This is an archive of past discussions with User:Tony1. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
Hello Tony, I doubt you remember me but we have interacted at FAC at times in the past. I saw your comments on Imzadi's talk and was hoping you could do the same for Rivadavia-class battleship, as I want to put it up at FAC after the Milhist A-class review closes. If you're too busy, it's no big deal. Many thanks, Ed (talk • majestic titan) 00:53, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
that admin watch thing
Hi. I hope I'm not dredging up the past or bringing up a sore point. If I am, please forgive. If not... whatever happened to that "admin watch" thing? I was searching for it, but came up empty-handed. • Ling.Nut23:16, 6 August 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony - I see that you are on dialup for the near future, and so may not be checking Wiki. However, I just wanted to let you know that I am keeping an eye on the deadline for this, but with just three articles promoted so far this week, I'm hoping that a few more will be added to the list in the next few hours. If by early afternoon tomorrow nothing has happened, I'll just pick one of the three, but it would be nice to have a few more to choose from :) Let me know if this will be a problem, Dana boomer (talk) 01:41, 7 August 2010 (UTC)
I've added my pick and comments underneath the list on the page you provided for me - I hope this is where you wanted me to place it? It is a bit short, so please let me know if it needs to be longer. Dana boomer (talk) 17:56, 7 August 2010 (UTC)
Image sizes
Hi Tony, thanks for your message. I have about the same as you, about 20 words per line. I'm very much, 'the less unnecessary wiki markup, the better' so I would always ask the question, is this necessary? e.g. the 'right' parameter after 'thumb' is superfluous as the default is right. Is it necessary to add extra syntax and force the images higher than the default? I think we may have different philosophies on this, as I remember from the change in default size discussion - Wikipedia_talk:Image_use_policy/Archive_12#Diplayed_image_size - that you advocated a change in MOS away from saying forcing should be exceptional. Tom B (talk) 11:17, 7 August 2010 (UTC)
I agree that "right" shouldn't appear in the syntax. But there is no reason to go along with the default size, just as there was none to go along with the default when it was 180px. I think consensus, at least among the page writers, would be needed before reducing that much. I had already reduced the pics from 250px (the size used at FPC, from which we draw the highlights) to 240px, but wondered whether even that reduction was wise. Tony(talk)13:58, 7 August 2010 (UTC)
Butting in—if I'm placing images and it's on the right for a reason (to ensure a portrait is looking into the page, for instance), I'll use the "right" parameter even though it will default there anyway. Remember, en-wiki isn't the only place hosting this stuff; adding it to the syntax ensures that answers.com and the other significant mirrors place it correctly. – iridescent15:27, 7 August 2010 (UTC)
I didn't know there were schools of thought about this thing, too; whether I include "right" or not is usually down to my mood at the moment (do I prefer more economical syntax or consistency across the page?), although I tend to omit it.
By the way, I have around 25 words per line, but that's because I nearly always have the browser's history or bookmarks column open on the left (otherwise it can exceed 30 words/line). I wonder whether anyone else does that; for me it's not just a matter of convenience but one of appearance, and not having to view Wikipedia through a tiresomely long rectangle. I have just thought of measuring the result of the current arrangements, and I am not entirely surprised to find that it's practically a golden rectangle. Waltham, The Duke of08:04, 8 August 2010 (UTC)
Checking number of promotions
Hi Sandy, the Signpost's window is Saturday to Friday. Since the bot is slow to update the log (three only), would you mind confirming that our list is correct? I advised Dana to go ahead and choose her number-one. Tony(talk)07:55, 7 August 2010 (UTC)
WP:GO, like WP:FA, is accurate, and can be used for your doublecheck (although it runs Sunday to Saturday, so you have to check the template at the bottom of the page for past weeks)-- I don't want to take on the task of weekly checks of the Signpost, in addition to everything else. Go bug DaBomb87-- he never does much anyway :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:00, 7 August 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony: I have questions about capitalizations in Ezra Pound. According to my American Dictionary, imagism and modernism are not proper nouns. The sources are inconsistent, and use both Imagism and imagism (and our other pages are inconsistent). What's the best course for the sake of consistency? Follow the dictionary or follow the sources? Another question is anti-Semitism vs. antisemtiism. I prefer hyphenated with a cap, and the sources are inconsistent. Thanks. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 00:20, 9 August 2010 (UTC)
"antisemitism" is much harder to recognise: I wouldn't touch the unhyphenated form. I guess the upper-case S is used as for "African" and "European". Tony(talk)00:25, 9 August 2010 (UTC)
Agreed - hate the unhyphenated, though the sources use it. Semite is uppercase, but I'm happy using the lowercase, as I've seen that as well. Truthkeeper88 (talk) 00:28, 9 August 2010 (UTC)
Sister project on signpost
Hi Tony, some of the points you raised were legitimate but i had an issue with a lot of them. First a lot of the details about the priorities and how they are going to be enacted is directly from the Priorities page, I might have done a better job at summarizing them but dont blame me for what they are, a lot of the stuff is in generalities right now because the foundation will take that decision. As for website uptime, volunteer retention, extensions- you're really telling me that you dont know what they mean- readers are supposed to know the difference between Rfa and Rfd but not this "corporate talk". the invitation to read the priorities is not time bound, they are going to be there for the foreseeable future thats why I didnt include a "till when date". you mentioned that a lot of it sounds like corporate gobbledy, clearly you haven't visited the strategy project, because It is that. Eugene and most of the community calls the project strategy wiki, along with a lot of outsiders, Eugene called it the strategy wiki in the last update published on the signpost too. --Theo10011 (talk) 14:55, 9 August 2010 (UTC)
Sure, not blaming anyone. That kind of page is really hard to write: better you than me. But it's easier to poke at when one wasn't close to the original text. I still think readers (like me) should know what everything means; so you can help us by explaining what those terms I've queried really mean in simple English (perhaps just a few words, or substituting them with familiar words). The fact that the terms are used in the document doesn't matter: you can help all of our readers to engage with it here at the Signpost first. Most people, I assume, will not yet have participated. Tony(talk)15:07, 9 August 2010 (UTC)
Sure I understand your point and I am going through your queries point by point, the thing is a few things cant be answered by me or anyone yet since it is in generalities and the foundation will decide what they are going to be, the repository was created in the process for stats, I dont know if it was intended to and I clarified that, as for "the targets and measure of success" - thats all straight out of Sue's email, its intended to give a benchmark to judge our performance, I am going to clarify that as well but like I said some of this stuff especially on the steps to achieve the priorities like measurement in geographies, the uptime, the volunteer retention rate is intended to be not clear right now because the specifics are at the foundations discretion. Thanks.--Theo10011 (talk) 15:17, 9 August 2010 (UTC)
Exceptions (i.e. sites that can be both references and External Links) include an official site of the article's subject, or a website specifically devoted to the article's subject which contains multiple subpages and which meets the above criteria.
The information is essentially correct, but the sentence is stinky, and my initial attempts to fix it didn't actually fix it. So I'm looking for an expert recommendation: How would you say this? WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:37, 10 August 2010 (UTC)
Possibly this?
Exceptions—websites that can be both references and external links—include any official sites for the article topic, or a website specifically devoted to the topic, contains multiple subpages, and meets Criteria 1 and 2 above.
"Subject" was blurring with BLP subject as person. I'm not sure I've quite got the meaning right either in the current wording or my suggestion. I'd also remove the comma after "as references". The whole page is poorly written. :-) Tony(talk)05:49, 10 August 2010 (UTC)
Tony, I’m going on the road and won’t even take my laptop; I’ll interface to the planet through my iPhone. That pretty much rules out anything on Wikipedia. If there is an important vote on the FPC stuff between now and Sunday UTC, you can place a proxy vote on my behalf. I trust your judgement. Just put a “support” or “oppose” vote with no reasoning, copy one of my signatures, update the date/time of the stamp, and append “(proxy by Tony1)” at the end. Greg L (talk) 01:32, 12 August 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, but I'm about to be off the Internet for a whole week, starting tomorrow or Saturday—I don't yet know which. Tony(talk)03:43, 12 August 2010 (UTC)
Sydney Meetup :-)
See the meetup page for further information - short version is that we're hoping to meet in a fortnight in the city for a beer and a chat. Minors and Miners are welcome, with a responsible adult and a minimum of coal dust ;-) - do try and get out if you can, it's been a little while since wiki folk met in Sydney :-) cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 05:27, 12 August 2010 (UTC)
Can you explain to me how you believe WP:RJL is US-centric? Your continuing to repeat this assertion without backing it up borders on WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT. If there is truly anything in the guideline that is US-centric, then it can be fixed. If you can't come up with anything, then I respectfully ask (as an editor) that you stop repeating the assertion that WP:RJL is US-centric. --Rschen775403:44, 13 August 2010 (UTC)
There is utterly no reason to start a crusade against the long-established requirement to convert all measurements in non-scientific articles. Tony(talk)06:38, 13 August 2010 (UTC)
Please see MOS:CONVERSIONS. I submit that miles are innate feature with American highways, just as kilometers are innate to Canadian highways. Under that guideline with that understanding, the following applies:
Generally, conversions to and from metric units and US or imperial units should be provided, except... When units are part of the subject of a topic—nautical miles in articles about the history of nautical law, SI units in scientific articles, yards in articles about American football—it can be excessive to provide conversions every time a unit occurs. It could be best to note that this topic will use the units (possibly giving the conversion factor to another familiar unit in a parenthetical note or a footnote), and link the first occurrence of each unit but not give a conversion every time it occurs.
The conversions are provided in the infobox and throughout the prose. It is only the tables where the conversions aren't provided directly. Imzadi1979→06:54, 13 August 2010 (UTC)
No, miles are used generically for US highways, unlike specific usages for nautical purposes. It is unacceptable not to convert in tables. Tony(talk)08:34, 13 August 2010 (UTC)
Getting back on track to the main topic of the thread, do you have any other reasons why the guideline is US-centric? --Rschen775408:35, 13 August 2010 (UTC)
There are currently 2,471 articles in the backlog. You can help us! Join the September 2010 drive today!
The Guild of Copy-Editors – September 2010 Backlog Elimination Drive
The Wikipedia Guild of Copy-Editors invite you to participate in the September 2010 Backlog Elimination Drive, a month-long effort to reduce the backlog of articles that require copy-editing. The drive will begin on 1 September at 00:00 (UTC) and will end on 30 September at 23:59 (UTC). The goals for this drive are to eliminate 2008 from the queue and to reduce the backlog to fewer than 5,000 articles.
Sign-up has already begun at the September drive page, and will be open throughout the drive. If you have any questions or concerns, please leave a message on the drive's talk page.
Awards and barnstars
A range of barnstars will be awarded to active participants. Some are exclusive to GoCE drives. More information on awards can be found on the main drive page.
Hi Tony. Thanks for sorting out the minor overlinking, etc. One thing I'm not sure of though, I was told during the FAC nomination that I should put subjects in upper case and noticed you've used a lower case letter to start mathematics. Subjects later on appear in upper case. As somebody else did the same thing a couple of days ago, I'm guessing it's probably right, but shouldn't they be consistent? How do academic subjects appear? There seems to be some confusion and disagreement on this topic. TheRetroGuy (talk) 11:52, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
Hi RG: the MoS says when in doubt, use lower-case. But there is no doubt here: subjects and topics, such as mathematics and geography, should not start with an upper case letter unless otherwise required. Cheers. Tony(talk)11:55, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
I made my choice and put it up there. I wasn't sure if you wanted me to do anything else. If you do, let me know. Thanks for the opportunity!! Makeemlighter (talk) 23:58, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
Hey, thanks—good timing: I was just fussing around wondering about which images to display. And I was about to ask you whether we should put a button there for the 360º viewer, but you've displayed the link in your piece. Thanks. Tony(talk)00:03, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
MOS:DASH
diff Dude, seriously, does it get more trivial than MOS:DASH enforcement? Is a dash that is a few pixels too short or too long really going to undermine the authority of wikipedia? --Surturz (talk) 02:52, 17 August 2010 (UTC)
Not per se, but correct typography adds to authority, readability, and clarity. En dashes carry significant meaning. They are mandated by major style guides, not to mention WP:MOSDASH. It's not rocket science, is it? I can help with any queries you may have about typography. Tony(talk)22:05, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
No need, I'm completely prejudiced in this area. I think that all dashes/hyphens/minus signs should be U 002D, for the simple reason that U 002D is the only dash that has a key on the keyboard. I challenge your claim that different sized dashes add to the authority, readability or clarity of any text. Replacing all dash characters with U 002D never confuses the text.
