User talk:Gog the Mild/Blurbs

Battle of Cape Hermaeum

Hi Dank. This article (my nomination) has been promoted. But a change of scope and name was agreed at FAC, so it now redirects to Roman withdrawal from Africa, 255 BC. I have rewritten the blurb to reflect this, but there are significant changes, so you will probably want to run your eye over it again before I post it. Gog the Mild (talk) 11:26, 16 August 2020 (UTC)

Looks good, thanks. - Dank (push to talk) 13:25, 16 August 2020 (UTC)

• September blurbs: Valston Hancock and HMS Temeraire (1798). - Dank (push to talk) 18:22, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
• There's a discussion on Hawkeye7's talk page about FACbot and one of these blurbs. - Dank (push to talk) 12:34, 25 August 2020 (UTC)
• I'm going to recuse on any blurb that starts off with "Sir". Not my fight. Generally I've been able to lose the "Sir" for the simple reason that space is too tight in blurbs to allow redundancy, and this blurb already says that he was knighted, but it's your call. If we go with "Sir", I'll probably need to alert the Main Page folks. - Dank (push to talk) 16:17, 28 August 2020 (UTC)

  Dank: De-sirred. Gog the Mild (talk) 16:57, 28 August 2020 (UTC)

• Temeraire is just over the limit after my ce, at 1034. Otherwise looks good. - Dank (push to talk) 16:31, 28 August 2020 (UTC)

  Dank: D'oh! Fixed. Tremeraire and Valston Hancock are already on September's list. Should I just replace them, or is this something for you to do? Gog the Mild (talk) 16:56, 28 August 2020 (UTC)

  Happy either way. - Dank (push to talk) 17:14, 28 August 2020 (UTC)

  Dank: over to you then; it's why you get the big bucks. Gog the Mild (talk) 17:19, 28 August 2020 (UTC)

• Landis' Missouri Battery: Shouldn't that be Landis's Missouri Battery? Has the rule changed again? - Dank (push to talk) 20:03, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

No, you are correct. I thought it a bit above my pay grade to mess with the title. I could pipe it to "s's".

It can cause problems if page titles change after promotion (people won't find the relevant pages and may assume the pages don't exist), and this is a title that will probably change. - Dank (push to talk)

If it's okay, I'd like to pass on this one and get back to my plants. - Dank (push to talk) 22:41, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Dank: of course, and thanks. Gog the Mild (talk) 23:00, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

• Arthur Blackburn: I don't have a preference, but I've been told not to say for instance "lawyer and Australian recipient" (I guess because it suggests that they weren't Australian when they were a lawyer? Not sure). Also, we get pushback if we define an abbreviation (VC) that we only need once. - Dank (push to talk) 20:12, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

1) Good point. Tweaked.

2) Even though I use "VC" later in the blurb? How am I supposed to handle it?

Gog the Mild (talk) 20:23, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

We're supposed to either write it out the second time, or say something like "their award" the second time, or find a way to avoid repeating it. The theory is that abbreviations that the reader hasn't seen before can seem jargony. But as a rule of thumb, if we actually need the abbreviation twice after it's been defined, then it's fine. - Dank (push to talk)

Sorry about misusing some jargon above ("tag-teaming"); noted. - Dank (push to talk) 20:44, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

• Jim's picks for October: SMS Dresden (1907) and William T. Anderson. - Dank (push to talk) 01:41, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
  • You mentioned to me that there is some other stuff you're working on in September ... if you want me to do these two, no problem. I'll hold off as long as you've got them in your to-do list (at User:Gog_the_Mild/Blurbs). - Dank (push to talk) 17:06, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

    Dank: thanks. Apologies for letting these get close to the wire. I am now back from holiday and things should go back to normal. (You may or may not consider this much of an improvement.) Gog the Mild (talk) 16:20, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

    It's always an improvement when you're around. The blurbs look good. - Dank (push to talk) 16:24, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

    Dank: flatterer. Cheers. Gog the Mild (talk) 17:14, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

    I left User_talk:Casliber#WT:Featured article candidates/Orangutan/archive1 yesterday for Cas, but now that I think of it, it's probably generally relevant (and may explain some of my weirdness). - Dank (push to talk) 13:30, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

    Dank: Your weirdness is explicable! Who knew? Gog the Mild (talk) 13:36, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

Dresden

• I just made minor changes to WP:Today's featured article/October 5, 2020; see what you think. - Dank (push to talk) 15:53, 2 October 2020 (UTC)
• Btw, I see you're kicking ass (arse? I've never heard "kicking arse") in the Wikicup ... good work. - Dank (push to talk) 15:55, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

"1907": smacks head; what was I thinking of?

