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Revision as of 14:25, 3 July 2012

User talk:David Levy/Archive8/Header

Help with High traffic template

I noticed you're familiar with template code and can use it correctly, so can you help me update the High traffic template? Here's the background info and explanation:

I've noticed that Google Doodles link to the search results page and cause high traffic to sites and high surges in page views on a topic people would normally not look up as often. I saw the High traffic template was implemented on the Charles Addams article, so I copy-pasted it for the other Doodles of 2012, replacing the date for each topic (I stopped after the February 7th one since it was a bit tedious).

But this template has some limitations and doesn't allow for other descriptions for things such as Google Doodles to describe thoroughly. I had a hunch that it would cause mis-understandings, and I wanted to add some code (when I was putting the template in the pages) to further clarify that it came from a Doodle. So as I thought, my hunch was right, and this ambiguity in the template text resulted in people not knowing/remembering about Google Doodles, so they might say that things can't be linked from Google as shown here.

What I want to do is to add template code to allow the linking to a list of Google Doodles for each year depending on the input for the date parameter. There can be an additional phrase about the Doodle, and that phrase will link to the section on the list of Doodles for that year. So for example the template text for Charles Addams can say: "On January 7, 2012, Charles Addams was linked from a Google Doodle on Google, a high-traffic website." where the Google Doodle being mentioned is coded to link to the date that the Doodle was shown on the Google main page. The field parameter for the date (e.g., January 7, 2012) should take care of the input requirement.

A problem with this is the list of Google Doodles for 1998-2009 doesn't follow what I think will be the standard Google Doodle article naming procedure, so for Doodles in those years, the template will need additional code to specifically link to the date sections and the page (1998-2009). For future Doodles, the standard code for linking to the article list and section date can be used if Doodles for 2013 and succeeding years will be titled under the name List of Google Doodles in 20xx (or xxxx). Google seems to be making Doodles for each year now, so the articles will probably be titled like that, unless people decide they should all be moved into a single article for each decade under (2010-2020), which might require the code to be tweaked a bit at a later time (but that most likely won't happen and sorry about the unnecessary comments).

I'm not familiar with the template code, so can you help me with this endeavor (for lack of a better word)? Thanks - M0rphzone (talk) 23:18, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Also, I think using a bot would be better for adding this template to the articles that were linked by the Doodles. It's a bit tedious. Do you know which bot is able to do this task? - M0rphzone (talk) 23:22, 22 April 2012 (UTC)

Hello! Before going any further, I need to understand the underlying purpose of this endeavor. (How would the tagging be useful?)

The intended purpose of {{high traffic}} (which originated as {{slashdotted}} and was generalized as a result of a TfD discussion) is to warn editors of ongoing/recent traffic spikes possibly resulting in problematic editing by users suddenly arriving from linking websites. It's meant to serve a temporary notice (removed when traffic returns to normal), not a permanent record. (Editors have neglected to remove some transclusions, which probably has promoted misunderstanding of the template's purpose and encouraged further misuse.)

Your goal, if I understand correctly, is to permanently commemorate past and future instances in which Google Doodles resulted in increased traffic at related articles. (If this is desirable, it would be best to create a new template.) What's unclear to me is the reason behind this. In what respect is a record of this information, permanently occupying the article's talk page, beneficial to the project? How does it encourage or enable improvement to or maintenance of the article? How is it helpful to know that a Google Doodle caused a traffic spike in the past? —David Levy 00:34, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure, but I suppose if the template were to stay, it's for documentation purposes to let editors know why there are/were so many edits and edit requests on a particular day, as well as go back in the revision history for those dates to check for and cleanup any disruptive/incorrect/test edits that were missed. It's most likely unnecessary, but then why is the infobox still present on Talk:Wood? That's where I first encountered this template. - M0rphzone (talk) 00:50, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

As noted above, editors inserting the template sometimes neglect to remove it, causing stale transclusions to linger indefinitely. (This issue was mentioned during the 2009 deletion debate.) The problem snowballs when others see the old tags and assume that they're intended to be permanent.

