Wikipedia talk:Typo Team/Archive 5

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Encylopedia

A search by Jonesey95 in Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 April 15#Encylopedia turned up 14,000+ instances of this error, suggesting that it hasn't been looked for before. A search for "Encylopaedia" turned up several thousand more. Arrggghhhhh! The only mercy is that a good proportion are on talk pages. Narky Blert (talk) 05:38, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

@Narky Blert: Don't panic! There are currently only 64 matches for encylopedia in mainspace and only 24 matches for encylopaedia in mainspace -- John of Reading (talk) 06:46, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Whew! Early morning panic over. Narky Blert (talk) 06:47, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

...plus two Encylopædia and (best of all) one EncylopÆdia. We also have several cases of Enyclopedia, Enyclopaedia, Enyclopædia, Encylopedias, Encylcopedia, Encylcopaedia, Encylcopedias, etc. Is it worth adding a typo regex for these or shall I just fix them? Certes (talk) 13:13, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

@Certes: You could try extending the "Encyclopedia (2)" spelling rule. (The "Encyclopedia (1)" rule is currently disabled because it tries to correct the valid -ae- spelling to the -e- spelling). -- John of Reading (talk) 13:21, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

This search (159 results) excludes namespaces that we probably don't want to modify, but extends beyond mainspace to things like template documentation. Someone might want to manually run through them and make appropriate corrections. – Jonesey95 (talk) 14:40, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

I've fixed A-H (54 everything in mainspace (about 100 articles) using "\b([eE])n(?!cycl)[cly]+op(ae|[eæ])di(as?|c)\b" → "$1ncyclop$2di$3" in place of "Encyclopedia (2)". That seems a rather liberal regex but doesn't seem to match any legitimate words. Apart from the usual cases of editors correctly citing misspelt sources, the only problem I've had is that the change may trigger after the specific rules to use æ for Britannica etc, so correcting "Enlyclycopedia Britannica" fully would take two edits. Do we want to consider that regex or does it look too slack for safe inclusion? Certes (talk) 18:29, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Template for wrapping Spanish words in English Wikipedia

Which template should I wrap around a Spanish word in Puerto Rican articles? This one:( { { lang|spa|albahaca } } which I just saw today or this one which I've been using all along for years. ({ { lang|es|albahaca } } --The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 15:02, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

@The Eloquent Peasant: I hadn't come across {{lang|spa}} before, but "spa" looks like a non-standard language abbreviation equivalent to "es". It seems to work in the same way as {{lang|es}}, so it's definitely not worth the effort of changing; if it ever gets deprecated, a bot should be along to do that. I know one other example: {{lang}} accepts "jp" as equivalent to "ja"; something I discovered by accident, by knowing "jp" as the standard abbreviation for Japan(ese) in other situations. I'd keep using "es", for the same reason as I've switched to "ja".

I tend to prefer {{lang-es}} over {{lang|es}}; unless there's so much of a non-English language in an article that it's very clear what the language is and the reiteration of Spanish in every instance would be distracting and annoying. Narky Blert (talk) 06:04, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

@Narky Blert: Thank you for the tip. --The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 16:28, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

corona virus -> coronavirus

I'm noticing "corona virus" instead of "coronavirus" a fair bit. Is this something that could be added to your list of typos? Cheers, Tdslk (talk) 19:08, 14 June 2020 (UTC)

@Tdslk: I've gone ahead & fixed most of the cases of this (I clocked 139). I'm sure there are a few that I missed, however. 0qd (talk) 23:34, 2 July 2020 (UTC)

Adding " its' " to the list

If the report does not already include " its' " (apostrophe error; fix is usually but not always to remove the apostrophe), can someone please add it? I am seeing about 200 errors currently. – Jonesey95 (talk) 04:32, 28 July 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:Bot requests § Bot for fixing italicizations of movie/newspaper/etc. names

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Bot requests § Bot for fixing italicizations of movie/newspaper/etc. names. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 03:41, 16 September 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Template talk:R from misspelling § Does anything happen when a page with this template is linked from mainspace?

 You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:R from misspelling § Does anything happen when a page with this template is linked from mainspace?. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 03:37, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

Why removing spaces in section headings and blank lines after them?