There are also practical problems e.g. if you have different dashes, but only one typable dash, then the non-typable dashes don't match when searching. (Apostrophes are even worse! Try debugging the fact that when the user types in "O'Brien" (using U 0027), the record they are looking for, "O’Brien" (using U 2019), doesn't show up.) --Surturz (talk) 05:58, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
There is no end to the willingness of developers to disregard proper, standard conventions of typography. Many of them seem to live in the typewriter age, which is heavily ironic. I do not believe there should be a race to the bottom, just because they don't get it. Sub-professional standards are not acceptable on any website, let alone WP. (1) Which font and browser do you use? Some of them show almost no difference, which is good enough to bin them and use a decent one. (2) If you don't understand the different meanings of hyphens, en dashes, and minus signs, you need to learn now. It's as basic as semicolons versus colons. Tony(talk)06:04, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
Do you mean the "and" that finishes the first para? That was there already. Waiting till the first para is finished till I come in to c-e. Tony(talk)04:21, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
Two quick things: first, I joined in 2005 (although I didn't edit much that year), and second, I much prefer English to mathematics. Other than that, it looks great! Cheers, Nikkimaria (talk) 03:50, 25 August 2010 (UTC)
MCVF
Any particular reason why you made this comment? It is quite common little things like en dashes can easily be unnoticed during FACs. Volcanoguy04:06, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
I think you meant the previous diff in that sequence. It was more a comment about the FAC process than anything personal. It's an easy one to pick up. Good edit by you subsequently. Tony(talk)04:19, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
Sorry about that. Do you know who I would talk to about getting an assessment section for WP:WPRS put together? That is really my reason for going to WP:V1.0. - Neutralhomer • Talk • 08:22, 26 August 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony. I have now sorted the overlinking at this articles FAC. Thanks for your comments, is there anything else? Tom (talk) 11:49, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
I have addressed the issues you raised at the FAC, please take another look to see if any other changes can be made to further improve the article. Thanks for taking the time to review, I appreciate it. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 01:31, 27 August 2010 (UTC)
Hungry Lucy (who are actually one of my favourite bands) had previously released a number of their works under CC licenses, though not CC licenses that count as "free" under Wikipedia's policies. I contacted the band, asking if they'd be willing to release images/songs under a more free license, and they let me know that (contrary to what it said on archive.org) their latest album, as well as all the images associated with it, were released under cc-by-sa-3.0. It's not just the first file which is a featured sound- you'll note that Juju said "x10 :)" after sending me the template message, and that all have been listed. It would make more sense to treat them as a set of featured sounds, rather than ten separate featured sounds, but they are all featured. J Milburn (talk) 00:20, 28 August 2010 (UTC)
Hi, nice to see that the "choice of the week" worked out. I don't know if you want to link [1] in F&A, but I thought you might enjoy reading it ;) Oh, and note the Newsroom discussion about the 3000th FA dispatch - it seems there needs to be some sort of coordination between Dispatches and F&A. Regards, HaeB (talk) 16:23, 29 August 2010 (UTC)
I was about to email you the link! But I'll act on your suggestion and put the link after Southpark's entry at F and A. Also emailing you about a possible event for F and A. Tony(talk)00:22, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. The MoS guideline (specifically, the third bullet point) is bizarrely worded, IMO. I'd not realised it said exactly that. I've emailed User:Noetica for advice, since he last edited that section and has his hands on all of the major style guides. Tony(talk)01:22, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
Dispatch
Tony, I'm just returning from travel, and although I've done extensive cleanup at Wikipedia:FCDW/3000, it's still pretty rough, and inconsistent, with a bit of editorializing about the content review processes that should be made less judgmental and more consistent. Do you have time to review? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:52, 30 August 2010 (UTC)
Hiya Tony, thanks for bring to me the attention the issue with Rlevse's status. I can see the issue and will clarify this on the clerks mailing list. I'll let you know the response I get. Many Thanks Seddontalk|WikimediaUK20:04, 31 August 2010 (UTC)
[Spoiler removed by Tony! Readers will have to wait for next week's edition of The Signpost.]
Thanks, --Michig (talk) 16:57, 1 September 2010 (UTC) Slight update - I can deprod and decline CSDs without admin tools, and will now be deleting where appropriate.--Michig (talk) 18:05, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
Signpost (features and administrators)
>>Hi, I couldn't winkle out much about you from the RfA page or your "no frills" user page. Are you from the US? Anything more we can add? For example, any admin areas apart from deletions? Any other content areas? <<
It wasn't very informative, was it? Not long after I first started in 2007, one of the admins had noticed that I didn't have a talk page and then redirected my user page redirected to a talk page. Several people commented that I ought to have a user page, so I undid the redirect. Then I was reading through the new admin materials and seeing recommendations against posting information that would allow people to figure out one's identity. I've avoided displaying what my occupation is or where I live, although it wouldn't be that difficult to figure out.Mandsford19:52, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
That's great: thanks Mandsford, I'll write this up. NB I've removed the spoiler above—readers will have to wait for next week's edition!Tony(talk)01:05, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
MZM, I'm trying to understand how it works... You have subscribed to the delivery at the m:Global_message_delivery/Access_list. Presumably, the post will be delivered to your Meta account from now. And do we simply substitute the path if it is to deliver to user talk pages at sister projects'? Ohconfucius¡digame!02:46, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
Sorry, the instructions are still a bit hairy. There are really only two pages you need to focus on when making a delivery: m:Global message delivery/Spam and m:Global message delivery/Status. "Spam" is where you configure the message to run. "Status" is where you tell the bot to start. There are slightly better instructions on the "Spam" page.
m:Global message delivery/Access list is a list of people authorized to use the bot. In this edit, I added you to the list (assuming you own the Meta-Wiki account "Ohconfucius"). m:Global message delivery/Targets is a directory of subpages where you can specify a list of users to deliver to. For example, m:Global message delivery/Targets/Signpost is the list I was testing with. You can create a new subpage or use the "Signpost" subpage to test. The format there is pretty self-explanatory, I think. If you make a new subpage, you'd update the appropriate section of m:Global delivery message/Spam, obviously.
Could you be persuaded to support this article's FAC if a few things were fixed up? I think it's pretty close, but it needs a bit of tightening up in places, NocturneNoire seems to want the nomination withdrawn, but I think that would be a shame. MalleusFatuorum02:29, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
Hi, ILO, I've noted your reviews over the past few months at FPC, and I wonder whether you will consider being our judge this weekend for the FP Choice of the week in next week's edition of The Signpost. It would mean writing a paragraph after the "window" closes midnight Friday UTC (i.e., Saturday or by early Sunday UTC, if possible). Please let me know by email or on my talk page. Thanks. Tony(talk)12:37, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
Sure, I'd love to if you or someone else would explain what you'd like me to do. Thanks for considering me! --I'ḏ♥One17:16, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
Here's the draft. End Friday midnight, the window closes and we'll have the list completed for you. Hit "View latest issue" and from there at the bottom "Previous issue" to get the gist of what people write. Saturday is good; early Sunday is OK. Then we have to finish it off for the deadline Monday. Thanks. Tony(talk)22:53, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
Ok, so do I describe the pictures that got promoted, do I to pick one above the others or describe FPC a bit? --I'ḏ♥One03:57, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
Scroll down here to see the current week's judement para. And here's the previous one. You can keep looking back further. But just select the FP you think is most worthy, interesting, your favourite, and provide the reasons. I'll tweak your text if you wish. Tony(talk)05:29, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
4 more images have been promoted, you might want to update (or do you end at Friday? If so never mind), anyway I've been working on this all day, hope you guys like it. --I'ḏ♥One05:16, 5 September 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony, I found 3 stories that might be of interest but I am not sure if they've been previously covered or if they are notable enough. I left a message in the newsroom as well, do you mind taking a look.[2][3][4]. I can write them up if I know which one to cover. Thanks. Theo10011 (talk) 04:46, 5 September 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony, Great Idea. I definitely support the idea of listing possible news stories and links in the Newsroom for everyone. We need better organization at the Newsroom, so far its only 3 people who do the majority of all the work. My availability might be sporadic in the coming weeks but I would be more than willing to add possible news stories and provide sweeping edits whenever I find the time. Let me know how I can help. Thanks.--Theo10011 (talk) 21:15, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
On 2009-09-18, I posted a suggestion for adding a "time" tag to allow users to select their own date / time format. You responded with: "For a whole host of reasons, the community has rejected the concept of date autoformatting. Please contact me if you want further information." I'm contacting you because I want further information. =) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aleph Infinity (talk • contribs) 00:42, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
Re [5]: Yes, of course I was sure.
Read the source: "the union of this particular couple was nullified by a Quezon City Regional Trial Court in August 2007 on the ground of psychological incapacity. The OSG elevated the trial court's decision to the Court of Appeals, 'alleging absence of sufficient evidence to sustain a finding of psychological incapacity.'"
I value your copyediting work and I don't want to be rude again. But it's a major journalistic blunder to attribute a position in a court case to the wrong party. And after I corrected and explained it the first time, it was really frustrating to see that it had been inserted a second time. And I have had to correct so many inaccuracies of this kind in Signpost articles during recent months that I would really like to hear some sort of suggestions how this could be avoided in the future.
I am also concerned about this right now because of the book review, which is a genre that exposes its auhor more than othes. I recently was reminded of how last year a Signpost book review got its author into major trouble just because one formulation involving a BLP was somewhat ambiguous (or not even that). Your copyedits already introduced a minor factual error (the 2008 talk and publication were in fact the same text).
Another thing, you should take a look at [6][7] etc. I had to spend quite some time after publication defending your actions and while I think such ownership feelings are totally out of place and hope he has calmed him down, I think it might have been worthwhile to put some notification that the text was merged on the talk page of the 3000 draft or in the Newsroom.
About deadlines, I am going to describe the "automatic deadline" idea I mentioned a while ago, although I have since identified some potential problems with it. I'll be interested to hear what you think.
The "journalistic blunder": no, it was unclear and appallingly worded in the first place. When I re-edited, I knew you would look again, since you'd already made a point about this text. My edit-summary drew attention to the matter, as well. I would do it again.
"the 2008 talk and publication were in fact the same text"—well it wasn't clear in the first place; that is why I changed it. I expect that you as primary author will check these things. The alternative is that I litter the whole text with inline queries, but I know you will examine the diffs. Please stop complaining; this is part of collaboration. A copy-editor can't see through walls, and I don't expect to have to go back to original sources to clarify—that's for you as author, I think, and I rest my case, since you've done it. If you want to avoid having to check back through copy-edits, perhaps you could ensure that the text is clear in the first place?
Deadlines: I hope there's going to be one deadline, and only one—not a fixed one and a fuzzy one after it. No one minds if the publication comes out a few hours, or even 12 hours late, but not 24 hours late. If 24 hours becomes the norm, please move the real deadline to retain its prime function as a discipline for all of the journalists. It fails at that, otherwise.
3,000: I did put notification in several places, as well as in the edit-summary of F and A. It didn't help that 3,000 didn't have an entry in the newsroom table. He knew very well what was happening, and the move was hardly surprising—it had been mooted at least once already. Tony(talk)04:34, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
Even an ambiguous wording (which the N&N thing wasn't) is way better than a wrong statement. To suggest otherwise is endorsing game of telephone journalism. And contrary to the assumption, I spotted this only by chance the second time around, when publication was already imminent. I do try to have a last look over each story before I publish, but every writer is still responsible for their own edits. My edit-summary drew attention to the matter, as well. - you mean "Chicago Manual of Style now says not to dot US; more c-e"?
3,000: Yes, I agree that he should have been expecting that. As I said, I defended your decision. I should perhaps have dissected RM's claim about not having been notified more thoroughly, you quite rightly pointed out that you put a note on the 3000 talk page too.
Deadlines: I am still in the process of writing up what I wanted to say about the issue. I looked at the stats already and while I definitely don't want to go back to that state, I'd still like to remark that from November 29, 2009 to July 13, every single issue was published on Tuesday or later. Again, this was not a good thing, and I understand the frustration of the regular writers about having to wait for ITN and N&N. I only say this to note that the problem was present long before I became editor.
As promised, I looked into the Webchat thing. There was a problem because the URL format had changed since RockDrum set it up, it didn't preselect the channel properly (you would have had to enter "#wikisignpost" manually). I fixed it on the Newsroom page. If you now click on the IRC/Webchat link there, you should just need to enter a nickname and the captcha, and be done. If "Tony" or "Tony1" are already taken, try something else - how about "TonySignpost"? ;)
To change your delivery options for this newsletter please list yourself in the appropriate section here. To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. BrownBot (talk) 23:54, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
Mauna Kea needs a good copyedit. It's almost ready for FAC, but it really needs a good thourough copyedit and shakedown beforehand. Hmm, do you accept article requests? :) ResMar16:44, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
Noetica posts only occasionally on WP at the moment. I emailed him for advice on this issue, which has come up at the Australian politics pages in relation to WP's article by this name. Here is his emailed response. Feedback is welcome below the collapsed box. Tony(talk)06:33, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
Extended content
First we narrow consideration to attributive use (that is, use preceding and modifying a noun). The expression seems most entrenched in Australia, so Australian precedents are highly relevant. Here are analyses of the first 100 hits in two Google searches (8 September 2010), on variations of "two party preferred vote" [TPPV] (Google ignores punctuation in searching, but shows punctuation in its hits):
[A search at site:www.theage.com.au yields the same results, since content is shared between these two Fairfax publications]
Search 2: site:www.theaustralian.com.au
T P P V : 4 instances
T-P P V : 41
T-P-P V : 60
Clearly there are divergences between our two major broadsheet newspapers. Equally clearly, forms with at least one hyphen are strongly preferred. I consulted current Australian reference sources (Macquarie Dictionary; Australian Government Publishing Service Style Manual; Penguin Word Guide, Australian edition) and found no direct mention of TPPV. But the general guidance in AGPS supports the form T-P-P V:
"Compound adjectives that consist of short adverbial phrases are always hyphenated. For example: an up-to-date account; a dusk-to-dawn curfew; a forty-year-old male; surface-to-air missiles." (p. 92, layout adapted here)
These examples are ineptly chosen, since they do not survey a variety of forms; and "forty-year-old" would be hyphenated even as a noun. Nevertheless, we find nothing here to steer us away from T-P-P V.
The treatment in New Hart's Rules (the pre-eminent British guide) is too general to give direct assistance. CMOS 16 (Chicago Manual of Style, a major US authority, recently released) surveys hyphenation for many grammatical types of compounds, but shows nothing tightly parallel to our TPPV. Still, the examples that come closest support T-P-P V. From CMOS, section 7.83:
a one-and-a-half-inch hem
twenty-first-row seats [disambiguating: not "twenty first-row seats"]
time-clock-punching employees
twenty-first-century history
These are the most similar to our TPPV that I could find in the whole eight-page table (but see an exception below). In each case it would be most plausible to drop the last hyphen, since it is at the highest level in the hierarchy of modification. So the weight of these examples strongly favours T-P-P V over T-P P V. For completeness I show also this form from the CMOS table:
late nineteenth-century politicians
This is an apparent anomaly, and is certainly controversial. I have discussed such forms in great detail with User:Wavelength at my talkpage. There is a good reason for excepting dates from the general rule that binds all elements of the modifier with hyphens. They can grow enormously; but since there is usually no chance of ambiguity in the construction, aesthetic considerations outweigh other concerns. Basic principles would justify this, for example:
early-to-early-middle-nineteenth-century painting
We could loosen to this:
early- to early-middle-nineteenth-century painting
Or perhaps even to this, among other strange variations:
early-to-early-middle nineteenth-century painting
But nothing is lost by a sounder simplification, along lines that CMOS appears to recommend:
early to early-middle nineteenth-century painting
No such considerations apply in the case of TPPV. Elegance and unimpeded comprehension are best served by adhering to uniform principles. I therefore support the form T-P-P V: "two-party-preferred vote".
