User talk:Natalie.Desautels

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Hello, Natalie.Desautels. You have new messages at User talk:Natalie.Desautels/sandbox/Michael Laucke discography and filmography.
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Michael Laucke

Hi, Natalie -- At your suggestion, I've been reading the Michael Laucke article again. You'll see that I've made a few minor copy-edits to improve the sentences. Hope you approve. There are a few things I wanted to ask you about regarding the first two sentences in Michael Laucke#Early career:

• In 1961 Frank Angelo became Laucke's first manager. Laucke performed his first concert of atonal music in Montreal in 1965, with the Quebec Contemporary Music Society‍—‌Société de musique contemporaine du Québec (SMCQ) in French.

1) Just from a stylistic point of view, I'd like to avoid the repetition of "Laucke" so close in proximity (so near each other). I'm going to work on that, but before I do, I want to ask you something about the second sentence:

• Laucke performed his first concert of atonal music in Montreal in 1965, with the Quebec Contemporary Music Society‍—‌Société de musique contemporaine du Québec (SMCQ) in French.

This sounds like he performed his first concert of atonal music in 1965, and there were many other performances of atonal music following it. It even sounds as if atonal music is what he is known for. I'm not sure that's what you meant. If this was indeed his first performance playing the guitar, and it just happened to be a concert of atonal music, then the sentence needs to be worded differently, something like this:

• Laucke performed his first guitar concert in Montreal in 1965, a program of atonal music with the Quebec Contemporary Music Society.

Was Frank Angelo Michael Laucke's manager when he performed in Montreal in 1965? If so, perhaps:

• With Frank Angelo as his manager since 1961, Laucke performed his first guitar concert in Montreal in 1965...

or:

• In 1961 Laucke hired Frank Angelo as his first manager, four years later performing his first guitar concert... /his first concert...

Either way, you avoid using "Laucke" twice.  – Corinne (talk) 00:59, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax:

Hi Corinne, How wonderful that you were able to help with some very fine copy-edits to improve the sentences. I much appreciated these improvements, to be sure. I opted for

"With Frank Angelo as his manager since 1961, Laucke performed his first guitar concert in Montreal in 1965, a program of atonal music with the Quebec Contemporary Music Society‍—‌‍—‌Société de musique contemporaine du Québec (SMCQ) in French."

I have been wondering about the above sentence structure for some time now. The "Quebec Contemporary Music Society" is wikilinked, and has its own English page (which I contributed to). Do you feel it necessary to include "Société de musique contemporaine du Québec (SMCQ) in French", as it now stands? Wouldn't this be more appropriate on the French Wikipedia? Also, if one does keep the original French name for this society, do we really have to tell readers that it is "in French". My feeling is that we should just go with Quebec Contemporary Music Society‍. Again, my gratitude for your attractive edits. warm regards, Natalie --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 07:14, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi, Natalie -- I'm glad to help. Regarding the French name of the music group, I've usually seen the name given first in the language of the country (in italics), followed by the translation in English – in parentheses, regular font. However, since Canada is, I believe, officially a bilingual country, I suppose either title could go first, with the other in parentheses following it, but no "in French". Since it is, after all, Quebec, my preference is for French first, followed by English in parentheses.  – Corinne (talk) 14:14, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi Corinne Thanks so much for this sound advice, now implemented as "French first, followed by English in parentheses" . I also wiki-linked the French name to redirect to the French Wikipedia. best wishes, Natalie --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 23:05, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax and Pdebee:

Hi Corinne, It's me again with two questions. A) What are your thoughts on this sentence, taken from the Transcriptions section; my changes are in bold. "SOCAN lists 112 classical works transcribed for the guitar by Laucke, thus further broadening the guitar's repertoire in music of the renaissance, classical and romantic eras, as well as in flamenco." It seems awkward to me. B) I elaborated more briefly, as appropriate, on transcriptions in the lead section as followsː "Laucke is credited with having broadened the repertoire of the guitar with over 100 transcriptions of classical and flamenco music." ...mon immense gratitude, Natalie --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 00:19, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

La deuxième phrase, du lead, est parfaite, mais il y a des problèmes avec la première phrase. Il paraît que les mots "thus further broadening" s'appliquent à l'action de faire partie de la liste (par SOCAN), pas au travaille de Laucke. Je pense ce que l'on veut içi c'est de clarifier que c'est le travaille de Laucke qui a étendu la le repertoire de la guitare. Je suggère:

• SOCAN lists 112 classical works transcribed for the guitar by Laucke, illustrating the extent to which Lauke has broadened the guitar's repertoire in music of the Renaissance, classical, and romantic eras, as well as in flamenco.

(Je ne comprends pas pour quoi vous avez "further", en "further broadening". Sauf dans le lead, est-ce que vous l'avez mentionné?). That's enough French. Just wanted to try writing something in French, the first time in many years. It's probably full of mistakes.  – Corinne (talk) 01:07, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

I'd better ask this question in English: Was it the listing by SOCAN that broadened the guitar repertoire, or was it Michael Laucke's transcription work that broadened the guitar repertoire? If the former, then the sentence is all right. If the latter, perhaps something like the version I suggested just above.  – Corinne (talk) 01:45, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax:

Bonjour Corinne, Now that was very cute! ...a very noble attempt indeed, especially if you haven't had occasion to speak French in so long. I corrected the few spelling errors found (in bold and strike-through), but didn't really bother to restructure the syntax too much. (I was getting worried actually; my best and kindest English writing contact and now she's writing to me in French :). ...just joking of course; feel free any time... Thanks so much for this help; it's much clearer now. Yes, I did mention "broadening" in the lead. And, it's Michael Laucke's transcription work that broadened the guitar repertoire; I implemented this change accordingly. kindest regards, Natalie --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 02:17, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

Hello, Natalie -- At Checkingfax's suggestion, I am going through the article once more in an attempt to improve the wording and organization. By now you will have seen that I've made some bold edits. If you have any questions about them, I'm happy to discuss and/or explain them. I'm not finished yet, not even with the beginning of the article. I want to ask you about the sentence near the beginning:

• He was selected in 1982 by Andrés Segovia to perform for the PBS network at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, following which he became Segovia's pupil.

I'm not happy with the placement of "in 1982", so am still thinking of what to do. I had moved it to the middle of the sentence to avoid having two years so close to each other. But now, upon thinking about it, I think the year he performed for the PBS network at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is more important than the year he was selected for it. I don't know if the year is the same or different. If it is different, and if you agree with me, can you tell me the year he performed at the Met? If it is the same, then I will have the option of moving "in 1982" to a different place in the sentence. Please let me know.  – Corinne (talk) 00:23, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax, Corinne, and Sainsf:

Hello, User:Corinne, First of all, I must express my gratitude for your help; it is a privilege to have on board someone with such exquisite English language skills—no embarrassment effect intended. The year that Laucke won a competition to study with Segovia and then to perform in the PBS Met film are the same; to wit, 1982. I agree that performing for the PBS network at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is more important than being selected for it, but the year is the same. I will now take the pleasure to address your other queries. --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 09:46, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

In the section Michael Laucke#Paco de Lucia you have Villa-Lobos linked with a pipe so that it appears as Villa-lobos, but in Michael Laucke#Transcriptions you have it as simply Villa-Lobos. Shouldn't these be consistent?

I notice toward the beginning of the article after the lead, you mention his age several times, sometimes as "thirteen" and sometimes as "13". These should be consistent, too. Which do you prefer?  – Corinne (talk) 01:21, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax, Corinne, and Sainsf:

Hi User:Corinne, Yes, the syntax for Villa-Lobos should be consistent. I will defer to User:Checkingfax to choose one or the other. Both piped and non piped versions give the same result from a user-interface point of view, but code-behind should be consistent.

I tend to think of the spelled out version, "thirteen", as more imbued with ceremony, as used in "Four score and seven years ago", and "13" as, well, sort of scientific. I might opt for the "thirteen" style, for the age of a person. --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 10:10, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Natalie, I'd just like to offer my opinion regarding two places in the article. It's just an opinion, so you can disregard it. I think the part about Chenier going to Europe and not recognizing Laucke upon his return is clever, but not appropriate here. It has little to do with Laucke's career as a guitarist, composer, and music businessman, and I think it is an unnecessary distraction. I also think the part about Paco de Lucia practicing in the bathroom because he liked the sound of the music reflecting off the tiles is unnecessary. I know you mention the tiles a little later, but you can express Laucke's reaction to the sound of de Lucia's music without mentioning the bathroom tiles. I think it is just a little too much information that is not necessary, and not really encyclopedic in tone. Finally, in the first sentence of the article, you mention that he is a "music industry businessman". Maybe I've missed it, but I don't see any direct mention of him as a "music industry businessman". Can you point me to any discussion of him as a businessman? If you mean that he is a businessman just by virtue of having made many recordings, or being a performer, then I think you've got to define "businessman". To me, he seems to be more of a "music professional". Correct me if I'm wrong.  – Corinne (talk) 01:44, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

I agree with Corinne, she has explained my discomfort with the first two inclusions very well. My suggestion would be to exclude these points from the article, we don't want the article to lose focus. Sainsf <^>_{Feel at home} 09:56, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax, Corinne, and Sainsf:

Hi User:Corinne, I felt the anecdote on Chenier was kind of fun, but I see your point of course. Perhaps a text that is just a bit on the edge of encyclopedic may remain more in the reader's mind though. Nevertheless, I agree that the remark in and of itself has little to do with Laucke's career as a guitarist, composer, and music businessman. If it is seen as an unnecessary distraction, and construed as losing focus, than certainly it must be deleted.

I will be submitting my thoughts, probably within an hour or so, on the tile issue as well as the Paco de Lucia section in general and its life-changing experience for Laucke as an artist. The resonance of the tiles is more meaningful if explained properly ...more on this in a bit... I hope there will be some glimmer of interest in my little preamble to come, and that it will be in the best interest of the encyclopedia and those who read it and keep it alive. Thanks for bearing with me!

Regarding the "music industry businessman", Laucke apparently produced CDs, albums and some very large shows out of his own company, called Michael Laucke and Company; he produced concerts as agent/manager/impresario for 10 years at Place des Arts in Montreal and elsewhere. There are several mainstream newspaper articles mentioning his role as producer/businessman, such as When Laucke plays the guitar, he means business. The first paragraph is quite clear, especially, "He is a private enterprise of some complexity". There are many others though... So I believe he can be called a "music industry businessman". ...Thank you kindly for your interesting input on this. Natalie.Desautels (talk) 12:35, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

In the Michael Laucke#Articles section is the following sentence:

• Laucke has published several articles in music journals about the growth of the guitar in Canada:

This is perhaps nitpicking a little, but I paused upon reading "the growth of the guitar". A guitar cannot grow. Interest in the guitar can grow. The guitar can grow in popularity. Interest in guitar studies can grow. Guitar sales can grow. But a guitar cannot grow. I know there is a (probably translated) title with the same phrase below this, but that does not mean that the wording of this sentence cannot be improved.

• Laucke has published several articles in music journals about the growth of interest in the guitar in Canada.

• Laucke has published several articles in music journals about the increased interest in the guitar in Canada.

• Laucke has published several articles in music journals about the growth in popularity of the guitar in Canada. (etc.)  – Corinne (talk) 01:55, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax, Corinne, and Sainsf:

Hi User:Corinne, You are perfectly right; a guitar cannot grow, even if you water it ! The actual articles talk about the increasing popularity of the guitar in Canada, so I would opt for

• Laucke has published several articles in music journals about the growth in popularity of the guitar in Canada.

My reasoning is that there can be growth of interest, or increased interest, but that doesn't necessarily lead to actual popularity which is what the articles are about. very best wishes, Natalie.Desautels (talk) 12:54, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

I fixed this sentence. Regarding the Villa-Lobos issue I mentioned above, I wasn't referring to the fact that one was piped and the other wasn't. Perhaps I wasn't clear, but I was pointing out that one had "Lobos" capitalized and the other had it lower-case.  – Corinne (talk) 14:28, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

User:Corinne Thank you; I found a few lower-case 'l's and corrected them. (Now the wolf (Lobos) can make his way back into town (Villa)) kindest regards, Natalie Natalie.Desautels (talk) 18:57, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi, Natalie -- Congratulations on achieving GA status for this article! You worked hard on it and it is well deserved. I was just curious about something. I had suggested earlier that you remove the bit about Chenier going to Europe, and not recognizing Laucke upon his return, and you seemed to agree. I just looked and see that you only removed part of it but left this:

• When Laucke was 13, Chenier left for Europe. Laucke did not see him again until four years later, when they faced each other in the North American snooker championships in Montreal. During that period, Laucke had changed so much that Chenier did not recognize him nor remember his name. Laucke asked Chenier if he recalled the name Le jeune Mike (young Mike).