Recently, there was an edit summary [[WP:TYPO]], where one typo was fixed.

Also, one plural was changed from [[frozen foods]] to [[frozen food]]s? We've nearly 20 years of posts by wikimedia software authors saying redirects are both useful and painless. We've [[Template:R from plural]]. And WP:NOTBROKEN. There's no reason to change them.

But many section headers have the spaces removed, and the blank line following them removed? We've years of edits with section headers in this form: (== Title ==), followed by a blank line. The wikimedia software handles them properly. This is how the "New section" tab adds sections. This is the prefered format for those of us using the built-in or external line editors, who don't just preview; we also review changes, and that diff is better formatted with abundant new lines.

Why?
William Allen Simpson (talk) 01:14, 5 August 2020 (UTC)

@William Allen Simpson: You're addressing minor changes that I in particular tend to make while fixing typos, rather than any standard of the Typo Team. My general practice is to make section spacing consistent within an article. Having spaces around the title or a blank line after the heading are fine, but they should be the same all the way through the article. I won't edit an article solely to fix these, but I will do it in passing while I'm there for something else. Likewise with links to plural redirects. There is no benefit to linking to frozen foods over frozen food; it is not a redirect with possibilities, or any of the other "Reasons not to bypass redirects". I clean them up in passing, since it makes things very slightly more efficient. What is your rationale for changing them back? Nick Number (talk) 02:12, 5 August 2020 (UTC)

Speaking as a former contributor to the wikimedia software, and now infrequent editor, I've already given my rationale above. There is no efficiency (however slight) in "cleaning them up", and it makes the editable text less legible. If you were actually making "section spacing consistent within an article", then you would have added spacing to the 3 headers missing them, not the dozen or so that you changed. The actual wiki coded headings of the MOS use spacing, even though some examples do not. There's a reason given in the code:<!--While some editors prefer spaces around "Title", please do not insert spaces in the examples on this page, as they may cause awkward line-wrapping in the examples.--> I'm glad to learn that this is not a common practice here, despite WP:TYPO being the sole edit summary given. Let's make it a general practice not to do this anymore.
William Allen Simpson (talk) 02:23, 5 August 2020 (UTC)

I use WP:LintHint, WP:AutoEd, spellcheck, then preview before publishing. If all that these tools suggest is moving spaces around I don't bother saving the edit. If they fix any real issues (a typo or a closing italic without an opening italic, for example) my save applies the fixes that make formatting consistent along with the important fix. --Guy Macon (talk) 09:13, 5 August 2020 (UTC)

@William Allen Simpson: Good question. The most important part I guess is consistency. My experience is that most of the section headings in mature articles lack the spaces and newline for section headings. If I'm cleaning up an article and I notice headings are inconsistent in an article, I change it to be consistent, which more often than not is to a form without the spaces and newlines. I also admit I strongly prefer the compact version because it helps with readability of the source. Each newline after a visible section heading means one less line of source will be visible in the text editor's text field, which on a normal widescreen monitor on a desktop browser is already getting quite squeezed for vertical space and "fluffy" source code makes it harder to spot non-local issues. That said, the new section button adding whitespace does not mean there's a preferred format. A "preferred format" to me implies some sort of editor consensus. There is no such consensus but, if anything, I think from my editing it seems like the editors lean towards no whitespace more than otherwise as a "preferred format". Jason Quinn (talk) 04:04, 16 November 2020 (UTC)

@Jason Quinn: @Guy Macon: @Nick Number: Based upon the replies, this is not about making anything consistent, or about a preferred format, or article maturity. Apparently, this is a function of the AutoEd whitespace script. It does not check for consistency, it merely removes all the spaces and blank lines. There are years of warnings about AutoEd. Examining its regexp, it looks like a rather serious mistake in programming that has been spreading around wikipedia. Any article that has been around for a long time will probably have been hit by this virus.
William Allen Simpson (talk) 21:32, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

If you dislike something that AutoEd does, you should, first, bring it up with the author and see if they are willing to change it, and, second. if that doesn't work post an RfC at MOSTALK to see if the community agrees with you. Complaining about AutoEd on Wikipedia talk:Typo Team is pointless. --Guy Macon (talk) 00:39, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

