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This page contains discussions that have been archived from Village pump. Please do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to revive any of these discussions, either start a new thread or use the talk page associated with that topic.

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Off-Wikipedia discussion board

I recently came across a dispute between rlandmann and greyengine5 and tried to go see what it was about. I searched several talk pages about the topic. And finally found that the discussion of the Wikiproject is being carried off-Wikipedia on a bulletin board. [1] I find this disturbing. Do we have any policy about this? Rmhermen 04:52, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

To view the actual forum, rather than just one topic, see [2]
You can read some of the discussion leading up to this development here. In short, a number of the more active participants in WikiProject Aircraft feel Wikipedia talk pages not conducive to long and detailed discussions.
As for it being "disturbing", I'll just repeat a comment I made before the trial started -"there's nothing more "sinister" about wikipedians using an external forum to discuss aspects of a project than if we were exchanging private email, or chatting via IRC or any other IM network (or meeting in person over a cup of coffee). In fact, a web forum ensures a transparency and accountability that none of those other modes of communication do."
Finally, from the beginning, this has been described as a "trial". If there are objections from the broader community (on the basis of policy or otherwise), then we'd like to know about them. Anyone with doubts as to why some of us have felt a need for a different way of talking about the project is free to try and make sense of the dog's breakfast that is the archived talk pages of WikiProject Aircraft. --Rlandmann 05:25, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
IRC and IM provide something which Wikipedia does not - realtime communication. When decisions are made over IRC or IM, the log files are usually posted on the talk pages to allow others to catch up and voice objections. Talk pages are Wikipedia's non-realtime discussion feature. If you don't want to use them, you should have good reasons not to. By using an external forum, you lose 1) watchlist notification of discussions on a particular article, 2) discussions showing up in RC, 3) clear track record of all discussions associated with a particular page, 4) refactoring, 5) licensing of discussions as being part of the Wikimedia text corpus, 6) ability to post under your name without re-registration, 7) wiki-markup in comments (including image markup). ...
Not everyone who works on articles which are part of a WikiProject's scope is a member of a WikiProject or interested in becoming one. Hence, many people who will edit these articles will be confused as to what is going on and why certain decisions are made. Transparency of the decision-making process is key on Wikipedia.
But the biggest problem is the risk of the discussions being lost. Conversations on talk pages are automatically backed up together with the rest of the DB and will exist as long as Wikipedia itself exists. What happens to the forum you set up if you lose interest, or if the server harddisk crashes?
Talk pages certainly take a while to get used to, and there is room for improvement in terms of usability. However, when properly handled, they are superior to a forum. That's because you can take a discussion that went over 30 pages and summarize it down to three essential paragraphs. You can use all the functionality of the wiki in your posts. You can create any type of poll with any voting system you want. When someone comments on a page in your watchlist, you will be notified. You can allow other people to edit and improve your comments (as I do).
For all the reasons above, I strongly recommend not to use an external forum. Not being actively involved in the pages of this WikiProject, I will leave it at that. But if a single person who is actively involved does not want to participate in this forum, that should be reason enough to close it down.--Eloquence*
Related discussion on Wikipedia talk:Village pump as to whether the village pump should be moved to a forum. Angela. 11:31, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)
I am concerned about not only the lack of record of discussion but the lack of advertisment of its existence or of the poll being taken. But announcing polls is always a weak point. I think we need to use Wikipedia:Community_Portal and Wikipedia:Current surveys more. Rmhermen 14:11, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)
I'm not sure what you're talking about. It's clearly displayed at the top of Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Aircraft.
As for it being 'disturbing' - how so? It's open for everyone to read. Registration is not required. It's a functional system for viewing posts, rather than a cobbled-together mishmash like the wikipedia talk pages. IRC and IM have no tangible or permanent logs, while this forum cannot be edited or deleted at someone's whim. If a similar system was integrated into the mediawiki, would you call it disturbing then?
As far as user:Rmhermen's concerns, I've not seen him as an active participant of the project either on the talk pages or off. The forum will remain online indefinitely, as the server has daily backups and the forum will remain there whether i retain my interest in wikipedia or not. Having seen the absurdly high level of bickering, infighting, resistance to change, and pointless discussion which goes on, that interest is in fact already beginning to wane. -eric 19:21, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)
I second what rlandmann and Ericg have said above, that forum is permanent enough, and what's more it provides a far better medium for discussion and opinion-gauging votes, especially on policy issues, than an ordinary Wikipedia talk page. In addition, it's clearly listed at the very top of the WikiProject:Aircraft talk page, so it's not as if it's hard to find or secret. This is not like an ICQ session at all, it's totally open and transparent. Anybody can view it and contribute to it. Impi 08:58, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I have no problems with users discussing things off-Wikipedia. But I have a MAJOR problem when they come back with a policy change based on discussion that occurred, for example, on IRC. That's unacceptable. RickK 22:39, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

Alias (television)

What is the general consensus about this article? Having procreated a separate article for each episode of the television series, each article looks slightly peculiar.
There have been three seasons so far, each season having 22 episodes and each episode has a separate article in Wikipedia, with a premise which gives a resume of the action, as well as the cast of guest actors and their characters, director and writers. Not being seemingly very worldly-wise, am I being paranoic about this? Or am I being a spoilsport if I imagine this being slightly exagerated as a treatment for a television series? Or is it so super a programme that it is absolutely necessary to go into detail with a separated article like that? Am I wrong? Dieter Simon 01:02, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

A common thing newcomers seem to like to do is to "make structure" first, in the hope that it can be filled out later. But really wiki grows by refactoring, not by "fleshing out". So I'd say put everything in the series article, including characters, metaplot, actors, and individual episodes in one big article. If the article grows so much (by dint of there being a comitted userbase who have put in the effort of writing decent content for it) then split it into three our four articles (say one main one, and one per season). Only when that solution has outgrown convenience do we really need one article per episode. It's not that more episodes take up more room (they do, but that's trivial), it's that information chopped up into such little bits is too hard for the reader to find. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 01:13, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I remember asking myself the same question a few months ago. I noticed that the body of the episode articles seemed to be a copyright violation, but I wasn't sure. Can you check into this? If it is, then the articles on individual episodes should probably be deleted, which would solve your problem. Acegikmo1 01:38, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
If they were just the paragraph plot summaries, I'd agree merge, but since they have so many other details that are episode-specific (director, writer, guest cast, notes), it would end up being about 130K, which does qualify for breakouts. Even doing one article per season would be over 40K, still well over the recommended 30K limit. For the record, in general, given a choice I would rather have breakout articles for episodes, rather than for every regular and recurring fictional character and object, as I think the episode articles are more encyclopedic, expandable, and comprehensive--they can not only include the things these are starting with, but also ratings, controversies or other notable response to the episode, etc. That being said, Unveiled (Alias episode) and Almost 30 Years (Alias episode) may be copyvios, as they appear to use the same text as several other sites, perhaps from tvtome.com or www.episodelist.com. On the other hand, since tvtome is using it, it may be from a press release, which, by definition, doesn't seem like it could be protected by copyright. If they are copyvios, it gets worse, because Truth be Told (Alias episode) does NOT appear to be a copyvio, so each one would have to be evaluated separately. (this is all based on my scanning those three named articles--if they are not valid samples, please suggest ones that are.)Niteowlneils 02:46, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I'd say rewrite anything this person wrote from scratch, and tell me if they keep reverting it. Derrick Coetzee

I'd say, actually read what I have written. Derrick Coetzee, you easily qualify as the single-handedly most discourtious, outright rude in fact, wikipedian I have yet to had the displeasure to interact with. Shame on you for trying to discourage new contributors on a whim. It seems that, to you, besmirching and insulting newcomers is easy prey due to your seniority status (of course, it means you can make sweeping negative generalizations with respect to my entire reputation and abilities here without inconviniencing yourself to examine the facts). Anything. Does that include abuse? El_C

Addendum:

Derrick Coetzee has written to me that the above passage was stated in jest. I appreciate the clarification and I retract my comments directly above.

I request that any further comments regarding the Kahan Commission article be directed towards Talk:Kahan Commission. Thanks. El_C

And actually, I'm not convinced that is the formal name

Would the official Report convince you? I provide both an online and print sources to it in the article (I caution you, though, this will involve expending 10 seconds of your time, in the usual sense of the word).

To sum up, the unwritten rule: the newcomer is always wrong, and damn the written rules. You learn (not-so) new things everyday! El_C

I don't care who is the newcomer (I didn't check your history, or Diberri's--yours could go back to 2002, or whenever Wikipedia was created, and my comments would be the same)-- 1) I believe the common name should lead. 2) my doubting of whether that is a formal name is largely due to the usage at www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/Foreign+Relations/ Israels+Foreign+Relations+since+1947/1982-1984/ 104%20Report%20of%20the%20Commission%20of%20Inquiry%20into%20the%20events at the refugee camps in Beirut (which at the moment times out) (which I believe is one of the sources you provide in the article)--the fact they capitalize few words leads me to believe it is, at most, a formal description of a "Commission of Inquiry", rather than a formal title of one. Also, I err on the side of caution--clearly the 12-word title is one of the ways that report is known. Whether or not it is a "formal" title is not clear--maybe, maybe not, short of a phone call to the Israeli government, thus my preference for 'also known as'. I spent at least 15-20 minutes researching this issue before logging my reply--I am not the sort that quickly dashes out my 'gut reaction'. Niteowlneils 14:17, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Grammar and complete sentences

At Talk:Kahan Commission, User:El C and I have been having a spirited conversation about the use of complete sentences in the 'pedia. He contends that

Formally, the Commission of Inquiry into the Events at the Refugee Camps in Beirut.

is a complete sentence, but I disagree. I tried to correct the sentence fragment [3] in accordance with Wikipedia:How to start a page#General principles and Wikipedia:How to copyedit, but was promptly reverted. This is a very minor dispute, but I was hoping that some more seasoned Wikipedians could lend me their guidance. (Of course, if I'm wrong about the above example being a sentence fragment, then please let me know.) Thanks in advance, Diberri | Talk 00:37, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)

This is, of course, a sentence fragment (a noun phrase in fact); it tells me nothing about said Commission (try tacking "doesn't exist" onto the end to see what I mean). Also, it makes vicious overuse of capitalization. At most, only Beirut and Commission of Inquiry should be capitalized. I'd say rewrite anything this person wrote from scratch, and tell me if they keep reverting it. Derrick Coetzee 00:50, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
The noun phrase would be fine as a parenthetical aside after the common name, but it is not complete enough for the first sentence of an article. And the uncommon name shouldn't lead anyway (2700 hits to 190). I'd use (the Israeli gov site doesn't use so many caps):
The Kahan Commission (וועדת כאהן), formally, the Commission of Inquiry into the events at the refugee camps in Beirut (וועדת חקירה לחקירת האירועים במחנות הפליטים בביירות), was established by the Israeli government on 28 September, 1982, to investigate the Sabra and Shatila Massacre (16-18 September, 1982).
And actually, I'm not convinced that is the formal name (in the usual sense of the word), and instead of "formally" would say "also known as". Niteowlneils 02:10, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
---
Formally, the Commission of Inquiry into the Events at the Refugee Camps in Beirut.
If that's a complete sentence, then... :-)
chocolateboy 02:30, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

NPOV tag

Division_of_Korea has been tagged NPOV by an anonymous user. Can anyone please check whether this tag should be there? I have been too involved in the article to judge this. Thanks in advance. Kokiri 22:23, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Perhaps you should ask the user who did it.
Acegikmo1 00:53, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
The article seems alright to me. The anon should explains himself; otherwise it's just a form of malicious vandalism or experiment that should be ignored if the anon doesn't explain himself in a few days. I mean, a flashing NPOV tag is a big deal that we'd wanna fix, and the "accuser" should at least have the courtesy to be less vague about his claim. Some explanations on the Talk would've been very nice. --Menchi 09:45, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Siggy stuff

I have a really long user signature...It'd be awesome if we could make a template system where some thing like {{User sig:Ilyanep}} would show up in the markup and your siggy appeared in the page. That'd make a very much cleaner wikimarkup. I'm gonna go submit that at sourceforge~ — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs, DWΑΟΛ) 21:23, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Done Here is the tracking page. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs, DWΑΟΛ) 21:23, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Ouf, that's a horrible sig to look at in the edit view. Ya now, it alreay is possible, just that templates are only included 5 times per page... so the feature you should push for is either a separated sig system, included endlessly, or a general extension of those five instances of a template per page. [[User:Sverdrup|User:Sverdrup]] 22:46, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Wow...nice blinky. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs, DWΑΟΛ) 13:53, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I don't think we should encourage large sigs. -- Cyrius|✎ 22:56, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I don't really like sigs that use images (they look worse on the page in most cases). — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs, DWΑΟΛ) 13:53, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Yeah but they're fun. [[User:Theresa knott|]] 17:12, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Quite! [[User:Anárion|File:Anarion.png]] 18:22, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Oh dear - I'm sorry. That earlier Sig Escalation question looks like it backfired... I only have myself to blame. -- Solipsist 18:53, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC) (shakes head and shuffles off mumbling to himself)
Dunno bout all the pic ppl, but I use genuine unicode :P (take a look at my sig, I made it a template). [[User:Ilyanep|Ilyanep]] 13:09, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Tengwar is not in Unicode yet... [[User:Anárion|File:Anarion.png]] 14:09, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Alternatively, one can use unicode characters that not everyone can see. It's possibly less annoying. zoney ███ talk 23:06, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Just where could one find a big list of unicode characters and how to implement them? I'm feeling rather behind-the-times. Rhymeless 03:38, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Just use any big Unicode list, and type them with &0123; for decimal references, and &x0123; for hex references (default U+0123 form). With Opera 7.5 and up, just type the hex references, select it, and press ctrl+x: 0123 -> ģ! Couldn't be easier to ✍ them. [[User:Anárion|File:Anarion.png]] 07:29, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
There's I nice site I found for getting the unicode values of various greek letters (and more) (which I use for my sig) -- "http://www.redbrick.dcu.ie/help/reference/html-tags/characters.html" [[User:Ilyanep|Ilyanep]] 13:09, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Use of Mediawiki Software and Content

Although I understand that modified code to Mediawiki software must remain open source (right?) and that content at Wikipedia must remain public (right?), can one use Mediawiki software for a commercial purpose (e.g., post advertisements on one's own Mediawiki system)? Could the content of Wikipedia be downloaded by a company who then puts their own version back on the web but includes web advertisements on their system? (I'm possibly interested in doing the former, but just curious about the latter) [[User:Brettz9|Brettz9 (talk)]] 20:57, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Sure, mediawiki is GPL, so you can use it for anything you want. Some of wikipedia's mirrors even run mediawiki (and do half-assed things to hide the edit interface) 'cos they can't figure out how to generate a static version. And they run ads for all kinds of stuff. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 21:24, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I was gonna say (Finlay beat me by like 1 minute). The latter is basically what all of our mirrors do, and you can do the former because the source code for MediaWiki is GPL and Wikipedia chooses to be GPL, but your site's content doesn't have to be — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs, DWΑΟΛ) 21:27, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
You'd have got in first if the server hadn't been struggling to parse your byzantine signature :) -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 01:30, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

google not showing article

The article "Constantin Brunner" is not showing up on google searches, despite having been posted many months ago. Any idea why this would be?

