Wikipedia

Wikipedia:Simple talk/Archive 109

< Wikipedia:Simple talk

Bot needed

Wikipedia:List of Wikipedians by number of changes is no longer being updated. This is because the bot that used to do it, BOTijo, was run by emijrp, who has now retired. We need to find a replacement. (See also this discussion.) Thanks, Thrasymedes (talk) 18:40, 27 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't mind a new bot as I pretty much like such nice statistics. Maybe we can get de:User:Aka running his bot. The table on dewiki looks quite good, see Number of contributions there. -Barras talk 12:18, 30 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
On the English Wikipedia, MZMcBride maintains a bot for that task, we could also ask there to get his bot running over here. But maybe someone of our bot operators (Dj, Chenzw, BG7, ...) are interested in setting up a bot for this. -Barras talk 12:25, 30 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Tech News: 2014-01

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please inform other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent software changes

  • You can now see the text of DjVu and PDF files in search results on wikis testing the new search tool (CirrusSearch). [1] [2]
  • With the new version of the Wikibase DataModel extension, you can install it outside Wikimedia wikis. [3]

VisualEditor news

  • Images are now shown inside VisualEditor as HTML5 <figure /> elements. Comments are welcome. [4]
  • You can now test a basic version of VisualEditor on mobile devices; see this article as an example.

Problems

Future software changes

  • CirrusSearch will be added as the second search method for Spanish (es), French (fr), Portuguese (pt) and Russian (ru) wikis on December 30. Wikimedia Commons, Wikispecies and Wikinews users will also be able to enable it in their Beta Features options.
  • AbuseFilter log entries will be visible in CheckUser tool reports. [6] [7]
  • It will soon be possible to search for log entries done by users without an account. [8] [9]
  • It will no longer be possible to globally hide users with more than 1,000 edits. [10] [11]

Tech news prepared by tech ambassadors and posted by MediaWiki message delivery • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

08:48, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Tech News

I think the Tech News should have a page of its own. It has rather overwhelmed this page, and I notice editors are using this page much less these days. Our talk page (as it was) is essential to our wiki. Macdonald-ross (talk) 09:55, 30 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I rather wonder if someone here is actually interested in the news at all. If no one really reads that or wants it, we can unsubscribe that page, so we don't get the notice anymore. -Barras talk 12:15, 30 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I am in favour of unsubscribing this page from the weekly tech news. If editors are interested (in the news), I think they should go ahead to obtain a personal subscription. Chenzw  Talk  12:41, 30 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I went ahead and removed that page from the list I guess there is no need to clutter this page with Tech News which most of us don't even read. -Barras talk 13:45, 30 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

WikiProjects

Hello! I am not entirely sure this is the right place to be talking about this, so if it isn't, please delete my contribution, but if it is, delete this sentence maybe? Thank you!

So one of the biggest parts of the (English) Wikipedia community that I've seen is WikiProjects! Simple English Wikipedia is currently much smaller and less active than English Wikipedia. I think that if we began more WikiProjects and made them active that more people would want to contribute to and help the Simple English Wikipedia! We have only 1/400 of the pages of the English Wikipedia, and if we want to expand our wiki more quickly, we probably need a bit more help.

Some suggested WikiProjects:

and any more that might be wanted/needed!

Thank you for reading! Thesixthstaff (talk) 02:13, 1 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

By choice, we do not do official WikiProjects here. We do have some in userspace, though. You might look at Category:WikiProjects -- some of your suggested ones probably already exist in some form. Usually they don't stay active very long, because we just don't have enough editors. Starting these projects has never brought us more editors in the past, but you can try. If you decide to try starting one or reactivating one that already exists, you can mention it on this page, but once you have your members, all work should be done in your userspace. Good luck! --Auntof6 (talk) 03:21, 1 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Category:Words

Hi all. I made a query about the scope of this category a while ago – on the category's talk page. I thought I'd go ahead with what I thought was best, but I'm wondering whether anybody has any comments or thoughts before I do. Osiris (talk) 18:30, 2 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Vikidia, a wiki encyclopedia for 8-13 years old children to open in english

Hi there,

Vikidia is a wiki encyclopedia for 8-13 years old children. I let a message there in December 2011 about Vikidia and the m:Wikikids proposal: Wikipedia:Simple talk/Archive 96#WikiKids - Vikidia.

Vikidia in French works quite well, with about 15700 articles, substantial growth in visits and quite a lot of messages of (young) readers on the guestbook say that they appreciate it.

Since 2011, I worked again on this proposal (see the subpages), however, as we decided recently, Vikidia will no longer endorse the proposal and I'm glad to announce that we will instead open a Vikidia in English.

I would explain this decision if required, anyhow, feel free to comment, you may read the Wikikids pages for the intentions and relevance of such a project, you may visit the draft wiki and even create your account there. It's not fully open yet, you have to enter the ID vikidia and password aidikiv. I hope you will like the project, right now we are discussing to which extend we may reuse some content from SEWP and Wikijunior. Thanks! Astirmays (talk) 19:03, 3 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Can Somebody Teach Me about Archive Box Uses

I wanna know exactly how I could use archive boxes. I have just archived my second edition of my own talk page on Nov 30, and I performed my first archive seventeen months before that. Also, I would like the archives semi-protected indefinitely so out-logged users cannot perform vandalism over those pages and only I and certain Simple English Wikipedia changers can edit it when necessary.

Angela Maureen 23:01, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

The only way to get a page semi-protected is by requesting an admin to protect it. But there is a bot out there that will atleast keep your archives up to date without your direct intervention see Miszabot. Also there is some information at Template:Archive box that may help with some of your questions, or you can find some help here Help:Archiving a talk page. Hopefully this helps. Enfcer (talk) 23:12, 4 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Categories : Preview

I noticed that when previewing a page, you cannot see the category. I was recently trying to add a category label on a page I created, but could not see if I correctly added it, resulting in multiple attempts. Is it worth the time for someone to implement this ability? Thanks Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 16:27, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

When you've open the preview of a page you edited, you will find the categories at the very bottom of the page. -Barras talk 17:54, 6 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Welcoming committee

There is a fairly new WikiProject called The Welcoming Committee Thanks.--Mr Wiki Pro (talk) 19:23, 14 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Request for comment on Commons: Should Wikimedia support MP4 video?

I apologize for this message being only in English. Please translate it if needed to help your community.

The Wikimedia Foundation's multimedia team seeks community guidance on a proposal to support the MP4 video format. This digital video standard is used widely around the world to record, edit and watch videos on mobile phones, desktop computers and home video devices. It is also known as H.264/MPEG-4 or AVC.

Supporting the MP4 format would make it much easier for our users to view and contribute video on Wikipedia and Wikimedia projects -- and video files could be offered in dual formats on our sites, so we could continue to support current open formats (WebM and Ogg Theora).

However, MP4 is a patent-encumbered format, and using a proprietary format would be a departure from our current practice of only supporting open formats on our sites -- even though the licenses appear to have acceptable legal terms, with only a small fee required.

We would appreciate your guidance on whether or not to support MP4. Our Request for Comments presents views both in favor and against MP4 support, based on opinions we’ve heard in our discussions with community and team members.

Please join this RfC -- and share your advice.

All users are welcome to participate, whether you are active on Commons, Wikipedia, other Wikimedia project -- or any site that uses content from our free media repository.

You are also welcome to join tomorrow's Office hours chat on IRC, this Thursday, January 16, at 19:00 UTC, if you would like to discuss this project with our team and other community members.

We look forward to a constructive discussion with you, so we can make a more informed decision together on this important topic. Keegan (WMF) (talk) 06:46, 16 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Calling all weather/hurricane/tropical cyclone/etc. experts

Would anyone interested or knowledgeable in tropical cyclones/hurricanes please take a look at Category:Tropical cyclones by strength, then go to the category's talk page and reply to my question there? Thanks. --Auntof6 (talk) 04:13, 19 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Cleaning up the WikiProject area

I'd like to see the WikiProject area tidied up, and I've made some suggestions at Category talk:WikiProjects. Your comments are invited. --Auntof6 (talk) 07:33, 21 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I won't be around to set this up as I was hoping to, but if anyone else wants to take over User:Only/Featured February, please do! Would be a good idea to get some English Wikipedia featured articles over here to Simple. Only (talk) 20:58, 26 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Review of Purplebackpack89's community ban

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Unblock declined - This discussion shows clearly that the community is against the unblock of Purplebackpack89 (talk · contribs) at this point in time. The block may be appealed again at earliest in one year from now, means not before 30 January 2015. All other possible unblock requests within the next year should be declined based on this discussion and made decision. -Barras talk 15:43, 30 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Purplebackpack89 has once again requested that we consider removing his community ban. For those unfamiliar, the original ban discussion can be found here. -Mh7kJ (talk) 16:35, 23 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I was about to outright decline it when you edit conflicted with me. The last time it was discussed by the community there was concern he didn't understand why he was blocked. He has still not acknowledged the problem. As such I see no reason to even really discuss it. But since it is posted here now I oppose it. -DJSasso (talk) 16:38, 23 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

What did User:Purplebackpack98 do?-Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 16:48, 23 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Read the link to the first discussion to find out. -DJSasso (talk) 16:49, 23 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Response to Djsasso and Osiris

(copied from his talk page)

I believe that people should only be indeffed for vandalism and sockpuppetry. I've done neither. Just because I don't think the same way as some of the other people here doesn't mean I should be indeffed. The only reason I was indeffed is because other editors don't like me, not because I made bad contributions. Quite the contrary: you'd see that I have created hundreds of badly-needed articles. Any claim by Djsasso or Osiris that I am a net negative is patently false, and so inaccurate as to border on a personal attack. If Djsasso or Osiris think the Wikipedia is better without me, they apparently value community space ahead of article space, which is clearly worse off by me not being here. And the reason I consider this Wikipedia a joke is because this completely bullshit block was instituted in the first place. I reiterate: two and a half years is too long a block unless vandalism or sock-puppetry is involved. Furthermore, if a block is determined to be of sufficient length, groveling need not be a prerequisite for it to be overturned. Purplebackpack89≈≈≈≈ 00:34, 24 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I don't value project space over article space. I value multiple editors over a single editor. There were a number of editors you scared away from the project with your combative nature. The more you argue with people the less time they have to actually improve the wiki. Vandalism and sock-puppetry are not the only things that damage article space. This wiki has functioned considerably better with you gone than it did with you here. -DJSasso (talk) 13:32, 24 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
You can believe what you want to believe. I believe I am Batman, does that make me so? Just because you believe people should only be indeffed for vandalism and sockpuppetry doesn't make it so. The community has said you were a disruptive influence in the past, and the way this discussion is currently going then they believe you are going to be disruptive in the future if you are unblocked. Take it from me, people remember being called jokes, and would much rather hear that you realise what you've done to annoy people and how you're going to change. If you had done so, I would have supported an unblock. Currently though, no. Kennedy (talk) 09:31, 25 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not change it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No more changes should be made to this discussion.


