User talk:Steelpillow/Archive 2020-22

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A barnstar for you!

	The Books Barnstar
	Thank you so much for fighting to keep the books feature on Wikipedia alive. I'm sorry things didn't work out, but your advocacy still means a lot to me! –MJL ‐Talk‐☖ 16:02, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Thank you, much appreciated. I will keep trying to push for one of the two new PDF renderers to reach a workable state, so that the UI can be reinstated. At least the noise on the helpdesk shows that there is still a demand for the tool. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 16:07, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia Books

Since you participated in the discussion on Wikipedia Books I herewith inform you that a decision has been taken.

See Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)/Archive_176#Suppress_rendering_of_Template:Wikipedia_books Dirk Hünniger (talk) 20:28, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Thank you. Yes, they have lost the plot so badly they want the rest of us to as well. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 21:52, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi Steelpilow,

the discussion was originally classified as non consensus. And later on changed into decided.

Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Requests_for_closure/Archive_29#Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)/Archive_176#Suppress_rendering_of_Template:Wikipedia_books

Yours Dirk Hünniger (talk) 18:39, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for the link. More accurately, it was archived without being closed first. Someone closed it as an RfC, even though it had only ever been a discussion and never followed RfC procedure. See also User talk:Jimbo Wales#Is shafting PediaPress OK? — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 19:59, 1 January 2020 (UTC)

I also want to see the books tools restored to function, quite dearly. Worth discussing again before long. – SJ + 01:30, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

The templated message on every Book: page is untrue, Book Creator still works. I agree this needs correcting, but the template is protected so we have to find and convince an admin. What has gone is that the local PDF tool no longer does books. I have not checked recently, but last time I looked neither of the proposed alternatives yet gives acceptable results by default. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 10:35, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you very much for the excellent revision of the "Memristor" entry!80.187.97.27 (talk) 13:47, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

book creator removal

also see phabricator:T241683 Dirk Hünniger (talk) 22:03, 15 January 2020 (UTC)

Botswana Defence Force Page

The tables for this page has long been part of the page until deleted, infact Rwanda Defence Force & Nigerian Army copied and use same template from the Botswana defence force page, if I may ask why are you deleting it, for what particular reason? Why not then do the same for the above mentioned pages — Preceding unsigned comment added by 168.167.79.68 (talk) 15:05, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

The place to discuss this is at Talk:Botswana Defence Force#Tables of equipment; other editors can then see what we are saying. Please reply there. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 22:37, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

K5054

I'm intrigued by the description of this machines paint job; it makes no sense to me, since (generally) French Grey is a warm grey very distinct from a blue-grey. I see there is a cite needed tag against 'cerulean blue'; this is how the aircraft is described in the Putnam book on Supermarine aircraft. I'll look it up and add the cite shortly.TheLongTone (talk) 15:46, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

The exact shade has long been a source of confusion. The best we can do is to cite the (otherwise) reliable sources which contribute to that confusion. It does not help that these paints often faded and yellowed quite quickly in strong sunlight, or when used on a model and left for decades beyond the short lifetime of the aircraft the paint was meant for, but contemporary observers sometimes did not realise that. Thank you for chasing up the missing cite, I knew I had read it somewhere but could not remember where. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 22:46, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Sorted. Colours are a minefield, and really unless a specific pigment is being used as a name (eg ultramarine) the terms are meaningless. Interestingly the oed describes Frenc Grey as having Chinese Blue and a red pigment added to it, but without knowing what balck pigment was used its still meaningless. Changing the subject, I think I'm going round the bend: I have this memory of an incarnation of K5054 prepped for an attempt on the world speed record, and painted dark blue with a silver flash down the side. I've flipped through my sources and can find no mention...TheLongTone (talk) 14:34, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for the ref. Is there any chance you could quote the bit which describes it as Cerulean Blue? All the other refs quote their contexts. It was once mooted that K5054 be prepped for the speed record, but the mod was canned when a Gustav went faster that it could ever do. So another Spit was converted to the Speed Spitfire as you describe, but the Germans repeated the upstaging game twice more and the whole project was eventually canned.

DoneTheLongTone (talk) 15:46, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

But I still want to know where I've read about (and seen a picture of) the Speed Spitfire, which I am (fairly) sure was dark blue.TheLongTone (talk) 15:49, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

http://i262.photobucket.com/albums/ii120/Duggy009/Speed-Spitfire.jpg and http://www.ipmsdeutschland.de/FirstLook/CMR/CMR_Speed_Spitfire/CMR_124_Speed_Spitfire_cover.jpg - Ahunt (talk) 15:52, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Well, the linked article in my reply gives some refs and there are plenty more. I cannot recall seeing any original colour photos but there are many recreations, for example there is a side profile in the old Aircam edition on the Merlin spits (see below). Or just google "Speed Spitfire" and select Images. Thank for the quote, by the way. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 16:33, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

There is a picture in the Putnam book on Supermarine aircraft, curiously right at the end of the section listing variants, but no mention in the text. But this in any case can't be where I read about it, since I only bought it a couple of weeks ago. It does look darker than I would expect cerulean blue to appear.TheLongTone (talk) 15:14, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Do you mean K5054 or the Speed Spitfire? Only the prototype was "cerulean" or similar, the Speed Spit was a nice glowing dark blue with yellow fuselage flash. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 15:32, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