I think you should remove all of this. The only part that may be important to keep is that when they faced each other in the competition, Laucke beat out Chenier and won the championship. The way it is now, with all of this left in, there is a disconnect and an uncomfortable transition to the next sentence beginning "Laucke recalls, 'Then I decided to leave snooker'".  – Corinne (talk) 15:17, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

User:Corinne. I made an error, probably from working too fast. It now stands corrected. Many thanks. best wishes, as always, --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 23:30, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Natalie, you had "Flamenco Road" in italics before, and now it is in Roman (regular) font. Did you want it to be in italics?  – User:Corinne (talk) 19:22, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi Corinne. Thank you for pointing this out. As Checkingfax mentioned, all album titles should be in italics so it has now been corrected. Natalie.Desautels (talk) 19:44, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

Input to GA Review of 'Michael Laucke'

@Natalie.Desautels: Dear Natalie,
I hope you are keeping well and I am aware you are very busy; so, I will aim to be brief and to the point.
As you requested, I have now looked at the subject article again and, instead of interfering with the current editorial activity, I have decided simply to offer suggestions for your consideration. These are changes I would apply to the article myself if it had been included in the regular crop of articles put forward for copy editing by Suggestbot. However, since there are already quite a few editors participating in this GA review and also editing in situ, I will offer my editorial suggestions from the sidelines and will leave it entirely up to you to decide for or against them, and to apply them yourself if you decide they have merit. I hope to be helpful to you with this approach, while also staying out of the way of the 'lead' reviewers, so that we don't end up in the proverbial "too many chefs in the kitchen" situation.
I have therefore created a new section for you in one of my drafting sandboxes. (Please ignore the other sections in there.)
The format I've adopted for this specific process is a bulleted list—with a bullet for each of the article's sections—showing selected (and numbered) sentences as they are currently worded in the article, along with editorial amendments such as words stricken through, or alternative wording offered for your consideration. Where appropriate, I have also given you a rationale for the proposed alterations, but might not always do so. Finally, I have only reviewed the lead section so far, to give you an opportunity to comment on whether or not you find this approach useful. I would obviously remain sensitive to your preferences and will aim to adjust my contributions accordingly. I will then proceed sequentially and review all sections from top to bottom, while also keeping abreast of comments and edits made by the other reviewers; my intent is to help and support rather than hinder and obstruct.
I am very pleased for you that the GA review is now well under way and I wish you good luck for a successful outcome.
With kindest regards for now;
Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 10:54, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

Dear User:Pdebee ...so good of you to write and express your ideas with a view towards further improvement to the GAR article. On one of your drafting sandboxes, I found almost all of your ideas most excellent and am excited about implementing them during the course of the evening. I truly appreciate your time, effort and thought; your kind and very good-natured gesture did not go unnoticed Tous mes meilleurs vœux, mon cyber-ami , Natalie --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 23:20, 4 April 2016 (UTC)

@Natalie.Desautels: Dear Natalie,

Thank you for your lovely replies, above and also in my sandbox. It's a real pleasure to assist you, Natalie, and I will now carry on reviewing each section one by one, since this approach seems to work well for you. Also, please be assured that my suggestions are always offered for your consideration; therefore, please continue to challenge (in your customary very nice way ) any suggestion with which you are not satisfied; what is important is that we all strive to make the article as excellent as it can be, and this is best achieved through this kind of iteration: it takes much elbow grease to polish a precious stone. [I wish I could claim this was an ancient Navajo saying but, regrettably, I've only just made it up... ]

Seriously, though, I will respond later today to the additional information you added, in my sandbox, about Laucke and Segovia; please kindly look there at your convenience and let me know if you like that new suggestion better. In any case, I hope it will help some more.

Finally, thank you once again for inviting me to join your team of reviewers; to me, it feels like you've entrusted each of us to nurture your baby and, for my part, I am grateful for your trust and confidence. Merci mille fois, Natalie. .

With kindest regards;

Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 09:02, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

(talk page stalker). Hi, Natalie. Be sure to attribute Patrick and his sandbox in the edit summary if you do a direct copy/paste of any suggestions. This is for the copyright paper trail. If you totally rewrite his suggestions in your own words, and only use his words for inspiration, then you can relax this requirement. Same goes for any copy/paste input you glean from Corinne and her awesome input. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 17:01, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax and Pdebee: Checkingfax, gotcha! I try to suggest the editors do their own changes, once I begrudgingly approve . ...will keep copyright issue in mind. Important. very best wishes, --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 17:11, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
	Too little an appreciation for your large heart and impeccable politeness! It beats me how you have not got a dozen of these yet. You are one of the kindest and cheerful I have met here! Sainsf <^>Feel at home 13:09, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

Dear User:Sainsf, My goodness, what a pleasant surprise! ...and just in time to delight in along with my morning expresso and of course breakfast croissant, as we French are wont to do. Top of the morning to you, my cyber friend and colleague Natalie Natalie.Desautels (talk) 13:50, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

Hehe, may you be sunshiny and spread your charm everywhere! Sainsf <^>_{Feel at home} 13:55, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

PS. User:Sainsf, Indeed, music equals fulfillment and "music is the trade of love" (Shakespeare). I've only been here just over one year (although I've enjoyed making over 3500 edits), so perhaps I'll have the pleasure of gathering more nice barnstars as time goes by. But I'll always enjoy the adventure of it all, come what may Thanks again. Natalie --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 14:05, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

Yeah, I used to be mad for barnstars in my early days (you won't believe that I once asked a user to reward me, and he made me understand that barnstars make you more happy when won, not when offered; never mind, that was a long five years ago!) I am sure you will be an Awesome Wikipedian in the coming days if you go on like this. Cheers! Sainsf <^>_{Feel at home} 14:23, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

Cher User:Sainsf, Je vous remercie infiniment (dhanyavaad, dayaaluta ke saath) Natalie Natalie.Desautels (talk) 20:25, 5 April 2016 (UTC)

For an editor who adds freshness to WP

	The Cheerfulness Award
	Echoing Sainsf, Natalie, you are a breath of cheerfulness on WP. With your sweet, kind, polite, appreciative nature, and your delightful sense of humor, you make Wikipedia a better place in which to volunteer.  – Corinne (talk) 14:19, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Wow. ...All I can say is a B.I.G. ... ....

Seriousness aside (as Groucho Marx used to say), this is very heartwarming ...and meaningful to me. Thank you. --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 14:43, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

The Excellent New Editor's Barnstar for you!

		The Excellent New Editor's Barnstar A new editor on the right path
		Dear Natalie, I am over the Moon for you, now that your very first brand new article has successfully reached the hallowed heights of GA status! This is a considerable achievement and you should feel very proud of your success with it, as much as we—your Wiki-friends—feel so very proud of you! Throughout this effort, and with wonderful assistance from our friends @Checkingfax: and @Corinne:, you have shown great skill and determination in learning many aspects of developing an article for our encyclopedia, thus becoming very rapidly acquainted with the myriad of editorial guidelines and facilities that constitute this special Wiki-universe we inhabit, as its editors. For all this, very well done for your focus in becoming familiar, so quickly and expertly, with this new environment. In addition, and on a more personal level, you have impressed me (and several other editors, evidently) with your diligence, politeness, kindness, good humour and wit. In fact, so much so that I consider you simply as a lovely, trusted friend and I would feel honoured to work with you again, any time, and on any future project. For all these reasons, dear Natalie, I send you my warmest congratulations on this important milestone in your life as a Wikipedian editor! Long may you continue to excel here!! With much love and kindest regards; Patrick. ツ Pdebee.(talk)(guestbook) 16:06, 9 April 2016 (UTC) P.S. Of course, I will continue to expect great things from your future contributions!

That's so kind, really . I sent you a Teamwork barnstar in appreciation for your fantastic contributions, particularly on that special page you especially created to help us. Future contributions ...hm, I guess that might be the Quebec French article we were working on. I would love that! kindest regards, --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 21:56, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Yes, congrats, Natalie. I was the nom, but you pulled the train. When you came into the Teahouse I was not optimistic about me being of any significant use to you or to your article, but I was, you proved me wrong, and I have learned so much from you, and from the process. I wish I could gush like Patrick, but I was not raised that way. Corinne was a big part of this promotion too with her keen eye, as were the aggregate efforts of the other 50+ editors that participated in the evolution of the Michael Laucke article. Sainsf really put things over the top. Tread lightly on this new promotion. We do not want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, in case you have any big plans for change. We should look at the original sandbox version for kicks. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 21:01, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Checkingfax, I sent a few very well deserved barnstars around for all those who contributed in achieving GA status for Michael Laucke but now it's your turn and I am, contrary to my chatty nature, a bit at a loss in front of all, and I do mean ALL, you have done to help, guide, teach, encourage, and more, much more. ...and always in such a timely manner. I really think I would have been lost without your help. I probably would have made my way after a couple of years of wading through the rules and policies which you made short work of, not an easy achievement by any means! A good amount of my 'cheery nature' here comes from the helping atmosphere you provided. (Don't mean to embarrass you but I am one of those outgoing French people, after all. ) But try we must , so a Teamwork barnstar is on its way to you. Sincerest gratitude, --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 22:21, 9 April 2016 (UTC)

Some falafel for you!

I think I read somewhere above that you love falafel... I felt sure you would have missed it a lot when you were devoting all your time to this superb article! Take this as a treat from my side! Sainsf <^>Feel at home 02:45, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax and Corinne: User:Sainsf, Many thanks. It would be appropriate, in this gastronomic instance, to say Yum, which would be Miam in French. I always found the onomatopoeic differences in languages interesting; there is often a very different equivalent. Does that mean that sounds strike our ears differently according to the language we speak? A cat says Meow in English, but Miaou in French; a cow says Moo, but Meuh in French—not close really. Interesting food for thought... --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 02:59, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I always found that interesting, too.

• English: List of animal sounds, List of onomatopoeias

• Spanish: [1] and [2]

• French: [3] and [4]  – Corinne (talk) 04:20, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

Dear Corinne, I'm in a bit of a rush now (contrary to my philosophy that life is too short to rush through it ). I just want to send my thanks for these absolutely fantastic links. I'm excited to take time to go over each sound in each language; I already found a great many sounds I didn't know. It's also interesting that some onomatopoeic sounds exist in one language whereas only a discription of the sound might exist in another. A dog says 'woof' but in French and Spanish you can only describe the sound with a verb "Le chien aboyait", "El perro estaba ladrando" and so on. ...got to run or I'll get carried away again . Bye for now. --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 18:40, 10 April 2016 (UTC)

@Natalie.Desautels and Corinne: Dear Natalie and Corinne,

When I read your interesting exchange above, about animal noises, it reminded me that in European French, dogs are deemed to say "Ouaf Ouaf"... There are a couple of videos with that sound as a title on YT, including this one: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5SDGzixYDPY

The words "Ouaf Ouaf" are also spoken (by humans!) as a European French expression to mean the exact equivalent of the anglophone "Very droll!", i.e. a comment made to someone whose joke was not particularly funny. On the other hand, when Brits want to indicate that they find a quip particularly witty, they would often say "Boom-Boom!", which I believe originated from the music-hall gag of emphasising (a posteriori) a punch line for members of the audience who had missed it.

I wonder if, like me, you sometimes try to imagine the real situation that triggered the advent of an idiomatic expression? For example, what could have prompted someone to select the very words "I am over the Moon" for the first time? We use these expressions all the time for their metaphorical meaning, of course, but I often find myself trying to 'listen' to them in their literal form, thus discovering how truly poetic some of them are.
Anyway, sorry for the digression! Keep well and joyful, and have a very pleasant day.