Changing Passwords.

Recently, I ran into a very big problem revolving someone I know using my account. If somebody could please let me know how I can change my password, I would be very thankful. -Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 22:52, 27 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Just visit Special:ChangePassword and follow the instructions. Vogone (talk) 22:57, 27 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I think I saw the edit your talking about and I was tempted to leave a not on your talk page.--Mr Wiki Pro (talk) 23:00, 27 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I too was tempted (and started) to write a note on my talk page asking people not too, and that I would take care of the situation. Anyway, thank you very much. Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 23:03, 27 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Alright. My sincere apologies to everyone on Wikipedia for this mishap, it won't happen again. (Luckily I caught it fast enough that only one edit was made. _Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 23:07, 27 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Is this the edit in question? Only (talk) 00:52, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Yes that was the edit. Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 01:28, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I find it quite peculiar that you were able to detect and revert someone else on your account within 7 seconds of the edit. Do you have an explanation for that? Only (talk) 01:34, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. If you must know, I was almost at my computer as the edit was made by my sibling. I was taking the computer away as held onto it and posted the intolerable edit. As soon as I got the computer, I used Rollback to revert the edit. (Many thanks to Rollback.) -Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 01:38, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not buying this in any way. Only (talk) 01:41, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
And, on top of that, it's not your password that's the issue here. Your sibling didn't need your password presumably. They just needed access to your computer. But, again, I'm not buying that you were able to wrestle the computer away and make the rollback within 7 seconds. And taht your sibling just happened to know enough about Wikipedia editing to be able to go to a talk page archive and post a Category. See also en:Wikipedia:My little brother did it. Only (talk) 01:46, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Echo OsirisOnly, I'm almost tempted to stick a Template:uw-selfrevert on your talkpage... Kennedy (talk) 09:03, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Psst...I'm Only, not Osiris :) Only (talk) 10:58, 28 January 2014 (UTC) [reply]
Damn! Your usernames are relatively similar at a glance and I read it wrong. Sorry hehe! :) Kennedy (talk) 12:43, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, when I saw the first comment, I thought it was from Osiris. I guess I need to train my eyes to see differently. _Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 16:34, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
You appear to have used a similar excuse before Kennedy (talk) 17:46, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I do not see how they resemble. Anyway, wether or not you believe me, is up to you. What has happened has happened. I cannot change that. My Rollback rights have been removed, and nobody trusts me anymore. Is there anything that you wish to add? Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 18:12, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I was willing to give benefit of the doubt but seeing as how you used the exact same excuse and that time blaming a friends son? No I don't buy it now. -DJSasso (talk) 19:03, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I am not blaming a friend. Please tell me where I said that I was blaming a friend or friend's son. I said that I was blaming someone I know. If you must know, I was referencing to one of my brothers, but I know that if I said that straight out, that people would immediately think of en.My brother did it.Pending(tell me I screwed up and where) 19:14, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I'm assuming that Djsasso is referring to [12] (see sockpuppetry), because your en account was blocked as a sockpuppet of Here2HelpWiki. Thesixthstaff (talk) 19:27, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
As he mentions I am referring to the edit linked to above by Kennedy where you blaimed that incident on a friend's son and this time you are blaiming it on your brother. -DJSasso (talk) 19:54, 28 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Search Finder Update

I understand that search Finders take a while to process new pages, but I was wondering about how long?Pending(tell me I screwed up and where)

WikiProject: Reformed Vandals

There is a New WikiProject here. Thanks--PendingTell me I screwed up!

WikiProject: Copy Editors

There is Finally a Copy Editing WikiProject here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pending (talk • contribs)

User:Message From Xenu/twinkletag.js

This page is showing up in the stubs category. Can someone fix it? 64.6.124.31 (talk) 16:53, 30 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

That's not the only category that page shouldn't be in [13]. I think this can be fixed with nowiki tags since those templates are transcluded onto the script. --Glaisher [talk] 17:07, 30 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Can't we just blank that section? I know it's somebody's personal JavaScript, but it's been sitting in those maintenance categories for years. I doubt the script even works anymore and tagging has been a feature of the main Twinkle script for a while. Plus the editor hasn't been active in three and a half years. But if anybody can disable it, please do or let a sysop know exactly how to.. I'm not good with JavaScript. Would backslashes work? Osiris (talk) 02:19, 31 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]
They probably would work, yes. Another way would be to change "{{stub}}" into "{{" + "stub}}". Either should work. PiRSquared17 (talk) 01:06, 7 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Pi! Wasn't sure if I'd screwed it up. Wouldn't want to incur the wrath of Xenu... Osiris (talk) 01:12, 7 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Why are roots not found underground

If you know it,please leave a comment.Please leave the comment by next tuesday {11/2/2014} Thank You. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.255.1.138 (talk • contribs)


Should we remove nonsense comments like this or just ignore them?--Mr Wiki Pro (talk) 17:11, 4 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Ignore, they'll never come back. And if they do; we don't do your homework for you Kennedy (talk) 19:39, 4 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Ok thanks for the advice. Just out of interest do these nonsense comments appear often?--Mr Wiki Pro (talk) 19:58, 4 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

New feature "Getting Started"

Hi everyone,

This is an extra announcement that today we released a new feature, called "Getting Started", which provides all newly-registered editors with suggestions of what to edit and how to do so. You can learn more at the English Wikipedia guide to the feature, a version of which should be created here too probably. Unless you're registering a new account you will not notice this feature, though it does apply an edit tag to identify which edits come from suggested pages. Thanks, and do let me know if you have any questions. This was also mentioned in Tech News. Steven (WMF) (talk) 19:15, 11 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

DYK stale

Hi everybody. Did you know could use some attention, if anybody has the time to spare. It's basically become TDKR Chicago 101, who is very diligent with nominating hooks, and myself, reviewing them. It would be good to get some variety and different opinions in there every now and then. Osiris (talk) 21:04, 11 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Help

Hello, I've tried installing an anti-vandal bot but I don't think it's working right now. You'll find the appropriate edits in my contribs. I put up a /run and a /source page but it doesn't seem to have worked. Do you have any tips that I should use? Thanks, Cotevertu (talk) 15:13, 13 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I am sorry, do you mean you are trying to use an anti-vandal bot here? If so I would suggest you not, as we already have an anti-vandal bot that runs here. And in order to run a bot you have to be approved. Only very knowledgeable editors are able to run them, and your question suggest you might not be and your recent vandalism would also likely cause a rejection of an application to run one. -DJSasso (talk) 15:29, 13 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I understand that there are certain users that can allow bot script, but what pages do these users use for their bots? Cotevertu (talk) 15:32, 13 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
They don't use pages, they run computer programs that they write from their computers. -DJSasso (talk) 15:36, 13 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, so it runs from their own computer? As opposed to a page on wikipedia? — This unsigned comment was added by Cotevertu (talk • changes).
Yes, that is correct. -DJSasso (talk) 15:39, 13 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
If you just want to help revert vandalism, I recommend installing Twinkle. As stated above, we already have an anti-vandal bot: User:GoblinBot4. PiRSquared17 (talk) 18:07, 14 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

template help

Hello! Ran into an issue on the year articles and I'm not sure how to fix it. The years after 1 can use Template:Year in other calendars. If the template is put on BC years there are massive Expression Error issues. It appears others have used Template:BC year in topic which includes the calendar box. Problem is the red links in the topics box to pages that would likely be redirects. So, can anyone make Template:Year in other calendars work for the BC articles? Or is there another solution? Thanks! --Tbennert (talk) 03:22, 16 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Template:BC year in topic calls Template:Year in other calendars anyway, so to make it work directly you just have to consider the expression used by the template to call the other template. Since there is no year zero, each year BC is the number of the year minus 1. So:
  • On 1 BC it would be {{Year in other calendars|year=0|BC}}
  • On 2 BC it would be {{Year in other calendars|year=-1|BC}}
Probably a less confusing idea would be to add a parameter to the template that allows you to hide the topic box. Or, if articles needing the topic box are a minority, make it so that it's left off by default. Would that be okay? Osiris (talk) 04:30, 16 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The examples you posted work perfectly so I'll use that solution. Thanks for the help! Template issues cause unreasonable panic for me. I'm so glad there are folks like you who can work out the kinks. Thanks again! --Tbennert (talk) 03:42, 17 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Taxobox colouring

This is really not important, but I thought I'd tread lightly and ask first in case anybody else is interested.

