User talk:Stfg/Archive 1

Asrael Symphony

Thank you for improving the English in Asrael (symphony). Since I'm not a native English speaker, I apprecitate that very much! You can check the other articles, I've created, if you want, just visit my user page. Thanks again and welcome to wikipedia! Vejvančický (talk) 21:00, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Ediacaran-Early Cambrian skeletalization

Thanks you for editing my text! English is not my native language.

"even-aged". I wished to tell that the beds with sponge spicules in the China and Mongolia are both the same age. They're 580 millions years old.

A possible small distortion in:

My phrase: Secondly, except possibility to rise over the substrate, these tubes could give the protection against the environment and predators.

Your phrase: Secondly, these tubes made it possible to rise over the substrate while giving protection against the environment and predators.

Explanation. Tubes are carried out simultaneously by several functions: the vertically standing tubes are device to rise over a substrate and competitors for effective feeding and, to a lesser degree, for protection against predators; and tubes also are armor for protection against predators and adverse conditions of environment.

I have complexities with competent beautiful translation into English of my thoughts. I will be grateful to you for adaptation of these explanations for section Cambrian_explosion#Ediacaran.E2.80.93Early_Cambrian_skeletalization and its editing. My thanks! Aleksey (Alnagov (talk) 19:25, 6 June 2010 (UTC))

Thanks...

...for your help with the article Canis! Chrisrus (talk) 15:08, 28 July 2010 (UTC)

your revert

Hi, when changing an article is considered sweeping away other peoples work this is a strange understanding of what a wiki is. Better is the enemy of good. The image that I put there instead is FP on commons with a peer reviewed (technical) quality. There was even some discussion about what a good headliner image would be and I got some feedback that an image with a more isometric perspective would be preferred to a pure front view. --Ikiwaner (talk) 18:29, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Responded here. --Stfg (talk) 09:41, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Grevy's zebra

I apologize for my reverts. I went ahead and fix the problems you pointed to. Thank you for your consideration. Are you gonna give it a GA review? LittleJerry (talk) 03:58, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Zebra aggression

Stfg,

I remove the two references to aggression between zebra and wildebeest because they appear to be odd, even anomalous, events. There have been thousands of hours of observations of both of these species, and such aggression is apparently so exceedingly rare that we have only two such instances. I though describing each in detail gave them unjustified weight.

Mokogodo — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mukogodo (talk • contribs) 05:18, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

Good point. Thanks very much. --Stfg (talk) 10:38, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

Kite types .pdf links

Thanks again for your help in troubleshooting my problem; I was able to open one of the links in IE (couldn't find the other in a quick search) without any problem, so apparently it's a compatibility issue with Firefox. Wi2g 16:05, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for letting me know. A bit scary, that - Firefox isn't exactly rare :) --Stfg (talk) 21:45, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

GOCE / Mid-drive newsletter

Guild of Copy Editors March 2011 backlog elimination drive Greetings from the Guild of Copy Editors March 2011 Backlog elimination drive! Here is your mid-drive newsletter. Participation GOCE March 2011 backlog elimination drive progress graphs So far, 79 people have signed up for this drive. Of these, 64 have participated. Interest is high due to a link to our event from the Watchlist page, and many new and first-time copy editors have joined us for the drive. If you signed up for the drive but haven't participated yet, it's not too late! Try to copy edit at least a few articles. Remember, if you have rollover words from the last drive, you will lose them if you do not participate in this drive. If you haven't signed up for the drive yet, you can sign up now. Many thanks to those editors who have been helping out at the Requests page. We have assisted in the promotion of seven articles to Good article status so far this month. Progress report We have already achieved our target of reducing the overall backlog by 10%; however, we have more work to do with the 2009 backlog. We have almost eliminated May 2009 and we only have some 700 articles left from 2009. It is excellent progress, so let's concentrate our fire power on the remaining months from 2009. Thank you for participating in the March 2011 drive. We anticipate it will be another big success! Utahraptor resigns The UtahraptorTalk to me has decided to step down from his position as project coordinator due to real-life issues. Your drive coordinators – S Masters (talk), Diannaa (Talk) and Tea with toast (Talk)

Sent on behalf of the Guild of Copy Editors using AWB on 04:48, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