IRC Channel

Is there an IRC channel for the Typo Team? If there isn't, I think someone should create one. An IRC channel would allow for faster, more direct support for any questions about particular typos or the Typo Team in general. Kenneth Sweezy _{Talk to me..... Please?} 18:59, 8 August 2020 (UTC)

We don't seem to have a rush of volunteers for this one. I for one appreciate having the discussion in one place and on wiki. I appreciate that there are people who like IRC and use it for urgent stuff like blocking a currently active vandal. But I think typo fixing benefits from on wiki discussion and doesn't have the same urgency. ϢereSpielChequers 15:08, 26 November 2020 (UTC)

Typo on Tommy John Surgery Page

The word “recronstruction” appears in the article for Tommy John Surgery. Enjoy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.111.143.106 (talk) 06:05, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing this out. Next time you see a spelling error, feel free to edit the article yourself - that's how I got started at Wikipedia, ten years ago now. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:38, 21 April 2021 (UTC)

Typographical error article

Hi, I wanted to bring attention to the article typographical error. I was firstly concerned with the poor treatment of scribal errors and printing issues, but more modern aspects (frequency, causes, tools,...) probably also need attention. If you have some more theoretical interest in typos, just know some good sources or have other improvements, please stop by. Personuser (talk) 18:31, 22 May 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing insititute

search: insititute, a misspelling of genius, occurs 4 times, the rest,10, are redirects. There were very many, in many contexts.
Was Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser used? .... 0mtwb9gd5wx (talk) 07:07, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

@0mtwb9gd5wx: "insititute" is on my list, but I have no easy way to check when I last tackled that one. I use AutoWikiBrowser to fix spellings; more detail at User:John of Reading/Typo fixing with AutoWikiBrowser. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:45, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

genius and genious ... ingenious

search: genious, a misspelling of genius, occurs 44 times. (Genious redirects to Genius), some are (sic) .... 0mtwb9gd5wx (talk) 06:51, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

I replied at Wikipedia:Help desk#Spell Check BOT invocation: All the search results are proper names, titles, quotes or redirects. Do not change any of them unless you have checked the source doesn't say genious. PrimeHunter (talk) 10:58, 24 June 2021 (UTC)

A huge list of probable typos and misspellings

This is a list of probable typos generated for the Wikipedia dump from 1-jul-2021. Short excerpt. Full list. A blog post about it. Explanation of my method. ( Done by User:Yurichev )

Previous talk about it: Wikipedia_talk:Typo_Team/Archive_4#A_huge_list_of_probable_typos_and_misspellings.

Interesting. Some of the terms with many hits, e.g. "assista", are valid foreign words, spelled correctly. It looks like your method includes titles within references and/or citation templates, which it probably should not do, since many titles are in foreign languages. Similarly, the method catches a word like "Plastick", which is part of the name of a record label, and "Heuven", which is a surname. It should probably ignore capitalized words. See How the moss lists are made for more information about how to reduce false positives. – Jonesey95 (talk) 14:01, 17 July 2021 (UTC)

Repellant

I notice that between the spellings of repellent and repellant around 12-13% are the latter. Would be interested to hear if others consider repellant to be a misspelling? It's not in the typo list. - Neils51 (talk) 12:00, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

It looks like a legitimate variant. See this ngram and Webster. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:46, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

Judge misspelled as Jugde

Hi. I was looking for typos and found that about 7 articles had "judge" misspelled as "jugde". I don't really know if there's a way to submit this sort of stuff to be added to tools or whatever but that shows it's pretty probable even though it's not listed on Wikipedia:Typo Team/moss.