I've noticed that our taxoboxes are quite inconsistent with their background colours. The standard colours are given at Template:Taxobox#Color. They're added through Template:Taxobox colour. However, about 300 articles or so are specifying different colours. There are a heap of animal articles using lightblue which in the template is the standard colour for fungi. Another heap of animal articles are using lightgreen which is the standard for plants.

And then there are just a whole lot of random colours here and there. Most of them are probably from people playing around – fluro red and blah blah blah were among those that I replaced – so I've been removing the really dark colours where you can hardly see the words. But there are others where it looks like it was an aesthetic choice: green in the article on reptiles, for example.

The standard colours can be easily changed through the template, but using the template instead of the parameters is very beneficial. I think we want some semblance of a system, if only to prevent people fiddling around and making silly choices that go unseen. But are there any reasons for not using the template on every article? Osiris (talk) 16:10, 4 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

With respect to living things there are various considerations. One is that our present standard colours are often far too obtrusive. Compare our pink animals with the English wiki colour (it's a number). The content of the box is primary, the colour should not obtrude. I use light blue for extinct animals mainly because I think the distinction between living and extinct animals is well worth making visually. Several of the colours for other living things could be changed to less vivid colours. Virus is fuscia; bacteria is a light pink; Archaea is an even lighter pink.
I am probably the only editor who writes content across the whole range of biology, and the reason I have not raised this issue is the same as I have mentioned before with respect to other issues. Experience shows that these discussions often lead nowhere and take up a lot of time. The only things I would think are really important is to change pink for living animals to the now standard En wiki colour, and to keep a distinction with extinct species. One has to remember that there are millions of living species, and even on our wiki the number of pages for living animals far outweighs the number of pages for all other living things. Therefore it is the organisation of templates on the living animals which is the priority.
There is another issue with the En wiki change to automatic taxoboxes. One advantage of the old manual system (which we use) is that one can take out levels of the taxonomy that are not critical for the particular page one is editing. In that way one can simplify the often far too detailed information on the En wiki version. I would say more about this, but we should probably discuss it separately and later. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:56, 7 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah great, we can easily change the colour from pink. That's why using the template to do our colouring is the easiest way to go. The colours enwiki uses are all quite mild and I might suggest that we just change them all over to match theirs. Although I do think the violet colour used for viruses is quite glaring and the contrast with the blue text is difficult. Perhaps we can tone that down to plum instead of violet.
That explains why there are so many light blue boxes on non-fungus articles. If we're going to distinguish fungus and extinct species one of them is going to have to be changed. But distinguishing extinct species is adding another layer. It's doable, but I think it's best to also try and retain the original distinctions (by kingdom or domain) ...so that extinct animals and extinct plants are not the same colour. A whiter shading of the original colour for extinct species might be the best option. This is assuming it's technically possible through the template without too much fiddling around. Osiris (talk) 23:07, 7 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The English wiki colours are here: [14]. I think they are a great improvement on their previous set. Yes, we could use their colours, with slight adjustments. We should probably tone down colours for Viruses (definitely), Fungi, Archaeplastida (that's our Plants!), and Chromalveolata. By tone down I mean less bright hue, but same colour. I think the Animals colour in the table is deeper that the colour in their taxoboxes: see Asian Golden Cat example below the table. We should use the lighter version of that colour.
I would still like to keep a separate colour for extinct species of animals. One way would be to use the "incertae sedis" colour (we don't use incertae sedis taxoboxes at all) for extincts and light blue (lighter than our present) for Fungi. The incertae sedis colour ("linen") is close enough to the new Animal colour so that readers will not be shocked... Anyway, that's a secondary issue. Macdonald-ross (talk) 09:37, 8 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Okay. Leaving the colours for extinct species for the moment, are these okay? Comparison might make it easier. Osiris (talk) 10:04, 9 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Ours En New Extinct
Animalia: pink / rbg(255,192,203) Animalia: rgb(211,211,164) Animalia: rgb(211,211,164) Animalia: rgb(220,220,183)
Plantae: lightgreen / rgb(144,238,144) Archaeplastida: lightgreen / rgb(144,238,144) Plantae: rgb(189,245,189) Plantae: rgb(211,248,211)
Fungi: lightblue / rgb(173,216,230) Fungi: lightblue / rgb(173,216,230) Fungi: rgb(192,224,236) Fungi: rgb(212,234,242)
Chromalveolata: salmon / rbg(250,128,114) Chromalveolata: rgb(173,238,63) Chromalveolata: rgb(204,244,133) Chromalveolata: rgb(213,246,157)
N/A Rhizaria: rgb(225,204,252) as protists
Protist: khaki / rgb(240,230,140) Excavata: khaki / rgb(240,230,140) Protist: khaki / rgb(240,230,140) Protist: rgb(243,235,165)
N/A Amoebozoa: rgb(255,200,160) as protists
Bacteria: lightgrey / rbg(211,211,211) Bacteria: lightgrey / rbg(211,211,211) Bacteria: lightgrey / rbg(211,211,211) Bacteria: rbg(224,224,224)
Archaea: darkgrey / rbg(169,169,169) Archaea: rgb(236,210,210) Archaea: rgb(236,210,210) Archaea: rgb(243,226,226)
Viruses: violet / rgb(238,130,238) Viruses: violet / rgb(238,130,238) Viruses: plum / rbg(221,160,221) Viruses: rbg(228,180,228)
N/A incertae sedis: linen / rgb(250,240,230) N/A
I could accept all the colours suggested in the last column as sufficiently laid back as to not interfere with reading. Thank you for taking such trouble. Macdonald-ross (talk) 13:36, 9 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the animalia colour should be a bit lighter, as mentioned. Macdonald-ross (talk) 18:20, 9 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I've changed them over, but have a look. I thought you might like to check out the original animal colour as it looks in the taxoboxes first, because you mentioned above that in the documentation example it looked lighter anyway. If it's still looks too dark, I can lighten it. I'm getting a bit of a glitch on the bacteria pages at the moment, but I'm looking into it. If you notice any others let me know. Osiris (talk) 20:00, 9 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The new system is everywhere an improvement, IMO. Thank you. Macdonald-ross (talk) 06:40, 12 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Personally I prefer the proposed changes as well.  Hazard SJ  03:02, 18 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

About extinct species: I'm finding it difficult to lighten the shading enough that it would be noticeable. When you put them next to each other, the difference is noticeable, but when viewing articles one at a time I really don't think it will be. If anyone wants to have a try, please do. I'd like to get all the boxes using the template one way or the other. Osiris (talk) 10:57, 18 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Could you give me a link to the examples? I'm not sure where to look. Macdonald-ross (talk) 13:08, 18 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I just added the colours to the table above. You can also try it out on an extinct animal's article using {{Taxobox/sandbox}} instead of {{Taxobox}}. Osiris (talk) 13:11, 18 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Amendment to the Terms of Use

Hello all,

Please join a discussion about a proposed amendment to the Wikimedia Terms of Use regarding undisclosed paid editing and we encourage you to voice your thoughts there. Please translate this statement if you can, and we welcome you to translate the proposed amendment and introduction. Please see the discussion on Meta Wiki for more information. Thank you! Slaporte (WMF) 22:00, 21 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Simplified Medical Articles

A while ago we had a try at generating simple English articles for key medical topics. Previously the articles we creating were way too long and the content was too complicated. We are having another go at creating simplified articles that are more in the 3 to 4 paragraph range. We are going to be using them as base article for translations into smaller languages of Wikipedia. An example of such an article is here Leishmaniasis. Not sure if this is something that this community would be happy to have on Simple English Wikipedia? And if there are people who would be interested in simplifying this content further? We have a bunch more simplified versions of medical article but are currently keeping them in a work area on English Wikipedia here [15] and here [16] as we are unsure if there is interest. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:00, 18 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I think these would be good to have, and I'd be interested in helping simplify them further. I'll do some simplifying on Leishmaniasis later when I'm on my main PC. --Auntof6 (talk) 20:27, 18 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Great we would love to have you join our efforts. We currently have two tracks within the project, a full article track (for translation into the big languages) and the simplified track (for translation into the smaller languages). You can read more about the project here [17] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 21:09, 18 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I did some simplifying, which brought the grade level down from 13 to 11. We like to aim for grade 8, but this article is going to have some complex words such as the drug names, etc. --Auntof6 (talk) 21:59, 18 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I view the new project with some trepidation based on previous experiences. I suggest the articles need to be edited for a more general readership, rather than for medical students, practitioners and professionals. Readers who need more details know where to get it. In particular, all the treatment sections need simplification here. I hope the new initiative does well, I really do... Macdonald-ross (talk) 09:26, 19 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Some of the changes to the simple English version of Leishmaniasis are excellent and I am combining them into the main EN version. Agree that our last attempts were a failure. Also agree that we may not be able to find a version which is both sufficiently simple for Simple En and sufficiently broad for translation. Plan to continue working in a work space on main En. For example it matter that there are two types of African trypanosomiasis for translation as the treatments for one does not work for the other. Not sure if Simple En wants this sort of detail. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:17, 19 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I added some information to the Leishmaniasis article: As I understand, Leishmaniasis is also common in other mammals: This piece of information may be important, because these animals act as vectors. Secondly, I added information about the lifecycle of the parasite. These additions probably need looking over for simplicity; they also introduce very specific red-links. As I understand, one way to fight the disease is by disrupting the life-cycle of the parasite. This means that any translation of a disease spread by a parasite should include a short section about the life-cycle of the parasite. Other than that, I am in favor of getting a set of medically accurate articles that may act as a base for translation. --Eptalon (talk) 10:15, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Requirements for notability (biographies)

