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User talk:AlanM1/Archive 7

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Latest comment: 10 years ago by MediaWiki message delivery in topic The Signpost: 30 April 2014

Archived at 2014-05-05T08:45Z

The Signpost: 08 January 2014

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The Signpost: 15 January 2014

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The Signpost: 22 January 2014

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tz database update

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Yup, I'm serious.

Hi AlanM1, I would like to refresh the database to the 2013i release, but saw all the reverts you did and big notice you put out. I don't think people would notice my request if I state it in the talk page, so I came to you directly. Let me lay down my plans of updating the tz database and more:

  • I'll create a few pages on (most likely) new time zones, such as Africa/Juba, Asia/Khandyga, Asia/Ust-Nera and Europe/Busingen. I can do these while waiting for your reply.
  • After getting your green light, I'll refresh the table.
  • The picture on the right will replace the current version (as of 2009, goodness), mostly used in the tz infobox. The replacement should be done after the table is updated.
  • The infobox itself will be updated by including a red pog to mark the location of time zones.
  • This might not happen eventually, but I plan to replace the picture in UTC infoboxes with an SVG version. I have the raw ingredients but couldn't cook them up yet.

I hope that's enough to prove that I will not be vandalizing the page. Hytar (talk) 11:01, 25 January 2014 (UTC)

@Hytar: Hi. It's nice to see someone take an interest in the tz pages! It would be great to have your contributions. It's been a while since I worked with them, so I can't comment too accurately on your detailed issues without some research, but they sound good. Off the top of my head:
I remember the map being an issue, and getting it into SVG will make it more maintainable.
There was some talk about the difficulties/advisability of having individual pages for each zone name, some of which ambiguate existing pages. Had I to do it over, I'd have at least put them under their own page hierarchy, like "tz/". There is the question of whether most of them will ever have enough info to support their own article.
The way in which the lookup of values is supported currently is somewhat slow, and could really stand to be migrated to Lua and possibly wikidata (which should make future updates easier). —[AlanM1(talk)]— 06:11, 27 January 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for your reply. Sorry I couldn't work on the articles quickly, as I have RL responsibilities and holidays in between.
I think that the current naming of time zones in Wikipedia articles are fine, and does not easily make existing pages ambiguous (because of "/" in the name). Indeed, most of the articles are in the stub category. However, they could be expanded from sometimes elaborate comments in the source files of the tz database, and also from discussion the mailing lists.
On lookup of values, I presume you mean the infobox. No doubt the infobox template is complicated as it pulls text from related pages. Any changes to the database means editing these related but separate pages. Rewriting the template in Lua or to link to Wikidata is a good idea, but I'm not the best person on this topic. Hytar (talk) 03:24, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

The Signpost: 29 January 2014

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The Signpost: 12 February 2014

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The Signpost: 19 February 2014

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The Signpost: 26 February 2014

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March 9 edit-a-thon at MOCA in downtown LA

LA Meetup: March 9 edit-a-thon at MOCA
 

Dear fellow Wikipedian,

You have been invited to a meetup and edit-a-thon at the Museum of Contemporary Art in downtown Los Angeles on Sunday, March 9, 2014 from 11 am to 6 pm! This event is in collaboration with MOCA and the arts collective East of Borneo and aims to improve coverage of LA art since the 1980s. (Even if contemporary art isn't your thing, you're welcome to join too!) Please RSVP here if you're interested.

I hope to see you there! User:Calliopejen1 (talk)

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An RfC that you may be interested in...

Latest comment: 10 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

As one of the previous contributors to {{Infobox film}} or as one of the commenters on it's talk page, I would like to inform you that there has been a RfC started on the talk page as to implementation of previously deprecated parameters. Your comments and thoughts on the matter would be welcomed. Happy editing!

This message was sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) on behalf of {{U|Technical 13}} (t • e • c) 18:26, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

(test) The Signpost: 05 March 2014

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Kennedy Center Honors

Latest comment: 10 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

I don't care particularly, but the rules for Talk pages specifically say they are not to be used for general discussion of the topic of the article. A list of people who contributors think should win Kennedy Center Honors clearly contravenes that. Intelligent Mr Toad (talk) 11:53, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

@Intelligent Mr Toad: Editing of other people's contributions to Talk pages is also discouraged, though, unless by admins for oversight-type violations (e.g. personal info, protection of minors). Because it wasn't mentioned in your edit summary, and lumped in with your new section, I assumed it was unintentional. Otherwise, I'd have probably left it alone. However, since it's back now, the comment was responded to, and is over 7 years old, so I'd suggest "let it be".   —[AlanM1(talk)]— 19:24, 11 March 2014 (UTC)

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Dementia

Latest comment: 10 years ago8 comments2 people in discussion

We had a discussion several years ago regarding Parkinson's, dementia and Alzheimer's and how to list the death. Remarkably I wasnt the one stirring the pot in that discussion. Anyways, the end was determined that for the 3 that it is Ok to list them as CoD or to list them as complications of dementia (for example) if it was a quote from the article.

As far as common practice, it is up to the individual coroner or doctor (if he signs the Death Certificate):

"Depending on the circumstances and the practices of the doctor, dementia may be entered on the death certificate as the sole or main cause of death, or as a contributing factor. If it has not been mentioned, you can ask the doctor to include it if you wish."

http://www.alzheimers.org.uk/site/scripts/documents_info.php?documentID=101

Most of the deaths like the lingering effects of a stroke is from pneumonia which may or may not be listed as well.

It is something near and dear to my heart as both my Great Grandmother and Grandmother died from dementia. My GG was 102 when she died after suffering from it for 20 years and my Grandmother died from it at 99 after 15+ years of treatment.