The Speed Spitfire. Which my picture shows with a three-bladed dural prop. I should have thanked you for the links to the pics btw, but doesn't one show the thing with a silver flash. Incidentally 'cerulean blue' in fine art terms is used for a specific blue pigment, very similar to Cobalt Blue but with a slightly gree bias. One of my favorite paints. It's one of the more expensive pigments...TheLongTone (talk) 12:57, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Price devotes ten pages to the Speed Spitfire in his The Spitfire Story. He describes it as having a royal blue upper surface and silver underside. He does not note the colour of the fuselage flash. The plane's initial incarnation with the souped-up engine had a 4-bladed prop. This was replaced by a standard Merlin and 3-bladed prop when it became K9835 and went into service. Price has a photo showing it still in its blue-and-silver livery but with a yellow-bordered RAF roundel in front of its newly-painted K9834 serial. The side flash is noticeably lighter than the yellow border. I finally found the colour side profile in Profile Publications No. 41 The Supermarine Spitfire I & II by James Goulding. The underside is depicted the same dark blue as the top, oops. The side flash looks yellow, which is what I always assumed, but I now notice that the caption concludes, "...subsequently ... camouflaged through which the gold stripe eventually appeared." However while the photos in Price show a range of roundels at different periods, all show the side flash clearly and none show any sign of two-tone camouflage. So if Goulding is wrong on the underside and the camo, what weight can we give his "gold"? One of life's little mysteries. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 14:33, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm inclined not to really believe anything unless I have three sources that agree. And there is some real rubbish out there; I've just encountered a book on Alcock and Browns flight which at one point described the aircraft as being doped silver. Since I generally believe my own eyes (probably unwise) I believe the thing was unbleached linen. I havn't read the Price book ( aircraft that work properly are not my main area of interest) but at 2.99 with free shipping its a snip on abebooks!TheLongTone (talk) 15:12, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Oh, I can show you three sources and more that agree on utter rubbish about J. W. Dunne and his aeroplanes. The provenance of the sources is always paramount and a surprising number of "authoritative" accounts merely parrot the previous parrot ad nauseam (leading to a new take on the phrase "sick as a parrot", but I digress). — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 15:31, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Finally someone sane contributing to the discussion

I was starting to think I was the only rational and logical person left in the world. Thanks --Gtoffoletto (talk) 20:13, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. I have found with all these fringe/pseudo issues that passionate Sceptics are in general as rigid, unscientific and prone to emotive post-rationalisation as are passionate Believers. The reality is often suppressed by both sides in case it might weaken their position. Ancient Classical writers occasionally reflected on such peccadilloes of human nature - some things never change. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 21:36, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Just so you know: I've reported those two exact users before [1] (no need reading through all of it. Exactly the same behaviour as now). They work in tandem and I'm afraid you are witnessing their standard MO. When I reported them I was banned for a day for WP:FORUMSHOP (first time in over 10 years and over 1000 edits). I was very I'll and a bit incoherent and I think admins mostly just got annoyed with me and stopped listening. Obviously their behaviour is not simple to document (admins criticised my failure to do so). I was also alone against multiple aligned editors although other editors expressed their sympathy as they had similar problems with them in the past. I am hesitant to try it again (it felt like calling the police for help and getting shot myself) but I don't see how we can get out of this without admin involvement since so few editors roam those pages. Do you have more experience on this front? I never reported anyone or had issues of this sort before except my last failure. What a colossal waste of time. --Gtoffoletto (talk) 19:38, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

jps obviously has appalling discussion skills but compensates for it with extreme determination and has learned how to avoid the main behavioural pitfalls. It takes a very clear head and a lot of experience to deal with disagreements in such circumstances. LuckyLouie has not really engaged enough for me to judge. Without enough participants to form a clear consensus, it is very difficult to make progress.

But there is another tension on Wikipedia in a more or less permanent battle between the proponents of paranormal phenomena, the sceptics who want to debunk it all on principle, and those seeking to build a balanced presentation around reliable sources. Of course we all claim the last of these, but in general the sceptics will succeed in pushing their PoV unless one can find sufficiently sound RS to support some balanced commentary. For example on precognition the fact that most people believe in it, in spite of scientific consensus, is attested by the scientific community's own research, among other RS. I am not into ufology, but I should imagine the same kinds of issue apply there. My best guess, which I offer you in simple honesty, is that you may have tried too hard to treat the ufo aspect neutrally as an apparent possibility, and not realised that in doing so you are breaching Wikipedia's taboo on pseudoscience. With that taboo on their side, character like jps become even harder to deal with. Editing these contentious articles is never a smooth ride and never will be.

My best suggestion to you would be to avoid edits which affect sensitive content for a good while and stick to more mundane improvements to these articles. Also, take a more cautious approach to the reliability of sources and to giving undue weight to minor details.