Editors putting up biographies to this wiki should keep to the standards for notability. This applies to experienced editors as well as unregistered visitors. Here's where the guidelines are: Wikipedia:Notability (people). Note that "having an article on English wiki" is not a criterion for notability. Macdonald-ross (talk) 13:08, 22 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The notability criteria appear to be the same for Simple as they are for en. In that case, if a person/subject is notable enough for an article on one, they're notable enough for the other. En articles have had good Simple versions of them deleted on the basis of them being insufficiently notable for Simple. If Simple has a higher threshold for notability, please specify that difference. Jim Michael (talk) 15:04, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Some articles on En wiki do not meet their own criteria, and therefore do not meet ours. Furthermore, we have never agreed to accept publication on En wiki as a criterion for Simple. Macdonald-ross (talk) 16:59, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
If they don't meet En's criteria, they should be deleted from there. There have been good articles deleted from here that have previously survived deletion nominations on En. If there are differences in notability requirements, they should be stated. Good articles have been deleted from here on the basis that they are 'not something that Simple needs'. Jim Michael (talk) 23:24, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
You are not addressing the issue: we make our decisions, based on our consensus, and we are not bound by what En wiki does to their equivalent pages. Remarks about pages other than "delete" often refer to the options of redirect or rewrite. If you feel we have made a mistake on a former page, you can re-propose it. Macdonald-ross (talk) 12:37, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
You both are correct, we aren't forced to have what they have, that being said our notability requirements are identical to theirs now. They used to be different and we purposefully changed them so that if it was notable and valid for an article on en then it was valid for an article here. That being said if it never went through a Afd or something like that on en then we don't know that it meets the notability standards yet. -DJSasso (talk) 13:41, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Problem with an editor

I asked a question regarding the Olympics articles here: [[18]] and I'm having a problem with one of your editors. How do I deal with this, since I'd appreciate a straight answer to the question rather than the sophomoric responses that I've been receiving. — This unsigned comment was added by 24.212.139.102 (talk • changes).

I understand your annoyance, but this is the wrong wiki! You need to be on English wiki to ask your question. Macdonald-ross (talk) 09:08, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Could you please point me to the correct page within en.wiki to do this? Thanks! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.212.139.102 (talk • contribs)
You should go to this page. --Mr Wiki Pro (talk) 19:17, 25 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Grazie! — This unsigned comment was added by 24.212.139.102 (talk • changes).

Autosexuality

This article has been tagged for transfer to the Wiktionary for a few months now. Should it be deleted now?

It isn't in Simple English Wiktionary yet. Once it is, you could make a request for deletion. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:14, 25 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Definition of personal categories

Why do we have categories like "Americans of German descent" where as we also have categories like Italian-British? What is the definition of these formats, especially the latter? What do we do with people who live their entire life in one country, but whose parents come from another? What do we do with people who were born in another country but live their whole lives from an early age in another country? See the categorisations of Albert Einstein, Eduardo Paolozzi and many others. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:07, 21 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I really dislike these categories. I think they're a mix of 1) native-born citizens with ancestry from other places and 2) people who were born with one citizenship and either changed it or acquired dual citizenship. I don't think it's helpful to mix these, and yet a mix is what we have. If we trace any given person's ancestry back far enough, we're likely to find a dozen or more different countries where they had ancestors -- do we categorize them under all the ones we can find? I also don't think it's helpful to categorize something like "Americans of German descent" under "German people" -- they're American people, not German people.
I'd like to see these categories eliminated -- I think they're a level of detail we don't need. If not eliminated, I'd like to see them used only for people whose mixed ethnicity has something to do with why they're notable. --Auntof6 (talk) 10:46, 21 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
So, working towards a consensus, we might have no joint attributions of country except:
  1. legal changes of nationality: both may be listed in the infobox
  2. clear evidence that their work in both countries is critical to their notability
  3. otherwise, category to be where the notability was mainly attained
Example: Einstein would be in German nobel prizewinners (or physicists) and Paolozzi would be in British sculptors (or British artists). Macdonald-ross (talk) 11:33, 21 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
That doesn't sound quite right to me. I think the issue is nationality vs. descent. I definitely think we should keep nationality categories, which to me indicate citizenship. Descent (where your ancestors came from) is a cloudier issue. Where do we draw the line? As an example, look at en:Nia Vardalos. (Our article on her doesn't have all the details, so I've pointed to the enwiki article.) She started as a Canadian citizen in a family with Greek heritage, so you could call her a Greek-Canadian, or a Canadian of Greek descent. Then she became a US citizen, so what do we call her now? Greek-American? Canadian-American? Greek-Canadian-American? Her case is particularly complicated because her Greek heritage actually figures in her work. Maybe that should be the criterion -- if the person's ancestry is related to their notability, that could be a reason to have them in an ancestry category (if we want ancestry categories at all). --Auntof6 (talk) 23:27, 21 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I think we should keep the descent ones. The ones we need to nix are the ones labelled "Italian-American" or the like. They are technically two different things, one is about nationality which is the decent ones. The other is about ethnicity the "Italian-American" ones. I don't think we need the ethnicity ones as they can get pretty muddled as you mention if you go far back enough. But the ones about nationality are really simple and to a biography quite important and defining. Where a person came from is a major defining aspect of their life. It is easy to handle as well because it only applies to themselves. Were they born in Germany and moved to the USA. It doesn't actually matter where their parents or above were from. -DJSasso (talk) 13:11, 21 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The ethnicity categories seem quite useless to me as well. I think mentioning a person's ethnicity if known is important, but having categories on this seems like overcategorization. TCN7JM 13:29, 21 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree with part of what you said, Djsasso: descent is about where a person's ancestors were from, nationality means what countries the person is a citizen of. I would keep categories about nationality/citizenship, but maybe not categories for ancestry/descent. If we do have categories for ancestry/descent, we should be specific about criteria for including people in them (for example, how many generations back?). --Auntof6 (talk) 23:27, 21 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes your decent is ancestry, hence how I explained it. What country did you come from. You were born in England so you are of English decent. However, ethnicity is what ethnic race are you a part of. You can be born in England and thus be of English decent but you can still be of Italian ethnicity and thus you would be Italian-English. -DJSasso (talk) 13:27, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Where you were born is not your descent. Your descent is where your ancestors came from, and tbose are the categories I'd like to see gone. And let's not bring the term "race" into this -- it's separate from citizenship and ethnicity, we aren't discussing racial categories (which I'm not sure we have anyway), and it confuses the issue. --Auntof6 (talk) 13:51, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I didn't say race, I said ethnic race. The two different things. I am born in Canada from Canadian parents that makes me of Canadian descent. However, if you follow up my family tree I am from a number of places Scotland being one so my ethnicity would be (partially) Scots (which is an ethnic race or group if you prefer to not use the word race) however I would not be of Scottish descent because my parents/me were not from Scotland. -DJSasso (talk) 17:05, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I think categorising ancestry is totally useless to readers, the way that it's being done at the moment. Wentworth Miller is an example I saw on NewPages a few days ago. It looks like it's eventually going to be placed in around a dozen different "something-American" categories, based on the person being, on average, one-twelfth of each. To be one-twelfth of something, it means drawing a line back to one of the person's great-great-grandparents – of course it probably isn't evenly spread, which means (for all we know) he could actually be one-twentieth Syrian; so at what point does he stop being Syrian-American? Or, perhaps a more pertinent question: Who really cares? Are readers really looking for people by the nationalities of their ancestors? It might be of interest to a tiny group of people, but it's not particularly encyclopaedic so why bother with it?