Finally, we turn to the isolated non-attributive form (TPP, with no following noun). It is rare. Apart from in a bare title (illegitimately formed, for Wikipedia), it might occur in a sentence like this:
Are those voting statistics two[-]party[-]preferred, or first[-]preference?
I would argue for "two-party-preferred" even here, on the analogy of "well-behaved" in this sentence where it is used predicatively:
The child was well-behaved.
The justification? We would not use "behaved" as a predication by itself:
The child was behaved.
"Well-behaved" functions as a semantic unit, in predicative as in attributive use. So with our sample sentence:
Are those voting statistics two-party-preferred, or first-preference?
Thank you for the <typically excellent> update; the first part was most helpful, but the second part was unnecessary (you know as well as anyone that my prose stinks, and "delimited" did not occur to me-- I will, however, use this word in the future). We are both troubled by recent discussions, which have become unnecessarily personalized. Even friends will sometimes disagree. Best, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 13:43, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
Your prose doesn't stink at all: you are obfuscating. This is more than the common disagreement you seem to be casting it as. I am distressed at the stance you have taken on your talk page, which seems to have been designed to undermine the work I do for The Signpost. You've been taking pot-shots at "Features and amins" for a few weeks now, without any sound basis, IMO. And you were the one to personalise: telling HaeB that I get interested in things and then drop them was very, very unfair. It's as though you're being a control freak and are conceiving the revamped F and A as some kind of competition to your little power-base. I don't buy this. If you weren't so good at your job, I'd push for a no-confidence motion at FAC. You're certainly failing the "assume good faith" test; more like assuming bad faith in WPians as a default, to get your way, to discredit me. Tony(talk)14:20, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
Tony, there's substantial failure to AGF in your post above, which I hope you'll reconsider. Someone somewhere once commented something to the effect that, you simmer up quickly, but you simmer down just as quickly (I apologize for the paraphrase, as I don't recall where to find that comment or who made it); I hope we can talk once you simmer down. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:35, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
Passing on personal tittle-tattle in public is unwise given the current feelings of ill-will. This matter simmered up slowly, during your slow volley of unfair remarks over the past few weeks. I do not intend to engage with you again. Tony(talk)01:25, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
I am referring to your utter ineptness in airing this at the same time as trying to persuade me to accept your nastiness. You appear to suffer from a serious lack of personal skillsWithdrawing over-the-top remark.Tony(talk)01:41, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
Haruna
That was deeply appreciated. I don't know if you can tell, but I do read and attempt to follow your recommendations in other FACs, and I was hoping at some point that you'd say you liked the result :) - Dank (push to talk) 04:08, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
Major announcement: the Silliest Wikilink of the Month awards
The new judge, Ceoil, will soon announce the winners of the awards for August, July and May 2010, and at the end of this month will announce the winner for September.
He has agreed that we might then change the focus of the competition from individual wikilinks and small groups of wikilinks to whole articles that are badly overlinked. Inevitably, those valuable editors who perform gnoming services are confronted with overlinking throughout whole articles (particularly of "dictionary" items). In almost all cases, this has arisen earlier in WP's history, when there was no coherent strategy for maximising the utility of the wikilinking system. It's a lot of work to clean it up, and the Silliwilli awards was set up to encourage this work.
Therefore, we have decided that from October 2010 onwards the awards should be judged in terms of whole articles. Competitors will still be asked to list individual links (but expanded to six of the funniest, most useless, most inexplicable individual links in the article, as an example of the entry); however, the removal of overlinking from the whole article will be the sole determinant in the award.
Wet dreams, actually, with only one part of my anatomy bolt upright. Such is the mathematical clarity from using that finely etched distinction between percentages and percentage points correctly. Don't you get them too? It's a real turn-on; more, even, than en dashes. Tony(talk)16:19, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
I'll share a secret with you, but don't tell anyone ... actually it's not a secret at all. Tony's quite right in thinking that WQA is a waste of space. It simply encourages trivial complaints of "incivility" and it ought to be binned. MalleusFatuorum23:35, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
I already knew that. Others dont and never will, and feel anointed to chip and lay an ill informend openion, just to have a 10c say. But god works in mysterous ways, the fecker. Ceoil (talk) 23:56, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
It's a moderately surreal talking shop that needs to be experienced. Sometimes it helps people to let off steam, but most people think it's weak and effectual. It's also to blame that WP:CIVIL is widely regarded as unenforceable. Ohconfucius¡digame!03:17, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
Don't say that! If you take away the steam, some people have nothing left. CIV is often used as hammer by people who dont care to hurt people who do. Ceoil (talk) 06:38, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
Hi. I have tried to address all of your concerns (except one, caused by a template). Would you mind looking at it and letting me know if I need to do anything else to improve the article, or if I've messed it up more? :D Thanks, GregJackPBoomer!00:13, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
Percentages
I have no problem with you running around changing these things on most articles; no one else cares as much as you so it doesn't matter.
On these articles, however, there is a manner in which these figures are referred to in the real world - electoral swings, at least in Australia, in any reliable source, will be referred to in terms of percentage swings. As such, our articles also refer to them in this way.
I think I've pointed out that the real world does use percentage points in a correct mathematical way, although not all sources do. The Sydney Morning Heral, for example, has a strong policy of doing so. MOSNUM is based on real-world practice, and in this respect has the advantage of avoiding ambiguity. Anthony Green's opinion (I can link you to it in the archives of the 2020 fed. el. page if you wish) is that either p. or p.p. is acceptable for "margins". But when changes in percentage are at issue, MOSNUM is quite clear. You would need to raise the matter there. I can go back to those state articles and self-rv where margins alone are at issue, although I think in the tables, it would be better not to append a percentage sign in the right-most column, following the lead of the infobox in the 2010 federal election infobox. Surely that will offend no one.
Again, please avoid language that belittles me in ("running around"). I extend the same courtesy to you, and I would appreciate reciprocation. Tony(talk)16:15, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
MOSNUM does not trump Wikipedia's prohibition against using original research, which is what you're trying to do here. The use of "percentage points" is an Americanism, and your coverage of "changes in percentage" is simply not backed up in Australian usage. Your suggestion is offensive; you're prescribing going against what practically every Australian publication, online or offline, does, because of your own obscure preferences - and Wikipedia just doesn't work that way. Rebecca (talk) 16:21, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
Original research is exactly what you're trying to do; you're trying to apply language and such that I've essentially never seen used in an Australian context because of your eclectic personal preferences. Wikipedia uses reliable sources for a reason. Rebecca (talk) 16:22, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
That phrase should be "a 6 per cent increase", yes; but it doesn't excuse the original research you keep adding in its place there, and in the other election articles. Rebecca (talk) 16:25, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
It's like talking to a brick wall. I have pointed out that there is ample evidence of the use of percentage points in the correct mathematical sense in sources; that is what MOSNUM's guideline is based on. The fact that you have never seen it is not the point. Plenty of other people have seen it. Please cease your accusations of original research: they are ridiculous. As I've pointed out, "margins" may well be acceptable, given Anthony Green's statement; however, trying to get your way by accusing me of OR when I apply MOSNUM is not helpful. Please do not run around reinstating your own versions that contradict the guidelines, without further discussion on talk pages involving other opinions. Tony(talk)16:29, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
You're trying to refer to these figures in a way which is simply factually wrong in an Australian political context, as backed up in all reliable sources, and then trying to tell me that I should do it because a style guideline says so. The fact is that what you're trying to do here is the textbook definition of original research; you're ignoring what all reliable sources do and applying your own interpretation. Rebecca (talk) 16:33, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
The use of 'percentage' you appear to insist on is factually wrong and ambiguous – any high-school student (you don't even need a mathematician or statistician) to tell you that a percentage is the outcome of when you put one number (the numerator) on top of another number (the denominator) and divide. Just because most of the world at large is "the great unwashed" does not mean it is correct to follow the herd and perpetuate whatever the error happens to be in circulation. We constantly find errors within and amongst our reliable sources which, incidentally does not disqualify them as 'reliable', we also constantly try and replace them with sources where the reporting reflects the objective reality – and we do not refer to that as 'original research', as you appear to wont to do. Our job, here in the 'Encyclopaedia anyone can edit' is to educate. I think it would be appropriate to drag the great unwashed with us. What's more, instead of arguing that what Tony is saying is 'original research', and going around stalking him and reverting his 'fetishistic insistence' on being correct, you are being equally if not more anal than Tony. After all, you may prefer to live in a world of ambiguity, you ought to respect the fact that Tony prefers is to ensure the language used herein is clear and unambiguous. --Ohconfucius¡digame!01:20, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
You say they're factually wrong: many sources use them, the maths is correct, and the language is clear and unambiguous (unlike the use of "percentage" in the way you seem to be insisting on). I could just as well brand your actions as OR. Are you telling me I'm plain wrong to state that p.p. is used by sources? Have you checked the ones I've specified? I suggest this be further discussed at MOSNUM and MoS, tomorrow. I do not want to find reversions when I get up that re-introduce wrong language and breaches of the style guides. Tony(talk)16:37, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
Whatever it is, it's certainly not OR. The table the pendulum is practically copied from uses % in the same way - see [8] Checked Malcolm Mackerras "Elections 1980" book and he has tables such as "% Swing" (heading), "3.3 to Lib", "5.0 to ALP". Orderinchaos17:52, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
What Tony continues to fail to understand is that although majority is not consensus, he equally has no consensus for his change from the status quo, therefore he cannot push his changes in to articles until HE has reached a consensus to change from the status quo. I find Tony's stance untenable. Timeshift (talk) 01:13, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
Quick question - is TimeShift9 - Rebecca or is Rebecca - TimeShift9 - anyway of finding out - I'm just curious - not accusing or assuming or pointing a finger, just wondering?! CheersCanberraBulldog (talk) 09:56, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
One is in SA and I've talked to him variously in 2007-2008 on the phone, the other is in WA and I met her in 2007. They both have a long history on Wikipedia, have quite different views on some topics and have more than once been in conflict with each other. So, no. Orderinchaos17:45, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
A percentage sign is a bit like a hyphen.. but slanted and long — oh so long — and with a ball on each side. Sexy eh? --Surturz (talk) 06:23, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
Surturz, you know you've committed a MoS breach in spacing those em dashes. I will make you eat thousands of them for punishment. Tony(talk)07:26, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
It's pretty clear by now that he knowz exactly what is correct and proper punctuation to use, and is doing it just to wind you up. Don't rise to the bait any more. --Ohconfucius¡digame!07:42, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
RE: this. Actually I think sufficient fits, the reason being that by sufficient I mean that it will give more then plenty of time to evacuate the people. However, preventing a volcano from destroying infastructure is understandably difficult; you can board up everything before a hurricane and hope for the best, but there's very little that can withstand molten lava, and considering one of the hallmark charecteristics of Hawaiian volcanics – volume – there's a good chance that your house would be at least partially buried in volcanic rock, which is a bit, um, difficult to remove ;) One thing you can do is build on a hill; like a Kipuka, your house would be surrounded by lava but left untouched. I remember an image on the television once, lahar surging through a town and destroying everything except for a little church on a hill...
Could I ask you to clarify or check a few things from the failed Limbo FAC review?
You said:
The infobox pic really leaves a lot to be desired. What is it? Could it possibly be tweaked and re-uploaded to bring out the structure? It's a mystery.
On this, this is the only "cover" pic available. If there was a better image (I point to Braid (video game), another I've worked on, where the indie developer put out a nice full size image to reduce down from), I'd be using that. Instead this is the largest and only "cover" image we have, I've not done any rescaling of it. The only thing I think I could add to improve is a caption, noting the cover shows the boy searching through a dark forest.
"trial-and-death"—it's already within quotes, so are the hyphens necessary?
Direct developer quote which is cited later in the article. But looking through sources, I've seen it quoted to the devs both ways, so I suspect the less questionable approach (quotes, sans dashes) would be best? --MASEM (t) 13:43, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
Masem, on Q1, I'd never have worked out that it's of a boy searching through a forest. I know the blackness of the image is evocative of the mood of the piece, but would it not be possible to scale up the bottom bit? Hmmm ... hard, isn't it. A caption would be a very good solution, actually.
Yeah, definitely without hyphens if you have the choice. So much easier to read then.
It appears I did not answer you soon enough to get the BnF article better... Sorry about that (I had quite an important deadline IRL).
I drafted other articles in my sandbox, meant to be published someday in the Signpost : User:Jean-Frédéric/Signpost. Please edit at will, and let me know if I can improve them in any way. I know quite well the protagonists of the stories, so I can easily ask them for details you may think of.
Early feedback from HaeB on IRC is that the story about the photo workshop in Paris is probably too long for a not-so-extraordinary event. Feel free to make cuts so it fits the Signpost purposes. I did not really write it with only the Singpost in mind : this might be good for, say, our next chapter report, while a short news would be plain fine for the Signpost.
We also agreed with HaeB that too much news from French-speaking folks might be boring for the reader, so we thought it could be better to have one story per following issues.
Overall, as you may have noticed, I am quite interested in writing in the Signpost about what we the French chapter are doing. So you may hear again from me in the future, and I am sure I can count on you and the other Signpost folks to help me write good stories :-)
Hi Tony, thanks for the message. I'm dropping a note to thank you for the lovely introduction in the Signpost. Also to tell you I've changed the grey colour on my talk page :) Warm wishes Wifione ....... Leave a message14:37, 16 September 2010 (UTC)
The Military history WikiProject coordinator election has started. You are cordially invited to help pick fourteen new coordinators from a pool of twenty candidates. This time round, the term has increased from six to twelve months so it is doubly important that you have your say! Please cast your vote here no later than 23:59 (UTC) on Tuesday, 28 September 2010.