GOCE drive newsletter

Guild of Copy Editors March 2011 backlog elimination drive report Greetings from the Guild of Copy Editors March 2011 Backlog elimination drive. Thank you for participating in the March 2011 drive! This newsletter summarizes the March drive and other recent events. Participation GOCE March 2011 backlog elimination drive progress graphs There were 99 signups for the drive; of these, 70 participated. Interest was high mainly due to a link to our event from the Watchlist page. We had a record-breaking 84 articles listed on the Requests page in March; 11 of these have been promoted to Good article status so far. Several of our recent efforts have received Featured Article status as well, and the GOCE is becoming a solid resource for the Wikipedia community. Many thanks to editors who have been helping out at the Requests page and by copy editing articles from the backlog. Progress report Remarkable progress was made in reducing the backlog this month, as we now have fewer than 500 articles remaining from 2009. We are well under the 4,000-article mark for the total number remaining in the queue. Since our backlog drives began in May 2010 with 8,323 articles, we have cleared more than 53% of the backlog. A complete list of results and barnstars awarded can be found here. Barnstars will be distributed over the next week. If you enjoyed participating in our event, you may also like to join the Wikification drives, which are held on alternate months to our drives. Their April drive has started. New coodinators On March 21, SMasters appointed Chaosdruid (talk) and Torchiest (talk) as Guild coordinators to serve in place of The Utahraptor, who recently stepped down. Please feel free to contact any coordinator if you have any questions or need assistance. Your drive coordinators – S Masters (talk), Diannaa (Talk) and Tea with toast (Talk)

Sent on behalf of the Guild of Copy Editors using AWB on 14:39, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

GOCE barnstar

		The Cleanup Barnstar
		For copy editing 16 articles with a total of 15,973 words during the Guild of Copy Editors' March 2011 Backlog elimination drive. Thanks for all your contributions! SMasters (talk) 05:28, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

GOCE drive update

Guild of Copy Editors May 2011 backlog elimination drive update Greetings from the Guild of Copy Editors May 2011 Backlog elimination drive! Here is your mid-drive newsletter. Participation GOCE May 2011 backlog elimination drive progress graphs So far, 54 people have signed up for the drive, and 33 are actively participating. If you signed up for the drive but have not participated yet, it's not too late! Try to copy edit at least a few articles. Remember, if you have rollover words from the last drive, you will lose them if you do not participate in this drive. If you have not signed up for the drive yet, you can sign up now. If you have questions about getting started, feel free to talk to us. Many thanks to those editors who have been helping out at the Requests page. We currently have 17 articles awaiting edit. Progress report We are making slow progress on achieving our target of reducing the overall backlog by 15%; in order to accomplish this goal we will need to complete about 400 more articles. However, we are making good progress on the 2009 backlog, as we have eliminated over half of the articles from 2009 that were present at the start of the drive. Let's concentrate our fire power on the remaining months from 2009; leaderboard awards will be handed out for 2009 articles this drive. Thank you for participating in the May 2011 drive. We hope it will be another success! Your drive coordinators – S Masters (talk), Diannaa (Talk), Tea with toast, Chaosdruid, and Torchiest

Sent on behalf of the Guild of Copy Editors using AWB on 06:58, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

Capitalization of Les élémens

Please note the Opera Project guideline on capitalization which is: here. Thanks. --Kleinzach 01:52, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Apologies - I didn't know this one. Thanks for making me aware of it and for correcting the error. --Stfg (talk) 07:28, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

GOCE drive newsletter

Guild of Copy Editors May 2011 backlog elimination drive report Greetings from the Guild of Copy Editors May 2011 Backlog elimination drive. Thank you for participating! Participation GOCE May 2011 backlog elimination drive progress graphs There were 63 signups for the drive; of these, 45 participated. Although we did not award a bonus for articles from the Requests page this drive, we are not experiencing lengthy delays in getting the articles processed. Many thanks to editors who have been helping out at the Requests page and by copy editing articles from the backlog. Progress report During the month of May we reduced the backlog by approximately 10%, and made remarkable progress on eliminating articles tagged from 2009. There are now only 15 articles left, down from the 415 that were present when the drive started. Since our backlog drives began in May 2010 with 8,323 articles, we have cleared more than 54% of the backlog. A complete list of results and barnstars awarded can be found here. Barnstars will be distributed over the next week. If you enjoyed participating in our event, you may also like to join the Wikification drives, which are held on alternate months to our drives. Their June drive has started. Coodinator election The six-month term for our first tranche of Guild coordinators will be expiring at the end of June. We will be accepting nominations for the second tranche of coordinators, who will also serve a six-month term. Nominations will open starting on June 5. For complete information, please have a look at the election page. Please feel free to contact any coordinator if you have any questions or need assistance. Your project coordinators are S Masters (talk), Diannaa (Talk), Tea with toast (Talk), Chaosdruid (talk), and Torchiest (talk).

