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Administrators' newsletter - February 2017

News and updates for administrators from the past month (January 2017). This first issue is being sent out to all administrators, if you wish to keep receiving it please subscribe. Your feedback is welcomed.

Administrator changes

NinjaRobotPirate • Schwede66 • K6ka • Ealdgyth • Ferret • Cyberpower678 • Mz7 • Primefac • Dodger67

Briangotts • JeremyA • BU Rob13

Guideline and policy news

• A discussion to workshop proposals to amend the administrator inactivity policy at Wikipedia talk:Administrators has been in process since late December 2016.
• Wikipedia:Pending changes/Request for Comment 2016 closed with no consensus for implementing Pending changes level 2 with new criteria for use.
• Following an RfC, an activity requirement is now in place for bots and bot operators.

Technical news

• When performing some administrative actions the reason field briefly gave suggestions as text was typed. This change has since been reverted so that issues with the implementation can be addressed. (T34950)
• Following the latest RfC concluding that Pending Changes 2 should not be used on the English Wikipedia, an RfC closed with consensus to remove the options for using it from the page protection interface, a change which has now been made. (T156448)
• The Foundation has announced a new community health initiative to combat harassment. This should bring numerous improvements to tools for admins and CheckUsers in 2017.

Arbitration

• The Arbitration Committee released a response to the Wikimedia Foundation's statement on paid editing and outing.

Obituaries

• JohnCD (John Cameron Deas) passed away on 30 December 2016. John began editing Wikipedia seriously during 2007 and became an administrator in November 2009.

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Discuss this newsletter • Subscribe • Archive

13:38, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Marco Börries

The article Marco Börries has been proposed for deletion because it appears to have no references. Under Wikipedia policy, this biography of a living person will be deleted after seven days unless it has at least one reference to a reliable source that directly supports material in the article.

If you created the article, please don't be offended. Instead, consider improving the article. For help on inserting references, see Referencing for beginners, or ask at the help desk. Once you have provided at least one reliable source, you may remove the {{prod blp/dated}} tag. Please do not remove the tag unless the article is sourced. If you cannot provide such a source within seven days, the article may be deleted, but you can request that it be undeleted when you are ready to add one. TopCipher (talk) 16:37, 10 April 2017 (UTC)

Nomination of Walligal for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article Walligal is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Walligal until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. -- Patar knight - ^chat/_{contributions} 20:38, 26 May 2017 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:End of season

Template:End of season has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 05:17, 7 June 2017 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:Management consulting

Template:Management consulting has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 06:08, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Belphegor's prime

You think Belphegor's prime is a stub? Man, I sure don't - I think of the stub tag as being there to let us easily find articles that don't have the minimum information to make sense to a casual reader. That article is well beyond that point, I'd say. - DavidWBrooks (talk) 00:51, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

Well, that rather raises the question as to whether a subject that can be given a comprehensive article in a grand total of seven sentences really needs a standalone article in the first place. I mean, it's primarily notable for being a bit amusing. We don't have an article for 80085, which has amused pre-teen boys with desktop calculators for decades. A brief flip through the relevant category didn't turn up any other standalone articles for similarly quaint-but-pointless primes. Maybe there are some, and we could collate them into a broader article. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 15:51, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

I don't think it's comprehensive, it's just not a stub IMHO - there's a huge gap between stubbiness (too small to have even minimal usefulness) and comprehensiveness. Having said that, it is pretty borderline for an article of its own. Maybe part of, let's see ... Intriguing numbers? Weird numbers? Kind of funny in odd way numbers? - DavidWBrooks (talk) 16:00, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

I note that it isn't mentioned at all on list of prime numbers, the one place you'd think it'd be guaranteed a mention. But whether adding material to 125K listicles is a good idea is a question in itself. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 16:05, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

Holy toledo, what a page that list of primes is! ... but thank you for introducing me to Emirp. How have I missed that vital mathematical concept all these years? - DavidWBrooks (talk) 16:58, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

Touch_(Unix) reads like a manual page

My search 'touch unix' (without the quotes) on a popular internet search engine brought up the article touch (Unix) top. I am long accustomed to skipping past the wikipedia editorial exhortation box to an article's content, as the eye runs past spam in an email inbox, but when I returned, having slaked my thirst for knowledge, to read this editorial box, I was at first somewhat stunned that there was even a template to accuse an article of being "written like a manual or guidebook", and then somewhat quizzical that this would be considered a bad thing when discussing a Unix command. I did think that it was one of the best things I'd ever read about a Unix command. I have now read the relevant paragraph on "what Wikipedia is not" about this policy, and reviewing the edit history, it looks like the non-standard examples have been revised. So how about taking that template off the top of the page? Each one removed increases the force of all of the others… LaFolleCycliste 05:42, 20 August 2017 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by LaFolleCycliste (talk • contribs)

This edit helped, but the article still consists almost entirely of a "Usage" section which is just a thinly-paraphrased copy of the man page, and an "Examples" section which is a howto. Ask yourself what Encyclopaedia Brittanica would have to say about this subject were it notable enough for inclusion. Anyone who needs help using the utility is perfectly free to do what you did and Google it, and look on any of the hundreds of existing resources which exist for this purpose. It's not ours. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 12:00, 20 August 2017 (UTC)

Plural of "ABS" is the same as plural of "ATM" ("ATMs"), etc.