With kind regards;

Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 09:22, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

@Pdebee, Checkingfax, and Corinne: Hi User:Pdebee Thanks for this generous and interesting information as well as the cute video . Indeed, I haven't heard "Ouaf Ouaf" here in Quebec ...maybe it's too cold! . Warmest regards and renewed thanks, Natalie --Natalie.Desautels (talk) 20:10, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

Pdebee Thanks also from me for your interesting comment and the link to the cute videos. I've seen books that detail the origin of a lot of idiomatic expressions. They're quite interesting. That's just as interesting to me as how speakers of different languages have different "words" for the sounds of the same animal. I wonder, do they actually hear the animal's sound differently, or do they hear it the same but just come up with a different representation of it?  – Corinne (talk) 03:11, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

@Pdebee and Checkingfax: Hi Corinne , I would say the latter, since the waveform of the actual sound is scientifically the same, just as a C# is still the same note regardless of who is hearing it. Of course that brings up the perennial discussion as to whether everyone sees the same color green... Nonetheless (néanmoins ), I would contend that the language adapts to express the animal sound, that we hear it the same— as much as that is possible (since it is scientifically unproven), and that we attempt to express it with the idiomatic human language sounds available, as pronounced by all vocal mechanisms responsible for emitting sound in each specific language. Natalie.Desautels (talk) 04:50, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

@Pdebee and Checkingfax: Hi again Corinne , In a similar vein, I was once translating between two uni-lingual English and French musicians. The French singer had some problems with her voice and the English musician said to her 'Oh, you have a frog in your throat.' I told the French singer that what he said meant "Vous avez un chat dans la gorge". Hearing this and knowing a little French, the English musician then declared, in Huckleberry Finn fashion, "My goodness, they have a different word for everything!". This is a true story and as you probably know, one says frog in English but cat in French. Seriousness aside, the explanation I later found was that the creature, a frog or a cat, was present in the region where the expression first came to be. Thanks for letting me share this little anecdote with you. kind regards, Natalie Natalie.Desautels (talk) 05:02, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

Do you want one Edit tab, or two? It's your choice

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Whatamidoing (WMF) 19:22, 11 April 2016 (UTC)

Michael Laucke has been nominated for Did You Know

Hello, Natalie.Desautels. Michael Laucke, an article you either created or to which you significantly contributed,has been nominated to appear on Wikipedia's Main Page as part of Did you know. You can see the hook and the discussion here. You are welcome to participate! Thank you. APersonBot (talk!) 21:20, 14 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi Natalie. Congrats on this Did You Know. Glad to see the article has progressed so well and thank you for all your invites to participate in issues regarding it. I merely reverted some vandalism there once so I hope I don't sound rude when I say rather excuse me from the list of interested parties please. Many thanks and I hope you get it to Featured Article article status soon! Robvanvee 17:08, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

Hi Robvanvee. Thank you kindly for taking the time to write and sending your gracious compliments (plural ); much appreciated, to be sure. I hadn't realized that your contributions were small in quantity albeit excellent in quality. As per your very polite request, I will be attentive to no longer pinging you, and look forward of course to a renewed and always productive crossing of paths. kindest regards, Natalie.Desautels (talk) 20:42, 25 April 2016 (UTC)

Million Award for Planned Parenthood

		The Million Award
		For your contributions to bring Planned Parenthood (estimated annual readership: 1,793,486) to Good Article status, I hereby present you the Million Award. Congratulations on this rare accomplishment, and thanks for all you do for Wikipedia's readers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 04:41, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

Checkingfax A great many thanks and heartfelt appreciation for this lovely surprise. I am very proud to add this honor to my little collection. Warm regards, and with all my appreciation, Natalie Natalie.Desautels (talk) 17:13, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia: check out the Teahouse!

Hello! Natalie.Desautels, you are invited to the Teahouse, a forum on Wikipedia for new editors to ask questions about editing Wikipedia, and get support from peers and experienced editors. Please join us! Natalie.Desautels (talk) 19:31, 27 April 2016 (UTC)

Adding alt img text to the images that are lacking it

Hi, Natalie. I would encourage you to take a look at this important IEG proposal. If you like it, please add your support and rationale. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 23:11, 30 April 2016 (UTC)

Thanks so much, Checkingfax, for making me aware of this excellent project. I have taken the pleasure of adding my support vote to it. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 18:57, 1 May 2016 (UTC)

WikiProject Latin music invitation

You are invited to join invite to join the WikiProject Latin music, a WikiProject dedicated to improving articles related to music performed in Spanish, Portuguese and languages of Ibero-America. Simply click here to accept! Or, if you're interested in reading more on Latin music, you may want to check out the Latin music portal.

I saw on your user page that you are interested in flamenco and thought you might be interested. Erick (talk) 16:00, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

Thank you so much Erick; ...very nice of you to make me aware of this! kind regards, Natalie

No problem, and I wish to welcome you to the Latin music project! Erick (talk) 17:10, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for your offer

If you could help put that draft into more comprehensible English it would be much appreciated. Feel free to edit it whenever you have time. Then I could think more about rewriting it and adding sources.

For biographies of living people, the most important thing is almost always finding sources discussing them. Although as I showed on the talk page, there are exceptions. Doug Weller talk 18:01, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi Doug Weller, I would be pleased to take the pleasure to put this article in good shape, and into proper English, as time permits, hopefully over the next week. I was happy to find the original Spanish article on Peñas de Cabrera, which is well written and intact, and there's good material to be culled there, albeit without references. I found lots of good quality source material in Spanish through Google search so I'll help translating references too, if you wish. The pictures are gorgeous, to be sure—it almost makes me want to make a French version as well. ...very nice discovery. This is magnificent 'flamenco' country—Andalusia, where I spent lots of time but didn't know about Peñas de Cabrera. ...will write soon. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 09:19, 6 May 2016 (UTC)

DYK for Michael Laucke

On 7 May 2016, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article Michael Laucke, which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that Michael Laucke's snooker winnings allowed him to finance 110 trips from Montreal to New York City to study the classical guitar with Franco-Spaniard Rolando Valdès–Blain? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Michael Laucke. You are welcome to check how many page hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, Michael Laucke), and it may be added to the statistics page if the total is over 5,000. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.

Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 00:52, 7 May 2016 (UTC)

Michael Laucke

Hello:

The copy edit Checkingfax requested from the Guild of Copy Editors of your article Michael Laucke has been completed. (I've let them know.)

You'll notice that I moved information on his MAC activities from the "Highlights and Awards" section that was not in the "Personal Life" section to it, and deleted it from the former. I did not check the other "Highlights/Awards" to make sure that the information is also included in the appropriate section of the main body of the article; if it isn't, it should be. Having said that, I'm not sure whether a "Highlights and Awards" section is then necessary - it certainly does no harm. I checked the Segovia article and it doesn't have one.

When you have time, it would be a good idea to archive any URLs you used in your citations to avoid the future possibility of "dead" links.

Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Kind regards,

Twofingered Typist (talk) 14:24, 10 May 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax: Hello Twofingered Typist, Thank you so much for your wonderful editing on Michael Laucke. I would be amiss not to mention how much your fine touch improved the flow, readability, and clarity and makes the overall experience just more enjoyable and interesting. I wanted to extend my appreciation for your fine work and have taken the pleasure to send you a much deserved barnstar to add to your already impressive collection.

Your judicious use of the semi-colon did not go unnoticed and piqued my interest, as in 'Laucke studied with several classical guitar masters: ....' The application of this which I found most effective was before quotes, as in, 'Guitar and Lute magazine declared it: "One of the best...". This is what I think of as the 'magic touch'.

Anyway, ...not to get too carried away as time is always of the essence—and once spent, never comes back I've noticed :)—I would like to reciprocate by offering translation work, if need be. Should you ever need translations to and from French, Spanish or German, I am a proud code switcher (and receptive multilingual), enjoying several mother tongues and well diploma-ed and experienced in each. I would be happy to offer my service should the occasion arise; I think that you would not be better served.

Regarding the Highlights/Awards section, indeed, toward the end of this week and following your suggestion, I will be able to make sure that the information is also included in the appropriate section of the main body of the article. Although we do see Honors and awards sections for classical musicians from time to time, such as in Itzhak_Perlman, it is admittedly more frequently used in the pop field (where they tend to win lots of grammies ). Since Laucke was a strictly classical musician but went on to the more popular flamenco genre, I agree that including the Highlights/Awards section does no harm; in fact, it would probably also be of interest to readers who hurriedly skim over articles, not uncommon in the day and age .

Un gran merci une fois encore. Thank you again for your fabulous work. with kindest regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 22:18, 10 May 2016 (UTC)

You are most welcome, I was very happy to help. Cheers Twofingered Typist (talk) 11:59, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax and Twofingered Typist: I just wanted to report that, as recommended, I have made sure that the information in the "Highlights/Awards" section is also included in the appropriate section of the main body of the article; and it is as it should be, for every item on the list of Highlights/Awards. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 12:54, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Alt text

Wikipedia:Alternative text for images. The alt text you added to the Michael Laucke article may not be helpful for the function it's designed for. For example, instead of "Laucke playing his classical guitar, smiling" in the infobox I would suggest "photograph of Laucke, seated in half profile, playing his guitar and smiling while looking away from the camera". Also, I'm not sure what "Laucke" will sound like in a screen reader, but https://translate.google.ca/#en/fr/Laucke might give you an idea. Of course any alt text is better than none. Thanks for improving the article. Walter Görlitz (talk) 06:32, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi Walter Görlitz, Thanks very much for your kind suggestions and very interesting ones at that; much appreciated. Indeed, I tried to adhere to Wikipedia:Alternative text for images. Longer, more interesting and descriptive alt tags, like the one you suggested, would be interesting, to be sure. And I found your suggestion attractive, well crafted and informative ...perfect actually. But in the section How to write alternative text, it says 'Alternative text should be short, such as "A basketball player"' and 'Very long descriptions can be left for the body of the article.' Some good examples are given here. So I decided to err on the side of caution and go with the short version for now, much as I would like to do otherwise, ...perhaps un-bold of me . Thanks also for the sound bite; in radio and TV broadcasts I've heard 'Laucke' pronounced quite like the reader you sent. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 08:06, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi, Natalie and Walter Görlitz. My experience with people that use screen readers is that they crank up the speed of their screen readers and that they assimilate text very quickly by ear. There may be some impatience with image descriptions that are overly detailed. I am not sure. The advice in the Wikipedia alt text guidelines does mention keeping them short like the example cited by Natalie. I suck at writing alt text. May I suggest asking Graham87? He uses JAWS. I am also not sure if in a photograph it is necessary to say it is a photograph. Most images on Wikipedia are photographs unless they are scans. Even if they are paintings they are photographs of paintings, usually. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 17:44, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Yes, us screen reader users read text very fast, but partly that's because we can cut off speech at any time, so long descriptions aren't that big a problem if they're more, well, descriptive. I'd personally take the second alt text without the "photograph of ..." bit. JAWS pronounces "Laucke" as "lawk", to rhyme with "hawk". Graham87 01:33, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi, Graham87. Thanks for stopping by. Here is the 7-second flac of Laucke saying his own name, etc.: Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 20:21, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax: Hi Walter Görlitz. I got the go ahead from Graham87 for your excellent ALT text, and have taken the pleasure to implement it with due credit given to you and Graham87, of course, in the summary. I really appreciated your fine touch, and would be delighted if you could look over some of the seven remaining ones here, naturally as time permits. Graham87 uses the JAWS screen reader and says that long descriptions aren't a problem if they're descriptive, as yours so nicely was. I would insert your new ALT versions, have Graham87 listen, and then make adjustments as need be. Many thanks once again. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 21:20, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, the alt texts sound good. Graham87 01:25, 13 May 2016 (UTC)

Interesting

Hi Natalie.Desautels (cc @Checkingfax:) Here's something interesting for you, after your edits on the Sorcha Faal reports article the viewership number skyrocketed (at least in the terms for this article). How many followers do you have? Thanks. Picomtn (talk) 09:52, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax:) Hi Picomtn. I am delighted to hear that and especially glad that you are pleased. As soon as a few urgent matters subside, I intend to completely go through the article and implement the changes I forsaw, quite probably toward the end of this week, or going into the weekend. warm regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 12:18, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Hi, Picomtn. Every article Natalie touches has the same aftereffect. I put an external link to the SFR stats above. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 17:34, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