And I have looked at this in several Australian papers and they all list a long lingering battle with dementia. http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/neville-wran-dead-aged-87-20140420-36ywh.html

Sunnydoo (talk) 00:46, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

@Sunnydoo: Hi. Taken together, the section quoted:
"Although dementia is a life-shortening illness, another condition or illness (such as pneumonia – an infection in the lung) may actually cause a person's death. This other condition or illness will most likely be listed as the cause on the person's death certificate. Pneumonia is listed as the ultimate cause of death in up to two-thirds of people with dementia. The person's ability to cope with infections and other physical problems will be impaired due to the progression of the disease, and the person may die because of a clot on the lung or a heart attack. However, in some people no specific cause of death is found, other than dementia. If the person is over 70, ageing may also be given as a contributing factor."
seems to confirm my understanding that dementia could not really be called the "proximate cause of death" in most (maybe all) cases. The last two sentences seem to say that it is sometimes listed when, absent dementia, "natural causes" would be. To me, "natural causes", or a specific system failure, like cardiac arrest, or even "multi-system failure" is more correct. I looked at other articles for the present case, as well as a couple of others, and they consistently seem to use wording that avoids "cause of death", using terms like "after a long battle with" and "had been suffering from" instead.
Mostly, I found the issue being discussed on the Alzheimer's website, related forums, etc., which makes sense, since it's naturally and reasonably in their interest to promote visibility of the disease.
I suppose it's a question of whether "cause of death" is supposed to mean the "proximate cause of death" usually listed on the cert, or the longer-term cause when it's a degenerative disease, like diabetes, morbid obesity, etc. Maybe we should broaden the documented definition of the field to "established cause of death or major contributing conditions"? —[AlanM1(talk)]— 00:47, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
We have had that discussion a couple of times...I know WWGB and I have discussed a couple of times as well. The problem is that there is not a consistency in the reporting of the deaths and none of us have the time or resources to track down all of the Death Certificates involved. In the US and British Territories for Natural Deaths, there is a Primary Cause and a Secondary Cause for Natural Deaths on the Death Certificate itself. Usually the Primary Cause is like you say Cardiac Arrest, Pneumonia, etc. and the Secondary Cause is usually a long term disease such as MS, MD, Cancer, Diabetes, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, dementia, etc etc. The problem enters from the Media (as you can tell I am not a fan of the US media at the moment). They either dont report the Primary cause (which is what you are looking for CA, Pneumonia, etc) or they simply use the phrase "Complications from." Unfortunately, the "Complications from" rankles a lot of folks on the Death's page as they dont understand what it means (and in their defense, it is an advanced concept). I had to stop one of the guys (i think it was Inedible Hulk) last month from running through removing all of the Complications from in the Month. What we have resigned ourselves to do is simply choose the best information that we have from a credible source. In this case that would be dementia, as the cause which would be the Secondary Cause in the US. But we simply dont have better information to the #1 cause. Pneumonia is a 66% shot, but I can tell you my Grandmother didnt die from pneumonia but from a secondary digestive infection (peritonitis) which also takes quite a few people with dementia. There was an argument Inedible started on the subject that is in the Archives related to Cardiac Arrest and CoD that touched on a few of the matters. You can access that discussion off of the Talk page under the Archive 1.Sunnydoo (talk) 01:22, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
And the "Natural Causes" argument is one I pushed for but got blowback on as well. In order to be able to list Natural Causes as a CoD on the Death's page, it has to be directly stated in the article. People feel that it is too unspecific.Sunnydoo (talk) 01:28, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
@Sunnydoo: Then it makes sense to just clarify the meaning of the field (as CoD/contributing factors), since that's descriptive of what the media gives us. —[AlanM1(talk)]— 03:06, 22 April 2014 (UTC)
@Sunnydoo: Thinking about it further, I had the same problem with "cancer" in most cases, since it doesn't really say what system failed. Looking into it further, this doc cleared it up for me. What I was thinking as the meaning of CoD was more like what they describe as "mechanism". —[AlanM1(talk)]— 08:35, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
I think that may be a little misleading. I understand what they are saying, but I have always been a completionist. If you have never seen one, here is a good link for you to view- http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/dvs/blue_form.pdf. Part I is the Primary cause and Part II is the Secondary cause in a Natural death. Cancer can be extremely tricky to judge. Sometimes its the treatment which is extremely toxic, sometimes its damage to the immune system or other bodily apparatus leading to infections or secondary damage such as kidney failure. And sometimes it is a direct cause for example in brain cancers where the tumor either shuts off or overloads the electrical system. Its one of the reason why you see me use "Complications" so much, as it covers a lot of bases.Sunnydoo (talk) 09:44, 25 April 2014 (UTC)
Hmmm. The handful of death certs I've seen (mostly LA and Orange Counties of California) only have a single line for "Part I" and do not have the time-to-death. It seems that, in the case of diseases like cancer and cerebral disease, the media tend to report that, and that's what we're stuck with. It seems more useful than the "immediate cause", anyway. —[AlanM1(talk)]— 20:16, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

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The Signpost: 23 April 2014

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May 10 Asian Pacific American edit-a-thon in LA

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LA Meetup: May 10 Asian Pacific American edit-a-thon
 

Dear fellow Wikipedian,

You have been invited to a meetup and edit-a-thon at the Junipero Serra Branch of the LA Public Library (4607 S. Main St., 90037) on Saturday, May 10, 2014 from 10 am to 4 pm! This event is sponsored by the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center and the Asian Pacific American Librarians Association and aims to improve coverage of Asian Pacific American topics, particularly as they relate to southern California. Please RSVP here if you're interested.

I hope to see you there! Calliopejen1 (talk) - via MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 18:11, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

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The Signpost: 30 April 2014

Latest comment: 10 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
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