I started a discussion about pluralizing "ABS" as "ABSs"--that is, "anti-lock braking systemS" the same way as we pluralize "ATM" as "ATMs," etc. Will you please show this other editor why that's correct with me?

Thanks if so, 174.23.105.242 (talk) 22:24, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for your help!

Hey, Chris, thanks for your help over there. Well, regushee decided to act like a baby about it by calling us "trolls" and not providing any concrete support for his "it sounds silly" argument, so I wrote up a reply calling him out on that. Do you think we should report him for incivility? As well, do you have any ideas of other editors who would be reasonable enough to see how obviously stupid "anti-lock braking system systems" is just like you and I know it is?

Thanks, Mike Christenen, 174.23.141.137 (talk) 19:58, 2 September 2017 (UTC) (until my dynamic address changes again).

Hey, Chris, a troll went in and reverted anti-lock braking system again. But I suspect that if I go in and revert his vandalism, he'll just war with me. Will you please go in and revert that back to the non-redundant version that we agreed on? 75.162.244.184 (talk) 06:18, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

Tags on AVX-512

You added three tags to the article, and while I can see where you are coming from. I don't see how they can be resolved, so you just end up with permanent tags, and the tags would apply equaly to all article on wikipedia on the subject of intruction sets. This is one of the less technical written with more details on use instead of just listings of instructions. Carewolf (talk) 20:24, 3 September 2017 (UTC)

Hi. It may be that technical sheets like this simply can't be presented as articles in themselves. Wikipedia isn't a technical reference, and it's not clear what value there is in an encyclopedia copying huge lists of specs out of vendor PDFs into standalone pages. Merging the less banal content to Advanced Vector Extensions would be a start. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 08:11, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

The thing is that it is a separate technology from old AVX1/2. And it is not detailed enough to be a technical reference, it is only listing new features not a complete set. Compare with SSE3, SSSE3, SSE4 and XOP articles for similar subject matter but for smaller instruction set extensions.Carewolf (talk) 08:24, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

There are different ways to list features. The very worst way to do so is to individually list every single new instruction along with its description in the manual, which is what the article does. Nobody who needs to look up this information for a practical purpose is going to start with Wikipedia rather than the vendor documentation, and nobody who isn't looking for implementation material is going to read it in the first place. Contrast with the SSE2 article, which does a good job of explaining the purpose and features of the extension without resorting to literally printing out the names and purposes of all 144 instructions it adds. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 09:51, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

The SSE2 article is old and the odd man out, some of its instructions had their own articles, see MOVAPD. I think however wrote it, skipped them in the main article to make them their own, but never completed it. I could move the list of instructions out to other articles, but keep the meat of what can be done with them?Carewolf (talk) 10:37, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

What actual value does listing each individual instruction provide? It's boring technical detail. Imagine if we had articles on aircraft which explained what all the switches in the cockpit did - that's the sort of level this lies at. I don't think people would generally bat an eyelid if they were just removed, and the article stripped back to cover the same areas as the SSE2 article. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 10:48, 4 September 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure what kind of entertainment you are expecting from an article on a processor instruction set. AVX-512 follows the structure of similar articles on SSE, SSE3/SSSE3 and AVX/AVX2, as well as XOP/FMA/F16C which all have a brief description of new instruction. AVX-512 additionally has a list of supported mnemonics from previous instruction sets that can be encoded with the EVEX prefix - this is important because desktop CPUs will have extensions that essentially update earlier SSE/FMA/MMX instructions. SSE2 article on the other hand is simply useless - no description of new instructions, their encoding scheme, no some real-world examples, just some general boring blah-blah that could be found elsewhere, i.e. SIMD and Instruction set architecture. Dmitry _{(talk•contibs)} 21:02, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

The same kind of "entertainment" present in other encyclopedias: well-written general-purpose information which examines a subject from a real-world perspective rather than being an unedited content-dump for technical manuals. The SSE2 article is the only one of this set which pays the remotest heed to this, by happy accident. I'd sooner see all of its peers reduced to the same level of information and build back up than try to explain piecemeal to people who think that Wikipedia is an appropriate day-job opcode reference why this isn't a good idea. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 23:00, 20 September 2017 (UTC)

Can you help me with a six years old issue?

Hi, Thumperward!

I have some troubles with lack of documentation of an old deleted template, Fix bunching. At the time of the deletion discussion, you seemed to be one of the people with most knowledge about it and its alternatives. I do understand that it may be harder for you to remember the details now. However, if you do or could refresh your memory, this could be a great help.