Not plagiarized, but indeed written out on a separate sheet prior to being committed to Wikipedia, and not spell-checked. Some it is just American spelling.--WickerGuy (talk) 12:46, 21 September 2010 (UTC)
I have replied. Can't be bothered to type it out again and not sure if you get an automatic notification of my reply, hence leaving you this message. gazhiley.co.uk09:33, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony, thanks for that. I was a bit unsure if the break code would still be OK for videos, but it seems to be fine. Graham8710:28, 28 September 2010 (UTC)
You might not remember, but, in the ArbCom elections last year, you said you couldn't figure out if I'd be a hanging judge or not. I think I may have just answered your question :). AGK17:28, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
My edits
No, you don't have to; as you can see, these links lead to the Chinese Wikipedia and the Anglo-Saxon Wikipedia. The only text in the link is "colon language code colon", thus ":zh:" or ":ang:" or whatever.
What I did was to repare the extra infix "wp": see
These are only used for linking other wikimedia projects, such as Wiktionary (and I believe it only works with same-language projects): simple link
I left the whole link as I saw some other similar links, and didn't want to ruin the set :)
Cheers! --Fluence (talk) 20:41, 1 October 2010 (UTC)
5 FLs, 4 FPs, 0 RfAs, but a helluva lot of FAs. All in all, this was a pretty strange week, huh. I added Avenue into the creds for Largest eruptions; Qfl wrote the original version, but me and Avenue cycled improvements during the FL (Qfl was away). The positive comments on the page make this my three-for-three contribution to be singled out, which is nice. I always knew, people love hot red stuff ^^ ResMar00:41, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
The only thing I've done in regards to the Spanish Wikipedia is translate some of their articles into English. I haven't been involved in its FAC process (there was a translation effort on an an English article I took to FAC, Verdeja tank, but the translation was never completed). Sorry. JonCatalán(Talk)06:13, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
i wouldn't be too concerned. most editors know by now that over-linking is discouraged, and i haven't yet seen it used more than once or twice in a single article...usually in an infobox and\or within the article text. cheers! --emerson709:01, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
Unified date formats
Hi,
You've run the script on a lot of pages, most of which had no business linking dates in the first place.
But one page I wrote, Assassinations in fiction, linked dates, but in cases of assassinations of historical figures, so that a link to 1100 would give you the day of death.
That page wasn't linking inconsequential dates, like film release dates; it was linking dates of some historical import.
My understanding was that we were not unlinking every date everywhere, only minor ones of no special significance.
If an event is important enough to describe on a date page, that it is fair to link discussions of that event to that date page. No?
Sincerely, Varlaam (talk) 08:04, 9 October 2010 (UTC)
I have reinstated the link at your request. However, I can find no reference to Rufus or Tyrell at 1100. Can you point to it? In any case, I'm confused as to how a year page is useful to the reader's understanding of an anchor topic even if it is mentioned in the year page (presumably, the fact will appear in the anchor article). I am looking for evidence that the other "facts" listed at the 1100 article (without direct attribution, which always puts me off, too) might shed light on the anchor. Maybe you're right, but it's not immediately clear to me. Tony(talk)08:30, 9 October 2010 (UTC)
1) My basic point is as follows. Once upon a time, in olden days, we were encouraged to link everything in sight.
So if Lady Gaga got her hair coloured, the article would say this happened on [[1 October]] [[2010]].
Obviously there was a lot of such foolishness that got eliminated.
So are there cases where it is still legit to link, what are those cases, where is this documented, etc. etc.?
2) With my specific page, I have for a long long time made a distinction between fiction and fact. It is called "in fiction" but a lot of it is history presented dramatically.
So if someone was trying to kill the President of the Moon in 2200, 2200 was never linked. But if it was Kennedy in 1963, 1963 was linked. Generally speaking, assassinations of or attempts on world leaders, Gunpowder Plot and so on, are significant enough as historical incidents that will get listed on a What Happened In History-style page, like the WP date pages. If anybody were to write an Important Events of 1963 list, JFK would be in there. These incidents are often turning points in history.
Anyway, on that page, you could always tell what is real, what is not, because the dates of real events were linked, but 2200 was not. A 1936 attempt to kill Hitler which never happened would not get a link, since it's not real, but real cases would.
So my feeling is if there are allowable circumstances for linking, does this page, more or less, meet those new criteria?
3) In the specific case of Rufus (and maybe Tyrrell), that does appear on that page as:
2 August—William II of England
He has the nickname Rufus because of his red hair, and it's important to distinguish him from William I, the Conqueror.
4) In conclusion, therefore, 95-100% of the dates you unlinked had been scrutinized by me somewhere along the way, and were not of the Lady Gaga type, but rather of the JFK type, a major event, JFK, Lincoln, but also cases from Europe that are not as well known in North America or Australia as they probably could or should be.
18:22, 9 October 2010 (UTC)
Varlaam, does the page 1100 give any further information about the topic, apart from listing occurrences that are related only because they occurred in the same year? You may be interested to read through the RfC in ?April 09, a big one, in which the community discussed this ad infinitum and by a huge margin decided to be very cautious in linking years. Tony(talk) 01:43, 10 October 2010 (UTC) PS and there is a problem, isn't there, if an editor can't easily find the reference to the topic in the year page. Tony(talk)01:44, 10 October 2010 (UTC)
By that token, would any article which mentions any fact which occurred in 1963 merit that link? and wouldn't that return us to that ridiculous situation we had prior to early 2009? You gave JFK as an example. Any article which mentions his death would point to the specific article on his assassination, obviating the need to link to 1963. Reading 1963 doesn't get the reader any wiser or better educated about JKK's death than if he had not read it, so such a link would be a low-value (or no-value) link, by definition. --Ohconfucius¡digame!07:36, 10 October 2010 (UTC)
I've gone through some of the previous AC election pages, and the feedback page, and added a good deal of content to both the WP:ACE2010 page and the /Candidates page. If you get the chance, could you look the two pages over and check if there's anything dubious or in need of copyediting? Cheers, Skomorokh10:35, 13 October 2010 (UTC)
For your incredible work over the past years both to enforce a high standard of prose and writing on Wikipedia, and for your numerous workshops and efforts to educate others in how to enforce and reach those standards. Cam(Chat)(Prof)02:13, 15 October 2010 (UTC)
This occurred to me in the last couple of hours. I'm copyediting floormates' essays at the moment, and in some cases the prose is just atrocious. I've made a mental note of directing several of them to your Criterion 1a workshops (particularly the multiple word removal and redundancy ones) in the future. Thank-you for constructing those workshops and for enforcing such a high standard. It ensures that other editors (like myself) can eventually copyedit at higher standards as well. Cam(Chat)(Prof)02:13, 15 October 2010 (UTC)
FAR
Hi Tony - If you are interested, there are a few FARs that could use your input:
All capitals in military operation names - guideline?
Hi, apologies for popping up out of the blue like this - I ID'd you as a possible source of help from Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Academy/Copy-editing essentials. I was wondering if you could please point me at the definitive source of information (if it exists) on this topic. I feel sure that it must be set out clearly somewhere, but I have failed so far to find it. You can see at Talk:Operation Eagle Claw#All capitals in op name where I am having a go at explaining what I think is the consensus, but it would be a lot easier if there was one place in one guideline where it specifically said what we do or don't do. I'm hoping that you know where that is! Alternatively, I suppose the little smorgasbord of references I've assembled might have to do - but it would be easier it I could just point to the one place. Sorry to bother you, and thanks in advance. Best wishes, DBaK (talk) 08:53, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
I've responded there. I don't have an ultimate solution, but my take is that all-caps should be avoided unless it's really strange for military readers and others. Tony(talk)11:38, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
Thank you very much for that. I suspect that military readers, or some of them, would prefer all-caps; but it would be a big job and require much sorting out (and writing of exact guidelines) to change, and it's not clear that the small benefit to military readers would outweigh the other considerations, so I think I will just hope that stability prevails. Thank you very much for your trouble. Best wishes, DBaK (talk) 12:27, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
PS Very very nice Current Listening Obsession! And I should know: I speak with considerable bias on the matter ... no NPOV where Bach and the trumpet are concerned! :)
I like my baroque music on the caffeinated side, and the trumpets/timpani package often hits the spot! Let me know if sanity does not prevail about the caps; another obvious step would be to raise it at WT:MOS, where the experts hang out. Tony(talk)13:47, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
Sorry to butt in (nothing personal, I'm always doing it!), but I'm not convinced by the grammar in the second sentence. "Vejvančický, from the Czech Republic, with more 16,000 edits and two and a half years' experience in a wide range of areas, including new-page patrolling, and our currently backlogged speedy deletion and AfD processes." That doesn't add up for me. I just put it into Word and got a big "Fragment (consider revising)" message. Replace "with" with "has" and make it "more than 16,000 edits" and it seems OK. Alzarian16 (talk) 13:31, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
Hello Tony! I saw your message and I was pleasantly surprised about your invitation. However, I should clarify that I am not really a regular at FPC. It has become some sort of a hobby for me in the past month, so I cannot say I have that much experience (especially about the technicalities of photography). I would be happy to write a paragraph, however, considering my inexperience, I would be fine if you change your opinion/choice. Nergaal (talk) 17:02, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
Nergaal, I'm not much swayed by membership of any group ("anyone can edit"); technical and/or artistic opinions from informed users are what matter. So please, yes. Tony(talk)11:56, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
To stop receiving this newsletter, or to receive it in a different format, please list yourself in the appropriate section here. To assist with preparing the newsletter, please visit the newsroom. BrownBot (talk) 20:42, 23 October 2010 (UTC)
Capitalisation
Hi Tony - the difference is the same as between a list of presidents, and a list of Presidents of the United States. The specific requires a capital, the generic does not. The strong implication in the section titles is that they are of General Secretaries [of X], so the capitals are needed. Warofdreamstalk10:12, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
"De Gaulle was a French president" is vague; he could have been president of anything (of course, he's famous enough that many readers will know he was President of France, but the phrase could equally describe a company president, or a French-born president of another country. "De Gaulle was the French President" is specific and therefore needs a capital. Warofdreamstalk10:23, 25 October 2010 (UTC)
Hi there. I am interested in volunteering at the Arbitration elections, mostly out of a desire to help Wikipedia, but also out of an intellectual curiosity spurred on my my academic training in political science. I have three questions.
Am I elegible to join (I'm not an admin, but I am an editor in good standing)
Is it too late to join (The elections are only what, a month away)
If I can join, what still needs to be done.
Please use a talkback to inform me if you respond.
I've seen instances in the past where editors get their panties all in a twist if someone edits the Signpost, so I won't touch it. But there seems to be a significant error there: noam cohen -- noam chomsky. Tks for your hard work. • Ling.Nut01:02, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
Abject apologies! I missed your edit - I only just noticed it.
Pdfpdf, hi, I agree that this needs to be sorted out first, and I'm sure LM will cease any further such conversions until it's nutted out. Will you assist in discussions? I'm sorry to see that you have been upset by this. MOSNUM talk is a good place, and I'll see whether LM will take it there, or whether it's simpler to work it out here. I myself am used to "km/h", but I'd like to know more about who uses which version, where, and in what circumstances. That would help everyone. Thank you. Tony(talk)15:55, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
I'd like to think I did: "Will you assist in discussions?". Did I?
I'm sorry to see that you have been upset by this. - Thanks. But notice, I survived, so it can't be too bad ...
but I'd like to know more ... - That's a laudable goal. However, I'm not sure I can add anything useful.
BTW: I'd like to emphasise that I'm not really here (as evidenced by the fact that I missed your post.)
No problem at all. Issues of units on en.WP can be very complex and often fuzzy. IMO, we need to develop a few more guidelines for a few of the troublesome ones (acres to metric, OMG). Automation experts such as Lightmouse can be very useful to the project if they bring up matters that editors point out. I hope to see you more at MOSNUM. Tony(talk)13:46, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for your posting. Your goodwill is both acknowledged and appreciated. However, it's now 3am here, so if you don't mind, I'll leave it until later to leap into action. Best wishes, Pdfpdf (talk) 16:45, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony, I appreciated your input and came to see what else you're up to. I didn't realize you were so much a part of our amazing MOS! I took the liberty of correcting a spelling error and another confusing line on the hyphen/dash exercises page. I hope you don't mind. Take care! –Paul M. Nguyen (chat|blame) 19:56, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
Tippett is on my list, but I fear he is behind Delius and Britten in the queue for polishing up. If you are disposed, I have Edward Elgar at FAC, where all comments would be gratefully received. I'll make a note to alert you when Tippett is also up there: summer 2011, I'd estimate. – Tim riley (talk) 14:07, 29 October 2010 (UTC)
This weekend I am in New Orleans for my grandmother's funeral tomorrow and will be travelling on Sunday. I would be able to do a much better assessment next week or the week after.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:30, 30 October 2010 (UTC)
You have been invited to comment in a special Request for Constructive Criticism page. I am looking for areas in which I can improve. I have identified you as both an experienced and trusted Wikipedian, and as someone that has had sufficient contact with me to able to recognize areas in which I can improve.
Please feel free to visit and post any comments or criticism you have. At a certain point, I cannot improve if no one tells me what I need to work on. Thanks in advance, Sven ManguardTalk00:27, 31 October 2010 (UTC)
I was trying to find a convention regarding the use of U.S. versus US, but no style is given precedence (a free ticket to an edit war).
The Chicago Manual of Style was cited by other users previously as a reason to retain U.S.. However, as noted here, the newly published 16th edition has changed its position on abbreviating "United States". They now support US, rather than U.S.Significant Rule Changes in The Chicago Manual of Style, 16th Edition.
Since you are very active in this area of Wikipedia, this may be of interest to you.