I don't know if that is any help, but it's the best I can offer for now. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 02:11, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice. I agree with what you say. I would like to point out that none of the edits I have made even remotely mentions "aliens". Although not relevant to my edits I believe the most probable explanation is some kind of testing of advanced tech by the US itself or by some of their adversaries. I thank you for your invaluable and balanced participation in the discussion. It's crucial that this doesn't become a "fight" between me and the other editor. Something I am trying to avoid at all costs by focusing on RS and CIVILity. However the small number of editors is problematic since the other side is used to working in a tight group and stifling all other editors. I find their "extreme determination" extremely dangerous. Maybe RfCs are needed to bring in additional editors? --Gtoffoletto (talk) 10:49, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

RfCs can be useful, but they can also have unintended consequences. By raising an RfC you put yourself in the spotlight, I just do not see that as wise until you have gained a better understanding of why your edits provoke such reactions. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 12:35, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

I will follow your advice. I do not shy away from criticism. Actually I gladly accept it and value it greatly. Please see the discussion in the talk page. We have been duped again by mischaracterisation of the sources and false reporting. Be careful with what those users report. They only superficially examine what they bring forth and often make false statements that should not be taken at face value. --Gtoffoletto (talk) 13:38, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

p.s. I love aviation. I've been occasionally writing about aerospace engineering related topics for over 10 years on it.wiki and en.wiki. I would like to unequivocally state that I am NOT. Repeat NOT a UFO "believer". I believe in science. Don't believe the false narrative by those users. they are simply personal attacks.--Gtoffoletto (talk) 13:44, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Making UFOs make sense

I've double checked, the article is free access. Try: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0963662515617706 or Google "Making UFOs make sense". It's a very good read. -- {{u|Gtoffoletto}}  ^talk 15:59, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

Then perhaps you would like to pay the $37.50 it is asking me for as an unaffiliated private citizen? But no, only joking, I see now that an institution I am affiliated to does have access, so I can go in that way. But free access it certainly is not. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 16:18, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

Mistery solved. I see you are in the UK. You are now outside of the EU :'( When I click on the link I see a redirect to europepmc.org. Glad you got it one way or the other! -- {{u|Gtoffoletto}}  ^talk 16:27, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

Ha! Got it now! But hey, we are supposed to be in a transition period when EU stuff still applies. :/ — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 16:42, 3 May 2020 (UTC)

ANI

Have you left a massage on the talk pagers of all the accused?Slatersteven (talk) 12:56, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Yes indeed. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 12:59, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Class-A review for Lockheed F-104 Starfighter

Greetings Steelpillow,

I hope you are safe and sound these days through all the craziness. I was curious if perhaps you had the time and inclination to give the Lockheed F-104 Starfighter article a review for its MILHIST A-class review. Gog the Mild, who did the initial review, recommended I find someone with a strong technical/aircraft background as well. I know you have contributed substantially to aircraft articles in the past, and so I was thinking you might be an excellent addition to the review team. If you aren't available, do you have any other recommendations of whom I might contact? Thank you! CThomas³ (talk) 23:44, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Hi. Thank you for the compliment of asking but, for various reasons, I don't usually review articles. You could try asking at the Aircraft project talk page. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 08:44, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

No problem, will do. Thank you! CThomas³ (talk) 17:18, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Possible hoax

If RMI-8 is deleted as a hoax, please consider adding to Wikipedia:List of hoaxes on Wikipedia. buidhe 08:17, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for the thought. It is not really a Wikipedia hoax, it has long existed among a core of off-wiki enthusiasts and been elaborated through various media. The article creator was probably as much duped as anyone else. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 08:48, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

Irish vs Irishman

Topic moved to Talk:J. W. Dunne#Irish vs Irishman. Any further comments should be posted there. Note that creating it there is the same process as creating it here, and just as easy; please do so in future. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 08:27, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

New message from Doug Weller

Hello, Steelpillow. You have new messages at Doug Weller's talk page.
Message added 18:42, 17 July 2020 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Doug Weller talk 18:42, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

New message from Cosmic SophisTree

Hello, Steelpillow. Please check your email; you've got mail!
It may take a few minutes from the time the email is sent for it to show up in your inbox. You can at any time by removing the {{You've got mail}} or {{ygm}} template.

CosmicSophisTreeLLC 03:55, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

Wikiwings

		Wikiwings
		For both a consistent commitment to maintaining the highest quality standards for aircraft lists and a fair approach to all participants during an intense discussion of the subject. –Noha307 (talk) 00:58, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

I don't understand

Hi!

I don't understand why the regular compound of ten tetrahedra should not be mentioned in the "Self-dual polyhedra" paragraph of the Dual polyhedron article:

indeed, in the Compound polyhedron article, the regular compound of ten tetrahedra is described as self-dual;

OK, it has "two components" (the two chiral twin regular compounds of five tetrahedra); but these are dual to each other.

What is wrong in this simple argument? :-/

RavBol (talk) 14:23, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

My sincere apologies, I was thinking of a different issue over regularity (or rather, I was not thinking!). I have restored your edit. Thank you for pulling me up. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 16:13, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

No problem: you made me think and look for another strong argument, which i added between brackets (and sourced) just after the statement in question. :-)

RavBol (talk) 21:03, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Sadly I cannot find any other reliable sources to cite in support of the facts that Hart does not mention. You are obviously correct in your statements, but that is not enough on Wikipedia and the whole subsection has been deleted. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 08:02, 3 September 2020 (UTC)

---

Hi!

