User talk:SMcCandlish/Archive 7

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June 2007

User:SMcCandlish/List of ways to verify notability of articles

Resolved

 – Integrated with Wikipedia:Notability/Historical.

Sorry for not getting back to you earlier. Here you go. Just poke me back when you are done with it, to delete it again. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 05:50, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Or I'll just slap a db-userreq on it. No biggie. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 06:46, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Redirect of Ten Minute Warning (drinking game)

Resolved

 – Not an article I work on; I don't care, and thought it due for AfD anyway.

Hello, this is a message from an automated bot. A tag has been placed on Ten Minute Warning (drinking game), by Mschel, another Wikipedia user, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. The tag claims that it should be speedily deleted because Ten Minute Warning (drinking game) is a redirect to a non-existent page (CSD R1).

To contest the tagging and request that administrators wait before possibly deleting Ten Minute Warning (drinking game), please affix the template {{hangon}} to the page, and put a note on its talk page. If the article has already been deleted, see the advice and instructions at WP:WMD. Please note, this bot is only informing you of the nomination for speedy deletion, it did not nominate Ten Minute Warning (drinking game) itself. Feel free to leave a message on the bot operator's talk page if you have any questions about this or any problems with this bot. --Android Mouse Bot 2 01:02, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Redirect of Power Hour

Resolved

 – Not an article I work on; I don't care, and thought it due for AfD anyway.

Hello, this is a message from an automated bot. A tag has been placed on Power Hour, by Mschel, another Wikipedia user, requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. The tag claims that it should be speedily deleted because Power Hour is a redirect to a non-existent page (CSD R1).

To contest the tagging and request that administrators wait before possibly deleting Power Hour, please affix the template {{hangon}} to the page, and put a note on its talk page. If the article has already been deleted, see the advice and instructions at WP:WMD. Please note, this bot is only informing you of the nomination for speedy deletion, it did not nominate Power Hour itself. Feel free to leave a message on the bot operator's talk page if you have any questions about this or any problems with this bot. --Android Mouse Bot 2 01:02, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

"No one says apt"

Resolved

 – Just an entertaining chat.

I say apt. Grouse 21:44, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

I am known to exaggerate. At least a thousand times a day. ;-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:52, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Dear SMcCandlish: Apt implies fitting or appropriate, and is therefore more specific than valid, in my opinion. Neither of the 2 dictionaries that I consulted after seeing your edit comment considers apt, which derives from Latin, to be informal. Fowler's does not disapprove of apt, although it only discusses its use before an infinitive. Also, why do you prefer the past perfect tense where the past tense is correct and sufficient? Is this a difference in usage between British and American English? And which is the present tense verb to which you object? I'm not going to revert war over this, but please reconsider or explain (you may reply here to maintain continuity). Thanks. Finell (Talk) 23:32, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Not a big deal really; "apt" sounds informal and slightly archaic to my ears. Something my Southern grandmother would say, along with "ornery" and "reckon". I don't find apt to be more, but less, specific. "Apt" is a highly subjective feeling, like whether a woman's dress is too short to be appropriate at the symphony, or whether a male can possibly fittingly be a teaching assistant in a women's studies course at a university. Valid is an objective (or at least less subjective) criterion, like whether the ad hominem fallacy has been invoked in an argument, or a scientific claim is actually backed up by the data that its proponents claim supports it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 03:18, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for replying about apt. Perhaps there is a word that is better than either apt or valid. What about your replacement of past tense with past perfect? Which was the present tense verb to which you objected (that your edit corrected)? Finell (Talk) 07:57, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Don't recall at this point; I have over 1200 pages on my watchlist. Sorry. It isn't anything personal, I just run through with a broom and move on. It's possible I swept up something that should have been left lying (if so I know the feeling; I defended a subjunctive at Godwin's Law for over a year from people "fixing" it, and finally just replaced the entire phrase with something else so the issue would stop coming up, because the bogus "corrections" from people used to nothing but 2006-2007 informal American English were incessant.) Anyway, what objection do you have against "valid"? I peferred it because it is rooted in logic, and is an analytical term with boundaries that bar (at least most) subjective nonsense interpretations (unlike "apt", which is well within the realm of whim and activism). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 08:09, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

Whether a particular comparison to Hitler or Nazis is rhetorically persuasive or is excessive (and thus weakens the impact of appropriate comparisons) is not a matter of hard, objective fact (validity, or truthfulness) but, at least in instances where reasonable minds might differ, a matter of subjective appropriateness and degree.

