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Sound format

Can user have a look to Wikipedia talk:Sound. I'm not conviced that this change is a good thing and I don't think it has received large support. Ericd 12:15, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

User:Zarni02 has instituted a new Wikipedia policy allowing the use of WAV and MP3 sound files instead of just OGG. However he has gathered very few comments and run no polls before instituting this change. It was announced on Requests for comment. Rmhermen 12:56, Jul 16, 2004 (UTC)
In my opinion this new policy is evil. WAV is an horrible solution from a technical POV. MP3 has patent issue. From a legal POV I see it like accepting copyright violations or deciding that Wikipiedia is not GFDL.
I don't know what happened, but I never heard about the Wikipedia:Request for comments posting until it was over. (I check my Wikipedia watchlist at least 10 times a day, but never saw the edit to Wikipedia:Sound and Wikipedia that announced it. More Wikipedia technical problems?) I applaud the effort to broaden sound support on Wikipedia, though not necessarily the path taken. (I'm still reviewing that.) However, I want to point out that there are some very vocal OGG users who seem fixated on preventing WAV and MP3 files from being used by Wikipedia on specious legal grounds. There are certainly practical concerns about the size of WAV files, although the recommended WAV and MP3 filesize limit of 64KB is certainly more restrictive than the up-to-2MB files that OGG users have already uploaded. The OGG crowd routinely rejects the complaint that OGG is virtually unheard-of outside the world of open-source when compared to WAV, MP3, and other popular formats. (The software support alone for OGG — a dozen or so players and encoders and no inline browser plugins — compared to hundreds of software components for each of many other formats is an obvious argument for WAV, MP3, etc.) It seems to me that this whole dialog is confined primarily to a sizable number of existing OGG users and a few new folks looking to use a more readily-available format. The problem is that few of the latter seem to be speaking up on the issue, leaving the argument to default in favor of the OGG crowd. I think User:Zarni02's proactive, bold action is a commendable effort to bring this issue to the forefront. -- Jeff Q 23:10, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Sorry Jeff I rememberalong time ago some wikipedian arguing that it was very cool to upload copyrighted images. Yeah it was cool !. Yes, it's not cool to have to install a Direcshow filter. When your vanilla Media Player can play MP3. Yes, legal issues are annoying everyone.
Ericd 22:20, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Sorry, Ericd, but your ad hominem attack accusing me of wanting WAV and MP3 support because it's "cool" is totally unfounded on anything I've written. Unlike what your above statement implies about you, I have never uploaded any copyrighted material, and I have never in my 42 years bowed to any trend considered cool, which is more than I can say about anyone I've ever met. (Your implicit accusation is also unfounded on anything I want to upload, which I've made clear from the start — illustrative sound samples for encyclopedic topics that I create, hold the copyrights to, and license under GFDL, just like the images in my very modest gallery.) You should avoid personal attacks and try to stick to the topic at hand. You might also want to review Wiki pages on polite discourse. By the way, you might try reading the reference document you so helpfully posted on Wikipedia talk:Sound. It covers encoders and decoders only and specifically states "this license does not cover the right to distribute, broadcast and/or stream mp3 / mp3PRO encoded data". I could have provided the relevant link myself, based on information on that page, but I see no reason to help someone who has more interest in ridiculing people that making cogent and concise arguments. -- Jeff Q 23:20, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)

(moved this down) A discussion about this is now at Wikipedia_talk:Sound#MP3_on_Wikipedia, announced here, at goings on and the mailing list -- Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 02:52, 2004 Jul 17 (UTC)

Here's a few suggestions for format for a footer table, taken from Ronald Reagan:

Preceded by:
Jimmy Carter 		President of the United States
1981-1989 		Succeeded by:
George H. W. Bush
Preceded by:
Pat Brown 		Governor of California
1967-1975 		Succeeded by:
Jerry Brown
Preceded by:
Jimmy Carter 		President of the United States
1981-1989 		Succeeded by:
George H. W. Bush
Preceded by:
Pat Brown 		Governor of California
1967-1975 		Succeeded by:
Jerry Brown
  1. First line: Preceded by and Succeeded by are bold, names aren't, title isn't.
  2. Second line: Preceded by and Succeeded by are bold, names aren't, title is.
  3. Third line: Title and names are bold.
  4. Fourth line: Only names are bold.

I don't want a formal vote, just an idea from someone other than me - which of these is easiest on the eyes and most immediately readable? Thanks. --Golbez 01:41, Jul 17, 2004 (UTC)

I would say 2 is the most legible. - SimonP 05:18, Jul 17, 2004 (UTC)
Second is gentler on the eyes. Ocon | Talk 05:19, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Yeah, I thought that would work - it doesn't bold the links (which for some reason just looks wrong to me :P) and it keeps all the bolds on the same level. --Golbez 05:33, Jul 17, 2004 (UTC)
The third form is how they're normally done, on many thousands of pages (e.g., Winston Churchill, Tony Blair, &c.). James F. (talk) 10:08, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I wouldn't say *thousands*, and they are presently done by the first form on many other pages, though I don't know if it's thousands. Even ones I haven't edited. I don't plan to change the format of existing tables, unless I'm making other changes/fixes to the table. This was mostly for new things. Incidentally, the page that first started me on this, George W. Bush, uses style 1. So... I didn't ask how it's normally done, I asked which method was easiest to look at and use. Just because a way is how it's been done so far on Wikipedia doesn't mean it needs to be. That's a major point of Wikipedia. --Golbez 23:45, Jul 17, 2004 (UTC)
OK, rephrase: It's used on thousands of articles (the peerage articles, the British and Irish offices, and so on) because it's the most sensible to use: the things you are interested in, and so are highlighted in bold, are the office, the predecessor, and the successor. This is why you should use 3. I also think 3 looks best. Happy now? ;-)
James F. (talk) 14:44, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Quite; but the verdict at present is running 2-1 against you. ;) I'll continue pondering this. --Golbez 19:31, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)

Bug reporting

Would it be possible to request a page somewhere in the Wikipedia: namespace where bugs can be reported? The instructions at the top of this page lead to one page, which leads to another, which leads to another, and the instructions for reporting are about as clear as mud. Would it be too much to ask for either a page here where suspected bugs can be reported, or clearer instructions on how to do it? I don't have access to IRC by the way so that's not an option either. -- Graham ☺ | Talk 22:50, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

The problem with this is that problem reports really belong in the Meta, not in the English Wikipedia. Few if any of the problems are specific to English Wikipedia. Having said that, it's a reasonable request, because many Wikipedians don't have Meta signons.
MediaWiki software problems belong on Sourceforge. There are two reasons that this isn't an adequate problem management strategy in the long term. Firstly, many genuine problems aren't with the MediaWiki software at all, but with things like skins, database corruption, SQUID configuration or the like. Secondly, Sourceforge is a bit daunting for first time users.
But anywhere on the Wikipedia site, be it in the Meta or the English Wikipedia, is a poor solution for two reasons. Firstly, the very time it's most important to have the problem management site available is the time that the WIkipedia site is having troubles and may not be usable. Secondly, even if the site is usable, the added stress of logging the problems is exactly what we don't want when the site is under stress already.
As an interim solution, I'd strongly support an English Wikipedia project namespace page. We would need to have a team dedicated to doing first level problem determination of problems raised on this page, and raising the problems on the Meta or on Sourceforge as appropriate, for it to work. To do this we'd also need to design the system so that a minimum of cleaning up and reporting back was necessary. It will only be possible to attract these people if the system is good enough that it saves them more time than it takes, a reasonable ask surely. For reporting back, normally only a link would be required. People without Meta signons and without Sourceforge experience can easily read pages there if they are provided with proper hyperlinks.
Long term, we need to think of something a bit more strategic. Andrewa 00:42, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The only place that developers are guaranteed to find bug reports is at sourceforge. The bug tracker has a box where you can type in the problem. Add your username or email in the box as well so they can contact you for further details if necessary. You don't need to get an account or log in to do this. Just type in the box! That's all. A lot of people are scared of it, but it really is that easy. If you absolutely don't want to use Sourceforge, there is a page of bugs at m:bugs (the full page title is m:MediaWiki feature request and bug report discussion). There is a separate page for bugs that you think might be related specifically to the new release of the software at m:MediaWiki 1.3 comments and bug reports. However, these two Meta pages total 345 MB, so the pages are very difficult to edit, and quite unlikely to be read. Bugs reported only on the village pump are increasingly likely to be ignored as the page is archived every few days and such reports are just removed. Bugs reported in the Wikipedia namespace will lead to pages that are too large for many users to edit, as shown by pages such as m:bugs. If you think it is possible to use a wiki page for this, try looking at those pages on meta - it clearly isn't working. I can't see why it would work any better on this site than it does on meta. Angela. 00:47, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Thank you for the sourceforge link for reporting bugs; is this link actually listed anywhere in the 'pedia? I think it needs to be made more obviously available. -- Graham ☺ | Talk 01:02, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Yes, it's at Wikipedia:Bug reports, which used to be linked from the sidebar. Maybe it should be put back again? Angela. 01:11, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I thought of a nice idea to encourage users to browse through the Wikipedia pages:

A small contest, that requires users to 'click' through subjects to get from one subject to another, with the least possible stages.

For instance:

Get from: Tombstone, Arizona

To:

Cassini-Huygens Mission

This is how i did it, there are possible other (shorter, funnier) ways as well...

Tombstone, Arizona -> Gunfight at the O.K. Corral -> Discovery Channel -> List of Discovery Channel programs -> The Blue Planet -> Ocean -> Titan (moon) -> Cassini-Huygens Mission

It could be possible to post a new challenge every day/month/week, and the one with the shortest route wins that contest (and ofcourse, receives enternal fame).

I did not know where to post this proposal, so i did it here. Maybe i could make an article of it, but its not really an encyclopedia article ;-)

--K-Mile 12:35, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Someone beat you to this - Wikipedia:Six degrees of Wikipedia :) Adam Bishop 13:13, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Fun game, but you can't use dates or years or it is too easy! Pcb21| Pete 15:10, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • There should be a limit at six. You know, like six degrees of Wiki. Mike H 15:12, Jul 16, 2004 (UTC)
  • 6 Degrees of Wiki is not a challenge, it is just existing links. What i had in mind was that the shortest, and most original/funniest links would be mentioned on the page. And, the 2 endpoints are set for that contest, so it's not just that you can find any link, it must be the specified one. (And back again :)) Wiki Link Contest <- I Will put it here -- K-Mile 15:38, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/Wiki Link Contest for some more rather critical discussion of this idea. Please keep discussion in the VfD subpage to the topic of whether or not the page should be deleted. Andrewa 01:02, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia logo has aliasy text

The main Wikipedia logo has the words "The Free Encyclopedia" in an italic font. These words are very ugly, being full of aliasing. It is a shame that the beautiful multilingual spherical jigsaw is spoilt by this. Can someone improve it? At this size of text, I think an upright font would come out better than an anti-aliased italic font. The italic version could still be used at large sizes or higher resolutions. Gdr 13:01, 2004 Jul 16 (UTC)

  • Hmm, it looks fine to me, however if you have a background color other than white or light grey, I can see why it might happen; the area surrounding the text is transparent, but the anti-aliasing seems to transition to white; put it on a medium-colored or dark background, and ugliness ensues. I'm not sure what could be done about that... -- Wapcaplet 01:23, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
    • If you have a need to put one on a dark background, I hacked a version for my own usage a while back. See Image:Nohat-logo-X-en-darkbg.png. My user page has an image of it in use against a dark gray background. -- Cyrius|✎ 02:04, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I made the logo. It's anti-aliased. The problem is that IE doesn't support anti-aliased transparency in PNGs so the anti-aliasing is hard-rendered on a white background which doesn't look good if the actual background isn't white, which in the new skin it isn't. . If IE properly rendered PNGs this wouldn't be a problem and we could use the version with anti-aliased transparency and the logo would look good on any background (except, perhaps, black). My original suggestion was to put the logo inside a box with a 2-pixel border ([:meta:[Image:Nohat-logo-XI-en.png]]), but this idea was ignored, and wouldn't work well with the current skin. The benefit of putting the logo in a box with a white background is the anti-aliasing of the text will look good in any browser. I don't like how the new skin floats the logo over a non-white background. It should be on a white background. Nohat 03:30, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I'm looking at the logo in Safari, so not affected by the IE bugs. I agree that the logo looks better on a white background, but it still looks aliased to me, especially the capital letters. I can see now that it is anti-aliased, but at this small size anti-aliasing isn't very effective. Hence my suggestion to use an upright font. Gdr 14:22, 2004 Jul 19 (UTC)

I've checked the logo in the GIMP and it also shows a white fringe around the text. Also, here's what the logo looks like with a black background in Mozilla Firefox. The image has areas of 100% opacity, and areas of 0% opacity; there's nothing in between. I'm fairly certain that Firefox correctly supports PNG transparency, and I know the GIMP does. Don't mind me. I don't know how to read. -- Wapcaplet 19:40, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wikistats inaccurate?

Wikistats indicate that the number of new articles per day is rapidly decreasing, from about 600 a day a few days ago to 258 per day in July (as of July 14) [1]. I have some doubts whether this is accurate. Clicking on Special:Newpages shows that there are 750 new pages in last 24 hours and 4878 pages created in last 7 days (4878/7=698 per day) which is a lot more than 258 per day. Could this be a bug? Andris 10:30, Jul 16, 2004 (UTC)

Please see the Wikipedia growth since February 2004 greatly slowed thread on Wikien-l which is discussing whether the stats are right. Jimbo's response says "there are significant problems with the averages due to some missing data". Angela. 11:23, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"List of topics" pages

There seem to be a number of these, for instance, List of gay-related topics. Should they be merged into categories? —Ashley Y 08:01, 2004 Jul 16 (UTC)

No. Categories have their place, lists have their place. Sometimes they overlap, and both can still be useful. Ambivalenthysteria 08:35, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
See also Category:Lists that should be categories and Category:Lists. --ssd 08:09, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I think most lists should not become categories. It's specifically "lists of topics" that I think are good candidates for becoming categories.—Ashley Y 20:33, 2004 Jul 17 (UTC)

Penrose triangle

For some reason the image displayed at Penrose triangle is missing the bottom line of the triangle. If you actually click on the image it is fine, it is just being displayed wrong in the article. In case this is browser specific, I'm using IE 6 right now. --Pascal666 07:08, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

It shows fine here with Mozilla 1.7. andy 07:27, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
That's my image. I get the same problem in IE, and it is a bug in the browser. It should be able to be fixed using explicit markup, but a workaround is to add a white row to the bottom of the image. Derrick Coetzee 07:43, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I get this too. I think it should be fixed. We don't seem to have a policy on browser support, but if a sizeable number of users see Wikipedia looking silly, IMO we should just fix it. Andrewa 00:23, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Looks to me like an off-by-one-pixel error, since the image had no margin. I've added some margin, and while I was at it added color and reduced the file size by 65% to boot. -- Wapcaplet 01:59, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Summarised sections

Getting (More?) Academics Involved

I'm vaguely thinking of starting a project to encourage academics to contribute to Wikipedia (via university e-mail and poster campaigns perhaps). Although Wikipedia is certainly an excellent resource, it is still greatly lacking compared to subject specific encyclopedias (The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy is one I have had personal experience with). Academics have had years of experience explaining their subject areas to those with little prior knowledge and many have already contributed to other encyclopedias. It seems to me there are two factors stopping them from contributing: 1) ignorance of Wikipedia 2) technical barriers. My thought is that if we could set up a kind of "middle ground" between the willing academics and Wikipedia we could leave them to do what they're good at (writing about their subject using a format and media they're used to) while Wiki-volunteers take what they give them and beat it into a format appropriate for Wikipedia. I'm conscious of the fact that someone has almost certainly already had this idea, and that asking for help from people "with names" so to speak may seem anti-thetical to the Wiki spirit. Thus all comments/suggestions/flames are welcomed. Cfp 10:39, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Although you'll find that some academics already help out here, I think this is a good idea. Another thing we could try to do is contacting subject encyclopedias and asking them whether they'd be willing to add their stuff or licence it under the GFDL... .Kokiri 12:22, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC).