In the Apeirogonal prism article,

<post moved to Talk:Apeirogonal prism#Alternate coloring>

RavBol (talk) 22:51, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

I have moved your query to the article talk page, where I and others can reply in context. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 09:59, 15 October 2020 (UTC)

Genuine English grammar preservation

Hi!

I recently edited several sentences in the Antiprism article, because of grammar points about singular or plural, article or no article... But i'm not quite sure whether these changes preserve the exact meaning of these sentences...

Perhaps an educated native English speaker should compare my last edit: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antiprism to the previous one? (By using the Wikipedia comparison tool, of course.)

Cheers, - RavBol (talk) 15:06, 10 October 2020 (UTC) ;-)

Thank you for the heads-up. I have made a couple of minor corrections; many native British get these ones wrong too, nothing for you to worry about. Also, I think it best to leave the problem image (Schlegel diagram for A3) blank until a corrected image can be found, so I have commented-out its code. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 16:30, 10 October 2020 (UTC)

Thank you very much for your answer & for your checking & fixing these tricky English singular/plural compounds! By the way: you introduced another such compound by replacing the infobox's title "n-gonal antiprism" with "n-gonal antiprisms", whereas the article's title is "Antiprism" & every other item in the infobox (except "Faces" & "Properties", of course) is in the singular. Only educated native English speakers can understand such subtleties! ;-)

Cheers, - RavBol (talk) 00:13, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

I think it would be the same in other languages. Article titles are by default in the singular, as "Antiprism". The infobox describes general properties of all antiprisms (plural). Each expression gives the value of a single property of some given n-antiprism. I would not expect a German or French mathematician to see things differently (although German and French Wikipedians might be a different matter entirely). — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 08:31, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

I think i see what you mean, although i tend to disagree on this particular point: i find it clearer to consider one case at a time, all the more so as each polyhedron has several components & properties.

And by the way: i will add something in the same infobox soon (don't worry: i won't remove the "s" you added, of course). :-)

Cheers, - RavBol (talk) 18:51, 11 October 2020 (UTC)

Wikiwings

		Wikiwings
		For amazing dedication in sorting out jet fighter generations. - Ahunt (talk) 16:05, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

Jet fighter generations

It is completely true that any distinctions between generations are arbitrary, but I find these pages very useful as lists of roughly contemporary, allowing me to compare similar aircraft and look in to them and their designs easily.

Until there's a well subdivided article for jet combat aircraft from the 40s to 60s, it would be better to keep the pages up rather than throwing all these people's work away.

Basilicus2 (talk) 13:41, 7 January 2021 (UTC)

Hi, you might want to argue your point in the discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Aircraft#Fifth and other fighter generations. Meanwhile, you can always go into the page History and recover any lists you find useful for your own non-encyclopedic purposes. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 14:31, 7 January 2021 (UTC)

Man-Lifting Kites

In your recent edits in Man-lifting kite, I believe your deletions violate Wikipedia policy and standard processes. Your edit reasons state they are dubious, off topic, or irrelevant, but as you know with your extensive history on the site, Wikipedia practice is to use tags such as {{dubious}}, {{off topic}} and {{relevance}} and then both parties allow for collaborative editing if the original editor does not revert it. I propose either your restoring the content which you personally dispute as being relevant to the article and instead tag it as appropriate so we can follow standard practice, or we could engage a more formal review such as through the Neutral Point of View Noticeboard at WP:NPOVN. The statements are properly sourced or are connective in nature and I believe they are relevant to the topic, I believe your removal (rather than accepting standard Wikipedia practice) is due to your own bias toward a historic viewpoint. Bwagstaff (talk) 23:31, 23 January 2021 (UTC)

Article content should be discussed on the article talk page. If you don't like my behaviour, take me to WP:ANI. Either way, keep your argumentative and unresearched opinions about me off my talk page. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 10:41, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Reversion thanks

Hey, thanks. Maybe it's time for me to go to bed, making these typos.

		The Minor Barnstar
		Thanks for catching my mistakes and finishing my copyediting on Rotorcraft. Anon423 (talk) 17:40, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

You're welcome. Hope you had a nice refreshing sleep — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 19:12, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)#Logins_bounced

I'm assuming you are OK with the address showing in Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)#Logins_bounced -- if not please let us know ASAP if it needs purging. — xaosflux ^Talk 20:01, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

Thanks, but my IP is dynamic these days. It has already changed. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 11:10, 9 February 2021 (UTC)

FYI

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#Deprecate_linking_to_Wikipedia_books_in_templates_and_articles--Moxy- 14:40, 16 March 2021 (UTC)

Looks like supporting Books is a minority sport now, but thanks anyway. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 17:37, 16 March 2021 (UTC)

LTNS

Hey SP, how's things? I wanted to ask you about the pages Skylab 4 and Skylab controversy; back in 2018 there was a discussion that we took part in where the consensus was to merge into Skylab 4. For some reason that didn't happen. I was wondering if you had any idea why? I somehow lost track of those pages (turns out they weren't on my 10K+ page watchlist!) If you have any info about that, lemme know. Meanwhile, I'm revisiting the idea on the Skylab controversy talk page. Cheers - wolf 02:03, 26 March 2021 (UTC)

Portals

I thought they were supposed to be there. Trigenibinion (talk) 11:40, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Of course not! I have no idea what gave you that impression, but it is wholly false. I have started a WikiProject discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Aircraft#Portal links, which you might like to contribute to.