Sent on behalf of the Guild of Copy Editors using AWB on 08:25, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

May GOCE barnstar

		The Copyeditor's Barnstar
		This Barnstar is awarded to Stfg for copy edits of over 30,000 words during the May GOCE copy edit drive. Thank you very much for participating! --Diannaa (Talk) 02:18, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks!

	The Devil's Own Copyeditor
	Thanks for copyediting Tasmanian devil! Malkinann (talk) 21:40, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

Another: Thanks for copy editing Trent Daavettila! Two Hearted River (paddle / fish) 19:12, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

GOCE drive newsletter

Guild of Copy Editors July 2011 backlog elimination drive update GOCE July 2011 backlog elimination drive progress graphs Greetings from the Guild of Copy Editors July 2011 Backlog elimination drive! Here is your mid-drive newsletter. Participation So far, 45 people have signed up for the drive, of which 30 are actively participating, a very high participation rate. If you have not signed up for the drive yet, you can sign up now. If you have questions about getting started, feel free to talk to us. Progress report Progress has been less than that needed to meet our target for the drive (which would reduce the backlog by about 400 articles). Remember though, if everyone copy edits one or two articles every day, we will easily meet our goal. Many thanks to those editors who have been helping out at the Requests page. Reducing the number of articles on this list has been a major success of this drive. Thanks for participating! Your drive coordinators – Diannaa, Chaosdruid, The Utahraptor, Slon02 and SMasters

Sent on behalf of the Guild of Copy Editors using AWB on 05:04, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Yet another thanking...

I guess you may be bored to death by all the thanks you receive, but I really can't avoid giving you my meek and humble thankings for the not only great work you did with Helmichis, but for how fast you did it. So, thanks again! Ciao :-) Aldux (talk) 16:04, 24 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks very much Aldux. I enjoyed copyediting Helmichis. It was already very well written and it was nice for me to learn about something I've never heard of before. Best wishes, Simon. --Stfg (talk) 08:06, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Translation question

I see you added the following to Wikipedia:Translation:

"I have been put off by this problem quite often too. Would it be acceptable in such cases simply to replace the {{copyedit}} with either {{Cleanup-translation}} or {{Rough translation}}, or is this considered naughty? (Naturally, one should not take credit for article count or word count in when just doing this.)"

I think this belongs on the talk page. Perhaps you would like to move it there. I presume your question relates to circumstances where a translation is provided by a native English speaker with insufficient knowledge of the source-language culture. Perhaps you could clarify that. --Boson (talk) 13:42, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for drawing my attention to it. Actually, I'm really puzzled as to how I managed to put it there. It was meant to appear on a Guild of Copy Editors talk page. I looked around to learn about relevant templates, and put my question in the wrong place without realising it. I have removed it now. Apologies for the disruption.

My observation was not actually about native English speakers with insufficient knowledge, but about what copyeditors should do with articles tagged for copyediting when they are either (a) articles created by people with too little knowledge of English to be able to write intelligibly in English, and (b) machine translations copy-pasted into articles with no further effort. Making any sense of these goes far beyond copyediting, of course. --Stfg (talk) 14:57, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! I was a bit puzzled, but that explains it. In my experience, correction of machine translation usually involves going back to the original and re-translating manually; the machine translation is usually a hindrance. --Boson (talk) 15:31, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Copyeditor's Barnstar
	For your work on the Liverpool FC article in particular, but your GoCE work generally. Thanks! GedUK  16:14, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! I really appreciate that. --Stfg (talk) 17:57, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

GOCE July drive checks

Hi

I was going to take a look at your edits to May Revolution as part of the GOCE drive checking process, then realised it was much too large to be completed today, so I will endeavour to complete it after the drive is finished at 00:01 UTC.

