Talk:List of placeholder names

"Not a real word"?

The article says:

In European Portuguese coiso (masculine of coisa, thing, and not a real word) or cena are often used.

What is meant by not a real word? If it is often used, it must be a "real" word... 143.54.6.75 (talk) 18:51, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

German

Otto Normalverbraucher (from Otto Normal = regular gasoline)

According to the corresponding german article Otto Normalverbraucher refers to the food ration card system after WWII. People were split into different groups, i.e. pregnants, veterans or heavy workers. These groups got more or better food. The regular group was called Normalverbraucher meaning an average consumer. The names of these groups were printed on the food ration cards. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.218.147.40 (talk) 12:43, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

Teil and Zeuch

Mentioning that "Teil" has acquired a specific meaning in certain contexts seems rather vague/useless. I guess the specific meaning that is hinted at here is "ein Teil" for "a pill of exctasy", which would tie in nicely with "Zeuch" being a generic placeholder name for any kind of drug. Pulverzicke (talk) 16:39, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Should this page be moved

Based on my understanding of naming conventions for lists, a better title for this article would be List of placeholder names by language. (The word "different" sounds a bit awkward here anyway.)

I just want to check that I am understanding correctly before I officially request the move or do the move myself. SoledadKabocha (talk) 04:07, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

fine with me —Tamfang (talk) 04:39, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

Swahili

Anecdotally, the Swahili language also can use "fulani" or certain, a bit like Arabic. Thadk (talk) 22:11, 15 August 2014 (UTC)

English exams?

In all kinds of English exams in high school, Li Hua (Chinese: 李华) is often used as the character in writing test.

Please clarify. Do English exams in China often involve composing stories about someone named Li Hua? Otherwise the sentence seems to say that students studying English are tested on ability to write the Chinese characters 李华, which is weird. —Tamfang (talk) 23:37, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Danish words

Dingenot, dimsedut, dibbedut, huddelifut, himstregims and tingest does not all come from the word dims. I removed that claim. "Tingest" obviously comes from the word "ting" (thing) and I seriously doubt "dingenot", "dibbedut", "huddelifut" and "himstregims" would come from "dims". They're likely just made up because of a lack of another word on the spot. Also, many people say "himstregimst", so I will add that one too. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.110.44.130 (talk) 08:15, 4 May 2015 (UTC)

Latin

Someone should add Aulus Agerius and edit the section about Numerius Negidius: the two names are often found in law together, with the former meaning the plaintiff (agerius < agere, to move the case or to prosecute) and the latter the defendant (negidius < negare, to deny the accusation or to defend the case). This is already explained with a reference at Numerius Negidius, which probably could be merged into this page. 24.123.118.10 (talk) 15:06, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

French "chose"...

It's usually feminine, but when used in this particular way (along with a few other very specific ways), it's masculine.

Not going to edit myself because I'm sure my edit would just be undone.

Thanks SAH — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.78.95.91 (talk) 02:08, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

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List_of_placeholder_names_by_language#Places_20 [Spanish # Colombian Spanish # Places]

Is this Colombian or Argentinian?:

• La loma de la mierda ("shit hill") is a vulgar name in Argentina for a very remote place; similarly La loma del orto ("anus hill").

Argentinian has another section. ※ Sobreira ◣◥ (parlez) 10:56, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

List_of_placeholder_names_by_language#Persons_10 [Italian # Persons]

Are this:

• Tizio, Caio, Sempronio, Mevio, Filano, and Calpurnio

also mentioned/appearing in the text in that order? ※ Sobreira ◣◥ (parlez) 11:00, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

additional Swedish expressions

Please add the following for Swedish

places : Tjotahiti (read : Tahiti in Polynesia) and Långtbortistan

Yes, that is the same as used in neighbor countries Norway and Denmark

numbers : femtioelva (this means fifty plus eleven)

male persson : Sven Svensson (several thousand Swedes have this name)

No, I can't remember any similar female name even though it is trivial to use Svea Svensson in the same way.

long time ago : Anno Dazumal (from German), Innan eldkvarn brann (before a fire in Stockholm in 1878), artonhundra frös ihjäl (the year 1816 was extremely cold)

These are very rare. Half of them I have not seen for more than one decade. 92.34.204.146 (talk) 17:58, 4 January 2024 (UTC)

Japanese companies

A new passage:

Sometimes, Yamada [the usual generic surname] will be replaced with the name of a company, place, or a related word; for example, 東芝 太郎 Tōshiba Tarō for Toshiba, …

In what sense "for" Toshiba? Is Tōshiba Tarō a generic employee of that company? In what context would such a name be used? —Tamfang (talk) 07:08, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

תרפפ״ו

@Purple-bananana and אנטון צ'כוב: Please check if I got that right. I really just wanted to fix the misspellings and formatting, but decided to rephrase it to make it more explicit and to the point without relying on readers' knowledge of Hebrew conventions that much. (I want to refer explicitly to Hebrew numerals rather than to some vague styling. The explanation of doubled פ seemed detached from the word itself, because, as I understand it, there is already ר in hundreds position that would normally be incremented to ש. Casual reader might have no idea how does that ק"כ with ק relate to it, or if the " has any significance.) But I'm no expert, so please verify if that's okay. Thanks. – MwGamera (talk) 12:20, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

This is English Wikipedia . Please use English, so that other csn understand you. --Altenmann >talk 16:05, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

Thank you, looks much better than what I did! Adding citations, where i can find them (sadly most are in hebrew, or from untrustorthy websites) -- Purple-bananana (talk) 12:12, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

ראובן and שמעון

In the Hebrew section, the is a paragraph about the use of ראובן and שמעון as placeholder names primarily in the Talmud and responsa, (sort of as an equivalent to Alice and Bob in cryptography, where a sequence of actions or relationship between two people is dicussed,) but I couldn't really find citations directly about that, only direct uses in responsa and Talmud commentators. I'm unfamilliar with the convention about this kind of stuff, is just adding such direct mentions and a note acceptable? Purple-bananana (talk) 12:31, 27 September 2024 (UTC)

Please do not restore unreferenced texts into wikipedia. This is against Wikipedia rules. Don't you see that the section is tagged since 2021? Please use English language and Latin script. Otherwise it is a disrespect to the vast majority of Wikipedians. --Altenmann >talk 16:17, 27 September 2024 (UTC)