Also, once a conversation has started, please reply in the same thread and do not jump to another page, it makes continuity very difficult for others who may take an interest. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 11:45, 22 April 2021 (UTC)

Sig

Hello. FYI, I fixed your signature here, which for some reason did not include a username.--- Possibly (talk) 05:06, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

OK thanks. That happens if you type five tildes instead of four. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 07:49, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

"curious place"

In your edit on Administrators' noticeboard (Mass deletions of operators) you wrote: "Uli Elich opened a discussion at Talk:List of Britten-Norman Islander operators#Mass deletions of operators, which is a redirect page's talk page - curious place ..."

Just for clarification: I have opened this discussion at 17:26, 16 May 2021, when the original "List of Britten-Norman Islander operators" and its associated talk page still existed.

Only at 05:38, 17 May 2021, the user critisized by me deleted the entire list, thus making the talk page related to a brand new redirect. Regards --Uli Elch (talk) 12:59, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

You mean the page was merged across after you opened the discussion? I did not realise that, my apologies for the confusion. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 13:26, 19 May 2021 (UTC)

Your comment about Wikipedia books

"We really do not want a 'hidden' wiki stitched into the one that anyone can read."

We've already had that for years with draftspace, but anyway... RadioKAOS / Talk to me, Billy / Transmissions 20:07, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

hawking quantum gravity paper

as far as i could find, this was the earliest mention in hawking's work of imaginary time.

i'm not sure if there is anything earlier (maybe there's a conference paper where he formally introduces the idea), so you are free to correct me if there is earlier work.

it is obvious he is using the concept of imaginary time to deal with issues. i think it's kind of hard to not see how the path integral formulation he's proposing relies on imaginary time.

the more important questino is if there is earlier work. i wouldn't be surprised either way. the reason i didn't "look harder" (i looked at a few pages and few different terms) is that imaginary time (to me) seems to leverage a similar concept in complex analysis (argand plane).

indeed if you read the first few paragraphs of the Path Integrals section, he does say something similar.

so, are you still "green" in "physics" or what? it's pretty obvious man just in case you aren't seasoned enough to read papers over textbooks yet

"It is convenient to rotate the time interval on this timelike tube between the two surfaces into the complex plane so that it becomes purely imaginary."

198.53.108.48 (talk) 01:11, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

Hi. Obvious to those who can get hold of a copy, no doubt. As noted, I could not get past the online paywall. Nor do I have easy access to a suitable dead-tree repository. Thank you for the quotation, I have worked a reference into the main article text. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 09:30, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

there is a hub of science (AHEM) and even a library of genesis (AHEHEM for books mostly) that is useful in these cases, youngling. just saying. i don't advocate such things of course. you're welcome and i appreciate your participation 198.53.108.48 (talk) 17:48, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

You flatter me. I celebrated my 69th birthday just a couple of weeks ago; I kid the younger generations that since then, I have not known which way round is up. You must be a true elder statesman! ;) — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 18:01, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

Your recent revert

Regarding this diff: your edit summary "prior to opening discussion" suggests that you did not notice the existence of a prior discussion at Talk:Dual polyhedron#Dorman Luke construction, and that you intended to open a discussion. However, you just reverted, without either contributing to the prior discussion or opening a new redundant one. That seems counter to the spirit of WP:BRD to me. Please explain yourself. —David Eppstein (talk) 18:40, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

Hi David,

"Please explain yourself"? Really! Such an abruptly confrontational turn of phrase is unbecoming. But let that pass. Indeed I was not aware of the prior discussion, I responded simply to the notification of your edit in my watchlist. Note that the defined procedure is B > R > D; You are Bold, I Revert, then we Discuss. I am puzzled why you might interpret WP:BRD differently. The example use cases offered are just that, examples, while the remarks on reversion at WP:BRDR do not mention the need to review any prior discussion. It took me more than a few seconds to compose my reply, which I have now posted and I expect you will have read while I was writing this. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 19:09, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

"abruptly confrontational" says the editor who participated on the article's talk page multiple times between the month-ago discussion and now, failed to notice that part of the discussion or remember their participation, and then reverted the long-discussed edit? —David Eppstein (talk) 23:16, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

I am unable to find my sig in the discussion on Dorman Luke where you mooted the move. So no, I think it is your turn to misremember for a change. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 05:11, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

IP unblock request

This user's request to have autoblock on their IP address lifted has been reviewed by an administrator, who accepted the request.