First of all I noticed that nbsps in linked article titles are causing errors, as well as you having removed some links. Once I started looking in depth I realised it was going to take a long time to finish the checks and so I will complete it and leave notes here if necessary. Chaosdruid (talk) 17:56, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Hi Chaosdruid. Thanks for looking at this. I shall look forward to learning what you find.

About the nbsps, though, I am puzzled. Please note that I did not introduce the nbsps you corrected today. They were already there. The article before I started work had [[Ferdinand VII of Spain|Ferdinand VII]] and I simply removed the bit after the pipe, since I felt that "of Spain" was worth having visible. The other one you restored and amended originally read [[Peninsular War#Napoleon's campaign (October 1808 – January 1809)|a series of reversals]] before I started work. The reason I unlinked it is that the Peninsular War is wikilinked just two sentences previously. If I was mistaken to do that because of the pipe, please let me know. Also, on my system these links with the nbsps show as blue links and they go where they are meant to. What errors are you seeing? (Barring linking problems, nbsps would normally be wanted in those places, wouldn't they?)

Finally, yes, I found the article heavily overlinked and tried to improve this. Many of them were duplicates or I had moved the linking up to an earlier mention of the same thing (especially names). Many others were things like countries, which I unlinked per WP:OVERLINK. If you think I went too far in this, please let me know, and I'll also welcome any other comments you have. --Stfg (talk) 20:06, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

I have never seen nbsps in article titles before, nor in headers. On my system they definitely do not work. They go to an error page that says "maybe the link had bad characters in it" or something very similar. I cannot see the need for an nbsp in an article title or a header as they are probably never going to get close to the edge of the page, especially article titles. I think that there is something going on there that needs a little more looking in to.

I know you did not introduce the links, but I was just telling you that I had noticed there was a problem. I think there was one link that you had edited that had the nbsp in it, though I could clearly see that you had not added any of them. I just thought it strange that you hadn't spotted they weren't working, I guess that was because for you they were working fine :¬)

I will try and check through some more, I did get halfway down, but there is not really anything to say so far - apart from "good work" lol Chaosdruid (talk) 16:08, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

PS I forgot to say that the problem only occurs when in edit mode or when looking at diffs, when reading the article they work fine. I cannot understand why it is used though, even appearing in a file name for a picture - File:Ferdinand& nbsp;VII of Spain (1814) by Goya.jpg, something which is not even seen and so will not wrap!?! I believe they were all added after 2 January 2011, and after Diannaa's last copy edit, probably by Cambalachero [1]. Chaosdruid (talk) 16:33, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Ah, I see. It's something I would never notice, as I always edit with two windows, one with the article in it's pre-edit state and one with the edit box. When checking for linking problems, I do it in the first of those, so this problem would be invisible to me.

I agree that nbsp should not be needed to format an article title (I have text size set to largest, and a few article titles wrap then, but I think it doesn't matter.) Perhaps we just need to make a habit of piping links of this kind, even when not rephrasing the article title, for example: [[Number 7 grommet|Number 7 grommet]]. Does this need to be said somewhere? And how many people will actually remember to do it? --Stfg (talk) 16:47, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Lol, that sounds like a MoS discussion, I sense a nice can of worms opening and a three month debate :¬)

I could not find anything specific in any of the MoS or linking guides. It is a fairly recent trend I suspect, and so someone will probably have to start the debate at some point. I did feel apprehensive about starting such a discussion, but have started one at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (linking)#nbsp in wikilinks (we could also do it through other channels - jointly for moral support and to shield each other when the MoS sticks and beatings get too much lol).

I also discovered that I should not be changing redirects on pages that I was editing! (*Piping and redirects in Wikipedia:Manual of Style (linking)#Piped links) Chaosdruid (talk) 18:29, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Ugh! I do hope not to spend the rest of August reading MoS talk pages and the like. Having posted that question about commas in dates, I had to watchlist it and see all that arcane stuff about ndashes, an experience I hope not to repeat! Anyway, having seen the replies to your post, I now understand the problems you had (I never knew about popups, you see). I've posted my 2d worth, but will now leave it to the experts to decide what is best ;) --Stfg (talk) 09:55, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Spider ID