Well yes, it came as a surprise to us all that CMOS did a complete back-flip on this: before you had to insert the dots; now they're evil, so to speak. It's about time. The question is whether it was a sudden push or had been building in their committees and boards for years. There has been great awkwardness in, for example, "U.S. and UK participation", and "... of the U.S., including the USA and the USAF" (USA standing for US Army)—and in the dropping of almost all other dots in US-related acronyms years ago, including the country-name abbreviation "USA". The tension is also present in modern-day American usage: many Americans have been dropping the dots in
"US" in their casual writing, and many, although probably not as many, in formal writing. WP supplies good evidence of this. Tony(talk) 05:40, 1 November 2010 (UTC) PS And let's not forget the tension between the American and Canadian usage of dots in U.S. and the near-universal US in the rest of the English-speaking world. Tony(talk)05:43, 1 November 2010 (UTC)
Judging featured pictures
Hi Tony,
thank you for the honour to judge the FP on en.WP. I will send you a comment at the end of the week. --Llez (talk) 08:07, 1 November 2010 (UTC)
Suggestion for signpost
On the philosophy that a little light does wonders, perhaps it would be well if the Signpost covered the current contretemps over plagiarism both at DYK and FA.--Wehwalt (talk) 15:05, 1 November 2010 (UTC)
Tony, our disagreements about delinking aside, please remember that you need to indicate your actions in an edit summary. This edit popped up on my watchlist, wherein you delinked some terms without listing anything in the summary. A quick check revealed that there are quite a number of your edits that list other actions in the summary, but fail to mention delinking. I've the feeling that it may be an error in the script you use; could you please address this issue? Thanks in advance. --Ckatzchatspy18:38, 5 November 2010 (UTC)
Please review Since your objections, the article has been amended by Lazer Brain. Please let me know if you think this is sufficient copy-editing. Thanks. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 00:45, 7 November 2010 (UTC)
I'd appreciate if you'd at least have the decorum to not deny me credit for restoration work that I do on images such as John Reynold's death. Thanks. Papa Lima Whiskey (talk) 15:04, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
You make it sound as though I did it on purpose. Are you in a bad mood? The Features and admins page is a lot of fiddly work which I do as a volunteer. I've had to write the largest part of two SP pages this week, as well as manage a horrendous real-life workload. Why are you giving me such a hard time? I'll go there right away and add your name. I might at that it says under "Creator", "restoration by User:Jujutacular". Your contribution is buried in the reviewers' discourse, which I suppose I'll have to comb through carefully in future. Tony(talk)15:18, 9 November 2010 (UTC)
I'm having some trouble copy-editing this one, especially since it's going to be on the main page soon. I worked on the article a bit 3-4 years ago, but that's ancient history! Would you be able to help me out? —Deckiller (t-c-l) 21:04, 10 November 2010 (UTC)
Tony1, I understand the desire to keep the questions under control, but perhaps, before editing someone else's question,[10] you should try at least a note to their talkpage to give them the opportunity to edit it themselves? And his question was what, 10 words over? But your comment to him was considerably more than that, so seems to have added more clutter than what you were trying to remove. --Elonka14:27, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
I'm not concerned. It's boring that someone just disregarded the instructions. The cost of going to people's talk pages and asking, then keeping tabs, is going to get out of hand. It will come to chopping off what is written after 75 words. The instructions are very clear. Tony(talk)14:31, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
Your attitude is not helpful. Please remember that the goal here is to facilitate the election process, not go rules-happy, which in itself could get out of hand. What if you edit someone's question to change its meaning? That would get even more tangled. Or in other words: If a question is 85 words instead of 75, please use some good judgment and just leave it alone. And do not edit someone else's question unless you have given them the opportunity to do it themselves. You are an organized person, I am confident that you will be able to figure out a way to keep track. --Elonka14:40, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
Tony, would you please show me anywhere where the community actually approved these rules? And no, this is not the community, this is a group of about twenty people. I'm rather concerned that rules are just being made up because a minority doesn't like stuff, and now that people are enforcing them without even leaving notes telling others what they allegedly did wrong, it's going too far. Heimstern Läufer(talk)15:11, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
85 words is too much over the limit to be fair to other questioners; whereas one or two words over the limit might sometimes be negotiable. There are three choices: edit it down myself, remove the words from 76 onwards with a note on the user's talk page; or remove the entire question to the user's talk page, asking them to repost it within the required length. If the question has already been answered, an editing down is more likely. Tony(talk)15:15, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
85 words is not a problem. 200 words is a problem. Perhaps you should talk to an arbitration clerk about how they deal with "too long" statements? They don't get obsessive about word counts -- Judgment is required. But copyediting someone else's question, removing a word here and there, is absolutely not a good choice. It's actually kind of horrifying that you even think that that is an appropriate action. To be clear: Do not edit other people's posts in that way. --Elonka16:00, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
Would a text length of 86 words be a problem and 199 words not be? The only way to ensure fairness to all is if the word count is strictly adhered to. Perhaps instead of rewriting others' questions to fit the wordcount, moderators should actually truncate the text at the 75th word. ;-) --Ohconfucius¡digame!16:33, 15 November 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony. Is the sentence "The album's lead single, "Run It!," featuring rapper Juelz Santana, topped the Billboard Hot 100, spending a month atop the chart." okay as it is, or does the "spending" part cause issues? I found it while reviewing Chris Brown discography at FLC, but I'm not sure whether it's wrong, or if I just don't like it. Matthewedwards : Chat 06:00, 16 November 2010 (UTC)
Perhaps I'm being picky, but is "spawn" okay in "[The album] also spawned the US top-ten singles 'Yo (Excuse Me Miss)' and 'Say Goodbye,'"? WP:WTW doesn't make a terribly good job of examples or lists of words to avoid. Would it fall under WP:EUPHEMISM? I can't think of a situation when an album would spawn, and even most generous definitions at wikt:Spawn "To generate, bring into being" or "To bring forth in general" don't seem to work. An album is inanimate, it could never spawn. I've seen this used on other pages too, as well as "the album produced four singles". It should be "The album includes four singles", or "contains", or something, surely? Matthewedwards : Chat 06:18, 16 November 2010 (UTC)
Happy Tony1's Day!
Tony1 has been identified as an Awesome Wikipedian, so I've officially declared today as Tony1's Day! For being a great person and awesome Wikipedian, enjoy being the star of the day, Tony1!
Well, I have to go to sleep now, sorry this didn't work. Maybe next time. Also, for your information. I'm usually on IRC from 10:00 AM to 10:00 PM EST. EST is 5 hours behind of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). Therefore, it's almost 3:00 AM for me, and I can tell you that it is very rare that I am on at 3:00 AM. He eh. Sorry about this. Sven ManguardTalk07:48, 19 November 2010 (UTC)
I went to your page and I saw Jimbo staring back at me. I then saw another picture of you and thought you and Jimbo were either clones or somehow bred very closely! Yikes! Is this some sort of plot that Jimbo is upto to replicate himself? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ivegotbellyfur (talk • contribs) 22:37, 13 November 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for asking me to write a choice of the week for Signpost - But I have to refuse, sorry. Just because I happen to take a good picture of a train here and there does not make me want (or dare) to judge other people's work... --Kabelleger (talk) 22:22, 20 November 2010 (UTC)
You wrote: "This is not the Russian WP, and our readers tend not to read Russian. Please explain why the clutter can't be in a ref."[11]
My answer: Because all other Russian writers, composers, cities etc. have their name in original Russian in lead. That's why. And I can't see how someone's original name in Russian could be considered "clutter". The rest, such as different ways to spell a Russian name in English, that is "clutter" and should remain in footnote.
--Frania W. (talk) 04:03, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
First, I've removed the humungous bulleted list of clutter from my talk page; you don't seem to have a feeling for what clutter is, and where it should be avoided. Second, please see my response on the talk page of that article. Including Cyrillic, Arabic, Chinese scripts right at the opening of the first sentence of articles, instead of making them available neatly in a footnote from the top, is plain ridiculous. As well, the transliteration is worse than useless: it is misleading, as someone has pointed out there. Tony(talk)06:26, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
"Could we have a show of hands for a recommendation (rather than compulsion) at MOSNUM " - my point was that there is no compulsion at MOSNUM not that it was being asked for - which of course it wasn't. RichFarmbrough, 19:03, 21 November 2010 (UTC).
Thanks for playing a key role in reforming several aspects of WP. You've done it through tireless reviewing, copy-editing, and playing devil's advocate—as well as knowing when to be blunt without being uncivil. —Deckiller (t-c-l) 02:27, 22 November 2010 (UTC)
Harry, it's very kind of you to assume I'm qualified, but I've emailed you with the reasons it would not be a good idea. Something like this: (i) I'd feel constricted in participating fully in community debates, and I'm a reformer; (ii) my expectations of reform in ArbCom's procedures would be too great (mainly changes to make the life of arbs less in one's face, as it were); (iii) my reforms in WP over the past five years have upset some people, and I'd be torn to shreds in the election—especially as I have been intemperate on occasion ... I can just imagine the diffs from a few years ago; (iv) I'd need to take a light load for two months a year and a very light load for another three; (v) I'm subject to a (minor) ArbCom sanction; (vi) I'm already an election coordinator; and (vii) there's very good talent out there which we are not yet seeing at the candidates' page ... why not? :-) Tony(talk)15:30, 21 November 2010 (UTC)
Note that we use it for example, in Oriental music, which I think is wrong. While you're at it, should we even capitalize Eastern, as in eastern philosophy or eastern music? Thanks for any advice. The article Wehwalt is thinking about is Flower Drum Song, a musical set in San Francisco's Chinatown, about Asian-American immigrants. -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:32, 22 November 2010 (UTC)
Just thought I'd say that I like the way you've steered The Signpost towards a more journalistic style. I've even started reading it again now. MalleusFatuorum02:19, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
Ah, thanks. And HaeB, plus other journalists on the beat, are central to this, too. Not to mention Sage, who contributed excellent features. Tony(talk)02:22, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony, OK, it's really not a big deal to me. I only added the dot because without it, the intonation sounded a bit strange with JAWS; maybe it's because the sentence ends with a number. I wasn't too sure about it myself. Graham8707:46, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
If you don't mind my jumping in on a question you asked another candidate, years ago (before I was active) there was a page that did attempt to list the status all probations, restrictions, etc. imposed on editors in arbitration cases. It was always out-of-date, and the consensus emerged that it was impossible to maintain and should be dropped. If you like I can try to hunt the old page down so you can see an idea of what it looked like and what some of the issues with it were. Newyorkbrad (talk) 07:23, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for taking the time, NYB. Yes, it would be good to see this. My immediate interest is for The Signpost's "Arbitration report", which I helped to copy-edit this and last week. This brought home just what a complex thicket it is to locate the right information for the context. Tony(talk)07:28, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
Well, I can't locate a single person I know who has restrictions. Amendments don't seem to be added. The links are not to the editor's restriction, but just to the whole case. This would be good if the gardening were done. Not a small job, but really important. Tony(talk)14:47, 23 November 2010 (UTC)
Tony, can you say what your main concern is about the outstanding restrictions? If a question comes up as to whether a certain restriction is still in place, reading the case itself would be the first resort. Cases are usually annotated with any changes that are made later. EdJohnston (talk) 02:07, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
Ed, a sample or two reveals that there are no (footnoted) links from the original case remedies to amendments, clarifications. That would be a start. Admins and others should have to invest a significant amount of time in reading a whole case to determine what an editor's current restrictions are. It would also help readers to get a grip on how the case has evolved, without a PhD-like research effort. Needs to be much more user-friendly. Tony(talk)02:50, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
Consider WP:DIGWUREN. I think you should find all information about whether a given editor is restricted by searching for their name in WP:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren and Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/Digwuren. I believe that the first of these (the case page) should normally be up to date, and should be annotated with links to the places where the changes were authorized. If you want someone to prepare a separate table showing all the restrictions, how will you ensure that the separate table is up to date? It seems to me that WP:RESTRICT is a reasonable compromise, though it lacks the amount of detail you would prefer. EdJohnston (talk) 03:36, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
I know you don't normally copyedit, but would you consider doing History of the New York Jets. The complaints are probably valid, as I did not write it from scratch, but allowed large portions of existing prose to remain. The train has left the station, and I'd rather not see it fail and have to serve a two week penalty (given that I'm obviously not going to beg a delegate). There is a tension between formal language and football terminology in the article, to be sure.--Wehwalt (talk) 14:23, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
Jimbo and international politics: warning bells are ringing
Hi Tony, I realize you're probably too busy for this with the elections, but I'm thinking of submitting the above for FA status, and I was wondering if you'd be willing to peer review it. I started a peer review last year, then got sidetracked, but I've reopened it here. Just in case there are changes to the article, the last version I can vouch for is at User:SlimVirgin/Lydda3. But I know this is a lot to ask, especially at the moment, so please feel completely free to ignore this request, and don't even feel you have to explain. Best, SlimVirgintalk|contribs08:35, 27 November 2010 (UTC)
I see you had made some comments on WT:MTAA. Unfortunately, the advice from there imported in the main MOS page doesn't seem a lot better. See discussion here. Thanks, Tijfo098 (talk) 13:18, 29 November 2010 (UTC)
Elections are currently underway for our inaugural Guild coordinators. The voting period will run for 14 days: 00:01 UTC, Friday 1 December – 23:59 UTC, Tuesday 14 December. All GOCE members in good standing, as well as past participants of any of the Guild's Backlog elimination drives, are eligible to vote. There are six candidates vying for four positions. The candidate with the highest number of votes will become the Lead Coordinator, therefore, your vote really matters! Cast your vote today.