Barrett Pashak

Um, the Google bots have not found it yet? How many wikilinks does it have? — Frecklefoot | Talk 21:10, Aug 17, 2004 (UTC)
See also section 45 Search for a discussion of a similar ongoing problem with the internal search. It may not be related.
Bobblewik 21:17, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Google's algorithm is secret, strange, and ever-changing. Some observations about the Brunner article:
  • It's not very well connected with the rest of wikipedia - its only links are Yehudi Menuhin and Jewish philosophy (and a category)
  • of those, Menuhin's connection to Brunner is weak (google will likely form some loose idea that Menuhin is about "music", whereas Brunner is about philosophy).
  • Menuhin isn't google's fave either - it last crawled it nearly a month ago (so it's likely that google thinks menuhin is already at the "importance cutoff" of its descent tree. It's not a terribly detailed article about him, and there will be numerous better (from google's algorithm's perspective) on the internet. On google you are only as popular as those who link to you.
  • curiously, Jewish philosphy isn't in google's cache at all (I'm less sure I understand why that is)
So, it appears the article is connected only to two articles that google's arcane algorithm doesn't consider to be terribly important in their own right, and as the algorithm runs largely by importance-by-association, Brunner (which indeed isn't in the google cache at all) has fallen off the radar.
Now, Brunner himself isn't very popular with google, getting only 780 odd links over the whole internet. So google might well consider his name too arcane for it to bother much about storing. It's perhaps ironic that one of those google has stored is a wikipedia mirror's version of the very Brunner page ([4]) - note that some of the mirrors deliberately (and more often than not falsely) interlink their articles and have more (fairly meaningless) indices - which may increase google's willingness to traverse their site, when compared with ours.
Executive summary: google is weird. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 21:19, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Thanks. Excellent answer. It really helps me understand Google better. It was the fact that Google does show the mirrors that prompted me to ask the question. Barrett Pashak | Talk 21:25, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
That is the koan of google - you cannot understand it. You can only understand that you can not understand. That's as enlightened as you're gonna get :) -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 21:32, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Votes for deletion

Related to the above, there is a proposal at Wikipedia:Votes for deletion/User:Rambot regarding articles created by Rambot. Are the articles created by Rambot suitable for Wikipedia? If some are not encyclopedic, which should be kept? --Eequor 22:27, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

See also

Rambot

Is there any convenient way to find out what percentage of the Rambot location articles have been edited by a human contributor? Rhymeless 18:59, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You could start out with all those changed by KevinBot these days.. -- User:Docu
KevinBot only changes Rambot pages that have been previously edited by a human? Rhymeless 19:31, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
No. KevinBot will change most (if not all) of the Rambot pages. Kevin Rector 23:01, Aug 17, 2004 (UTC)

RE: policy on formatting

Valençay SOE Memorial - This article is about the memorial and the memorial was created for one reason only: to honor the names of SOE agents listed on it. The list of names here is singular and integral to the article – the names are not another topic to be linked to because the monument and the names engraved on it are one and the same. Because they are integral to the article, they don’t fit into "See also" lists, "Compare" lists, "Related topics" lists, or "Reference" lists. However, User:Ta bu shi da yu removed the list of names and created a separate list: List of people on Valençay SOE Memorial's Roll of Honour. If we are to do separate lists, then the related Special Operations Executive (SOE) article needs a separate list of names. If we use this format for articles, then in all author biographys should there be a separate list for his/her books, or separate lists for actor films? For both conformity with many other such Wikipedia articles and ease of reading access, it seems to me that it detracts from the article to create a seaparate list for the names. User:Ta bu shi da yu reversed my reversal saying: I took this out and put it into a list for a reason. Reverting. My question is: What reason? Following User:Ta bu shi da yu's format, should we then reverse User:Jiang and User:TUF-KAT's REDIRECT from List of Presidents of the United States by removing the list of Presidents names in the Presidents of the United States article and relinking back to the list? Which is the right way? Without much effort, I can add Hollywood Walk of Fame and dozens more such articles that include a list integral to the article. Separate lists make sense where there are several categories of length such as the Wimbledon Championships winners. In these cases it deals with distinct and multiple matters: winners vs losers, male vs female lists, doubles vs singles etc. But when the list of names carries a singular relationship to the article, do we follow the existing setup for "President of the United States" or change it and other such articles to conform to User:Ta bu shi da yu’s separate list system? Thanks for the input. JillandJack 16:32, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Well. Regardless of the "general" policy, I don't think for this specific article the list should be removed. It's a short article! There's one paragraph above the list, and nothing below the list. I don't see why there's a problem keeping the introduction and list together. I mean, it's not really more than what most lists have as an introduction anyways! zoney ███ talk 20:26, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Link rot bot

Hi. I'm interested in creating a 'bot for detecting link rot. As I see it at present, I'd get the bot to download a random page once per suitable time period. The bot would then extract external links from the page, and check the pages pointed to by these links to see if they are still there. Links which remain inaccessible for (say) a number of days would then be listed on a web page. Humans could then occasionally check a page (on my server) to find a list of dead links, and the wikipedia pages that they're on, and could go and have a look.

Comments? If I did this, I would write the program myself and host the bot here (University of Westminster, UK).

Ross-c 15:29, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It's certainly worth doing, although I think you'd need a degree of manual verification of each apparently successful link (that is, you couldn't say a successful HTTP request necessarily meant the exlink was still valid). One thing you don't need to do is to check against an online copy of wikipedia. It'll be much faster, easier, and less server-mangling, if you download a copy of mediawiki and a recent cur database drop, and run the bot on an offline copy. You also don't have to write all of the bot yourself - there's already a python framework for bots which interact with wikipedia. I believe this is what User:Topbanana uses for compiling Wikipedia:Offline reports. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 20:54, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
The offline reports are generated by from periodic database dumps (See [5]). External link validation sounds like a worthy project - if helpful I can generate a list of all external links for you (suggest comma-separated list of "article title,external link", one per line?). - TB 08:10, Aug 18, 2004 (UTC)


Hmmm. I see the point of using an offline database rather than downloading from wikipedia. A list of links would be most of the work, and the rest of the programming would be easy. For the kind of thing I'm thinking of, it'd probably be easier for me to write a bot from scratch, rather than use the framework. However, I'm worried about how much space all the data would take up. I was thinking of running this on one of my servers that only has a few gig free space. The list of links would surely not be that big, no? I was thinking of doing verification based on the http error code (using wget so that temporarily moved links are resolved). More careful verification of the contents of the page the link points at would wait for version 2.0. - Ross-c 20:41, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Summarised sections

Reporting a search problem

There was a previous section about search problems. This was about false positives and misses. For example a search for "600 mps" has been reporting Jungle Carbine as a false positive match since 27 June. A search for 'eden cumbria north west' misses Eden, Cumbria even though it has been a match for 7 weeks. There are others.

I am grateful for the advice to report this as a bug. However, I was unable to do so. I went to the bug web site which required me to register. I succeeded in doing this but then it told me that bugs were now being handled elsewhere. So I went there and that site also required me to register. However when I registered, it did not send me a login. If anyone is already registered for bug reporting, would they be so kind as to report the bug?
Bobblewik 09:37, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Auto Unit Conversion

Since Wikipedia has an international audience, I thought it would be really cool if this worked:

Surround a number, along with its corresponding unit (for example, "22km") with triple round brackets: 

(((22km)))

Then, the Wikipedia software could automatically look at the text in the brackets, run it through a unit conversion (similar to the Google calculator), and present it in the preferred unit of the reader.

What do you think?

Would be cool, but also hard on the server I think. [[User:Anárion|File:Anarion.png]] 07:31, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
And also results in precise imprecision. It's about 20km from here would become It's about 12.43 miles from here. See also overzealous newspapers: She said, "I feel like a million dollars (£548,845.83)". -- Avaragado 08:11, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
You could however present the converted quantity as a tool-tip. I assume. Don't ask me how, my brain hasn't kicked in yet today :-) --Phil | Talk 08:52, Aug 19, 2004 (UTC)
Any number that can be converted can be done so with appropriate precision, simply by having the "calculator" determine the number of significant digits. It could even be clever enough to recognize that "20." has two significant digits, where "20" has only one, or even adopt a more flexible scheme that would reflect common use, translating "20km" into "12mi". However, the server load still seems to be an open question. I would hope this could be done with a JavaScript bookmarklet that would put the load on the client, where it belongs. — Jeff Q 09:58, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Server load would be low -- this is just some extra parsing at page save. [[User:Sverdrup|User:Sverdrup]] 13:45, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Uh...no. Let me spell it out:
  1. We click the button to save the page.
  2. The units are converted per...whose preferences I don't know.
  3. The page is saved.
  4. A user views it.
  5. Now what the heck happens?
I think what the suggester originally meant is:
  1. We click the button to save the page.
  2. The page is saved.
  3. A user views it.
  4. The page is parsed for the conversion to the unit of the viewer's choice.
  5. The new page is sent to the viewer.
However, that is more CPU-expensive. Johnleemk | Talk 13:52, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

That may be workable for logged-in users, but how do we present it to our anonymous visitors? Do we always show metric, always Imperial, base it on their IP address range (=extra server load), what? Also, we'll need to protect ourselves against overzealous conversion; quotes and historical discussions should remain inviolable. IMHO it's probably best to just keep the conversions in wetware. - jredmond 14:26, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Articles for every olympic competitor

I've posted a question on the 2004 Summer Olympics talk page here [7] about how far we should go with articles about olympic athletes.. just medal winners? All of them? Please continue discussion on that page! -- Chuq 06:18, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia Utilities (CSV conversion tool)

Hello all. As it seems, there is no page in the en:wp with a collection of wikipedia-related tools. As I known from the de:wp, there are quite a lot of such tools (see de:Wikipedia:Helferlein), including Scripts to generate lists of articles, discovery copyright-violations, integrating a wikipedia-search into the browser, syntax-highliting for different editors, a reference to the PyBot, etc.a.n. So wouldn't it be good to create such a page? I would even be willing to translate the german page and privide it here. But where would I put it? Wikipedia:Utilities is something else. So, maybe Wikipedia:Tools? Where should that page be linked?

BTW: I stumbeled across this problem because I would like to share with the world a nice little program I devised: it's a PHP-based tool for converting tables from CSV-format to wikimedia-table-syntax. That allowes you to import tables from spread sheet applications like Excel, from databases, or from statistics programs like SPSS into the wikipedia, without having to do much typing and formating. Have a look at de:Benutzer:Duesentrieb/csv2wp (en) and try it out. Now, where do I put this to make it available to more people? thanks -- 84.128.104.197 19:16, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC) (that's de:Benutzer:Duesentrieb).

Hey cool! Someone (Sj) actually created Wikipedia:Tools as I suggested on the IRC while i wrote the above message. So, would anyone like to contribute? -- 84.128.104.197 19:56, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Summarised sections

TheFreeDictionary.com

Someone please tell me that the people behind http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com are violating the GFDL etc in some way.

Surely ripoffs such as this should not be tolerated: http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Canadian%20Tire%20Money Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Tire_Money

Alexburke 07:01, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)

If you look, you can see at the bottom "This article was derived fully or in part from an article on Wikipedia.org - the free encyclopedia created and edited by online user community. The text was not checked or edited by anyone on our staff. Although the vast majority of the wikipedia encyclopedia articles provide accurate and timely information please do not assume the accuracy of any particular article. This article is distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License." The GFDL requires that they mention the GFDL and Wikipedia, and a link to some kind of machine-readable source. That means that they can link either to our main page or (prefarably) the article itself (they link to the article itself). This site is in full GFDL compliance. →Raul654 07:06, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)
Yes, I saw that. I was hoping there was some way their wholesale harvesting/ripoff of WP could/should be halted...Alexburke 07:23, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)
Uh, anyone can download the database (http://download.wikimedia.org/ ). As I said above, the GFDL requires it (that you provide the database or a link to it). The only real complaint about it is that our mirrors compete with us on google. →Raul654 07:32, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)

Missing Wikipedians

Heph, Kingturtle, and Hcheney seem to have disappeared. Anybody seen them around? [[User:Neutrality|Neutrality (talk)]] 16:54, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Oops, accidental reversion

I read the reversion tutorial earlier today, and to recap, it said to click on the date & time of the desired version, and save it. Curious to see an earlier version of Image:Westminstpalace.jpg, I clicked on the "Rev" link by mistake, which reverted it instantly.

Not wishing to break anything else, should I revert it to the version prior to my reversion? Fortunately the image is not linked to a real Wikipedia article.

PhilHibbs 19:18, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Correction: I don't think I have changed anything, looking back at the earlier revisions. PhilHibbs 19:47, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I think you did revert it back to the old one that was darker. I reverted it back for you. G'day. [[User:Ilyanep|Ilyanep]] 20:38, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
That's odd, as the page didn't display the darker image that you get when you click on the 20:11, 19 Aug 2004 link next to my modification log. Neither did the talk page that I found the image on change. PhilHibbs 21:36, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Sometimes the old image is still in the browser cache. With IE, try pressing CTRL and clicking reload at the same time, that often helps. -- Chris 73 Talk 23:11, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I have concerns over the copyright on the perl.com logo on the Perl page. PhilHibbs 12:04, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Then put it on Wikipedia:Copyright problems. That doesn't necesarily mean it will be deleted, just that it will be examined. --Golbez 14:26, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Database Error on Watchlist

I'm getting a database error (again) when I try to view my watchlist. 

A database query syntax error has occurred. This could be because of an illegal search query (see Searching Wikipedia), or it may indicate a bug in the software. The last attempted database query was: 
SELECT cur_namespace,cur_title,cur_comment, cur_id, cur_user,cur_user_text,cur_timestamp,cur_minor_edit,cur_is_new FROM watchlist,cur USE INDEX (name_title_timestamp) WHERE wl_user=44062 AND (wl_namespace=cur_namespace OR wl_namespace+1=cur_namespace) AND wl_title=cur_title AND cur_timestamp > '20040822065741' ORDER BY cur_timestamp DESC
from within function "wfSpecialWatchlist". MySQL returned error "1104: The SELECT would examine more rows than MAX_JOIN_SIZE. Check your WHERE and use SET SQL_BIG_SELECTS=1 or SET SQL_MAX_JOIN_SIZE=# if the SELECT is ok".

There was a user (developer?) who was able to help when this happened before, but I can't recall who this was. [[User:Bkonrad|older≠wiser]] 19:01, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Sorry about that. I've raised the appropriate limit again. Please let me know on my talk page if you (or anyone else) sees it again. Longer term I'm working on a way of doing watchlists which shouldn't have this problem. Jamesday 01:49, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Template:Notenglish

The template "Notenglish" is very biased. {{notenglish}}

Deleted?!? That's just too extreme. That just suggest that Wikipedia is an English only Encyclopedia, as opposed to a community of editors who speak various languages. The notenglish template is a good idea, but I think it needs to be toned down to something like: "This page has been listed on the List of Pages to be Translated to English. Please help Wikipedia by translating this entry into English so that it can be easily translated into other languages."

See Template_talk:Notenglish for discussion.

-- Allyunion 14:55, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

But, um... this IS an english-only encyclopedia. Hence the little "en" at the top of the screen, in the addressbarthingy. I would presume that es, jp, de, etc. would have similar policies. --Golbez 15:59, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
As an occasional supporter of "native" terms, I do however, suggest that this template is perfectly warranted. Any non-English article content should either be translated, or if no-one's doing so, deleted. One should perhaps first check if it has come from the appropriate language wiki, if not, copy it there first. That step should maybe be added to the template. (If it's French, stick it on fr: if not there already. If it's nonsense, the fr: editors should pick it up) zoney ▓█▒ talk 16:50, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Is there a place to list duplicate articles?

I think that Swift boat and Patrol boat, rigid, may be the same thing. Mooo! 07:58, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Of course there is: Wikipedia:Duplicate articles. andy 09:26, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Untagged images - please help!

There are lists of untagged images at User:Yann/Untaggued Images. Please help with tagging these, and remove any tagged ones from the lists. All images that are not tagged will not be included in the planned Mandrake distribution. Please see Wikipedia:Image copyright tags for details of how to tag images. Based on a sample of 277 untagged images, at least 1 in 5 should have been tagged GFDL. Therefore, there are 10,000 GFDL images that won't be distributed unless they are tagged. Angela.

I'm afraid I don't understand. How can we know how to tag an image if we don't know where it came from? — Frecklefoot | Talk 15:39, Aug 26, 2004 (UTC)

Help vandalism on Thai wikipedia

User: 203.145.13.22 is emptying all pages on the Thai wikipedia. I do not have moderatorrights there. I am one on the Dutch wikipedia. Can someone either block the guy, or give me some rights? Waerth 17:31, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Why is no one coming to help the Thai wikipedia is geting destroyed !!!!! Waerth 17:40, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Help!!!! Waerth 17:45, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
You're temporarily an admin there, and I've blocked 203.145.13.22. Angela. 17:57, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)

London talk

For those of you in London, England, you may be interested in a Wikipedia talk taking place next Tuesday (31st August). Jimbo and I will be giving a talk about Wikipedia at Oyster, 1 Naoroji Street, London WC1X 0JD on August 31. It will start at 19:10 (BST). Updates on the event will be made at minty.org, a wiki run by the BBC employee who is organising this. (map) Angela. 00:41, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)

  • as of 11.17am fri 27th, if everyone turns up who's emailed to say they are coming, there should be about 40+ people. Murray.

Wikiproject Holidays

I've just started Holidays Wikiproject. Can some people join to help organize that? — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 22:53, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Are these valid votes? Sockpuppets, or just new?