We probably should deploy a bot to clear out all instances from 2011 and earlier. —David Levy 01:19, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

This discussion needs to involve more people's opinions since I have a feeling that we don't have all the reasons. How about discussing on the community portal? - M0rphzone (talk) 01:28, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't know what "reasons" you mean, but feel free to initiate such a discussion. (I'm fairly busy at the moment, so my participation might be limited.) —David Levy 01:56, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

I meant that I didn't think the explanations quite represented other editors' opinions. I'd like some more explanations about it from other people as well, but nvm. Also, are you going to archive this page anytime soon? It's been 2 years since your last one, and it's taking quite some time to load as well. - M0rphzone (talk) 02:14, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Done.

Thanks for the reminder. I always seem to forget, so I probably should look into having a bot do it for me. —David Levy 04:05, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Well, with a talk page that long, I thought you were doing it on purpose, lol! - M0rphzone (talk) 04:12, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

For some reason, archiving my talk page never seems to occur to me until someone mentions that it's gotten too long. In one instance (archive #2, from 2006), an editor apparently took one look at the page and did it for me!  :) —David Levy 04:25, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

I would highly recommend one of the mainstream archiving bots for a fairly quiet talk page like yours. Rich Farmbrough, 12:39, 6 May 2012 (UTC).(Using some automation)

Google AP links

Here is an excerpt from Template:Cite_news
Do not post urls of Google or Yahoo! hosted AP content: that content is transient. Use MSNBC or another provider that keeps AP archives.
Whywhenwhohow (talk) 03:24, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

WT:TFL#Renaming and re-stylizing Today's Featured List?

My proposal is dead... dead into the bottom. I know your concerns about the way I write. One question: how can I write a better proposal of this idea: turning "Today's Featured List" into "this Week's featured list"? Must I do it in WT:Main page, as I should have? --George Ho (talk) 07:06, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Hello! I have no major concerns about the way you write. (In the above-linked discussion, I objected only to a specific piece of text.)

The proposal is clear. It simply isn't something that's going to gain consensus. Leaving a dynamic main page section static for a week is undesirable, and it would interfere with other elements of the page and ideas currently planned.

But if you wish to resubmit the proposal, Talk:Main Page is the correct forum. —David Levy 16:25, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Thanks

For fixing yet another of my ITN grammatical errors that I'm simply putting down to anglo-australian-american confusion. Stephen 04:41, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

No worries. The error was present at ITN/C, and this is one of the trickiest ENGVAR issues I've encountered. It certainly has tripped me up on occasion.

In one instance, I attempted to follow another English variety's convention, only to be informed that it didn't apply in that particular context (so the wording actually should have been the same as it would have been in American English). I'm not sure that I'll ever be able to understand all of the intricacies. —David Levy 05:11, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Bolivia nationalization

Why did you change the spelling to nationalise? There's no support for that at ENGVAR. --Trovatore (talk) 07:57, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

For consistency with the article and the bold link's target.

I'm American, incidentally, so this was a change from my English variety. —David Levy 08:07, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

A bowl of strawberries for you!

Just came around to say Hi :) Happy Editing! TheGeneralUser (talk) 09:50, 13 May 2012 (UTC)

ITN Orbit Tower

Can you come decide whether this should be posted before it expires in under an hour? Bzweebl (talk • contribs) 23:10, 16 May 2012 (UTC)

Barnstar

		The Barnstar of Diplomacy
		Awarded for the very long but ultimately fruitful discussion culminating at Misplaced Pages talk:Hatnote#New proposal. -- JHunterJ (talk) 00:24, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Thank you! (: —David Levy 00:29, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Master race

Check out the hatnotes on this one. -Stevertigo (t | c) 20:35, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

We can do something like: "Master race" and "Herrenvolk" redirect here. For other uses, see Master race (disambiguation) - since herrenvolk is just a translation. -Stevertigo (t | c) 20:42, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Both the television episode and the comic book story have titles ambiguous with terms redirecting to Master race, but they don't have titles ambiguous with each other. Someone seeking the television episode won't search for "Master Race" (so it should appear only on a hypothetical "Herrenvolk" disambiguation page) and someone seeking the comic book story won't search for "Herrenvolk" (so it should appear only on a hypothetical "master race" disambiguation page).