Hello, Tony1. You recently requested an IRC cloak, but it looks like you didn't send a memo confirming your request because your IRC account isn't registered. To register, type the /msg nickserv help register and follow the instructions there. Once you've registered and confirmed your e-mail address, type /msg memoserv send wmfgc IRC cloak request to confirm your cloak request. If you have any questions, please message me on IRC (/msg kibble MESSAGE) or leave me a message on my Meta-Wiki talk page. (I probably won't see messages left here.) Thanks! Cbrown1023talk17:00, 5 December 2010 (UTC)
Long ago, way back in the mists of time, you suggested that some noise reduction on this 19th-century recording would be a good idea. I've had a go myself, but it's my first-such attempt. If you get a moment, I would be delighted if you could revisit the nomination with your thoughts on the current version. Regards, BencherliteTalk12:36, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
October edit
I just discovered an edit yopu made way back in October seems to have inadavertently altered a heading to read "unsuccessful etitions for ncorporation" [13] Fixed now but thought you ought to know in case the script has done other strange things :-) Lozleader (talk) 22:18, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for picking that up. Not a script, thank heavens, but I suspect a malfunctioning shift button on my keyboard in my attempt to replace caps with sentence case in a title, as required by the MoS. Tony(talk)00:16, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
Started a discussion here: Talk:Conservatorium_High_School#The_Con_versus_Con_High. I hear The Con, referring to the high school many times more than I hear Con High (which I think is actually restricted to the students and staff there, even parents call it the Con).
There would have to be documentary evidence. It defies all anectodal evidence I have heard, and conflicts with the terminology, established over nearly a century, for a quite different institution: the Sydney Conservatorium. Tony(talk)12:12, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
There is no reliable documentary evidence, just as there is no reliable (ie, not linked directly to the school, staff, students or related associations) evidence of the use of "Con High". The fact that a previous editor and I both use it indicate the likelihood of there being actual usage of the term, and I can attest to colloquial usage by the general public (as I said, even by parents of students at the school).
In which case no colloquial term should be used. It is not acceptable to confuse readers about the totally different ownership and administration of a high school and a faculty of the University of Sydney. Tony(talk)06:52, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
OK, then we remove the other as well because of WP:V#SELF? This doesn't really advance the cause of wikipedia. No, that would be ridiculous.
People will search for the Conservatorium High School as The Con, so do we just disregard these people because they're wrong? -Danjel (talk) 06:08, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
Good point: I'd create a disambiguation page, with both institutions listed. The entry for Con High should say something like "known in-house as ...". But I'm really uncomfortable that colloquial names are being given such prominence. Who would search for either using "The Con"? And how many other institutions in the world might use this. It's really very loose, and I'd expect any such unsuccessful search to be followed immediately by a search using the proper name(s). Underlying the whole thing is a sense of snobbery among Con High people, if the single-syllable really is used as you say it is now (it never used to be). This is a falsehood, since it is taking the name of a tertiary institution and applying it to that of a high school. This is parochial and should not be encouraged by WP. Tony(talk) 06:50, 8 December 2010 (UTC) Furthermore, both a google and a WP searches reveal that "the Con" is listed solely as referring to the USyd faculty, not to some high school. I believe this is a private, in-house, pretentious habit that has grown among parents and students. I think I'd object to it. Tony(talk)06:53, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony. I've just read the Signpost report that you and Skomorokh wrote on the results of the election. The stats were very interesting, but I was wondering if more was going to be written on the candidates themselves, especially the expected new arrivals? Or is that going to happen in a future issue?
One other thought - it is not clear at all what Jimmy will do as regards the term lengths, so maybe wait until he says something?
Carcharoth, excellent: I look forward to your comments on the stats. Skomorokh has not yet commented on the text, but I emailed him about it, and I think he has dropped by to look. I asked the election chatroom to comment on angle and tone; Sven Manguard has been in there thinking about it. The text is a partial draft only, which I'd not normally put on-wiki; it seemed important and very topical right now, so I linked to it from the election chatroom to get feedback.
More on the candidates themselves? I thought about it, and wondered. Perhaps the same kind of information Dabomb87 and I give on the new admins at "Features and admins"? If you mean that, yes, it's a good idea. Jimmy made it clear (last year) that he will use one- and two-year terms to minimise oscillations, just as he has used one-, two- and three-years terms pre-2009 (there's a consistent history of this). I have expressed leeway in the sentence already (my italics here): "The three candidates with the lowest successful votes (John Vandenberg, Jclemens, and Shell Kinney), are likely to have one-years terms to minimise the theoretical oscillation of vacancies at ACE2011, with two-year terms for the other nine successful candidates (see the ArbCom chart). Jimmy Wales is expected to formally announce the results soon." Is it too definite? The link to the ArbCom chart has question marks, not names. Tony(talk)10:08, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
I think naming the candidates with the three lowest supports is a bit too definite (I would remove the parenthetical bit), but that's up to you. I'm not sure what you mean by "The link to the ArbCom chart has question marks, not names" (oh, hang on, I see what you mean now). BTW, which one of the black dots is me? :-) As far as the new arbitrators go, obviously wait until things are official, but I would have thought some mini-interview with each one could work, but for a later issue (include all 18 members of the 2011 committee if you want to get balance). Carcharoth (talk) 10:15, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
I'll remove the three names. Your point is 66%, 23% (x and y axes, respectively). There are two black points diagonally positioned and almost merging. Yours is the south-western one of the two. In view of how much text the candidates wrote about themselves and their views, I think I'll avoid an interview-type approach right now. There may be opportunities in 2011. Tony(talk)10:28, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
Thanks, and fair enough. I was surprised, though, at how many are in or based in the UK. More than in previous years, I think. That only really came out at the end of the election campaign as someone (I forget who) went around asking them if they were from anglophone countries. Carcharoth (talk) 10:39, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
An interesting point that you have probably noticed. If the election was ranked on pure support percentage with neutral and oppose taken out of the equation Sandstein would have been elected at 8th place. The one to loose out would be Jclemens who would drop down to 13th because of a large number of neutral votes. The really interesting point to note about this election was that there were more neutral votes cast than support or oppose. Is that because many users didn't assess all of the candidates and so didn't form an opinion on them? Notable high neutral vote counts were for Stephen Bain (who just hasn't been around for the last 2 years) followed fairly predictably by Harej, David Fuchs and PhilKnight (I discount Balloonman because his withdrawal would have influenced the voting). Interesting that two of these have been elected as arbs particularly as David Fuchs has 104 more neutral votes than support and PhilKnight has 93 more neutral than support. Does this end up as an election based on apathy? Polargeo (talk) 10:54, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
If anything, ACE2010 showed more voting intensity, and within that a greater shift towards supports than towards opposes. The real problem in terms of low-intensity voting was with the manual system, where the abstain/neutral component was 75%. It is a good trend. Tony(talk)11:25, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
Yes it is not terrible. Obviously 2008 was a very different system. I think the real issue is that in 2009 we ended up 22 candidates going for 9 places. In 2010 it ended up as 18 candidates going for 12 places and the voting system disguises the fact that we will now have 6 arbs who only received approximately 1 in 3 support. Polargeo (talk) 12:33, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
OK, Carcharoth is right. I made a conceptual/mathematical blooper when I said the top-left is the point of minimum distortion (i.e., minimum difference between the support vote and the ranking formula output). I was talking baloney: to start with, it's a zero, not a "minimum". Second, it's a line, not a point. So two lines are valuable for visualising the relationship between these two measures: the "no-neutrals" line and the "no-opposes" line. I'm now updating the graph to reflect this. Tony(talk)13:59, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
Each of the candidates
I would use each of the candidates is; although you seem to have recast the draft. The subject is each; in American this must have a singular verb, since it is formally singular - and in Commonwealth English I gather you mean each one of the candidates individually, which I think would also be a singular verb; the real difference between the dialects is "the pool of candidates".
Thanks. I'm happy with "each of the candidates is", although I switched it from "are" before asking you, still not having thought it through. Tony(talk)05:34, 11 December 2010 (UTC)
I'm looking for some good short books on writing. Can you recommend any? Also what do you think of Strunk & White? Or Zinsser's book? I was looking around on the web, and surprisingly I saw some good print reviews for Stephen King's On Writing. Eudora Welty's book One's Writer's Beginnings is another book I was considering buying. The problem is I see some people criticizing these works, so I'm not sure what to do. Aaron Bowen (talk) 22:06, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
Aaron, this is a question you might also ask the experts at WT:MOS, although I suspect there's a great deal of disagreement among them. When you say "writing", do you mean university assignments, PhD dissertations, Wikipedia articles? And "good short books": I presume you're not referring to style guides, of which there are some quite good ones online and free (although each is anchored in just one of the varieties of English, and each has its faults and/or biases). Perhaps you're talking about books that offer advice about how to write better. My own set of tutorials are a mixture of that, of style guides, and most importantly of show-and-tell exercises (the redundancy ones are the most successful, I think—a few are not so successful). You might be interested in the list of external links on the main article. WP now has show-and-tell exercises and advice specifically for the creation and improvement of the prose in MilHist and Film articles, too. <Reminds self to revise his own over the Xmas break.> Tony(talk)10:20, 10 December 2010 (UTC)
Thats my bad, I wasn't clear enough. I've tried your exercises and will keep at those, but I need to spend a few more dollars (10-15) to get free shipping on an order at amazon. So I've decided to get a book(s) to help improve my writing, and those were some I considered. That book you recommend is $45.00 unfortunately, which is a little out of my price range. The writing is for personal correspondence, some short stories I do on my own, and for here maybe; I've been debating becoming an active contributor again. But really its for all around improvement. Aaron Bowen (talk) 23:26, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
That said, you don't have to necessarily change it at the signpost. I have a feeling the cropped version was mainly favored because it is more suited for infobox use. Jujutaculartalk17:07, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
I was confused at the time, and the judge thought the opposite of what you said, too. But I'll correct the caption in the light of what you say. Tony(talk)01:57, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
i am in a hurry right now, so just quick answers to your inline comments:
should this be "dissemination"? Diffusion is not the right word
you're right, this is a faux-ami ;-)
what has this got to do with Wikimedia?
this is of uttermost importance for Wikimedia. At the moment, each government agency use different re-use conditions, and then you have to ask each one permission, requests that often they have neither the time nor the skill to answer. If conditions are standardised by the APIE, there would possibly be one unique process to ask the BnF for digitised books, the archives for documents, etc.
the quote didn't really make sense. Does this?
the audience really liked the quote (that it seems I failed to render) − Monniaux was basically saying that Wikimedians expect things to go fast (one meeting and all is wrapped up), but with institutions (rather than governments) it takes a long, long time.
presume this is present tense, not future
Well, the agreement to do so is signed, but there is no roadmap defined at the moment. We're working on that.
"to invite readers to proofread books" ← this is a bit cryptic ... proofread? Unpublished books? I don't get it.
This is basic Wikisource vocabulary : Wikisourcians have scans and crappy OCRs, and they proofread the text, from fixing typos to typing the entire text. I don't understand what you mean by "Unpublished books": books are in the public domain, they obviously were published decades ago.
"here is the issue of the re-use of public data, which is regulated by law" ← where is public data NOT regulated by law? The contrast is unclear
Hum, this is going to be quite technical. There is special law in France, so-called 17 July 1978, that basically says that whatever is produced by the government agencies are public data. For example, scans of public domain books made by the BnF are public data, and agencies may use this law to control access.
I'll finish tonight, after work. I talked with HaeB yesterday, except if something goes wrong on his end he can wait until the end of the day to publish, so I should have to submit the rest. Jean-Fred (talk) 15:11, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
WikiLeaks
Hi Tony, I've removed your declaration of support for WikiLeaks from your user space. Please note that Wikipedia should not be used as a platform for advocacy of any kind, including that of a political nature. This is one of Wikipedia's fundamental principles, and a policy supported by community consensus. If you wish to share your opinions on this topic, please do so through another medium, such as a blog. Thank you, - Kingpin13 (talk) 13:58, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
Hi, I couldn't help noticing that the same picture of the mallard ducks is featured in last week's and this weeks Signpost. Last week showed the full version; this week should show the crop - but this is the opposite of what the infobox reports. So I thought I'd let you know so you can sort it out. Cheers, HereToHelp(talk to me)06:11, 14 December 2010 (UTC)
Now I'm confused. I had representations to do it the other way, then this way, now the other. I found the actual nomination page not all that clear as to the intention of the reviewers (which one was actually featured, which one wasn't). Tony(talk)07:37, 14 December 2010 (UTC)
Dear Tony, how are you? I have a question regarding the above wikilinked article. In the lede section, the summary of the music video for the song states, "The accompanying music video features a surreal white bathhouse, where Gaga is kidnapped by a group of supermodels who drug her, and sell her to the Russian Mafia for sexual slavery. The video received positive response for its artistic treatment and visual imagery; critics complimented its provocative and symbolic plot."