A lot of new users with no other contributions are starting to vote on the VfD Sång till Skåne discussion, where I've been active, and where there have up to now been rather few votes. Is there something I can/should do about it? Is it possible to check, for instance, whether they're all from different IP's (=not sock puppets)? If they're bona fide new users, they've still registered purely in order to submit these votes. Compare the straw poll at Wikipedia talk:Requests for adminship. I'm feeling a bit frustrated about it, and a quick response would be appreciated. Bishonen 20:56, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I think most admins familiar with VfD can look at the discussion and recognize the familiar pattern of a deletion debate being inundated by newbie users and possible sockpuppets. Whoever takes responsibility for assessing the consensus of the debate will be able to take this into account. Thus, a decision to keep or delete can be made while giving appropriate weight, if any, to the opinions of these users as opposed to the more established participants. If you're still concerned, you could add a comment that simply states how many contributions those users have and how long they've been registered. I don't think more than that is necessary. --Michael Snow 22:44, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Thanks very much, you've set my mind at rest. I don't think I need to point out the lack of edits, then, since the redlinks on one side of the vote are conspicuous enough. Bishonen 00:13, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Hey, bishonen. The socks aren't going to have their votes counted. Sometimes people like to point that out to the sock puppets themselves, but sometimes not. When you point it out, the sock puppets just seem to multiply all the more. I don't think you need to worry about it. If you want, drop me a note the day that that article drops off the VfD, and I'll do a count and take the appropriate action. My recollection is that the thing is failing but is just being debated whether it should go to Wikisource or not. The more worrisome thing, I think, is the bone of contention about National Anthems. Geogre 00:51, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Hey there, Geogre, you might definitely want to take a look, if you haven't for a while. Rossami has made a very good intervention, so the situation's not as it was. But you're the one who listed this item on VfD, remember; maybe you shouldn't be the one to do the counting? --Bishonen 13:02, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
What's funny is that I was thinking that I should, for the very same reason -- as if, as the nominator, I was especially responsible for its fate. I can see that I was just tripping, though, and Rossami is an excellent, fair, professional, and even handed admin. Geogre 02:20, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)
He will be, yes. :-) See RfA. I know, it's a classic case of "Wasn't he one already?", isn't it? I'm hanging fire on voting for him, as you know, but that's hardly going to make any difference. Bishonen 19:24, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

New Scientist has published an article that suggests that one of the biggest challenges for Wikipedia editors in trying to identify sock puppet accounts is that "the IP addresses of users can only be accessed by a few administrators because of the need for privacy" and therefore editors would not have access to this information. If that is really an issue, then surely each different IP number could be allocated a random unique reference by Wikipedia. The IP addresses could still be kept secret by Wikipedia, while the unique references could be used by editors to more (remembering that multiple users may share an IP address) definitively match authors? Aramintan (talk) 14:47, 14 November 2013 (UTC)

Wording for copyright request

Is there suggested verbage to use in a written request to a copyright holder to use his/her material on Wikipedia? Do I need to mention the GFDL for example? Taco Deposit | Talk-o Deposit 20:26, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)

There are a few suggestions at Wikipedia:Boilerplate request for permission - 20:44, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC) Lee (talk)
Thanks; that's just what I was looking for. Taco Deposit | Talk-o Deposit 21:01, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)

Dealing with growing page (References to Star Trek)

My pet page, References to Star Trek has grown quite large in a relatively short time. It is now 30 kb, so each time it is edited there is a warning. There is no natural way to split the page that would avoid the problem in the long run, since the "television series" section alone will eventually exceed 32 kb. I would like some feedback on the following:

  • If the page is simply let to grow over 32 kb, what sort of bad things might happen? Apart from being a big page to load, is there any risk that some browsers may not be able to view it properly at all?
  • Are there any existing guidlines on how to split a list (although this is slightly more than a list). One idea is to make separate pages for all television series which have more than 10 entries. If that were done with for example The Simpons, would References to Star Trek/The Simpsons or References to Star Trek in The Simpsons conform better to whatever existing practices/conventions there are? The drawback would be that the episodes could not be seen in the ToC (which is useful to avoid accidental exposure to spoilers).

Any ideas on how/if to make the article smaller are appreciated – Foolip 19:04, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Do not use subpages in the article space. Ever. References to Star Trek in The Simpsons is fine, but if it is just a list, it should really be named List of references to Star Trek in The Simpsons. Somewhat large pages shouldn't present a real problem with most modern browsers, but are often a good sign that an article needs to be broken up, because it's difficult for a person to find content on a large page. Derrick Coetzee 19:52, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I think the References to Star Trek in The Simpsons scheme would be just fine. I think that if you split of any large ones, you should probably split off all large ones. Perhaps set a cutoff of 5? That would remove the bulk of the long entries, namely Simpsons, Futurama, Family Guy, and South Park. Then leave the ===The Simpsons=== in there with "Main article: References to Star Trek in The Simpsons" [[User:Siroxo|Here is a schmancy new signature and a line of text that is long enough to show how it might look when there is some stuff coming before it. Please take a look at it to bask it in all of its radiant glory —siroχo

—siroχo 



#627562



#7b967b

#4d6c94]] 20:29, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments. I'm curious: is there a Wikipedia policy for subpages, a reason why they are considered harmful/unwanted? Fortunately, I do like the "References to Star Trek in The Simpsons" scheme better, and will chose that. I had considered having a cutoff at say 5-10, and perhaps to lower that limit as needed when more different series are added. My only concern is, as mentioned, that the episodes will not be visible in the ToC, something which may be useful to avoid seeing any spoilers. Are there any ideas on how to address this? Perhaps stating right before the ToC that any television series which does not have subheadings probably (the exception is Cheers) has a separate page. – Foolip 22:13, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Just gab

I really can't stand when I come across the entries named in foreign words! (sorry, I don't read French, German etc.) Even though I am learning Japanese, I found weird when I see some entries named in Japanese romanization even though there are the corresponding words in English. English seems to be so easy to introduce latin family language words that may make English WP a mixed-up. They really spoil my enjoyment when I am surfing the English WP, and I have to keep reminding myself that this is English WP, not French one, nor German one, nor Swedish one. Don't ask me which entries, because I can't remember them all. I am just thinking, some entries with Chinese-character-titles would appear later, it seems to be only a matter of time. So what the use of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)?--Yacht (talk) 18:55, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)

Do you have some examples? --Golbez 19:02, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
See Wikipedia Talk:Naming conventions (use English) - topic has been brought up there. zoney | talk 19:38, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Examples of what you are unhappy with would be useful. In some cases (e.g. Nihilartikel) there is no English word, and a foreign word is presumably better than making up a neologism. In other cases (e.g. Académie française) the native form or (e.g. Bharatiya Janata Party) semi-native form qualifies as the most common way to refer to the entity in English. I would consider these to be under their correct names. But maybe you have something else in mind? -- Jmabel 01:09, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)
Well one misnamed article, which I plan to move shortly, is Les Fauves which should be under Fauvism in English. But if you really want to get alarmed about foreign infiltration, check out List of English words of German origin or worse Lists of English words of international origin. -- Solipsist 15:21, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Or see loan word. According to that article, Latin and French make up 40% of the English vocabulary. Norse loanwords make up only 2%, but the important 2% - apparently one could go a day without using the aforementioned Latin/French 40%, but you would have to use the Norse 2%. zoney ███ talk 16:12, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
In the words of James D. Nicoll: "The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary." -- Nunh-huh 02:40, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Here perhaps is a good example, created just a few minutes ago. Ägyptisches Museum could be better placed at Egyptian Museum Berlin. -- Solipsist 17:33, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
And now a tough one - 'Xiangqi' which I've never heard of as anything other than Chinese chess, whilst Japanese chess I'm more than happy to call Shogi (perhaps because I know it better). On the other hand Go is redirected from Wei-ch'i. I suppose the question is; does it matter if the redirects are in place? -- Solipsist 21:18, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Shouldn't we rename 'Wikipedia' to an English equivalent of the Hawaian / classical kludge?

Vote

There's apparently a vote ongoing at Wikipedia:Blocking policy/Personal attacks about a proposed addition to blocking policy. Wasn't sure it had been announced and the vote totals seemed awfully low on both sides, so I thought I'd announce it here. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 16:33, 2004 Aug 23 (UTC)

  • Thanks, Meelar! It hadn't been announced anywhere I've seen, and I know my own feelings on the matter are rather high. Geogre 00:52, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Article of the week --> Wikipedia:Collaboration of the week

Dear all Wikipedians,

Please note that Wikipedia:Article of the week has been renamed as Wikipedia:Collaboration of the week. If you have a link to AOTW on your Userpage, you may want to update and edit it accordingly.

BTW, please come to WP:COTW and vote for the next week's article for "Collaboration of the week". Thank you.

-- PFHLai 14:31, 2004 Aug 23 (UTC)

why? — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 15:33, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
There was some discussion at Wikipedia talk:Collaboration of the week; to some, "article of the week" gave the impression that AOTWs had some special status, which is misleading. A vote was held, and "collaboration of the week" won with 37.5% of the votes, with "project of the week" close behind at 25%. --Diberri | Talk 16:44, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)

Template:Mapquest

I've added a new template, Template:Mapquest ... but I haven't fully tested it yet, and at the moment, it only works for US Addresses, because of the state factor... I suppose different templates could be created to assist for other countries searches... -- Allyunion 14:09, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

If anyone wants to try it now... Format is: {{Mapquest|address=|city=|state=|zip=|country=|text=}} -- Allyunion 14:41, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

how come {{Mapquest|Street=1600 Pensylvania Ave.|City=Washington|State=DC|Country=US}} doesn't work? — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 15:40, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

See Template talk:Mapquest. The usage changed slightly. -- Netoholic (Talk) 15:57, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

We're trying to improve and fix any of the bugs still. See Discussion page @ Template talk:Mapquest for usage and updates. -- Allyunion 14:37, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Alright! It seems to be working quite well now. I think we have an agreement on the format, as listed above. All we need is people to run a lot of test trials on it, preferably non-US cities. -- Allyunion 11:19, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Montréal, Québec

Could an admin please move "Montreal, Quebec" to "Montréal, Québec"? It cannot be done right now, not sure why (the target page is just a redirect). The e acute is ISO-8859-1 safe.

Urhixidur 12:16, 2004 Aug 23 (UTC)

Is the English name really with an accent? I cannot recall ever seeing it written such outside of French texts. Anárion 13:04, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Google gets 12 million hits for Montreal and 4 million for Montréal, or if limited to english pages only, 7.4 and 1.2 million respectively -- Chris 73 Talk 13:44, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)
Officially, the name Montréal is supposed to be written with an accent in English.
From The Canadian Style, published by Public Works and Government Services Canada, 1997:
"On November 23, 1983, the Treasury Board issued its Circular No. 1983-58 to implement the policy adopted by the Canadian Permanent Committee on Geographical Names (CPCGN) regarding the linguistic treatment of geographical names on federal maps and in federal documents. [...] Names of inhabited places retain their official form in both English and French texts, e.g. Montréal (Que.), Saint John (N.B.), and St. John's (N.L.)."
On the other hand, Montreal (sans accent) is very very common, and easier to type on keyboards sans accents. Grstain 13:47, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
There has been considerable discussion about naming conventions for cities. I believe the convention is to use the most common English language spelling rather than defer to "official" spellings. It was decided that the article should be at Kiev rather than the official "Kyiv", similarly Calcutta is used rather than the official "Kolkata". If we locate Montreal at Montréal, Québec simply because it is the official spelling, we could risk reopening some highly contentious cans of worms (which have been fairly quiet of late). [[User:Bkonrad|older≠wiser]] 14:16, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Style sheets created and used by government bodies are just that. They have no standing outside the body that creates them and anyone who choses to use them. Different government bodies within the same government may have different style sheets. Often, as with any style sheet or style guide, a particular recommendation may not be generally followed outside the organizaton. See Hansard: Thursday, May 13, 2004 for an official English transcript from the Canadian parliamentary record in which diacritics are not used on Montreal or Quebec (though diacritics appear on personal names and the place name Trois-Rivières). This is normal Canadian English usage in which it is customary for certain place names to appear in English without diacritics (even though in general diacritics on French names are preserved). I would not be surprised to see this change eventually. In which case Wikipedia can also change

eventually. Jallan 18:30, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

This article should be at Montréal instead of Montréal, Quebec, as this is a prime example of primary topic disambiguation. Trilobite (Talk) 17:26, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I've only ever heard Montréal pronounced in such a way as to warrant keeping the accent in English. Then again, maybe it's pronounced differently in the US (like coupe and coupé). How is it pronounced in Canada - is the spelling Montréal more accurate? zoney ███ talk 19:28, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
In Canada both Montreal and Quebec are generally pronounced in English as they look like they would be pronounced in English: something like Mun-tree-all and Kwuh-beck. That an Anglicized pronunciation is normal for these forms in English is certainly part of the reason for the customary dropping of the acute accent. In any case, since that is current de facto standard practice and also a practice of the Canadian government (as indicated above in my last note here) it is what Wikipedia should follow. I believe that use of Montréal in an English context is increasing but that it is very far from being the norm. That parliamentary transcripts do not use it shows that CPCGN recommendations are not accepted universally for English text by government bodies. Jallan 20:40, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Our policy is quite simple - you are to use the most common english name. As has been said above, I think that means the unaccented form (Montreal and Quebec). →Raul654 22:52, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)
Oh good. So the policy for this encyclopaedia is to use the wrong names. I think it is splitting hairs to insist on the accent removal - the accented form is correct, but almost identical to the "common" form. zoney ███ talk 23:33, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
It is not the policy of this encyclopedia to use the wrong names. It is also not the policy of this encyclopedia to replace the forms of names in general use in English by forms not generally used because some people think they ought to be used. Such advocacy is against Wikipedia policy. If, for example, you wanted Deutschland to appear in Wikipedia instead of Germany, you would first have to persuade a substantial number in the outside world to use Deutschland in English text instead of Germany.
To make a case that Montréal is the correct form in English text, you might first convince the editors of the Canadian parliamentary proceedings that they should use it. Then convince the Bank of Montreal (which calls itself "Bank of Montreal" in English and "Banque de Montréal" in French) that they should use Montréal in English. Convince the Montreal Gazette that they are spelling it wrong and so forth. Convince other English newspapers that spell Montreal but Trois Rivières. Only if the outside English-speaking world changes should Wikipedia.
There's a discussion of such translation issues at "Reader Reaction and Workplace Habits in the English Translation of French Proper Names in Canada" by Brian Mossop, Government of Canada Translation Bureau and York University School of Translation. It states in part:

No government-wide official rules have ever been enunciated by a federal authority concerning the translation of French place names into English in running text. However, some government institutions do from time to time provide translators with rules, and these do not necessarily conform with The Canadian Style. For example, the instructions from the Immigration and Refugee Board state that 'Montreal', 'Quebec' (the province) and 'Quebec City' are to be written without accents. Also, an Alta Vista search of Government of Canada Web sites (...gc.ca) showed that 'Québec City' is used, but not nearly as often as the unaccented form: there were 1,124 hits for the accented form, as compared to 5,254 hits for 'Quebec City'.

While your at it, persuade French speakers in Canada that "London, Ontario" in Canada should not be rendered in French as "Londres, Ontario" because "Londres" is the wrong name.
Names of places are often different between languages and only usage defines what is right. Style sheets like The Canadian Style cannot force their views on correctness. No style guide can. The French Language Academy is often the butt of ridicule for attempting and failing to force particular usages and spellings. As long as a significant majority government documents and university publications and newspapers presenting text in English predominantly use Montreal rather than Montréal in English, Montreal is the predominant correct form in English, the form of common usage, and therefore the correct form to be used in Wikipedia. The Canadian Style hasn't yet been able to change general usage on that matter. If usage does change, even if the change were mostly confined to government use and academic use and reference works, then there would be a good case for Wikipedia to follow along.
Are the correct Gaelic forms of Irish names with diacritics always commonly used in Ireland in English text or are the names used in English text often those forms that have become normal in English?
Jallan 02:36, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I agree with the "most common" rule for spelling — this is language, not mathematics, and there are only "standard" and "nonstandard", not "correct" and "incorrect" — but I wouldn't use Google blindly. We should use the spelling (and accenting) that is most common among professional sources. This is especially important for accenting, because many nonprofessional English-speaking writers don't know how to type letters with accents. That being said, the New York Times, CNN, and other English newspapers I can find, even the Canadian canada.com and the Globe and Mail, use the unaccented "Montreal" in their online editions (I'm not sure about print editions). —Steven G. Johnson 01:08, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)

Do we have to have this discussion every three weeks? Why do new editors think that, somehow, the arguments that have failed in the past will somehow prevail this time? THIS IS THE ENGLISH WIKIPEDIA!!!! RickK 05:00, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)

Er, if they are new editors, they wouldn't been around for previous debates. THIS IS COMMON SENSE!!!! Pcb21| Pete 07:20, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Webster's Ninth New Collegiate lists both spellings in both cases, each with a different pronunciation (the French pronunciations are given for the accented forms). This is consistent with the "conventional/local" distinction, which seems to be standard in English writing. Keep it where it is. Austin Hair 07:51, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)

Would it make sense to ask the developers to design and provide a facility, much as we have now for dates, which would allow entities that have alternative presentations, such as Montreal/Montréal, Hawaii/Hawai'i, etc. to be displayed according to a user's personal preference? [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 16:22, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Leave the accents off. I've never once seen them used in Australian English, and suspect that the only place you will find them consistently used in English is in Canada, where Francophone politics is an ever-present force. Our consistent policy has been that where something is well known internationally by a different name to that used locally, the international name takes precedence, and the local name is used as a redirect. This as I see it is saying that so far as article names are concerned, it's more important for the encyclopedia to be easy to use than to be pleasing to the pedants. Andrewa 17:36, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You suspect wrong, Andrewa. Mostly Montreal remains mostly unaccented in English text in Canada. And The Canadian Style rules adopted by a some government departments which would like Montreal to have an acute accent in English text are just as clear that English names should not be modified in French texts, for example that "St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador" should be rendered in French as "St. John's, Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador" instead of the normal French usage "Saint-Jean, Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador". Their rules want cities, towns and villages to remain untranslated and unadapted in style although names of regions and geographics names are to be translated. From this comes the oddity above that they don't want the city "St. John's" to be translated when rendered in French but accept that "Newfoundland" should be translated. I sympathize with an attempt to simplify by standardizing on one name only for each municipality. But the CPCGN rules have not caught on in Canada outside of some government departments and have not become general usage in Canada outside those departments in either English or French. CPCGN wants names of cities to be left alone (other than translating of geographical terms that might be part of a city name). That changes much traditional usage. But names of provinces are to be translated (as the translations are too "official" to be discarded). That produces the much ridiculed recommendation that the city of Québec in the province of Québec should be "Québec, Québec" in French but "Québec, Quebec" in English. The traditional English rendering is "Quebec City, Quebec" and that remains the normal English rendering. See List of communities in Quebec for the normal English forms which are in almost all cases exactly the same as the French forms.. The only ones with different English and French forms are Montreal (which is Montréal in French), Quebec City (which is Québec in French), and Trois Rivières which is often rendered in English by the English translation "Three Rivers". Jallan 19:22, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Very interesting, but I think you've misunderstood me. What I was saying was that outside of Canada, I don't think the accented form is common in English. If as you say the accented form is not the most common English form inside Canada either, that's even more reason not to use it in English Wikipedia article names.
And from what you say it seems this pattern carries on to translated names as well as transliterated ones, with some amusing glitches. Andrewa 03:03, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Yahoo search

