SilverFox183

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Again, welcome! ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 13:20, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Canadian English or United States English

Before you make any more changes to the spelling in articles dealing with North American countries other than the US, which includes Canada and Mexico, please take some time to read Wikipedia:Manual of Style#National varieties of English and Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Spelling. This will help you to avoid errors with articles like Canadian Aboriginal syllabics. Thanks. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 20:00, 28 April 2012 (UTC)

Ditto the above per your modification of the spelling of "whisky" in the Scottish Gaelic article. "Whiskey" is generally used only in Ireland and, inconsistently, the U.S.. See here if you're interested. Mutt Lunker (talk) 22:51, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for all the cleanup you've been doing in the language articles. I've rv'd a couple paragraph breaks that IMO interrupt the coherence of the paragraph, but I appreciate all the hard work – I had no idea how many errors there were in many of the articles I've worked on, and never corrected! — kwami (talk) 20:36, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the kind words my friend. As a general rule, any more than 10 lines of text in a paragraph just makes it look too grey. Sometimes you need more than 10 lines, but it's still a good flexible rule. In order not to cause mass freakout, I am leaving paragraphs with 11-15 lines alone. However, once they get to 16 lines, I am really adamant that they need to be broken up. They should be broken fairly equitably. 16 lines goes to 2 paragraphs of 8, 20 lines goes to 2 of 10, etc. SilverFox183 (talk) 03:41, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

That's a good rule of thumb, but some articles are organized according to content, w one paragraph per (sub)topic. Breaking them up according to length destroys that organization. (Also, the number of lines depends on your screen, and how much of it you use for your browser – what's 15 lines for you may be 5 for me.) And subtopics aren't all the same length, so making the paragraphs all the same length is a bit procrustean, don't you think? — kwami (talk)

Well, I tend to leave short paragraphs alone in general. I just leave them short. There are not many rules on short paragraphs. So after my edits, paragraphs certainly do not all have the same length. However, if they are too long, I try to chop them up into various lengths. I try for 8-11 lines per paragraph, but sometimes I might have less. Sometimes you just have to leave a long paragraph. A long sentence must be left alone. And a long description of a list needs to be left alone. With those two, you can't chop them up, but you can reword them so the sentences or lists are not so long. When I worked at the magazine, we had a rule, "No more than 10 lines in a paragraph." That's the general rule. The problem is that more than 10 lines makes the text look "grey" or "too grey." The paragraph looks really long and boring and the reader gets scared looking at it and doesn't even want to read it. My editor's eyes just cringe when I see huge paragraphs. It looks horrific to me. SilverFox183 (talk) 08:58, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Not sure it works the same in online format as on paper. Anyway, if you're doing the writing, you can write it so that you match those criteria. But if it was written to be coherent with long paragraphs, then simply dividing them up can sometimes mess up the flow. And of course 10 lines for you won't be ten lines for s.o. else. The MOS just says, Paragraphs should be short enough to be readable, but long enough to develop an idea. Overly long paragraphs should be split up, as long as the cousin paragraphs keep the idea in focus. The last was the reason I reverted a couple. (Most splits were fine.) — kwami (talk)

I think I will keep on splitting long stuff. Anyway, there are not too many long paragraphs to split. Most paragraphs are quite short. I try to keep continuity going, but if I mess up continuity, go ahead and revert me if you wish. Long paragraphs look grey and ugly both online and in print. The effect is quite the same.

Oh, for Iñapari language, could you add a ref for the speaker count? Otherwise someone will just check Ethnologue and revert to 4. — kwami (talk) 20:40, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

Hi, for the Iñapari language speaker count, I was looking at the article. The article text said 40, so I changed the count to 40. Looking back over the history of the page, someone changed the count from 4 to 40 for no apparent reason. So it should be moved back to 4, correct. I was wrong on that. SilverFox183 (talk) 03:41, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

If you go down to the code area at the bottom of the info box, the ISO code links to SIL, which links to the Ethnologue article. That's our default source for population data. Anything else should be referenced directly. (I tried getting a project started to verify all of our population figures and overtly source them to Ethnologue, but the coding to lay the groundwork proved too controversial, so it never happened.) — kwami (talk) 06:09, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

(I notice however that many of the 'capitalization errors' are not errors at all. Here,[1] for example: the capitalization is "Deep linguistic prehistory with particular reference to Andamanese." In several other cases it seems the titles should be left in sentence case too, and not sure why you're capitalizing 'century' outside of titles. — kwami (talk) 20:57, 5 August 2012 (UTC))

I guess I have to disagree on that one. I go by Chicago Book of Style. That's the best editing manual for English out there. According the CBS, it's mandatory that titles of all publications, including articles, books, speeches, songs, plays, you name it, in books, magazines, newspapers, journals, etc. to get capitalized. Everything must be capped in the title with the exception of a few prepositions and conjunctions that we never cap in English inside a sentence. I just don't agree that "Deep linguistic prehistory with particular reference to Andamanese." is the proper capitalization for that piece according to CBS rules. It really doesn't matter how the authors capped their piece - what matters are CBS rules for reproducing the title in another work. SilverFox183 (talk) 03:41, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Except that you're also doing that with other languages where English capitalization rules don't apply.