Most academics probably don't have the time to contribute, or wouldn't want to because they might see it as a waste of time. On the other hand, it's worth a try. If nothing else we might get a lot more students. Exploding Boy 12:27, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)

Before starting a campaign, perhaps there should also be efforts to better engage the academics already working on Wikipedia. 172 16:39, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I can think of at least two more reasons many academics may be reluctant to contribute to Wikipedia. First, I believe that authorship credentials are quite important in the necessary pursuit of tenure and reputation, and Wikipedia doesn't lend itself to the fixed, reproducible text with established authors that formal publications do. (As Wikipedia grows, however, I'm hoping that contributions to it will become more "respectable" in this environment.) Second, the relative loose and open contribution structure of Wikipedia, compared to professional journals, could be seen as "lowering the standards" of an academic's contributions. Such a wild and wooly information creation environment would probably seem too chaotic to be worth one's investment in time and effort. Again, I am hoping that Wikipedia's reputation, based on an ever-increasing utility and accuracy, will reduce this potential stigma over time. For now, we should anticipate such concerns by presenting solid reasons for such contributions despite them. -- Jeff Q 18:12, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
We need to help empower the academics already working on Wikipedia. An editorial review board headed by academics, for example, may help raise standards and guide other editors. 172 18:24, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The writing of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography started being written about 10 years ago (its out in September 2004 I might add. They obtained writers by circulating higher education and also specialist groups, and in the end attracted about 10,000 contributors world-wide. But not all these are 'academics' but all have expertise in the subject matter. Surely that is what matters for Wikipedia. There will be independent scholars and retired scholars, neither of whom are 'academics' in the sense I think is meant in this discussion.
How do we attract than class of writer other than by word of mouth and by existing Wikipedians undertaking networking? Maybe we might attract new Wikipedians by placing letters and articles in journals we are involved with. What about printing out articles we have written and sending them to colleagues for comment or information, and then explaining how easy it all is to achieve? The Wiki system is streaks better than trying to get esoteric stuff published through the normal print media, with very long delays between submission and publication, and minute print runs. Writings can reach a far wider audience than the usual run of journal article, especially now that search engines like Google are in the act. Apwoolrich 18:46, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

It's probably a waste of time to get academics involved here, and unnecessary.

They need to publish papers under their own name in peer-reviewed publications. It's the only way they can continue in their careers. Whereas, we here toil anonymously, a little bit like the cathedral builders in the Middle Ages.

Academics aren't needed for most encyclopedia articles, which are just a very brief and broad overview at a level aimed at the intelligent layman reader, the sort of thing that someone with an undergraduate degree could write.

And there are a lot of people out there with undergraduate degrees or even PhDs who did not choose a career in academia, who probably make up the bulk of the contributors here. The Internet is a great equalizer, everyone has access to a wealth of reference material that at one time could only be accessible to someone with the resources of a university library.

Where the academics could really make a major contribution would be in the sister project Wikibooks. Free textbooks would be wonderful.

-- Curps 22:35, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

A few replies: I like the idea of getting academics involved at the editorial level, particularly due to the minimal technical skills this would require (it could be done exclusively through Talk pages). My thought behind particularly targeting academics to contribute is the teaching and communications skills they have of necessity picked up and I suppose this equally applies to "retired scholars". Certainly there are other specialists who it would be good to atract to Wikipedia, but there are none quite so easily reachable as active academics. Perhaps what is needed is a Wikipedia Advocacy Group (good initials at least...) I think it's worth checking out The Budapest Open Access Initiative to see the direction journals will hopefully progress in. Wiki's will never replace the traditional system of peer reviewed journals, and I don't think they should hope to. Wikipedia's strength (it seems to me) is as a comprehensive education resource, rather than a repository of the cutting-edge and often controversial material found in journals. As to whether we need academics, I genuinely believe we do. Yes for an article on why the sun rises and sets only undergrads are needed, but for articles making subtle distinctions between almost identical positions, greater experience and knowledge is necessary. It's unlikely that there are any undergrads capable of writing articles on the use of C* algebras in quantum mechanics or somesuch. REP (mentioned above) is exclusively written by fairly big name philosophers, and is an astounding size. I promise Routeldge wouldn't have been wasting their pennies on them if they didn't think they were strictly necessary. A final point is that academics are not some alien selfish species which is incapable of doing anything unless it's going to help get their department another star next time ratings come around; I'm sure many if not most contributors to Wikipedia have full time jobs, academics just happen to have the right knowledge and skills to make them ideal Wikipedia contributors. cfp 23:20, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

There are two good reasons why most serious academics won't get involved with Wikipedia: (1) there is no quality control and no way of ensuring that one's work is not tampered with by idiots, and (2) there is a strong prejudice at Wikipedia against anyone who has expert knowledge or professional training. If anyone says, "Um, I know that 2 and 2 makes 4 because I am a professor of mathematics," they are imediately dismissed as an arrogant elitist who is "arguing from authority." Very few academics will put up with this. Adam 12:13, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

As long as we're all agreed that this attitude (2) in the Wikipedia community is counter-productive, perhaps there is still hope for progress. (Another thing is that on my original plan academics would be partially insulated from the community, they would submit their article as a word doc say to some Wiki-volunteer, who would then be in charge of incorporating it - and doing any harangueing with the Wiki-community in order to do this.) I'll report back on this page if I meet with any success after my trial campaign around my uni (or possibly just a few departments from it) next academic term. cfp 15:46, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I think this is a famously bad idea. No academic worth her salt is going to submit a document -- it takes time to write something up, even if you've got encyclopaedic knowledge on the subject, and they would have to write something up as they couldn't submit something they'd already written -- to some random stranger who goes by silly nickname and allow that person to then be responsible for incorporating it into the text of a preexisting article. The approach to take is the hobby approach. Put it this way: academics study what they do because deep down they love it. Most of us who contribute extensively to articles on particular topics do so for the same reasons. We just might find the odd academic who has the inclination to spend some of their free time working on articles in their areas of expertise as a bit of fun, just because they love that subject matter. Unless we have articles specialist-authored or -reviewed and then locked (from editing) to the general public we're not going to get these types of people contributing seriously or under their real names. Exploding Boy 15:58, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
As one of the academics here (I don't contribute under my real name), I don't exclusively write articles in my areas of expertise. What keeps me contributing is the opportunity to work outside my primary areas of research for a change. I'm under the impression that that's true of some of the others too. 172 16:13, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I take your point Exploding Boy, my hope was merely to provide a way for those academics who have enough problems coping with e-mail to contribute. Obviously locking articles is completely anti-thetical to the wiki idea, and in line with this, we've got to encourage academics to contribute with no expectation of their content being treated any differently from that created by a high school student. That is to say, they will be judged by the same standards and further modified in line with these standards. However as the academics' articles will usually be better than those of the high school student, they will tend to be better treated by the community. I totally agree that we should encourage them to "take the hobby approach". Marginally shielding those who wish to be shielded from the technological knitty gritty just enables them to get on with what they enjoy (writing about their subject) rather than grappling with the finer points of wiki conventions. TBH I do not quite understand the scale of your gripe. (As for academics working outside their field, obviously the more the merrier, however once an academic steps outside their field obviously they lose much of what distinguishes them from everyone else - it is academics working in their field Wikipedia particularly needs.) cfp 20:16, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wanting to Start a Category

I would like to start a Category. First there are no directions anywhere on how one starts a category. I put a new Category and it shows up in red. I can't firgure out how to make it blue. Second I found directions at mediwiki but there is nothing about starting a new name category. Third, For the Classics for topics like that of Ancient Rome and Ancient Greece. I know they have a category already but "Classics" needs their own category and ancient Greece and Ancient Rome need to be sub-categories for this one. And what should it be named "Classics", "Classical", "Classical Dept." (my choice), "Western Classics", ...??? If I am a classical scholar and want to go to all subjects dealing with the Classics what should be the category name?WHEELER 22:47, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Put in the [[category:types of shoe]] kind of thing which will give you the red thing at the top. All the articles in the category should be listed there. Then enter some text and a categorisation for that e.g. [[category:human]], which will appear at the top right, and since you've created the new category, it should then appear blue. Don't be shy to have a fiddle round; you can always nominate them for speedy deletion if you cock it up. Dunc_Harris|☺ 00:08, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

It still appears red. I added [Category:Human] to vice and I have added Category:Vice to the Human category and it still appears red. So I am still not doing something right. I also added a sentence in it and it still appears red.WHEELER 18:48, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Darwin -- Wedgwood family

This is a general request for help with biographies of members of this family; I've bitten off much more than I can chew. I have made several new stubs. These are linked on the page above. Happy editing. Dunc_Harris|☺ 18:43, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Since you started it, you probably know a great deal about it. (not discouraging others to take part). My tip, take your time. Don't think you'll have to finish these articles all at once... what about doing one a week? -- Kokiri 07:40, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

One a week takes about six months, and I don't fancy doing the artists much. I have a to do list if anyone wants a look:

view the to do list

The following is a list that needs to be done (please cross out if you have helped me!)

  • Erasmus Galton I have seen some info on - only minorly notable, however.

New articles

Aside from articles that deserve speedy deletion, why do people waste their time (and ours) on articles that have only one line? Surely, other than defining, say, a city or town, shouldn't there be more content if they are going to create the article? Please help me, I'm getting annoyed.--naryathegreat 17:21, Jul 19, 2004 (UTC)

I don't see a one-line stub as a waste of time; that's more than was there before. Have faith, eventually they'll improve. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 19:51, 2004 Jul 19 (UTC)
It is if it is no more than a dicdef, for something that does not belong in a dictionary (a company name for instance). And I don't feel that they improve, they stay the same line forever. And if you're going to create an article, be ready to put some effort into it right then and there.--naryathegreat 21:37, Jul 19, 2004 (UTC)
Forever is a long time especially on a wiki! I've seen loads of one line articles improve over time. theresa knott 21:47, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)
See: Wikipedia:Perfect stub article and m:Kill the Stub Pages. -- Kokiri 07:42, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
A stub will be seen and improved, a missing article is less likely to be created if you, the person who sees the need, fails to create it. So better create a stub than leave a gap. Bmills 07:40, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

A {{PAGENAME}} variable with escapes

I just now found it necessary if some other ways of formatting the current page name were available, to facilitate their placement on links, for example. One could replace all spaces with "%20"; and another could replace all spaces with underscores. [[User:Poccil|Peter O. (Talk)]] 16:21, Jul 19, 2004 (UTC)

You mean like localurl? {{localurl:Brian O'Ryan}} -> /wiki/Brian_O%27Ryan -- Tim Starling 00:53, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)
Not really. {{PAGENAME}} returns Village pump/Archive AL for this article. I'd like to see alternatives that escape it into Village%20pump so that spaces won't be misparsed when I'm doing external links in URLs. [[User:Poccil|Peter O. (Talk)]] 02:08, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)
Yes, e.g. to make http://www.google.com/search?q=%22Michael%20Jackson%22 on page Michael Jackson conveniently, using a template which uses this new variable. And similar in connection with searching or creating a new article., etc. Patrick 01:55, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)


Do you have to link to Google? They rank our pages very low these days, usually below the mirrors. Yahoo is much better. And Yahoo takes a regular XML dump of the Wikipedia database, allowing them to stay more up to date with the site with less crawler traffic. Click on Special:Randompage, and do a search for the title in Google and Yahoo, and compare the results. I'm not saying that makes a difference for the Michael Jackson search, just that I think we should retaliate by not supporting them. -- Tim Starling 02:23, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)
Boggle... It seems, to put it mildly, mad to try to "retaliate" against Google because of poor page rankings. Is it Wikipedia policy to try to ignore the most popular search engine and hope it goes away? Wouldn't it be better to try to get them to take the XML dump, and to work with them to improve the page ranking? -- Avaragado 10:18, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Retaliation works for me ;) -- Tim Starling 14:25, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)
To return to my request... [[User:Poccil|Peter O. (Talk)]] 04:54, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
To return to my original question... [[User:Poccil|Peter O. (Talk)]] 04:54, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
Okay, back to my request. I'm wondering if someone will do something so that Wikipedia will support a new variable for escaping the current page name sometime soon. [[User:Poccil|Peter O. (Talk)]] 02:37, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)

Scrolling "Welcome" in status bar

(Sorry in advance if this is redundant/posted in the wrong section - I couldn't see any relavent spot at the top of Village_pump)

Is this scrolling text really necessary? I find the movement incredibly distracting when I'm trying to read articles. It occurs on the en.wikipedia site, which is almost exclusively English - why the need for different languages? Why those particular seven rather than every known language? I know I shouldn't complain as mostly a simple user of Wikipedia, but I find it much worse than the red begging box, which has thankfully been changed.

I've never seen any scrolling text on Wikipedia before. As for other languages, I don't quite understand. Could you rephrase that please? Johnleemk | Talk 15:25, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Profuse Apologies, it seems to have magically stopped now. I presume this was most likely a bug in my browser (Firefox) that maybe picked it up from a previous site I had visited. Unless it is something to do with cookies and first visits?. Again, sorry about that, I got a little too enthusiastic I think.

Yes, if you have multiple tabs open, any marquee text in the status bar caused by one of the tabs will also display in the others. They will hopefully deal with this bug soon. — Chameleon My page/My talk 17:05, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia Community

Does anyone think Wikipedia (and its sister projects) could benefit from some features focusing on keeping the WP community a community? At the moment it's all geared towards writing a great Wikipedia. I just thought that adding a bit of community could make Wikipedia a bit more attractive... Any thoughts? --Kokiri 11:30, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Sure, I've wondered about it. But I'm not sure exactly how to pull it off. As a wiki programmer I often have to don my amateur sociologist hat. Wikis are predominantly a social phenomenon, and you have to understand that changes to the software can have wide reaching effects on the community. Sunir Shah (who I often talk to on this issue) is of the opinion that developers should code the simplest thing that could possibly work, and should avoid "playing God". By contrast I'm committed to keeping everyone happy by whatever means are available to me.
There's two things that come to my mind when I think of community. The first is friendship. Friendship comes through regular association over an extended period of time. When I was just editing Wikipedia, I found that occasional user talk page comments alone weren't enough to form strong social relationships. IRC is much better, as it provides for regular social interaction even when there is no article-related issue to talk about. However in my (possibly atypical) experience, the lack of emotional cues can lead to all sorts of anxious speculation about people's feelings towards you. Misunderstandings are frequent, and I think they can lead to the formation of negative impressions. So what do we really need? Voice conferences, video conferences and real life meetings, I guess. But IRC is better than nothing.
The second thing that comes to mind is identity. We need to feel that we are part of something. This already happens to some extent. I've speculated about things like team games, but I'm not sure how much that would help. Perhaps we should form small groups of people with common interests, and promote cohesiveness within each of them by encouraging regular high-bandwidth communication, like IRC banter or voice.
Practically what does this mean? I guess it might help to implement a gateway to an IRC-like forum which is not only accessible from most web browsers, but is also closely integrated with MediaWiki. Perhaps a chat room could be plonked into a talk page like a template, say {{chat:vfd}} to include a java applet accessing a chat room about VFD. -- Tim Starling 15:06, Jul 19, 2004 (UTC)
IMHO, we do not need community features. For one thing, they will overwhelm everything else; our treasured, overworked developers will be badgered to tweak echo-box software so we can talk to ourselves, rather than badgered to improve the wikipedia. For another, a sense of community already exists, growing out of improving the encyclopedia. That makes the community awkward and hard for newbies and non-transparent, but it also makes it genuine and long-lasting. The Internet is full of "communities" but wikipedia is unique. If we concentrate on the work, the community follows. - DavidWBrooks 20:05, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)
It's certainly true that the community on Wikipedia arose spontaneously when lots of people come together with the common goal of writing an encyclopedia. I agree that it would be wrong to concentrate on "community" features to the exclusion of all else, a sense of community will persist regardless. However the reasons Wikipedia is successful are social (to use the term broadly). Wikipedia is not perfect in social terms, it has well-known problems. I can't really talk about them openly on the pump because the discussion would get heated. Suffice to say that I don't believe discussing features to improve the Wikipedia community should be taboo. Let's brainstorm now and worry about how much time developers have later. -- Tim Starling 04:01, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)
I wasn't thinking of a great deal of features, but maybe something to make newcomers a bit more welcome, make them feel a bit more part of the Wikipedia community. One disadvantage, imho, of Wikipedia is that it is so big... Maybe we should have smaller communities, or maybe what I suggest is more projects (these can be understood as communities). It's about bringing people together and thus stay. --Kokiri 07:33, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

New project: writing captions

Hi, folks, please take a look at the new Wikipedia:WikiProject Writing Captions - your comments will be much appreciated, as will be your participation. -- ke4roh 04:24, Jul 19, 2004 (UTC)

Missing sources for images

Wikipedians have produced many maps, diagrams, graphs and figures available under the GFDL. But just having the image isn't quite enough, because it's hard to edit a diagram unless you have the sources that were used to make it. All you can really do with the image is scribble over the top.