Looks like you're 'active' here, and from Talk:Spider I wondered if you might be able to help out with some spider-ID-ing, on Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Miscellaneous#Spiders.  Chzz  ►  15:42, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi. I'm very sorry, but I don't have this expertise. Opisthothelae are well up the Linnaean hierarchy, and it was a rather simple issue. Identifying species is much harder. Good luck. --Stfg (talk) 16:18, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

link clicking

Hi

Sorry about all the confusion. I think that Robert has confused the thread by concentrating on pop-ups, rather than my original post which mentioned editing and diffs, and had nothing to do with pop-ups at all. Pop-ups do not work either though, they are the third problem, not the main problems, somthing that has become muddied by Robert. Sorry if you though anything was your fault, you were actually making important contributions.

I was trying to steer the discussion back on course as a lot of the posts are now talking about different pop-up related issues rather than the main ones :¬) Chaosdruid (talk) 17:57, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi. Thanks very much. I don't use any of those tools. To check links, if they are already in the article I use the article page; if they aren't, I either wait for the preview or use a sandbox. Anyway, my point will have been understood by everyone by now: that whatever we use to check links needs to behave compatibly with what happens in ordinary windows. Cheers, Simon --Stfg (talk) 18:05, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

GOCE drive report

Guild of Copy Editors July 2011 backlog elimination drive report GOCE July 2011 backlog elimination drive progress graphs Greetings from the Guild of Copy Editors July 2011 Backlog elimination drive. Thank you for participating! Here is your end-of-drive report. Participation 50 people signed up for the drive, of which 39 participated. Thanks to all who copy edited articles and helped us reduce the backlogs in both the total articles and requests. We offered a bonus for copy edits from the Requests page, and have been somewhat successful in reducing that backlog, as a record 89 new requests were received in the month of July. Progress report During the month of July we reduced the backlog by 338 articles, or by about 8.5%. We did not reach our goal of a 10% reduction, but we came close, and did very well considering the small size of the group participating. Since our Backlog elimination drives began in May 2010, we have reduced the backlog by 4,708 articles. End-of-drive results can be found here. We will be handing out barnstars within the next week or two. Requests page Please remember that the GOCE Requests page is receiving a high number of requests, with the number of August requests already above three per day. Any assistance to help keep the backlog down would be greatly appreciated. Our next drive will be in September. We hope to see you there! Your drive coordinators – Diannaa, Chaosdruid, The Utahraptor, Slon02 and SMasters

Sent on behalf of the Guild of Copy Editors using AWB on 16:43, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

GOCE Barnstar July 2011 drive

		The Barnstar of Diligence
		This barnstar is awarded to Stfg for copy editing articles totalling over 60,000 words during the GOCE July copy edit drive. Thank you very much for participating! -- Chaosdruid (talk) 01:45, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

		Leaderboard Award – Number of Articles of 5,000 words or more– Tied 2nd Place
		This Leaderboard Barnstar is awarded to Stfg for copy editing five articles of 5k+ words during the Guild of Copy Editors' July 2011 Backlog elimination drive. Congratulations on winning this prestigious award. Thank you for your hard work. -- Chaosdruid (talk) 01:45, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

		The 10k Copy Edit Barnstar
		This is awarded to Stfg for copy editing two articles, 10,184 in May Revolution and 10,283 in Tasmanian devil, of 10,000+ words during the July 2011 Guild of Copy Editors Backlog elimination drive. Thank you for your outstanding effort! -- Chaosdruid (talk) 13:42, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Apologies

Apologies - this month the list was pre-compiled for us, so I have also corrected the awards list :¬) Chaosdruid (talk) 13:42, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

No worries. Thanks very much. --Stfg (talk) 13:47, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

Please observe inuse tags

I did. Prior to edit the page I checked the history to know when was your last edit, and since it was 40 minutes before, I assumed you were not around. My edits anyway were not focused in the text, I was checking the sources, so I did not reverted any of your edits. I understand the importance of the inuse tag, and I'm sorry if I did wrong. I'll wait for you to finish before I do further editing, thanks for taking the time to c/e.--GDuwenTell me! 19:05, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks very much. In this case no problem happened, but I sometimes take more than 40 minutes between saves, especially if references have to be viewed to check that a proposed new wording is valid. Best, --Stfg (talk) 19:18, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