Michael Laucke page stats

Hi, Natalie and Picomtn. You can see page spikes here when Natalie was first editing the Michael Laucke article, during later edits, and on its May 7, 2016 DYK (1003 page views). Natalie has some magic hands. For instance, some of the page views are her edits, but she never made 576 edits in one day like it shows on November 12. I am sure Google did not crawl the page 576 times in one day. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 17:56, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

@Picomtn: Hi, Checkingfax Thanks very much for the vote of confidence. Perhaps the high-ish stats are due to my several mother tongues, so that every count is automatically multiplied by four. ...just kidding, I know, it doesn't work that way . Hopefully I can work this magic into 'Sorcha Faal' and help give it the visibility and audience breadth that it's worthy of. This article is really interesting to me; as soon as I can clear my backlog a bit, I'm excited about continuing to build it up, probably towards this weekend. (I saved the source code, as I am wont to do, before the 'battle' as it were, as I believe some of it can be useful when re-worked). Obviously the more I understand about the subject, the better I should be able to help improve it. This article is rife with fantastic potential and an initial search turned up so many good quality and mainstream sources. I was wondering if it would be possible to make one article as a BLP for (pen name) 'Sorcha Faal' and at the same time have a Wikilink to 'Sorcha Faal reports', similar to music sites where you often see a main article and a link to a discography. It seems we can get many good quality, mainstream sources for 'Sorcha Faal reports'. A 'Controversy" section, as one also frequently sees, would be neat, interesting and Wikipedian in its fairness. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 22:51, 12 May 2016 (UTC)

"...an editor cannot Preview"

• I'm not sure I totally understand what you were missing here, but perhaps what you need is Navigation Popups? Go to your Preferences link atop any page, go to the Gadgets tab, and check "Navigation popups: article previews and editing functions pop up when hovering over links". There are many other useful gadgets there. BTW, as for scripts, IMO by far the most useful is "User:Ucucha/HarvErrors" although you may also have use for "User:Ucucha/duplinks". I see you already have the prose size script. You also have a couple others I'm unfamiliar with; I'll look at them. Cheers.   Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 00:23, 13 May 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax: Top of the morning to you Lingzhi. This may seem long, but I'm addressing a few issues here that were left on various pages.

Preview bug: To see the little bug that occurs in my use of the Notes/Ref technology that I implemented; Go to Edit source (you don't have to make any edits). Hit Show Preview. Now go to the Notes section and click link 1, for example. It goes properly to the corresponding link in the text about guitar transcriptions[5]. Now if you click the little [5] just after transcriptions, program asks you to leave the page, whereby you will lose all changes of course. So now there are two choices. You can Save and then test the links afterwards. Or you can also right-click on the little [5] and "Open link in new tab", and the result in the new tab could serve as a Preview, albeit a bit jumpy/buggy. It's not such a bad bug really; there is a work-around after all. Not like that big cockroach that they found in one of the first mainframe computers that gave us the word 'bug' in the first place .

Navigation popups: I enabled this and it's quite handy, and installed Ucucha/HarvErrors and User:Ucucha/duplinks as well. Thanks for these neat tips. HarvErrors found nothing, but duplinks turned up some useful information and I analyzed the results. So there is some work to be done here, notwithstanding a few exceptions to the duplicate rule for infoboxes, tables, image captions and the like.

Fixes–the important as well as the various and sundry: I'd like to undertake all fixes over the week-end. I spent most of last night figuring out how to further simplify the multiple references you brought to light at the end of sentences. I have a good conception now of how to bring this to fruition. Also, a good rule to follow would be—when 2 consecutive references, fine and when 3 refs they have to be reduced. ...wondering how much time I have. I'm delighted to get these suggestions for final touches and my main goal is really that an article be as good as it can be. I mean an FA would be nice, but all these opportunities for fine tuning are exciting to me.

Three Gymnopedies or Trois Gymnopédies: Regarding your small edit here, I think it should be one or the other, and not both languages mixed in the same sentence, as Three Gymnopédies. I prefer using the English text in en-Wikipedia. I can't bring myself to change any edits by other editors, as it's not in my nature. So after this discussion, kindly feel free to re-edit, as you see fit. Language is really one of my fields of expertise, having translated back and forth from my several mother tongues since I was born it seems (...still one of my greatest pleasures). This of course doesn't make me right! (I'm a code switcher and receptive multilingual—diploma-ed too). Endless discussions often ensue about the Gymnopedies, like here.

So we might consider that:

• The original Satie guitar transcription by Laucke is a Canadian bilingual French/English edition; it spells Gymnopedies in English as do a great number of articles around the web, although some use the French spelling.
• Among musicians, few in the English world use the French pronunciation.
• In Satie's biography, he mentions the Greek word Gymnopaedia, as the source, which now has translations in many languages.
• When a musical work becomes well-known, as in this case, it is customary to translate the title; examples abound. Thus, as a French person, I'm loathe to say that Gymnopedie has become English

...hope I didn't digress; I've spent more time talking language in my life that sleeping!

Finally, my French translation of Michael Laucke uses only the French spelling, and my Spanish and German versions will use their own spelling as well. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 13:20, 13 May 2016 (UTC)

• hey that script I told you about, Ucucha's Harv errors/warnings, coughed up these errors on yuor FAC nom:

• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "u.s._senate_program" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "beijing_china" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "wigmore_program" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "Hungary_newspaper_interview" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "old_malthouse" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "china_minister" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "andalusia" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "india_program" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "intoxicating" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "world_tours" is not used in the content (see the help page).
• Cite error: A list-defined reference named "hour-world_tours" is not used in the content (see the help page).
•   Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 01:08, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax: Thanks Lingzhi. Yep; ...saw them in bright red as soon as I visited the article right now. So I fixed these references which were just broken by an editor who removed some text in the body without its associated LDR ref; Lua's AI is still not advanced enough to read minds . kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 05:24, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

This week's article for improvement (week 20, 2016)

Ozone-oxygen cycle in the ozone layer. Hello, Natalie.Desautels. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Ozone layer Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Gustaf Skarsgård • À la carte Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:09, 16 May 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI •

'Three Gymnopedies' or 'Trois Gymnopédies' by (par) Eric (Erik) Satie

@Checkingfax, Lingzhi, Corinne, Twofingered Typist, and Jerome Kohl: Kindly help us make a small decision regarding whether we might use 'Three Gymnopedies' or 'Trois Gymnopédies' in the Michael Laucke article. It presently says "Three Gymnopédies". My preference is for a completely English version. I considered that many sheet music publications use the English spelling, the French translation of Michael Laucke uses only the French spelling, and the Satie guitar transcription by Laucke is a bilingual French/English edition which spells Gymnopedies in English. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 05:34, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

• English with diacritic – {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 06:02, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
• English without diacritic or French – Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 06:42, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
• Whatever the heck the most influential journals and books do.  Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 07:11, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
  • Our article is just Gymnopédies, without three or trois. But I don't really care one way or the other.  Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 02:01, 22 May 2016 (UTC)

Schirmer sheet music and books publishing, one of the most notable music publishers, offers both Eng and Fr versions depending on the edition. We may have to make this small decision here. As John Cleese says ...'sorry, ...stuck with it' :). Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 07:22, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

I'm assuming that "Gymnopédies" is the kind of word that cannot be easily translated; otherwise, it would have been. I've seen many works of both music and art with the title given first in the original language, in italics, followed by the English translation in parentheses, in regular (Roman) font. It would look like this: Trois Gymnopédies (Three Gymnopédies) with "Gymnopédies" remaining in italics since it is an untranslatable word. I am not a fan of mixing French and English in the same phrase, such as "Three Gymnopédies". I also think if "Gymnopedies" – without the accent – is used, it should be explained that since the word is not easily translated, the French word has been adopted into English for the sake of the title (reasoning that is a bit convoluted). I prefer Trois Gymnopédies (Three Gymnopédies), with some explanation somewhere as to what Gymnopédies means.  – Corinne (talk) 14:12, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

I also feel the original French title is appropriate here. Here http://www.word-detective.com/2010/03/gymnopedie/ is an interesting take on the word's origin; and another http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O76-Gymnopdies.html Cheers. Twofingered Typist (talk) 22:24, 21 May 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax and Lingzhi:. Hello Corinne and Twofingered Typist, I've taken the pleasure to implement your kind suggestions throughout the article. In its first occurence, we now find Trois Gymnopédies in italics, followed by the English translation in parentheses, (Three Gymnopédies), with "Gymnopédies" remaining in italics. Trois Gymnopédies is then used throughout. And I've added two references providing an explanation as to what Gymnopédies means. I'm sure this is precisely what Satie wanted, that is, to drive us crazy . Off topic a bit but as a point of interest, using great invention Jean-Louis Roux translated the works of Shakespeare, along with the English idiomatic expressions translated in a truly ingenious way. The Jabberwocky with its invented words, and for all its "slithy toves that gyred and gimbled in the wabe", has enjoyed many wonderful translations that make such good sense. 'Gymnopedie' is in fact very easy to translate, requiring little alteration. Still, I like the solution we found. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 10:45, 28 May 2016 (UTC)

This week's article for improvement (week 21, 2016)

A small whirlpool in a pond Hello, Natalie.Desautels. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Whirlpool Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Ozone layer • Gustaf Skarsgård Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:08, 23 May 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI •

This week's article for improvement (week 22, 2016)

A photodetector salvaged from a CD-ROM. The photodetector contains 3 photodiodes visible in the photo (in center). Hello, Natalie.Desautels. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Photodetector Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Whirlpool • Ozone layer Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:06, 30 May 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI •

Out, Out—

• I asked for help with the photo of Elton John, apparently there was no way to save the hand. The changes were made to the file in the article and so are already visible there... If you are attached to that hand (pun intended), then you can either try again to edit the photo, or delete the photo from the article... but somehow or other, the blurry hand should be fixed. It's ugliness is distracting.  Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 00:33, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax:, Hi Lingzhi. That's funny :) At first I thought you were referring to 'out damned spot' . A friend in graphics is trying to improve it. I know it can be done 'cause I once had a better version but lost it; shame on me, as Bush jr. once said. I'll upload it in a day or two, and seek your opinion. We should fix it, but as Wilde said "Whether you do or whether you don't, you'll always regret it" or some such thing. :) kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 00:50, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

It's already been fixed, see article. If you have another, better version. then go for it. Cheers.  Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 00:54, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

@Checkingfax:, Hi Lingzhi. I Know. Ah, this often happens when I think in one language and write in another. :). I may have a better one in a day or two. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 01:05, 31 May 2016 (UTC)

Is this paragraph as clear as it can be?

@Checkingfax: Hi Twofingered_Typist and Corinne,

This concerns the section on the Flamenco Road album in the Michael Laucke article. I reworked what was a very long sentence, split it in three, and feel it is much better. It flows better now and is certainly less jumbled. Is it as clear as it can be? ...to wit:

• Ten works were recorded at five different studios in Montreal, each chosen for its unique acoustics, and the recording's instrumentation for the title track, Flamenco Road, required the use of 24 tracks. It comprises a combination of five guitars—flamenco, Spanish, classical and electric—and all natural acoustic guitars are played the Spanish way, using all the fingers of the right hand without a pick. The rhythm section includes bongos, four congas and a rock drum set blended with other percussion instruments such as claves, maracas and castanets. It further incorporates three dancers performing typical "palmas" (hand-clapping) in synchronization, as well as three trumpets, three pianos and a "country-style" violinist.[49]

Many thanks. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 18:48, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

See Below for my suggestion - minor changes. Twofingered Typist (talk) 20:07, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

Ten works were recorded at five different studios in Montreal, each chosen for its unique acoustics. The instrumentation for the recording's title track, "Flamenco Road", required the use of 24 tracks. It comprises a combination of five guitars—flamenco, Spanish, classical and electric—and all natural acoustic guitars are played the Spanish way, using all the fingers of the right hand without a pick. The rhythm section includes bongos, four congas and a rock drum set blended with other percussion instruments such as claves, maracas and castanets. It further incorporates three dancers performing typical "palmas" (hand-clapping) in synchronization, as well as three trumpets, three pianos and a "country-style" violinist.[49]

Many thanks for this improvement, deftly done. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 20:44, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

2016 Wikimedia Foundation Executive Director Search Community Survey

The Board of Trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation has appointed a committee to lead the search for the foundation’s next Executive Director. One of our first tasks is to write the job description of the executive director position, and we are asking for input from the Wikimedia community. Please take a few minutes and complete this survey to help us better understand community and staff expectations for the Wikimedia Foundation Executive Director.