(A real example: I noticed a couple of missing ships on User:Gsl's excellent map at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Battle_of_Aboukir_Bay.png. With access to the GIMP source for the image, I could have added the ships myself. But lacking the source, instead I asked Gsl to improve it.)

So I think that Wikipedia should encourage illustrators to upload their sources along with the image. Of course, not every contributor will be able to use the GIMP, or Adobe Illustrator, or 3D Studio Max or whatever. But having the source will mean that several people can work on an image, and there is a chance to continue to make improvements to the image when the original illustrator is busy or away. Gdr 13:01, 2004 Jul 16 (UTC)

  • I second this request. I try to upload the source (wether .psd, source code of some sort, etc) along with pictures. It is sometimes problematic, when the source is a lot larger than the image, but I think it is worth it. David Remahl 16:00, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • Thirded! I started something like this for maps: Wikipedia:WikiProject Maps/Source materials. We could definitely use a nice repository for all sorts of source material, though. One definite problem: Many source materials will be significantly larger than our 2MB upload limit; my automobile diagram model is verging on 4MB, for instance. A lot of SVG or similar stuff could be ZIPped to under 2MB, though. -- Wapcaplet 01:38, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I have created a new page for listing image source files: Wikipedia:Image source files. Please improve as needed, and link to it from appropriate places. -- Wapcaplet 03:07, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

That's a good start, but I don't think it will scale. The best thing to do would be to put a notice on each image page explaining where to find the sources for that image. To help people do this, the Wikipedia software at Special:Upload should prompt you to upload sources with each image. Gdr 11:02, 2004 Jul 21 (UTC)

Agreed, the ideal place to link them is from the image description page. It is likely to become unwieldy once there are a lot more sources, but we can deal with that when it happens. Having a list like this is helpful in the (relatively few) cases where a source file doesn't seem to have a corresponding image; one in particular is Image:USA CountiesSVG.zip, which is somewhat general-purpose and could be the basis for a variety of images, while not itself being very useful for illustration. I suspect there may be some designers (particularly in the area of map-making) who are seeking a particular kind of source file to base their illustrations on. Maybe one day that page will just become a list of "raw materials" from which to work, rather than collecting every Photoshop or SVG file we upload. I don't know if prompting uploaders for a source file is the best idea; most of the time, one will not be available, and it may confuse people who don't have one. -- Wapcaplet 16:19, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Bot work request

If at all possible, can someone who runs a registered bot set this bot to work on the Wikipedia, to remove not-necessary entities and replace them? Especially items like é are encoded as &eacute;, which is completely unnecessary as é is in ISO-8859-1, and a lot easier to edit. The same applies to the other accented letters such as á, ó, è etc. Anárion 23:10, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Agree strongly; it is a real pity to have to work around &amp entities when I can just plug my Danish keyboard in and type Å Ø Æ etc :). I am still fishing a lot of these non-standard English characters out of Norse mythological related entries, 3 years on. Sjc
The "problem" is that Wikipedia is geared up to cope with all users, not just clever chaps like you who can swap keyboards with insouciant ease. Some people access Wikipedia, and indeed the entire Internet, from public facilities where they are not allowed to change any settings. Some people would click on en edit link like I just did and those interesting characters you so easily rattle off with a single keystroke are instantaneously replaced with garbage—some browsers are kind enough to use a question mark, some are not. The system is designed to cater to the lowest common denominator and until some dead-certain cast-iron system can be put in place to allow everybody to work the same, that's the way it should stay. In actual fact, my humble opinion is that the editing interface should intercept all characters with an equivalent HTML entity and replace them with the appropriate entity to avoid just the kind of problem to which I alluded earlier. Maybe the editing toolbar could be augmented to allow entry of HTML entities? HTH HAND --Phil | Talk 13:41, Jul 19, 2004 (UTC)
Hear hear! Wikipedia is for readers too, not just editors. And for people with only one keyboard type available to them. Bmills 13:47, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)
It should be noted that in all operating systems i've come across you can remap your keyboard so that you dont need to buy a new one for each langauge, you should check out this neat new technology. -- Ævar Arnfjörð Bjarmason 02:03, 2004 Jul 20 (UTC)
Err, what is the point of using ISO-8859-1 if you are not even supporting characters in ISO-8859-1? Any browser which cannot display á etc. will not be able to display &aacute; either, and it is a bitch to edit -- using the normal US International keyboard (not obscure language editions!). I'm not asking for full Unicode here, but for characters which over 99,9% of all PCs can display! The "some browsers" mentioned must be Netscape 4 and MSIE 4... browsers which were old years ago and which nobody uses anymore. Anárion 14:22, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I'd like to stress Anárion's point here, in case it's not absolutely clear. He (she?) is not saying "f*** people who can't see my special characters!" but rather he's saying that characters that do not need to be escaped as, for example, &eacute; (because they are fully supported by the current encoding) should be simply be entered as é. This would not affect the display on anyone's computer — it would only make the source code easier to read.
People who don't know how to enter such characters directly with the keyboard can continue using HTML entities, but such entities would then be automatically converted to the appropriate character.
Now, here is my suggestion. I don't think this should be done with bots. Already, I've noticed that certain characters that I enter directly into the source are automatically converted to entities. For example, if I input a Greek character such as Δ and then hit "Show preview", I find it has been automatically converted to &#916;. This is not a bot; it's how the software works. It determines that Δ is not supported by the encoding and makes the necessary conversion to make sure all browsers can display it. It would surely be easy to make conversions work the other way too; that it to say, if I enter é as &eacute;, the software should detect that this character requires no escape code, and should convert it to a simple é. Don't you think? I think the geeks should get onto this. What is the official procedure for suggesting software tweaks anyway? — Chameleon My page/My talk 10:20, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Thank you for clarifying my point :) Anárion 10:25, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Sorry, you seem to have misunderstood my point. There are many examples in Wikipedia articles where a user has edited with a non-compliant browser which has broken the extended characters. If these characters had been entered using HTML entities, which are expressed in ASCII, this would not have occurred. Desperately trying to recall any specific examples, now ... Granted this is becoming less likely, and is hopefully only likely to happen with the more "outlandish" extended characters, but the idea is to impose a system which always works, not one which works fine unless someone happens to edit Wikipedia with BrokenBrowser™ 1.3.4 which turns each é character into a ☮. HTH HAND --Phil | Talk 11:03, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)

áéíóú

àèìòù

äëïöü

最@ñ

?????

ç? 80.58.36.239 13:09, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

That anonymous user there was me in the fabulous Netscape® Communicator 4.8, which I've just downloaded in order to see what the fuss with backward compatibility is.
Findings: this entire website was virtually unusable, with overlapping text everywhere — a total mess. Practically the only thing that did display fine was those accentuated characters you see above! Those question marks are Greek letters I tried to input directly. Greek doesn't seem to be supported at all, not even with entities. Since Greek ("outlandish") characters which are entered using a compliant browser are converted by the Wiki software into entities, Netscape — although it cannot display them — does not screw them up in the code. This also applies to Chinese characters, amongst others.
In conclusion, I think you're worrying about nothing, Phil. — Chameleon My page/My talk 13:28, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Regarding keyboard and entering special characters: on Windows, just open the Language Bar preferences and add some languages. You will then be able to use the bar to change the keymap. I recommend the Spanish keyboard layout; it makes it easy to type most European languages. For the slightly more adventurous, it is possible to create one's own keymap. Just download the Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator from Big Bad Bill and make your keyboard input any symbol you like. I personally have created my own keyboard based on the UK and Spanish ones, with extra key combinations for things like "Œœ" (oe ligature), "、" (Chinese list comma), "¥" (Yen or Yuan symbol) and "—" (em dash). (Unfortunately I have to use entities instead of typing in these em dashes because the Wiki software doesn't convert them to entities, and Microsoft-produced dashes won't display properly on all computers). I haven't worked out how to do this on SuSE Linux 9.0 yet. — Chameleon My page/My talk 13:49, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The ‘US International’ keyboard allows one to type almost all European chars: '+a is á for example. The MSKLC is really cool. Anárion 14:00, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I support any effort to make Wikipedia friendly to translation and multiple browswers. I can't quite follow the discussion but I noticed the reference to ISO-8859-1. I am sure you guys are already aware of it, but ISO-8859-15 ('Latin 9')is available and contains the euro character.
Bobblewik 09:20, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

And with the exception of some extremely obscure characters ISO-8859-15 is identical to ISO-8859-1. Of course the right thing to do would be to move to Unicode (which is identical to ISO-8859-1 in the first 256 codepoints as far as character encoding on the web is concerned). The point of this discussion is mainly an outcry against the overescaping of entities where not needed. Anárion 09:41, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Single issue userids Nevillecampbell and Delsoares

User:Nevillecampbell and User:Delsoares both seem to have been created for the sole purpose of posting unencyclopedic material to Wikipedia. What's the procedure for dealing with this? Andrewa 20:36, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

This is covered by "Wikipedia is not a free wiki host", "Wikipedia is not a soapbox", and "Wikipedia entries are not advocacy, personal essays, or vehicles for personal pomotion". What Wikipedia is not lists several options, with VfD being the most applicable. -- Cyrius|✎ 21:02, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I agree. Lisitng them on VfD is probably the proper thing to do. RickK 21:03, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)
Thanks for the comment. But perhaps I didn't make myself clear. It's not just the user pages, it's the whole userid. Both these userids have posted the material in question to Talk:Main Page where it has been reverted. They've also put it on both their user pages and their user talk pages. They have made no other contributions.
Listing these four pages for deletion is certainly a valid step, but I wondered whether there was anything I should consider instead or as well. Andrewa 10:07, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Possible copyvio?

Galant VR4 contains the line, "The ff. is from Mitsubishi Motors Motorsports Museum (http://www.mitsubishi-motors.com/corporate/museum/motorsports/e/index.html)". Not sure what ff. means. Following? Anyway, since it said this is from another site, but I can't *find* it on the other site, what's the proper procedure? I didn't set {copyvio} since the page already seems to admit that it's a copyvio, but it may not be, since the info could simply refer to the list. I can't find any mention on the Mitsubishi site of much that's in the article, except maybe race results. Any ideas? --Golbez 10:39, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)

  • Thanks for pointing that out Golbez, the info was copied from: [2]. I removed the blatant copyright infringement. -- Solitude 10:44, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • Don't forget that {copyvio} is for possible copyright infringements. You can use that mark to start the process and start a discussion going: it's an indictment, not a verdict. -- Jmabel 18:04, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)
Thanks for pointing that out; I'll keep that in mind. --Golbez 19:30, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)
    • {{copyvio}} is the full thing. (I'm sure thats what Jmabel meant, I just want to clarify for anyone who has not used it before. —siroχo 18:58, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)

Image bug or what?

Image:Radovan.jpg shows an image which is most definitely NOT an image I uploaded; yet there is no upload history. What could have happened? Nikola 07:51, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

CTRL+F5 is your friend. Use it whenever you see the wrong picture. Derrick Coetzee 08:41, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
No, that's not it. The wrong image is still there, without any upload history. Seems to be a software bug... Nikola 21:47, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Whitespace randomly appearing and disappearing

Maybe my browser just acts funny, but I keep seeing whitespace appear and disappear over the course of days and hours on various different articles. Sometimes the Main Page has large gaps above and below the introductory text toward the top. Other times, it's a regular gap of one line. Is somebody twiddling a bit on the server code somewhere that is causing this? It's just weird and makes me think I'm going crazy sometimes... —Mulad 02:38, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I'm getting this too, with IE6. --Golbez 04:53, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)
I see it with Safari for OSX. Ocon | Talk 05:05, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Seen it on Firefox .9 on Linux —siroχo 06:25, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)
Yep, me too (using Firefox, both Windows and Linux) Dori | Talk 12:59, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)
Happens in Opera 6 too, on seemingly random pages, around tables usually. TPK 09:33, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Foundation website

This is just a reminder that various members of the board, Wikimedia officials and anyone else interested in the Wikimedia Foundation website will be meeting in the #wikimedia IRC channel today (Saturday 24th) at 21:00 UTC to discuss various aspects of the site. Please see m:Foundation website meeting, July 2004 for details. For those who can't be present, a full log will be posted on Meta tomorrow. Angela. 09:15, Jul 24, 2004 (UTC)

New Request for Comment.

I have filed a request for comment aganist VeryVerily. You may wish to take a look. Neutrality 04:54, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

AFL dot com spaming

http://www.conigliofamily.com/AFLdotcom.htm

I think people who are associatied this website are using Wikipedia to promote their group. I just removed a para from the NFL which seems to be continously put back into the article. That para appears on this group website as a quote of what others are saying about the AFL. Basically implying that some neutral 3rd party thinks the AFL was so much better than the NFL.

Now I realize we are only talking about a couple of football leagues and not some hugely more important issue but spam is spam Smith03 13:56, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

New Request for Comment

I have filed a new request for comment. You may wish to take a look. Neutrality 04:54, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

List of XXX necessary?

since the new namespace "Category" in introduced, are the "list of XXX" pages still necessary? --Yacht (talk) 16:09, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)

Political Color Coding?

On the article for the US Senate Republicans are represented by red and Democrats by Blue. At the last presidential election, the map states being changed as votes came in shown on News bulletins followed this convention on some networks, but on others GOP was blue and Democrats were Red. The latter were predominantly BBC, SKY i.e. British whereas FOX and I think CNN i.e. Ameirican followed the former convention. In Britain Blue and Red are synonomous with Conservative and Labour; or right and left so perhaps that is the reason this method was used instead. Whilst as a non American I am likely to assume that Red for GOP and Blue for Dems is correct IS IT? or were the NEWS channels just selecting one colour for each for the sake of illustration which could just as easily been stripes and polkadots? Dainamo 15:54, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Yes, in U.S. red for Republicans and blue for Democrats has become traditional. Accordingly, the center of the country is often called the "red states". No idea why nor when this was first adopted. Do we have an article discussing that? -- Jmabel 17:03, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)
There's Red state and Blue state, but I'm not sure they discuss the origin. Talk to an older political junkie than me. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 18:02, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)


Goes back to the 19th century I beleive Smith03 18:03, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I seriously doubt that. My personal recollection is that the red state/blue state stuff started fairly recently. (I had originally said "the 1980s" but see below Dpbsmith 20:08, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)). In particular, the colors used are always a sort of pastel salmon red and deep sky blue, whereas traditional campaign color schemes of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s always used the brightest of primary colors... Also, during the 1950s and early 1960s I can't imagine that any political party would have allowed itself to be associated with any shade of red or pink. (That's no joke, I'm not kidding. Those were the days when schools stopped using the term "social studies" because even the word "social" seemed dangerous). Dpbsmith 19:58, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Google Groups search on "red state" "blue state" , sorted in chronological order, from 12 May 1981 through 25 July 2001—that is, all USENET posting containing both of the exact phrases "red state" and "blue state" shows 9 hits total. Two irrelevant hits in 1995 and 1999. First one in sense of "Republican" and "Democrat" is Nov. 23, 2000. Searching from 25 July 2001 through today, in contrast, yields 238 hits. Here's a link to the search: [3] Dpbsmith 20:08, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Erronous information

On the page located at: http://www.fact-index.com/b/br/bristol_centaurus.html, it says:

"Other piston engines of this size were developed by both Pratt and Whitney and Wright, but neither could be considered as successful during the war."

This is a foolish and incorrect statement. The B-17, B-24, and B29 were all powered by Wright radial engines. The P-47 Thunderbolt, F4U Corsair, F6F Hellcat, B-26 Marauder, and A-26 Invader were all powered by Pratt & Whitney Radials. These engines, especially the Pratt & Whitney, were highly successful during WWII, flying hundreds of thousands of combat sorites. The Centaraurus on the other hand, which the article implies was successful, NEVER SAW A SINGLE COMBAT SORTIE IN WWII!

Wade (RG_Lunatic@cox.net)

Need to know Tongan words translated to English

I have a gentleman that only speaks tongan and I need some general works written in Tongan and english for my staff and i to use. Could some one help. Example: Meal time Ride Bathroom Shower Shave Change your clothes join us for walk join us for music here is your medicine here is a snack ie cookie, banana, follow me please lets go now how our you today any one that could hep translate so I can put on flashcards in Tongan and English wouldbe greatly appreciated my E mail me at hcstoney @juno.com july26,04 Thanks

Same old stories

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Need to know Tongan words translated to English

(Moved to Reference Desk)

Duke University

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duke_University The "Duke University" entry is not displaying properly.