The relevant section of Impact (EC Comics) comprised extraordinary claims, attributed solely to material excerpted from a reprint of the comic book itself, the extensive quotation of which raised copyright concerns. So I've removed the entire section and the corresponding hatnote. —David Levy 21:30, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

I would argue that hatnotes can be combined, when dealing with translations of a same term. But since you've dealt with one hatnote, we can maybe look at maybe 2 or 3-dabbing the other. -Stevertigo (t | c) 21:37, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Done. —David Levy 21:53, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Cool. On something else, when I rework divinity a little bit (um, quite a bit, actually), maybe you can move divine → divine (disambiguation), and redirect divine → divinity? -Stevertigo (t | c) 22:00, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

I've tidied the revision history of Divine (disambiguation) to enable you to perform the move yourself. —David Levy 22:17, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! (I really do think I need to work on the divinity article before I do the move though.) -Stevertigo (t | c) 22:20, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

Feel like taking a crack at Terahertz radiation's hatnotes? -Stevertigo (t | c) 05:29, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

I've done my best. —David Levy 06:14, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

ITN

Seeing as you just made some tweaks, I'll bypass WP:Errors and ask that you wiki-link MVP. Bzweebl (talk • contribs) 00:31, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Done. Thanks! —David Levy 00:44, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Example template

Hey, David. I reverted your changes because it's transcluded into the discussion at Misplaced Pages talk:In the news, and it might be confusing to change it after other editors have commented on the original. I was reluctant to substitute it because I didn't want to fill up the discussion page with a bunch of extra code if I didn't have to. About the changes themselves, I don't have too much of an issue with the divider, but I'm not sure I like the bullets. Everything else on the main page is separated by dashes, I believe, and I think using bullets might look a little out of place. --Bongwarrior (talk) 04:18, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay. I thought that minor changes would be acceptable, given that your proposal refers to "a format similar to the example on the right" and the only comments about the specific style were requests for better division.

Good point about the dots (though we do use them in the Misplaced Pages languages section). —David Levy 04:29, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

No, no problem. I've put back the divider because it's a good idea, and I think I've overestimated the potential for confusion. --Bongwarrior (talk) 04:35, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Okay, thanks! And you're right about the dashes, I think. —David Levy 04:37, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Blocked or Banned

I think this person, Gwern Branwen, User name User:Gwern should be blocked or banned. It seems that he or she has a "hacker's mentality" and has no respect fror Misplaced Pages's rules and therefore has no business on Misplaced Pages. Mugginsx (talk) 14:09, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

Why do opposers there use the "long-term" criterion? Have I pointed out correctly that significance and impact of this novel does not reflect reader's interests? Now that the discussion is closed per WP:SNOW, would this make me look disruptive? --George Ho (talk) 23:40, 21 May 2012 (UTC)

Why do opposers there use the "long-term" criterion? Have I pointed out correctly that significance and impact of this novel does not reflect reader's interests?

You seem to be conflating separate criteria ("usage" and "long-term significance").

Now that the discussion is closed per WP:SNOW, would this make me look disruptive?

Probably. —David Levy 00:09, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

How did I conflate separate criteria? How can I be less disruptive? --George Ho (talk) 00:12, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

How did I conflate separate criteria?

"Readers' interests" falls under "usage", so it isn't a valid consideration in the context of "long-term significance".

How can I be less disruptive?

I suggest that you try harder to understand others' arguments before attempting to refute them. —David Levy 00:18, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

How do I understand arguments without requesting a move? Asking them to elaborate? --George Ho (talk) 00:32, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

How do I understand arguments without requesting a move?

I didn't mean that you shouldn't request a move. I wasn't referring to any discussion in particular.

Asking them to elaborate?

That probably would be helpful. —David Levy 00:37, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

How many years must I wait for the right moment to propose again? --George Ho (talk) 01:50, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

In this instance, it's extremely unlikely that such a proposal would succeed, no matter how long you were to wait.

It was noted that the issue pertains to the naming of the Harry Potter articles in general. If you still believe that the setup should be changed, a broader discussion (with no actual move requests) at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Harry Potter probably would be a much better idea. But be advised that consensus on this matter is longstanding and appears to be quite strong. So instead of proposing an immediate course of action, you'll need to persuade others that the underlying logic is sound. —David Levy 02:02, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

There's one problem; the talk page isn't that active anymore. Maybe I'll deal with the renaming neither too soon nor too late in WP:village pump (idea lab). Right now, I must establish a proposal to turn the WikiProject into a task force. --George Ho (talk) 02:10, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Request to be my mentor

Say, would you like to be my mentor for a while? I would like some help. If not, then would you be my helper, as jc37 is right now? --George Ho (talk) 00:39, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

