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God of War III

In response to this, you are correct. It was the 6th at one point in the past few years. I had not checked that in a good while until you made this edit. If Sony would release more recent sales numbers, God of War III might still be 6th. The last time they released sales numbers for this games/series were in 2012. When I was working on this for FAC, I tried finding more recent sales numbers from reliable sources, but to no avail. --JDC808 ♫ 07:12, 1 July 2017 (UTC)

Sure, not a problem. - Dank (push to talk) 12:12, 1 July 2017 (UTC)

I can't edit the TFA for God of War III, but your recent edit is incorrect. In-game, it is called the "Great War", not the "War of the Titans", and what you've changed takes away the fact that the character Kratos also battles the Titans, not just gods and monsters. You also removed the character Pandora, which is important to the plot of the game. --JDC808 ♫ 05:33, 14 July 2017 (UTC)

• For Pandora, it's your call; we can mention Pandora's Box or Pandora, but not both. Unnecessary repetition doesn't fit TFA's style.
• Great War: I may have misunderstood, and the problem is the word "reigniting" ... are you saying that what happens in game is a replay of the War of the Titans? Or are you saying that it's a replay of a fictional war fought in GoW I or II, in which Titans take part? Another problem is that we're speaking English here; we don't get to choose what words mean if they already have well-known meanings, and "Great War" means World War I for most readers, so if we need to use the term, we'd have to alert people that it doesn't mean what they think it means. (Again, "reigniting" is the problem word here, because you could conceivably replay any real war within a fictional world.)
  • In the game, the Great War (the in-game name for the War of the Titans) had already happened, and many years later (present day in-game), Kratos essentially restarts that war. Although many readers may know the term to mean World War I, I would think that they could put two and two together to realize that a game based and set in Greek mythology is not referring to World War I. --JDC808 ♫ 04:00, 15 July 2017 (UTC)
• I said "deities", and Titans and Olympian gods are all deities, but this repetition is acceptable if it's important. I'll add back "Titans". - Dank (push to talk) 13:15, 14 July 2017 (UTC)
  • One request here: could you please add a serial comma after "gods"? --JDC808 ♫ 04:00, 15 July 2017 (UTC)

Disneyland Railroad featured article nomination

The Disneyland Railroad article is currently being nominated to become a featured article here: Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Disneyland Railroad/archive1. I see that you are one of the more active reviewers for featured article candidates, so I eagerly invite you to weigh in on this one. It has passed specialized reviews for its images and sources, and one review for its prose, but it still needs a few people to chime and say they support the nomination on the review page to wrap things up. Your input on that page will be very helpful. Jackdude101 (Talk) 19:39, 2 July 2017 (UTC)

TFA images suggestion

@TFA coordinators for a future occasion, part of a comment I made at WP:ERRORS might be of more general interest: "As an aside, it's a pity that more use isn't made at TFA these days of the multiple images setup that has been used in the past where one image doesn't do justice to the subject matter (Canada and Castle both being blurbs that could have benefited from this) - see this link of when/how it's been done in the past." The images can be even added to WP:CMP, which wasn't an option a few years ago (when I were a lad etc), and protecting by hand the blurb subpages isn't terribly time-consuming. HTH. Bencherlite^Talk 18:34, 3 July 2017 (UTC)

Thanks Bench. Pinging David Levy. Thoughts, anyone? - Dank (push to talk) 18:41, 3 July 2017 (UTC)

Thanks; hadn't even considered doing this, but yes, it might come in handy. I'll be starting on August in a week or two and will keep it in mind. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 20:03, 3 July 2017 (UTC)

Regarding your claim on the missing comma

Regarding your claim on the missing comma, That comma rule is overridden by comma conventions that avoid a comma both before and after those parentheses., is there a place where those conventions are documented?

It you take the sentence "The British North America Act of July 1, 1867, united the colonies of ... " (with commas per above), there is only place to insert the parenthetical expression "(now celebrated as Canada Day)", and that is between "1867" and the comma. I can't see why the comma would be removed.