If we keep these categories, the first thing we should do is to properly define their purpose, and then we need to rename them so that we all know what it is they're for. I think the English Wikipedia uses "Fooian emigrants to Foo" for people that changed their citizenship, and of course the article is then placed in both nationalities' trees through other (career) categories. Osiris (talk) 14:40, 22 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I strongly agree about properly defining and renaming. I'm not sure the names enwiki uses are precise enough, though. They define the categories properly via hatnotes, but the name alone would include people who emigrated (moved) but didn't change their citizenship. Also, I wonder if there are cases of people changing their citizenship or acquiring a second citizenship without moving to their new country -- maybe a prisoner of conscience given citizenship to a different country or something like that? Just to have a different suggestion on the table, the categories could be named "Naturalized Fooian citizens from Foo" or just "Fooians from Foo". --Auntof6 (talk) 17:19, 22 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I see four sets of categories that enwiki uses:
At least I think that's what they're for, although I'm not really sure. I really don't think we need categories for expatriates. I would agree with what I think you're implying, to just have one set of categories for people who changed their citizenship or became a dual national, regardless of whether they moved or not. Are people who were born dual nationals covered under that though? And would there be a name that covers all of that? Osiris (talk) 12:38, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
In my view this should be looked on a case-by-case basis using the criteria of notability. For example, "Americans of German-Jewish descent", although very specific, might well be notable as it would link in with the holocaust and would include at least one (maybe more) Nobel Prize winner – Albert Einstein. Martinvl (talk) 14:40, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Notability applies to articles, not categories. As a link to the Holocaust, that category would not be specific enough. We don't need to categorize by everyone who had a Jewish ancestor in Germany. (No disrespect to those who did, but such a category would not be very useful here.) Also, the fact that a category might cover a lot of people, or who the people are, shouldn't matter. We're trying to keep the category structure here simple. --Auntof6 (talk) 00:36, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Osiris' explanation is incorrect. Most naturalised citizens did move from one country to another, which was their motivation for changing citizenship; to become a citizen of the country they moved to. Not all emigrants change citizenship; many do so, but many never do. Millions of people move to another country and never change citizenship. Jim Michael (talk) 15:10, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for clarifying. I haven't actually tried to explain what naturalisation is; I'm sure people can just look it up. I'm trying to work out the purpose of each set of categories on the English Wikipedia, so we can figure out what to rename ours. Osiris (talk) 15:23, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The first comment mentions the Americans of German descent category. It is differently formed to all the other cats in the tree, which take the form of Irish-Americans, Italian-Americans etc. All the subcats should be named uniformly. Jim Michael (talk) 15:30, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Right but there's a pretty clear consensus forming that we should stop the practice of categorising people by descent. So we're now talking about what to name categories for people of dual nationality or people who have changed their citizenship. Osiris (talk) 15:37, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, we could move to delete all categories relating to the descent of people.
And do we agree to categorise citizenship rather than nationality? Advantage: it is a legally definable term; nationality is not, and its use varies greatly.
Apart from that, anything else could be made subject to notability. The biography itself could contain anything which has a reliable source, but categories would be limited to notable aspects of a person's life. Macdonald-ross (talk) 22:24, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Nationality is citizenship. I think that is the big misunderstanding a number of people are having in this discussion. Ethnicity would be the hard to define one, but nationality is not. Nationality is squarely based on where you are a citizen of. -DJSasso (talk) 13:33, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
(?) No, nationality and citizenship are not the same. Probably in most jurisdictions they're the same from a practical stance, but in many countries they're totally different – the UK and the U.S. being two examples. Not all British or U.S. nationals are citizens, and some countries have multiple nationalities and multiple levels of citizenship.
Macdonald-ross, could you clarify what you mean about notability? Are you suggesting that, say, a person who became notable after they changed citizenship not be categorised by the earlier one? Osiris (talk) 16:00, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Except that in the context we are talking about they are the same thing. Because someone from American Samoa would be listed as American Samoan nationality here, not US nationality. And UK is a bit unique in that it is made of constituent countries, so you are technically citizen of both Scotland and the UK for example. -DJSasso (talk) 16:25, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
But American Samoans are still American under U.S. nationality law. They're American nationals. But not American citizens. So it's not the same thing. Constituent countries in the UK don't have anything to do with citizenship, so that's a completely different separate form of nationality. I was referring to overseas territories; if you're from Bermuda you don't have British citizenship but you're British by nationality. Osiris (talk) 16:43, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, but the original post was asking about the two category trees we have. The one that includes nationality/citizenship and the one that is based on ethnicity. His original post unless I am completely misunderstanding it is him asking which one we should use. His post I replied to here is saying so its agreed we should use citizenship not nationality, when based on his earlier comments it seems more like he means citizenship not ethnicity. Because currently we already categorize by citizenship/nationality in a mixed tree. Its the second tree that is just ethnicity that seemed to be his issue. So in terms of our categorizing nationality and citizenship were in the same tree. (ie the same thing)-DJSasso (talk) 16:46, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Macdonald-ross can you please clarify for us? On close review, I think he means nationality in the informal sense, similar to the kind Jim Michael has described below (self-identity). Which is probably something best left to the text. I believe he already addressed categories to do with ethnic or national descent in his first sentence. Osiris (talk) 17:08, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
For what its worth I would agree that self-identifying would be better suited as part of the prose instead of a category. I was mostly commenting on which of the two trees would be the appropriate one. I would have no problem nixing the ethnicity tree, but would strongly be against removing the tree that currently contains people that are nationals/citizens of a given country. That is why I had to comment on the citizenship not nationality comment he made. -DJSasso (talk) 17:12, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I agree absolutely about keeping the nationals/citizens tree. Osiris (talk) 17:23, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
In many cases, a person defines his nationality differently to that of his citizenship. For example, Sean Connery and Alex Salmond are British citizens, but they self-define as Scottish only. Some people feel so strongly about their ancestry that they gain the citizenship of their ancestors without moving, for example Kirsten Dunst and Julianne Moore. They have both stayed in their native USA and retained their US citizenship, yet have gained German and British citizenships respectively. Hence it would be incorrect to state that they are American only. Gérard Depardieu has renounced his French citizenship and gained Russian citizenship to reduce the amount of tax he is liable for, without moving to Russia. Dappy self-defines as Greek, despite having been born in and lived in England all his life. Anjem Choudary identifies as Muslim only; he does not recognise nationalities. Cary Grant gained US citizenship during his career; Greg Rusedski changed his citizenship from Canadian to British during his career, alienating his Canadian fans as well as never being fully accepted as British by the UK general public. Nicole Kidman was born in the US to Australian parents and thus has dual citizenship. Everyone born in the US is entitled to US citizenship from birth. Martina Navratilova lost her Czechoslovak citizenship, becoming stateless, gained US citizenship, then later gained Czech citizenship whilst maintaining her US citizenship. These examples show that in many cases, the person does not clearly belong to one country only. Germany gives citizenship based on jus sanguinis - hence a person born and raised in Germany by his Turkish parents is also a Turkish citizen, even if he has never been to Turkey; he is a foreigner in the only country he has ever known. Jim Michael (talk) 22:58, 23 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
In cases of dual or multiple citizenship, a person would be categorized under all the applicable categories. For example, Nicole Kidman could be categorized separately under Australians and under Americans -- no hyphenated categories needed. This would put the person in partly-redundant categories (being in both American actors and Australian actors, for example), but it would reflect reality.
In cases like Connery and Salmond, we have "Scottish people" as a subset of "British people". That shows who is Scottish, but still includes them under the UK, of which they are citizens. I would want to categorize by criteria that are recognized by some legal authority, not categorize by personal preference. If that means using the term "citizenship" as opposed to "nationality", then that's what I think we should do. --Auntof6 (talk) 00:25, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, each case is different. Another reason why we shouldn't bunch them altogether in the same categories. Osiris (talk) 11:21, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I created many of the cats, but I did not begin the categorisation. I worded them in a way that made them shorter and with a wider definition. I did this because a) there are far fewer articles on Simple than on en; b) it includes more people in them: naturalisations, dual citizens and ancestry. None of the cats on Simple are for expatriates, because being an expatriate does not change anything about the person other than his residence. A reason I did not create expatriate cats is that it is difficult to determine at what point a person ceases to be merely working abroad and becomes a person who is living abroad long-term. If an expatriate takes on the citizenship of the country he has moved to, that changes his status from expatriate/resident foreigner to that of naturalised citizen. Jim Michael (talk) 14:33, 24 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to reply to Osiris' requests for clarification by giving a few examples:

  1. Bobby Fischer: a very strange life. I would use only Categories "American chessplayers" and "World chess champions". All the rest would go in the article and infobox. I would not list him as Category:"Icelandic citizens"/people/whatever, because that is not meaningful in relation to his notability.
  2. Nicole Kidman I would indeed list as "Australian actress" and "American actress". She is notable in both stages of her life. Also as "Academy Award winner" (we should categorise top honours only).
  3. Hans Krebs I'd list as "British Nobel Prize winners". It was his life in England which made him notable.
We need to think about the "People from X" categories. What is their relation to notability? None? If so, why are they a category, when the fact is in their infobox? For many, many people their place of birth is irrelevant to their subsequent life, and often it is accidental.
I also think the use of "ethnic" categories is a quagmire, and we should not use them as a category. When you get cases like Fischer, who was the son of Jewish pareents, a non-believer in Judaism and an anti-semite, the difficulties become apparent. Many of us Europeans are not simply anything except "Caucasian" (whatever that might mean). So by cutting the categories down to the bare bone we avoid all sorts of problems which English wiki has never been able to solve.
There are many problems with self-attribution, and we should limit it as a basis for categorisation. However, if the evidence on the page is well sourced, and relevant to their notability, then there is no obstacle in using categories like "LGBT people" (which do often need self-attribution). Macdonald-ross (talk) 11:01, 25 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
One thing I would like to comment on is the idea of the category not being related to their notability. That isn't the point of categories. Categories are in relation to how much they define one given person from another. And whether or not its a major aspect of the persons life, not just their notability. So for example Bobby Fischer being an Icelandic citizen is a very important category to have on an article because it is very defining of him. Same with the People from categories, where you are from generally defines you greatly (obviously not everyone) so those are also very important categories. The purpose of categories are to help people find a subset of articles, so if you were to leave him out of Icelandic people for example you would cause the group to be incomplete for those searching and would make the category somewhat useless. -DJSasso (talk) 13:10, 25 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Fischer gaining Icelandic citizenship was very relevant to his life. He did not want to be American any more, and chose to permanently leave the US. Krebs was German: he was born, raised and educated there, so those things were very relevant to his life. Categories, and article content, do not have to be relevant/limited to things to do with the person's notability. A biography is a summary of a person's life, not merely his career. Where a person is from may not be his birthplace, as some people move very early in their life. Wendy Richard would have identified much more as a Londoner than as being from Middlesbrough. Jim Michael (talk) 18:54, 25 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
While I agree with most of what you said, I disagree with the from part. You can only be from one place which is where you are born. You may self-identify as being from somewhere else and you may live somewhere else but you aren't from there, you will always be from the place you originally came from. Middlesbrough in your example. -DJSasso (talk) 19:18, 25 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Break

OK, I've learned something here, about nationality not always being the same as citizenship. So how about this:

  • Combine nationality and citizenship for category purposes. For sub-national entities such as territories and possessions, use subcategories. Using the example of people from American Samoa, the category for those people could be under the "American people" category (maybe it's there now, I haven't checked). Using a subcategory would include them in both. These categories should contain people who actually had the nationality/citizenship. They should not contain people whose only connection with it is that their parents or other ancestors had it.
  • Remove categories for mixed nationality/citizenship, such as Category:European Americans and everything under it. This includes "Fooian people of Fopian descent". If a person has multiple nationalities or citizenship, it can be indicated by putting them in the separate individual categories. For example, a person with both American and Greek citizenship would be in "American people" and "Greek people", not "Greek-American" or "American-Greek".