In that case, I have to apologize again. I'll wait till you're done to keep working in the article. Thanks.--GDuwenTell me! 19:26, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Ducie Island

Your GOCE copyedit of Ducie Island is really fantastic. I've just been an observer, but I wanted to personally thank you for doing such a thorough and helpful review. All the best, – Quadell ^(talk) 15:44, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Quadell. Comments like that really make it worth it. Best wishes, Simon. --Stfg (talk) 15:46, 16 August 2011 (UTC)

A barnstar for you

		The Special Barnstar
		I give you this barnstar for reciting your well-written poem which I thoroughly enjoyed. Very clever. The UtahraptorTalk/Contribs 14:06, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

:)) Thanks! --Stfg (talk) 14:08, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

6th Airlanding Brigade (United Kingdom)

Hi I was just doing some small tweaking, finished now if you want to continue. Jim Sweeney (talk) 20:25, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

OK, thanks. I dived in a bit quick there, but will start now. Cheers, --Stfg (talk) 20:30, 20 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi, in those situations the only thing I can do is offer you what I would do under those same circumstances.

I would copy everything from the bottom window into the top window and hit the big save button. If you do not know what this does, then I will explain; if you do know, skip to the next bit :¬) The bottom window of the edit conflict page has your changes, and the top is the already saved version by the other editor who worked on it after you started. Highlight everything in the bottom window, copy it all, highlight all in the top, paste (so that both top and bottom windows are the same), and hit save. It basically overwrites everything that they just did, rather than you losing your work.

(next bit) I then check the history, tell what has happened and remind them that they need to go and redo their work and please pay more attention to the inuse tags (it has happened a few times to me, so I know how it feels - on one occasion it happened three times in succession over a 30 minute copy-editing session, I even left messages on their talk page after the second one and they still did it a third ec!).

I know I have probably said this before, but try and remember to just do one section at a time, that way it is less frustrating when these things happen, and if not at least less work is ruined. Remember though, your edits are probably going to be a lot bigger than any conflict during a copy-edit session. Most often they are fixing one or two typos, a ref here and there, or removing whitespace etc.

Anyway, hope you are ok and haven't pulled out all your hair! Chaosdruid (talk) 03:38, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Hi Chaosdruid. Hair maybe a bit whiter, but still intact, thanks. I actually pasted only over the clashing "tweak", not the other two which weren't involved in the conflict. (Maybe I should have been more brutal and overwritten the lot, but that seems a bit negative.) Normally, I just put a note on the offender's talk page and wait for a response before continuing. But on this occasion, the requester had actually posted (above) that I was clear to go, and then effectively broke his word, not once, but three times. In the face of such treatment, I feel it's unwise to be too nice.

I only use the section edit button for very minor edits. I'd use it more if there was a facilty to preview citations in the preview window. I know the trick of including a {{reflist}} in the edit and removing it before saving, but I too often forget to remove it, and that's embarrassing. Do you know a better solution?

P.S. Thanks for reviewing Ducie Island. --Stfg (talk) 10:09, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

What I should have said: I wasn't asking for help on how to deal with edit conflicts, which I understand quite well. My purpose was to warn GOCE folks that the article seemed not to be stable and there might be a risk of their time being wasted. After the article went quiet for 3 days, I removed those statements. Also, I decide whether to edit on a section or article basis according to my own method of working. That is my right, and I haven't asked for advice about it either.

Chaosdruid, I have the feeling you may have subconsciously started to see yourself as some kind of unoffical mentor to me. Please understand that I would consider that inappropriate and would not consent to it. --Stfg (talk) 18:35, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Boldface

I take it you are referring to the individual island paragraphs? (if not then forgive me because that is what I am going to take it you meant for now lol :¬)

I read it as if that was a bulleted list (or child list) - as it is not defining any terms I discounted it being a definitions list. The bullets provide emphasis and separate the paragraphs for the reader.

In that children example, from the MoS page, I am sure the use of boldface for New York and the three buildings in that example is for emphasis only, in other words so that the viewer can easily see how the prose is split into a short list. I would vehemently protest any such use of boldface in an actual article as it is against MoS and I see such boldening regularly removed. This did come up as I began to see more and more TV and film articles using boldface in the cast lists. I had a definitive answer from the TV project where 3 or 4 of their most prolific editors agreed that they should not be in boldface. I did ask them to change their style guide and/or project MoS to match.