Steelpillow (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

Steelpillow (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

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Block message:

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Accept reason: Autoblock removed. --jpgordon^{𝄢𝄆𝄐𝄇} 04:35, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

Note that I have a dynamic IP controlled by my telco - technically it is the IP of some Mobile Telephony node or other acting as a NAT gateway, it is not my own IP. The gateway gets periodically blocked to prevent anon IP edits, but this is the first time I ever got autoblocked when logged it. Apologies for the borking of the above template-within-a-template display, out of my control. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 03:06, 6 October 2021 (UTC)

User sandbox transcluded in article space (Gotha Go 147)

Why is a sandbox page from your user space being transcluded in Gotha Go 147? That is highly unusual. – Jonesey95 (talk) 01:10, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

Apologies, I copy-pasted code from the wrong page and forgot to correct it. Now done. Thanks for the heads-up. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 08:44, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

List of seaplanes and amphibious aircraft

Thank you very much for your hard work on this list. I was about to complain about the disappeared wikilinking, but was confident that I'd not need to whine - and you showed me right, sure enough! On a sidethought, the article opens with some reserve about insufficient links or references - does that need to remain? For a "list" article, it seems very well done as it stands now. Keep up the good work! Jan olieslagers (talk) 17:15, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

@Jan olieslagers: Thank you, I am glad you appreciate the changes. My view is that in these list articles references are really only needed for red-linked or unlinked entries, and perhaps for the more oddball notes; the rest can be easily verified via click-through to the article and its sources. So until most of the red links are either fixed or tagged, I think the referencing template should stay.

It was not really so hard, just some crafty copy-paste between Wikipedia, a spreadsheet and a text editor. I used the text editor to find/replace repetitive code as required and the spreadsheet to fiddle the columns around, just needs a moment's thought as to what to do when. There is obviously also still a lot of post-reformat cleanup and filling-in to do, I expect I will get bored with all that it long before it is done! — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 18:57, 14 December 2021 (UTC)

possible typo in table

hello I have left a comment in the wiki page about Homology. it is about the table: "Topological characteristics of closed 1- and 2-manifolds". cheers une musque de Biscaye (talk) 09:56, 25 December 2021 (UTC)

Thank you!

Hello, Steelpillow, and thank you for chiming in at Lift-to-drag ratio. Your input at the talk page has been very helpful, and your current reorganization of the page even more so. Thanks and I hope you will keep this page on your watchlist in the future. -- MelanieN (talk) 19:22, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Hi @MelanieN: You are very kind, thank you. I'll certainly keep it on my watchlist for a while, but there is always more to attend to than I have time for. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 19:27, 4 January 2022 (UTC)

Hi, I came here to say the same thing as MelanieN. You've handled a difficult situation with tact, but also firmness when needed. Your last summary at ANI is spot-on. I've been an IP-editor trying to make a change that I know is correct, and hitting a blank wall of polite refusal to take any notice (expressed in the form of repeated reversions), and it's certainly very hard not to get aggressive and emotional. There is no question that the IP editor responded wrongly, but had they not done the work they did (and stuck at it in the face of adversity), we would still have a misleading article. I very much appreciate your putting their words into context. Kindness and politeness are good and important; but if wikipedia becomes the politest but wrongest encyclopaedia, it won't be terribly useful. I sincerely hope everyone else in that debate will follow your example, drop the hostilities, and chalk this up to experience. I don't know the right barn-star template, but I'd give you one if I knew how! Elemimele (talk) 20:30, 5 January 2022 (UTC)

Thank you Elemimele, much appreciated. Don't worry about the barnstar, I already have the warm glow from it! — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 21:23, 5 January 2022 (UTC)

J. C. Barker

Hey, I am not sure if you have ever come across the research of John Barker (J. C. Barker), there is an interesting article about his life here [2] and a case he studied here [3] [4], he created something called "The Premonitions Bureau" which documented predictions of the public. Barker was a psychiatrist who worked at Shelton Hospital. I believe that Barker did refer to the theories of Dunne. I have not yet found his birth or death date. I think he might qualify for a Wikipedia article. It's not an article I want to create right now because I have hundreds of others in my list and it is not a topic that I would usually write about but I thought I would put this person on your radar. Psychologist Guy (talk) 17:47, 8 February 2022 (UTC)

It appears Robert Nelson a few years after Barker founded the Central Premonitions Registry in New York in 1968 [5] [6]. It might be worth adding that to the precognition article. Psychologist Guy (talk) 17:58, 8 February 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for these tips. Barker was intimately involved with the Aberfan disaster and the reputed psychic premonitions among its victims and relatives. The pseudo/science controversy over them is possibly notable enough to deserve some mention, and Knight's book might help with that. Apart from that, I have my doubts whether mention of those collection institutions would survive our "don't give them space" censorship police; one needs neutral (non-sympathetic) RS for that. I wonder if Knight has anything to say about Dunne. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 19:14, 8 February 2022 (UTC)

Fairey Monarch

Hi, could you explain this edit summary please? As the removed text was present at article creation it appears to imply that I did not reflect the source correctly. Mention of the Prince 4 has also been removed from the Fairey template, a name supported by Lumsden. Nimbus (Cumulus nimbus floats by) 10:19, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