• Survey, (hosted by Qualtrics)

Thank you, The Wikimedia Foundation Executive Director Search Steering Committee via MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 21:48, 1 June 2016 (UTC)

This week's article for improvement (week 23, 2016)

The Hilton Athens is part of the Hilton Hotels & Resorts hotel chain. Hello, Natalie.Desautels. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Hilton Hotels & Resorts Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Photodetector • Whirlpool Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 6 June 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI •

This week's article for improvement (week 24, 2016)

A cubic zirconia crystal made by the Shelby Gem Factory Hello, Natalie.Desautels. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Shelby Gem Factory Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Hilton Hotels & Resorts • Photodetector Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 13 June 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI •

My apologies.

Dear Natalie,
With reference to this intervention and its resulting action, it occurs to me that if another editor found something objectionable about it (s/he didn't say what), then you might too. Therefore, I would like to offer you my apologies if anything in that edit offended you in any way. In case it did and you don't wish to discuss it any further, then I will respect your silence; I just hope you will consider the possibility that it was never my intent to offend.
With kind regards;
Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 13:53, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Dear Pdebee To find anything objectionable with your generous, kind and immensely skillful outpouring of edits would be impossible. As I mentioned on your talk page here , your comments were immensely helpful and your further acknowledgement deeply appreciated. I believe I may be responsible for the mix-up since I simply copied the text without implementing the transclusion code. Then you left a reply which Lingzhi probably thought belonged on a talk page. So that's where I put it after going through the history and carefully digging into an old version to find what was deleted. ...espiègle, n'est-ce pas? I think what Lingzhi was getting at is that the FA or GA review pages should be kept short; I have even been told not to leave an explanation and to just say 'Done'. Apparently two editors review lots of FA review pages and so shortness helps them. At least that's what I've been led to understand.

Your edits along with Jerome Kohl's were also inspirational; I subsequently made 70 edits, had 20 references deleted—down from 140 references to 120—the content Notes section (11 references) was eliminated altogether by incorporating the information into the main text, and I carefully matched references with precisely the correct sentence and did some reference bundling too! So that was an amazingly productive collaboration , for which I send once again my profound thanks. warm regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 14:57, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Dear Natalie,

Many thanks for your re-assuring words and actions. This event has enabled me to learn how to close a section on an FA review page: I will be much briefer in future and will now add personal and/or teasing comments only at an editor's personal talk page.

By the way, my earlier reference to ...

(or maybe I should wait a little longer: until you've finished munching your way down the mountain of cookies/bagels/pancakes to celebrate said FA achievement! )

... was motivated by something you said after the ML article made it to GA, to the effect that you were celebrating by eating bagels or pancakes (or some other delicious indulgence...) but for the life of me, I can't find it anywhere and so can't provide you with the diff of your (mouthwatering) quip, at the time.

In any case, thank you for taking the time to send the above, and very well done! for all the improvements you've continued to apply to the article! I remain very impressed, and very proud of you!

With kindest regards, as always;

Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 15:56, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Dear Patrick, a.k.a. Pdebee, . You are most welcome, always. The tantalizing bit you were looking for was archived here. ..just 'Find' the 2nd occurrence of the word 'croissant', as in 'Time to celebrate with a nice croissant, as we French are wont to do' and 'this huge stack of croissants '. ...de beaux souvenirs . Chaleureusement, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 21:14, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Dear Natalie,

Thank you so much for taking the time and trouble to trace that exact post which had eluded me!

And how is it possible that I could ever have forgotten (Mon Dieu!) that it was a croissant that serves as your gâterie cérémoniale de premier choix!

Good luck and very best wishes for the last stretch towards FA success!

With kindest regards;

Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 23:22, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Pdebee Thanks for the very nice wishes. The article stands much improved, so that's really a reward in itself. Never expect and you will never be dissapointed, the Buddha tells us . So I am enjoying the voyage, and again, your participation is so appreciated. Hm, ... a bit hundgry but it's too late for a croissant; aha, a "soupe de poisson avec sa rouille" beckons . kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 05:37, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

'|Quotes=' translated in Citations and original language inclusion, or not

@Checkingfax, Twofingered Typist, Corinne, Lingzhi, and Sainsf: @Jerome Kohl and Pdebee:

Greetings to all, Thanks to everyone for your wonderful help. I am excited about the progress this article is making as I give a good workout to my very fine tooth comb. Meanwhile, I would like to gather some opinions on whether the original language should be included in a Citation when using the '|Quotes=' parameter for a translated quotation. For example, [7], [25], [43], and a few others. I worked hard on typing up all the quotes but I dont mind eliminating the source language if need be, as it takes up twice the space or more at times. Nevertheless, The original language does add color, as languages are wont to do. Perhaps I slipped into this usage because it is in harmony with my multilingual upbringing, but it may be at odds with en-Wikipedia. Many thanks for your feedback. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 07:18, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

• I have never seen anyone use this, or use so many translated quotations, so I wouldn't know. For me, I would keep all the text that is quoted on the page (which is a good inducement to keep those quotes short). I have seen reviewers saying you had too many quotes in the article and I mentally agreed; just deleting some quotes would also ease your burden. My two cents, FWIW.  Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 07:44, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Thank you Lingzhi! Re FWIW; it's worth a lot! . Duly noted; I will attend to making some decisions for further reducing quotes. (It really was "l'embarras du choix". I used the smallest fraction of all the articles I collected.). But my question is, even if I keep the quotes short, would you also include the original language. I guess not since you emphasize short, and the original language, colorful as it is, makes the quote twice as long. Correct? kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 08:11, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

IMHO, every word translated should also be quoted in the original language.  Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 08:41, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

• Hi, Natalie. Since the References section is near the bottom of the page I really do not care. That being said, I've always wondered why Wikipedia footnotes are not all the way at the bottom of the page? MOS:LAYOUT guides us to put them above the External links and below the See also sections.

On second thought, if the citation includes a URL I would only include the translated portion as the original version can be read from the URL.

To that end, I would suggest archiving all the URLs before they rot out. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 07:51, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Hello Checkingfax. ...very good point, to wit: since the original version can be read from the URL, I should trim the quote to show only the translated portion. Also, some URL's point to Commons items, so rot out is not a danger in these cases. For external URLs, the Wayback Machine already did some marvelous work, such as here ; notice the wonderful archiving in the url. The Flickr URLs should definitely be archived. Your thoughts on helping prevent link rot and nipping it in the bud, so to speak is very sound indeed. Many thanks once again. kind regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 08:25, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

• Dear Natalie; in MOS:QUOTATIONS, the last section says:

Foreign-language quotations
Quotations from foreign-language sources should appear with a translation into English, preferably a modern one. Quotations that are translations should be explicitly distinguished from those that are not. Indicate the original source of a translation (if it is available, and not first published within Wikipedia), and the original language (if that is not clear from the context).
If the original, untranslated text is available, provide a reference for it or include it, as appropriate.
When editors themselves translate foreign text into English, care must always be taken to include the non-English source material, in italics (except for non-Latin-based writing systems), and to use actual and (if at all possible) common English words to translate. Beware linguistic "false friends": Portuguese Federativo should never be rendered as Federative but always as Federal, for example, while Spanish raro should usually be translated as strange or weird and only in limited contexts as rare.

With kind regards; Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 09:06, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Thank you Patrick/Pdebee, for this definitive and authoritative answer. I keep on forgetting that whatever one needs to implement, chances are that WP has a policy somewhere with good advice! This is the solution I will use, along with some quote trimming. Many thanks once again for researching and sending along this policy to me; much appreciated. Kindest regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 09:53, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

You're most welcome, Natalie. . Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 10:06, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

TWL HighBeam check-in

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This week's article for improvement (week 25, 2016)

The aqueduct of Segovia, Spain Hello, Natalie.Desautels. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: List of aqueducts in the Roman Empire Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Shelby Gem Factory • Hilton Hotels & Resorts Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 20 June 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI •

User:Ritchie333/Userbox Suede

RIP Suede, 1994 - 2013. Always in the way, especially when chicken was involved.

Hi, I came here to tell you I've reviewed Template:Did you know nominations/Flamenco Road but also I noticed you'd picked up the userbox with my (sadly late) cat playing my Nord Electro. I converted it into a template this morning, and have popped that version on your userpage. It has a programmable gender so it displays "he" / "she" properly, and if there is demand I may do a "gender neutral" version as well. Ritchie333 ^{(talk) (cont)} 16:29, 22 June 2016 (UTC)

Hi Ritchie333 First of all, my very sincere condolences; being a B.I.G. animal lover, especially the cat family, well... at times it's worse than losing a human. Cats never have what we call 'les arrières pensées' (hidden agenda, ulterior motive, or some such thing) ...perfect little creatures... So, thank you for this charming userbox as a fond memory that whatever, whoever passes though our lives remains always a little part of grateful for the richness they brought to us. Hm, 'especially when it came to chicken' . Like! One of mine likes to go to the kitchen sink, and have the few drops from the faucet fall on his little forehead. Then he always feels guilty for the little pleasure, so he comes to me right afterwards to be caressed; it's a sort of permission granted I guess. But I digress...

kind regards, with renewed thanks for this lovely userbox, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 19:56, 25 June 2016 (UTC)

This week's article for improvement (week 26, 2016)

Home page of Wikipedia Hello, Natalie.Desautels. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Home page Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: List of aqueducts in the Roman Empire • Shelby Gem Factory Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 27 June 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI •

Editing News #2—2016

Editing News #2—2016 Read this in another language • Subscription list for this multilingual newsletter

Did you know?

It's quick and easy to insert a references list.

Place the cursor where you want to display the references list (usually at the bottom of the page). Open the "Insert" menu and click the "References list" icon (three books).

If you are using several groups of references, which is relatively rare, you will have the opportunity to specify the group. If you do that, then only the references that belong to the specified group will be displayed in this list of references.

Finally, click "Insert" in the dialog to insert the References list. This list will change as you add more footnotes to the page.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor team has fixed many bugs. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are improving support for Arabic and Indic scripts, and adapting the visual editor to the needs of the Wikivoyages and Wikisources.

Recent changes

The visual editor is now available to all users at most Wikivoyages. It was also enabled for all contributors at the French Wikinews.

The single edit tab feature combines the "Edit" and "Edit source" tabs into a single "Edit" tab. It has been deployed to several Wikipedias, including Hungarian, Polish, English and Japanese Wikipedias, as well as to all Wikivoyages. At these wikis, you can change your settings for this feature in the "Editing" tab of Special:Preferences. The team is now reviewing the feedback and considering ways to improve the design before rolling it out to more people.

Future changes

The "Save page" button will say "Publish page". This will affect both the visual and wikitext editing systems. More information is available on Meta.

The visual editor will be offered to all editors at the remaining "Phase 6" Wikipedias during the next few months. The developers want to know whether typing in your language feels natural in the visual editor. Please post your comments and the language(s) that you tested at the feedback thread on mediawiki.org. This will affect several languages, including: Arabic, Hindi, Thai, Tamil, Marathi, Malayalam, Urdu, Persian, Bengali, Assamese, Aramaic and others.

The team is working with the volunteer developers who power Wikisource to provide the visual editor there, for opt-in testing right now and eventually for all users. (T138966)

The team is working on a modern wikitext editor. It will look like the visual editor, and be able to use the citoid service and other modern tools. This new editing system may become available as a Beta Feature on desktop devices around September 2016. You can read about this project in a general status update on the Wikimedia mailing list.

Let's work together

• Do you teach new editors how to use the visual editor? Did you help set up the Citoid automatic reference feature for your wiki? Have you written or imported TemplateData for your most important citation templates? Would you be willing to help new editors and small communities with the visual editor? Please sign up for the new VisualEditor Community Taskforce.
• Learn how to improve the "automagical" citoid referencing system in the visual editor, by creating Zotero translators for popular sources in your language! Watch the Tech Talk by Sebastian Karcher for more information.

If you aren't reading this in your preferred language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you!