Since the in-house search (what is the name for it) has stopped working, we are back with Google and Yahoo search. The Yahoo search does not seem to work for me. Does it work for anyone else?
Bobblewik  (talk) 09:01, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I never use it, google always works for me. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 15:32, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Yahoo produces different results to Google. It can be used to find things missed by Google. Given that they are both out of date, that is convenient. I think they also differ in the search options permitted. Anyway, if it has been broken for a length of time, then it should be fixed or removed.
Bobblewik  (talk) 17:26, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I think it was the {{SERVER}} variable in MediaWiki:Googlesearch that was causing problems. I've replaced this with en.wikipedia.org. Does it work ok now? Angela. 19:32, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)
Yes it works now. Thank you for fixing it.
Bobblewik  (talk) 08:46, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Images of Italy

I have a pile of photos of various Italian locations (architecture, etc) that has been given to me for use on Wikipedia, provided that it appear on pages. (In other words, the person who took it, doesn't want them to sit around in an image dump). So, if anyone who would know major landmarks in Italy would want to go through them with me, and find where they should go on various pages, that would be great Rhymeless 06:47, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

How many are there? You could put them up on a gallery sub-page of your user page, leave a note here, and invite people to go and have a look at them and put them in the relevant articles if they feel they are needed. I am happy to do this so you've got one volunteer already. — Trilobite (Talk) 17:30, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Roughly 30. Allright, I could probably put them there, as long as they didn't remain there indefinately. Thanks. Rhymeless 18:36, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
This seems to me like a form of blackmail: "use my image RIGHT NOW or I won't let you use it EVER". What harm would it do if an image was uploaded but not used immediately? If the photo is good then eventually an article will be written that can use it. Can you persuade the photographer to chill out and just GFDL the photos? Gdr 11:14, 2004 Aug 24 (UTC)

Jewish Holidays Wikiproject?

Is there a wikiproject for Jewish Holidays? If not, there should be. I was looking at a few articles (specifically Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur) and found that their layouts aren't the most standardized. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs) 05:19, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

How about just a Holidays wikiproject? Why not make them all alike? RickK 06:30, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)

I suppose we could do that. But is there one? — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 15:30, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Not in favour of this. Far too many articles would fall into the ambit of this. For a start, it's unnecessary to mix religious and secular holidays. Plus there's national and meaningless (bank holidays?) holidays to be thrown in too. Probably it is enough to start projects for holidays that should be logically grouped - like Jewish, Christian, US, English, Scottish, etc. zoney | talk 23:48, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC) Hierarchically organised, it should be fine. zoney ███ talk
That's what I'm trying to do on here. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 19:43, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

French Revolution: WikiProject?

Over the last year a few of us have done a lot of work on topics related to the French Revolution. We've pulled in a ton of relevant 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica material, some of which has now been heavily edited, some not. We've also drawn heavily on an out-of-copyright history by François Mignet.

At this point the political history is pretty solid through at least September 1992 1792 (the start of the National Convention) and not too shabby even after that; the military aspects are just starting to come together. User:Didactohedron recently did a pretty major refactoring. I was wondering if there are, say, at least five people interested in starting a WikiProject to coordinate further efforts]: it would be nice to start keeping a collective task list. If you're interested, reply briefly here. If I get 4 yeses besides myself, I'll set up a WikiProject page. (I'd model it more or less on the approach taken by Wikipedia:WikiProject Philosophy -- Jmabel 05:17, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)

Gee, I had no idea the French Revolution lasted so long. --Michael Snow 22:13, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Guess that's why Zhou Enlai thought it was too soon to tell what he thought of it... -- Jmabel 01:01, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)

I know, I am far from ideal

I am totally positive there is a page for such requests as mine, but I don't remember what it's called. Please forgive me. Can someone update Wikipedia:Most-edited talk pages please? Tuf-Kat 05:10, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)

Aum page image screw up

Hi, the image in the page appears screwed up in IE6. I just would like to bring attention this . Thanks.--Jondel 03:57, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It's not an image, but the unicode #2384 (ॐ) Not sure how to fix that -- Chris 73 Talk 04:24, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)
Perhaps someone should make it an image. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs) 04:27, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Adding another br tag seems to fix it at the Sandbox. I'll do the same in page. Thans.--Jondel 06:46, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Still getting a ? in Win98/Firefox 0.9. I guess this thing needs Unicode... Radagast 19:38, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)
I use Mozilla 1.8a3 and it works fine. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ) 19:41, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
It's not a question of browsers, it's a question of installed fonts. I have Japanese, etc. fonts installed, so that works, but I don't have Devanagari, so it doesn't show for me. DenisMoskowitz 17:45, 2004 Aug 25 (UTC)

nationality

I'am a little confused by certain nationalities such as people from Slovenia. In the past I categorised an athlete as Slovene but was left a message by someone saying they should be called Slovenian. Not a problem I just guessed I had made a mistake but I have just noticed that the same problem has arisen with Argentina where the preferred option seems to be Argentine not Argentinian. Does wiki have a standard list somewhere of what we are to call people so that the categories can follow the same standard as it seems a contradiction to choose Slovenian and then Argentine in Category:People by nationality or I am just being stupid???Scraggy4 00:51, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

See List of adjectival forms of place names, though be aware that the issue isn't always that simple. IIRC, Croat/Croatian aren't supposed to be interchangeable and the issue is perhaps bound up in Croat/ian nationalism... or something. Tuf-Kat 01:01, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)
Just a note about this last sentence — they can be interchangeable in normal writing, i.e. one can use "Croatian" as an adjective for the Croats, but the links to Croatian should be all disambiguated in order to indicate whether the country or the nationality. I have been doing this for a while now, though some careless anonymous users still persist in linking ambiguously... --Joy [shallot] 16:00, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
The issue is usually ethnicity vs. citizenship. To use Tuf-Kat's example, a Croat (as a noun) is a person of Croatian ethnicity, regardless of his/her citizenship; a Croatian (as a noun) is a citizen of Croatia regardless of his/her ethnicity. I believe Slovene/Slovenian is exactly analogous. The matter gets muddled because for some countries/ethnicities the word for both is the same (e.g. German). Also, there are cases like Hungarian/Magyar where in English the first can mean citizenship or ethnicity, but the latter refers specifically to ethnicity. -- Jmabel 03:55, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)
The "Slovenians" vs. "Slovenes" thing is not actually a decided standard -- there's some users who have an agenda to change _all_ instances of Slovenes to Slovenians because they think it's "archaic", but so far there has been little or no substantiation to this claim on the relevant Talk pages (AFAICT).
In any event, if you have a person from Slovenia, they are definitely Slovenian, and chances are that they're also Slovene (but do check before writing that). If you have a person who speaks the Slovene/Slovenian language but who is not from Slovenia, they're almost certainly ethnic Slovenes, but calling them ethnic Slovenians is IMHO a bit confusing. I think that the analogy with Croat/Croatian should be applied, but it's not a consensus. Who left you this message, anyway? --Joy [shallot] 15:56, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Lack of Wiki hits in Google

Is anyone bothered by the fact that the 'pedia no longer appears anywhere near the top of searches in Google? When I put in Syagrius or magister militum I get any number of sites containing copies of the wiki text, but not this site itself - in these two cases I gave up looking. The info on these sites is presumably copied at some moment in time and therefore "frozen", and is therefore less likely to be accurate. Please forgive me if this is a subject that has been raised before, but I couldn't find any mention of it. Djnjwd 23:02, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It has been mentioned before, but what can we do? We can't force google to put us top. Theresa Knott 00:08, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Yes, you can. Go to google and put in a word. Look at the top-right of the screen; that word is hotlinked. It takes you to selected definitions from certain sites. Would it be too much to ask Google that they give us the same consideration? Maybe I will, but it'd be nice if someone official did it. --Golbez 03:19, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
We can send google quality complaints. Basically, these other sites optomize for google and we don't; that's why they kill us in the google rank →Raul654 00:15, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)
Is it true that a possible reason for the low Google rating is low reliability? The other dictionary sites are more consistently, available than Wikipedia. I think uptime has been pretty good for a while now, but the site still rates relatively poorly... David Remahl 00:22, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Similarly, latency might figure in, if relevence is considered equal. I think our only real hope is to enforce our license so that people can get from any mirrored page to the "live" page. We may consider modifying our license slightly to ensure that the link is prominent (many are at the bottom of long articles in a tiny font). Derrick Coetzee 00:51, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I hope something like this is done. Google ranking wouldn't matter all that much if when people had read a mirrored article once they knew where it came from originally, and that the mirror was inferior, and came here in future. — Trilobite (Talk) 00:56, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I'm wondering if we could legally sue the people who own these domains (do a detailed WhoIs to find who it's registered to). I'm not sure if Wikipedia could get a team of lawyers, but is it actually possible? — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs) 02:17, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Well, you certainly don't need to start with suing. There is a standard license enforcement sequence, starting with polite requests, to more sternly worded, then threatening legal action. I know it has worked with a number of sites. I don't know where on wikimedia, but this has another place it is being discussed actively, somewhere on meta I'm sure. - Taxman 02:45, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks has a non-compliance process, including a Wikipedia:Standard GFDL violation letter. -- Chris 73 Talk 02:58, Aug 23, 2004 (UTC)
But even the compliant sites shouldn't be above wiki. Suing aside, this is sort of a problem. — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs) 04:26, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Why not? From Google's perspective thefreedictionary.com is a better site than Wikipedia. It has virtually the same content, faster response time, better use of tooltips/metatags/etc... Yeah, Wikipedia is becoming well-known and has a gazillion links to its homepage, but links to specific pages aren't that common, so the clones don't lose out from this perspective either. AFAIK Google doesn't have a weighting for being the "original". Pcb21| Pete 09:15, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

There's discussion on this ongoing at Wikipedia:Send in the clones. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 06:38, 2004 Aug 23 (UTC)

There is also a valuable discussion about problems with Google on Wikipedia:External search engines. Some of those discussions began last year, and it looks as though each intake of new editors asks the same questions - and gets the same answers! May I suggest these pages plus this current Parish Pump discussion are somehow consolidated (by an administrator?) and placed on the Community Portal page with a heading like 'Wikipedia and search engine difficulties'. That way we have somewhere to keep an eye on it. It might be noted in whatever welcome material we sent new editors to draw their attention it.

There are also the regular pages Search engines and Google which so far as I can see do not touch on this problem. Apwoolrich 13:20, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I tend to believe that there's also a software (Google compatibility) issue involved. I did a Google search for the first paragraph of our Cohortative mood article - it's a vanity thing, and Firefox make such searches very simple - and got three results: 2 from thefreedictionary.com (which does link to the Wikipedia article, although the article has been since moved) and one from wikiverse.org (which doesn't). This means that not only Google does not rank the Wikipedia article highly, it is also entirely unaware of its existence (the same can be asserted using a Google cache query). Worse still, particularly when Wikipedia's search is disabled, is that, naturally, Google is also unaware of the article when doing a Wikipedia-specific search. The article is also not particularly new; presumably, Google scans the Web every 30 days, and the article is seven months old. One reason for this (and for other issues) is possibly Wikipedia's Crawl-delay value set at robots.txt. While it not particularly high (in fact, it is minimal), Wikipedia is pretty big, which might discourage even usually-reliable Google. -- Itai 14:31, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Television naming conventions

A draft of a poll to establish (or re-establish) naming conventions for television programming is currently underway at User:Gtrmp/TV draft poll. Once finalized, it will be moved to Wikipedia:Naming conventions (television)/poll and opened. All input and criticism are welcome! -Sean Curtin 22:07, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Naming conventions (television) was written as a result of a previous poll and discussion. A vote has been presented asking Wikipedians whether they would like to adopt the current version. The vote is being held on the Talk page and ends on Sep 13 2004 at 00:00 UTC. The intent is that if the measure fails, that Sean Curtin's poll would be used to gather consensus and re-write it. -- Netoholic 02:13, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Database Error on Watchlist

I'm getting a database error (again) when I try to view my watchlist.

A database query syntax error has occurred. This could be because of an illegal search query (see Searching Wikipedia), or it may indicate a bug in the software. The last attempted database query was:
SELECT cur_namespace,cur_title,cur_comment, cur_id, cur_user,cur_user_text,cur_timestamp,cur_minor_edit,cur_is_new FROM watchlist,cur USE INDEX (name_title_timestamp) WHERE wl_user=44062 AND (wl_namespace=cur_namespace OR wl_namespace+1=cur_namespace) AND wl_title=cur_title AND cur_timestamp > '20040822065741' ORDER BY cur_timestamp DESC from within function "wfSpecialWatchlist". MySQL returned error "1104: The SELECT would examine more rows than MAX_JOIN_SIZE. Check your WHERE and use SET SQL_BIG_SELECTS=1 or SET SQL_MAX_JOIN_SIZE=# if the SELECT is ok".

There was a user (developer?) who was able to help when this happened before, but I can't recall who this was. [[User:Bkonrad|older≠wiser]] 19:01, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Sorry about that. I've raised the appropriate limit again. Please let me know on my talk page if you (or anyone else) sees it again. Longer term I'm working on a way of doing watchlists which shouldn't have this problem. Jamesday 01:49, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Missing Wikipedians

Kingturtle, and Hcheney seem to have disappeared. Anybody seen them around? [[User:Neutrality|Neutrality (talk)]] 16:54, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

And Fabiform. Someone needs to upload a photo of a milk carton onto Wikipedia:Missing Wikipedians. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 22:55, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Milk carton? zoney | talk 00:04, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
It's an American thing — missing people are sometimes featured on the back of milk cartons. [[User:Neutrality|Neutrality (talk)]] 00:05, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Creepy... zoney ███ talk 00:34, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
It's supposedly found hundreds of people, so hey. You learn to ignore it (which, I know, contradicts the first sentence, but hey). [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 06:36, 2004 Aug 23 (UTC)
And Kate (formerly Lady Lysine Ikinsile). We're gonna need a bigger milk carton. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 00:12, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

a better message needed when moving a page that does not have content in its talk page

Right now if you move a page that does not have content in its "talk page" you get this response after the move: 

  Move page
  From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
  Move succeeded
  &nbsp 
  Page "Bea Weblogic" moved to "BEA Weblogic".
  &nbsp 
  Please check if this move has created any double-redirects, and fix them if necessary.
  &nbsp 
  The corresponding talk page was not moved.

While "true", I find that last sentence somewhat misleading. Either it should be eliminated in that set of circumstances, or should be reworded to indicate there was no talk page to be moved. - [[User:Bevo|Bevo]] 15:40, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Perhaps "no talk page to move"? Ilyanep — Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs) 17:56, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Fixed up. Dysprosia 23:05, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Thank you! That threw me, too, the other day. — Jeff Q 16:45, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Linux

Yay! I made the transition to Linux! I write to you now on Red Hat Linux 9.0, using Mozilla Firefox! Just felt like shouting it. [[User:Supadawg|supadawg - Talk]] 13:50, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
P.S. Still gotta figure out how to recompile the kernel...

OK, Zaphod!
  • If you only just "made the transition", then you most definitely 'do not' want to be recompiling your kernel. Regardless of whatever any l33t h4x0r tells you. Stick with the pre-packaged ones. I remember being a newbie and recompiling the kernel, it led to reinstalling the system. Oh, and you might want to upgrade to Fedora Core, which (unlike RH9) is neing actively maintained. The User Formerly Known As 82.6.10.139
  • Hey, I've also recently installed Linux on my WinXP laptop - I use Mandrake 10.0, a fairly user-friendly distro. I like it a lot, and it sure is much more stable than XP. Mac OS X remains my favorite OS, however. Good luck and whatnot. Ðåñηÿßôý | Talk 02:03, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

What is the best linux for an old x86 pIII? I want a desktop environmnt with Open office and a browser. Can this be done? I am not up to making my own, and all the RH and Man versions that I have tried are too slow. Thanks

  • Theory goes that Debian might owrk for that, though it all depends on your definition of "too slow". I consider the loading times for Out Run on the ZX Spectrum to be "too slow", as a guide :)
  • It's not really the kernel that will kill you - it's the window manager. DO NOT use a modern version of KDE or Gnome. →Raul654 01:16, Aug 27, 2004 (UTC)
  • Nah, it all depends on how much speed and RAM you're talking about. I got a fairly new Debian installation going on a Pentium-300 w/ 128MB, KDE and all. Was a bit sluggish, but perfectly usable. XFCE4 ran even better (and looked almost as nice). -- Wapcaplet 01:25, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thank you, although I don't really understand how I would change these things. Is there a packaged distro that you would recommend for older comps that still has versions of OO that will read Word 2k?