I would make the following points:

  • There are certain categories we put people in that do not have to relate to notability, such as birth years, death years (or living people, where that applies), and cause of death. The nationality/citizenship categories should be among those. The fact that the notable part of a person's life happened when they were a citizen of one place or another is not something we need to consider when categorizing.
  • Some of the categorization could be replaced with list articles. For example, we could have an article called "List of American people of Greek descent".
  • Some of these proposals would remove a lot of things from Category:Ethnic groups and its subcategories. The ethnic group categories should be more for indigenous groups, with possibly a few others.

As for "People from" categories (people from certain cities, counties, etc.): to me, these should be for where people were born, or maybe where they first lived as infants, and not for where they lived at some other point in their life. (What I'm thinking here is that a lot of people are probably born in a certain city because that's where the hospital is, but when they leave the hospital as an infant, they go home to a different place.) Since these categories are usually subcategories of the nationality/citizenship categories, my opinion is that they should contain only people who were born there, even if someone not born there strongly identifies with the place. A person should be in, at most, one such category, because you're only born in one place. Maybe these categories should be called "People born in Foo"?

That is my current thinking. --Auntof6 (talk) 02:20, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The term 'from' is ambiguous, but that is how the cats have always been on here and on en. Some people were born in a town/city which has never been their residence. This often happens in rural areas and small towns, when there is no maternity department in the vicinity and the birth takes place in the nearest town or city that has one. It would be strange if a 'from' category could not be applied to a bio of a person whose residence had been that town/county/city for his whole life, simply because he was born several miles away from there. Jim Michael (talk) 10:57, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, that is the point I was trying to make with my comment about being born in a certain place because that's where the hospital is. With our articles that give place of birth (as many do in infoboxes), I wonder how many of them give the place the person actually first lived and how many give the place of the actual birth. I'm not sure we can find that out in most cases, so we have to go with the information we have. We can at least not use places the person moved to later. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:35, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
How would we define later? Jim Michael (talk) 17:22, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Simple, if they were known to be born or lived someone else prior to that point. Only use the earliest known location. -DJSasso (talk) 17:25, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
That would categorise many people as 'not being from' the place they have lived for over 90% of their lives. If a person lived the first of his fifty years in his birthplace and the following 49 in another location, he would certainly consider himself to be from the latter place. Jim Michael (talk) 17:31, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it would. We're trying to simplify things here, and part of that is making each kind of category mean one thing. The "people from" categories currently mean more than one thing -- sometimes it means the person was born in a place, sometimes it means it's where they first lived (such as after going home from their hospital birth), and sometimes it means somewhere they moved to later in life. We may not have a way to distinguish between the first two, but we can certainly separate the third. We don't want to categorize by where a person feels most tied to, we want to categorize by things that are more concrete. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:44, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I agree entirely with the suggestion to delete categories for mixed nationality/citizenship. I think a consensus for it has been demonstrated, and would be a good result even if nothing else comes out of this discussion.
I don't know about removing the nationality aspect (adjective) from categories for non-sovereign entities. I think there are good reasons for treating many of them for what they are, which is their own legally recognised nationalities. For example, Greenlandic people are different to Danish people both in practice and in law, and the same goes for places like New Caledonia and the Cook Islands that are recognised as nations in their own right. Not that we can't still have them as subcategories of the larger nationality for reader-friendliness, but I think they should still be named by nationality rather than geography.
I also don't know that we should have such firm limitations for the "People from..." categories, which were presumably originally intended to be the "notable residence" aspect of categorising people. Guidelines for their purpose and usage is a good idea, but each case will be different and in one or another a consensus may develop to treat it differently. Categorising by place of birth seems as strange to me, personally, as categorising by place of death. Since in many cases it will have very little to do with the person's life, it seems more relevant to a BD&M archive than an encyclopaedia. Osiris (talk) 19:41, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I disagree with a blanket ban. For example, it would probably be appropriate to have an article entitled "Refugees from Nazi Germany" and also a category by the same name. If the number of items in the category became too large, it might be appropriate to break the category down by the refugee's destination and/or the refugee's ethnic origin - Jewish, Polish etc. Martinvl (talk) 21:47, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
When did we start talking about refugees? For purposes of this discussion, whether a person is a refugee is a separate issue from whether they change their citizenship or have more than one citizenship. --Auntof6 (talk) 02:10, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
OK, thanks for the link about "notable residence". Once again I have learned something. I just think it's at least confusing and probably misleading to have those categories under nationality/citizenship categories as we have them now. A category like "Category:People from Glasgow" being under "Category:Scottish people by location" implies that the person is Scottish, whereas they might just be an expatriate living there. But I will leave that aside for now.
I think I'm seeing enough consensus on the "mixed" categories. I'm going to create a list of the ones I think we're talking about and create an RfD just for those. Stand by. --Auntof6 (talk) 02:10, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Many refugees permanently move to and take the citizenship of their country of residence, for example Andrew Sachs.
Expatriates aren't from the place they live in, hence they are not in the cats of their residence. We don't have 'lives in' cats. A person is from where they grew up. Charlie Chaplin lived and worked in the US for years, but he's not categorised as American because he was a British expatriate. Jim Michael (talk) 12:55, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, probably we need to rename those parent categories eventually. Compare our Category:Australian people by city or town with enwiki's en:Category:People by city or town in Australia. Using the latter would address some of the confusion. Osiris (talk) 21:14, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see how the different wording of those two Australian cats makes a difference, or is relevant to the matter under discussion. They both categorise Australians by which city or town they are from. A person from Geelong for example would be categorised in the same way on both Simple and En. Jim Michael (talk) 21:55, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The difference is that "Australian people by city or town" implies that the person is Australian. A person can grow up in a place without being a citizen/national of that place. "People by city or town in Australia" would not be limited to Australian people. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:56, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
En and Simple each have a mixture of formats. For example, en:Category:People by city or town in Italy is a subcat of en:Category:Italian people by location, yet not all people from Italy are Italians. Some of them may merely have been born there; others may merely have grown up there. All the same type of cats should be in the same format. Jim Michael (talk) 17:44, 28 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Making/Taking time to simplify text from other sources (including other Wikipedias)

Many of the people this is addressed to will probably not see this, but I'm going to say it anyway.

Recently I've seen editors put up articles here that were not simple, saying that they didn't have time to simplify them. The reason this Wikipedia exists is to have articles in simple English. Putting up articles that aren't simple makes work for other editors, and defeats the purpose of this Wikipedia. If you don't have time to simplify text, then keep it in your userspace or work on it offline until you can get to it. (IP editors can't have userspace pages, so they would have to work offline.) Some of the editors here would be glad to help you work on an article in userspace if you want.

In the past, some people have wanted to get rid of Simple English Wikipedia. Having articles that are not simple gives those people more reasons for getting rid of it. If we aren't doing what we say we are, why should we exist?

Not everyone can write simple English. English is difficult to start with. Simple English is even more difficult, because you have to understand the language better. If you have trouble writing simple English, you might want to write for English Wikipedia instead. There's no shame in that -- they need people, too. Think of it this way: for any Wikipedia -- English, French, Swahili, etc. -- you have to write in the language of that Wikipedia. Here, the language is simple English, which is not the same as regular English.

Those are my thoughts. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:25, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

One of the problems that we have is identifying the article's audience. Writing for a 12-year old whose mother tongue is English is very different from writing for an adult for whom English is a second language and they have a linguistic ability of a twelve-year old. In the case of technical articles I believe it important to use the correct terminology regardless of who the reader is. Such terminology and concepts might make the article look less than "simple". Martinvl (talk) 21:57, 26 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
How is it different? Our audience is anyone with limited English skills. We don't aim articles at any subset of that group. As for technical vocabulary, that is not what I'm talking about -- technical vocabulary, where appropriate, is an exception we recognize, as long as it's defined, linked, or explained somehow. --Auntof6 (talk) 01:52, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I have already had this discussion with another editor. Basically, the article Metric system has been written for a 12-year old as it excludes anything to do with electricity or mechanics. On the other hand I am also working on the article Planck constant which is certainly aimed at readers for whom English is a second language - I do not think that a 12-year old has enough of a scientific background to understand the concepts being presented. (For the record I tutor 16-18 year olds in physics and maths). Martinvl (talk) 03:47, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Well, you could always add to the metric system article if you want. Even if an article seems to have been written for children, it doesn't have to stay that way. --Auntof6 (talk) 04:13, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
What you need to remember is that being easier for children to understand is a side-effect of our project but not our target. Our target is simpler english for everyone. Not all articles will be simple enough for children because we don't aim for them to be. We aim for people with limited english skills to be able to read them. -DJSasso (talk) 14:55, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
One of the articles that I am working on at the moment (Metric system) has a Gunning Fog Index 0f 8.98. Another (Planck constant) has an index of 10.20. In the first, I have deliberately avoided anything scientific. On the other hand the second is science-heavy and I am sure that many English-speaking adults would find it hard going while a person who has a reasonable grasp of science, but only rudimentary English will find it helpful. This is a case of me having identified a target audience and written for that audience. Martinvl (talk) 16:45, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

There is a cross-wiki discussion in progress as to whether c: should be enabled globally as an interwiki prefix for links to the Wikimedia Commons. As your wiki has a couple of redirects whose titles begin with "C:", they will need to be renamed if this proposal gains consensus. Please take a moment to participate in the discussion. Thank you. Scott Martin (talk) 12:16, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I supported this, as I don't think we are particularly attached to those redirects. I think the "CAT:" prefix is more usual for that kind of thing anyway. Osiris (talk) 21:16, 27 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Special:WantedPages

Somehow Special:WantedPages got updated! I was going to work on Types of business entity because it is in all Template:infobox company. Well the english page is ridiculous huge and unhelpful, so that is not a good start. The infobox directions say to use "public, private, joint venture or similar." I can definitely do some basic information on these broad types of organization. Here's my question - is there any tool that reports all the values entered in the infobox for "type="? Thanks! --Tbennert (talk) 02:37, 28 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know of any, but we could send the pages into to some temporary tracking categories if it's going to help you organise them? I had a look through some of the transclusions and there are a wide variety of values being passed, but most seem to be basic "Public", "Private", etc. Osiris (talk) 02:56, 28 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]
No need for anything special to organize. If there had been a way to run a report I could have used the top values to create the types of entities article. I'll just go with the common ones and adjust if I find others used often enough. As always, thanks for the help! --Tbennert (talk) 06:02, 1 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Call for project ideas: funding is available for community experiments

 

I apologize if this message is not in your language. Please help translate it.