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk), 21:09, 30 June 2016 (UTC)

Acceptance of nomination for a Wikipedia adminship

Hi, Natalie. I hereby accept your co-nom of me for a Wikipedia adminship and I have published the nom page here. I am humbled by your faith and trust in me. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 23:00, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

File:Juan Habichuela flamenco guitarist.jpg listed for discussion

A file that you uploaded or altered, File:Juan Habichuela flamenco guitarist.jpg, has been listed at Wikipedia:Files for discussion. Please see the discussion to see why it has been listed (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry). Feel free to add your opinion on the matter below the nomination. Thank you. ww2censor (talk) 23:02, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

File:Antonio Rey Navas.jpg listed for discussion

A file that you uploaded or altered, File:Antonio Rey Navas.jpg, has been listed at Wikipedia:Files for discussion. Please see the discussion to see why it has been listed (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry). Feel free to add your opinion on the matter below the nomination. Thank you. ww2censor (talk) 23:07, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

File:Jean-Luc Montminy.jpg listed for discussion

A file that you uploaded or altered, File:Jean-Luc Montminy.jpg, has been listed at Wikipedia:Files for discussion. Please see the discussion to see why it has been listed (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry). Feel free to add your opinion on the matter below the nomination. Thank you. ww2censor (talk) 23:08, 1 July 2016 (UTC)

Sorry but unfortunately the source pages do not indicate the copyright status of the images nominated as above. If the person is alive we can only accept freely licensed images for deceased people it is more complex and requires more information. ww2censor (talk) 10:53, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

2 July 2016

Dear Natalie,
I hope you are keeping well? All is well here and I am still on my Wikibreak, even though I login most days, mainly to check messages, tidy up my user page, and help a little bit where I can (like welcoming new editors). I have a lot of hand-written prose for several articles (current and new), but I prefer to carry out such marathons of massive updates when I'm sure I'll be able to devote several hours per edit session, which I can't at the moment.
I was sorry to see that the effort to bring the Laucke article to FA status has been suspended, but I am sure ce n'est que partie remise. I browsed it again today, after staying away for a while, and found a few sentences that I felt I could improve further. I have not gone through the whole article, but please feel free to revert any of these few copy edit changes if you end up concluding they don't add much value.
If you intend to work on something else and would wish for my participation, I'd be glad to consider joining you in another effort. For example, I noticed recently that the article on Quebec French does not have a section on archaïsmes, unlike the corresponding French article. This is a topic that fascinates me, as you know, and I'd love to work with someone like you on this, as a means to learn more about it. Another (cosmetic) aspect about that network of articles, is that some of the tables could have their entries sorted in alphabetical order, which I'd be happy to do, given my Wikignome-ish tendencies.
In any case, I trust the weather is warm now, where you live, and that you are in good health and happy.
Have a great weekend, Natalie.
With kindest regards, as ever;
Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 14:55, 2 July 2016 (UTC)

This week's article for improvement (week 27, 2016)

An answering machine Hello, Natalie.Desautels. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Answering machine Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Home page • List of aqueducts in the Roman Empire Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 4 July 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI •

This week's article for improvement (week 28, 2016)

An ear of rye Hello, Natalie.Desautels. The following is WikiProject Today's articles for improvement's weekly selection: Rye Please be bold and help to improve this article! Previous selections: Answering machine • Home page Get involved with the TAFI project. You can: Nominate an article • Review nominations Posted by: MusikBot talk 00:07, 11 July 2016 (UTC) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of WikiProject TAFI •

Talkback

Hello, Natalie.Desautels. You have new messages at Template:Did you know nominations/Flamenco Road.
Message added 13:53, 11 July 2016 (UTC). You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

North America¹⁰⁰⁰ 13:53, 11 July 2016 (UTC)

DYK nomination of Flamenco Road

Hello! Your submission of Flamenco Road at the Did You Know nominations page has been reviewed, and some issues with it may need to be clarified. Please review the comment(s) underneath your nomination's entry and respond there as soon as possible. Thank you for contributing to Did You Know! BlueMoonset (talk) 00:43, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

This nomination needs your attention as soon as possible. Thank you. BlueMoonset (talk) 17:45, 31 August 2016 (UTC)

Natalie, further issues have been found with all the previous hooks; you will need to come up with a new hook very soon if you wish this nomination to continue. Thank you very much. BlueMoonset (talk) 05:15, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

Hi BlueMoonset. Many thanks for your good work. At this point it's probably best to throw this fish back for lack of 'hookiness' (pun intended). Alt 1 through 3 have some floundering potential though, but ...perhaps best to heed Budhha's advice ~ 'don't think you can save the drowning man (or fish, as it were)'. kindest regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 17:33, 13 September 2016 (UTC)

Have a good Wiki-break! ;-))

Dear Natalie,
Have a good one, and don't work too hard! ... And no scoffing too many croissants when Canadian athletes win medals...
Looking forward to your return.
With kindest regards;
Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 09:38, 18 July 2016 (UTC)

Dear Pdebee, too late ; ...already put on several pounds due to croissants over indulgence ...now I have to find time to go on a diet on top of all this translation work! ...just kidding of course, but it was lovely to hear from you and thank you for the good wishes. ...be in touch again soon. kindest regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 19:41, 24 July 2016 (UTC)

Congratulations on your reaching the 6,000 edits mark! ツ

Dear Natalie,
I know you're still away and busy with Rio2016, but wanted to send you my warmest congratulations for turning into a:

This editor is a Grognard Mirabilaire and is entitled to display this 1937 Wikipedia First Edition.

I hope you won't be grogner too fiercely, though...
Speak again when you're back, later this month or so. Until then, please keep well and don't work too hard!
Bien cordialement,
Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 14:13, 22 August 2016 (UTC)

Hi Pdebee, Thank you so much; ...celebrating with the usual croissants here ...not 'grognard' at all . Rio was grand, ...helping people understand each others language is always rewarding for me. With the very little extra time I had, I took in some of the events, which were incredible. I've been really busy with translation work; ...not much time for anything else at the moment. It was lovely to hear from you, always. C'était très agréable d'avoir des vos nouvelles, toujours ...my kindest regards, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 17:33, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

Dear Natalie,

Brava! Welcome back! Looking forward to your continued contributions here at the Wiki, once you've caught your breath.

Bien cordialement;

Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 19:19, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

Editing News #3—2016

Read this in another language • Subscription list for this multilingual newsletter • Subscribe or unsubscribe on the English Wikipedia

Did you know?

Did you know that you can easily re-arrange columns and rows in the visual editor?

Select a cell in the column or row that you want to move. Click the arrow at the start of that row or column to open the dropdown menu (shown). Choose either "Move before" or "Move after" to move the column, or "Move above" or "Move below" to move the row.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor Team has mainly worked on a new wikitext editor. They have also released some small features and the new map editing tool. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. You can find links to the list of work finished each week at mw:VisualEditor/Weekly triage meetings. Their current priorities are fixing bugs, releasing the 2017 wikitext editor as a beta feature, and improving language support.

Recent changes

• You can now set text as small or big.[5]
• Invisible templates have been shown as a puzzle icon. Now, the name of the invisible template is displayed next to the puzzle icon.[6] A similar feature will display the first part of hidden HTML comments.[7]
• Categories are displayed at the bottom of each page. If you click on the categories, the dialog for editing categories will open.[8]
• At many wikis, you can now add maps to pages. Go to the Insert menu and choose the "Maps" item. The Discovery department are adding more features to this area, like geoshapes. You can read more on MediaWiki.org.[9]
• The "Save" button now says "Save page" when you create a page, and "Save changes" when you change an existing page.[10] In the future, the "Save page" button will say "Publish page". This will affect both the visual and wikitext editing systems. More information is available on Meta.
• Image galleries now use a visual mode for editing. You can see thumbnails of the images, add new files, remove unwanted images, rearrange the images by dragging and dropping, and add captions for each image. Use the "Options" tab to set the gallery's display mode, image sizes, and add a title for the gallery.[11]

Future changes

The visual editor will be offered to all editors at the remaining 10 "Phase 6" Wikipedias during the next month. The developers want to know whether typing in your language feels natural in the visual editor. Please post your comments and the language(s) that you tested at the feedback thread on mediawiki.org. This will affect several languages, including Thai, Burmese and Aramaic.

The team is working on a modern wikitext editor. The 2017 wikitext editor will look like the visual editor and be able to use the citoid service and other modern tools. This new editing system may become available as a Beta Feature on desktop devices in October 2016. You can read about this project in a general status update on the Wikimedia mailing list.

Let's work together

Do you teach new editors how to use the visual editor? Did you help set up the Citoid automatic reference feature for your wiki? Have you written or imported TemplateData for your most important citation templates? Would you be willing to help new editors and small communities with the visual editor? Please sign up for the new VisualEditor Community Taskforce.

If you aren't reading this in your preferred language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you! Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:19, 14 October 2016 (UTC)

Wikifriends?

Dear Natalie,
I hope you are keeping well and not too busy? All is well here...
I would feel honoured if you would permit me to add the following userbox on my user page:

This user is a WikiFriend with User:Natalie.Desautels.

However, please don't hesitate to decline, and I will readily accept—and fully respect—your decision, with good grace.
Thank you.
With kindest regards, as always;
Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 21:29, 23 October 2016 (UTC)

Dear Patrick,
...very nice to hear from you! I am in Paris staying on the gorgeous Avenue des Champs-Élysées ...can see the impressive Arc de Triomphe from my window. I'm here for a few weeks ...combination of business and pleasure, including real French croissants made using that incomparable French butter. ...and that unique 'soupe de poisson avec sa rouille', and the cod, 'loup' and other fish caught and served fresh daily, and ...did I mention the mille-feuille with that distinct Crème Chantilly? And theatre, concerts, books ...lots of books...

Oops, ...got carried away again it seems... Indeed, I would be honoured to be connected with the 'friend' userbox you so kindly mentioned.

kindest regards, as always, Natalie Desautels _{…as within, so without} 01:55, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Dear Natalie,

Mon Dieu; que de plats les plus savoureux les uns que les autres! On ne sait plus où donner de la bouche! Bonne chance, malgré tout, au pays des arts et de la pensée... et de la bonne bouffe (de toute évidence!)...

Thank you for your kind acquiescence of our Wikifriendship in userbox form!

Please consider dropping me a note when you're back in Wiki-action; thank you, Natalie.

Until then, please keep well and joyful, and beware of la gourmandise...

Mille amitiés les plus cordiales;

Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 22:08, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Need a translation

Hello, Natalie! I guess you are back home now and settling into your fall schedule. Welcome back to Wikipedia! It's nice to see you editing again. I'm just now finishing a copy-edit of Operation Dragoon. In that article there is a photo of a procession after the liberation of Marseilles in 1944. I see in the file description that the only description of the photo is in French. Since the officer Jean de Lattre de Tassigny is a key figure in the article, and there are a number of people in the photo, I think it would be nice to have the description also in English so that readers who do not know French can read it and see which one is de Tassigny. I wonder if you feel like translating the description and adding it (if that is permitted). I understand most of it but would not be able to do as good a job as you could. Here is the image:

Liberation of Marseille, August 1944

 – Corinne (talk) 18:51, 25 October 2016 (UTC)

Dear Corinne,

In her reply in the section immediately above, Natalie told me yesterday that she's currently in Paris for a few weeks. I hope she/you won't mind that I jumped in...

With kind regards;

Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 19:43, 25 October 2016 (UTC)

P.S. I have been thinking about your idea of adding the translation into the description of the file itself, but I don't know whether that's allowable. I would suggest the obvious: add a summary of the (long-ish) translation into the caption (see the article on the Yalta Conference, for an example of a photo with a long caption). I have added such a summary in the third subsection below.

Hope this helped some more. Best wishes, Corinne.

Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 22:46, 25 October 2016 (UTC)

Original description

André Diethelm [Identifié par ressemblance avec le portrait disponible sur senat.fr] passe en revue des troupes dans Marseille libérée en août 1944. On reconnaît, derrière Diethelm, le général de Lattre de Tassigny (en pantalon et chemise d'uniforme, sans veste, regardant sur sa droite les soldats) et Emmanuel d'Astier de La Vigerie, à droite de la photo. Entre les deux précédents, derrière Diethelm, en képi à feuilles de chêne, le général de Monsabert. Photographie prise sur le quai de Rive-Neuve à l'angle avec le cours Jean-Ballard<ref>Localisation faite en reconnaissant les traits des bâtiments, qui n'ont guère changé depuis.