Hi. Neither Gunston's cited encyclopedia nor Taylor's tome in the Putnam series mentions the Prince monicker for this engine. Both say that the P.24 Monarch was a clean-sheet design. I can find no mention of a "Prince 4" in relevant discussions on the Secret Projects forum, though my search was not exhaustive. I do not have access to Lumsden, but if that supports the Prince 4 designation with sufficient background to suggest it is not a mistake, then perhaps you could add that information and cite it appropriately. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 10:37, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

Surely you can't positively state 'what the sources say' if you don't actually have access to them all? If you visit the first iteration of this article only Gunston and Lumsden were used. The text you removed was 'an enlarged development' where Lumsden p. 150 says 'a more powerful development of the Prince H-16 with greater capacity', which I wrote as 'enlarged development' to avoid Copy vio, I would say that is following the source very accurately. Is the Secrets Projects forum a reliable source? Nimbus (Cumulus nimbus floats by) 10:57, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

No, the forum is not an RS, but it does have some very expert and comprehensive discussions. Gunston states that the P.24 was "totally new" compared to the abandoned P.12 and 16. But on rechecking Taylor I see that I misled, for which I must apologise; he notes only that the P.24 was an "original concept" in its 12+12 layout. I also note that, according to the figures attributed to Lumsden (and supported for the P.24 by this 1941 Ministry memorandum which I just stumbled on), the individual cylinder dimensions of the P.12 and P.24 are identical, which is strongly suggestive. So OK, maybe it's Gunston who made the mistake there, but it's still no corroboration of the "Prince 4". We are not helped by the taking down of the Flight archive. Ultimately the WP:BURDEN is on the editor who includes the material to provide reliable citation, and still I don't think Lumsden alone quite makes the case. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 11:38, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

The Flight archive is still available through internet archive engines and the links are being repaired by various editors and bots, I have the citation page up at the moment. You are saying then that Alex Lumsden is an unreliable source and that Secret Forums is where the true experts can be found? Lumsden is a high quality source and is easily available per WP:VERIFY, if the facts can't be found there and in other books then I don't see the point of continuing to use the good faith citation system (that Wikipedia articles are essentially built around) and should 'just add stuff' instead like many other editors do (so many that reverting them daily has become a chore). Nimbus (Cumulus nimbus floats by) 12:34, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

Last time I looked, the Internet Archive's issues of Flight run only to 1935, not the 1950s as referenced in the article. On balance I now agree that we should describe the P.24 as a development of the Prince, as overall the available sources suggest that Gunston is wrong there. But I remain unhappy about referring to it as the Prince 4, as Lumsden - reliable as he customarily is - is as far as we know alone in this. I have also seen it suggested that the Monarch was for a short time named the Queen, but that is even less reliable. As for the rest, I am sure you have a point to prove, but forgive me if I find it obscure. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 14:13, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

I can absolutely assure you that I have Flight, 20 December 1957 page 943 readable on my PC, obtained today through web.archive.org. The point you had trouble understanding is a question, do I add material to the encyclopedia without sources or do I continue to cite high quality sources and hope that they will be taken in good faith?

A much better way to deal with citations that are not believed is to post a query on the article talk page where the problem (if one exists) can be discussed. Nimbus (Cumulus nimbus floats by) 14:48, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

Ah, one of the scattered pages that were archived. As you must well know, the majority are not. Shame neither it nor the other page cited mentions the "Prince 4" though. Sufficient also to remind you of WP:BRD, which was at your disposal. Those who do not have the courtesy to post web links to save others time are hardly in a position to whinge about better ways on their talk pages. Enough, thank you. This conversation ends here. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 17:21, 11 February 2022 (UTC)

My apology

Hi Steelpillow. My apology for my part in getting us to the point where you're warning me as you did here. I'm happy to refactor and explain anything I've written. I didn't mean for anything I wrote to be taken as a description of you, or to make assumptions of you motives. I am trying to focus on your arguments solely, and point out policy as we go. Sorry if I've come across as doing otherwise. --Hipal (talk) 18:06, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

Happy to accept the spirit of your apology. But you should be aware that openly accusing another editor of policy violation and posting a sanction notice on their talk page makes it hard to believe you really meant nothing critical in their direction. No doubt I came across as more abrupt and thoughtless than I meant to, so please accept my apology in return. Take care and keep editing! — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 18:29, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

Much appreciated.