Several years ago the New York Times published a letter of mine, but edited out my correct use of the subjunctive case. When I questioned the editor (very politely and deferentially), he explained the subjunctive is no longer used in modern English except for an assertion contrary to fact (e.g., "If the Earth were flat, then ...")—which my subjunctive usage in the letter happened to be, although I continue to use the subjunctive wherever it is grammatically correct. Was I asleep when the subjunctive case was ripped from my language? Did the Anglos [sic] and Saxons posthumously defeat the Romans and seize linguistic dominance while I was away?

When I was in 4th grade, the teacher taught the class said that it was incorrect to begin a sentence with because. I asked why, and gave her a grammatically correct example of the usage. She acknowledged that my example was correct, but said one should not begin a sentence with because because that often leads to error (she was probably concerned about sentence fragments, e.g., "Because it rained."). To this day, probably because of my resentment of the teacher dumbing down the language, I begin a disproportionate proportion of my sentences with because.

Peace. Finell (Talk) 10:34, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

I hear ya. Had similar experiences. Imagine having an English teacher who believed that "spatial" was pronounced "spattial", not "spacial". Anyway, I suspect that most cases of Hitler/Nazi comparison that some random person could feel were "rhetorically persuasive" without an objectively definable reason for it, would probably be fallacious in one way or another, most commonly argument to emotion. E.g., no matter how terrible you think your boss is, and no matter how much you can convince an emotive person you are right by sharing horror stories, a comparison of you boss to Hitler is unlikely to have any logical validity, except on a very absurd level (or one not relevant here; e.g. perhaps your boss only has one testicle.) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:23, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

DAB laziness

Resolved

 – Everyone's apologized. Shiny.

Please do not convert articles to disambiguation pages without fixing all of the links to the orginal page so that they go to the new one you moved the content to. That's a dreadful disservice to our readers, and to other editors who are now left with little choice but to fix the mess you made. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 07:55, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Get over yourself SMcCandish. Learn to talk respectfully to people. The page was a mess (there were several Fred Davis' and the "snooker" one was hardly world famous) so I did A SERVICE (not a disservice) to make disammbiguation. The reason you correct pages all day and don't have friends is because you need to learn social manners. I have two fists that could teach them to you---mehudson1

There was nothing disrepectful about my message to you (unlike your reply). I think you are missing the point. Making DAB pages is not a bad idea. Making DAB pages and doing nothing to clean up afterwards is a very, very bad idea. Hundreds of links that used to go to the correct place now go to a DAB page for no reason other that you simply couldn't be bothered. PS: Threats of violence do not go over well here. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:45, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

apology given, however saying I "simply could not be bothered" is picking a further fight. Please watch your words as well. [The previous unsigned comment was posted by Mehudson1 (talk · contribs), 19:28, 4 June 2007 (UTC)]

Accepted, and good point, so I apologize as well. To completely rephrase: If you are going to create a DAB page at the former location of an article, which is often a good idea, please police the links to that page so that they go to the proper new article location. Better I hope! — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 19:33, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Template:CompactTOC

Resolved

 – Self-resolving notice.

Hi. Your cleanup, last night, on this template, was “bad”, because after it, something as 1250 pages were showing a bad interwiki to br:Patrom:Taolenn eeun pennad 2. This was fixed a few minutes ago. Hégésippe | ±Θ± 15:05, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Good catch; sorry about that! — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 17:59, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Refactoring others comments

Resolved

 – No further dispute; I think we understand each other.

I must say, I am a bit surprised with how you here [1] "upgraded" my warning to Mangrope001 on Tuesday.

In my opinion, this is not the way to do it. Not that I disagree with the actual content- I am not here to discuss that user- the user seems bad, and I was probably far to nice - but the fact you are this comfortabel with changing anything inside another users message. It would probably have been far more appropriate to also replace my signature with yours, since you replaced a level 2 warning with a blatant vandal warning. Is it really the right thing to do to sign with others name? Greswik 13:27, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Good question. I've done this before with no complaints, but I understand the complaint being made. I wasn't sure whether it would be more appropriate to refactor the template and leave the sig alone, replace the entire thing and sign it myself, or simply add a different-level warning with my sig, leave the original, and let people be potentially confused. Entirely open to opinions on the best course of action there. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:40, 8 June 2007 (UTC) PS: WP:REFACTOR is quite permissive. I think it is also questionable whether its present wording actually reflects present consensus, however. I am perfectly comfortable doing some forms of refactoring, and have never had a complaint about it; the most common being fixing broken links, e.g. Billlliards. I never fix anyone else's others forms of typos, of course, only ones that actually break the functionality intended. This of course isn't particularly analogous to swapping a template to change a warning level to something that more closely matches the vandalism. PPS: No subterfuge was intended in the edit in question. I figured, article history makes it impossible to literally falsify anything, meanwhile leaving your sig on preserves your 'credit' for tagging the vandal first, as it were. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:44, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Ananthabhadram needs copy edit

Resolved

 – There's a whole project for such requests. Querent directed there. Twice.