Translation

André Diethelm [identified by resemblance with the portrait available at senat.fr] reviewing troops in Marseille, liberated in August 1944. Behind Diethelm are: general de Lattre de Tassigny (in uniform trousers and shirt, without jacket, looking at soldiers to his right) and Emmanuel d'Astier de La Vigerie, far right in the photo. Between the latter two and behind Diethelm, is général de Monsabert (in kepi with oak leaf). Photo shot (by an unknown author) on the quay de Rive-Neuve at the angle with Cours Jean-Ballard. Location identified through recognition of local buildings, which have not changed much since then.

Suggested caption

André Diethelm reviewing troops in Marseille, liberated in August 1944. Behind Diethelm are: general de Lattre de Tassigny (in uniform trousers and shirt, without jacket, looking at soldiers to his right) and Emmanuel d'Astier de La Vigerie, far right in the photo. Between the latter two and behind Diethelm, is général de Monsabert (in kepi with oak leaf).

Patrick, thank you so much for your reply and for undertaking the translation. This is well written and fine. I'm just wondering – even though the phrase, "liberated in August 1944", is a perfect translation of the phrase in the French description, it does not indicate at all that this review of the troops took place immediately following the liberation of Marseilles, which, given the subject matter of the article, would be more pertinent. I mean, can we not assume that that was when the photo was taken? Can we safely write:

• André Diethelm reviewing troops in Marseille, following the liberation of the city in August 1944...., or

• André Diethelm reviewing troops in Marseille, upon liberation of the city in August 1944....?

Or do you prefer the original (i.e., your) wording?

Also, when I was editing the article, I was struck by the spelling "Marseille", so I looked at the WP article Marseille, and I saw that "Marseille" is the French spelling and that "Marseilles" is generally used in English. That's why I paused at "Marseille". I was used to seeing "Marseilles". That's really interesting because it's the opposite of what one would expect. One would expect a silent final "s" (found on many French words), left off in the English spelling. I wonder how in the world an "s" found its way onto the English spelling of the name of the city. Do you think the English spelling, "Marseilles", should be used throughout the article Operation Dragoon or the French spelling, "Marseille"?  – Corinne (talk) 14:41, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

Dear Corinne,

You're most welcome, of course; it's always a pleasure.

Well, I simply translated the original description provided by the Wikipedian who uploaded the digital photo into the Wikipedia file. Your query addresses two different events:

1. the date of the liberation of Marseille, which an existing article records as taking place on 29 August 1944;
2. the date when the photograph was taken, which is not on record; so, we simply don't know.

Therefore, what I would do in this case is to refine the date in the first sentence of the caption to:

André Diethelm reviewing troops in Marseille, liberated on 29 August 1944. ...

This would provide more precision, even though it does not address your suggestion to change the translation to "following the liberation of the city" or "upon the liberation of the city", which is nonetheless very strongly implied. One could of course assume that these important and very busy officials would not have chosen to hang around in Marseille for very long. Therefore, one could further assume the photo to have been shot in late August (29, 30, 31) or in early September. However, we simply don't know. The article on fr:André Diethelm does not provide a date for this parade either; so: we simply cannot date the photo without first searching for a verifiable source that provides the date of this parade, on the supposition that this specific event was ever recorded and documented by historians.

As you already know, the article (at our en Wiki) does not have the final 's' in the spelling of Marseille, but does mention the English spelling in the first sentence of the lead section. Therefore, both spellings are available to the reader in a single source, and I am happy to let you decide how to spell it in the caption: Marseille or Marseilles.

With kindest regards, as always;

Patrick. ツ Pdebee.^{(talk)(guestbook)} 19:37, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

P.S. Maybe you could consider copying this entire section into the talk page of the article on Operation Dragoon, for our accountability to other editors? Thank you, Corinne.

I have copied this discussion to the talk page of the article: Talk:Operation Dragoon#Need a translation.  – Corinne (talk) 21:02, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

ArbCom Elections 2016: Voting now open!

Hello, Natalie.Desautels. Voting in the 2016 Arbitration Committee elections is open from Monday, 00:00, 21 November through Sunday, 23:59, 4 December to all unblocked users who have registered an account before Wednesday, 00:00, 28 October 2016 and have made at least 150 mainspace edits before Sunday, 00:00, 1 November 2016.

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

If you wish to participate in the 2016 election, please review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 22:08, 21 November 2016 (UTC)

Laucke-ish

I just noticed (was alerted via username link) some activity on Laucke. It seems to be a disagreement with User:Corinne and another editor, so I'll let it run its course, but... lately I have been feeling pangs of guilt for being a little too brusque with my closing comment on the FAC. I sincerely hope you will accept my apology... mea culpa.  Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 06:11, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Editing News #1—2017

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Did you know?

Did you know that you can review your changes visually?

When you are finished editing the page, type your edit summary and then choose "Review your changes".

In visual mode, you will see additions, removals, new links, and formatting highlighted. Other changes, such as changing the size of an image, are described in notes on the side.

Click the toggle button to switch between visual and wikitext diffs.

The wikitext diff is the same diff tool that is used in the wikitext editors and in the page history.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the VisualEditor Team has spent most of their time supporting the 2017 wikitext editor mode which is available inside the visual editor as a Beta Feature, and adding the new visual diff tool. Their workboard is available in Phabricator. You can find links to the work finished each week at mw:VisualEditor/Weekly triage meetings. Their current priorities are fixing bugs, supporting the 2017 wikitext editor as a beta feature, and improving the visual diff tool.

Recent changes

A new wikitext editing mode is available as a Beta Feature on desktop devices. The 2017 wikitext editor has the same toolbar as the visual editor and can use the citoid service and other modern tools. Go to Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-betafeatures to enable the ⧼Visualeditor-preference-newwikitexteditor-label⧽.

A new visual diff tool is available in VisualEditor's visual mode. You can toggle between wikitext and visual diffs. More features will be added to this later. In the future, this tool may be integrated into other MediaWiki components. [12]

The team have added multi-column support for lists of footnotes. The <references /> block can automatically display long lists of references in columns on wide screens. This makes footnotes easier to read. You can request multi-column support for your wiki. [13]

Other changes:

• You can now use your web browser's function to switch typing direction in the new wikitext mode. This is particularly helpful for RTL language users like Urdu or Hebrew who have to write JavaScript or CSS. You can use Command+Shift+X or Control+Shift+X to trigger this. [14]
• The way to switch between the visual editing mode and the wikitext editing mode is now consistent. There is a drop-down menu that shows the two options. This is now the same in desktop and mobile web editing, and inside things that embed editing, such as Flow. [15]
• The Categories item has been moved to the top of the Page options menu (from clicking on the icon) for quicker access. [16] There is also now a "Templates used on this page" feature there. [17]
• You can now create <chem> tags (sometimes used as <ce>) for chemical formulas inside the visual editor. [18]
• Tables can be set as collapsed or un-collapsed. [19]
• The Special character menu now includes characters for Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics and angle quotation marks (‹› and ⟨⟩) . The team thanks the volunteer developer, Tpt. [20]
• A bug caused some section edit conflicts to blank the rest of the page. This has been fixed. The team are sorry for the disruption. [21]
• There is a new keyboard shortcut for citations: Control+Shift+K on a PC, or Command+Shift+K on a Mac. It is based on the keyboard shortcut for making links, which is Control+K on a PC or Command+K on a Mac. [22]

Future changes

• The VisualEditor team is working with the Community Tech team on a syntax highlighting tool. It will highlight matching pairs of <ref> tags and other types of wikitext syntax. You will be able to turn it on and off. It will first become available in VisualEditor's built-in wikitext mode, maybe late in 2017. [23]
• The kind of button used to Show preview, Show changes, and finish an edit will change in all WMF-supported wikitext editors. The new buttons will use OOjs UI. The buttons will be larger, brighter, and easier to read. The labels will remain the same. You can test the new button by editing a page and adding &ooui=1 to the end of the URL, like this: https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Project:Sandbox?action=edit&ooui=1 The old appearance will no longer be possible, even with local CSS changes. [24]
• The outdated 2006 wikitext editor will be removed later this year. It is used by approximately 0.03% of active editors. See a list of editing tools on mediawiki.org if you are uncertain which one you use. [25]

If you aren't reading this in your preferred language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly, so that we can notify you when the next issue is ready. Thank you! User:Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 19:19, 9 May 2017 (UTC)

Your access to AWB may be temporarily removed

Hello Natalie.Desautels! This message is to inform you that due to editing inactivity, your access to AutoWikiBrowser may be temporarily removed. If you do not resume editing within the next week, your username will be removed from the CheckPage. This is purely for routine maintenance and is not indicative of wrongdoing on your part. You may regain access at any time by simply requesting it at WP:PERM/AWB. Thank you! — MusikBot II ^talk 20:23, 31 October 2017 (UTC)

Women in Red World Contest

Hi. We're into the last five days of the Women in Red World Contest. There's a new bonus prize of $200 worth of books of your choice to win for creating the most new women biographies between 0:00 on the 26th and 23:59 on 30th November. If you've been contributing to the contest, thank you for your support, we've produced over 2000 articles. If you haven't contributed yet, we would appreciate you taking the time to add entries to our articles achievements list by the end of the month. Thank you, and if participating, good luck with the finale!

Editing News #1—2018

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Did you know?

Did you know that you can now use the visual diff tool on any page?

Sometimes, it is hard to see important changes in a wikitext diff. This screenshot of a wikitext diff (click to enlarge) shows that the paragraphs have been rearranged, but it does not highlight the removal of a word or the addition of a new sentence.

If you enable the Beta Feature for "⧼visualeditor-preference-visualdiffpage-label⧽", you will have a new option. It will give you a new box at the top of every diff page. This box will let you choose either diff system on any edit.

Click the toggle button to switch between visual and wikitext diffs.

In the visual diff, additions, removals, new links, and formatting changes will be highlighted. Other changes, such as changing the size of an image, are described in notes on the side.

This screenshot shows the same edit as the wikitext diff. The visual diff highlights the removal of one word and the addition of a new sentence. An arrow indicates that the paragraph changed location.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the Editing Team has spent most of their time supporting the 2017 wikitext editor mode, which is available inside the visual editor as a Beta Feature, and improving the visual diff tool. Their work board is available in Phabricator. You can find links to the work finished each week at mw:VisualEditor/Weekly triage meetings. Their current priorities are fixing bugs, supporting the 2017 wikitext editor, and improving the visual diff tool.

Recent changes

• The 2017 wikitext editor is available as a Beta Feature on desktop devices. It has the same toolbar as the visual editor and can use the citoid service and other modern tools. The team have been comparing the performance of different editing environments. They have studied how long it takes to open the page and start typing. The study uses data for more than one million edits during December and January. Some changes have been made to improve the speed of the 2017 wikitext editor and the visual editor. Recently, the 2017 wikitext editor opened fastest for most edits, and the 2010 WikiEditor was fastest for some edits. More information will be posted at mw:Contributors/Projects/Editing performance.
• The visual diff tool was developed for the visual editor. It is now available to all users of the visual editor and the 2017 wikitext editor. When you review your changes, you can toggle between wikitext and visual diffs. You can also enable the new Beta Feature for "Visual diffs". The Beta Feature lets you use the visual diff tool to view other people's edits on page histories and Special:RecentChanges. [26]
• Wikitext syntax highlighting is available as a Beta Feature for both the 2017 wikitext editor and the 2010 wikitext editor. [27]
• The citoid service automatically translates URLs, DOIs, ISBNs, and PubMed id numbers into wikitext citation templates. This tool has been used at the English Wikipedia for a long time. It is very popular and useful to editors, although it can be tricky for admins to set up. Other wikis can have this service, too. Please read the instructions. You can ask the team to help you enable citoid at your wiki.