It looks fine to me. Could you be more specific? [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 17:29, 2004 Jul 28 (UTC)

Boston meetup

There will be a Wikipedian meetup in Boston this Saturday. Sign up if you plan to attend. Dori | Talk 16:52, Jul 28, 2004 (UTC) (Who unfortunately cannot)

Renaming files

Can image files be renamed after they are uploaded?Justin Foote 00:12, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Not currently. They will have to be reuploaded at the new name, and the old file will have to be deleted. Dori | Talk 00:36, Jul 24, 2004 (UTC)
The procedure for non-admins is to upload the image with the correct name, change all liks to th new image, and list the old image on Wikipedia:Images for deletion, mentioning the reason and the new image. An admin will delete the image in time -- Chris 73 | Talk 02:23, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Arbitration Committee elections

Jimbo has proposed that two new people be elected to the Arbitration Committee. Please see Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections July 2004 for a draft page about how this will take place. The page is based on Jimbo's mailing list post and is not yet finalized. Angela. 23:01, Jul 23, 2004 (UTC)

Is there any easily understandable reason why the "What links here" links are in only slightly alphabetical order? -- Picapica 19:41, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

The links are in temporal order, the one added most recently at the bottom. Both alphabetical and temporal ordering has its uses, and IIRC when it was switched to alphabetical once there were several users asking for the old ordering. andy 20:36, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
If I remember correctly, the temporal order was due to a bug, which was interpreted as a feature :) Dori | Talk 22:30, Jul 23, 2004 (UTC)
When the link tables are rebuilt, they are done so by going alphabetically through all the articles, so rebuilds end up with alphabetically ordered lists. However, adding a link subsequently causes it to be added to the end (unavoidable without a re-write of how the database works, AFAICT), and so occur in temporal order.
HTH.
James F. (talk) 00:21, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Just to say "many thanks, andy, Dori, and James F." - not only understandable answers, but supplied in alphabetical order of respondents too! -- Picapica 21:24, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Why are the Wikistats pages so far behind?

I noticed that the English Statistics page lists 297,000 pages, but the Special:Statistics page lists 310,000 articles. Any idea why are they different? The wikistats seem to be lagging by over three weeks. Jrincayc 13:24, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

The statistics are generated from the most recent dump. This may be up to a week old. They cannot be done in real time, and running the stat scripts loads the server quite a bit. That's my understanding at least. Dori | Talk 22:28, Jul 23, 2004 (UTC)
It is even worse than that. For example, English passed 300,000 on July 7, and yet as of today, July 25, the wikistats is now saying that there are 292,000 articles based on the July 24 dump. That can't be right. Are the English dumps farther behind than other dumps? Jrincayc 22:40, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Headbutting

Do we have an article about headbutting anywhere? I thought we did but can't find one, maybe it was deleted? Thx. Pcb21| Pete 08:15, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

The closest thing I could find was Scottish kiss. -- Popsracer 13:33, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Alexa

Alexa has a feature where you can put your logo into an alexa toolbar and distribute it to visitors on your site. Perhaps we should try it? Ilyanep (Talk) 21:12, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Can you provide a link to the feature so we can see what it does exactly? [[User:Mike Storm|Mike Storm (Talk)]] 00:25, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I think it refers to the Alexa toolbar. I personally dislike 3rd-party toolbars, and as I don't use Internet Explorer but Firefox, it probably doesn't even work. -- Solitude 10:22, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Yeah its an IE thing. Pcb21| Pete 10:36, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Maybe someone could make up a Wikipedia skin for Mozilla? Although I am rather attached to my "Vorkosigan Comconsole" :-) --Phil | Talk 13:47, Jul 23, 2004 (UTC)
Second of all, a wp skin for Mozilla would so totally rock!
First of all, I use Mozilla, not IE. Second of all, it has a feature where you can add you logo into an alexa toolbar and distribute it, it's something like Alexa associates or something.

Etiquette for Dealing with Troublemakers

An anonymous contributor (69.194.239.250) edited User:Trebor1990 and added quite some useless and unwanted junk. Does Wikipedia have certain etiquette for dealing with such problems? --Trebor

Sure - see Wikipedia:Dealing with vandalism. Just revert the change, then put a warning on the talk page for that IP. If it is persistent you can list it on Wikipedia:Vandalism in progress, but usually an admin quite quickly will ban that IP then. andy 19:17, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Just remove it when you notice it, on your user page or any other. If it becomes repeated vandalism then treat it like any other vandalism. Jamesday 19:20, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How to revert a page after vandalism

I noticed vandalism on Highland Park, Texas. I often see people reverting pages but I do not know how this is done. Feel free to revert it. For the future, please can somebody tell me how I can revert a page myself?
Bobblewik 11:07, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Go to History for the page. open the last unvandalised version (by clicking the time and date link for it) and save. Bmills 11:11, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Many thanks. I have learnt something useful.
Bobblewik 13:16, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:How to revert a page to an earlier version for all the do's and don'ts of reversion. - 11:18, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC) Lee (talk)

Ooh. I have just read lots of great advice and tips there. Thanks.
Bobblewik 13:16, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Fixing an accidental page move

When trying to rename Yabloko Russian Democratic Party to simply Yabloko (in keeping with the most-common-name rule), I cut-and-pasted "Yabloko" into the destination box, but somehow also pasted "To help support Wikipedia, please visit our fundraising page, or read about how we use the money" at the same time. I haven't any idea how that occured, but the article is now called To help support Wikipedia, please visit our fundraising page, or read about how we use the money. Yabloko. Could an admin please fix this? (And is there somewhere better to ask this sort of thing? Simply picking a random admin from the list and hoping that they're around seems a bit ... inefficient?) Thanks. -- Vardion 09:50, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

fixed. Bmills 09:56, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Thanks. -- Vardion 10:00, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The talk page is still at the location with the fundraising request in the title. Lucky Wizard 02:09, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

New language sister project

Where would people suggest I look for helpful information on how to start a sister project in a new language? A clear step-by-step guide in English would be fanstastic, if one exists. (I am specifically interested in setting up a new-language version of WikiSource, and I posted a query there as well, but I know there are tons of extremely knowledgeable here.) It would be great if anyone could refer me to such a guide or other helpful materials.Dovi 04:27, Jul 22, 2004 (UTC)

Have a look at m:How to start a new Wikipedia? Although it is aimed at creating a Wikipedia, a lot of the information there will apply to a new Wikisource as well. If the Wikisource you want to create is a language that already has a Wikipedia, you should be able to create it very easily using the "create wiki" button that appears when you go to the correct URL. Currently, Wikisource has some DNS issues, so you might not be able to get to it, but once it is back, go to an address such as http://ro.wikisource.org/ or whatever language you want to create, and click "create wiki". The language will added to a queue and created within a day or so. The first thing you'll want to do is make sure you have the right namespaces (Wikisource instead of Wikipedia). Then you can begin creating your Main Page and advertising it at the sister projects (Wikipedia, Wiktionary etc) in the same language to encourage new users. Angela. 18:40, Jul 22, 2004 (UTC)
Thanks very much! Assuming that DNS means "domain namespace" or something along those lines, can anyone suggest to read about those issues?Dovi 03:52, Jul 23, 2004 (UTC)
Actually you can't create new Wikisources yet. The remaining single-wiki projects are meta, sep11 and wikisource. Wikipedia, Wiktionary, Wikibooks and Wikiquote have multiple wikis. If there's support, I can convert Wikisource to a multi-subdomain project too. -- Tim Starling 07:33, Jul 23, 2004 (UTC)
I really can't comment on that since I'm a newcomer over there. But maybe you can help with this question: On those projects that do have domains and are written right-to-left, such as the Hebrew and Arabic Wikipedias, how is it done? In other words, is there currently a way for me to make Hebrew pages on WikiSource appear and load text from right-to-left?Dovi 08:24, Jul 23, 2004 (UTC)

Should we ban JPEG images?

Those who want to ban MP3 sound (Wikipedia talk:Sound) from wikipedia might be interested in the Forgent patent affecting JPEG images which is in today's news. [4] So far Sony has signed a license and an unnamed other company has paid US$15 million for one. After moving to ban the world's music format, should the world's photo format should be next? Japan and the US are the major countries which allow these patents. Should we instead refuse to deliver MP3 and JPEG content to viewers in Japan, to pressure users there to get their laws changed? That's the approach copyleft takes: make a large set of resources available, but only let you use them if you agree to the terms, so applying pressure to change your license. Jamesday 01:44, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I doubt the volume of users in Japan is enough to result in a law change. I would also hold off until a case goes to court and we have a finding - there is a lot of discussion about whether their patent can be enforced. --inks 02:24, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Japanese use is pretty high. US use is even higher (the US is the other country with software patents). However, I don't think we should ban any world standard format until there's a nearly universally used replacement. Jamesday 19:16, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The MP3 format is different, there is no JPEG alternative that i am aware of, this roally suchs though and i hope for a free image formats soon. -- var Arnfjr Bjarmason 03:35, 2004 Jul 23 (UTC)
Yes, the case is different. However, PNGs can be used for the same content as JPEGs, and are lossless. It's just a pity they result in larger file sizes. — Chameleon My page/My talk 03:57, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
PNG's are not comparable, they're a lossless compression format. -- var Arnfjr Bjarmason 04:56, 2004 Jul 23 (UTC)
PNGs are a replacement for GIFs, as they are truecolour and lossless. There is no widespread alternative for JPEG. Anrion 08:14, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
What is it about PNGs (or any other image file type, for that matter?) that makes them not an alternative for JPEGs? Lucky Wizard 02:09, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)
umm, this was not today's news - the article is from July 19, 2002. and if you read it up to the end you'll notice that the patent in question expires in 2006. regards, High on a tree 01:38, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I don't think Forgent has a legal leg to stand on; I don't think their claims to the JPEG patent would hold up in a serious court case. Forgent is just a case of slime abusing the legal system. Samboy 01:13, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Mediation Committee: New members needed

sannse, co-chair of the Mediation Committee, has just written on the mailing list that she believes the committee could do with expansion to help ensure requests are answered as quickly as possible. Please see How does one become the member of the committee? and nominate yourself there if you are interested in playing a part in the dispute resolution process. Angela. 22:20, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Has anyone else noticed that "From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia." now appears in black under the title of each page above the main text? Also does the "edit this page" link at the top of the page look bold to you? (I'm using MonoBook, btw) —siroχo 17:38, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

The emboldening of the "edit this page" was suggested by Angela, spent the customary week without objections, and was then implemented, on MediaWiki:Monobook.css and its talk page. The re-instatement of the by-line was, I think, a technical fix to it being missing (it was there beforehand).
HTH.
James F. (talk) 19:00, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The reasons for the change, and the method to remove the bold text, are explained at MediaWiki talk:Monobook.css. Angela. 22:20, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

I still don't see why we can't have an edit this page link at the bottom of the page, where is where most people are (particularly in Talk pages) when they decide they want to edit. Adam 09:28, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Just set your preferences so that double-clicking the page takes you to edit mode. Then you can edit from whereever you are on the page. Bmills 09:36, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
You can add the links at the bottom yourself using your custom javascript and css pages. See m:User styles/bottom tabs for instructions. Angela. 18:43, Jul 22, 2004 (UTC)

http://www.wikibooks.org gives GoDaddy holding page (fixed!)

Discovered something terrible when I typed in www.wikibooks.org . Some moron has forgotten to pay for the domain name and now it's for sale. Oh, no please admins or whoever is responsible for this. Get this domain back! I just wanted to add my first contribution in wikibooks but that's impossible now. By the way, I made sure to check whether I typed the right domain, but the link on the main page links to the same domain. If the domain is bought by someone else that's really a disaster. Please do something, whoever is responsible for this! Thanks a lot in advance. Laudaka

Works fine for me. Tried misspellings wikbooks.org, wkibooks.org, both are non-existent. wikibooks.com goes to the Wikimedia Foundation bookshop in German, which is odd, however. Dysprosia 14:18, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Unfortunately I get the same behaviour as the frantic anon above. www.wikibooks.org goes to a godaddy.com "Page under construction page" Pcb21| Pete 14:21, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I get the same behaviour as well. Goes to godaddy.com. Andris 14:27, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
I just tried it and I do get to the english Wikibooks main page. Looks still good to me. Awolf002 14:29, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Goes to godaddy.com for me, too. Bmills 14:32, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Me thinks it is just a temporary problem with the registrar which was used to register Wikibooks.org. When checking the WhoIs information, it still shows our User:mav as the administrative and technical contact for both wikibooks.com and wikibooks.org. And both have an expiry date of 2013, so there seems to be no need to worry, should be just a technical glitch somewhere. andy 14:36, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Random web search identifies this random posting connecting godaddy.com with a scam faking an antispyware tool. Mind you, andy is more likely to be right, methinks. - Fennec (はさばくのきつね) 14:38, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I get the english wikibook page as planned. -- Chris 73 | Talk 14:39, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I get godaddy.com. — Chameleon My page/My talk 14:41, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I get godaddy.com also. Company PC which is actively checked for viruses and spyware twice daily. Anrion 15:12, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Checking the whois record in more detail it shows that zwinger.wikimedia.org is set as the main DNS, and gunther.bomis.com as the secondary. However zwinger seems to be dead (no ping answer), maybe this explains why godaddy then returns a wrong IP from their DNS. BTW: I get godaddy as well. andy 14:44, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)


The Wikimedia servers are firewalled to block ping attacks and that also blocks normal pings. Jamesday 15:31, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
This wikitech-l posting suggests that the DNS record for wikibooks.org was changed (by us, deliberately) within the last few days, and the old details are still cached for many people (who are now apparently getting GoDaddy). By the way, the GoDaddy page doesn't say the domain is for sale, just that it's coming soon and that you could register other domains through them.--rbrwrˆ 15:10, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
There was a problem with DNS yesterday. Depending on how long your DNS server caches DNS information you'll see either wikibooks, nothing or the GoDaddy page. If you're using Windows, restarting your computer may clear a locally cached DNS result which could show you the problem for longer than most. Zwinger is fine. Its firewall is set to block ping requests. Jamesday 15:31, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I was getting the godaddy problem yesterday (21 Jul) but it is pointing at the right place now (22 Jul); I suggest other users try again? Jal 10:54, 22 Jul 2004 (BST)
On Windows, run ipconfig /flushdns to flush your DNS cache (some web browsers have their own caches and may need to be restarted). On Mac OS X, run lookupd -flushcache. Gdr 21:56, 2004 Jul 21 (UTC)
www.wikibooks.org was going to the right place before the DNS switch, and people who are reporting a working en.wikibooks.org have the updated DNS information. So perhaps the old DNS server has been recently changed to mark www.wikibooks.org unused, despite the fact that the change in DNS server has not fully propagated yet. -- Tim Starling 16:00, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

Hi, everyone. On my computer I got godaddy.com first and I get wikibooks now again, the problem seems to have been fixed. Hurray! Wikibooks is working again and I'll contribute my first page today. Paulus/laudaka (add me to your YIM/AIM/ICQ/M$N M contact list if you like!) Laudaka's talk page 14:24, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Page disappeared

An article titled Vai viegli but jaunam? which I have edited a few months ago has disappeared. Searching the database [5] returns the article among hits but clicking on the title gives the "Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this name" message. What has happened? Is there article deleted? Some software bug? Andris 12:27, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

Our mirrors still have it, so apparently it and its history were erased here for some reason. Anrion 12:35, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
If it was deleted, it's not in the archive. Bmills 12:44, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
It appears that the software strips the trailing "?". Lupo 12:52, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
A similar case was brought up on the help desk yesterday. The page can still be accessed here, though. Bit of an annoying bug really. - 13:25, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC) Lee (talk)
A month or two ago Brion fixed a glitch where articles with a ? couldn't be reached. It looks as though that glitch has returned. I'll mnention it to him. Jamesday 13:39, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Looking at the Admin section for restoring pages it says: 13:44, 21 Jul 2004 Jamesday deleted "Vai viegli but jaunam" (Correcting a bad fix for a software problem. The correct page name will be back soon. content was: '#REDIRECT Is It Easy To Be Young') and the last page was REDIRECT Is It Easy To Be Young. Guess the fix is in progress. -- Chris 73 | Talk 14:42, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Issue on Isle of Sheppey

Note Wikipedians that an external link on the wikipage Isle_of_Sheppey references an offensive, self opinionated and unsuitable website that should not be on any wikipage. Yesterday I replaced it with a more suitable link, but it has been restored, and I am not about to begin a crusade over it, but feel the community should censor it Faedra 11:40, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

See Talk:Isle of Sheppey. Anrion 13:49, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)


A new type of stub has been created: it's called a substub. Substubs are like regular stubs, only even smaller. You can read more about the difference between stubs and substubs here, or view examples of stubs vs. substubs. There is also a new substub template message; the new message is meant to replace the normal stub message, but only where, of course, an article is a substub instead of a stub. The new message looks like:

This article is a substub! If it is not expanded soon, it may be deleted.