Please, could you take a look at the article Ananthabhadram? It needs quite some copy editing job. In case you are interested, do not begin before 10 June. I am making some improvements to the article. I hope to get the article to a GA status and eventually to an FA status. Aditya Kabir 08:19, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Just put {{Copyedit|date=June 2007}} at the top of the page when it is ready for copyediting, and someone from Wikipedia:WikiProject League of Copyeditors will get around to it. If there's some urgency about it, you can ask more directly at the project. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:32, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

"...If there's some urgency about it, you can ask more directly at the project." - How do I do that? Aditya Kabir 19:11, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

Oh! I forgot to mention that I am a bit impatient with the article, and can't wait to get it to GA. Too bad. Well, you haven't told me how do address the project directly yet. Cheers. Aditya Kabir 06:28, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Um, I'm not sitting at the computer waiting 24 hours a day seeking messages from you. I have a life. Have patience, eh? In answer to your question, go to Wikipedia:WikiProject League of Copyeditors and follow their instructions. If they have no particular instructions, post a request at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject League of Copyeditors (their talk page). Seek patience. If your article needs copyedting that badly, then it is not near GA status yet. All in due course. If it is well-sourced, the first hurdle is long since jumped. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 07:40, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Sources; the meaning of "Wiki"

Resolved

 – Discussion moved back to other user's page, here.

Can you please tell me what the acronym "Wiki" stands for?

I believe, it's "WHAT "I" KNOW IS".

What >>> I <<< KNOW IS.

Not "What "PUBLISHED SOURCES" know is".

This is "WIKIpedia", not "WPSKpedia".

[The previous unsigned comment was posted by Jtorey (talk · contribs), 11:50, 8 June 2007 (UTC) ]

What?!? Where are you getting this silliness? Wiki is not an acronym at all (it's a Hawaiian word for "fast"), and doesn't "stand for" anything. See Wiki.

See also WP:POLICY. Whatever you think Wikipedia should be but isn't, isn't for a reason, covered by Wikipedia policies. In particular, adding material that is not reliably sourced is not an option here. The MediaWiki software Wikipedia runs on is free; you can set up your own Wiki with your own rules somewhere else if you like. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:24, 8 June 2007 (UTC)

En dashes

Resolved

 – Discussion actually at manual of style talk pages.

WRT to your recent edit of the Dashes pages, will you please take a look at the comment against retaining the preference for hyphens in titles, and provide a rejoinder? Tony 08:45, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Can you please centralize this discussion? You have it being discussed at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dashes)#Proposed expanded version of advice on hyphens and dashes in MoS, again at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dashes)#Proposal for three substantive alterations, and yet again at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Hyphens and dashes in the MoS. The simplest way to do this would be to put {{Resolved|1=Discussion centralized [[LINK|here]].}} at the top of two of them, linking to the remaining active one. I would suggest that the second and third above should be merged into the first, especially in the case of the third (it isn't really appropriate to discuss sweeping changes to a guideline somewhere other than on that guideline's talk page; discussion elsewhere generally would not be evidentiary of consensus to change that guideline, since the editors most concered with that guideline are unlikely to notice the "extraterritorial" discussion.) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:13, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Alternatively, take the entire third discussion and refactor it out of Talk:MOS and into Talk:MOSDASH, then {{resolved}} the other threads there, referring to the larger discussion now in MOSDASH's talk page. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 21:16, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject banners

Resolved

 – Self-resolving chat.

Thanks for all the conversion work; you beat me to the snooker ones. :-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 03:26, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

Hey, no problem, it's actually a calming, near-mindless task that also satisfies my borderline OCD tendencies that have arisen from continued exposure to Wikipedia, LOL. Plus, the bad attitude of certain Anti-WikiProjectBannerShell editors has urged me to make as many templates compliant as possible and thus eliminate their ability to use that in an argument.

Sorry about the snookers. ;) TAnthony 14:56, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Admin coaching

Resolved

 – Question answered.

Greetings. Are you still interested in having a coach? Majorly (talk) 10:10, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

I am, but I don't presently have the real-world time to devote to the endeavor. Perhaps in the fall. I'll return to the admin coaching pages and sign up again when the time comes. :-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 22:58, 14 June 2007 (UTC)

Link to updated response from CBDunkerson (eom)

Resolved

 – Self-resolving FYI.

Noted. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 22:56, 14 June 2007 (UTC)