Let's work together

• The team is planning a presentation about editing tools for an upcoming Wikimedia Foundation metrics and activities meeting.
• Wikibooks, Wikiversity, and other communities may have the visual editor made available by default to contributors. If your community wants this, then please contact Dan Garry.
• The <references /> block can automatically display long lists of references in columns on wide screens. This makes footnotes easier to read. This has already been enabled at the English Wikipedia. If you want columns for a long list of footnotes on this wiki, you can use either <references /> or the plain (no parameters) {{reflist}} template. If you edit a different wiki, you can request multi-column support for your wiki. [28]
• If you aren't reading this in your preferred language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly. We will notify you when the next issue is ready for translation. Thank you!

—User:Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 23:15, 28 February 2018 (UTC)

For Generally Being a Cool Wikipedian

	The Platonic Idea of the Poutine
	I couldn't help but notice the quotes on your User page, as well as the general vibe around your work. And no, this award is not because -I'm assuming- you're a Quebecker as well. Good luck in your life, and I hope you pass by sometimes to make some more of your enlightened edits. Cheers! Double Plus Ungood (talk) 05:53, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

Editing News #2—2018

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Did you know?

Did you know that you can use the visual editor on a mobile device?

Tap on the pencil icon to start editing. The page will probably open in the wikitext editor.

You will see another pencil icon in the toolbar. Tap on that pencil icon to the switch between visual editing and wikitext editing.

Remember to publish your changes when you're done.

You can read and help translate the user guide, which has more information about how to use the visual editor.

Since the last newsletter, the Editing Team has wrapped up most of their work on the 2017 wikitext editor and the visual diff tool. The team has begun investigating the needs of editors who use mobile devices. Their work board is available in Phabricator. Their current priorities are fixing bugs and improving mobile editing.

Recent changes

• The Editing team has published an initial report about mobile editing.
• The Editing team has begun a design study of visual editing on the mobile website. New editors have trouble doing basic tasks on a smartphone, such as adding links to Wikipedia articles. You can read the report.
• The Reading team is working on a separate mobile-based contributions project.
• The 2006 wikitext editor is no longer supported. If you used that toolbar, then you will no longer see any toolbar. You may choose another editing tool in your editing preferences, local gadgets, or beta features.
• The Editing team described the history and status of VisualEditor in this recorded public presentation (starting at 29 minutes, 30 seconds).
• The Language team released a new version of Content Translation (CX2) last month, on International Translation Day. It integrates the visual editor to support templates, tables, and images. It also produces better wikitext when the translated article is published. [29]

Let's work together

• The Editing team wants to improve visual editing on the mobile website. Please read their ideas and tell the team what you think would help editors who use the mobile site.
• The Community Wishlist Survey begins next week.
• If you aren't reading this in your preferred language, then please help us with translations! Subscribe to the Translators mailing list or contact us directly. We will notify you when the next issue is ready for translation. Thank you!

— Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 17:12, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

Editing News #1—July 2019

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Did you know?

Did you know that you can use the visual editor on a mobile device?

Every article has a pencil icon at the top. Tap on the pencil icon to start editing.

Edit Cards

This is what the new Edit Cards for editing links in the mobile visual editor look like. You can try the prototype here: 📲 Try Edit Cards.

Welcome back to the Editing newsletter.

Since the last newsletter, the team has released two new features for the mobile visual editor and has started developing three more. All of this work is part of the team's goal to make editing on mobile web simpler.

Before talking about the team's recent releases, we have a question for you:

Are you willing to try a new way to add and change links?

If you are interested, we would value your input! You can try this new link tool in the mobile visual editor on a separate wiki.

Follow these instructions and share your experience:

📲 Try Edit Cards.

Recent releases

The mobile visual editor is a simpler editing tool, for smartphones and tablets using the mobile site. The Editing team has recently launched two new features to improve the mobile visual editor:

1. Section editing
   • The purpose is to help contributors focus on their edits.
   • The team studied this with an A/B test. This test showed that contributors who could use section editing were 1% more likely to publish the edits they started than people with only full-page editing.
2. Loading overlay
   • The purpose is to smooth the transition between reading and editing.

Section editing and the new loading overlay are now available to everyone using the mobile visual editor.

New and active projects

This is a list of our most active projects. Watch these pages to learn about project updates and to share your input on new designs, prototypes and research findings.

• Edit cards: This is a clearer way to add and edit links, citations, images, templates, etc. in articles. You can try this feature now. Go here to see how: 📲Try Edit Cards.
• Mobile toolbar refresh: This project will learn if contributors are more successful when the editing tools are easier to recognize.
• Mobile visual editor availability: This A/B test asks: Are newer contributors more successful if they use the mobile visual editor? We are collaborating with 20 Wikipedias to answer this question.
• Usability improvements: This project will make the mobile visual editor easier to use.  The goal is to let contributors stay focused on editing and to feel more confident in the editing tools.

Looking ahead

• Wikimania: Several members of the Editing Team will be attending Wikimania in August 2019. They will lead a session about mobile editing in the Community Growth space. Talk to them about how editing can be improved.
• Talk Pages: In the coming months, the Editing Team will begin improving talk pages and communication on the wikis.

Learning more

The VisualEditor on mobile is a good place to learn more about the projects we are working on. The team wants to talk with you about anything related to editing. If you have something to say or ask, please leave a message at Talk:VisualEditor on mobile.

PPelberg (WMF) (talk) and Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 21:25, 15 July 2019 (UTC)

Editing News #2 – Mobile editing and talk pages – October 2019

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Inside this newsletter, the Editing team talks about their work on the mobile visual editor, on the new talk pages project, and at Wikimania 2019.

Help

What talk page interactions do you remember? Is it a story about how someone helped you to learn something new? Is it a story about how someone helped you get involved in a group? Something else? Whatever your story is, we want to hear it!

Please tell us a story about how you used a talk page. Please share a link to a memorable discussion, or describe it on the talk page for this project. The team would value your examples. These examples will help everyone develop a shared understanding of what this project should support and encourage.

Talk Pages

The Talk Pages Consultation was a global consultation to define better tools for wiki communication. From February through June 2019, more than 500 volunteers on 20 wikis, across 15 languages and multiple projects, came together with members of the Foundation to create a product direction for a set of discussion tools. The Phase 2 Report of the Talk Page Consultation was published in August. It summarizes the product direction the team has started to work on, which you can read more about here: Talk Page Project project page.

The team needs and wants your help at this early stage. They are starting to develop the first idea. Please add your name to the "Getting involved" section of the project page, if you would like to hear about opportunities to participate.

Mobile visual editor

The Editing team is trying to make it simpler to edit on mobile devices. The team is changing the visual editor on mobile. If you have something to say about editing on a mobile device, please leave a message at Talk:VisualEditor on mobile.

Edit Cards

What happens when you click on a link. The new Edit Card is bigger and has more options for editing links.

• On 3 September, the Editing team released version 3 of Edit Cards. Anyone could use the new version in the mobile visual editor.
• There is an updated design on the Edit Card for adding and modifying links. There is also a new, combined workflow for editing a link's display text and target.
• Feedback: You can try the new Edit Cards by opening the mobile visual editor on a smartphone. Please post your feedback on the Edit cards talk page.

Toolbar

The editing toolbar is changing in the mobile visual editor. The old system had two different toolbars. Now, all the buttons are together. Tell the team what you think about the new toolbar.

• In September, the Editing team updated the mobile visual editor's editing toolbar. Anyone could see these changes in the mobile visual editor.
  • One toolbar: All of the editing tools are located in one toolbar. Previously, the toolbar changed when you clicked on different things.
  • New navigation: The buttons for moving forward and backward in the edit flow have changed.
  • Seamless switching: an improved workflow for switching between the visual and wikitext modes.
• Feedback: You can try the refreshed toolbar by opening the mobile VisualEditor on a smartphone. Please post your feedback on the Toolbar feedback talk page.

Wikimania

The Editing Team attended Wikimania 2019 in Sweden. They led a session on the mobile visual editor and a session on the new talk pages project. They tested two new features in the mobile visual editor with contributors. You can read more about what the team did and learned in the team's report on Wikimania 2019.

Looking ahead

• Talk Pages Project: The team is thinking about the first set of proposed changes. The team will be working with a few communities to pilot those changes. The best way to stay informed is by adding your username to the list on the project page: Getting involved.
• Testing the mobile visual editor as the default: The Editing team plans to post results before the end of the calendar year. The best way to stay informed is by adding the project page to your watchlist: VisualEditor as mobile default project page.
• Measuring the impact of Edit Cards: The Editing team hopes to share results in November. This study asks whether the project helped editors add links and citations. The best way to stay informed is by adding the project page to your watchlist: Edit Cards project page.

– PPelberg (WMF) (talk) & Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 16:51, 17 October 2019 (UTC)

Editing news 2020 #1 – Discussion tools

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This early version of the Reply tool automatically signs and indents comments.

The Editing team has been working on the talk pages project. The goal of the talk pages project is to help contributors communicate on wiki more easily. This project is the result of the Talk pages consultation 2019.

In a future update, the team plans to test a tool for easily linking to another user's name, a rich-text editing option, and other tools.

The team is building a new tool for replying to comments now. This early version can sign and indent comments automatically. Please test the new Reply tool.

• On 31 March 2020, the new reply tool was offered as a Beta Feature editors at four Wikipedias: Arabic, Dutch, French, and Hungarian. If your community also wants early access to the new tool, contact User:Whatamidoing (WMF).
• The team is planning some upcoming changes. Please review the proposed design and share your thoughts on the talk page. The team will test features such as:
  • an easy way to mention another editor ("pinging"),
  • a rich-text visual editing option, and
  • other features identified through user testing or recommended by editors.

To hear more about Editing Team updates, please add your name to the "Get involved" section of the project page. You can also watch these pages: the main project page, Updates, Replying, and User testing.

– PPelberg (WMF) (talk) & Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 15:45, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Editing news 2020 #2 – Quick updates

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The new features include a toolbar. What do you think should be in the toolbar?

This edition of the Editing newsletter includes information the Wikipedia:Talk pages project, an effort to help contributors communicate on wiki more easily. The central project page is on MediaWiki.org.

• Reply tool: This is available as a Beta Feature at the four partner wikis (Arabic, Dutch, French, and Hungarian Wikipedias). The Beta Feature will get new features soon. The new features include writing comments in a new visual editing mode and pinging other users by typing @. You can test the new features on the Beta Cluster. Some other wikis will have a chance to try the Beta Feature in the coming months.
• New requirements for user signatures: Soon, users will not be able to save invalid custom signatures in Special:Preferences. This will reduce signature spoofing, prevent page corruption, and make new talk page tools more reliable. Most editors will not be affected.
• New discussion tool: The Editing team is beginning work on a simpler process for starting new discussions. You can see the initial design on the project page.
• Research on the use of talk pages: The Editing team worked with the Wikimedia research team to study how talk pages help editors improve articles. We learned that new editors who use talk pages make more edits to the main namespace than new editors who don't use talk pages.

– Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 18:11, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Editing news 2020 #3

On 16 March 2020, the 50 millionth edit was made using the visual editor on desktop.

Seven years ago this week, the Editing team made the visual editor available by default to all logged-in editors using the desktop site at the English Wikipedia. Here's what happened since its introduction:

• The 50 millionth edit using the visual editor on desktop was made this year. More than 10 million edits have been made here at the English Wikipedia.
• More than 2 million new articles have been created in the visual editor. More than 600,000 of these new articles were created during 2019.
• Almost 5 million edits on the mobile site have been made with the visual editor. Most of these edits have been made since the Editing team started improving the mobile visual editor in 2018.
• The proportion of all edits made using the visual editor has been increasing every year.
• Editors have made more than 7 million edits in the 2017 wikitext editor, including starting 600,000 new articles in it. The 2017 wikitext editor is VisualEditor's built-in wikitext mode. You can enable it in your preferences.
• On 17 November 2019, the first edit from outer space was made in the mobile visual editor.
• In 2019, 35% of the edits by newcomers, and half of their first edits, were made using the visual editor. This percentage has been increasing every year since the tool became available.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 02:06, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

Removal from newsletter subscription list

Hello,

It looks like you haven't edited for a long time, so I'm taking your name off of Wikipedia:VisualEditor/Newsletter. If I've guessed wrong, or you come back to Wikipedia in the future, then please feel free to re-add your name, or to put your name on the global list at m:Special:MyLanguage/VisualEditor/Newsletter.

Thanks for your interest in editing.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talk) 02:56, 19 August 2020 (UTC)