You can use this new message by either replacing {{stub}} with {{substub}} in cases when a stub is more accurately described as a substub, or simply inserting {{substub}} at the bottom of an article. Many substubs are automatically listed on Wikipedia:Shortpages. You can discuss this new type of stub here, on the template message's talk page, or, preferably, on the substub talk page itself. -- Mike Storm 03:10, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Nice. When do we get {{subsubstub}}? ;-) Chris 73 | Talk 04:31, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
A subsubstub is any article with fewer than 14 characters including any messages. Adding {{subsubstub}} would put it over this limit; thus such a message isn't needed! :-) --gadfium 04:41, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Actually, I believe the proper boilerplate for {{subsubstub}} is {{delete}} (; —siroχo 07:28, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
{{delete}} - Yes, that's less than 14 characters, so we can use this. Now what do we write in the last 4 characters for a {{delete}} subsubstub? ;-)
"coke" (sans quotes of course) :-) Ilyanep (Talk) 20:20, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Wouldn't it be cool if the contents of a template could be overridden on a per-user basis, like we do with the style sheets and javascript. Then I could blank templates like {{stub}} and {{substub}} because I don't find them useful (I can see that it's a short article, ok!) but others who like these messages for whatever reason can still see them. Whatlinkshere etc would still work as they do now. Pcb21| Pete 07:23, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Good idea, like class='urlexpansion' for a text that may or may not be displayed.--Patrick 10:09, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I think you could get that effect by editing Template:stub, enclosing the text in <div class="template" id="stub">...</div> and then putting div.template#stub { display: none; } into your monobook.css. I didn't dare try that one out on the live Template:stub, though, but a test using Template:testing showed that it works for the display. However, Template:testing has a link to User:Lupo/temp (a test page of mine), and "What links here" on User:Lupo/temp didn't show the page I had included "{{testing}}" on, only the template itself did. Is this normal, or are some templates (e.g. Template:stub) handled differently so that the pages including the template show up on "What links here" on Wikipedia:Perfect stub article? Oh, and BTW, could some admin please delete Template:testing again? Thanks. Lupo 11:34, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Deleted Bmills 12:14, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
No, you are seeing the standard whatlinkshere behaviour for all templates. Thus I think this solution works. The only argument against it is that it complicates the wikitext when editing the template. When considering who edits template pages (experienced), I think this cost is worthwhile - obviously the talk page and an HTML comment will make clear what is happening. What do others think? Pcb21| Pete 12:11, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
These complexities can themselves be hidden in a template. See User:Pcb21/stub test and its includees. Pcb21| Pete 12:33, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Fine, then let's go for it! (Frankly said, I don't think the two-stage template solution in any simpler than just adding a <div> around the text. But I don't care very much about such a minor implementation detail, both are fine with me.) Lupo 12:41, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How about {{nanostub}}? Exploding Boy 07:44, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

Actually, if you go to Wikipedia:Shortpages, you'll see that there are no pages under 14 characters. I think the smallest right now is 46. -- Mike Storm 16:05, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

What exactly is this addition of another layer of complexity to the rules supposed to accomplish? You have a fancy new tag. Why? -- Cyrius|✎ 22:45, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I think this is really rather silly. It doesn't seem to accomplish anything useful, it's just over-categorization. —Lady Lysiŋe Ikiŋsile | Talk 22:48, 2004 Jul 21 (UTC)

First topic: The whole idea is that substubs are in extreme need of improvement. Besides, while you complain about over-categorization, hundreds of other people scoff at Wikipedia and complain about how unorganized it is. Second topic: If you support the idea of having substubs, then please list your name on the substub talk page. Third topic: I have no plan to make a subsubstub. If anyone did, I would be against it. -- Mike Storm 00:03, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Agreed. While many substubs (damn, you got me confused, I almost put subsubstub :0) may be candidates for speedy deletes, it's a very fine line. And these are the articles that need help the most (and are easiest for aspiring writers such as myself). While this may be overcategorizing, it is better than having thousands of articles @ 15 bytes Ilyanep (Talk) 20:20, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Stubs include many articles where the article is clearly incomplete but still provides much useful information about the topic. Substubs seem like stubs which really need a bit more work. Highlighting the more deserving of attention group of stubs might be useful. Jamesday 11:35, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

NOTICE: New type of stub

If you support the idea of having substubs, then please list your name here. There's also lots more discussion about Wikipedia:substubs on the talk page.

Other encyclopedias copying from wikpedia

Its one thing to encourage free use of articles, but there seem to be a lot of on line encyclopedias who are copying wiki without crediting. Even if they mention wikipeida they are lifting imcomplete articles and provide no facility to correct and sometimes have some kind of software conflict that makes the display wrong anyway, all of which make Wiki sources look less credible. What is the point of this? why don't they just link to wikipedia as a resource?. I think that the terms of free use should prevent this type of thing if this is possible. Dainamo 09:44, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Uhm, yeah, except it wouldn't be _free_ anymore. Free GNU licenses don't impose restrictions on how the material may be used, it only requires attribution and requires that derivative works are licensed in specific ways.
Many do a very rough job of taking Wikipedia's articles, but as long as they don't violate the license, that's OK. They may take partial articles and mangle them as they see fit. What kind of rules would you like to see? — David Remahl 09:49, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Er, the whole point of the GNU FDL is to make Wikipedia a free and open resource which means that anyone, (even the unscrupulous), can make use of it. The real problem imo is the fact that Google ranks these pages higher than Wikipedia's in may cases due to the prevalence of spamdexing which these unscrupulous operators rely upon. If Google's engine were better and more discrimating than this would not be an issue. Sjc 09:53, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Maybe we should get sneaky too, and do stuff to improve our page rank. — Chameleon My page/My talk 10:05, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
No black SEO tricks. Play fair. Eventually Google will reduce the effect of various tricks anyways. gracefool 03:22, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

The search engine experience is the biggest problem, I agree In so far as "Free Use" is concerned, there are already conditions such as accreditation and an idea might be to exclude unapproved presentation in an another encyclopedia. Aa religious analogy might be: Whether he approves or not God gives us freedom to do what we want, but does not permit us to to be God I know its a bit crap, but its the nearest I could think of. I am not a lawyer so I might be suggesting something that is totally impractical, but in that case there could be some mileage of a polite request to those who have some scruples. In so far as they are concerned, surely a link to wikipedia would be much easier anyway? If you can't beat them join them Dainamo 11:43, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

No, a simple link wouldn't bring them Google traffic, and then they wouldn't get money for their ads. They have no scruples. — Chameleon My page/My talk 12:47, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Maybe the time has come to shaft the scumbags at Google once and for all; I am thinking we might have a Wiki spider; I am pretty good at this sort of stuff and know quite a few people who are of a similar mind. I will go and float some of this on Usenet and see what the feeling is. There is nothing worse than searching for something and having to wade through a swamp of spamdexed bullshit. Sjc 19:43, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I have found that some of these other users don't even have an up-date version of Wikipedia. I was doing a search this morning for a topic I am curently writing about, was directed to another site and then found it was another user of Wikepedia who was not noting articles I submitted at the start of last week! I hope there is some system to have the Wikipedia at the top of the list just because it will always be the current version.Apwoolrich 10:03, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Countermeasures

I wasn't sure about something, and wanted to bring it up here. Basically, mirror versions are appearing much higher in google than we are. The explanation people give for this is that they're somehow manipulating the pagerank system. My question is not "how" (I'm not technical enough to really grasp), but rather "Could we do this too?". [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 13:44, 2004 Jul 21 (UTC)

One key way they seem to do this is by including a series of phrases such as (for an article called Stuff): "What is Stuff? Information about Stuff. Stuff definition..." — Chameleon My page/My talk 15:07, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How could we do this without putting it in the article text? [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 19:42, 2004 Jul 21 (UTC)

They often include it in the page <title>, and presumably also in the meta tags. It could also be incorporated in small text at the bottom of the article. — Chameleon My page/My talk 20:24, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
By the way, the book "Google Hacks" includes some basic SEO tips in the final chapters. (Just thought I'd mention it.) Lucky Wizard 02:09, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I read somewhere on Wikipedia that at least once someone wrote to google about a mirror having a higher rank than the real wiki, and the people at google fixed it. Not sure if this is possible for the entire wikipedia, though. -- Chris 73 | Talk 22:16, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Good idea, how about a few GOOGLEBOMBS too?
I propose we collectively draft an official letter to Google on the matter, as well as working at our end to boost our ranking to the level it deserves to be at. — Chameleon My page/My talk 10:44, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Such a thing is not unheard of; for special things, Google will give preference to certain sites over others, and these things are built in. See: UPC search, definition search. So it's not like Google would just dismiss it out of hand, and in fact, I think they might enjoy more integration. But how about WE get that integration, instead of one of the cheap ripoffs? I support this and think it should be done quickly. --Golbez 05:16, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Google has a feature that allows you to only search websites that have to do with certain subjects, like Mac, linux, U.S. Government, etc. I think that we should ask them to do a similar thing for Wikipedia. But is telling the difference between Wikipedia and a mirror really that hard? Search results that are from Wikipedia look like: ARTICLE NAME HERE - From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. [[User:Mike Storm|Mike Storm (Talk)]] 02:09, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The real problem here is that potential users of Wikipedia and thus possible long term contributors to the knowledge base are regularly diverted away from what is the real source of the information in the first place, and to which they maybe one day would otherwise contribute. However, as a follow up to my suggestion that we might think about a PD search engine to slaughter Google, it looks like the cathedral once again is out to do for the bazaar: [6] Conceptually nice, however the thing seems to be down or broken a lot at the moment. However, I think this shows that the cathedral has had enough of the antics of the bazaar and has decided to act already. Sjc 10:57, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Database download gives the technical reasons we are almost assured a low Google ranking: because we're database-bound, crawlers are restricted to one access per second. Our mirrors are typically flat HTML, so can be crawled much faster.

I suggest that there's not much point worrying about our Google ranking until we are confident we have the server power (enough Squid frontends, I would guess) to handle the traffic. Remember that the deal with Yahoo doubled our load in a week - David Gerard 10:40, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I just found my article on effeminacy on the free dictionary.com. I don't see where they referenced wikipedia nor myself. I wish I could get credit for all my hard work.WHEELER 23:58, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia is referenced at the bottom, below the stuff like "free dictionary browser". Lucky Wizard 02:09, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I would encourage everyone to submit the articles they care most about to DMOZ, the basis directory for Google and other search engines. This may eventually ameliorate some of the problems related to searchability. -- Stevietheman 17:39, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

How?

I wanna do something like this:

For some articles Ive written, for example, for Edwin Rosario. How can I do that?

Thank you and God bless you!

Sincerely yours, "Antonio Bananaramo Martin"

If you mean that you want to create a nice table, then you can check out Wikipedia:How to use tables. If you mean that you want to create a nice boilerplate template message, then you can check out Wikipedia:Template messages, or if you want to create a new one, then copy this into the address bar: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:THENAMEOFYOURMESSAGEHERE, and edit the page so that the message is how you want it to look. Then, simply copy this onto a page: {{THENAMEOFYOURMESSAGEHERE}}. -- Mike Storm 03:18, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I would really really really suggest you do not. Creating a category is a better idea (IMO). Put <tt>[[Category:categoryname]] at the bottom of the articles in question. Check there isn't already a suitable category. You can also put categories into higher categories - David Gerard 11:07, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

II, III

I don't think there's an entry in the naming conventions for this, so which is the proper format for a name with a II, III, etc, that isn't a royal name? Article in question is John H. Bankhead, II. Should it be with or without the comma? I note that "with" comma takes up the bulk of redirects to Bill Gates, but the article itself mentions him as William Henry Gates III, no comma. Any suggestions? --Golbez 02:38, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

The more common practice is not to use commas before II, III, etc. (unlike Jr. or Sr. where it's the other way around), so I would use John Smith III (but John Smith, Jr.). A redirect from the other version is always useful, of course. Gzornenplatz 03:23, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

Are Congressional Archives Copyvios?

Would it be a copyvio to use information (or copy-pastes) from http://bioguide.congress.gov/? It's a federal website, but the "copyright information" page at http://bioguide.congress.gov/copyright.htm only mentions the image; it mentions no copyright or license on the text at all. Ideas? --Golbez 01:56, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure the text of that site is an official US government publication and thus public domain. Given that it doesn't say otherwise, it's a safe assumption. Just be really careful about the images. -- Cyrius|✎ 02:08, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The text of the congressional bioguide is public domain. However, you should attribute it as a source to give credit where due. If you like, you can include {{bioguide}} in an article which adds the text:   This article incorporates public domain material from the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. older≠wiser 02:10, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Oh. Someone beat me to it. Okay. :) Thanks --Golbez 02:38, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I've been using those images; they're public domain. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 13:41, 2004 Jul 21 (UTC)
Well, I don't think they would specifically mention that "not all images are in the public domain" if that were not the case. I have not come across many that are, but in such cases, there is copyright information by the image. older≠wiser 20:32, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Hiding Text

To avoid an editing circle of well meaning, but incorrect changes and then necessary correcting that is being made on a few particular pages (due to a commonly held misunderstanding) I would like to enter an explanation text that appears in editing but does not appear on the page. How do I do this? Dainamo 23:34, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

  • You can enclose the text inside of HTML comment delimiters, like this: <!-- comment here -->. It might also be a good idea to put your comment on the article's talk page as well. -- Wapcaplet 23:58, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Or even better, explain the misunderstanding in the text of the article, so no one is tempted to "fix" it. Nohat 07:08, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
This method sometimes works, but other times it really fails. An article can lose its coherence when it is peppered with subclauses and get-outs aimed at satisfying the varying demands of writers, rather than readers. Depending on circumstances: it is often best stick to the talk page, and an HTML comment as a back up for particularly crucial items. Pcb21| Pete 07:30, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Range block

As per policy, I'm reporting here that I have blocked range 64.12.116.10/31 for 48 hours. This is probably wrong, since I really have no idea how to do it, but I used the Wikimedia calculator to try to figure it out. The user has been using IDs from 64.12.116.10 through 64.12.117.22. RickK 22:24, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)

Add 205.188.116.19/31 for 72 hours. RickK 22:38, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)

That was AOL. The block was far from effective, since it only blocked two IP addresses, and it still had the potential to drive away possible contributors. I have unblocked all of the AOL IPs. Guanaco 04:37, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
You're really good at undoing blocks and really bad at protecting the site from vandalism. You might try stopping doing one and starting doing the other. RickK 19:19, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
I think his point is that AOL owns a huge number of ip addresses, somewhere close to what used to be called a Class A address space (subnet mask 255.0.0.0), but spread out amongst multiple actual net blocks. Blocking all AOL addresses would potentially block dozens of anonymous users. - Kenwarren 19:37, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
The problem is IT DOESN'T ACTUALLY PROTECT THE SITE FROM VANDALISM. I've discovered by bitter experience it doesn't stop the vandal and does generate a flurry of aggrieved email from victims of collateral damage.
Guanaco has however been experimenting with 1-hour blocks, which switch off the vandal for that session (I think) with minimal inconvenience to legit AOL users. Hopefully he can give us his results from this approach soon - David Gerard 11:01, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

And this is bad because...? Adam 09:44, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Old features removed in new skin; Categorizing

I remember that in the old skin you could edit the article's summary with an [edit] link that always appeared at the top of the article. That link doesn't appear in the new skin and everytime I want to edit the summary of an article, I have to click the "edit this page" option which downloads the whole article instead of the summary alone. Could we get that back por favor?

What about [[Image:|thumb|center]]? It is not centering the thumbnails. :/

Could we have the images on the Image description page centered? They are now aligned to the left.. suxxors.

What the hell happened with that feature where you could specify if the image that you were uploading was public domain or not so that we didn't have to manually edit the Image description page? It fucking sucks to edit every image that I upload, that can be done with a simple form. Who was was developing that?