HandsomeFella (talk) 06:46, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

I'll be happy to discuss what reliable sources say. Pick whichever one you like. Also, the point is covered in MOS:COMMA. - Dank (push to talk) 14:02, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure I'm following what you mean with reliable sources (in this context), but the point is indeed covered in MOS:COMMA. Please see the "Burke and Wills" example. HandsomeFella (talk) 19:59, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

Please see "a comma separates each element and follows the last element unless followed by other punctuation". - Dank (push to talk) 20:03, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

You apparently interpret this as being applicable to the "Burke and Wills" example. I think your interpretation is wrong, as it contradicts an explicit example. Do not be fooled by other punctuation, which can distract from the need for a comma, especially when it collides with a bracket or parenthesis, as in this example. "Other punctuation" applies mainly to the end of a sentence, where you obviously don't need both a comma and a period/full stop. HandsomeFella (talk) 21:07, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

"a comma separates each element and follows the last element unless followed by other punctuation" is plain English, and matches the practice at FAC. - Dank (push to talk) 21:37, 4 July 2017 (UTC)

Apr to Jun 17 Milhist article reviewing

		The WikiChevrons
		On behalf of the Milhist coordinators, you are hereby awarded the WikiChevrons for reviewing a total of 17 Milhist articles at PR, GAN, ACR or FAC during the period Apr to Jun 2017. Thank you for supporting Wikipedia's quality content processes. AustralianRupert (talk) 06:29, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

Thanks AR! - Dank (push to talk) 11:56, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

TFA request for 12 September 2017

Hi Dank. I wanted to just drop you a line inquiring into the possibility of having the Steve Biko article as the TFA for 12 September 2017; that date will be the fortieth anniversary of Biko's death. The reason why I've approached you on your Talk Page rather than going through the standard channels is that the Biko article has only just been nominated at FAC and is not yet an FA. I am really hoping that it will be awarded FA status in time but obviously that is not set in stone. Is there a standard procedure for this situation? Midnightblueowl (talk) 17:39, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Waiting until it's promoted is the standard procedure. By then, TFAR will probably be accepting nominations for 12 Sept. - Dank (push to talk) 17:44, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Gubby Allen TFA

I notice you changed "England captain" to "England's captain" in the blurb (which is now protected). The first one is more correct in "cricket speak" and in sport in general, certainly in the UK. Sarastro1 (talk) 18:31, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, I didn't know that. Does this edit work for you? - Dank (push to talk) 18:40, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

Looks fine to me. Sarastro1 (talk) 19:09, 30 July 2017 (UTC)

FAC reviewing barnstar

		The Reviewer Barnstar
		FAC can't function without people like you contributing reviews. Thank you for the sixteen FAC reviews you did during July. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 23:35, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

Thanks Mike, always happy to get another badge. - Dank (push to talk) 23:58, 2 August 2017 (UTC)

On the Origin of Species for TFA

I believe the article is in very good shape. It has held up well over time and is quite stable. Rusty Cashman (talk) 12:51, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Thanks. It looks like it's in good shape, and it works well as a TFA rerun, I think. - Dank (push to talk) 13:04, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

Of course you should probably also ask the opinion of Dave Souza as he was the other primary editor of the article. Rusty Cashman (talk) 08:36, 9 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, your ping will do that. I've added the article to User_talk:Dank/Sandbox/2. I probably don't have room for it this November ... would you prefer that it run on the 159th anniversary or the 160th? - Dank (push to talk) 18:23, 9 September 2017 (UTC)

Dead links

I know there are bots that go round fixing them - do you know if it's possible to give any of them tasklists? I'm thinking of getting one of them to patrol everything that's in Category:Wikipedia featured articles on a regular basis, not just for the purposes we're discussing, but to help ensure quality standards in our FAs. If not, might be worth requesting a new bot. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 12:30, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

It's a difficult question in general ... but clearly we want bots to do just as much of it as they can do (well). Let me discuss with the TFA coords. - Dank (push to talk) 14:19, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

Cool. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 14:52, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

Dweller, yes, that sounds great. If you've got the time, see if you can find out if there's a bot that does a good job with this. - Dank (push to talk) 19:31, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

Let's see. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:02, 17 August 2017 (UTC) I've invited what I think is the two most relevant bot operators to join us here, GreenC and Cyberpower678. For your info, this stemmed from this. Even if you/your bots are not the right people/entities (!) to help, your expertise and advice will be invaluable. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 10:16, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