Also the links to the July version of the "huge list" of typos listed at Wikipedia:Typo_Team#A_huge_list_of_probable_typos_and_misspellings are all broken (cc: User:Yurichev). Thanks, DemonDays64 (talk) 07:47, 15 August 2021 (UTC)

All fixed: https://yurichev.com/news/20210717_wikipedia_typos/ Wikipedia:Typo_Team#A_huge_list_of_probable_typos_and_misspellings --Yurichev (talk) 18:37, 15 August 2021 (UTC)

@DemonDays64: Hmm, "jugde" should in fact show up in the by-article moss "main listing" reports, though we only get around to each article once every one or two years. It's not on moss's list of likely frequent misspellings because it's not frequent enough...and actually, I just checked, and there are currently no such misspellings in any articles. (Yay!) It might be worthwhile to add it to Wikipedia:Lists of common misspellings/J and/or Wikipedia:Lists of common misspellings/For machines which will likely cause any such typos to be fixed faster while editors are fixing other things. -- Beland (talk) 23:47, 24 September 2021 (UTC)

Typo fix request process

Hi Typo Team - Good work you're doing over here. I wasn't able to see how one requests a typo fix. I volunteer at the help desk and copy editing guild, and another editor pointed out that "Institute" is misspelled 92 times as "Insititute". Here's the post. Wikipedia:Help_desk#Insititute_Institute_92. I confirmed that it's misspelled, but it may not be as many as 92 times now - people may be fixing them. I fixed one. The poster was directed to seek help at the language reference desk. I then posted at the Guild of Copy Editors to see if they had a better suggestion, and they suggested I try here. I added it to Wikipedia:Lists of common misspellings/I, but was wondering if there's a way to post a typo fix project to give it more attention? Is adding it to that common misspelling list enough? I also noticed that when I click on "insitute" on the list, a single entry of the misspelling from sister projects (in this case, textbooks from Wikibooks) appears to the right of the main results. I fixed two at Wikibooks already but wonder if there's a similar way to flag those, short of going to that project and putting the misspelling in the search box and doing it myself? TimTempleton ^{(talk) (cont)} 01:39, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

@Timtempleton: That was the right thing to do; I just checked and there were only two instances of this typo on Wikipedia, and I fixed both. Future instances will also be detected and fixed by the moss site-wide spell check, though so far each article is only corrected once or twice a year, depending on how fast volunteers can fix misspellings. -- Beland (talk) 23:32, 24 September 2021 (UTC)

Looking for more? Plug this into Wiki search (leave off trailing close quote) - "insititute"||"insitute - Neils51 (talk) 23:38, 25 September 2021 (UTC)

Lay-by & layby

My understanding of 'lay-by' is that it is the shoulder of a road, etc., and there was only one spelling, the same in the UK & US (can have a different meaning in Oceania). The major dictionaries would seem to bear this out also. I note though the use of 'layby' in some UK transport related websites. Is this a typo? The spelling of 'lay-by' against 'layby', in Wikipedia is around 2:1. Thoughts? - Neils51 (talk) 07:43, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

"Layby" is a form of payment for goods by instalments in advance. It's also an alternative spelling of the parking place, at least in the UK, unless these are all typos: [1] [2] [3]. Certes (talk) 11:46, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

Thanks Certes, perhaps they are typos. I am struggling to find a competent resource that says otherwise. "Lay-by" is fairly new and the original and as far as I can see the only meaning of "layby" is "to set aside for future needs". - Neils51 (talk) 02:25, 4 November 2021 (UTC)

Not exactly "Typos" per se, but grammar, and I do not know where else to put this (still "new")

Hi all. Happy to have my hand slapped if I put this in the "wrong place", but I need to learn, so here we go...

I have decided to undertake a new project of identifying and cleaning up all the "Notable people" sections that tend to be on most towns/cities pages of the wiki, all over the globe. There are many of them, so this would essentially be a never ending project. The slight "typos" here have more to do with cleaning up and making consistent the form of each name as presented on those pages. For instance. One page might have:

Option A. John Doe (1900–1990) writer, lawyer, doctor

Another might have,

Option B. John Doe (1900-1990) — writer, lawyer, doctor

and yet another might have,

Option C. John Doe (1900-1990) Writer, lawyer, doctor

Slight differences above as you can see, and there are more variations, but I am partial to option "A". All lower case, and no "." period at the end. Also no "em dash" or other punctuation after the close of parentheses for years active/alive in the particular town/city. I am already moving forward with some of this work, but if someone knows of a place where they are discussing this sort of project and making headway, I'd be happy to work with any team that already has a single format in mind as optimal. While I am aware that wikipedia has no set leadership or guide on this at times, I'm just trying to help clean some of this up and to make it more consistent across "Notable people" pages... doing one small part to help. :) Th78blue (talk) 14:42, 20 October 2021 (UTC)