It might be a good idea to check with the MOS as to whether, in the case of refs, we impose a uniform style, or follow the title itself. (Not a question I remember ever asking, but it's not productive if we have people working at crossed purposes.) For the names of organizations we use their preferred (often trademarked) capitalization, and I'd always assumed the same for books, articles, etc. But then, the MOS recommends reformatting direct quotes in some cases, so maybe CBS is the way to go. — kwami (talk) 04:52, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

[Actually, User:Noetica‎ is usually a good source for MOS questions, if someone like me objects to the way you're doing things. He's been involved in the MOS for years now. — kwami (talk) 05:10, 6 August 2012 (UTC)]

I looked over the Wikipedia MOS, and it is absolutely mandatory that all titles of all written works be fully capped except for certain words which are never capped in English. And of course you cap the first word in the title regardless of what it is. "Deep linguistic prehistory with particular reference to Andamanese," is just wrong for a title of a written work. It doesn't matter how the authors wrote it out on their site. What we are doing is following the MOS and CBS, both of which say we should cap all titles. As far as my capping "century" as in 20th Century (probably?) I must say that I don't know the rules on that one! And my CBS book is not on the shelf at the moment; it is in a box. So we might have to look that one up online and see what online sources say. Seeing titles of written works in sentence case really jars me. It looks amateurish and unprofessional. Wikipedia pretty much looks that way anyway, but that's one reason I am on my cleanup binge! I am a former magazine editor BTW. I have a degree in Magazine Journalism and an MA in Linguistics. If I am title capping titles in languages other than English, that may well be wrong. I try not to do that, so that's bad if I am doing that. I am messing up. In Spanish, French, German and Portuguese, titles get sentence case. Not sure about other languages. SilverFox183 (talk) 08:58, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

A lot of academic journals use sentence case, for the articles if not for the journal itself. That may be more common than title case. It does seem that maybe we're supposed to change that, but I can't find where it says that explicitly.

"20th century" is definitely not capitalized, unless it's the name of s.t. (20th Century Fox). — kwami (talk) 10:17, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Well, if you read on the MOS page, it says use title case for all titles of all written works. I think we ought to do that, regardless of what this or that journal does. English Wikipedia ought to be consistent. Let's choose a way to write titles and then write 100% of them in that way. Not, say 90% in title case and 10% in sentence case. This sort of inconsistency is maddening about Wikipedia.

You're probably right about that. I just don't ever recall it being brought up. (Not that it hasn't.) — kwami (talk) 18:32, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Hi Kwami. I looked it up. There is no set policy on capping non-books. I guess only books are to be capped?! Anyway, something called "compositions" are supposed to be title capped, but compositions appears to only mean maybe books, plays and things of that sort. As far as journal, magazine and newspaper articles, that's another ball of wax. The Wiki style guide says pick one style for them, sentence or title case, and then keep with that. What's not allowed is mixtures of sentence and title case in one article. Either put them all in title or put them all in sentence, but don't mix them up. "Deep linguistic prehistory with particular reference to Andamanese," is not the "real title" of that piece in any universe. It's just the way the authors titled it. But how that title gets reproduced in works that reference it depends on the style guide being used. Chicago Book of Style says title case all works period, books, plays, poems, songs, albums, mss. theses and dissertations, and journal, magazine and newspaper articles. How to cap "Deep linguistic prehistory with particular reference to Andamanese?" I guess Wiki says cap it however, but cap it the same way you are capping all other references in the Wiki article. SilverFox183 (talk) 12:10, 7 August 2012 (UTC)

Okay. I'd always tried following the authors' pref, but that does result in a lot of inconsistency. We don't follow the authors' prefs for other things, like punctuation. — kwami (talk) 04:10, 8 August 2012 (UTC)

December 2012

Please do not add or change content, as you did to Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, without verifying it by citing reliable sources. Please review the guidelines at Wikipedia:Citing sources and take this opportunity to add references to the article. Thank you. Cresix (talk) 23:56, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Hi, I don't know how to add sources. It's a fact that his mom was found at a secondary crime nearby. I just didn't know how to add the source. SilverFox183 (talk) 23:58, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Read WP:CITE and WP:RS. Ask for help on the article talk page. Not knowing how to cite sources does not entitle you to add unsourced information. Cresix (talk) 02:37, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

I am not adding anymore unsourced information to that article, jerk. As per your instructions. Now go away. You should not have removed my information, you little fascist. I put in there that there the mother was found shot and killed in her home, and I deleted the part where it said she was killed at the school. That was the truth. You should have left the facts in and waited for someone to find a link to it instead of being an uptight little anal retentive weenie.SilverFox183 (talk) 03:33, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

This is your only warning; if you make personal attacks on other people again, you may be blocked from editing without further notice. Comment on content, not on other contributors or people. Cresix (talk) 14:20, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

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