My problem is that Template:FixBunching once upon a time was copied to a Swedish variant, which is still present: sv:Mall:FixBunching. This template is used on some 80 articles, mainly about historical wars. It has no sensible categorisation, no iw-linking, and almost nothing on its talk page. It has no accompanying documentation; for the first years, there was a link to the documentation for Template:FixBunching, but some time after that was deleted, so was the link from our template, with no substitute. Just looking at how it is employed, I suspect that it was used to fix enlignment of several infobox contents, as well as providing hide/expand wrappings for some of them. Am I right?

I'd like either to document and classify our template, replace it, or delete it. I succeeded to find the deletion discussion, and see that you there refers to a talk item with the most fantastic title Template talk:Fix bunching#Universal fix has been discovered!. This sounds a bit like having found that elusive "last 8software) bug":-) but even with a more limited and context bound interpretation, I would with interest have followed the link, if the discussion had not been deleted together with the template. I suspect from the little of what you wrote that I've been able to find that indeed the enwiki template was made superfluous, either by some general software fix, or by some simple material rearrangement. I also suspect that the same would be true of its svwiki clone. However, these are just guesses.

I'd like some explanation about what the template did, and of what that ultimate fix did, and how to eliminate the template without loss of simplicity or functionality. Alternatively, if I got a copy of the deleted documentation, I might translate this to a Swedish documentation, and find an appropriate context for our template. However, if it really nowadays is unnecessary, elimination would be the optimal solution.

Do you think you can help me? JoergenB (talk) 15:52, 10 September 2017 (UTC)

Hi! The "universal fix" in question was a CSS change to common.css as discussed in https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T28449 - that's really all I know about it. Maybe applying this to sv-wp will fix the issue? Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 10:26, 11 September 2017 (UTC)

Ban evasion

Hello, I hope you don't mind but I have reverted edits made by the IP sock of a banned user. No offense intended. Cheers!   Aloha27  talk  12:15, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

I do mind, because I get email notifications every time it happens. Block the IP and move on. If you're not able to block the IP, then go and play admin elsewhere instead of spamming me please. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 12:39, 12 September 2017 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of Follow Follow (fanzine)

The article Follow Follow (fanzine) has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

Non-notable fanzine, no reliable or third party sources, fails WP:GNG.

While all constructive contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, pages may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{proposed deletion/dated}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the page to address the issues raised. Removing {{proposed deletion/dated}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. In particular, the speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. Jellyman (talk) 17:31, 11 October 2017 (UTC)

ArbCom 2017 election voter message

Hello, Thumperward. Voting in the 2017 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 10 December. All users who registered an account before Saturday, 28 October 2017, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Wednesday, 1 November 2017 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

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Open-Source Governance Flag

Hi Thumperward!

Thank you so much for your incredible and generous contributions to Wikipedia for so many years! I am currently working with a student of mine (User:Claradm) to improve the Open-source governance article and get the flag removed that I believe you placed all the way back in 2011. Do you think your flag is still relevant today, given all the edits that others have made? If so, what can we do to fix it?

Thanks so much for your help! David (talk) 01:01, 14 March 2018 (UTC)

P.S. I love the Netherlands! You're so lucky to live in such a progressive nation.

Hi David. This is the article as it was when it was tagged. A lot of the self-hosted references have been removed, and some good new secondary sources added. If you want to remove the tag then be my guest. Thanks! Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 11:11, 17 March 2018 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:Administrative law in the People's Republic of China

Template:Administrative law in the People's Republic of China has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Störm (talk) 11:29, 19 March 2018 (UTC)

Nominating cnote templates for merge

Hi! The {{cnote}} templates has been nominated for merging with the {{efn}}/{{notelist}} family of templates. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. E to the Pi times i (talk | contribs) 06:29, 31 March 2018 (UTC)

Nomination of List of fictional assimilating races for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether the article List of fictional assimilating races is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The article will be discussed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of fictional assimilating races until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the article during the discussion, including to improve the article to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the article-for-deletion notice from the top of the article. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 18:28, 8 June 2018 (UTC)

ECS

Hi!

Can you clarify, what you mean? My change lists 8 internal sources about engineering and OOP and 1 external publication from OOPSLA 1986. Did you read it? The whole ECS article is "original research" created by the Martin, by the way.

Thanks, Loyso. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Loyso b (talk • contribs) 00:07, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Adam Martin is not some random Wikipedia editor. His description of the subject is a canonical source, and has been examined by numerous other sources. You, on the other hand, have repeatedly inserted a paragraph where you attempt to unpick the subject matter through your own personal research (none of which examines Martin's work). This is neither appropriate from the perspective of Wikipedia's policy on original research, nor conducive to a well-written article (which should not contain arbitrary contradictions). Stop doing it. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) (talk) 09:19, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

ArbCom 2018 election voter message

Hello, Thumperward. Voting in the 2018 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 3 December. All users who registered an account before Sunday, 28 October 2018, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Thursday, 1 November 2018 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.

The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.

If you wish to participate in the 2018 election, please review the candidates and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:42, 19 November 2018 (UTC)