However, after reading the music video section, I felt like that there was something wrong with the contsruction of the sentences and the summarisation of the music video section. Can you please point me out how I can rephrase the quoted bit? — Legolas(talk2me)09:19, 14 December 2010 (UTC)
Legolas, I'm well thanks, but tired after a heavy few months in RL and here. Was that song composed before 1750? </half-joking> It's not really my thing. And when I read there, "two women pull her out of the bathtub, rip her clothes off and force her to ...", I was ready to be disgusted. But I believe just a glass of vodka was at issue. The section looks ok on a quick read-through. Tony(talk)12:56, 14 December 2010 (UTC)
Haha, well try watching the video after having a glass of vodka then. Thanks for the read-through. Here's wishing you good health and solutions to every problem in RL. — Legolas(talk2me)16:42, 14 December 2010 (UTC)
FAR reviews
Hi Tony - I know you're quite busy with everything to do with the ArbCom elections, but there are a couple of FAR reviews that could really use your keen eye, if you're interested:
If not next week, than the week after. How about we gather images from this week and next week, and I'll do it at the end of next week? That would work better for me. --AmericanXplorer13 (talk) 03:45, 17 December 2010 (UTC)
If you're still looking for an FA reviewer this weekend, I can probably do it, although given that there are 13 articles to look at, my judgement may be cursory. DrKiernan (talk) 17:24, 17 December 2010 (UTC)
As someone who has nominated or commented on one of the current candidates, a couple of which are getting very old, you are invited to comment at this discussion to see if we can tidy up the FSC page before Christmas (and / or one or more of the nominations). Thank you. BencherliteTalk19:05, 17 December 2010 (UTC)
Hi :)
Hi Tony, nice to meet you. My freind Legolas recommended me to you for a small favor. I am currently in a fairly successful FAC process and need a little help. SO the article is "All I Want for Christmas Is You" and it has a few prose issues. Can you please run through it and fix any small issues you find? It really isn't a big job, Legolas and myself already did it. Please help? :D Thanks for your time!--CallMeNathan • Talk2Me20:56, 14 December 2010 (UTC)
Has this just got put on the shelf? Having gone through all that effort discussing it we ought not to just let it lapse. Johnbod (talk) 19:45, 17 December 2010 (UTC)
Johnbod, the default size was raised at Commons in April and enwiki in May; since then, it has been rolled out to all WMF projects. Tony(talk)02:23, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
180 to 240, rather than to 220, would have been my choice. The guides and policies have changed now so that it's fine to resize away from the default. Tony(talk)03:08, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
Thanks ... BUT, I think all editors should use the 240px220px standard so they see what our readers see. That is the way images should be arranged, with due consideration of the window width and default font size. It doesn't stop me from forcing pictures larger (occasionally smaller) for everyone, though. Tony(talk)03:45, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
I thought the standard was now 220px? In any event, if you're logged in what you see is determined by your preferences, which I suspect is why Johnbod has noticed no difference in the default thumbnail size. MalleusFatuorum04:58, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
I'm well aware of that, but I do look at a default view every so often. I must have got used to the new one without registering a change, or just forgotten. Using the default view to edit has benefits, but the variability introduced by other factors, like hardware, means you can never work out a design that works for everyone. Johnbod (talk) 12:56, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
It's true that nothing works equally well for everyone; but it is possible to create rules that lead to the best compromise. Please see the thread I've created at WT:MOS on revamping the image guidelines (although I haven't yet formulated a proposed new text. Tony(talk)13:25, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
Tony, I've started the page for our annual review of the year, and I was wondering if you and Dabomb87 wanted to write the section on featured content. Ideally, this would be a few paragraphs on the best new featured content (similar to what's in F&A) this year. I was wondering if you'd fancy doing it? Thanks, wackywace10:20, 21 December 2010 (UTC)
Yup, we've done a RotY for several years now (2009; 2007, Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV; 2006, Part I, Part II). I was thinking we could ask some very long-term contributors for their opinions on new featured content, just like is done in F&A. A section on humour would be a brilliant idea, I'll have a word with Mono about it. Regards, wackywace10:34, 21 December 2010 (UTC)
Happy Holidays
Happy Holidays
Hope you have a lovely holiday season. I have one request: At least once this season, completely ruin someone's attempt to piss you off. If someone cuts you off in traffic or shits on you at work, just smile and wave and tell them Happy Holidays. Maybe they'll be less of an asshole, even if it's just for the rest of the day. Andy Walsh(talk)20:36, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
Wishing you a very Merry Christmas & Happy New Year! Wishing you all the very best for the season. Thanks for all your help and support this year. Merry Christmas and may Santa be good to you! – SMasters (talk) 04:26, 24 December 2010 (UTC) Click to play!
Hello. I noticed some of the edits you made on pages I recently looked at, and I must say that although you are removing links and stuff according to policy, some of your edits are unconstructive. Let me give you and example. On the Kristen Stewart page, you removed links for Los Angeles and then you removed the words California and U.S. next to it. Please refrain from removing this info. You are here to help, not take away info. Thank you. Tinton5 (talk) 19:54, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
Los Angeles, California, US, Americas, Northern Hemisphere, Earth, Solar System, Milky Way,... etc. This is when postal address mentality takes over from practicality. English-speakers are expected to know where LA is, and NYC, and London, etc. It clutters an infobox to insert such redundant information. Tony(talk)01:17, 25 December 2010 (UTC)
I agree with Tony on removing "California, U.S.". Our goal is to keep things as succinct as possible while still maintaining clarity. However, I do not see the harm in wikilinking the city. —Deckiller (t-c-l) 01:53, 25 December 2010 (UTC)
I disagree with this because we should never assume that people in an English speaking country will know where these are, as silly as that may sound. There are people in this country and around the world who speak English and are looking at this page. You make an invalid argument by saying it takes up too much room, thats why I abbreviate the United States with U.S. and people freak about it. It is best to provide the most information possible to the reader, and it looks incomplete without it. I have to agree with Deckiller about linking the city. Tinton5 (talk) 17:00, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
This is a misplaced use of the model for postal envelope addressing in an encyclopedia article where a careful balance is needed between providing low value information and linking low-value targets (in terms of reader utility). That LA is a city in the State of California is of little interest to anyone outside the electoral and postal systems; and that either might be mistaken as geographical entities in New Zealand is fanciful. We have to draw the line when a city is so well-known around the world that it can just be stated per se: London, Rome, Paris, London, New York City, Los Angeles, etc. The infobox, in particular, does much better when trim. I don't want to get the feeling as a reader that these hierarchical enveloped addresses are given for the sake of being "correct" in some sense. That is inappropriate here.Tony(talk)17:12, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
Hello tony i agree with you 100percent so pls disregard the statements on my talk page that i have put in line over. I will explain my reason for my changed views. After seeing this edit i see that this is a view that seems to be around. So i took a look at were this idea has been talk about and found may threads, but then found (by way of your edit history) Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (linking)#Parent–child links. I agree with GFHandel on this matter. We realy would need to add nationality and/or ethnic background to Wikipedia:OVERLINK, as most will see this as a very different topic the what is list there now. I will post more that Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (linking)#Parent–child links. Moxy (talk) 20:38, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
Oh, thank you, Dank. Sometimes it seems like a big, deadlined heave. I do wish I wasn't the only person doing it. Sharing it, having a week off every so often, would be good. Tony(talk)02:35, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
It does seem like a lot of work ... you could also do the last two weeks of FAs one week, and two weeks of the other featured content the next week. I wish I could help, but I'm covering all the copyediting for MILHIST's A-class review, and we've got a surge of submissions. - Dank (push to talk) 02:54, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
Hi Tony, ended up here after looking at an AN thread and happened to see this comment. I don't mind giving it a go (with a little guidance) if you ever want a hand. I should be around a lot more than usual, at least for the next few weeks, so let me know. Trebor (talk) 01:26, 28 December 2010 (UTC)
We have reached the end of the year, and what a year it has been! The Guild of Copy Editors was full of activity, and we achieved numerous important milestones in 2010. Read all about these in the Guild's 2010 Year-End Report.
Highlights
Membership grows to 503 editors
2,589 articles removed through four Backlog elimination drives
Thank you very much for working with me in 2010 to make the encyclopedia a better place. Regardless of any disagreements we may have had, I want to wish you all the very best for 2011. I look forward to working with you, and I hope for health and happiness to you and your family in the year to come. I therefore send you this glass of the cratur, so you can celebrate, whether it is Hogmanay or New Year's Day where you are. Warmest regards, --John (talk) 04:58, 1 January 2011 (UTC)
Excellent work on the guide, Tony1. I don't know when you wrote it, but it's easy to read, and it addresses pressing areas of editing. I was just reading through some of it and thought what a great guide it is. Kudos. fdsTalk00:12, 2 January 2011 (UTC)
Thank you. I haven't been there for ages, so it's probably a tiny bit out of date now. I must check the page-hit numbers. Tony(talk)00:21, 2 January 2011 (UTC)
Re:Congrats on your featured-sound choice of the year
I got lucky on the album really; they're the only sounds I've requested. I've done a fair amount of picture requesting (and I've dealt with a good few through OTRS, too). If you're ever writing something about that, I'd be happy to offer some thoughts. J Milburn (talk) 21:02, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
Errr ... that was done after my edit, by an IP. Please do not make haughty accusations without checking your own diffs. What you point to, anyway (Star City -> Start Cityv) would be a highly unusual fault in a script, anyway. Tony(talk)09:11, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
This is the diff. I have been unable to reproduce the change in the url when running the script, and therefore suspect the reference link was altered due to manual keystroke error. As to "visible text was deleted without being replaced", could you perhaps be more precise? If you are referring to the removal of 'Notable', I'd say that word is usually redundant in a section heading – such thing is taken as read. ;-) --Ohconfucius¡digame!09:22, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
Noise is the grainy effect you sometimes get on pictures- it's something I get a lot when I'm shooting in darker conditions. If you zoom in on the beak, you'll see it's a little grainy, but it's by no means terrible. Take a look at this picture for an idea of noise- see the way the light around the the top of the image is not a smooth circle, but somewhat speckled? This shot is also very noisey- zoom in on his left eye. Cloning something out is a process whereby you remove a feature from an image by "cloning" the area around it. It's something you see at Commons FPC more than here, as people generally react badly to it here. However, one recent example would be this, in which grass from the first image was "cloned" out of the second image. However, it was the first image which passed (though it is no longer in use, sadly). J Milburn (talk) 12:25, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
J Milburn, thank you for such good explanations. F and A has taught me, at least, to be a little more analytical about images. Thanks, Kingpin. I remember the WikiProject Report on that at The Signpost a few months ago. Tony(talk)13:33, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
Ah, thanks—I wish I'd known about these before. I've bookmarked them and am reading through them. Now all we need to do is teach editors how to optimise the size and location of images within articles on average for the range of readers' settings. Tony(talk)02:09, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
Are books challenged in Australia?
In puttering here and there, I'm now trying to resolve dumped templates in articles where I find them. Where an editor placed a template or tag in an article and I'm sure, supremely pleased with such an action, never attempted to resolve it. In Challenge (literature) a globalize template was placed on the article. Is there a term for parents or other organizations attempting to remove books from libraries or classrooms? Is there a group, like the American Library Association, that keeps track of these protests in Australia? Same question to Malleus re UK. --Moni3 (talk) 15:55, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
"You should link the Mississippi River"
What a drag to hear the Big Muddy called out for blueing (and similar, like states...sometimes in sentences where it almost forces me to put blue-linked items next to each other since I discuss a geo-distribution) after a conscious effort was put into reducing low value "blue speed bumps" and reserving them for things reader will enjoy going to, like supercooling in the context of blood, or mitochondria, a word that I need to use but which would be extremely difficult and distracting to explain within text (otherwise I would, explain it in text). :( TCO (talk) 19:35, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
I guess you could pipe the Mississippi River instead. Yep. Hm. Well. Wonder what diameter pipe that would take?--Wehwalt (talk) 20:13, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
Blue speed bumps: I like that. The problem is that some people are more sensitive to the psychology of reading text, while others don't quite see how the disruption of link markers might need to be balanced with their utility. Tony(talk)02:18, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
Now cove and catfish need wikilinks. And in an article where they are not key concepts but part of long discussions of examples of water habitat and examples of predators. TCO (talk) 21:27, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
Well, you might consider being a little more permissive with those words, although I might not link them myself; the real problems are in the many articles that still link piss-common words ("marriage", and "population density", and "city", in US town-articles is one current irritation). Tony(talk)00:02, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
It's not the individual word decision per se, it's dealing with people that have not seemed to consider the issue with sophistication. Plus I have enough blue ref bumps that I did to myself. :-( TCO (talk) 00:32, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
It's an issue that is close to some people's hearts, with an emotional component, it seems. Nevertheless, even the most hard-line editors, who would previously have encouraged indiscriminate linking (such as which we had without question until about three or four years ago) have acknowledged that there is overlinking; common geographical terms seems to be a sticking-point. What I don't understand is why some people prioritise the visual disruption and the dilutionary effect so low in the balance when they decide whether to link, and why the public's habit of clicking on links is so wildly overestimated. It's a mind-set born of the dream of interlinking the whole web to the maximum, rather than giving the readers the beneifit of our judgement. Sensitivity is required, and sometimes it's better to just move on when only one pet article is at stake. We've had battleground mentalities before, which do no one any good. Tony(talk)00:40, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
best way to handle pictures and refs
Thanks for pushing to make the small pics bigger (always surprised how small stuff is on this website, compared to the rest of the civilized world's picture practices on websites). Is 240 a minimum or a setting? One pic I'd like a little bigger is the trap picture as it is hard to see what the turtles are unless bigger (and can't crop and still keep trap in image).