I have used definitions lists on occasion, such as in the Robotics article. I am not against them, nor uses of ;Something for separating as a header without a level (i.e. no ===), but certainly not in the middle of prose unless it is another common usage of the article title or derivative of it. I hope that answers your query :¬) Chaosdruid (talk) 13:27, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

I just noticed your revert lol. I should have put "... who departed in 1790 to capture ..." instead of moving the date to the end. Chaosdruid (talk) 14:10, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Better still, just leave it as is. "was sent" is just as correct there as is "departed". Moreover, "was sent" gives information that "departed" does not.--Stfg (talk) 20:22, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict). Actually, the boldface thread was different from this thread about the 6th Airlanding Brigade edit conflicts, but OK. Yes, I was thinking of the list of islets, and no, it isn't a definition list; it is an embedded list and not merely "in the middle of prose". The bolding serves as a kind of not-for-TOC paragrah header; this is for lists of substantial paragraphs, not for the likes of cast lists. I disagree with your interpretation of the bolds in the children list example, but in any case, are you saying that the MOS fails to comply with itself here or here? And there are plenty more examples lower down. And where to you see MOS proscribing this kind of formatting of emebedded lists anyway? --Stfg (talk) 14:03, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Well, I was just carrying on from your comment thanking me for the review.

The cast lists I am talking about are ones like this Fringe_(TV_series)#Characters or The_Bill#Cast, more the same size as the Ducie paragraphs. There are larger ones as well, as was the one I enquired to the TV project about. THe other point to mention is that the MoS pages are not article pages and so, strangely enough, it seems that MoS may not necessarily apply to them - hence the seeming inconsistencies.

Nonetheless, Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(text_formatting)#Boldface does not include an entry saying that child lists should have their words boldened. Indeed the example from the childlist on the MoS embedded lists page is a little out of date as "New York City" is not in bold in the article itself. I do not think that they should be boldened, as I have already stated. I would even go so far as to say that should be removed. They are boldened in both the prose example, as well as the list example - both against the current MoS. I have raised that very issue on the talk page and changed the embedded lists page, as the change was in 2006 and even then the editors discussing it mentioned boldening should not be done as it was against MoS.

I see you have said there, "there is nothing in MoS to say that boldface can be used in this manner". This is not the same as saying there is something in MoS to forbid it. That is why I started out by asking whether you considered that list inclusive or exclusive. --Stfg (talk) 20:22, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

It also appears that you have misconstrued my comments, I said "in the middle of prose" about the two examples of prose and list on the embedded lists page, not about Ducie. Chaosdruid (talk) 15:01, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Ah, very good. So this was not an argument against the Ducie author's usage, then?

(Note: I am out tomorrow and am most unlikely to see anything more before Friday.) --Stfg (talk) 20:22, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

"nothing in MoS" - The 2006 conversation seems to say that the only mention in MoS about boldface at that time was "for article titles only". MoS currently says "only in a few special cases" and gives a few exclusions to a general blanket ban on boldface; as "in children lists" is not given there as an exception, then it is against MoS.

For longer paragraphs I use the ;Something or a level 5 header - I think the bulleted list is most appropriate solution in the Ducie article though. The Ducie boldening may have been a result of the editor only reading the children list entry and not knowing about the blanket ban covered by WP:MOS.

A similar occurrence came up with italics Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(text_formatting)#MoS_Italics_and_projects - once one starts applying MoS to punctuation and other more specific areas of MoS, things can get a little tricky. Often editors copy what other editors do, something that leads to multiple articles being incorrectly formatted and can give the impression that they are correct as "everyone does it that way".

As a matter of interest, there are always ongoing discussions about these topics: Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(novels)#Boldfacing_Character_Names_in_Characters_Section.3F this and Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(text_formatting)#Opinions_Needed_-_Boldfacing_Character_Names_in_Non-List_Article this being the latest; though MOS:FILM does include "Neither the actor nor role name should be bolded." Chaosdruid (talk) 04:30, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

Ah, at last you have answered the question I asked! Thank you. No need for all that stuff about discussions in 2006 and the rest.