The bot can be called to a collection of pages by feeding it a raw list of pages to look at with this tool. You would need to populate the categories contents into a raw list. It doesn't handle categories directly.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 17:55, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, retrieve the list of FA from MediaWiki API then trigger IABot (with the IABot API) to tell it process the articles (action=submitbotjob). Someone has to be the ultimate owner of the bot-triggering-bot, so if problems occur, the owner would defend the bot triggering another bot due to accountability. It would probably have to go through BRFA which would give it more credibility. I can help with software know how to do this and much of the software already written but don't want to be the owner/runner of the bot-triggering-bot. -- GreenC 18:28, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Thanks chaps. I *think* you're saying we could request a bot to feed the bot, or we could do it manually? Is that right? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 18:46, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

• Someone, the MediaWiki software said I was mentioned in this conversation in this edit. Does anyone have a clue why because clearly my name was not mentioned.--v/r - TP 01:19, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

a whole bunch of people got pinged, because dweller accidentally transcluded cyberpower's user page, and since a barnstar you gave him had your sig, your username was transcluded too. --Floquenbeam (talk) 01:29, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Oh dear, sorry TParis and erm everyone whose time I wasted. As I often remark in edit summaries, I hate Wiki-markup, though you'd think after all these years I might have got the hang of it. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 08:31, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Dweller, yes that's correct. -- GreenC 14:00, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Dank I tried running it manually on Australian Defence Force and look what it did. I think we should commission a bot to patrol the FAs. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 14:18, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

I've been confused by similar tools in the past, but it looks like this one is doing the job. Dweller, would you like to suggest this at WT:FAC? Caveat: It seems to have missed a lot of dead links. - Dank (push to talk) 14:26, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Hmph. If it's not doing the job, I'd rather understand why before we go further. Cyberpower678, please can you help us work out why it seems to miss a lot? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 14:32, 18 August 2017 (UTC)

Using the IABot tool to examine the IABot database: example. It's state is "dying" meaning it thinks its dead but won't determine until some X period of time to make sure it's not a transient outage. Some of the others are "whitelisted", not sure why but that means IABot doesn't do anything with them. Editors can make adjustments in the IABot database as needed. -- GreenC 04:25, 19 August 2017 (UTC)

IABot will automatically whitelist domains it detects as dead but really isn't, using the new external servers it uses for validation. This is in an effort to keep the false positive rate low.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 13:11, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

Thinking about posting at WP:BOTREQ, but before I do, Cyberpower678, how does your bot select which articles it will check deadlinks on? I presume that if we left X amount of time it'd get round all the FAs, but any idea how long X is, assuming life works perfectly like probabilities do? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 08:40, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

It will crawl through alphabetically from A to Z on all 5 million while also crawling across articles with at least one {{dead link}} template on it. IABot will also show up on articles requested by users on the tool, and of course you can have the tool analyze the article immediately on your behalf from your account. Using that last option, with the tool, allows to have the bot proactively add archives to ALL non-dead references.—CYBERPOWER (Chat) 13:11, 21 August 2017 (UTC)

All really helpful. I'm going to see if a kind bot developer will do this, because a) while the functionality of manual dumps is useful, it's not very easy or rigorous and b) we could, while we're at it, easily task such a bot to cover other Featured material (lists come to mind), articles in FTs... or even GAs. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:02, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Posted. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 10:07, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

The Ashes

The 2017–18_Ashes_series begins on 23 November. Would you consider doing a special TFA for it? Not sure yet what I have in mind. We could run two cricketers who've not yet been on main page, one from each country, or re-run the former Main page article Bodyline or something. I note there's nothing yet on the requests list for that date. Could we put a holding entry against the date and finesse the exact proposal?