And, is there a way that when you categorize, the article put in the category appears as you specified it on the brackets? For example, if you list Einsten as [[Category:Scientists|Einsten, Albert]] could it be listed in the Category as Einstein, Albert instead of listing it as Albert Einsten under the E section?

—John | Talk 22:12, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Re the public domain images, you can type in {{PD}} in the summary. Lucky Wizard 02:09, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

We MUST Americani[s/z]e Wikipedia.

Why are there so many British English spellings on Wikipedia? This is unacceptable. Is Wikipedia based in England or something? The default language of the Internet is American English, as Wikipedia's should also be.

  • No, we mustn't, but thank you for playing and here are your parting gifts. RickK 21:25, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)
I disagree, because not everyone in the world is American. This encyclopedia is meant for a global audience, and that includes people from the U.S., U.K., Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Hong Kong, India, and many other places. WhisperToMe 21:28, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
British English spellings are generally used in Wikipedia articles related to the United Kingdom or for words whose British spellings are more commonly used internationally.
Wikipedia is based in Florida, but it's really an international project. The UK has no more claim to it than the US, Germany, or Suriname.
The Internet does not have a "default language". American English is most commonly used in international business and commerce (e.g. .com), but that is not a good reason to exclude British spellings from British topics. Nor would adopting American English as a standard in any way "Americanize" Wikipedia. Spanish might ;-).
Acegikmo1 21:28, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I feel this is trolling. Let's not feed this anon. — Chameleon My page/My talk 21:40, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I don't mind the english spellings. I am an American but I use English spellings all the time. American english is really the bowdlerization of Queen's English anyway.WHEELER 22:03, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia will be taken over by Australians. We are writing a script now to replace all instances of "hi" with "g'day", and to convert all IPA pronunciation guides to appropriately diphthongised versions. Jeronim and I are handling the technical aspects, and the Australian-controlled Fox Broadcasting Company will do the PR side. We have an informal alliance with the Board of Trustees and developer corps, both of which are dominated by Europeans. -- Tim Starling 03:11, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

Don't forget - vegemite will now be a regular part of every Wikipedian's diet. →Raul654 03:14, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
When my daughter was in high school she took a trip to Australia. When she came home, she brought back a jar of Vegemite, which we had never heard of, and she gave it to us saying, with a straight face, that she had discovered this delicious product and that she just loved it. My wife spread a generous portion on a cracker and bit in. You should have seen the look on her face, first of nausea, quickly followed by chagrin as my daughter cracked up laughing and my wife realized she'd been the victim of a practical joke. I believe the ingredients in Vegemite are essentially similar to those in an American product known as Preparation H, but I have no intention of tasting Preparation H to see whether my surmise about the tastes of the two products is correct. Dpbsmith 12:40, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
In keeping with the tradition of British colonialism, we will allow you to retain your dietary habits as long as you speak our language. -- Tim Starling 03:33, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
and if your food is very good (sorry that's not you America) you are welcome to send delegations to set up restaurants in Aus :-) Erich 03:54, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Waiiiiit a minute--whatever happened to the secret plans to convert the whole site to pig-Latin? Elf | Talk 04:27, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
As long as it doesn't clash with der gemanization of die Wikipedia its fine with me -- Chris 73 | Talk
Bullshit. Either it is "der Germanisierung der Wikipedia", both in genitive case, or it is "die Germanisierung der Wikipedia", with "Germanisierung" in the nominative and "Wikipedia" in the genitive case. Consider this a very mild example of German smart-assism. Swedophile 21:01, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
You are all doomed. My new language bot BeowulfBot V1.0 will soon be along to revert all unorthodox spellings of this new-fangled English to correct cwene 's Anglo-Saxon in any case. Sjc 06:21, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Noe, noe! Fye! Surelye tis ye true language of Chaucer we muste be adoptinge, for the fulle benefite of all merrie wikipedalians, wherevere they do be.
Ethay ruetray ethodmay isway igpay atinlay. Isthay iscussionday ucksay. --Golbez 07:32, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • A troll, surely. But if serious, disturbing. Don't you Americans realise (that's realiSe with an 's') that this is just the sort of cultural imperialism that the rest of the world is getting a teeny bit antsy about? Graham 06:09, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
They're antsy about trolls? - Nat Krause 12:15, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Why are there so many British English spellings idiotic trolls on Wikipedia? This is unacceptable. Is Wikipedia based in England an elementary school or something? The default language of the Internet troll is American poorly written English, as Wikipedia's should also it always has been and probably always will be. -- Jmabel 06:26, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)

  • Tasty comment. Can I monitor your opinions?--Chealer 04:28, 2004 Jul 29 (UTC)

Hahah Starling, your joke to use a script to convert all instances of Hi! to G'day is hilarious. I really ROFL'ed when I read that thanx for making me laugh. Thanks for your joke Jmabel it really made me smiley. I'm gonna make it a little better you forgot to repeat something in strikeout I believe. Hehehe, we can make the jokes better in true Wikipedia.org fashion. Now a serious reactien: It is possible it is a troll, but if it would really have been a troll he/she would have given a lot more arguments to keep us busy and to divide us. He's given so little arguments that everybody is against him. I think he/she's just naive. I've to following proposition: Having wikipedia in one more spelling gives practical problems. Everybody who has tried using a spelling checker to correct spelling of Wikipedia.org pages will know how clumsy it is that you have to find out each time whether it's Brittish English or American English spelling. Because we're against US cultural imperialism I would seriously propose to rewrite ALL of wikipedia.org in Australian English spelling. Australian spelling check is readily available in any major word processor so it shouldn't be that hard. And with this we would take a political stand AGAINST the Americanization of world culture. No about the fun again: I'm going to copy part of the messages here to Wikipedia:Bad jokes and other deleted nonsense/Funny vandalism. Starling and Jmabel your replies will fit in excellently as a reply to a possible troll.Paulus/laudaka (add me to your YIM/AIM/ICQ/M$N M contact list if you like!) Laudaka's talk page 11:58, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I have no problem with either sets of spelling, and as a Brit even think that American spellings make more sense (I think "catsup" for ketchup is a notable exception to this :)). Aside from the Chinese, the English used print pretty early on leading to the spelling of words remaining the same while the language changed (If you did Chaucer at school you will know that knight was pronounced as it was spelt). There is however one spelling diiference in American english that rises my prejudices and thats using "izes" instead of "ises". The reason is bloody BILL GATES. Set your computer to British English and the spelling checks go British in everything but "ises" and you are constantly reminded to change these on a spell check! Whinging over now that's off my chest. Dainamo

You're wrong. Firstly, Word does not force the -ize spelling. Secondly, -ize is not an Americanism. Both -ize and -ise are standard English spellings. In the UK, -ise is most commonly used by the layman, and -ize by academics. Americans only use -ize, which makes it seem like an Americanism, but it is not. -ise is a rare example of the UK using simplified spellings (usually, US variants are the simplifications, e.g. "encyclopedia" for "encyclopaedia".) — Chameleon My page/My talk 09:24, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Good point. We should have en.wikipedia.org for American English, and en.wikipaedia.org for British English. Problem solved! --Wclark 05:00, 2004 Jul 23 (UTC)
I've seen another spelling for encyclopaedia: Encyclopdia. What kind of spelling is that? [[User:Nichalp|¶ nichalp | Talk]] 20:05, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)
"Encyclopdia" is the same spelling as "encyclopaedia", but typeset with an A-E ligature. Gdr 22:50, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)

I was so sure that you were wrong about this and that the choice between ize and ise was a modern one becasue of transantlantic influences. However, I have a four volume Imperial Dictionary c. 1890s and behold: "REALIZE" and "REALIZATION". Only in my modern "Chambers" dictionary do I get a choice and in my "Websters" I naturally get "ize"s. I bow to you as I am obviously not academic enough ;) Dainamo 19:31, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Thanks, I love being right. Heheheheheh. — Chameleon My page/My talk 01:56, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Incidentally, I gdon't understand why should using an "s" be a simplification when the sound is a Z anyway? And also how do you get word to accept "ises" other than adding each word everytime it picks it up? Dainamo 19:33, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Ahah, yes, it is indeed pronounced with a /z/ sound (I'm using IPA here), but this is normal: the letter s probably represents the phoneme /z/ more often that it represents /s/ in English — the sound is certainly rarely represented by the letter z, which gets nice high Scrabble scores accordingly! What I'm saying with the "simplification" thing is that Webster spellings usually lighten the load on the brain by reducing the number of spellings to memorise/memorize. That is to say, standard English distinguishes between "licence" and "license", "check" and "cheque", "story" and "storey", and Webster's mergers of such spellings make things simpler and easier (though looking a bit dyslexic).
The "-ise" usage in the Commonwealth is the one example of Brits doing the simplifying, because, if you write "realize", "organize" etc., you have to remember that "advertise", "revise", "televise" etc. must be written with an s, but if you just use an s in all these words, you can't go wrong!
In case you hadn't realised/realized, the suffix in question is from the old Norman French -izer, from Latin -IZARE, from Greek -ιζειν. Popular Commonwealth usage has been influenced by the modern French -iser, but this has never caught on with academics and scientists. The other words are from old Norman French advertir, viser, etc. and have thus never been written with a z. By lumping together these words of completely different origin, we are being as bad as the "check"-cashing, "license"-granting Americans!
For these etymological reasons, I always used to prefer the zed in the words ultimately derived from -ιζειν, but then I got on the web and starting coming across Americans like the one who started this section, and so I began using "-ise" just to annoy them.
Ironically, due to the abovementioned rarity of the letter, a z glares at the reader from the page, leading to it being the main symbol of American spellings in people's minds, despite the fact that it is not one. My Aussie girlfriend identifies American texts as the ones that are "full of zeds", forgetting that the real Americanisms are things like "color", "gonna", "thru", "theater", "maneuver", and lexical differences.
As for MS Word, what version are you using? I believe earlier versions were erratic, but in my copy of Word 2003, I can use either of the correct spellings for -ιζειν derivatives (but only "advertise", of course). If I set the language to "English (U.S.)" — suppressing the shudder — it insists on the etymological zed. I'm not sure whether it always accepts both spellings when set to Commonwealth English, or whether it is programmed to learn from what the user most commonly types. — Chameleon My page/My talk 01:56, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Surely MS Word insists on the etymological zee... Adam Bishop 18:08, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I knew someone would say that. — Chameleon My page/My talk 21:14, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Yes my Word 2000 is fine it seems to be Word 97 that is the guilty party. Incidentally much of American English language seems quite archaic to many Brits. Aside (or is it Azide? hehe) from obvious examples such as still suing bushells and pecks, Dickensian words like attorney and words of even earlier eras like gotten, not to mention a different nick name for every coin echo what has been lost in Brit-English Dainamo.
As with any comparison of dialects, some differences are due to archaisms, and others are due to corruptions/innovations. — Chameleon My page/My talk 21:14, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I find such schisms in languages fascinating; amazing what splitting 250 years ago (and longer) can do for a language; one side may retain old terms that the other doesn't, and both sides come up with new terms for a new concept. What's the British word for attorney? --Golbez 17:53, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The legal profession in the UK is divided into two groups - barristers and solicitors. Basically, a barrister is a 'courtroom lawyer' whereas a solicitor deals with legal matters that do not usually end up in court (like deeds, real estate etc). Mark Richards 18:03, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Not to mention Scottish "advocates". — Chameleon My page/My talk 21:14, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Somewhat of out date Mark! Solicitors have directly represented clients in lower courts for decades (and I think always have exclusively in magistrates court) They are increasingly doing so in higher courts now, although the tendancy is to still appoint the specialist advocates known as Barristers who previously had exclusive rights in higher courts. Barristers are appointed by the solicitor and have no contact with the client. Dainamo 15:31, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Barristers can and do appear in magistrates' courts. Only specially licensed solicitor-advocates can appear in higher courts along with the barristers, however. -- Necrothesp 10:41, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Hm...speaking of the usage of -ize and -ise, I've read the use of -ize in a bunch of short stories written by a son of Arthur Conan Doyle and some other writer — they were Sherlock Holmes stories, but I doubt if anybody considers them part of the official canon. Regardless, the book came out in the 60s, IIRC, so either Conan Doyle's son must have been Americanised/Americanized or someone else (his co-author? The publisher?) must have had some influence on him. Johnleemk | Talk 08:41, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Well, if you read the stuff above, you'll see there is no need to suppose any American influence just because he spelt such words with a zed. Even Fowler, in his famous usage guide, advocated in favour of zed. — Chameleon Main/Talk/Images 17:18, 24 Jul 2004 (UTC)
"It's not a motorcycle, it's a chopper baby".......... (a cryptic joke for movie fans) Dainamo 15:41, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)
"Zed's dead, baby" — Chameleon Main/Talk/Images 19:14, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)
It seems obvious that this complaint comes from a xenophobic POV, but on the other hand, there's a point to be made regarding the consistent use of language. I won't suggest that all English articles have to be in American English, but it would seem that some rules need to be developed to help in deciding what form of the English language to use in particular instances. -- Stevietheman 17:11, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)
To be quite honest, it really is mostly just the US that uses the US spellings. So while I support their use on US-topic articles, and it makes sense that British/Irish/commonwealth-topic articles use the British (international) spellings, I feel that Wikipedia should actually go further than this policy, and encourage international English as the default for non-localised articles. And yes, the "pedia" thing annoys me. In other contexts (general internet usage) one can be vague, but for an encyclopaedia, it should be precise. As regards the "ize" vs "ise" thing, well, ize may be acceptable in British English use for some words - but I, like many, prefer to intentionally use "ise" to delibrately avoid americanisation! Zoney 13:27, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedians in Wikipedia

I wonder if there is any wikipedians who has an article on him-/her-self in wikipedia? (What i mean is an valid article and NOT in namespace) SYSS Mouse 16:55, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

It's generally very frowned upon (and let's face it - most wikipedians are abject nobodies, hunched in the shadows in various dim hutches, unnoticed by the world) -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 17:15, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I know of one contributor (name ommitted) who is semi-famous. Think - equivalent to a B-list actor but in a different field. An anon kept making an article on him, and he kept deleting it. I don't really know of anyone else who is deserving of an article. →Raul654 17:20, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)
Was this done without VfD? Isn't that an abuse of admin power? There are lots of semi-famous people out there who objectively would qualify for inclusion... would they all be granted the power to delete articles about themselves? -- Curps 18:59, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Well, there's Larry Sanger, though he's no longer a Wikipedian. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 18:52, 2004 Jul 20 (UTC)
There's Michael Everson aka User:Evertype — someone notable in his field who also actually contributes here. Anrion 18:55, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
There are some that I have run across. Two that I still remember Alan Cox (User:AlanCox) and Lubos Motl (User:Lumidek). Maybe not what some would term famous, but in an encyclopedic world they are. I would add that they might appreciate some privacy though, so don't go badgering them for wiki-autographs :) Dori | Talk 19:07, Jul 20, 2004 (UTC)
I know of a science fiction author, who has become a regular contributor, who also has an article. He's quite capable of naming himself here if he wishes. Mintguy (T) 20:57, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
My userpage contains my biography, cause Im famous...at wikipedia at least and to some in Phoenix for my stunts (such as jumping off the roof of my church and into the hoops court before one of my basketball team's games). I dont know..it is YOUR user page, do what you want to as long as its not illegal. "Antonio Mr. Illegality Martin" Blah blah blah (lol) AntonioMartin
Hehe, I am just wondering how long before someone gets round to creating a List of famous Wikipedians. It is only a matter of time /yawn Sjc 06:27, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Sheldon Rampton is the classic example of a decent honest Wikipedian with an article. We also have an article on Florentin Smarandache, who allegedly edited Wikipedia from 9 different user names in an attempt to promote his own work. Another alleged self-promoter is Peter Lynds. Luckily most Wikipedians are more modest. There's a certain user who claims it's purely coincidental that he has the same name, interests, abilities and country of origin as a semi-famous person with a Wikipedia article. Jimbo Wales has managed to stop us from writing an article on him, at least for the time being. We probably have quite a few academics who are as important as Smarandache but don't write an article on themselves for reasons of modesty. Nobody really seriously famous that I know of. -- Tim Starling 09:50, Jul 21, 2004 (UTC)
As everyone else is going 3rd person here, I thought I'd break the mould. I once found my name in an article as a red wikilink and I deleted it in case anyone would be foolish enough to start an article. If anyone had, I probably would have deleted it. Bmills 10:57, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I won't name them, but there's one user who was quite shocked to find an article on themselves. They work quite hard to keep their online name and real life separate. They restrained themselves from watchlisting the article ...
I am horrified to realise I may be slightly notable. Anyone creating an article will be taken out and shot - David Gerard 10:51, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
You mean other than Gerard David ;-) -- Kokiri 12:18, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)

In the news

Jacques Chirac never declared Ariel Sharon persona non grata in France. The whole thing is a misunderstanding. Please, check your info before publishing news! More details in:

[[7]].