Transparent PNGs are really annoying me...

I have posted this here instead of on Sourceforge because I am sick of the lack of attention this issue seems to have been receiving. People say that transparent PNGs stuff up in Internet Explorer because of IE's poor support for PNG images. I disagree. Those of you with IE6, go to User:Mark/temp and look at the transparent regions of the flag of Nepal there. When inserted into an article at full size, the image is actually transparent, and Internet Explorer renders it perfectly. However, as soon as the thumbnailer is used to reduce the size of the image, the transparency goes out the window. Instead of showing the pink background I used there, most thumbnailed sizes have a white background, however one has a black background. When will the thumbnailer be fixed???? It's getting really annoying... - Mark 07:08, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The bug is with MSIE, not with the thumbnailer. Switch to a browser which is still being developed such as Opera or Mozilla Firething, or contact Microsoft support and insist they fix a years-old bug. MSIE is capable of supporting transparency, but alas this requires a really ugly hack to work with PNGs. Anárion 10:15, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Yes, this is the usual pre-programmed response. If Internet Explorer is entirely to blame for this problem, then how come only thumbnailed versions of transparent png images have the transparency problem? Why the difference between the full size image and the thumbnailed one? Did you even look at the page through Internet Explorer? If not, then I have prepared a screenshot of the page through IE6 for you here. - Mark 11:13, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC) Edit: I also tried manually resizing the image and saving it in Paint Shop Pro using the same palette and transparency as the full-size original image, and as you can see in IE6 on User:Mark/temp its transparency works fine. This just continues to point to a flaw in the thumbnailer, or at least a shortcoming in that it does not maintain the identical format used in the originals. - Mark 11:29, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I agree that it is a minor shortcoming in the thumbnailer, since it does not maintain the "colour" of fully transparent areas (I'm guessing that is the problem). What method is used in mediawiki to thumbnail PNGs? David Remahl 11:41, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You're both right. The problem with the thumbnailer is that PNG thumbnails for some reason always come out being true-color (which causes a related problem, namely that indexed full-version images are often smaller, in file size, than their true-color thumbnailed counterparts); transparency is interpolated in the auto-thumbnailed versions, resulting in partial opacity in some areas. That is where the MSIE bug comes in, because it can't handle partial opacity; it must be all or nothing. The reason your hand-made thumbnail worked, Mark, is because it does not have any partial opacity (in fact, it's indexed color, which AFAIK doesn't allow it). If our auto-thumbnailer just correctly produced indexed-color thumbnails for all indexed-color images, I suspect the problem would go away... -- Wapcaplet 17:06, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The problem would also go away if Microsoft would fix their broken PNG transparency support... -- Cyrius|✎ 17:08, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Well, that's true only if everyone using a broken version of MSIE upgrades immediately. It's a lot more realistic to hope for an improved thumbnailer. -- Wapcaplet 17:54, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
COOL - I never knew that PNG transparency was so impressive! Partial opacity is very useful/nice! Pity about it not working in IE! (Well, a pity for others - I can go "Bwah hah hah" with Firefox). As an addendum - are 16million colour PNGs not much larger file sizes? I've noticed that I must consciously reduce colours to 256 with PNGs. (To GIFs, of course, PSP would always automatically reduce). As PNGs are used mostly for diagrams, the 256 colours should usually be enough. Perhaps this reduction should be encouraged on Wikipedia? zoney | talk 17:14, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
One uses higher color depth PNGs when appropriate, like lossless storage of a photograph (JPEG is lossy). For the tasks one would have used GIF for, dropping to 8-bit (256 colors) or lower is desirable. -- Cyrius|✎ 17:19, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Well, my query is more along the lines of, "are people using truecolour when they shouldn't be?" zoney ███ talk 17:44, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • True-color PNGs are often much larger than indexed. In my experience, the size difference is usually in the ballpark of 50%; that is, true-color versions are at least twice as many bytes as indexed versions. The quality difference is negligible for most diagram-like images; when it's not, it's usually when the diagram has many colors and lots of complex gradient areas, in which case a JPG is probably more appropriate anyway. You can do a lot with indexed color; my Enigma rotor illustration is indexed, believe it or not. A good rule of thumb: For noisy images, use JPG. For clean images, use PNG. -- Wapcaplet 17:54, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • (post-edit-conflict) - to answer your second question, Zoney, yes, absolutely. I'd be willing to wager that 90% of the true-color PNGs that have been uploaded should really be indexed (or JPG, instead). -- Wapcaplet 17:54, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Another interesting aspect of this is that again above we have the response in several places that since it's Microsoft's fault, therefore it's Microsoft's problem. Nothing could be further from the truth.

At the risk of offending (again) some of our wonderful (I mean that) volunteers who work on the code and the site configuration, I'm going to explore this a little. Please take this as intended. It's not a criticism of any particular person, it's not a criticism of Linux or of alternative browsers, and it's not a recommendation that anyone support Microsoft.

Microsoft's driving force is to sell software. I often speculate that some of the patently poor quality in their products is what a British comedian (I forget who it was) termed falltobitsability, that is planned obsolescence. Regardless of whether it's deliberate, this inherent obsolesence is clearly an advantage to Microsoft. It is in their interests for users to upgrade as often as they can be persuaded to.

When a major site such as Wikipedia fails to support IE6 (or IE5 for that matter), the biggest winner is Microsoft. Few if any users will go to Linux as a result, a few may go to alternative browsers but for most the choice is between suffering the problems or upgrading their Microsoft browser. Upgrading the browser often means upgrading the hardware, which often means upgrading all the application software as well. (Few if any will go to Apple computers, but if any do again they are likely to buy lots of new Microsoft products as a result.) For Microsoft, it's a licence to print money.

The main losers are low-end users, and the next most significant loser is the site itself. From the point of view of both those who don't upgrade for whatever reason, and those who do upgrade but who don't understand the subtleties of HTML and other specifications, it's the site that is delivering poor quality.

Wikipedia is the only site I visit that has significant problems with either IE5 or IE6 and no apparent interest in fixing them. I have my theories as to why this is so, but probably that's enough for now. Food for thought? Andrewa 18:51, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The fact still remains that IE's PNG transparency support is broken. -- Cyrius|✎ 19:10, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
True. But is that really relevant? AFAIK we are not in the position to offer a fix for it. Andrewa 19:25, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I agree with Andrewa's points above; I am not an MSIE user, and I encourage every MSIE user I meet to switch to a less-broken browser, but the simple fact remains that MSIE has huge market share, and we're only hurting ourselves if we stubbornly refuse to make our site work well in that browser. That said, I think I will go take a serious look at the thumbnailing code, to see what it would take to resolve this issue... -- Wapcaplet 19:50, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I suggest Wapcaplet who seem to have a great understanding of the problem take it to MediaZilla (link in header). My guess is that it could be fixed with config, upgrade or change from gd php extension to ImageMagick (more overhead), or the other way around (don't know what they're using).

  • I just took a crack at it; it appears that ImageMagick is in use at the moment. I don't think ImageMagick supports any kind of color depth reduction (except to grayscale), which is most likely the reason we're ending up with truecolor versions. The GD extensions seem to be severely broken; in particular, the critical function ImageTrueColorToPalette, at least in my particular installation and config, does not seem to respect transparency. I did manage to get a truecolor transparent version by explicitly using ImageAlphaBlending and ImageSaveAlpha, but transparency goes away (replaced by black, usually) upon palette reduction. I'll keep at it; perhaps with some combination of the GD extensions and ImageMagick, it could work. -- Wapcaplet 22:04, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • if GIMP does it correctly, then libgimp should be able to do (programatically) also. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 14:14, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Oh, the frustration. I can clearly see now why this problem has not been fixed. I've concluded that the PHP-GD libraries are either absolute and utter crap, or I am just too dumb to figure out the right way to use them. I have successfully:

  • Created transparent nicely-antialised truecolor images
  • Created non-transparent nicely-antialiased palette images
  • Created horribly aliased palette images

The problem is, GD lib images by default are not transparent. They cannot be flood-filled with a transparent color; apparently the only two ways to do it are: (1) Tell a certain color to be transparent, in which case any of that color in the image also gets turned transparent, or (2) loop and set every single pixel to be transparent, which is definitely out of the question.

I think it might work to use a combination of ImageMagick (which has no problem whatsoever with resizing transparent images, unlike the GD libs, which botch this seemingly simple operation), and the GD libs (which can easily create palette images from truecolor, unlike ImageMagick, which botches this seemingly simple operation). The only question is whether transparency would be preserved. I suspect no. I think I'll come back to this in a day or two, when my neurons aren't so fried.

p.s. - The GIMP is definitely an option for this, but I don't know how good it is in terms of speed. Worth a shot, at least. -- Wapcaplet 00:53, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

At risk of displaying my spectacular lack of knowledge in the area of image formats and palette transparency, if one of the options is to make a certain colour transparent in the thumbnail, why can't you make the desired region that colour, and offset any other instances of that colour in the image by a small (insignificant) RGB value? So you make the transparent region #FF00FF, and make the other instances of pink in the image something like #FF01FF or something. But IANAP (I am not a programmer). - Mark 16:08, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You know, that is actually a fabulous idea. I'm fairly certain it can be done using the GD library functions. It'll result in some fairly inelegant code, but if it works, it will be worth it. I'll give it a shot! Thanks! -- Wapcaplet 16:45, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

How did you build and populate the calendar?

I'm running MediaWiki on a company intranet, and wanted to know how you built all the templates and infrastructure for the great calendar? Is that all done manually? What happens to conent marked for some given date when a new year comes in? Is there a bot that helps with all the calendar maintenance?

thanks a bunch, --NickT 23:32, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Yes, it's all done manually. Dysprosia 00:47, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
It's all done with a bot. His name is Maveric149 :) →Raul654 04:57, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)

Kemari

Could a Japanese speaking Wikipedian please assist at Talk:Kemari Mintguy (T) 22:42, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Weird image uploading problem

See Image:Conti-sig.gif and Image:Thisisatest.gif. I made a little picture for my signature and wanted to upload it. I first uploaded it as "Conti-sig.gif", which was "0 byte" according to wikipedia. I then renamed the picture on my hard drive to "Thisisatest.gif" and uploaded it again, and it works! I tested a bit more: Image:Thisisanothertest.gif and Image:Testsig.gif do work, but "Contisig.gif", "ContiSig.gif" and "Conti sig.gif" were all "0 bytes" as I tried to upload them. This looks very weird to me.. anyone knows what's up with that? --Conti|✉ 20:29, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)

No idea at all, except that after the initial faliure you maybe messed up in proceeding to replace the existing file.. At least, I successfully uploaded the pic and I've cleaned out your tests. Please note that graphics like that are much preferred to be PNGs, not GIFs. [[User:Sverdrup|User:Sverdrup]] 02:05, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I uploaded Thisisatest.gif, ContiSig.gif and Testsig.gif in that order, first worked, second didn't, third did.. really weird. Thanks for your uploading and cleaning anyways! Well, PNGs don't have the option to use a transparent color, so my sig might look not so nice when using a non-white background. What's so bad aboug GIFs anyways? --Conti|✉ 02:41, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)
I uploaded a png version now after I have found out that transparency is possible with it. I had the same problem again. I moved the pic to another directory and it worked, so I apparently can't upload some (not all) pictures directly from C:\ --Conti|✉ 18:50, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)

Does "E-mail this user" ever work for anyone else?

I've tried contacting other users about four times this way; never any responses. Then I tried to test the feature by trying to send an E-mail to myself. Didn't receive it. Finally I created a sockpuppet (sorry) just so that I could test whether I could send E-mail to myself from an account that wasn't my own. Nothing. Every time Wikipedia's software says the E-mail has been sent. Does this feature work for anybody else? Is my ISP doing overzealous spam filtering and blocking E-mail from Wikipedia without telling me? [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 18:32, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I've never gotten any either, though I have sent messages (or thought I did). I just sent you a message--did you get it? Antandrus 18:35, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Yeah, I did. [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 21:52, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I just sent a mail to myself, and it seemed to work fine. I've never tried to mail anyone else, or received mail from anyone... — Kate | Talk 18:37, 2004 Aug 21 (UTC)
Seems to work fine for me, I get emails sometimes. A few of the times I tried to use it to send one they didn't have email enabled, but at least one time they did and I was able to send the email just fine. Sam [Spade] 18:38, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I have never used it to send e-mail, but I have received e-mail a number of times, so it works for me. Adam Bishop 19:00, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Received a couple of them, but not many. -- Cyrius|✎ 19:02, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I've sent several and I received quite a few. Always seems to work fine for me. →Raul654 19:09, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)
The one time I emailed another user w/ this feature it did work ok. Ropers 19:44, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I've gotten a couple of death threats that way. A kind message of support I sent, on the other hand, was not received. I think it filters for hate speech. Try screaming and yelling. That will probably get through. :-) Geogre 20:56, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I've gotten emails before. Are you sure your email is correctly put into your preferences? [[User:Ilyanep|— Ilγαηερ (Tαlκ, cοηtrιbs)]] 15:37, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Oh, great. It's not reliable enough to depend on, but it's not broken enough to diagnose. Oh, well. My question is answered, no need to continue. Thanks. [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 21:52, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The one time I tried it, it didn't work. Incidently, did you check your spam folder (if you have one). The mail might be getting put there. anthony (see warning) 00:19, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Affirmative action

Please give a hand, this article needs alot of work, and alot of help from as many editors as possible. Sam [Spade] 18:23, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Overzealous spam filter

I am unable to edit the page Wikipedia:Copies of Wikipedia content (low_degree_of_compliance) to report violating copies because it already contains regular expressions considered spam by the spam filter. I see no way to repair this, since it's all over this project page, and it also won't tell me what expressions it's using. I have to wonder if it's doing its job properly even on article pages. Derrick Coetzee 17:15, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

m:Talk:Non-development tasks for developers
chocolateboy 04:09, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Domain donation — please vote! poll closed

Some time ago, I noticed that the wikipaedia.net domain name was hitherto unregistered.

I registered this domain name and sought to fully turn over it (donate it) to the Wikipedia Foundation.
I proposed making wikipaedia.net an alias/redirect to wikipedia.org, just like wikipedia.com and wikipedia.net (which are working aliases).

I did not however get anywhere with this. I got little or no answers to my emails to Jimbo (he's probably a busy man) and nothing concrete developed when I floated this issue on the wikiEN-l and foundation-l mailing lists.

I am now posting the issue here to get a spotlight on this and get your input, to get things done and ticked off my list as soon as possible.

On the mailing lists, some felt that by using the wikipaedia.net domain names, we're running a risk of people confusing us with the wikipaedia.org, wikipaedia.com and wikipaedia.de domains — these domain names are currently controlled by a third party. (This is part of a wider issue which I raised on the wikiEN-l mailing list. See [8] — user name guest, password 1ns4nI+y)

I feel that we have a very valid claim to all the major wikipaedia and wikipedia domain names. It is more than likely that many web users all over the world frequently enter wikipaedia domain names when looking for the Wikipedia. I also feel that we can best defend our interests by "claiming our space", adding the wikipaedia.net domain to the valid domain aliases we have and moving to gain control of all other domain names that ought to be in our control. Yielding to what I personally perceive to be cybersquatting is not a good idea.

I also know that some of us don't like wikipaedia domain names per se. However, I would like to point out that the Wikipedia name derives from "encyclopedia", and encyclopedia is simply the modern/American form of the English word encyclopaedia. The words are both in use and synonymous. Again, it is more than likely that many web users all over the world frequently enter wikipaedia domain names when looking for the Wikipedia. As Wikipedians, we have an important claim to wikipaedia and wikipedia domain names — and considering the scope and importance of our project, it is reasonable for us to control both variations of the name. Ropers 16:56, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Please vote: Poll closed

Should the donation of the wikipaedia.net domain name be accepted and made a working redirect to the wikipedia.org domain?

