User talk:Water and Land/Archive 2007-2008

No original research policy

From: Water and Land (talk) 19:39, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
To: mwtoews
You wrote: Hi, I've noticed your edits in the groundwater related articles. However, they infringe on Wikipedia's no original research policy (especially since you tagged on the talk pages "This article was made by ..."). These articles include Watertable control, Groundwater model, Salinity control, and Cumulative frequency; as well as certain sections of other articles. I don't want to be a jerk and list you articles for deletion (some people here would do that .. but not me), as they could be used and merged among other wiki authors. Your contributions to the small niche of groundwater-related articles are certainly welcome, however you should first consider the policies of Wikipedia before investing too much time and effort.+mwtoews 18:03, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
My reply: I am new to Wikipedia (a few days) and already in trouble. I have tried to do merging but was hitherto unable to do so (with 2 exceptions) because I felt there would be too much interruption of the train of thought in the pages visited. Yet, I will not rest, but continue to do streamlining. I fear some misunderstanding might have been roused by the phrase "This article was made by Water and Land". Herewith I only refer to the entry in Wikipedia (a new page), not to new or original research articles. All information I give comes from old research and existing sources and I am just reporting, referring, citing and pouring available knowledge into a new format, hoping to provide useful information. I guess I am not expected to make contributions merely by "copy and paste" from existing material, omitting any writing and "glueing" on my part. In fact, I could not detect much difference between the approach to the subjects in the pages I viewed and my approach, although there may be a lot of difference in style and emphasis everywhere. To avoid any more misunderstandings, I will remove the phrase, which was meant to assume some kind of responsibility for what I did and be open for comments. I might also adopt a fancy name (something like yours) to "depersonify" my contributions. By the way, do you have some authority in Wikipedia and what do you mean with "here" in (some people here would do that ...)"? Regards, Roland.

From: mwtoews

Hey, everyone was once new here, so no worries if you feel your are "already in trouble", so don't be discouraged about contributing. It can take a few months to get a good idea of how Wikipedia works from the inside (especially if you also want to learn the technical aspects, like including LaTeX math formulas). I can see the work you added is not exactly original research, but it is in paper format, rather than in more of a encyclopedia reference format. I have no more authority here than you; I just contribute whenever I have spare time and resources (I'm working on my Masters at the moment—so my spare time is presently limited). My username really isn't that fancy, since it is must my first two initials and last name, and is the exact same used at my past two universities. (Using any part of a real name in a username is actually quite bold, and I certainly encourage it.) In any case, your work is always credited through the additions in the history—but due to the licensing, it is free and public domain for anyone use to use and modify, so this distinction gets blurred or lost with each edit from someone else. There are about a dozen or so regular contributers on wikipedia that are specialists with groundwater—non of which I know personally, and only discuss things here and there. By "here", I meant the larger wikipedia community—some of which don't tolerate deviation from policies and delete or remove material that doesn't meet it. Feel free to ask me any questions you might have.+mwtoews 21:16, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Segmented regression

I replied on my talk page. – Quadell ^{(talk) (random)} 16:13, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Tag

I removed the wikify tag on Well drainage upon my second look. The tag just means it needs significant cleaning up. I probably needs an expert's review, although that's for someone else to do. Bearian 12:52, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

Drainage system

Hi, I noticed that you split the article off, which is appreciated - but you copied and pasted all of the content. Doing this destroys the attribution history of the page which is required for legal reasons, and requires a considerable amount of administrative effort to fix. I've properly arranged the histories of drainage system and drainage system (Geomorphology), but in the future, please move pages using the "move" tab at the top of the page. Thanks! east.718 at 06:51, July 6, 2008

Sorry, next time I will do better. Water and Land (talk) 08:39, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

It's no big deal. I'm just glad to see an expert contributing, especially in an oft-ignored subject like soil science. If you ever need any assistance, please don't hesitate to contact me. east.718 at 09:17, July 6, 2008

Surface water recharge

Are you sure that "Surface water recharge" is water that contributes to surface water courses? I searching this term (with quotes), and I see many definitions that define the term as surface water that becomes groundwater recharge. Most uses of the term I came across have an aquifer as the receiving body. +mt 16:42, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Hello Mwtoews, there we meet again. I have used the term "recharge" in a new article on Runoff model. The model is based on a reservoir concept with "recharge" that is converted (transformed) into "discharge" or "runoff". "Recharge", "effective rainfall" and "rainfall excess" are notions used to indicate which part of the rainfall runs off. All three notions are ambiguous but not unlogical and I see no problem with the use of "recharge" in the surface runoff process. To me there is in principle no difference between recharge to a groundwater body like an aquifer and recharge to a surface water body like a river or lake. Water and Land (talk) 20:06, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I see the context that you were using the term. Often, most papers, books, articles, etc. define their terminology for recharge. For example "direct recharge" could have many meanings as well, and I often see individual definitions of this term too. I was just making sure you were aware that there could be multiple interpretations of the term.+mt 18:35, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for giving your views. I like critical discussions because they usually lead to improvement. I would like to add that the use of the words "recharge" (input), "discharge" (output) and "storage", together forming the basics of the water balance, is common in many hydrological descriptions and models. Water and Land (talk) 18:45, 24 August 2008 (UTC)