Also, please "ping" me so I know when there is a response to this. Th78blue (talk) 15:54, 20 October 2021 (UTC)

Lastly, please see the following pages for pages that I have completed in this style, or that I am still working on. I plan to do this for every single page ever created for every town and city with a "Notable people" list (ambitious I know... happy to have help! Or to bring this up in another group? Or do I create a "Wikiproject" for "Notable people"?? This is all still fairly new to me, but I'm hooked. Wikipedia:Wikipediholic

• List of people from Philadelphia
• List of people from Portsmouth, New Hampshire
• List of people from Key West, Florida
• List of people from St. Petersburg, Florida
• Notable people from Dagestan

And so on... all of these (and more) I am trying to bring under a single, more clean-looking format. So far I have not met with any resistance, and have even been thanked for adding to these pages. I suspect people appreciate some streamlining here, but I also want to be stopped before I go much further IF something like this already exists out in the etherspace... If on the other hand I am trailblazing, then I just want to ensure there is some support or agreement for the formatting choices at the outset, so that I don't wake up one day to some rollback and cry myself to sleep that night.. Th78blue (They/Them/Theirs • talk) 20:05, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

Hi @Th78blue: I think that it is admirable that you have taken on this area as a personal project. My comment here is largely ‘generic’. I can assure you that a variety of people will have read your post here and that probably their ‘response’ has been "go for it". I can also assure you that if editors don't like what you are doing you will hear about it. The fact that editors have thanked you is a positive for the direction you are taking.

I would suggest that it may be worth looking at past featured articles for the style that is common (or not common) and even the ones in the queue (to be featured articles). These will have a reasonably high visibility and any edits there will assist with positive/negative feedback. Sometimes editors have endeavoured to make change, a number of editors agree on a path and then later down the track there is pushback with complaints of, “I wasn’t advised, I didn’t know”. Working in high visibility areas should get you fast feedback.

I haven’t looked at the MOS (Manual of Style) to see if there is any comment there pertinent to this area and from what I have read I don't recall any. If your approach is a positive and makes for improved articles then I would think it worth having your preferred and consensus-accepted layout & style documented in the MOS. Having it documented then also gives other editors guidance as to how they can work and is also ammunition when an editor says, “I don’t like your way, I want it my way”. Ammunition to then say, Ok let’s then discuss it and invite others to provide their opinion as well, and then reach a consensus, whether that involves change to or confirmation of your approach.

If you are looking for more initial comment then it may be worth a quick sentence or two at the Teahouse pointing to this section. Good luck and ‘be bold’! - Neils51 (talk) 22:34, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

Thank you very much @Neils51:, I think your advice will prove very helpful. Where can I peruse all featured articles? Th78blue (They/Them/Theirs • talk) 23:16, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

@Th78blue: Thanks, you're welcome. Here, WP:FA - Neils51 (talk) 23:26, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

Hey {ping|Neils51}}, how do I "point" to a section? I know how to reference an article (just put brackets around the top), but I am not sure about how to bring people to a subsection within an article or a page. Thanks! Th78blue (They/Them/Theirs • talk) 19:03, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

@Th78blue: Link to [[Article#Section]], e.g. Aardvark#Head. Certes (talk) 19:46, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

Quick question re Lupin

Does WP:LUPIN work these days for spell-checking? I've not managed to get it working for the last few years. If it isn't, could someone here edit the Lupin page accordingly, and keep an eye on its talk page, too? Thanks. Nick Moyes (talk) 11:53, 28 December 2021 (UTC)