Do you have an idea for a project that could improve your community? Individual Engagement Grants from the Wikimedia Foundation help support individuals and small teams to organize experiments for 6 months. You can get funding to try out your idea for online community organizing, outreach, tool-building, or research to help make Wikipedia better. In March, we’re looking for new project proposals.

Examples of past Individual Engagement Grant projects:

Proposals are due by 31 March 2014. There are a number of ways to get involved!

Hope to have your participation,

--Siko Bouterse, Head of Individual Engagement Grants, Wikimedia Foundation 19:44, 28 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Launching of Vikidia in English

I told about it before, we now open Vikidia in English :-). See Vikidia in English opens today, let’s build a children wiki encyclopedia! and the wiki itself: http://en.vikidia.org

About the relation with Simple English Wikipedia, we technically aloud users to import articles from both SEWP and Wikijunior (with patroller user group rights, it put the old records of the article in the history) but we don't plan to import all the SEWP article at once.

More details on Vikidia:Import of article from SEWP and Wikijunior and its talkpage. I hope that some of you will like this project ! Astirmays (talk) 18:43, 28 February 2014 (UTC)[reply]

So I had a look. I compared their article "Animals" with ours. Theirs has a friendly tone, which is good, but does not really explain what animals are. No definition, for example. With ours, a 10 or 11-year old could pass an 11+ test question "What is an animal?" Sometimes, you do have to do the science properly, otherwise readers are being short-changed.
Long-term they will suffer similar problems to us: lack of visibility compared to English wiki, shortage of competent regular editors, lots of silly childish vandalism by bored kids in classrooms... assorted persons thrown off main Wiki for various reasons... Well, it may work better in languages other than English. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:28, 1 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your feed-back. Sure we have to "do the science properly", we don't just want a childish tone.
Then about the "competent regular editors", you're right, that's the main challenge. The community on the French Vikidia is not massive, yet we have some good editors, both young and adults. There is some childish vandalism as well, but also some children and teenagers involved and eager to fix it. And about languages it may work better in, I guess that language in which Wikipedia is not very developed don't need another encyclopedic wiki, since articles would often be short on Wikipedia itself. On the opposite, there is two reason why languages that have the biggest Wikipedia mau need such a counterpart for children: the potential showed by this development and the fact that a great part of the articles would have turned long and too sophisticated for children. English is certainly in this case. If you want another post about this subject, you may read this one. Astirmays (talk) 21:53, 1 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Vikidia has one big advantage: its well-defined target audience. This means there are teachers with experience of the age-group, some of whom will want to take part. I would like to suggest some developmental testing: some classrooms try out the material to pin-point its weaknesses. Once you know the weaknesses, editors can home in with revised versions. This is something we have never been able to do with our rather open specification of readership. Macdonald-ross (talk) 07:22, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Actually on fr.vikidia, a big editor which is also a teacher has just expounded that he has sometimes proceeded exactly the way you suggest with his pupils. Still the general frame and functioning is simply the same as on Wikipedia (with no revised versions). Astirmays (talk) 18:54, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, that's very interesting. Macdonald-ross (talk) 19:19, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Use of "Schools" in categories

In British usage the word "school" only applies to institutes of primary and secondary education. "Schools" or "schooling" should not be used as a root for Universities and colleges, at least in Britain. At present, the top category for all these is Category:Schools, under which we find Universities, Engineering schools and so on. I recommend instead the more general "Educational institutions".

The use of "school" is an obvious Americanism, which many here do not like. I am not sure what the practice is in non-English-speaking countries. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:46, 1 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with User:Macdonald-ross. My understanding of both South Africa and the United Kingdom is that a "school" (unless it has a qualifier) caters for those in the age group 6-16, a "college" caters for those above 16, but does not award degrees while a "university" awards degrees. The matter is complicated by many institutions having the word "school" or "college" as part of their name - for example Eton College is a public school while the London School of Economics is a college within a university (University of London). Martinvl (talk) 10:42, 1 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Baliol College is one of the colleges of Oxford University; if you get a degree from there, I assume it is the college awarding, and not the university? --Eptalon (talk) 15:15, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Within the context of the word "College", there is no difference between the London School of Economics (LSE) and Baliol College. In practice there is considerable difference - the LSE, which is virtually a university in its own right, has the authority to award its own degrees. At Oxford things are different - academic departments are not attached to colleges though all academic staff (and all students) must be attached to a college before being admitted to a department. Martinvl (talk) 15:39, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
So I presume it is Oxford University awarding the degree, and not Baliol College? --Eptalon (talk) 15:55, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yes Martinvl (talk) 16:25, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
In the UK, pupils usually start school at five. Last year, the minimum school-leaving age there was increased to 17. Some schools educate pupils up to 18; some only to 16. It is de rigueur for grammar school pupils to pass their A-Levels and go on to university where they achieve a degree. Jim Michael (talk) 16:16, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding Macdonald-ross' original proposal, I would support using "educational institutions" as long as the consensus is that it is simple enough for people who are still learning English. Typing "Educational institutions in </country>" gives me a Flesch-Kincaid of 9+. TCN7JM 17:54, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I also support this. That score of 9 is not so bad, seeing as how we aim for 8, and many of our articles are at 11 or higher. We have other category names that are complex for the sake of accuracy (or possibly even for inclusiveness, as in this case). For example, many of the taxonomy categories use scientific names which are in Latin -- I'm sure the readability score on those is much higher than 9. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:51, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
An alternative might be "Schools, colleges and universities". This is more long winded, but less complex to understand.Martinvl (talk) 19:08, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The point about "Educational institutions" is its openendedness. There's no point in listing al the possible variations because there are always some others lurking round the corner. Institutes, for example; Academies, Seminaries... and then there are "schools" which are not educational institutions. If people are not switched on by my phrase, we'll have to live with schools. We can add a note about its wider application. Macdonald-ross (talk) 19:14, 3 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I completely agree with the original proposal of changing the category to "Educational institutions". Categories are for organizing not reading. Educational institutions is beautifully broad and more accurate too. --Tbennert (talk) 04:34, 4 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Terry stop

Another article nominated for moving to Simple English Wiktionary. — This unsigned comment was added by 64.6.124.31 (talk • changes).

Thanks, but you don't need to report that here. Having the tag on the article puts it in Category:Move to Wiktionary, and people can see it there. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:02, 4 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Crimea

It would be useful for an editor to keep our Crimea page up to date. Macdonald-ross (talk) 18:19, 6 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Body language

This probably needs some serious copyediting. It is almost like an essay. 64.6.124.31 (talk) 23:23, 6 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, and as an essay it wouldn't get a good mark! You might like our non-verbal communication, which is more like a real encyclopedia article. Macdonald-ross (talk) 07:52, 7 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Should the two pages be merged? 64.6.124.31 (talk) 16:19, 7 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
No, I don't think so. We don't always need to take positive action. There is the potential for a much better page. If an editor takes the idea of body language seriously, they could simply junk what has been written and base it on appropriate sources. Non-verbal communication covers a much wider territory, and is quite satisfactory as it is. It wouldn't be improved by any material in Body language. Macdonald-ross (talk) 20:31, 7 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I have rewritten the intro, which was copied mostly form enwp; the other parts (positive and negative signs) should be rewritten, or respective sources should be found. --Eptalon (talk) 11:28, 9 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Metro railway line distances

The British Government has always been rather coy about making distances of roads and railway lines freely available. Last year somebody, unrelated to either me or, as far as I am aware, to Wikipedia wrote to all the owners of Britain's metro railway systems asking for this sort of information under the Freedom of Information acts. I think it a good idea to transpose this information into the various railway templates. Any comments? The sites that I have found (from north to south) are:

Martinvl (talk) 09:35, 9 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

As I mentioned on your talk page, we like to keep our templates in synch with the ones on English Wikipedia ("enwiki") as much as possible so that maintenance doesn't get too difficult. If you added the information both here and on enwiki, it might not be a problem. People might want references for the information. Do you think you would add the information to the ones on enwiki as well?--Auntof6 (talk) 09:41, 9 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I'm intrigued by the comment "The British Government has always been rather coy about making distances of roads and railway lines freely available." The Ordnance Survey, the national mapping agency, have published accurate large scale maps of every detail on the nation's transport network for centuries. Distances between junctions on motorways, distances between towns, etc. are published on HUGE signs every few miles along the roadsides. I know that during the last war the signs were removed to avoid the risk of helping the enemy, but I believe normality was resumed soon after 1945. What "coyness" are you alluding to?
Also, if you think there is an appetite for this level of detail on the templates, why not add it in "enwiki" first, then copy here, to keep the two in sync? Centaur (talk) 10:44, 9 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Help required to decide article direction please

Hello all. There is a new article being written at System of measurement. The term seems to have a few different meanings. So the direction and primary topic of that article needs to be decided. Any help in figuring out which way to go with it would be welcome. Please join the discussion at Talk:System of measurement. Thanks, Centaur (talk) 23:15, 6 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The same could be said for the System of units article. The terms are very similar, so perhaps those two articles should be merged. Are there any other opinions on that? Centaur (talk) 22:38, 9 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal for new GA/VGA requirement

I've started a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Requirements for good articles#We need to add another requirement, here and at WP:RVGA about a new requirement I think we need. Your comments are requested there. --Auntof6 (talk) 08:57, 11 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Movies, books, etc with the same title

Do we have any guidelines for how to name articles when there are books, movies, plays, and whatever else with the same name? Should the unqualified title always be for the thing that came first, or for the article that was created here first? How about when we only have an article about one of them? I'm asking because an editor pointed out that our article The Hunger Games is about the movie.