I don't know what distinction you draw between "mentor" and "helper". Irrespective of terminology, I'd be glad to assist you to the best of my ability. —David Levy 00:43, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Here is Misplaced Pages:Editor assistance. If you like to be my mentor, here is user talk:George Ho/Mentorship discussions. However, you may ask the difference by asking one of my mentors. --George Ho (talk) 00:51, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

I wonder if you have free time to decide. --George Ho (talk) 21:58, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

I haven't had time to read the relevant pages yet. In the meantime, feel free to request any assistance that you feel I'm able to provide. —David Levy 22:05, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Hi. Sorry for the confusion. He had asked me, and I'm not sure I'm comfortable being another one of his mentors, but I told him I'd be happy to help as I may per Misplaced Pages:Editor_assistance#What_to_expect_from_assistance. - jc37 22:12, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

Now I declare you  officially my helper... mentor is not what you desire, as far as I can see. --George Ho (talk) 00:32, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

I told you that I've been busy and haven't had an opportunity to look over the information. As that explanation evidently didn't satisfy you, it's probably best that I not "officially" be anything. —David Levy 00:40, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

Reliable source or external link?

What do you think: http://www.webtender.com/db/drink/5520 --George Ho (talk) 12:39, 23 May 2012 (UTC)

ITN note

Hi David. I have a great deal of respect for you as an editor, and also a great deal of respect for your contributions to the ITN-related discussions. I find you to be one of the most sensible voices at various debates that take place there, and in the past there has most certainly been occasions where I have been convinced by your arguments, which I initially may have opposed. I feel as though the recent comments in that area have become very heated, and thus decided not to further engage for the time being to do some reflection. I have full intention on creating a positive atmosphere on those pages, and have often attempted to cool things down when they get heated. I do apologize if I have caused frustration, or seem obstructive, uncooperative, etc., and I do hope you accept this apology. Colipon+(Talk) 02:43, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

I sincerely appreciate the above message, but no apology is necessary. I disagree with some of your comments, but you have every right to make them (which you've clearly done in good faith). If I appeared to take personal offense, allow me to assure you that this is not so.

My frustration stems from the same source as yours: our inability to generate sufficient participation. My criticism of your approach was intended to be constructive, and I apologize if it came across in another light. —David Levy 03:05, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Poker decision

Yes, in short. There are too many discussions going on without conclusion. After one week, both discussions have gone to a natural conclusion, in my opinion. I know it's not "the done thing" but I think I've been reasonable in my conclusions doktorb _words 10:34, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Fair point well made. If someone questions it, I'll make my case though will accept if it needs re-opening. doktorb _words 17:59, 24 May 2012 (UTC)

Adminship Committee?

Hey David, I vaguely recall you weighing in at a recent VP discussion about adminship (although I can't seem to find it right now). There, I offered a proposal to create a community-elected "adminship committee" to do away with RfA drama, and create a streamlined, manageable, drama-reduced (because let's be honest, drama-free is wishful thinking) and community-accountable process, for all kinds of adminship recall, confirmation, and maybe even forced breaks in cases of burnout.

The latter relates to a section I stumbled upon on Jimbo's talk page, where someone proposes term limits for admins. These are imho a good idea in principle, but not manageable for the community in the form of traditional RfAs; and recall/confirmation RfAs are an even worse cesspit than usual RfAs.

I don't know your stance on adminship term limits or recall/confirmation process, or whether RfA as a bit of a problem child is on your radar at all. At any rate, I thought you might be interested since you are one of those few people who try to inject sanity into Misplaced Pages at every turn. --87.79.131.112 (talk) 03:09, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

Unsigned comment templates

Hi, I noticed your comments on Template talk:Unsigned and thought you might be able to help with this. Thanks. --xensyria 19:25, 25 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree

Block him David or this is likely to cause a chain reaction. You are correct. Someone, it seems, is covering for him. The silence is deafening. Mugginsx (talk) 13:54, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

I assume that you're referring to Gwern. I've become far too involved in the dispute to even consider doing that. Regardless, the mailing list discussion certainly hasn't shown that such a measure has the community's backing.