In case the explanation is needed, The Ashes is a big deal for millions of cricket fans around the world. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 10:25, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

Should I put a placeholder on the list, so it's not forgotten? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 15:12, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

In cases like this where you're not sure which article you want to run, I think it's best to just pick a likely article, and add it to TFAP for that date. It's not a problem to swap in another article later. Is there an article that hasn't run yet that might be suitable? Btw, that's Thanksgiving in the US ... would it work just as well for you to run the cricket article on the last day of The Ashes? - Dank (push to talk) 17:43, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

Dweller, I see now that the last day of The Ashes will be on January 8, 1.5 months later ... so it would work for me to have something Ashes-related on both days, if that works for you. - Dank (push to talk) 00:09, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Hi Dank. Hmm. Thanksgiving is a biggie and it's worth trying to avoid the clash of cultures if possible. Last day is a bit of a gamble, as matches are scheduled for five days but often (especially these days) are completed in four, three or occasionally even two days. I'm wondering if there's a time zone fix here but I'm too thick to work it out. The Ashes start on 23 November at 11am Australia time and the first day's play will cover the following 7 hours or so. I wonder if [most of?] that's actually 24 or 22 November in UTC? I'll ask for help at WT:CRIC.

If it's the 24th, the answer might not help as someone's requested a re-run of On the Origin of Species on its anniversary. That said, 2019 looks a much better year for a re-run of that particular article - 160th anniversary. We last ran it in 2009, on the 150th. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 08:24, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Blast. It's squarely 23 November. What would you run for a Thanksgiving article? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:21, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

FWIW, An American VP ran on Thanksgiving last year, although that was also a birth anniversary. Otherwise, I don't think Thanksgiving has been specifically marked at TFA in recent years apart from Wikipedia:Main Page history/2014 November 27 with Freedom from Want ("...The painting has become an iconic representation of the Thanksgiving holiday..."). Bencherlite^Talk 09:58, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Black vulture is ticked on my list of old FAs. Too obscure a gag to run it on Friday 24th November? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 10:47, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Combines a huge bird with Black Friday, I like it. For Thursday, I'd love to run something Thanksgiving-y, but the closest thing I can find (even including reruns) is Maple syrup ... not a close match. I'll save that for next year. This year is available for Ashes. Let me see what the main editors want to do about Origin of Species. - Dank (push to talk) 12:52, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Fab. I'll add a placeholder of Bodyline to the chart. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 13:27, 25 August 2017 (UTC)

Just looking at the forward planning, Ian Johnson (a dead cricketer)'s 100th birthday slot is just a few weeks after the 23 November Ashes (cricket topic) slot. Is that a dreadful thing? --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 11:27, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

It's Mike's call. - Dank (push to talk) 12:54, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

We need a better venue for these conversations. On the subject of which, have you seen my email? ;-) --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 12:56, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Just did, replied there. - Dank (push to talk) 13:04, 30 August 2017 (UTC)

Precious five years!

Precious

Five years!

Your polishing of the featured articles is a daily delight! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 06:33, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

Thanks Gerda, you do a good job with these awards. - Dank (push to talk) 12:11, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

Thank you ;) - I had my first "recent death" yesterday, met two of his students (you will recognize them by article style), sang his praises (and theirs). --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:14, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

Did you know him well? - Dank (push to talk) 12:17, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

Not at all, sorry, I should have clarified "met only 2 of his students". He died the day before his 90th birthday, see infobox. Nor did I know Aloys Kontarsky personally, but his playing. We don't know a day of death for him, please watch that article for changes because Le Monde printed 24, which can't be true, as I saw it printed in the FAZ that day, - must have been earlier (see article talk). - I wrote about some I knew well, though, this one before he died, this one after. - I hate to see "living = no" on people I wrote about, whether I knew them or not. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:26, 27 August 2017 (UTC)

That's solved, 22 August, in today's paper. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 22:00, 28 August 2017 (UTC)

"Old" FAs that haven't appeared on Main Page

As discussed elsewhere, I now have the 2009 FAs on my page at User:Dweller/Featured_Articles_that_haven't_been_on_Main_Page#2009. I think the format is a step on (a mix of lifting the useful start at WP:FA2009 and the help of The Rambling Man). If anyone would like to do some grunt work and do similarly for 2010, that'd be great. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 15:07, 29 August 2017 (UTC)

I'll be happy to do it. I was in the middle of an edit to the talk page of that page with some useful information, to avoid an edit conflict with you guys. - Dank (push to talk) 15:08, 29 August 2017 (UTC)

Thanks! There's also the fun task of converting 2008 into the improved format :-) --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 15:38, 29 August 2017 (UTC)

Going offwiki now, so I won't e-c with you for a good while. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 15:59, 29 August 2017 (UTC)