I'm sorry, this is a French newspaper, but I think you may find the same content in an US or UK one.

--146.169.6.192 14:16, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I've changed it. A bit of a wild claim to put on the Main page, I think. Bmills 14:32, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
This misunderstanding has already lead to a vandalism on the Jaques Chirac page. Ilyanep (Talk) 15:28, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Standardising article names

In the Geography section of Tasmania, I have a small list of geographical features (both natural and man-made). Following this I have a line that reads:

See also: List of Australian islands, lakes, bridges, highways, rivers, mountains and regions.

Looks clear enough, but if this is expanded, you can see the non-standard form of naming such articles:

I was going to move, rename and split articles so that they were consistent; but thought I would bring the point up here in case there were any other preferences or ideas? I thought (feature)s of Australia like the Lakes article currently is, would be nice and simple? -- Chuq 01:47, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

For listing the features of Tasmania, I would leave out "List of" and go with what the second category is named i.e. "Lakes of Australia". Go with "Rivers of Tasmania", "Regions of Tasmania" etc. Leave out the "List of" part. Yes, and it seems the Australian part needs to be streamlined. Lots of Work ahead for you.WHEELER 13:40, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I actually hadn't considered separate articles for "Rivers of Tasmania", etc. - I have a small table of the most well known Rivers, Islands, Highways, etc. on the Tasmania article itself. It is unlikely that the smaller/lesser known ones would warrant an article, but if someone wants to write them then I'll all for it! I think most "List of X in/of Y" articles should be "X in/of Y" as the "List of" part sort of deters people from expanding the article and including prose. -- Chuq 23:29, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Naming conventions#Lists, which recommends "List of Xs". Also see Wikipedia:Lists (stand-alone lists). Personally, I would rather see the title as Xs rather than List of Xs, but that is apparently the convention at this time. older≠wiser 14:05, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

  • That convention could (and probably should) be overturned in cases like this. It gained in popularity during the "invasion of the lists" (March 2003 or thereabouts) and went a bit too far. Here having "list of" adds nothing but a sense of inelegance. Having just X also allows for the addition of prose to complete the list. To prevent duplication, redirects from the "List of" form would be appropriate. Pcb21| Pete 18:53, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
True. I can see how, eg. List of cars would be better than Cars, if it was just a list of well known cars or models of cars. -- Chuq 23:29, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • Having "List of" as part of the title tells the reader to only expect a list. Otherwise there is an expectation that the article will contain encyclopedic vs almanac info. --mav 07:59, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • Most of those articles should be "List of X", since they are nothing but lists. If there was an article entitled "Islands of Australia" giving an encyclopedic account of the islands of Australia, then it should be titled with list. I believe the naming convention is well thought out in this case. —siroχo 00:36, Jul 23, 2004 (UTC)
  • Having "List of" as part of the title tells the reader to only expect a list. By the same argument, having "List of" will also deter people from adding information other than a list. For example, "Islands of Australia" could have a separate section for Bass Strait islands. Then someone could mention the Furneaux group and mention that these islands were discovered in (whatever year). Other islands could be listed as being under control of xxx state, or having a fairly autonomous government. Eventually it could become a fully fledged article... but if it is named "List of" this will deter people. -- Chuq 01:44, 23 Jul 2004 (UTC)
  • Why we can't have both "List of Islands of Australia" listing all the islands of Australia, and an encyclopedic "Islands of Australia" article? Paul August 16:15, Jul 28, 2004 (UTC)

Summarised sections

Wikipedia as a press source

For a good laugh, see my latest addition to the Wikipedia_as_a_press_source#July_2004_.2818_articles.29 :))) Nikola 00:47, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Do we need a list of articles with "To do's" ?

In the frame of the WikiProject Science, we have started to write "To do lists" in the talk page of articles needing improvements. The goal is to give specific suggestions to make the article "Feature class", and to encourage editors to do them.

We see this as a complement of the "Pages needing attention", i.e. those in which problems are know. "To do lists" are long term, while "pages needing attention" require immediate correction. This helps keep the list of "pages needing attention" short and accelerate the corrections. See the WikiProject for more details.

Was anything like this attempted before ? Any suggestion on how to do this better ? Would it be OK to generalize the process and write a general "List of articles with To do's". Pcarbonn 18:15, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I recently started doing this on a couple of talk: pages, and I think it's a good idea. Perhaps it would be acceptable / useful to make a convention for a "zone" at the top of the talk page where this kind of summary information can be seen prominantly, rather than being buried between lengthy conversations half-way through a talk page? — Matt 23:52, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Perhaps a todo talk subpage could become standard, located at Talk:Article name/todo. Then, at the very top of the talk page, the template {{todo}} could be added (see: Template:todo). This might be a good standard way of adding a todo list to an article. —siroχo 00:58, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)

I like the idea of a template. (I have changed yours a bit). One advantage is that it makes it easy to build the list of articles with todo's using the Wikipedia search list. I have already done this for the list of accuracy disputes in Wikipedia:Accuracy dispute (it is more accurate than the previously-used "What links here" mechanism). Unfortunately, the search index is not updated in real time. Actually, I found out that it is not updated at all for the moment. Can anyone say when it will be updated again ? Pcarbonn 17:44, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I modified your new template to work under different namespaces (although it should only be used under the various talk namespaces), and have created a short draft of a policy page at Wikipedia:Todo list. This seems like it could turn out to be very useful for organizing work on big articles. (edit:) I also added a category to the template, which may or may not be necessary and useful, we can remove it if it seems better that way. —siroχo 20:54, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)
Looks great. I like the idea of the category created by the template. However, I suspect that clicking on a link in the category page will bring you to the talk page, not the talk/todo page. This would not be convenient. This is an argument to have the todo in the talk page itself (under a "To do" section) rather than in in a separate page. (The header of the todo section would be included in the template.) Pro: makes the todo list more visible by editors, and facilitates access to the todo list from the category. Con: puts constraints on how the todo list can be organised (need to use sub-sections, need to place it at the top, ...) Overall, I prefer having it in the talk page. What do you think ? Pcarbonn 11:29, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I think the ToDo list should be on the Talk page, not a subpage. If it's an extra click away, then editors are less likely to use it — it's hard enough to get people to read the Talk: pages of articles they are editing. — Matt 18:55, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I can agree with keeping the todo list on the talk page itself. We just want to encourage people to keep the todo list useful—no discussions right in the todo list, keep the todo list at the top of the page above all discussions, etc. I've modified template:todo to do the following: It still only needs to be included as {{todo}}, and the list is stored on {{NAMESPACE}}:{{PAGENAME}}/todo but In the template, i've included {{{{NAMESPACE}}:{{PAGENAME}}/todo}} which basically puts all the text of the todo page right there, like a template. I think this is a good way to do it because it will stop people from adding text in the middle of the todo list, unless they mean to edit the list specifically. It'll also keep the talk page cleaner in general, and this could save space on exceptionally long talk pages (if which there are many). The todo list is the first visible thing on the talk page, and editing it is just a single click. For an example of how it looks in action, see User talk:Siroxo/test. —siroχo 20:31, Jul 27, 2004 (UTC)
OK, that looks really good. — Matt 21:02, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Awesome ! Any reason why we do not have the [category:todo] anymore ? I think that this is a great way to build the list of article with todo's. Pcarbonn 21:08, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I must have cut it out when editing, its back now though, I'm going to start writing up Wikipedia:Todo list next. —siroχo 21:21, Jul 27, 2004 (UTC)
Some comments: 1) I've trialled this at Talk:Cryptographic hash function. Something seems to go wrong with the "Edit this" link, though for articles with spaces, so I've tweaked the Template a little. I think it works now ;-) 2) Using this system, updates to the ToDo list won't be triggered on watchlists unless the user adds the ToDo list to their watchlist. — Matt 02:05, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Looks nice. The category feature does not seem to work anymore: all the categories are empty. Probably a temporary bug. Also, your todo's are not directly clear to me, and I think that this is because a verb is missing (e.g. explain, describe, rewrite, justify, compare, check, ...) The "Todo" policy should make it clear that a todo should always begin with a verb. Pcarbonn 11:03, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Good work all around, I think this will really be useful now. Is there anywhere else we should post about this for other people to check over and start using? —siroχo 20:40, Jul 28, 2004 (UTC)

I have added it to Wikipedia:Peer review. Still, I would be bold, and launch it now. What's the risk ? If you agree, please proceed. Pcarbonn 21:40, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Summarised sections

Time to implement suggested Monobook improvements?

Mav suggested that proposals with over 75% support at MediaWiki talk:Monobook.css be implemented on 3 July. Is there a plan in place to do this? --Jiang 01:07, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Time to implement suggested Monobook improvements?

Mav suggested that proposals with at least 75% support at MediaWiki talk:Monobook.css be implemented on 3 July. Is there a plan in place to do this? --Jiang 01:07, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Same old stories

Americocentrism

Can we please finally set up a policy against Americentrism or American_exceptionalism especially where the Template:In the news and Current Events sections are concerned, as I requested earlier at the Village Pump. Asking more non-American users to edit the page is not the way to go about it - at this moment there are currently only four articles on In The News and they all relate headlines that're either only pertinent to domestic American issues or reinforce an American perspective, though only one - Lance Armstrong's win - is worth keeping in the manner it is written. There should be a clear policy stating that no more than one out of three, or two out of four articles should relate to any single country, and as for Current Events, at least one or two articles from each of the permanently inhabited continents. It is not that hard. You don't have to sacrifice reading your favourite news source. You don't have to learn a new language. If you're on the net, just navigate to the "World" section of your news site and review the general headlines or click on individual countries and you will get plenty of important news that relates to the approximately 6+ billion - 300 million people that aren't American or don't live in the US. The only effort it's going to take is intellectual and if you can spend ages copyediting and padding articles you can certainly spare a couple of minutes selecting headlines that don't universalise US news items. -- Simonides 22:32, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Of the seven hundred or so edits on current events this month, you've made exactly zero. If you want non american news in Current Events, go ahead and add it. Right now you're asking others to do something you don't care enough to do yourself. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 22:46, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Yawn. Just the kind of knee-jerk reaction I expected and already quoted above. I have been editing the In The News template from time to time, but if most users who haunt the Current Events and In the News templates are American, there will be a slant no matter what; a policy can at least help change that, while yet other sulk over their flag. -- Simonides 23:01, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Write some news stories. Show others that there's a non american world out there, that it matters, and that you're willing to help. Lead from the front. You'd have every right to complain if valid non-american stories were being deleted or discouraged, but there's absolutely no evidence that that is happening. Like everything else in the wikipedia, people will only add stuff they personally are interested in, and no policy is going to change that. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 23:16, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
All of which diverts from the issue of Americentrism which you demonstrate - no one needs to "prove" there is a world out there and that it matters, because it does whether idiots and some Wikipedia users believe it or not. Policies go a long way in determining what stays on pages regardless of the numerous POVs that clamour for attention. -- Simonides 00:00, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
"Americentrism which you demonstrate" It's such a shame I'm not American, huh? There's no evidence that the policy you suggest is needed. There's no evidence that any such deletions have occurred, or that they will ever occur. There's no evidence that POVs "clamour for attention" or will ever do so. There's no evidence that space restrictions have preempted valid stories, or ever will do so. We already have too many policies and too many rules. If you want non-american stories, write them. Oh, and please reread wikipedia's policy on personal attacks - calling me an idiot and making bigoted assumptions about my nationality and motivations only make your case weaker. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 00:18, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
You don't have to be American to demonstrate Americentrism; there's plenty of evidence to prove Americentrism - you only have to look at the Template and Events section mentioned, but of course if you don't want to see it, that's up to you; the space restrictions on the News template prevent more than three to four stories - if all four are about the US, then valid stories are obviously pre-empted; if you think "there's no evidence that POVs "clamour for attention" or will ever do so" on Wikipedia, which is bustling with POV, you're off your rocker; I don't need to write all non-American stories - several already exist - they just need more attention; having a lot of policies is not an excuse against having good policies; I didn't call you an idiot, but I did mention idiots and "some Wikipedia users" in the same line; last but not least, my case is evidently strong enough that you can only reply with side-stepping tangential nonsense. -- Simonides 00:39, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
If all they need is attention, why not give them some? As you can see, now that someone bothered to put non-US stories on ITN, they're still there (EU sanctions over Darfur, e.g.). I don't see why you didn't just add them in originally, rather than complaining here. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 00:45, 2004 Jul 27 (UTC)
I added them. And this is not the first complaint, which means it's a problem. -- Simonides 00:50, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
No, I think discussing things, even complaining about them, is okay. However, as this is a wiki, the obvious solution is to fix things you don't like yourself. But please consider that in quite a number of cases this is not possible because you just don't understand anything about the subject. I'm barging in here because I just came across a case of Americocentrism (or whatever it's called) in one of those very unlikely places, and there's no way I can fix it myself: I wanted information on Contergan and, surprise, I learned that there were no -- no -- victims of the drug in America. In spite of that, the article is mainly about a reluctant lady from the FDA who saved America. <KF> 00:58, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
The more you browse, the more of those you'll find.
It should be obvious to any disengaged user that mere dissatisfaction with an article or state of things, and personal editing when errors are noticed, is only good for the short term; but if a site has pretensions of NPOV and encyclopedia standards, and the majority of the editors have a shared POV on some articles or issues, then an innate conflict of interests exists which needs to be ironed out as much as possible through editing strictures; note the emphasis, because there is not even an effort being made to get there. I'm just reading the usual reactionary retorts, like people arguing that if poverty exists, the poor should simply make an effort to get rich, and complaining (ie reporting and requesting an examination of the issue) doesn't solve things. I had only one or two experiences with the Current Events article as a newbie. I added several international headlines that I thought others would wikify. Instead, they were simply reverted and the usual programming came back on. There was less of a struggle with In The News - I've had some success with some articles though I initially faced frequent reverts. The point is that if there is a site-wide problem, it is not about what one or two users can or should do - people should 1) acknowledge the problem 2) consider resolving it through obligatory checks. I can't even seem to bring people to (1) and it is always disappointing to come across so much intellectual resistance on Wikipedia that one usually only sees among more narrow-minded people. -- Simonides 01:18, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I just don't see what would be solved by a new policy that isn't addressed by NPOV and our other policies. Well, we can agree to disagree. Best, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 01:21, 2004 Jul 27 (UTC)
Meelar, let's not just disagree and sorry if I was a little abrasive earlier. I am requesting a policy specific to the sections so that people have a guideline when they are in doubt, or so that we can avoid having four aticles about the US and US opinions for a day or two at a stretch, or anniversaries, etc that mostly mention American celebrities or reactions to events - it's a little different from general NPOV for articles. -- Simonides 01:33, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
No problem. I don't know how a hard guideline would work (for instance, numeric quotas for ITN are, IMO, a bad idea). However, a reminder in the ITN source text or something of that nature might not be a bad thing. You can come up with some proposed wording, and then take up a vote on Template talk:In the news. Best to announce it here. I'll look it over, but I'd like to see your suggestion first. Best wishes, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 01:48, 2004 Jul 27 (UTC)
Thank you. A simple "Please make sure the same country, the actions or views of that country, or the same issue is not the focus of more than one headline, with rare exceptions." should be fine - a little vagueness offers leverage. As for Current Events, I think a numerical option is best for starters - "at least one key headline from Asia, Europe, South America, Africa, and Australasia apart from North American stories; stories relating opinions and decisions of NATO member countries on the Middle East do not count towards the quotient for Asia." -- Simonides 03:36, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Yawn. Boring. Move on to other things. This same old song is falling on unresponsive ears. RickK 04:25, Jul 27, 2004 (UTC)

Yup, sort of like your replies. -- Simonides 04:56, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

This is a perfectly valid criticism, and has been met with the typical Wikipedia/open source response, i.e. "Fix it yourself" (ignoring the fact that yes, something is broken and shouldn't be). I am not interested in editing the current events thing (unless I spot something of interest that's been missed and add it), but yet that is no reason why the entries should be Americocentric. Zoney 13:46, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Modern Library