If you wish to initiate an on-wiki discussion, I'll weigh in with my opinions. But I won't intervene in an administrative capacity. —David Levy 17:48, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

I understand. Mugginsx (talk) 18:03, 26 May 2012 (UTC)

Main page

Thank you. -Blake Burba (talk) 08:00, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

Request your advice

Hi David - I know we haven't always seen eye to eye in the past, but I wanted to ask your advice as an experienced and uninvolved admin. I'm in a dispute with several editors over two articles: Politics in the British Isles and Ireland-United Kingdom relations.

I created Politics in the British Isles a few days ago; it was then nominated for deletion by User:Snappy. A discussion about what to do with the article has been ongoing here Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Politics in the British Isles.

RA, one of the editors opposed to Politics in the British Isles, proposes that the article should merged to Ireland-United Kingdom relations. Rather than wait for consensus to confirm his opinion, he took the unilateral step of copying the entire contents of Politics in the British Isles, and pasting it here to Ireland-United Kingdom relations , after which he used its existence there as an argument to try to prove that the original in Politics in the British Isles content is in fact just a fork. To me, this move is the essence of WP:POINT.

My experience has been, in a normal situation, this would be dealt with by a merge discussion on the talk pages, and once consensus is to merge, the content is moved and the original deleted. However, the original content cannot be deleted, because in this case, the article in question is up for AfD, so its contents are extremely relevant and can't just be blanked. In this particular case, I thus believe copying the content across the wiki is disruptive.

As a result of this disruption, edits I've made to improve the content in one place do not show up in another; synchronization issues abound; and ongoing discussions about the content have been moved from place to place. The end result is an absolute mess of dual maintenance that will persist until the AfD closes, which may be a while given the heated debate. I admit to have engaged in edit warring to attempt to undo this mess, along with Snappy and BHG on this issue, which I regret, so I'm not claiming innocence here.

In any case, my opinion is, during an AfD, the content should remain in the original article and not be copy-pasted elsewhere, until the outcome of the AfD is clear - either delete, or merge, or keep. Then if consensus agrees, we merge (and delete from the original). Otherwise, allowing things to continue will mean that dual maintenance will continue on these two pages, one of which is basically a complete content fork of the second, to the detriment of the wiki. Sadly, experienced administrator Brownhairedgirl has encouraged this forking, rather than allowing consensus to decide at the AfD what should be done.

I'd welcome your POV and advice on what, if anything, to do about it; my attempts to revert did not work, my pleas to request them to undo the fork did not work, so I don't know what else to do. Thanks! --KarlB (talk) 00:50, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree that it would be best to await the AfD discussion's outcome before proceeding with a merger (if that's what consensus dictates). As you noted, this would entail the elimination of Politics in the British Isles as a standalone article (via redirection, not deletion). An extant article should not be mirrored in another article (apart from small excerpts accompanied by "main article" links), so the current setup certainly isn't viable on a permanent basis.

However, I disagree that RA has done anything pointy or underhanded. You appear to have misunderstood what's meant by "content fork", leading you to mistakenly believe that RA attempting to spin the facts in a manner that he/she isn't ("I just copied everything from A into B - see - now A is a POV fork of B!!").

The term "content forking" refers not to the duplication of text, but to the intentional or unintentional creation of an article on a topic already covered in a different article. The assertion is that the creation of Politics in the British Isles constitutes a content fork not because it has text in common with Ireland-United Kingdom relations (which isn't your doing), but because it covers the same topic (and has from the start), comprising material that should have been added to the existing article instead of creating a new one.

To be clear, I'm merely explaining RA's position, not expressing agreement with it. I don't know enough about the articles' subject(s) to formulate an informed opinion on the matter.

My advice is to simply continue arguing your points (minus the accusations of sneakiness), finish up the AfD debate, and take it from there. My advice to others involved in the Ireland-United Kingdom relations edit war would be essentially the same. At this juncture, whether the additional material is included or omitted is of relatively minor consequence; its back-and forth addition and removal is what's disruptive.

If synchronization proves difficult, you should focus primarily on improving Politics in the British Isles, whose specific prose might affect the decision of whether to retain it as a standalone article. If it isn't kept, the improvements can be copied over to Ireland-United Kingdom relations when a proper merger (including redirection) occurs.

I sincerely hope that I've been helpful. —David Levy 02:53, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks David, I appreciate your input and insight. I of course also welcome your input at the AfD itself. But thanks again for your thoughts. --KarlB (talk) 03:29, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

ANI comment removal

Hi David! Sorry to bother you. I hope this was a mistake. --SMS 23:07, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Yes, it was accidental and unnoticed. My sincere apologies.