Coal and engines: I think that yours is marginally more encyclopedic, while mine was slightly catchier. So it probably depends on what you want the blurb to be doing - but that is ridiculous over-analysis.

Dresden → the ship: avoids the repetition of Dresden, but we now have "the ship" twice in close proximity so it's probably a wash. (Is that the correct US idiom?)

Yes. - Dank (push to talk) 17:40, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

We Brits don't kick arse; but may kick ass or butt. My (much) younger niece is fond of kicking butt.

Thanks. I entered on a whim and have been rather regretting it; my competitive spirit has kicked right in! Getting to the final round was straight forward enough, but a two week family holiday and a touch of ill-health have dragged me down from where I planned to be. Other finalists seem to be having at least as many problems, so butt continues to be kicked.

I note that you were active on Operation Normandy, back in the day. Once the WikiCup is over I am planning on filling some gaps with some articles on US WWII operations. I wondered if you would be interested in collaborating on some or all of them?

Once the WikiCup is over I shall probably be looking around for what new mischief I can get up to. Is there anything further along the TFA pipeline that you think I may be able to usefully work on/assist with?

Gog the Mild (talk) 16:45, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

Hope your health is better. My mind is elsewhere for a few days. - Dank (push to talk) 17:39, 2 October 2020 (UTC)

I'm waiting for various elections to be over before I make any plans about, well, anything (including TFA), but yes, John and I might collaborate on some MilHist articles at some point, and yes, we'll keep you in the loop. Thanks for the offer. - Dank (push to talk) 18:46, 3 October 2020 (UTC) P.S. Not Normandy ... Native American weaponry is more likely. - Dank (push to talk) 20:06, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

My mind is still elsewhere (mostly on plants) ... go ahead and post blurbs (or not) as you see fit. Happy to take any questions though. - Dank (push to talk) 20:16, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

Dank: Responsibility! Wah, ha, ha, ha, haa! Gog the Mild (talk) 20:18, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

Second Battle of Newtonia

@Hog Farm:, your blurb for this was fine, and I have posted it. For some reason your character total - 1,006 - was 18 characters low - I made it 1,024. Thanks, and feel free to crack on. Gog the Mild (talk) 16:21, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

@Gog the Mild: - what method for you use to measure character length? I used Microsoft Word and excluded the link to the full article. How should I be measuring the character length for greatest accuracy? Hog Farm _Talk 16:24, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

I use MS Word too, but included everything from "The Second ..." to "... article)". Ie all of the text. (But not the image nor the caption.) Gog the Mild (talk) 16:27, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

Ah. That's where I messed up. I'll include that in the character count for the future. Thanks for clarifying! Hog Farm _Talk 16:32, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

Battle of Byram's Ford

@Hog Farm: - Looks good to me too, except you need to link the title; it's a difficult habit to shake, isn't it? And I would suggest linking wagon train to train (military). Gog the Mild (talk) 16:18, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Both done. I need to get into the DYK mindset with linking titles, I guess. Just seems so foreign to do. Hog Farm _Talk 16:35, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Treaty of Guînes

You seem to be a natural at this. I forgot to mention that when there is no image we get an additional 75 characters. I have used this to expand and tweak Treaty of Guînes a little. diff. See what you think. Amend or revert anything you don't like. Gog the Mild (talk) 11:15, 20 July 2021 (UTC)

Weardale campaign

Hog Farm, thanks for kicking this into shape. Pretty good. Some nuances:

• Any reason why Lord Douglas and the earls of Moray and Mar aren't linked?
  • I thought I'd linked them. That's what I get for not proofreading.
• This is about Britain, so dates should be DMY.
  • Corrected. I also caught myself reverting to Am Eng in "recognizing" and have fixed that to "recognising" to match the engvar in the article
• Read the blurb not in edit mode - you don't introduce Isabella.
• If you put commas after dates in articles where a different school of commaisation is used you are liable to see them removed. "In 1326, the English King was deposed".
  • I've removed this one. Should the commas in "Two weeks later, the Scots" and "Neither side offered battle, and the Scots" be there? I'm really bad with comma usage.

You want to have a relook at it? Gog the Mild (talk) 17:36, 4 August 2021 (UTC)

• @Gog the Mild: - I've taken a crack at rejigging this, although I'm not good with the commas stuff. Hog Farm _Talk 03:29, 5 August 2021 (UTC)

  Hog Farm, that looks fine. Do you fancy posting it? Instructions and cut and paste boiler plate are on my Templates page, Feel free to dip into any of the in progress articles which take your fancy.

  I assume from your silence that you are content with Guines (above) so I shall post it. Gog the Mild (talk) 16:18, 5 August 2021 (UTC)