I'm tired of seeing the Modern Library's "100 Best Novels/ Non-fiction titles" mentioned on every article related to the list. The list was a marketing gimmick and is not an award or a critical evaluation - members of the board were themselves not aware of the ranking system and Random House themselves stated (sourced at article) that the list was partly meant to boost sales of their own stocklist (further it's ethnocentric and sexist and only lists novels in English): please stop mentioning it as if it were a literary standard - it isn't. If this doesn't sound annoying to you, consider mentioning a list of Best Films Of All Time drawn up by, say, Walt Disney corp., that mostly lists Walt Disney-funded films, admittedly ones that may have been popular all around the world, on every article related to the list and other film related articles as if it were an achievement - I think we can agree such lists are somewhat irrelevant. -- Simonides 22:32, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I've been working on the Modern Library categories. Perhaps it is merely a marketing gimmick, but it's the most famous and important marketing gimmick of its type, one that is frequently referred to. And I don't think it's anymore ethnocentric than, say, the Booker Prize. Gamaliel 06:33, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Actually the Booker has already addressed charges that is too narrow, see [8] --[[User:Bodnotbod|bodnotbod ......TALKQuietly)]] 07:08, Jul 28, 2004 (UTC)
Wow, Bodnotbod, you have a lot of code after your name.
Gamaliel, I am the easiest person to convince that the Booker Prize has only incidental merit as a literary award. However, an award is what it is: it comes with clauses or a history of rigid formulaic nominations (ex. Oscars) or does not have pretensions of universal significance. The Modern Library ranking though, is an arbitrary, one-off list that does have such pretensions (while clearly failing to meet them), and yet proclaims itself a transparently commercial tactic. The voters themselves have expressed disappointment and confusion over the list. Random House isn't an institute or critical body after all, it's a business, and businesses restrict themselves to activities that ensure profit one way or another. Random House is welcome to creating and publicizing such lists, but I think we as encyclopedia editors should be cautious about slimming the line between a methodical and genuine if weak attempt to recognize achievement - ex. the AFI 100, Sight & Sound Poll, etc. - and what is essentially product placement. -- Simonides 08:04, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Are there problems with the list? No doubt. Is it a marketing gimmick? Yes, but so are the Oscars (Titanic? Please.) and the Grammys, and in their own way, the Modern Library lists are a more sincere and accurate way or recognizing genuine achievement. Have other people done it better? Sure. The AFI lists (which I have also been categorizing here) are perhaps one example, though I have plenty of problems with them too. But the core issue is: Is the list significant enough to mention on wikipedia? Given the attention and popularity of it, I say yes. The Modern Library covers the controversies and issues many people have had with these lists, as it should. Gamaliel 14:51, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Britain = United Kingdom ?

Sorry if that has already been discussed, but I couldn't find it anywhere.

I remember seeing it on other pages as well, now I came across it in the paternoster article: [[Great Britain]] being changed to [[United Kingdom|Britain]], in this particular case by a User:Bobblewik.

I think authors of articles can very well distinguish between England, Great Britain, and the United Kingdom. In the case of the paternoster text, the change is irrelevant, but in other cases it might introduce a factual error. <KF> 00:23, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Yes, this comes up a lot. Folks should be careful to use the correct term. Mark Richards 01:03, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Anyone who's interested: User_talk:KF#GB.2FUK

Weird templates

(please reply to my usertalk to reply, thanks!) Someone help, What is the point of having template:regnum and the other ones used in darwin-ridden articles? As far as I see it's pointless, "translating" latin words to english, basically obscuring the content without serving any visibly useful purpose. Enlighten me! Thanks. --grin ✎ 21:10, 2004 Jul 26 (UTC)

I endeavoured to enlighten on your talk page. Pcb21| Pete 23:23, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Categories

I want to create a new category at the bottom of a page. How do I activate a new category and what are the criteria for addition? [[User:Nichalp|¶ nichalp | Talk]] 20:38, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)

At the bottom of a page? Categories appear at the top of the entry, though you do enter them at the bottom. First check to see if an appropriate or very similar category already exists (just click on the Categories link in any article for a full list). If not, you can create the category just by adding the category link, e.g. [[Category:Large equestrian dogs]]. That's all there is to it--you've created a category. After saving the article, you can click on the category link and enter a description and some information about the category. HTH :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 20:53, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)
"Categories appear at the top of the entry"??? Since when? Mine appear at the bottom. Is this a user preference thing? older≠wiser 21:27, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Depends on the skin, the current default skin shows them at the bottom. —siroχo 21:37, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)
My bad. I am using an old skin, and they appear at the top of the article. :-S — Frecklefoot | Talk 22:57, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Publicity Committee

In response to a recent negative article in the Register, I'm proposing a publicity committee, to handle responses to negative media coverage. Basically, it ensures that we have a liason between hostile media and the community. Feel free to edit or discuss it at User:Meelar/publicity committee. Best wishes, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 16:14, 2004 Jul 26 (UTC)

Ouch. I hadn't expected anything this scathing: [9]. Swines. --bodnotbod 18:38, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)
Meh, that's what they usually do. I suggest we ignore them. They're mostly sensationalist — kinda' like the online Daily Mail. A pity, though. I love their articles. Johnleemk | Talk 12:12, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)

*Wikipedia:WikiProject Irish literature

Hi

If anyone is interested in contributing, I created *Wikipedia:WikiProject Irish literature today. The stated aim is to make Wikipedia an essential resource for anyone interested in the filed of Irish writing. Bmills 15:01, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Add references, please

A number of historical and biographical articles appear with no references to sources. This is sloppy, because it can encourage readers to only use the Wikipedia article as their source. They ought to be encouraged to look wider. If a modern source is used, adding the ISBN to it may wall cause the reader to go out and buy the book! Even if a biographical article is based on the DNB, ( most of which is out of copyright, of course) a note about it as a source may cause readers to want to consult the latest version of the biography in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, out September 2004. Apwoolrich 12:52, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Common sense on MainPage, please.

I was rather disturbed earlier today to find on the MainPage, specifically on selected anniversaries for July 26, an item about somebody being arrested for masturbation in an adult theatre in 1991. ( Please see: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Template:July_26_selected_anniversaries&oldid=4849052 .) I have removed it right away.

I think Wikipedia should adopt some policy to prohibit various taboos on the MainPage. We have many other wonderful pages to choose. Why not use a little more common sense ? While the 'naughty' pages are available to all, and I give credit to those resourceful little brats with no classes to attend during the summer and know enough about computers to find the pages, I have to say that leaving items like masturbation on the MainPage is not that appropriate. It makes us look bad, especially in the eyes of a parent.

-- PFHLai 07:07, 2004 Jul 26 (UTC)

This has actually been discussed before (to death) when Gay bathhouse was nominated as a featured article. I think the ad-hoc policy was pretty much exactly what you just said - we don't censor out content, but (for fear of censorware and alike) we shouldn't "push" it on people by putting it on the main page. The understanding is that if you go to penis, don't be surprised if you find an explicit photo; the main page is not some place you'd expect to find explicit content, so we shouldn't be putting it there. →Raul654 07:13, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)

But that article isn't explicit content. RickK 18:58, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)

And it wasn't "somebody." As I immediately suspected from the description, it was Pee Wee Herman. It made front-page news--well, perhaps it wasn't the front page, let me check. OK, not quite. The Boston Globe put it on page 8, and this is how they carried it:
PEE-WEE HERMAN ARRESTED IN FLA.
Author: Associated Press Date: 07/28/1991 Page: 8 Section: NATIONAL/FOREIGN
SARASOTA, Fla. -- Children's television star Pee-wee Herman was arrested for allegedly exposing himself inside an adult theater, authorities said yesterday. Pee-wee Herman, whose real name is Paul Reubens, was arrested Friday night after undercover detectives raided the South Trail Cinema in a sting operation, a Sarasota County Sheriff's affidavit said. Reubens, 38, was charged with exposure of a sexual organ and released from the county jail after posting a $219 bond.
I think I would say that putting the word "masturbation" on the main page was inappropriate. Indeed, it's inappropriate on the July 26 page unless someone can cite a source that phrases it that way. The Pee Wee Herman article says "allegedly exposing himself" as does the AP article, and I think that's good enough; no need to add a plausible but unsubstaniated interpretation. And I think I would agree that the events that are only page 8 news in the real world probably shouldn't be main-page material for us.
But I don't think "adopting some policy" is helpful. It's not a frequent problem and we have the watchful eyes of editors such as PFHLai to take care of it when it does arise. If we don't have common sense, no policy we write is going to give us common sense. Bye now, I'm off to change "masturbation" to "allegedly exposing himself" on the July 26 page.Dpbsmith 21:20, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I've noticed that the category links, interwiki headers, and carriage returns before the first line of visible text in an article cause extra whitespace to show up if they are placed at the top of the page. This is just a heads up request that people take a sec in their edits to move cat and interwiki links to bottom and remove any unncessessary carriage returns at top. See George W. Bush article as an example. -SV

But if the categories and interwiki links are moved to the bottom, then extra whitespace shows up at the bottom! This is a bug in mediawiki: report it and get it fixed instead of asking people to change all the articles. Gdr 22:45, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)
It's been reported already. Dysprosia 01:17, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
It's less ugly at the bottom, and putting categories and interlanguage links at the bottom is standard style. -- Cyrius|✎ 02:30, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
But for how long? if you move it to the bottom it will just slowly creep up again as people start adding new sections which will be written below the content in place, so sure, do that, but it will be back up again next week. -- var Arnfjr Bjarmason 03:09, 2004 Jul 26 (UTC)
I have never seen this happen. It'd be an issue on talk-like pages like this one, but on a regular article? -- Cyrius|✎ 03:53, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Me neither. Johnleemk | Talk 12:58, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I've discovered that if you put the Categories and Interwiki links at the bottom and fill in the blank lines with HTML comments like this:
... last line of article
<!-- Categories -->
[[Category:...]]
<!-- Interwiki links -->
[ca:...]
[gd:...]
then the blank space is usually cancelled out. I also find this aesthetically satisfying because I believe in commenting everything to heck and back :-). A slimmer stretch for justification is that if (as I sincerely hope) this meta-information is eventually explicitly separated from the main text, a bot will find it easier if said meta-information is nicely tagged. --Phil | Talk 13:05, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure what is going on with this. When I check What links here for Beaver Island, I get a long list of articles, none of which, as far as I can tell, actually link to Beaver Island. Can anyone explain why this is? This certainly makes it difficult to check if it needs disambiguating. older≠wiser 17:24, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Looks like a one-entry link table corruption on the Falkland Islands redirect. These can be easily repaired by going to the page, hitting edit, then immediately saving without changes. Now the what links here for that page shows only three links. -- Cyrius|✎ 18:12, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Thanks for advice. I just had the same problem on a different article and editing+saving without changes also helped. Andris 09:47, Jul 26, 2004 (UTC)

List of XXX necessary?

since the new namespace "Category" is introduced, are the "list of XXX" pages still necessary? --Yacht (talk) 16:09, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)

Yes, because lists work in a slightly different matter. They are not build automatically, and can thus contain more info, better formatting, etc. Dori | Talk 16:11, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)
Lists can show more than just the title of an article. They can also contain red links which people encountering can see as a challenge to create an article about. RickK 22:34, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)
I think the red links point is the crucial factor here. Bmills 15:04, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Not crucial. You can easily add red links to the category page. More important is the restriction on layout (i.e. the red links would necessarily be separate from the blue ones). Pcb21| Pete 15:14, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Which is exactly what makes it crucial to retain lists pages if you want to show red links in a sensible fashion. And it's easy to add them.
On another point, is there any way we can find out how widely used Categories are by non-editing general readers? I'm inclined to think they are not really as visible as they could be. Bmills 15:26, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Political Color Coding?

On the article for the US Senate Republicans are represented by red and Democrats by Blue. At the last presidential election, the map states being changed as votes came in shown on News bulletins followed this convention on some networks, but on others GOP was blue and Democrats were Red. The latter were predominantly BBC, SKY i.e. British whereas FOX and I think CNN i.e. Ameirican followed the former convention. In Britain Blue and Red are synonomous with Conservative and Labour; or right and left so perhaps that is the reason this method was used instead. Whilst as a non American I am likely to assume that Red for GOP and Blue for Dems is correct IS IT? or were the NEWS channels just selecting one colour for each for the sake of illustration which could just as easily been stripes and polkadots? Dainamo 15:54, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Yes, in U.S. red for Republicans and blue for Democrats has become traditional. Accordingly, the center of the country is often called the "red states". No idea why nor when this was first adopted. Do we have an article discussing that? -- Jmabel 17:03, Jul 25, 2004 (UTC)
There's Red state and Blue state, but I'm not sure they discuss the origin. Talk to an older political junkie than me. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 18:02, 2004 Jul 25 (UTC)


Goes back to the 19th century I beleive Smith03 18:03, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I seriously doubt that. My personal recollection is that the red state/blue state stuff started fairly recently. (I had originally said "the 1980s" but see below Dpbsmith 20:08, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)). In particular, the colors used are always a sort of pastel salmon red and deep sky blue, whereas traditional campaign color schemes of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s always used the brightest of primary colors... Also, during the 1950s and early 1960s I can't imagine that any political party would have allowed itself to be associated with any shade of red or pink. (That's no joke, I'm not kidding. Those were the days when schools stopped using the term "social studies" because even the word "social" seemed dangerous). Dpbsmith 19:58, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)


[[10]] well you better edit this page if you doubt what I said Smith03 02:04, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Google Groups search on "red state" "blue state" , sorted in chronological order, from 12 May 1981 through 25 July 2001—that is, all USENET posting containing both of the exact phrases "red state" and "blue state" shows 9 hits total. Two irrelevant hits in 1995 and 1999. First one in sense of "Republican" and "Democrat" is Nov. 23, 2000. Searching from 25 July 2001 through today, in contrast, yields 238 hits. Here's a link to the search: [11] Dpbsmith 20:08, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I agree with Dpbsmith. I have a recollection of seeing television coverage at least one pre-2000 election in which the states carried by the Democrat were red and the Republican wins were blue. Although I can't state the year with certainty, it sticks in mind because, as a Democrat, I remember feeling upset at an apparent bow to the Republicans' linking Jefferson's party to Communism. I think it would be more accurate to say that colors were used rather indiscriminately before 2000, but that the closeness and sharp polarization of the 2000 election resulted in extensive discussion of the state-by-state division, with the result that red for Republicans and blue for Democrats seems to have become entrenched in the popular usage. The TV networks have always used different colors as an easy and obvious way to show state-by-state wins, but I don't think I ever heard the terms "red states" and "blue states" used before 2000. By the way, in New York, candidate petitions are pink for the Republicans and pastel green for the Democrats, and have been since well before 2000. JamesMLane 19:04, 26 Jul 2004 (UTC)

In general, I'd suggest avoid using colors that may needlessly confuse an international audience, but the cited use is a graph with a clear legend indicating its color codes without implying any meaning beyond the graph. It's fine by graph standards. While it may be a bit disconcerting on first glance to a UK audience, it's not ambiguous or misleading, unless someone looking for a fight in this heated political year wants to infer something about using red for Republicans. (Sure, many Communist parties and countries favor it, but so do we in the U.S. — as one of our three patriotic colors. Besides, as an independent, I'd have better grounds to complain about having my non-affliation coded in yellow. ☺) -- Jeff Q 23:30, 25 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Jeff, as I asked the orginal question, let me clarify that there was no confusion from a clearly labeled table or map. I was just interested in the correct form according to tradition. If we are discussing a particular country, the best policy is to use their chosen designation. In the same fashion I would address a Lieutenant in the US Army "Lou-tenant" amd one in a Commonwealth country "Lef-tenant" thus adopting what is appropriate in the particular situation. Dainamo

  • In the '70s and '80s, the predominant practice was to show the Republicans are blue and the Democrats as red -- following the European tradition that the party of the Left got the color of Revolution. My first memory of the Republicans assigned red is no earlier than the 2000 election, and I recall it seemed at that time counter-intuitive and contrary to tradition. It seemed wrong. But I assume that as "Liberal" went from a term of pride to a term of opprobrium in the '80s, the connotations of Red (especially in a country that, unlike Europe, doesn't generally make much distinction between "socialist" and "communist") were such it seemed to some news organizations to be unfair to always assign that color to the Democratic Party. Given the extreme polarization during and even more so since, the 2000 elections, the (counter-intuitive) terms "red state" and "blue state" are firmly entrenched in the Zeitgeist, yet another point of similarity at which the U.S. will differ from out English-speaking relatives. -- orthogonal 12:00, 27 Jul 2004 (UTC)
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