On my first attempt to save my reply, I experienced an edit conflict, so I followed the standard copy/paste procedure. I don't know why this resulted in your post's removal, and I can only speculate that a MediaWiki glitch occurred. I've restored the message to the now-hatted thread. Sorry again. —David Levy 23:25, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Not a problem at all and Thanks for restoring it. Sorry I didn't mean to ask for apology, it looked like a mistake but just wanted to check that was it removed mistakenly or it was something I am not aware of regarding that IP, but Thanks anyways. Cheers! --SMS 23:36, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Proposing a deletion review on WP:articles for deletion/Fictional women of All My Children, volume 2

I have made a deletion discussion that had people turn against me. Now I want to make amends with soapie people by reviewing my own AFD. How can I not anger them? And I have my proposal here:

I don't want to undo the damage because that would make me look wrong and foolish in the past. Nevertheless, I must for the sake of lessening the anger of people and of making more friends, especially those who are solely dedicated to soap operas. Anyway, I come into conclusion that there must be, at heart, some cleanup to be done, and I think portrayers of their characters have made their roles notable... unless I'm missing the real definition of notability. Suddenly, plots about them and their deaths suddenly impacted their roles and the whole show: I'm talking about Myrtle, Phoebe, and Mona. They were part of the show because... primary sources and affiliates made them, yet I solely depended on Google and their current state of articles to look for third-party and non-primary sources to determine their notability. I let you down in the past; this time, this discussion is proof of undoing the AFD I started. Recently, I have posted an idea of notability about television-related topics in WP:village pump (idea lab), so I'm still working on television notability. Meanwhile, this discussion could help starting to make friends, right? If not, how can I be friends?

--George Ho (talk) 02:38, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Talkback

♥ Solarra ♥ ߷ _{♀ Contribs ♀} 05:53, 16 June 2012 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Hatnote#Finalizing_the_new_proposal

You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Hatnote#Finalizing_the_new_proposal. Since you participated in the earlier discussion about trivial hatnotes and what to do about them, your input is requested on a finalizing a proposal. KarlB (talk) 06:17, 20 June 2012 (UTC)Template:Z48

Hi David; it looks like JHunterJ is taking a break from the wiki so I'd like to ask your advice - do you think we can close the (long) discussion at Misplaced Pages:Talk:Hatnote? The templates are created and the changes have been made to the guideline, so I think we can close the discussion down. I'm happy to do it, just wanted your advice first. --KarlB (talk) 17:39, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

ITN and TFL

In light of this remark and this revert from Rambling Man, I'd like to request in advance (in case you were planning on doing so) that you not remove the UEFA 2012 blurb from ITN in deference to TFL (as you did with Eurovision back in May). Thanks. -- tariqabjotu 21:31, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Copied from User talk:Tariqabjotu:

I undid your edit. WP:TFL is entirely independent of the vagaries of ITN, please leave the blurb as is. It may be that it takes a week for the community to decide on a suitable hook/update for ITN. TFL has an updated blurb, and updated article, we don't need ITNers to pop by to "fix" our work. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:19, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Is this how TFL functions? No one else can make changes to your section? The main reason I made the change is because I thought it was completely unnecessary to so strongly emphasize an event that just happened today with a list that talks about fourteen finals. But, I understand. This was discussed well in advance, which explains why it took you five attempts to put in a sentence that was grammatically acceptable in English.

P.S. Especially since you're being such a jerk about a reasonable change, I'll make sure that I prevent David Levy from dropping the UEFA story from ITN in deference to TFL since, you know, you are "entirely independent". -- tariqabjotu 21:28, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

No, it's not "how TFL functions", how TFL functions can be found at WP:TFL. We are promoting a list, not an ITN item, they are coincident but independent. I'm very interested by your comment "which explains why it took you five attempts to put in a sentence that was grammatically acceptable in English." which seems to be quite indicative of some kind of personal issue you have with my ability to write English. I'm also interested in where your sudden change to the TFL blurb was "was discussed well in advance". Finally "since you're being such a jerk" is, without a shadow of a doubt, a personal attack, which is really disappointing and something which I hope you won't repeat. Oh, and any issue you have with David Levy has no relevance to the content of TFL. If you would like to contribute to TFL, please do so, but please don't just "drive by" and assume it'll be fine by you. The Rambling Man (talk) 21:34, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