Piped links

I've been working through Wikipedia:Database reports/Linked misspellings (fixing all errors I find rather than just wikilinks) and noticed an anti-pattern that may be generally useful. Increasing numbers of articles have piped links of the form [[Correct spelling|Typo]], e.g. [[Saudi Arabia|Saudia Arabia]]. Editors may be making a typo, then using some tool (VE?) to link it to the correct target, but leaving the typo visible by piping. I wonder if we can use this development to our advantage. Unfortunately this isn't something we can search for and might require a (read-only) bot to spot links to A|B where A is an article and B a plausible typo for it. There will be false positives, e.g. Joe Semi-Literate tweeted "I bin promotid 2 [[chief|cheif]]" which we'd want to quote verbatim, but many should be correctable. Any thoughts? Certes (talk) 00:40, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

Sounds feasible. Could create a score result. For instance if characters are the same and the phrase/word is not equal then a high score. I think the AWB bug (or 'feature') still exists where if there is a typo in the second part (after pipe) and it is corrected (by AWB) then the consolidation does not subsequently take place. Seems to work OK if a user rule invokes the spelling correction, so presumably related to ordering. Neils51 (talk) 11:34, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

I think most typos are single-letter transpositions (cheif), omissions (chif), additions (chieff) or substitutions (cheef), so we could start with those, maybe allowing two or more for longer words and phrases. We'd want to exclude plurals and other variants, so ignore differences after the last matched character ([[apple|apples]]; [[baker|bake]]). We should probably also ignore capitalisation differences ([[Solar System|solar system]]) as deliberate choice. Certes (talk) 12:59, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

lead by

Hello Typo Team, if there is anyone looking for something to do then there are close to 3,000 entries of "lead by" that need to be reviewed to determine whether they need to be corrected to "led by". I'm finding around 30% in error. Unfortunately it's very much a manual process as correct usage is context related. The following is the search string I'm using. ~"lead by" insource:/ lead by / -insource:/ a lead / -insource:/ by example / -insource:/ to lead / -insource:/ the lead / -insource:/ their lead / -insource:/point lead / Neils51 (talk) 06:17, 1 May 2022 (UTC)

We did a related exercise in 2019, but it wasn't as comprehensive and new cases will have appeared. Certes (talk) 22:56, 14 July 2022 (UTC)

Edit summary

Hi, I've been helping with the moss project recently, and am wondering what the best edit summary is for TS+COMMA+. I have been using "missing space "A,B" -> "A, B"", but could this be shortened to just "missing space"? When making an edit with multiple corrections, the edit summary can be annoying to write and very lengthy, sometimes taking longer to complete than the actual corrections themselves. What would be the best edit summary in this scenario? Thanks, Max263 (talk • contribs) 15:18, 19 August 2022 (UTC)

Hi Max263, personally I would prefer "added missing space" or "added missing spaces", resp. Where the missing spaces have been added can be found by "Compare selected revisions" in the history, so I think there is no need to tell it in the edit summary. BTW, thanks for all your work adding the missing spaces in so many articles! --Cyfal (talk) 16:16, 20 August 2022 (UTC)

Thanks! Max263 (talk • contribs) 16:18, 20 August 2022 (UTC)

Referred to WP:Typo Team

I have been referred to you guys by an Administrator as this could be potentially useful to use my time on Wikipedia. How do I install the applications of WP:Typo Team? Adamdaley (talk) 12:57, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

Adamdaley has since been blocked. -- Beland (talk) 17:23, 24 January 2023 (UTC)

Advices

There appear to be more than 400 instances of this non-existent word. I'll make a start however reviewing a few instances it's more than a case of changing a word, the usage/syntax required examination. Neils51 (talk) 05:50, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

It is a word, but a rare one. There are also rare proper nouns such as "Good Advices". 99% will be wrong though. Certes (talk) 11:28, 14 March 2023 (UTC)

<em></em> not a lint error

FYI per MOS:EMPHASIS, use of <em></em> is prescribed instead of double tick marks when emphasizing words that aren't published titles, foreign words, etc. Can you update your processes & procedures accordingly? Thx. --IHTS (talk) 14:23, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Who is this addressed to? Do you have a link to a diff where em tags were removed or added incorrectly? – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:59, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

How to address to member(s) of the Typo Team responsible for the lint error processing & procedure? That's why posted here. --IHTS (talk) 18:17, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