Please sign below:

Yes

  • Ropers 16:56, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • As a Brit, I'm uncomfortable with the missing æ (it just seems wrong) and this site is supposed to be universal, so this is a good move. Necrothesp 17:19, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • "Wikipedia" should still be treated as the correct spelling, since that is what is used throughout even the non-English versions, but most likely anyone looking for "Wikipaedia" is looking for us. Maybe we should register wikpedia.org while we're at it... -- Wapcaplet 17:38, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • I stress using "Wikipedia" as the proper spelling. [[User:Poccil|Peter O. (Talk)]] 18:41, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)
  • Sure. Of course, the name will remain the same, but we're not Wikipedia.com, either, and there are no problems with that. Publications frequently get our address wrong (sending them to .com, for instance) so this is a logical step. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 18:58, 2004 Aug 21 (UTC)
  • I doesn't hurt us and can help others find our site. - SimonP 19:39, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)
  • It should definitely be accepted. We aren't talking about changing the name to Wikipaedia here so I really can't imagine what the no-voters have got against the idea. The more avenues we can close off to cybersquatters the better. Trilobite (Talk) 19:42, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Yes. The more entrances we make available, the better we are. --the Epopt 20:16, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Herbert 20:48, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)
  • Derrick Coetzee 21:06, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC): Changing my vote; while I certainly wouldn't encourage use of this as a primary name, having some common misspellings redirect is good, and others using them is definitely potentially confusing.
  • [[User:OldakQuill|Oldak Quill]] 21:19, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Sure, no reason not to. —Stormie 22:52, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)
  • Yes, the redirect would be useful. Dieter Simon 23:05, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Of course, Wikipedia would remain the correct spelling. -Sean Curtin 01:57, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)
  • I don't see any downside to this one. Let's do it.Antandrus 02:05, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Aye Alexburke 07:41, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)
  • Yes. In fact, seeing as the American standard is taken for Wikipedia, we should compromise by having "Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia" as the image tagline ;o) zoney ███ talk 15:47, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Obviously. [[User:Neutrality|Neutrality (talk)]] 16:57, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • As Neutrality said in fewer words (; —siroχo 19:26, Aug 22, 2004 (UTC)
  • 172 19:39, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

No

  • Mikkalai : Cybersquatting is cybersquatting is cybersquatting regardless who's doing it. If people are looking up 'wikipedia', they will eventually find it. If people are looking up an subject, they land into wikipedia good time. IMO wikipedia is already littering the cyberspace too much (with mirrors and cybercash cows). Sometimes it is takes pains to find an independent source on a subject. Mikkalai 17:59, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Unless someone is willing to donate the annual registration fees, this is a waste of money. If someone is willing to, then I'm ambivalent. I don't think very many people are going to type in "wikipaedia.net". If it were .com or .org, then maybe... anthony (see warning) 19:45, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Agreed but as reproducers of our content tend to use every trick in the book to get a top rank in Google, if cybersquatters had this address it's conceivable that someone could do a search and come up with a "Wikipaedia" page and think they were looking at the real thing. At least reproductions which don't use variants of our name don't taint our reputation too much with their pop-up ads etc. One with a similar spelling might. — Trilobite (Talk) 22:58, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
You make a valid point, but at the same time, when will it end? There are a large number of top level domain names, and other variations on the spelling of Wikipedia. Should we register every single one of them, just because someone might use them to illegally abuse our trademark? I don't think the damage that would potentially be done outweighs the cost of maintaining every single one of the possible variations of wikipedia.org, and I don't think maintaining the registration of just this one variation does anything to reduce the possibility of harm. anthony (see warning) 13:17, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • No, at least not unless the offer is accompanied by wikipaedia.org - I think Wikipedia is an .org or, at best, a .com, but certainly not a .net. Having only the .net is not much use in my eyes. (Yes, I'm one of the three remaining people who believe that generic top-level domain names should have a little meaning.) -- pne 19:41, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Please see below for answers to some of these concerns. Ropers 22:41, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Ambivalent

  • While I can't see any major harm in using www.wikipaedia.net and redirecting to www.wikipedia.org, I do see a point in having users get used to one domain only.
    RoseParks 17:04, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I don't see that it would matter even if someone used Wikipedia all the time under the impression that it was spelt Wikipaedia because that was the address they used. They would still be coming here, and anyway we can't go round policing people's minds to ensure adherence to US spelling. — Trilobite (Talk) 17:10, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Oh, it's actually even better:
Go to http://en.wikipedia.com/wiki/Color_Graphics_Adapter. (Note that that's .com.)
See how using that .com URL seamlessly redirects you to the "correct" .org one?
If wikipaedia.net gets set up the same way, then there wont ever be the least chance of anybody hanging around at the "wrong" URL. They'll get to the wikipedia.org address regardless — thus people will notice pretty quickly that we're "really" at wikipedia.org. The wikipaedia.net domain name is really just another door we're opening to our users (and at the same time closing to traffic hijackers). Ropers 18:08, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

May I close this poll?

Seeing the response, I don't think there remains any chance on the "No" votes overtaking the "Yes" votes. Also, I have just gotten an email from Jimmy. If nobody objects, I will proclaim this poll closed some time tomorrow. Please only respond if you want to object to me closing the poll. Putting up a second poll on whether to close the first one would be absurd. Feel free to still sign while the poll remains open. Ropers 03:59, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Since Britain is a U.S. colony, couldn't we simply ask them to spell things in proper American...? ;-) AdmN 19:26, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Poll Closed

This poll is now closed.

That's not to prevent anyone from still voicing their opinion, but we have to draw a line somewhere and count. Also, I'm readying this to get archived off the main Village Pump site, which is very crowded.

Results

  • In favour: 20
  • Against: 3
  • Ambivalent: 1

Thanks to everyone who voted. :)



I may add:
This donation doesn't cost the Foundation anything right now. The domain name is payed for a year. A cost would incur if it was intended to transfer the name to another registrar (which can be done anytime after the first 60 days of registration). A cost would also incur if the domain name were to be renewed. I would be very much for that, but my donation doesn't come with any strings attached.
This is in fact a very minor contribution (Go google for the cost of a domain registration. See?), but one which still hasn't been ticked off the to-do list.
I registered this domain because I ended up on wikipaedia.org and found out that... -- see here for my writeup of my findings: [9] (user name guest, password 1ns4nI+y) It was in the course of this noble waste of time that I realized that wikipaedia.net was not yet taken.
And yes, I am all for us getting the wikipaedia.org, wikipaedia.com domain names into the fold (and maybe the German wikipaedia.de as well).
I feel they belong to the Wikipedia and I fail to see any legitimate, non-traffic hijacking reason why anyone would want to use, say, wikipaedia.org.
I suggest we get working what we've got (wikipaedia.net) ASAP and then proceed to claim wikipaedia.org and .com as well, under the terms of the ICANN UDRP.

Ropers 22:41, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Strange Interwiki

I noticed on East Asia that the interwiki link to [[minnan:Tang-a]] shows up at the bottom of the article rather than under other languages. (the link works as advertised ;-) Is this just me? Kokiri 08:16, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

No. Me too. -- Chris 73 Talk 08:28, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)
I noticed the same thing with a similar 'minnan' interwiki on another article (can't remember which one). I suspect it affects many minnan connections, but I can't see why - the links look well formed. -- Solipsist 09:52, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Known bug. Angela. 11:29, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)

License violations

Where do I report sites violating the GFDL license in how they use our content? One particularly flagrant example is firstcarhire.com, stealing portions of Wikipedia pages without the slightest credit. See, for example, http://www.firstcarhire.com/country-guide/united-arab-emirates/abu-dhabi/ (compare Abu Dhabi). I've seen a number of mirrors also fail to credit. Is there a standard process for reprimanding these sorts of people? Thanks. Derrick Coetzee 08:01, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

And it gets much worse - this site copied the entire encyclopedia, including the project pages, with no credit to Wikipedia! They simply say "This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License." These people are getting sloppy. Derrick Coetzee 08:10, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

And even worse! This site claims copyright to our article (Abraham Lincoln)! The page is nothing but a mirror of our content, and it says right at the bottom of the page, "The contents of this web site are Copyright © 2003 Otherground, LLC and Civil-War.ws. All Rights Reserved." I can't imagine it getting much worse than that. Derrick Coetzee 08:15, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

If i understand it correctly, they do not have to credit wikipedia, but they DO have to license it at GFDL! Your last example is definitely a violation. -- Chris 73 Talk 08:31, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)

No they do have to credit Wikipedia. [[User:Theresa knott|]] 08:34, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

They fail to cite us or mention that it is licensed under the GFDL (thus, their copy is an illegal copyright infringement); worse, they claim they own it. This is a definite violation. →Raul654 08:40, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks is probably the place you want, Derrick --rbrwrˆ 09:41, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Ah, thanks. I should've been able to find this. Looks like others are already ahead of me on this. Derrick Coetzee 16:54, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The text at the bottom currently reads "All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License (see Copyrights for details).". Perhaps "It is illegal to copy text here without attributing Wikipedia as the source, and linking back to authors' pages". Oh, maybe bold text the illegal bit. I'm not really kidding - this sort of nonsense needs to stop - just cause it's "open" licence doesn't mean one can just STEAL. zoney ███ talk 11:25, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

They don't have to link back to Wikipedia, simply to the contributors who hold the copyright. The easiest way to do that might be to link to wikipedia, but simply listing the contributors and which bits they contributed would be suffient.

white box outside thumbnail border

Could this be removed? It only shows up when the content part of the page has a different coloured background (e.g. user pages). I'm not sure if this is the correct place to post about this, but it is annoying when wiki generally looks so good :o] porge 03:03, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The "Creatures" Category

Category:Creatures seems to be a bit messed up. --Sgeo | Talk 23:30, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Can you be more specific? I went to the Cat page, and it looked like a normal Cat page to me. Niteowlneils 02:43, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It has two "C" sections, and two "G" sections --Sgeo | Talk 17:45, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The software doesn't align categories that well, especially when there are a small number of entries, unfortunately. So this category is fine in terms of what we can expect. —siroχo 18:17, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)
Sorry, I didn't notice--I've seen that come and go on the speedy cat so much I don't notice any more when it happens elsewhere. Niteowlneils 01:05, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Minor edit symbol

Why does the letter to denote a minor edit in the watchlist/etc constantly switch between an m and an M? Is there some revert war going on with the codebase or what? --Golbez 22:52, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Nope, no one is fighting over the minor edit letter in the MediaWiki namespace. The software must at times be loading Language.php instead (where the minor edit letter is still M), instead of the custom interface. Natryn 00:59, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
For me it's not M or m it's m [[User:Ilyanep|Ilyanep]] 01:01, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I don't remember ever seeing M, altho' it apparently was the first few weeks I was here. I do remember when N briefly became ! a month or so later. Niteowlneils 02:43, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Scanned images of specific editions of books

I see that in the article Childhood (novel), there is a scan of the Penguin Classics edition. I would have thought this contrary to Wiki policy - there are many editions, why are we advertising a particular publisher?

We generally pick an edition, any edition. Current or first would of course be most canonical. If you have a better one to scan, go for it - David Gerard 22:29, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Licensing

Do I misunderstand the GFDL? I thought that the GFDL requires attribution to the author(s). Afaik, Wikipedia caters for this by having the history function. However, are not all copy&paste edits (copy from one article and paste in another) violations if the original author/article is not mentioned? Also, I've come across a number of images stating from German Wikipedia as source. This is probably true, but should there not be a link (and credit to the contributor), too?

I there a project working on image licensing? (tough on images ;-) I mean making sure images are tagged accordingly or removed? (BTW, what do you think about this source: Image:Michel-foucault.jpg?)

Summa summarum, should we not take licensing a bit more serious? Kokiri 21:25, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

This is a matter of some concern to me also. The issue of other encyclopaedias "grabbing" WP content is also pertinant. They shouldn't be allowed - WP "knows" who its contributors are, and has histories, these others do not. Bah! People getting confused between "copyleft" and "copyabsent". Sue them all I say :o) zoney ███ talk 00:47, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

If they link to the wikipedia article, the edit history there. So no problem. As for images - I do think people should put a link in to the image description page on the other wiki [[User:Theresa knott|]] 01:12, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Yes, we should advertise this to make wikipedians more aware of the need of attribution. It is therefore also important to remember to use the edit summary to attribute to someone else when copy-pasting, for example by writing "merged from Wikipedia:Village tap" when doing a merge, using the links-in-summary feature. [[User:Sverdrup|User:Sverdrup]] 17:27, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The history information isn't exported in the cur dump, so it's really hard to get the information without downloading and parsing a multi-gig file. If Wikipedia wants individual authors credited, they should make this information more readily available. anthony (see warning) 00:28, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It does look like copying and pasting anything that is not solely one author's contribution is against the GFDL. If you export the history that should be fine, and you don't need to link to wikipedia, likewise manually attributing to the authors in the history would be ok. If, however, you copied a chunk of text from one article to another within Wikipedia, and failed to attribute it to it's author (or its constituent parts to the relevant authors) that would be a violation.

Links: underlined or not?

Some weeks ago, at the time that the new "wikipedia page appearance" was launched, all the links on the pages lost their underlining. A few days later the underlining was back. Now, in the last few of days, they've gone again. Now there might be somewhere better to discuss this (but I can't find it), so here's my opinion! Links with no underscores definately look slicker and cooler - but they aren't practical in Wikipedia. When there are several links next to each other in the text, without the underlining you sometimes can't see whether it is one link or several, for instance:

To put it simply, it's not always intuitive. See also: Human-computer interaction - or should that be Human-computer interaction? 80.46.184.205 21:14, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I'm not sure whether link underlining is on or off by default (I'll check the source), but you can explicitly enable/disable it in the "Misc settings" tab of your user preferences. FWIW, I agree that Wikipedia's default behavior should be to underline links as that's the generally accepted way to say "Hey buddy, this is a link". --Diberri | Talk 21:31, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)


I see how you can change your preference for whether or not to underline links, but what I can't figure out is how to get the underlines to print. They used to be printed out with underlines as default, but now it seems you can't do this. Eoghan 19:22, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Aozora Bunko: S editing problem

Aozora Bunko: S is 31kb, and my primary browser can not edit the entire thing. I've fixed what I can through my secondary browser, but would someone be kind enough to fix the problem? It probably should be split, but there's no really good place to do so IMHO, since the "Sh"'s constitute the middle third of the list. Please also note all of the linking articles. 24.218.107.75 18:07, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC) (DocWatson42 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:DocWatson42 )

The Aozora Bunko: S page is now sectioned. Hope this helps. Happy editing ! :-) -- PFHLai 02:10, 2004 Aug 21 (UTC)
Thanks! That looks much better than I conceived of. Though the above message was the last bit I had to do, as I am to unfamiliar with Japanese literature to undertake any more. — DocWatson42 19:17, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Article of the week

A note was posted here a while about about the two votes on:

  1. the name of the Article of the week—some people have found the name "Article of the week" confusing, thinking that it a way to choose the week's best article, whereas it is actually a way to choose a non-existent article or stub page for everyone to work on to bring up to , the aim being to have a featured-standard in one week; and
  2. the policy for ties—this is not hypothetical: two weeks ago, Renaissance tied with Baghdad.

The vote has ended, and the proposal is to:

  1. rename "Article of the week" as "Collaboration of the week"; and
  2. for the policy for ties to be to extend the vote for 24 hours and then choose whichever article was nominated first (seniority).