In closing, I suggest you just leave the TFL blurb alone unless there are clear errors. It may or may not coincide with some half-sentence in ITN, but there's no harm in that. Cheers! The Rambling Man (talk) 21:39, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

You seem to have implied that making a change to the blurb without some sort of approval from a community or discussion with you is unacceptable. There is no other conclusion I could possibly make because, even until now, you have provided no reason at all as to why your version is actually better. Your edit summary and your comments here have only cited the point about ITN, and mocked the ITN procedure in the process, and your second comment here made no effort to respond to my point about excessively emphasizing one final.

I said what I meant and meant what I said. I imagine you can write English perfectly fine, and we all make mistakes, but the fact that you didn't get it correct on the first (or second, or third...) time seems to contradict the concept that there is some sort of process that needs to be followed before making changes to the blurb. And, yet, you described my edit as "drive by". Any more than yours? What the hell did you expect me to do? Inform you that I combined a couple sentences? Oh please, get off your high horse; I did not and do not need to do that. I need no one's permission to make such an innocuous change, and I don't expect such derisive and flippant remarks from prior editors when I do so. -- tariqabjotu 21:52, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Our standard practice is to not include the same event in more than one main page section at the same time. For example, we routinely remove one from OTD if it's mentioned (typically in much greater detail) in TFA or TFP. In this respect, no two main page sections are "entirely independent" of each other.

In May, when TFL was about the Eurovision Song Contest, I inserted code to suppress the ITN item until the end of the day. As I explained at the time, I did so both to prevent redundancy and to support TFL. (A related ITN item greatly increases the likelihood that someone interested in the topic will click away from the main page without even seeing the featured list section.)

The above disagreement notwithstanding, I believe that the same approach is warranted in this instance. An item's omission from OTD means that it doesn't appear until at least a year later, so an ITN item's one-day absence is relatively minor. —David Levy 22:13, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

To be honest, I didn't really agree with your decision to do that last time, as I feel TFL and ITN tend to emphasize different aspects of the content. For example, you really have to search through the TFL blurb, if you get down there, and get to that part of the blurb, before you see the link to the final of Euro 2012. And UEFA Euro 2012 isn't linked at all. Further, I think the omission of Euro 2012 would be far more glaring than the omission of Eurovision was (given it's substantially larger viewing audience).

And, yes, of course, I also feel given Rambling Man's insistence that TFL and ITN be completely independent, I see no pressing reason to coordinate with TFL. -- tariqabjotu 22:30, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

To be honest, I didn't really agree with your decision to do that last time, as I feel TFL and ITN tend to emphasize different aspects of the content. For example, you really have to search through the TFL blurb, if you get down there, and get to that part of the blurb, before you see the link to the final of Euro 2012. And UEFA Euro 2012 isn't linked at all.

If The Rambling Man would permit it, we could add a such a link.

But my point is that it isn't very harmful if the ITN item is simply absent (irrespective of something serving as a substitution) on Monday (UTC) — the only day of the week on which TFL appears on the main page, and the only instance in which this particular featured list will ever appear there. The ITN item would return on Tuesday, which isn't even outside our normal update window.

Further, I think the omission of Euro 2012 would be far more glaring than the omission of Eurovision was (given it's substantially larger viewing audience).

It would be a more radical approach, but instead of suppressing the item, we could modify it to serve as an anchor link to the TFL section, thereby directly promoting it.

And, yes, of course, I also feel given Rambling Man's insistence that TFL and ITN be completely independent, I see no pressing reason to coordinate with TFL.

I disagree with him and see possible ownership issues, and while I understand the temptation to say "okay, have it your way" and leave TFL to sink or swim on its own, I feel that we should instead set aside the above disagreement and act in the best interests of Misplaced Pages's readership and community at large. —David Levy 23:04, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