If you are referring to edits you have made like this one, I believe that is incorrect semantic markup. Please read MOS:WORDSASWORDS in the context of the text above it, Other, non-emphasis, uses of italics on Wikipedia should use ''...'' markup, not <em> or {{em}} markup, and the footnote that follows that sentence. See the examples in the "Words as words" section. – Jonesey95 (talk) 16:08, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Is there an inconsistency in MoS Guidelines? Because at MOS:EMPHASIS "Italics markup (''...'', or <i>...</i>) is often used in practice for emphasis, but this use is not semantically correct markup, so emphasis markup is preferred. (Italics markup are for non-emphasis purposes, such as for book titles and foreign-language phrases". --IHTS (talk) 18:09, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

p.s. Your reverts were not of text that was "about words as words" but rather simply emphasis on said words. --IHTS (talk) 18:15, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I do not see an inconsistency. The use of normal italic markup applied in this edit follwed the guidance at MOS:EMPHASIS and MOS:WORDSASWORDS. The phrases a special piece (two per player) named unicorn and The cubes (usually represented by squares and often called cells) are clearly italicizing "words as words" or technical/jargon terms that should receive normal wikitext italic markup, per MOS. There is no emphasis, explained in MOS as ... used to draw attention to an important word or phrase within a sentence, when the point or thrust of the sentence may otherwise not be apparent to readers, or to stress a contrast, on the italicized words in these phrases. <em>...</em> markup is not appropriate in these cases. – Jonesey95 (talk) 18:18, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I see. I wasn't interpreting text that defines/explains the meaning of a term to be text "about the word", just about its meaning. Hm. (Am thinking too much!?) --IHTS (talk) 18:24, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

And about this sentence?: A bishop moves through the twelve edges of a cube. (In that sentence, no definition or explanation of the emphasized word is given. The word is simply used but not attempted to be defined or explained.) --IHTS (talk) 18:29, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

The nest of italics-related instruction at MOS is confusing. I think you may be over-thinking it. The intent of <em>...</em> tags is for when you really want a word to stand out in writing in order to ensure that your meaning is not misinterpreted; you use it in a situation where you would say the word louder, provide a little more audible space around it, and lean forward and raise your eyebrows a bit in spoken communication. Everything else gets normal italic markup. As for the "edges" example, I think that MOS:TECHNICAL covers it; use regular italics. – Jonesey95 (talk) 18:44, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I understand what "emphasis" means, the problem seems to be that "emphasis of words as words" is some kind of different emphasis wanting different markup. The two guidelines as written conflict because of a fine distinction not specified. If emphasis for "words as words" wants italics markup (ticks), then this isn't true at MOS:EMPHASIS: "Italics markup are for non-emphasis purposes, such as for book titles and foreign-language phrases". --IHTS (talk) 18:48, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Ok, MOS:TECHNICAL broadens things out by "term introduced mentioned as a word in addition to its normal grammatical role". But even at MOS:TECHNICAL it's unclear: "it should be italicized or quoted, usually the former". (When I read "italicized", I don't automatically interpret as "italic markup" (i.e. ticks) only, but that italicization via other markup also, if appropriate.) Confusing/misleading! --IHTS (talk) 19:06, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

Am assuming MOS:TECHNICAL "italicized" means specifically italic markup (ticks). (The guideline languages s/b clarified/cleaned up. For e.g. at MOS:EMPHASIS "Italics markup are for non-emphasis purposes, such as for book titles, foreign-language phrases, introduction or use of technical terms, and writing about words as words." And at MOS:TECHNICAL "so, it should be italicized using italic markup or quoted, usually the former". (Am I understanding correctly? Thx for all your explains, which have helped a lot.) --IHTS (talk) 19:23, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I think that you understand: when the guideline says "italicized", it generally means italic wikitext markup. If the existing guideline is still unclear to you, I recommend that you start a discussion at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Text formatting. – Jonesey95 (talk) 20:51, 17 March 2023 (UTC)

I think it w/ be unclear to anyone/everyone. In addition, there may be ambiguity if WP italic markup is just ticks, or also <it></it>. The ambiguity here is none of my fault. --IHTS (talk) 00:34, 19 March 2023 (UTC)