Again, I'm happy to refactor anything I wrote. --Hipal (talk) 19:09, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

Copa del Rey (disambiguation)

I haven't re-edited Copa del Rey (disambiguation) because I don't want an edit war, but established guidelines state that intentional links to DAB pages go through the '(disambiguation)' qualifier, even if it is a redirect (WP:INTDAB). King's Cup should be listed as King's Cup (disambiguation). Leschnei (talk) 22:41, 6 May 2022 (UTC)

OK, my apologies. I have now found the relevant guideline at WP:INTDAB. It is not in the main MOS:DISAMBIG so I missed it before. I see another user has since changed it to yet another destination, so I have restored your original edit there. Thank you for your courtesy and restraint. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 08:58, 7 May 2022 (UTC)

Local nature reserve

Hi Steelpillow, I may have been a bit overzealous in reverting your edits at this article. It really should be capitalised because the article is purely about the official designation, not generic nature reserves. And as in eBay or Liberal Democrats (UK) we use the capitalisation employed by the owner of the name. However, my proposal to rename the article met with such opposition that I withdrew it. So we are where we are, but my sense is we should try and minimise perpeatuating the error in the article itself. Perhaps we can reach a middle ground. Bermicourt (talk) 17:29, 13 May 2022 (UTC)

We don't work out our internal arguments in the article lead, we do that on the article talk and/or policy discussion pages. The last thing any reader wants is a rundown on our dirty washing before the article even begins. Sheesh! See also Wikipedia:Rome wasn't built in a day. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 18:06, 13 May 2022 (UTC)

I have restored my verbiage cuts and also made a small effort in your direction. But I really have no interest in the Wikipedia-wide capitalization willy-and-boob-waving contest. If you wish to continue warring over the capitals, I would be grateful if you did not also war over the verbiage reduction, for reasons already explained. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 18:23, 13 May 2022 (UTC)

rm unreliable site

Regarding this edit and similar ones you've made recently, shouldn't you be adding a {{citation needed}} tag to the places you removed the sources? Obviously unreliable sources should be removed, but in most cases a source is still needed. Thanks. BilCat (talk) 00:55, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

In many cases, perhaps. In many other cases there is no value in doing that. I have been removing huge numbers of these citations and do not have the time to review each article/factoid on its own merits. There is plenty else wrong with these articles! — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 10:39, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

Gerard Hodgkinson

I went back to the original Daily Telegraph article and cited it, after your objection to the quote of it from an "unreliable" source. Now you have removed the new citation that leads directly to the original article. I appreciate that you may not have access to the Daily Telegraph archives, but I do, and the replacement citation was correct. Johnlp (talk) 16:46, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

My apologies. You reverted my edit to restore the unreliable source, and somehow I missed your two subsequent edits replacing it. Thank you for the heads-up. Now, I hope, back to sanity. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 16:56, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

OK, thanks. I struggle to use the Cite News template, so always need a previous ref to base it on. No harm done. Johnlp (talk) 16:59, 2 October 2022 (UTC)

No matter what their lordships say, it still can't fly

The Fairey Barracuda has the distinction of having more derogatory songs about it than any other FAA aircraft... the above to the tune of As Time Goes By. I see you knocked out a load of cites from the article on this machine. I'll see what I can do to replace them from something reliable. TheLongTone (talk) 13:30, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Sorry about that. Stemp's content is all based on scrapings from elsewhere; it is indiscriminate and self-published, so fails RS. I have Taylor's Putnam book on Fairey aircraft, so if you have any particular concerns I can take a look in it. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 13:45, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

The Putnam book is the only substantial source I have, so can't add anything you cant. Although I see there is a monograph on the Barra, which I might buy. I have a particular interest in this thing because my father flew as observer in them.TheLongTone (talk) 11:50, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

npa warning

Please do not attack other editors, as you did at Wikipedia:Fringe theories/Noticeboard. Comment on content, not on contributors. Personal attacks damage the community and deter users. Please stay cool and keep this in mind while editing. Thank you.Nigel Ish (talk) 18:15, 5 November 2022 (UTC)

AN/I discussion

I've started an AN/I discussion about AndyTheGrump's behavior. Feel free to join the discussion. - ZLEA _T\^C 00:31, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

Possible problematic source

I saw this edit on my watchlist, which used www.historyofwar.org as a source. I'd like to get your opinion on this source, as it appears to be self published, but the website's authors have published several books. - ZLEA _T\^C 05:47, 25 November 2022 (UTC)

I checked a couple of Spitfires and one B&V project I know in detail. The text is reasonable but every one of them contains detail errors. For example the prototype did not reach 350 mph on its first flight, and would pass through that target as it was further developed, while the rationale for the Hurricane was speed of development, and so on. The MkVIII had multiple wing tanks and was not deployed in the defence of Darwin. The BV 237 never received a production order as such, while the BV 141 article gives a spurious reason for the 237's cancellation. These articles do not appear to be peer reviewed or edited and they are not well informed about the technical aspects of the aircraft. The author is not always named. On the other hand, I have seen worse that has been through the professional/academic mill.

My own view is that the main body of facts is well supported by other more reliable sources, while this site should not be used to support minor details. Should cites to relatively well-known material be allowed? I don't really know, I suppose that might be one for WP:RSN. — Cheers, Steelpillow (Talk) 09:17, 25 November 2022 (UTC)

AN/I discussion

There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you. ZLEA _T\^C 01:12, 27 November 2022 (UTC)

"Moored balloon/Archive1" listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has identified a potential problem with the redirect Moored balloon/Archive1 and has thus listed it for discussion. This discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2022 December 30 § Moored balloon/Archive1 until a consensus is reached, and anyone, including you, is welcome to contribute to the discussion. Regards, SONIC⁶⁷⁸ 05:52, 30 December 2022 (UTC)