(Note: my current plans are to archive all threads on this page some time tomorrow, after which this and the previous thread will be considered closed. If there's any more you want to say, please go ahead by about 10:00 UTC. I've said all I want to.) --Stfg (talk) 18:50, 25 August 2011 (UTC)

GOCE drive newsletter

Invitation from the Guild of Copy Editors The Guild of Copy Editors invites you to participate in their September 2011 Backlog elimination drive, a month-long effort to reduce the size of the copy editing backlog. The drive will begin on September 1 at 00:00 (UTC) and will end on September 30 at 23:59 (UTC). We will be tracking the number of 2010 articles in the backlog, as we want to copy edit as many of those as possible. Please consider copy editing an article that was tagged in 2010. Barnstars will be given to anyone who edits more than 4,000 words, with special awards for the top 5 in the categories "Number of articles", "Number of words", and "Number of articles of over 5,000 words". See you at the drive! – Your drive coordinators: Diannaa, Chaosdruid, The Utahraptor, Slon02, and SMasters. >>> Sign up now <<<

Sent on behalf of the Guild of Copy Editors using AWB on 17:05, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

Archived notes striken out

Hi

It seems there is something going on here that is more than just you asking a question that "I hope you won't mind", indeed it seems that you have had a rather severe turnaround in attitude towards me. Let me be clear, I certainly am not subconsciously mentoring you, I simply offered advice to which you seemed to have no problem with. You placed messages on the GOCE requests page, discussed things at length with the editor, and I offered advice on how to get around that problem - something which you at first had no objection to. Why your opinion changed I do not know, though I would certainly be interested to find out.

Your statement, "Also, I decide whether to edit on a section or article basis according to my own method of working. That is my right, and I haven't asked for advice about it either." is about something that GOCE editors often encounter. You will find many comments advising GOCE editors to try and do articles one section at a time rather than a whole article at once, it is not just my personal opinion but a method of working that GOCE members advise to avoid problems with reverts, edit conflicts, and other issues that single edit methods might cause.

You have an issue with me over the use of boldface in child lists and I cannot help but think that you have taken something personally and allowed it to spill over, causing you to strike through the previously collegiate and chatty comments in User_talk:Stfg/Archive_1#6th_Airlanding_Brigade_.28United_Kingdom.29

I am a GOCE coordinator and I believe this needs to be resolved so that we can continue to work together. Chaosdruid (talk) 16:54, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

I have only just seen your post on the GOCE coordinators page. I will respond there and not trouble you any further with comments here. Chaosdruid (talk) 17:03, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

I haven't taken anything personally. I've been irritated (no more than that), but I think what I've written expresses why, and I don't really want to add to or subtract from it. By "work together", I assume you mean coexist; if so, you need not worry about it. I have no intention of making mischief for you and, assuming you have none against me, there is room for us both. --Stfg (talk) 07:53, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Apologies, my niece was taken severely ill and was in hospital in New York during the hurricane. I only found out about it the 27th and is one reason, along with another RL matter, which resulted in me being AWOL since the 29th. I also return to work tomorrow and am unlikely to available much until the weekend, though I will try and catch up between then and now. I would answer you assumption now though - I really did mean work together, be it simply within GOCE to strive for a better accountability and quality of our output on GA/FA requests or just improving Wikipedia in general. I realise that you may think this untenable, and that coexistence is the only resort, but I hope that is not the case.

Chaosdruid (talk) 18:59, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

(←) It will be coexistence. My feelings on all this are reasonably expressed in Wikipedia:Dig. I do not see that your position as a GOCE coordinator gives you any need to work with me. I remind you of the opening paragraph of WP:GOCE/COORD: "[GOCE's project coordinators] ... do not, however, have any authority over article content or editor conduct ...". To be blunt, I find the notion of striving for "better accountability" presumptuous: this is Wikipedia, not a company with employees. You phrased part of your unsolicited advice to me as follows: "I know I have probably said this before, but try and remember to just do one section at a time, that way it is less frustrating when these things happen, and if not at least less work is ruined." I won't work with someone who talks down to me to that extent, who railroads a perfectly reasonable discussion I raise (boldface), and who, seeing (correctly) that I have implied something, refers to the implying as "insinuating". As I've said, I intend not to make mischief for you. I know you are a person of good faith and will not make any for me. But we won't be working jointly on anything in future. --Stfg (talk) 18:10, 7 September 2011 (UTC)