On the refs, please advise on best action. I think we could clean up a lot by moving stuff to the end of the sentences. Yes, sometimes a ref applies to a particular clause or even word in the sentence, and since we have worked to write an integrated article, are many times with refs covering different aspects of a complex compound sentence, littered throughout. I think the "widdle blue bumps" slow down a lot more in middle than at end. I think at end, even a gross-looking mass of cites is not as bad as one at every comma. (I even had one after a dashed parenthetical at one point, but I later moved it to the end, just looked soooo distracting, really messed up the affectation of using the dash in the first place!) If we are trusted in our research, we could just move intra-sentence refs to the ends. Obviously a reader who wants to go to the sources has to look at a few more to resolve the one that addresses his problem, but I imagine there are a lot less readers pulling sources than reading the article text itself. Also, the sort of reader who pulls sources is the sort who can resolve which source addresses what. Plus since we have the titles of the papers and such (iow more info than a typical clipped "science mag" style reference) it is usually pretty easy to tell what ref is for what. That said, we are going to end up with more "more than 3 in a row" ref mashes, so will need to make more little ref bundles (which could be good result, I donno). And then the question comes up, do we just show the ref "bundle" or call out which ref addresses what (in which we have to start to repeat the sentence itself, although perhaps we could be more clipped. If we just make true "ref bundles", then we have to change the order also (that whole refs in numeric order thing) so we lose the "sentence support order". Also if we do this sentences ref bundling, we need to be on our toes about some of the refs that "stretch" over a paragraph or multiple sentences and not bundle some of those. Finally, it's a fair amount of work (but could make article more pleasant, agreed, no sweat), so I want to really get support and think through best option for now and future (at a certain point I become concerned about sustainability in the anyone can edit environment, versus what I would do for final product) of article (not flop back and forth).TCO (talk) 15:40, 11 January 2011 (UTC) (belated sig)
Don't know who you are or what article you're referring to! 240px is often what I use, up from the default of 220px. There's no particular maximum or minimum, but bear in mind that it's usually best to bunch all of the image syntaxes at the top of a section: that way, the least damage is done by widening or narrowing the window width. "If we are trusted in our research, we could just move intra-sentence refs to the ends."—but sometimes it's useful to have the pin-point. Often that has to be balanced against redundancy and disruption to the smooth reading. Tony(talk)12:21, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
Hi Tony, I saw your name mentioned on Giano's guide to featured articles (which I thought was very useful) as a contact for reviewing articles that have been submitted as possible FA candidates. I've recently rewritten ZX81 with the intention of nominating it for the Wikipedia home page on 5 March this year, the 30th anniversary of the ZX81's launch. You can see the featured article nomination at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/ZX81/archive1. Would it be possible for you to have a read through the article and let me have any comments? Prioryman (talk) 21:07, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
Hi Tony - Don't know if you have any time/interest for FAR reviews at this point, but there are some that could use your eagle eye if you were so inclined:
Hi Tony... As you are hopefully aware, I agreed to your request to pick the FA of the week for Signpost after you posted to my talk page. I have now found the draft F and A page which lists the FAs promoted this week. Failing advice to the contrary, I'll write a paragraph later tonight (Sydney time). I will be out until about 10 pm, but will get to it after that. Apologies that I didn't get to this earlier, but I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do. Once I have a draft, do I post it here or direct to the F and A page? Thanks. EdChem (talk) 06:49, 16 January 2011 (UTC)
Tony re "If you want a larger pool than the four aside from your own article" on my talk page... I don't have an article. I haven't had an article promoted to FA status yet. I haven't nominated an FL either, so I wonder if you have me confused with someone else. In any case, I have to run now - due at the theatre in less than an hour. Will post a choice when I get home. EdChem (talk) 07:37, 16 January 2011 (UTC)
Oops, was in a hurry and confused you with User:Ed!. No problem. The five this week, or add those at the other link into the pool if you wish, or do tomorrow if you get home late. Tomorrow evening would probably be OK, but not too late if possible. Tony(talk)12:43, 16 January 2011 (UTC)
It's ok. I have just reviewed the five from last week, partly because there is a stand-out in that group. If you want me to do a separate one for that older set from a couple of weeks ago I can - maybe for next week? EdChem (talk) 15:53, 16 January 2011 (UTC)
Thanks for bringing this to my attention, but ... three things. First, (manually) replacing the hyphen with a dash in that coord thing was redundant I now see, since it's not displayed, even though it should be a dash according to both MOSNUM and the ISO (luckily, I don't normally touch such coords ... I guess I just strayed upon it at that article ... the template should accommodate either symbol). Second, it still seems to go to New Mexico, not to Africa; can you be more explicit so I can see the issue? Third, there's actually a more serious error in that edit that I didn't pick up, and which I've now directed to User:GregU, the creator of the dash script. Thanks. Tony(talk) 07:18, 18 January 2011 (UTC) PS, but I don't get it: you've removed the whole geog. coordinate? Is there a new guideline we should know about? Tony(talk)07:21, 18 January 2011 (UTC)
It's true that {{Coord}} does not display minus signs; it uses directional initials like E and W instead. However, the minus sign affects the parameters passed to the toolserver, which are just as important as how the coordinates are formatted for display.
Template parameters (in the case of {{Coord}} at least) are code, and MOSNUM allows hyphens to be used in code, so I don't see any need to modify the template.
The coordinates displayed in the article were accurate, but if you followed the link to GeoHack on the toolserver you would've seen the longitude default to zero and the red dot appear in northern Algeria at zero degrees longitude.
If you could get the MOSNUM script fixed to recognize dashes as acceptable in Coord template parameters, I would be grateful for your help. —Stepheng3 (talk) 04:08, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
Thanks: does that mean I should remove coords? I guess you mean if they're announced elsewhere in the article. I think I might decide not to touch them and leave it to you guys. Tony(talk)05:32, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
I'd say that removing these duplicate coordinates is something that should be done, just as converting hyphens to dashes is something that should be done. However, just because you see something that should be done doesn't mean you have to do it. —Stepheng3 (talk) 20:46, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
Ah, I think he's been open for some time about the fact that he pops in only intermittently, since his RL workload is high. It's good that we have him at all, but we must be patient. Tony(talk)04:12, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
Thank you for your style guide. I read all text, and did all exercises. Then read ELOS. Over the last 3 months, I'm a better writer directly because of you. ;) Genjix (talk) 17:45, 21 January 2011 (UTC)
Hard disk platter
Hi, I didn't think there was any ambiguity. I can barely find any instances of that word hyphenated when doing a quick google search, and hard disk drive doesn't seem to be hyphenated either. Your thoughts? – Acdx (talk) 06:23, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
OK, that's worth taking into account; but which is it: is the non-expert who doesn't deal with this compound item every day meant to pair "hard disk" or "disk drive" in their mind? Experts often get into the habit of not hyphenating items that become part of their furniture. I am a complete ninny when it comes to this topic, but I am concerned to know how to parse the item. Or perhaps it could be either pair (in which case definitely no hyphen). Tony(talk)06:53, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
It should be interpreted as "drive with a hard disk". The common abbreviation "hard drive" sort of contradicts that, though. The term "hard disk platter" is actually redundant because hard disk itself refers to the platter. But that's what people commonly call it, and I think that's what the article should be called. My argument for not hyphenating it is pretty much the same.. You could bring it up on the hard disk drive talk page, though. – Acdx (talk) 10:16, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
The hyphenation of both, in that case, would make it easier for non-experts; it is supported by MOS:HYPHEN, although some leeway is given there. If I were creating the article, I'd certainly hyphenate it. I first thought it meant a disk drive that is hard. Tony(talk)11:55, 22 January 2011 (UTC)
FT at F&A
Hey. Just noting that while I didn't promote any featured topics this week, the Kentucky governors GT I mentioned earlier was promoted this week. I figure it's major enough to warrant a blurb if you'd like to write one or if you want me to. WizardmanOperation Big Bear23:12, 23 January 2011 (UTC)
I have just seen an edit summary of yours which claims that dashes are standard keyboard characters; this may be an unsuspected part of the DASH problem. What make of keyboard do you use and where did you get it?
The keyboard I'm using does not have either dash, just the hyphen and the underscore (on the same key, next to the one with 0 and the right paren). No keyboard I've ever seen has had either (and I've had to use a manual typewriter); that's why both are available on the Insert line at the bottom of the edit screen. SeptentrionalisPMAnderson04:02, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
Don't you have a Mac? Well, for us, it is a standard key. Mac keyboards are standard keyboards. If you have some different type of keyboard, you need to use the alt key (there's a code, I think). Tony(talk) 10:16, 30 January 2011\ (UTC)
We should not presume Macintoshese - any more than we presume American. Only a minority have Apples; most people don't need a machine which spends most of its memory and processing time on graphics. (Alt-hyphen changes page size; there may be some way to enter Unicode characters as a strong of digits, but that goes beyond a reasonable espectation of "keyboard character".) SeptentrionalisPMAnderson16:54, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
I miss the Mac keyboard shortcuts. If you have FF, you can install an extension like abcTajpu which you can customize. I have it set up so that -- [insert] produces an en dash, and --- [insert] an em dash, $$ > §, -> > →, -: > ÷, E > €, x > ×, 2 > ², etc. — kwami (talk) 17:29, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
Mac keyboards are standard, so classifying en dash keystrokes as somehow "special" just because they are not on some Windows keyboards is POV. Some other category needs to be found for this that avoids the implication that Windows keyboards are the only type of standard keyboard. Tony(talk)02:15, 31 January 2011 (UTC)
I use Windows now, and according to this, I have to type Alt 0150 to get an en dash, though it doesn't work. The only way I know to do it is to by typing out the html code, or using the list of special characters in the WP toolbox, which is a nuisance because you keep having to come out of the text to edit it. SlimVirginTALK|CONTRIBS02:33, 31 January 2011 (UTC)
I would love to know how this can work. I ask clients who have Windows to do it, and they say ... errr ... won't work. Is it a fiction, I wonder? Tony(talk)02:41, 31 January 2011 (UTC)
Dash#Electronic usage (permanent link here) says: "On Microsoft Windows, an en dash may be entered as Alt 0150 (where the digits are typed on the numeric keypad while holding down the Alt key)." (The present text has a dangling modifier.)
Re this edit, according to the InDesign style guide, it is incorrect to not use en dashes in compounded compounds, but they make no mention of en dashes in disjunction apart from numeric ranges. Other style guides are similar. It seems to me that the 'optional' should go in the previous section, not the one you restored it to. — kwami (talk) 07:49, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
Quite the reverse: en dashes to separate disjunct words, and "relationships" are supported by most of the authoritative style guides. An en dash for "pre-World-War-II" is possible, but not supported by most style guides. It is a quite recent innovation, I think. Another alternative is to rephrase it "X before World War II", with spaces alone. No one until now has suggested there is only one way of doing it. And their example of "second-rate–half-baked ideas" is a bit left-field for me. What is wrong with "second-rate half-baked ideas"? Perfectly clear and easy to read, isn't it? I'm certain a hyphen is not a dash, as "InDesign" asserts. Tony(talk)08:57, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
Yeah, I agree with you on 'second-rate half-baked ideas'. But although that example may be bad, the convention is not new. In Modern Punctuation (Oxford, 1919), they say,
The en dash in typographical work ... is used between dates or numbers, between names which are not single orthographic units, sometimes in compound words set in capitals. (p 231)
In [the phrase] the New York–Philadelphia mail printers commonly use not the hyphen but the en dash ... because one of the names is in two words (p 176)
So it would seem that convention has been around for quite a while. They don't mention the independent conjunction use as far as I can see, but the Atlantic Monthly guide (1921) does not mention the compounded compound convention. They only overlap on numeric ranges.
BTW, it would need to be "pre-World War II technology", because we don't normally hyphenate proper names. In that case it wouldn't be ambiguous, but in many cases it's difficult to parse the scope of a prefix if only hyphens are ever used. — kwami (talk) 10:38, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
Kwamikagam, you say "we don't normally hyphenate proper names"—I've not heard of that rule.
Is it the mail from York to Philadelphia?
"pre-World War II technology" is so clunky, if at all possible it should be avoided ... "technology developed before World War II" (or "available before"). The en dash is used by some publications in this role, but it is not widely accepted. For example, Scientific American started using it about six years ago, but not consistently between articles. It seems inappropriate not to add "optionally", since the en dash is only one of a few solutions. Tony(talk)10:48, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
Avoiding awkward usage is a matter of style, which is another matter. We're talking about how to punctuate assuming this is your wording. It's generally possible to just side-step the issue, but that isn't always convenient.
I've seen the proper-name thing in quite a few places. It's also apparent in the examples, which only hyphenate attributive common names, never NY or WWII. Here it is covered in the U Chicago manual, which also notes the all-caps convention for en dashes (both §167).
The mail may be from NY to Philly, but that wasn't the reason given. They (1919) also give the example the New York–Philadelphia trains but then give the Boston-Hartford express with a comma as a counter-example.
As for "optional", all uses of the en dash are optional. That was my point. The 1921 and 1919 guides only agree on numeric ranges; most modern, & perhaps overly simplified, guides I've seen (Webster's New World being an exception) do not mention independent conjunction. (Though my Webster's dictionary gives conjunction but omits double compounds.) What's really optional are the use of spaces in conjunction: some style guides specifically rule that out. — kwami (talk) 11:28, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
No, the use of en dashes is definitely not optional in some respects. The en dash issue has been thrashed out many times, and has involved reference to a lot more than just two or three sources (one from 1919), and from more than one variety of English, just as an aside. Is it the 15th edition of CMOS? It is not definitive for WP, only one source that might carry some weight, which needs to be balanced against others. So the all-caps example turns them into en or em dashes? This seems like a bizarre practice, and as I said, WP doesn't have all-caps normally. "assuming this is your wording" ... wording and stylistic aims are not isolated from each other; I do have a slight problem in providing "awkward" examples: it encourages people to use them. But still, there is no reason to force people to do it with an en dash plus spaces: just one option. If you want to argue for some rule about proper names, it probably needs to be done on the MoS talk page. Tony(talk)14:02, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
Not sure I followed that. En dashes, not em: hyphens tend to get lost in all-cap text, so it's a typographic alternate: WRITE IN ALL–CAPS vs WRITE IN ALL-CAPS. (True, not common here on WP, but not a problem to leave it in. Might come up occasionally.)
The use of the hyphen for an en dash is AFAIK always an option. It's a matter of typographic style, though I have no problem with making it policy here on WP (in fact, I would prefer that) even if it isn't always followed elsewhere.
The 1919 cite was to demonstrate these are not recent conventions. The compounded compound examples have been in nearly every source I've found, both Usonian and British, not just in two or three.
The rule about proper names is AFAIK universal: no-one hyphenates "New York" or "World War II" when used attributively. ("New-York-City school system"? "World-War-II memorial"? Doesn't happen: the capitalization is considered enough to link the elements together.) No, that wasn't the 15th, but the 15th has the same rule. §5.93: When a proper name begins a phrasal adjective [by which they mean an attributive phrase], the name is not hyphenated {the Monty Python school of comedy}. They've had that rule for 100 years now, probably longer. — kwami (talk) 15:38, 30 January 2011 (UTC)
I'm struggling with "When a proper name begins a phrasal adjective". "the" is the deictic, "Monty Python" is the classifier, "school of comedy" is the Head, and "of comedy" the range. All of these are rankshifted in what is, as a word string, a nominal group. So which bit is the phrasal adjective, in traditional grammars?
I agree that hyphenating proper nouns looks awkward and is unnecessary, since the initial caps already alert the reader to the conjoined elements. Tony(talk)02:06, 31 January 2011 (UTC)
Thank you! Your copy edits and suggestions helped Capitol Loop pass its FAC. Imzadi 1979 → 00:44, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
Happy Yuletides! 
