Just trying to give a push here for resolution.

@Nurg: See the docs linked from the frontpage. Triage has long happened. Thanks.

Ok, thank you, apologies on that point. It is very confusing, though, that "Needs Triage" can mean that it has long been triaged and is now just low priority.