A related topic might be for people of the same name, where we have an article about one of them who isn't the "primary topic" (to use a dab-related term). Should we try to match enwiki, where it comes to qualifying article titles? --Auntof6 (talk) 19:13, 4 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Off the cuff, I would say that if a book (play. film...) was clearly notable before any other version, then that is the primary (unqualified) title. Example: Conan Doyle's The Lost World. You could argue that, since the book version of Jurassic Park is almost unknown compared to the film of the same name, that here the film gets priority. But what we do have is "published first gets priority", so here the Jurassic Park book gets priority. Macdonald-ross (talk) 22:43, 4 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Same as anything else. en:WP:Primary Topic would rule the day. So if the movie is more popular than the book it would get the priority. If the book is then the book would. -DJSasso (talk) 14:24, 5 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
So popularity is the determining factor? That sounds kind of subjective to me. As far as The Hunger Games, I think the book and the movie are about equal. I'm going to move the article to a title that says it's about the movie. I'll leave the unqualified title as a redirect, but if someone wants to write an article about the book they can either change usurp that page or make that page a dab. --Auntof6 (talk) 03:30, 8 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Not popularity as much as notability. en:WP:Primary Topic explains it best. Lots of factors go into it usually such as which which has the most page views, what has the most sources (people usually do a google or google book search) etc etc. In cases where neither is the primary topic the main location is often turned into a disambiguation page. That being said. If we only have one article for The Hunger Games here then it should be at the undisambiguated page and can be moved once a page for the other is created. No need to disambiguate when we only have one article. -DJSasso (talk) 11:57, 12 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Doing that would mean having to change everything that links to it at the time the page got moved. I think it's better to distinguish from the beginning, when we can catch it. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:55, 12 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
That is how we do it by standard because we may never get the other article or it may be a very long time before we do. Generally we don't disambiguate unless we have to. I mean in this case its likely the article will eventually show up but for a lot of topics they might not. Generally when I see disambiguated articles here where they are the only article here with that name they get moved to the undisambiguated name. -DJSasso (talk) 12:11, 13 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
That's interesting, because I do the opposite, moving an unqualified name to a qualified one when an article isn't about the primary topic. To me, that's clearer, and therefore simpler. We often get articles from enwiki with links to titles that are unqualified because they mean the primary topic. If our unqualified title is about a different topic, that's a problem. Of course, it isn't always clear which is the primary topic. I also think there is often a bias toward making current pop culture-related things be the primary topics. --Auntof6 (talk) 13:31, 13 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
If the book and the film (movie) are about the same thing, then I think that initially there should be one article that covers both media. Only once that article becomes too large, it should be split into either two or three. It would be split into two if either the book or the film becomes significantly more notable than the medium, otherwise split it into three - top level article, one about the book and another about the film. Martinvl (talk) 12:38, 12 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
An article should be about one thing, whether it be a book, a trilogy of books, a movie, a franchise, or something else, and editors can create whichever they want in any order they want. It's simpler that way, and if an article is about more than one thing, and you run into issues with categories and with interwiki links. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:55, 12 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Technically in this case it would be about one thing. The Hunger Games franchise. But yes I do agree keeping them separate is probably better. -DJSasso (talk) 12:12, 13 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed optional changes to Terms of Use amendment

Hello all, in response to some community comments in the discussion on the amendment to the Terms of Use on undisclosed paid editing, we have prepared two optional changes. Please read about these optional changes on Meta wiki and share your comments. If you can (and this is a non english project), please translate this announcement. Thanks! Slaporte (WMF) 21:55, 13 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Can categories be renamed?

The category "World Heritage Sites in Great Britain" should be "World Heritage Sites in the United Kingdom" as the former does not include Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK, and which contains Giant's Causeway. --Mia (talk) 21:57, 17 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

They can't be directly renamed. You have to create a new category, change everything from the old category to the new one, then either delete redirect the old category (if it's likely people might still try to use it) or delete it. I agree that this change should be done, so I will take care of it. Thanks for pointing it out. --Auntof6 (talk) 00:35, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
You've done it! Thank you. --Mia (talk) 20:15, 18 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Special:RecentChanges showing wrong count for RfD

For a while now, the count of "Requests for deletion" on the recent changes page has been showing as one less than the actual number. Is that just me, or is anyone else seeing that, too? --Auntof6 (talk) 09:41, 23 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Other could also see it too (not anymore). Wikipedia:RecentChanges/Community uses {{PAGESINCATEGORY:Current requests for deletion}} which counts the number of pages in Category:Current requests for deletion. Wikipedia:Requests for deletion/Requests/2014/Categories showing mixes of national ancestry did not have a {{in progress}} template which automatically adds RfDs to that category. I have added it now. Regards, --Glaisher [talk] 10:02, 23 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Glaisher! I must have messed up when I created that page. --Auntof6 (talk) 10:18, 23 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Can article pages be deleted?

Oops, I created Anniversary days in the United Kingdom by mistake - I intended to create a category (which I have done now too). Can anyone advise how to delete an article page please. Mia (talk) 18:41, 22 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, pages can be deleted. You can read about it at Wikipedia:Deletion policy. Let me know if you have any questions. Since you were the only author of the page you mentioned, I deleted it under option WP:QD#G7. --Auntof6 (talk) 22:42, 22 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the link, and thanks for deleting it. Mia (talk) 21:28, 26 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

How to see the list of categories of Wikipedia?

Hello. I'd like to know how to see a list of categories in wikipedia. Thank you. Wuvixx (talk) 11:34, 26 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A list of all categories can be found at Special:Categories. See WP:CAT for details about categories. --Glaisher [talk] 11:38, 26 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, Glaisher! Wuvixx (talk) 17:28, 26 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

How to find a good subject that wasn't written about, to write an article about?

Hello. I'd love to write for Wikipedia but I need to find subjects to write about. Any suggestions? Wuvixx (talk) 11:34, 26 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Write about something that you're interested in and knowledgeable about. If you write an article that already has an article in another version of Wikipedia, you will have a format and outline to work from. Jim Michael (talk) 11:18, 27 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Alright, thanks for your reply! Wuvixx (talk) 12:41, 28 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

How to upload files on this wikipedia?

How to upload files like pictures on this wikipedia? Wuvixx (talk) 08:29, 27 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

We don't keep files on this Wikipedia. If you have files to upload, you can upload them at Wikimedia Commons if they meet the requirements as far as copyright and free use. This page gives some detail about what is allowed. --Auntof6 (talk) 09:40, 27 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks but Wikipedia Commons seem to prohibit character uploads and my article need a picture of a character. Is there a way to do it? Wuvixx (talk) 12:40, 28 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
No we don't allow copy written images here. That is why we only use images from Commons. -DJSasso (talk) 13:30, 28 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Alright, thanks for the help. Wuvixx (talk) 11:18, 29 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

An issue that came out of deleting ancestry categories

Yesterday I finished deleting the categories for Wikipedia:Requests for deletion/Requests/2014/Categories showing mixes of national ancestry. On quite a few of the articles I processed, I saw Category:Native American people. This category was being used for people of Native American descent, not just for people who are 100% Native American. (I saw say was because I have changed the description on the category.) In keeping with the spirit of the RfD, I think this category should be removed from a lot of the pages that have it. However, I'm not sure how to decide where to remove it and where to leave it. Some pages are obvious (Sacagawea, Crazy Horse, Russell Means, Geronimo, Chief Joseph). Some are less obvious (Kim Basinger, Bret Favre, Quentin Tarantino, Oprah Winfrey, Tammy Wynette).

Here are some ideas of how to make the decision:

  • Remove the category if the person has any ancestry other than Native American.
  • Leave the category where the person has some specified percentage of Native American ancestry. I think this criterion is used by some groups in the US to determine tribal membership. I'm not sure how we'd determine the percentage, though.
  • Look on enwiki to see how they list the person: under Native American people, or under people of Native American descent. If the former, leave the category. If the latter, remove it.
  • Leave the category on pages about people who are well known as being Native American, even if they have other ancestry. An example of this would be Maria Tallchief, whose mother was European.

Other ideas? Comments? --Auntof6 (talk) 06:25, 30 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

For me, first bullet, and some sympathy with fourth bullet in clear-cut cases. Macdonald-ross (talk) 06:51, 30 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Having not participated in the RfD, I suggest entirely after the fact. There are some very interesting people in that category here. I agree that bullet two would be impossible to determine. No article I looked at declares a percentage. I like bullet three. This eliminates Willie Nelson because he is in the category on enwiki as "American people of Cherokee descent". Joan Baez is in cats of English, Scottish and Mexican descent, but not as Native American at all. This would also solve Tammy Wynette, as she has no related category except "People from Itawamba County, Mississippi". As well, I agree with bullet four (including Maria Talllchief for example), but only if it is clearly stated in the article. Fylbecatulous talk 13:27, 30 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I have cleaned out the category. I left all the people of 100% Native American ancestry (Squanto, Massasoit, etc.). Of the others, if the person was significantly known as being Native American, I also left the category (Maria Tallchief, Jim Thorpe, etc.) Otherwise, I removed it. Feel free to check my work. --Auntof6 (talk) 10:00, 3 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

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