If anyone has any strong objections, please comment in Wikipedia talk:Article of the week. -- ALoan (Talk) 14:03, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Featured articles on politicians

A few days ago the featured article, Barack Obama, was about a politician currently running for U.S. Senate. I had requested it be featured (mainly out of pride), without realizing that having it on the main page could be seen as unfair. It raised several issues about what should go on the main page, so I've started a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. Jump in please, we'd love to have you. Best, [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 13:19, 2004 Aug 20 (UTC)

Analogue disc record

Not sure if this has been mentioned before, but there seems to be a consensus that analogue disc record is the worst-named featured article. There is a on-going vote to move it somewhere more sensible in the talk page, now at the stage of a run-off between the two most popular candidates. -- ALoan (Talk) 10:33, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

With 17 to 13 vote, the article is now at Gramophone record. -- Infrogmation 00:42, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
P.S.: Help in fixing links to the article is encouraged. Especially from those who voiced their dislike of the old title :-) -- Infrogmation 15:52, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Federal depository libraries

I'd just like to make everyone aware of this - as most of you know, US Government documents are public domain. What most of you probably don't know is that some libraries across the country are "Federal document repositories" - IE, they are storehouses for goverment documents. A Federal respository library is *THE* biggest cache of public domain information you will ever find. So if you are in need of pictures, maps, or diagrams on any topic, you can go to one and get them by the kilo. Here is a listing of federal repository libraries. →Raul654 06:55, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)

Cue article: Federal Government Depository Library, according to a link on Troy Public Library. --Tagishsimon
Also, I want to warn that this may not be the case in governments other than us gov. For example, any document, work or whatever from governments in Japan are copyrighted whether or not there is a statement about copyright. -- Taku 01:35, Aug 27, 2004 (UTC)

It Came From Dartmouth College

Wikipedia has been invaded by a mass wave of newbies posting sub-trivial, detailed non-notable articles about Dartmouth College (the favorite drink of Dartmouth College and how to drink it?) Has Wikipedia been suddenly advertised to Dartmouth? Can we look for these and put them on VfD where they belong? RickK 06:51, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)

Dartmouth - where have I heard that name before? OMG Archemedies Plutionium. Please no. [[User:Theresa knott|]] 13:49, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Judging from User:Pcw, this is a Dartmouth course project, where the instructor has asked students to go on Wikipedia and create article. Andris 16:02, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)
Well I didn't really think it was Archie, his style of writing is instantly recognizable, he doesn't go in for drinking games only grandious theories. Anyway I think he was fired from Dartmouth if my memory serves me correctly (I haven't been on usenet for years) [[User:Theresa knott|]] 20:21, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Condition yellow on this one anyway I think. This user is not just violating Wikipedia policies to which he objects himself, he's instructing his class of computer students to violate them too. A lose/lose scenario at present IMO. Andrewa 21:13, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Violating policies? I'm not sure I understand. I've looked over the policies and I can't find a clear instance. The biggest problem seems to be that someone feels that the articles are "sub-trivial" and "non-notable." These are pretty subjective designations and, I'm sorry to say, designations that don't seem to have a very neutral point of view. Unfortunately, the policies also encourage me to ask them to "write about what they know". What most of them know is Dartmouth college and, perhaps, something about their home town. Pcw 01:59, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Well, then, write about their hometown. I'm a 14-year old student from Malaysia, and I've written an article on Bandar Utama (though perhaps I should move it to comply with the naming conventions). Settlements, no matter how trivial, are generally accepted. Surely they must have some sort of passion. Linkin Park, Limp Bizkit? What's their favourite food? The relevant articles could use help, and even if they don't know much about them, people passionate about something generally research it. For example, despite being completely ignorant of Beatles trivia six months ago, within that time, I've written Yesterday (song), Something (song) and Hey Jude up to featured level with the help of Google. Johnleemk | Talk 09:00, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Well said.
As to which policies were violated, Wikipedia has policies as to what is encyclopedic, but the students appear to have been encouraged to ignore these policies on the grounds that the instructor thinks that they should be changed. Not good IMO. Andrewa 17:40, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
PS see Wikipedia:School and university projects for what he should have done. I guess we need to make this page more prominent somehow. Andrewa 21:37, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
PPS see also User_talk:Andrewa#Delayed_deletion. Andrewa 22:26, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
The instructor has replied to me personally, and grading in this course will be completed by 25 August. Andrewa 17:40, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Andrewa, I saw your plea for a delayed decision, but the fault lies not with us, for upholding our standards and policies, but with the user for violating them and asking us to, essentially, offer a free web host for his class for a little while. Dartmouth is not an impoverished community college. It is a very, very expensive, well endowed institution with a far more than adequate computing backbone. If Pcw wants his students to learn the wiki, he can have it installed on his campus intranet. I'm sure his computer science folks would be delighted to see someone take the initiative in creating a Dartmouth wiki. I feel very strongly that it is not our place to make an exception to make his life easier. I've taught technology for years, as well as English, and if I send students out of our resources, I figure it's like sending them abroad: they must obey the local laws. I find, further, his continued arguments on VfD that we're all wrong, that it is our policy that is at fault, arrogant and trollish. For my part, I do not plan to make an exception, and I urge others to do the same. Treat these articles like any others, and let Pcw invest in floppy disks, if he needs storage media for his class. This, to me, is extremely distasteful and offputting. Geogre 20:53, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

This should be a community decision, but I still think it would be good to postpone any deletions until Thursday 26, which is only a few days extension in the worst cases. There is no suggestion that standards will be lowered, or that the VfD notices will be removed during this extension.
And I'm appalled at what I see as a suggestion above that we would prefer the students to be directed to an in-house Wiki instead. Did you read the assignment sheet the students received?
We have an excellent opportunity here to make some new friends, and also an opportunity to make some new enemies, including of friends we already have. There are some lessons to learn, certainly, and I agree about the attitude shown by the instructor, and I am also appalled at the thought of what he might have told his students along these lines. But the assignment sheet gives a very different picture, and very in keeping with the valid points you are making.
It is not a matter of helping the instructor, that is a by-product. The articles are contributed by his students, not by him. Andrewa 21:37, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
PS but I wouldn't get too excited. From the voting, it appears unlikely that there will be any extensions granted. It was just a suggestion (plea if you like). Andrewa 21:41, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Andrewa, I did see the instructions, and the instructor asked the students to write articles that fit our guidelines. They do not do so, they have failed the assignment. Indeed, I am quite suspicious of "Pcw" being the instructor, as those instructions and the plea to leave the articles are incommensurate. Would I divert students to a campus instead of Wikipedia? If they cannot write articles that fit on our site, then they cannot write articles that fit on our site. If they must exist somewhere so that a teacher can complete his assignment, it would be better if they were on the in-house wiki, yes. Call that snobbish elitism, if you choose. Consider me hostile, if you choose. However, it is utterly unprofessional and unethical academic behavior for Pcw to ask us to change our policies. It is also, I think, inappropriate for us to make such an offer. As an academic, I am appalled at the suggestion that we change our standards for this assignment, especially since the assignment explicitly stated that we should not have to. Geogre 22:15, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Again, you make some good points. Agree it's unprofessional of Peter to have suggested we should change our policies, and unethical for him to have suggested as he seems to have done that his students should violate them. In fact the assignment sheet and his user page are so different in tone that I wonder what's going on. So far as I know, nobody has offered to change our policies. I certainly haven't. So far as students being unable to write articles that fit our site, I think that's over the top. They take a while to learn the ropes. Doesn't everyone? Andrewa 06:30, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

It seems to me that, if the assignment reads, Choose two topics that are appropriate. Make sure they fit inside the definition and are not in the Wikipedia already, they have failed. It is not up to US to change our rules to meet Pcw's assignment, it is incumbent upon him to follow his own assignment and to fail every single student who submitted unacceptable material. If these things are being listed on VfD right and left, this is a pretty good indication that the material is NOT appropriate, and does not meet Wikipedia standards, and therefore they should get F's, and we shouldn't bend to their needs. RickK 23:06, Aug 21, 2004 (UTC)

And more good points. I'd hope that the fact that despite what the assignment sheet said, several articles submitted in response to it were listed on VfD would cause those students to lose marks. That's one reason Peter's user page defending them and his comments attacking the validity of the VfD listings were of such concern to me, see above.
But the assessment is up to him. My concerns are twofold. Firstly, the current content of Wikipedia, that is to say what to do with substandard articles. My suggestion was that normal standards should be followed despite what Peter said, but that we consider a delay of a few days to allow the course to finish as smoothly as possible. Secondly, the future content of Wikipedia, which is dependent on the contributors. These students are all newbies. Some of them may become contributors. Some may become trolls. Some will undoubtedly just go away. I think we could be a bit more welcoming to them, at no loss to ourselves and great potential gain.
Peter's future students are also potential contributors. I hope that next time he might tell us in advance, as other instructors have done, and also revise the assignment sheet. Despite what it says, the message didn't get through. Perhaps it should explicitly say that articles listed on VfD and likely to be deleted will lose marks. IMO it should mention speedy deletion, which seems to have caught some by surprise. These aren't computer majors, and they seem not to have understood that Wikipedia isn't just another blogg.
I would have liked to get a list of the work submitted by his students. As well as the obvious idea of checking that we have caught all the damage, I'm also interested in why the assignment sheet didn't work as well as it should have, and whether we did get any new contributors as a result. So far as I can see this information isn't publicly available, their website is set up so that only the students themselves and the college staff can see the submissions. If we were in a less adversarial situation I'd ask Peter for a list by email, but frankly I don't even feel like asking in the current environment.
Cool it, guys. It's not all that important if the articles are deleted on our normal schedule. The assignment submission date was last Friday. Any further edits are in their own time, hopefully because they like it here and want to contribute. If Peter needs to see any deleted articles then I can simply email him a copy. I haven't promised him that there would be any extensions, and it doesn't look like there will be. No big deal there. Andrewa 06:30, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • Andrewa, just a thought: it occurs to me that the assignment is such an extraordinary example of a well written assignment, and the behavior of "Pcw" is so out of line with it, that it's possible that the user is not the instructor. His words and actions seem much more in keeping with a kid trying to ensure that his article stays and he gets good marks than an instructor or professor. It seems to me that the instructor/professor wanted us to act with our usual discretion and wanted to assess his students' abilities to fit in. I also note that the local content of the students is fairly characteristic for students in college. We have a Requested Articles page, and they have a really good library. I hope they do get hooked on Wikipedia. Given the fact that each student was to write two articles, we can assume that we have already had some forty submissions from the Dartmouth group. That means that some thirty-five, minimum (if the instructor has more than one class with this assignment, then we have

had eighty submissions), articles that haven't been listed on VfD or been speedy deleted. I welcome each and every one of those authors, and I thank the instructor (whoever he or she may really be) if any one of the students remains engaged and aware. Geogre 21:35, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You're not the only one to have wondered that, I have (and I've hinted at this above, twice) and so have others who have contacted me privately. But the email address on the assignment sheet is live, the person who responds identifies themselves as user:Pcw, and gives the email address given by Pcw as the return address. So I'd have to say no, there's some other explanation.
Class assignments such as this are going to happen, and more and more as we become better known, and I think we should welcome them as we have previously. They are an excellent chance to give people a very positive experience of contributing if we handle them well. If we handle them badly, on the other hand, they can just as easily be schools for trolls. Some of these people would never have attempted to edit at Wikipedia without the assignment. If it's a positive experience some will stay, and that's a win for us, as of course are the good edits they make. On the other hand if it's a negative experience they've been forced into they may find it easier to take it out on Wikipedia than on the educational institution, and even if they don't do this deliberately they are unlikely to have contributed much that doesn't need to be deleted or reverted.
I think we should give some thought to promoting Wikipedia: School and university projects a bit better. I was wondering at one stage whether perhaps we should even have a policy requiring class projects to be registered, but far better is to have a carrot, a positive reason for instructors to want to register. Ideas? Andrewa 07:39, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
PS your arithmetic doesn't do this justice. They each had to write two 200 word articles that fit inside the definition and are not in the Wikipedia already (their linking) to get the thirty points for question five, but to get the full fifty possible bonus points for question six they had to write another five articles. That's 140 new articles if one class of twenty all went for maximum credit, and looking at the assignment, once you've got the hang of the first two articles the bonus points are relatively easily earned IMO compared to the rest of it. I've seen at least one article (and not on VfD) that I thought might have been an attempt at these bonus points. Andrewa 07:56, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Just adding my two cents here on the controversy: Most of the Dartmouth articles, while probably not notable enought to warrant individual articles, are still important information in a greater whole about Dartmouth College. The wave of "mass deletions" going on at VfD strikes me as reactonary. What I propose is that we take whatever information that can be reduced (edited down) and merge it into the Dartmouth College article. Additionally, several stand-alone articles about aspects of Dartmouth should be created, most notably Dartmouth College student life, Dartmouth College arts and Dartmouth College athletics, which seems to cover most of the content of the articles. Let's work with this influx of energy, instead of fighting it. We might get some new editors of it, and I fear alienating these students. Kevyn 00:12, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • Kevyn, I really appreciate your example of Wikilove here. Truly, I do. If I'm frothing a bit, it's because of my experience as a teacher. (I'm a tough, tough grader.) It's exasperating to have bright students wilfully misread an assignment, and it's pretty characteristic for 18 year old college students to either plead ignorance or, more commonly, argue bitterly that it's not fair that their article be deleted. That's just an explanation of my mood about these. As for my votes, those are different. If we merge all of these articles to the Dartmouth College article, we're going to have a Dartmouth article that outweighs the Dartmouth College website. We're getting such excessive detail here on such minutia that our Dartmouth article is going to be four or five times anything else. As much as I think more information is better than less, I also think that we have to provide an overview. We can't duplicate the resources of the rest of the web. How much detail on a particular university does an encyclopedia need, and how much should it allow (different questions). For me, a single sentence ("Dartmouth has many musical groups, including the Dartmouth Dodecaphonics, the Dartmouth Wind Ensemble...") is all we should provide. More than that, and we start to diverge from our path. Major universities and colleges have great traditions and provide a raft of service and community organizations. Each one does, and providing 200 words on each facet of each is simply overwhelming. As for redirects, I think we have to ask the question we always ask of redirects: Will someone search this term? If we're talking about Dartmouth Womens Crew (n.b. the lack of apostrophe), possibly so. Otherwise, we're back to good old notability. Are the Dartmouth Chi Alpha Chi going to be a search term? No. Sorry for going on so long, but I definitely wanted a chance to explain my votes, as well as my mood. The two are unrelated, but they show up in the same vote space, I'm afraid. Geogre 00:47, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
      • Geogre, I don't think we are quite as far apart in our positions as you think. I agree that we should not try to be the definitive source for Dartmouth, nor is it desireable to be bigger than the Dartmouth website. To repeat what I said: What I propose is that we take whatever information that can be reduced (edited down) and merge it into the Dartmouth College article. Note the emphasis on REDUCE. While I probably wouldn't reduce as far as you would, I agree that we have more information than is necessary. I'd take it down to a paragraph, you say you'd take it down to a sentence -- it's just a matter of degree. On the issue of redirects, my reasoning for making redirects is not for SEARCH purposes -- though it is a remote possibility that these terms might be searched for -- but to put in a placeholder, to discourage future Dartmouth students from creating an article on the subject if they find no article at that location. I think that redirects serve a valuable function in cases like this, where VfD has determined that no article should exist. One other thought on the value of the articles being made into redirects instead of deleting them -- it preserves the history of the page, including the VfD discussion, in case at any point in the future someone wants to know why the article is no longer there. And, in the remote possibility that the subject of the article should become notable (Cue Judy Tenuta saying "It could happen!"), we've got the content already there in the history, ready to go. Kevyn 01:37, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • Most of these articles are not violations of Wikipedia policies. What they are are examples of articles which are continually deleted via VFD despite their not being violations of Wikipedia policies. Some of them also are not very well formatted, but I don't think you can expect new users to learn the obscure formatting guidelines of wikipedia right off the bat. I don't even know many of them myself and I've been here a long time. anthony (see warning) 00:04, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Does anyone think that we were a bit harsh on the Dartmouth folks? Particularly Pcw? --Golbez 22:05, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

  • VfD can be harsh, I agree. I don't think, though, that we're being too harsh on Pcw. I say that as a former prof. He has had time to correct his students. When the articles began showing up on VfD, he could have mentioned to his class(es) that they needed to look for items that are notable outside of the campus. I, at least, mentioned repeatedly that we have a Requested Articles page. His assignment (whether he wrote it or it came from another section of the class, I don't know) specifically informed students to read what we have, to see what we cover. And yet he has argued repeatedly that we're wrong, that we're calling "the people at Dartmouth not notable." We're not, of course, saying anything about people on VfD. If he is a dispassionate observer using Wikipedia as a metric of his class, then he is going to let the chips fall where they may. My own code of professional ethics says that it's wrong to send your class onto anyone else's space and then argue that the space is something you have rights to. Wikipedia is for everybody, but it has the same standards for everybody, too. This includes, unfortunately, the cutting comments and exasperation that some VfD voters (Lord knows, me too) will voice. He has to feel beseiged by having 20 condemning voices aimed at him, just as we feel beseiged by having what seems to us to be a flood of inappropriate articles. Both sides get testy. I hate to say what I'm about to say, but I think he should (dang, but I hate saying what anyone should do) work with us to work with his class to ensure greater conformity from them and greater benefit to us, and he can't be personally emotionally invested in the inclusion of any of the articles. Geogre 02:07, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • Keep in mind that the latest word from User:Pcw is that there were two hundred articles submitted. Perhaps twenty of them ended up in VfD. [[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 10:00, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)
To answer your question, Golbez, I didn't think that any of the decisions to list on VfD or the votes were particularly harsh. But I do think we could have done it in a more constructive manner. One article was described as crap, for example. IMO that's unnecessary, uncalled for, and violates the spirit of Wikipedia policies on personal attacks. The tone of VfD debate overall has been dropping lately IMO, and we need to correct the slide. Moving user subpages elsewhere will help, those discussions have been particularly difficult, and that policy change is in the pipeline. Perhaps we need to do something else too, but I'm unsure what.
Another thing that I notice is of the three newcomers' user talk pages I checked, on two no welcome had been posted although their articles had been listed for deletion. I question whether listing the article on VfD was really a more urgent task than posting a welcome to the newcomer. Ideally do both. In this case the welcome was particularly urgent, as the contributor may not return now that the assignment is over. But any newbie who has scored a VfD nomination needs an urgent welcome IMO. I'm sensitive to this as I scored on VfD myself before I scored a welcome, and I was very nearly not back.
It should IMO be a standard part of listing (or even voting on) an article on VfD to check who the contributors are, and what their edit histories are like, and what links to the article, and I fear this is often neglected at present. I'm not sure what to do to make it more common.
I'm sure there are more lessons to learn as the smoke clears. Andrewa 14:14, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Good articles from Dartmouth?

Someone mentioned somewhere (and now I can't remember where) that they knew of several articles that came from the Dartmouth class assignment that were top-notch articles and valuable inclusions to Wikipedia. We all know what the bad ones were, from the VfD controversy. Does anyone know what the good ones were? I'd really like to see the flip side of this mess. Kevyn 23:57, 25 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I know some of them, and you could email the lecturer and ask too, or you can guess them I think. Look for new users who created up to seven new articles in the week or a little more leading up to last Friday, and have done little if anything else. The lecturer has asked me not to identify the ones I know, and for obvious reasons I think.
My observation is that the overall quality is very high indeed, as you would expect. These are college kids, they have lots of interests, and they knew they would be graded on the quality and compliance to standards of the articles. And if under those conditions we didn't get a lot of good articles, then rather than sniping at the instructor and students we should be asking what's wrong with our documentation - which is the thing we can most easily change (and before anyone jumps on me again, I'm not saying lower our standards and have never said that).
But another thing I'm wondering is whether a certain amount of the conflict over those articles that did attract (sometimes valid) criticism is quite deliberate on the part of the instructor. One of the goals of the course seems to be to give the students experience in all aspects of the Internet, including the joys and otherwise of open-source development. IMO they've now seen first hand the worst face of our community, and I'm sure it's been very educational for them. I'd love to be a fly on the wall at any tutorials where the assignment experiences are discussed (I assume you do that in America, we certainly have in the courses I've taught in Australia), or even in the canteen where the students informally compare notes. Food for thought? Andrewa 00:49, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)
  • I just found a partial list of the articles on Pcw's talk page. I've looked over them, and most are, indeed, noteworthy, and fairly well-written, though there are a few that need cleanup. From this class assignment we've expanded our coverage of significant feminist issues, sports stars, Utah ski areas, Korean films, cold war history, weather phenomena and literary landmarks. Clearly, despite the tempest in the VfD-Pot, this was a worthwhile exercise for us. Kevyn 01:44, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)
    • We've also got some squirrely college stuff on feminist issues. It's what you'd expect, and not bad per se. As a literature person, I get hypertensive about things like the recent changes to Orlando: A Biography that sound like they came straight from a sophomore lecture and got filtered through a student. More a case of generalizing too much, adding trivia of interest, and presenting classroom observations as truth.... Like I said -- about what you'd expect. (In that article: Orlando was not her most successful novel or even close, its being in the fiction rack is no outrage, it's not all about Vita Sackville-West (that's a favorite theory of biographical readers), even if there is an element of that in it. Just enthusiastic. I wonder if the proposed Sexism on Wikipedia Pages argument is a Dartmouth IP.) Anyway, that's not a complaint. It's just a different kind of editing that needs to be done -- cleaning up over eager POV. Geogre 03:10, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Some lessons to be learned

Another lesson I think we can learn is that there were some negative comments about the standard of English in which some of the articles were written. Is this covered anywhere in existing policy? Anyway, I've put together something at Wikipedia:non English speakers that deserves work and comments IMO. If it's already covered elsewhere it can be merged or whatever. If it's not, it should be linked from a few places probably, and edited mercilessly like any new guideline. Andrewa 01:56, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

And another is that despite consistent policies on the subject, rhetoric is becoming common on VfD. For some thoughts on the subject, see Wikipedia:rhetoric. Again, I hope this will be edited mercilessly and if it's not entirely absorbed into other policy documents it should be linked to and from them. Andrewa 07:22, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Dartmouthian Votes for Deletion

I'm sorry... reading the Votes of Deletion page has prompted me to do a bit of humor in creating a special template for these Dartmouth Pages for Votes for Deletion. See Template:Dartmouth-vfd. I am certain it will end up on the tfd page, but anyone who's having a headache right now can get a good laugh out it, I suppose. -- Allyunion 00:33, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

And you've created a category as well, I see. Andrewa 01:38, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

  • I'm sure this is a bad thing, but I don't hate the Dartmouth vfd tag. Yes, I would never use it, but it does kind of say right up front why the articles that are going to VfD are going. It's usually not because they're poorly written. The tag doesn't do any good, though, because I get the impression that few of the VfD'd authors are looking a second time. That surprises me, somewhat. When I first saw the flood coming in, I felt sure that we were going to have some extremely shrill arguments on VfD. We have, but not as many as I thought. Perhaps the students are more mature than that, and perhaps they're not looking back. I don't know. (I note that some of the most horribly shrill people on VfD recently are not, in fact, young folks. Just one more sign that age and maturity are not always related.) Geogre 03:07, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

New template: POV check

I created a new template, Template:POV check, which is intended to be placed on articles which at first glance don't appear to have NPOV text, but whose neutrality is not disputed, unlike Template:NPOV. The text when I created it is:

This article needs to be reworded to conform to a neutral point of view. The apparance of this notice does not imply that the neutrality of this article is disputed.

Please discuss appropriateness and other matters. [[User:Poccil|Peter O. (Talk)]] 06:12, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)

In other words, this message is to be used for circumstances in which the article is undisputably POV? What's the point? Austin Hair 06:44, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)
Not necessarily undisputably. I was thinking that it could be used to mark articles for which a rewrite could be helpful to better bring an article to NPOV standard. Examples of this are newly written articles or articles with text paraphrased from other sites. [[User:Poccil|Peter O. (Talk)]] 06:53, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)

Perhaps this would get the point across more accurately:

This article may need to be reworded to conform to a neutral point of view, however, the neutrality of this article is not necessarily disputed.

zoney | talk 14:33, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Changes made. [[User:Poccil|Peter O. (Talk)]] 16:11, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)
I profess utter bafflement. Why not just slap a template on every article saying

This article may be neutral or, then again, maybe not; and this article may be accurate or, then again, maybe not; and this article probably could use attention because most articles could; and it might contain spoilers if it happens to be about a book or movie, otherwise not; and it could even be insane but probably isn't, at least I hope not.

[[User:Dpbsmith|Dpbsmith (talk)]] 23:16, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Too long-winded

This article may be a perfect article with absolutely no mistakes, or then again, it may not be neutral, may need attention (of course all of them do), contain spoilers (of course, who cares), need to be deleted, or be insane

Or even better:

There is an 85.7% chance that this article is in some way flawed or just plain sucks. In the case that it is part of the other 14.3% excuse us for the bother

;) [[User:Ilyanep|Ilyanep]] 00:57, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the original post above concerned where one looks at an article, isn't sure if it's neutral or not, and is flagging it as I've described. Now personally, I suggest merely commenting on the talk page is enough - but the point is, it's not a neutrality dispute. zoney ███ talk 01:37, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Systematic error in use of term "Latin alphabet"?

I just put this into Talk:Alphabet, but it struck me I should also put it here. Perhaps this has been debated to death and I missed it while on my wikibattical, but it looks pretty serious to me:

The following from this article Alphabet seems to me erroneous, or at least incomplete:
In modern linguistic usage, the term Latin alphabet is usually used to refer to the modern derivations from the alphabet used by the Romans (i.e. the Roman alphabet).
       A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y, Z
"Modern variations from the alphabet used by the Romans" include Norwegian (30 characters), Italian (22 characters), Spanish (29 characters), etc. And, for that matter, I'm pretty sure, the actual "Latin" alphabet had no J, no U, no Y, no Z. Every single article on a character uses this phrase Latin alphabet, but this is nothing but the English alphabet. Ortolan88 03:41, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I believe the Romans didn't have a W, either. (OK, that's the straight line...) -- Jmabel 05:41, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)

The term Latin alphabet is accepted and quite acceptable in current use to be the 26 un-accented characters as used in English. Quite clearly this is not the same as the alphabet used by the Romans, any more than the Arabic numerals we are familiar in in the West is supposed to be the same as those used by Arabic writers.
Further, in the Roman alphabet the letters C and G were interchangeable, and C was never pronounced as 'S' (as in Caesar).
--JohnArmagh 06:18, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Also, the K is used rather rarely in Latin. At any rate, I think that the term Latin alphabet really does refer to this alphabet. All the Romance languages I know of use it (of which Norwegian isn't), and accents aren't part of letters, they're separate marks. So Spanish, Italian, and so on have 26 letters. I can confirm it's true for the French alphabet. Andre 07:06, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Actually, I don't know about Italian. A website I just found says it has 21 letters. Andre 07:07, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
While accented letters aren't considered distinct, the use of certain other diacritics—as with ñ, for instance—does introduce distinct letters not present in English (or Latin). Nonetheless, the alphabet used in Spanish and other languages is still "Latin" by all accounts, despite the numerous post-Roman introductions. Austin Hair 07:23, Aug 20, 2004 (UTC)
I wonder how to interpret "In modern linguistic usage...." Is the term "Latin alphabet" used formally by linguists? In any case, there is no ambiguity (I think) in programming circles: the term Latin or Roman alphabet is synonymous with English A thru Z. AdmN 08:02, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Yes, we in the linguistic community do call that 26-letter alphabet the Latin alphabet, because it was originally designed for the Latin language, even though the original alphabet did not contain G, J, K, U, W, Y, Z, or any of the lowercase letters. Other launguages, of course, modify symbols and call the results new, distinct letters (Spanish Ñ, Norwegian Ø, Polish Ę, etc.) but typographically they are based on existant letters of the alphabet. The same argument could, I guess, be used to exclude G, I, U, and W (originally based on other Latin letters) but their use has become sufficiently engrained into international use of the alphabet that they are considered letters in their own right. Anyhow, calling the 26 letters the "Latin alphabet" is well-established usage, especially in the absence of other feasible alternatives, that reflects the origin of the alphabet. Livajo 14:55, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Unicode terminology suggests that "Latin alphabet" includes hundreds of letters ("Latin-1" and "Latin-2" encodings, etc.). "Basic Latin alphabet" in this terminology consists of basic letters without diacritics (A-Z). "Roman alphabet" seems to imply the alphabet actually used by Romans, so without G, V, W, etc. And that's how most people I know use these terms anyway. Zocky 15:16, 27 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Dealing with vandals from different IP ranges?

Richard Ramirez has been vandalized by both 216.145.85.36 and 208.183.105.11 in exactly the same way. A) How to deal with vandals that can come from such different ranges, and B) Since I'm at work, I can't really spend the time to clean and monitor this article right now. Can someone help deal with this? Niteowlneils 23:51, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

This [10] is somehow related, but it's range starts with 12. Niteowlneils 23:56, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Incorporating University of Texas Maps with Wikipedia

UT has a number of maps online that could be used to enhance some of the articles. [11]

According to their Maps FAQ - "Most of the maps scanned by the General Libraries and served from this web site are in the public domain. No permissions are needed to copy them. You may download them and use them as you wish."

Has there been any decision on using these? If there's no objection I may start going through the collection and seeing if any Wikipedia articles would benefit from their inclusion.

--65.197.68.35 20:53, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC) Gordon

As long as its Public Domain there's no problem, but perhaps you should try to find out which of them are not covered by "most"? Perhaps images that thez have manipulated og images of maps that are less then 50 yrs old or so (=copyrighted)--Dittaeva 21:55, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

2004 in Sports

I might have missed a previous discussion on this topic - but is there a consensus on the year in sports pages? With the 2004 in sports article, some sports are only listing a few major events, others are getting an increasingly full list of minor happenings. Some get a full list of every event for a month, then nothing. I put a comment in the talk page - no-one has responded. Now, I don't particularly want to go making sweeping changes off my own back, but the page is getting rather overlong. So I've brought the question here, aiming to avoid any dispute before it can even begin. So... what I'd propose is to trim it. Severely. Sweepings to be put into their own pages (2004 in Baseball, 2004 in cricket, etc). You'd only list the really big facts - say, for example, the winner of the men's and women's singles in the four Grand Slam Tennis events, the two top ranked players at the end of the year, and everything else can go in 2004 in Tennis. The idea is to give a quick overview of the year in sports. Any comments? Average Earthman 19:27, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I'm replying primarily because nobody else has. What you propose sounds eminently sensible, but they're not pages I'm particularly interested in. I would counsel that you let the other years in sports pages be your guide and, provided you put in a decent edit summary for any moves you do, I don't see why you should meet with any resistence. --[[User:Bodnotbod|bodnotbod » .....TALKQuietly)]] 18:27, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)

Using GNU GPL content in Wikipedia

Does anyone know if GNU GPL text is compatible with the GNU FDL? Any requirements? Reason I'm asking is that I'd like to include some documentation licensed under the GNU GPL. --Dittaeva 18:34, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

From http://www.fsf.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html "For instance, anyone publishing the book on paper would have to either include machine-readable "source code" of the book along with each printed copy, or provide a written offer to send the "source code" later."
So, I'd say sadly no. Can you contact the copyright owner and ask them to dual-licence it? PhilHibbs 19:21, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
The GFDL has the same machine-readable requirement. And we provide exactly that. →Raul654 19:26, Aug 19, 2004 (UTC)
It's odd, then, that the FSF should list that as a reason not to use GPL for documentation. PhilHibbs 19:31, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
On reading and comparing the GPL and the GFDL, the difference seems to me to be that the requirements for the transparent copy are not as stringent as for the source code. Source code should be the "preferred form for modification", where as a transparent copy can be plain text, HTML, LaTeX, PostScript, etc. So, while Wikimedia might conform to the GPL by providing the database source, I could publish printed Wikipedias with an HTML snapshot of the wiki available online. If there were GPL text mixed in, then I would not be able to exercise my rights under the FDL to do this. So, if we include any GPL content, we might as well have chosen the GPL with all its extra lawyerly goodness all along. Professing to be GFDL would be disingenuous. PhilHibbs 19:42, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
I discussed this with Anthony before (you might want to ask him about this) - he was advocating the use of the GPL for text documents. In my opinion, the big problem with GPL'd docuements is interpretation - interpreting the GPL for a text document instead of a program is mighty difficult. →Raul654 19:40, Aug 19, 2004 (UTC)
OK, I can accept that for plain text, the GPL and GFDL could well be identical. However, inclusion of GPL'd PostScript documentation wouldcould require provision of PostScript source for that document. PhilHibbs 19:44, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
No, that's blatantly not true. The GPL and GFDL both say that the machine readable version should be provided in the form that the human works with (or something to that effect) - so in the case of a program, you have to provide the source code and not the binary. In the case of wikipedia, that means we have to provide the wiki-markup, not the postscript. →Raul654 19:50, Aug 19, 2004 (UTC)
I don't think anything to do with the GPL could be described as blatant except that it's blatantly difficult to fully understand! :-( You may be right, but I can only conclude from the FAQ quote that the FSF consider this to be a problem with the GPL that users of the GFDL would wish to avoid. PhilHibbs 19:53, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Text should almost never be licensed under the GPL, and the GNU website says so. Contact your source and explain this to them, and hopefully they can be persuaded to change their licensing. Derrick Coetzee 20:13, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
As an aside, there is other GPL material already in the Wikipedia such as Image:Smiley.png - what's the official policy on inclusion of GPL material? PhilHibbs 20:17, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
Images are different, because it's the position of Jimbo that images don't have to be GFDL compatible. anthony (see warning) 00:40, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for the enlightening discussion. I was thinking about a file describing USE flags in Gentoo Linux, its probably GPL because its in their CVS, and I don't think they will prioritize to change it GFDL anytime soon, but I probably wont find any good use for it here either. I was thinking (now) about something like List over USE flags in Gentoo Linux. But there are probably many much more useful GPL resources out there. --Dittaeva 22:01, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)

IMHO, it all hangs on the difference between "the preferred form ... for making modifications" (GPL) and "a machine-readable copy" (GFDL). With plain text, there is no difference. With images, again, not a problem if you distribute the original image format (conversion from .bmp to .jpeg would not be suitable for GPL, IMO, but from .bmp to .png would). One could interpret the GPL wording as permitting conversion to an equivalently-modifiable form, but anything that decreases modifiability (such as converting wordprocessor documents to plain text or HTML) would be problematic. PhilHibbs 09:46, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I would think that including the source code of a program in a GFDL text would count as providing the source. The problem is that the GPL requires derivative works to be released under the GPL. The only way I could see this being legitimate is if you consider the text to be "mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of a storage or distribution medium". If you keep the text clearly separated from the rest of the article, this might be OK. anthony (see warning) 00:38, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

policy on image text wrt pointers to email addresses?

What's the policy on images like Image:GlockenspielSousaphone.jpg where the photographer has provided a sample of a photo for use in the Wikipedia, and also provides the email address where other photos potentially can be acquired by private arrangements with the photographer? Isn't this a form of an advertisement?

Hmm, interesting question. Since the "ad" is on the image page itself, I'd say "No." But it is a form of advertising when/if the user clicks through to the full-size image. Looking at the text on the image page, it looks rather benign and harmless. I'd say it's fine, but I don't know if we want to encourage professional photographers to license us photos just to get more business. Actually, I guess it might be a Good Thing. This 'pedia desperately lacks good illustrations. Anyone else?
Also, next time sign your post. Do this with 3 or 4 tildes ~~~ or ~~~~. :-) — Frecklefoot | Talk 17:15, Aug 19, 2004 (UTC)
I'm all for it. Hey, free images, right? As long as it's GFDL, this is no worse than by-attribution licences, of which we use plenty. [[User:Meelar|Meelar (talk)]] 17:27, 2004 Aug 19 (UTC)

As long as the photographer understands that his image description can be edited mercilessly at will (and we can remove the email address if we choose to), it seems fine. I don't even think we need to remove the email address in this case, because it's not really an ad, and it's on the image page, not in the article. anthony (see warning) 00:47, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

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