The Rambling Man made a comment on my talk page that I think may have been in response to your comment. If you would like to respond to him, please do so on his talk page. -- tariqabjotu 17:32, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Tariqabjotu "reverted" my good faith comment (like vandalism), rather than simply undoing it, after his personal attack on me; but in any case, feel free to continue the discussion with me about trying to make things better. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:42, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Please see the normal process and also Misplaced Pages:Today's featured list/submissions where we, as a community (albeit a small one) review blurbs and get a consensus for them before posting them. It's not ownership to count on consensus to provide you with a decent, fully-worded blurb per our standards. Someone turning up to change it as they see fit at the last moment isn't really appropriate, particularly given the reason that Euro 2012 would feature in ITN – we all know how long some articles can take to get to ITN. TFL lists are scheduled weeks, sometimes months in advance, so there's no reason why anyone interested in trying to "merge" the ITN and TFL process on the occasions that are suitable. The difference is that TFL presentation on main page is stable, i.e. we know any given list will run on a Monday, for 24 hours, hopefully updated if need be before featuring. ITN is very much the opposite. Sure, for an item such as Euro 2012, we'd hope that there were sufficient readers interested to do the updates necessary on the day to get it to meet the requirements of ITN before being posted, but that isn't always the case. Come 00:00 (UTC) on Tuesday, the list disappears back to whence it came, while ITN can persist for.... well... some time in certain situations. If ITNers wish to appraise themselves of the scheduled lists and collaborate for ITN/R items that may be featuring (hopefully on the same day on the main page), then perhaps that could work. If you can see a way of making that work, either of you, then I'm all ears. I would appreciate it if you refrained from calling me a "jerk" in any case. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:43, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

("jerk") The Rambling Man (talk) 17:49, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Hello, Rambling Man. You're welcome to continue the discussion here (and Tariq is welcome to participate if he's so inclined).

Please see the normal process and also Misplaced Pages:Today's featured list/submissions where we, as a community (albeit a small one) review blurbs and get a consensus for them before posting them. It's not ownership to count on consensus to provide you with a decent, fully-worded blurb per our standards.

As far as I can tell, it wasn't the reversion that upset Tariq. It was the wording and tone of the message that you posted.

I'm not defending his reaction, but I suspect that you would have received a very different one to something along the lines of the following:

Hi! I've reverted your edits to the TFL template. The content was determined through discussion on the process page (where the part that you removed was felt to be important), so I ask that you please suggest changes there beforehand to give everyone an opportunity to provide feedback. If you're interested in helping out, we'd be happy to have you on board. Thanks!

Instead, you scolded him and denigrated a section on which he focuses, declaring that TFL is "entirely independent of the vagaries of ITN" and declaring that you "don't need ITNers to pop by to 'fix' work."

It might not have been your intention, but this came across as extremely rude and disrespectful, as well as disproportionate to the relatively minor, good-faith edit that Tariq had performed.

You need to understand that no Misplaced Pages subcommunity (including those focused on the various main page sections) has the authority to control reader-facing content and bar others from changing it. Any administrator (or non-administrator if something hasn't been protected yet) may edit any main page material in accordance with his/her understanding of consensus and expectations within the Misplaced Pages community at large. That includes you, and I would say the same thing if someone were to tell a TFL regular that ITN "doesn't need TFLers to pop by to 'fix' our work." We might focus on different areas, but we're all in this together, working to deliver the best main page possible. This should be collaborative, not combative.

Certainly, you were entitled to revert Tariq's edit (on the basis that it altered the template in an undesirable manner), but the suggestion that he had done something wrong was inappropriate, and there was no need to treat his edits as an attack on TFL waged by the incompetent ITNers. (Again, perhaps this wasn't your intention, but that's how it came across.)

TFL lists are scheduled weeks, sometimes months in advance, so there's no reason why anyone interested in trying to "merge" the ITN and TFL process on the occasions that are suitable.

No one seeks to "merge" the processes. We simply need to cooperate.

As I explained, our longstanding convention is to not include more than one mention of an event on the main page at a given time. To this end, the various sections are routinely coordinated. Tariq merely sought to trim out a small bit of text that directly overlapped with the ITN item. I prefer a different approach (adjusting ITN), but Tariq's was reasonable and in line with the community's established practices.

What's your opinion of the solution that I implemented (temporarily repurposing the ITN item's bold link as a pointer to TFL)?

If ITNers wish to appraise themselves of the scheduled lists and collaborate for ITN/R items that may be featuring (hopefully on the same day on the main page), then perhaps that could work. If you can see a way of making that work, either of you, then I'm all ears.

Given the fact that TFL is scheduled well in advance, it would be very helpful if someone involved in the process were to notify the other main page processes when a list's appearance is planned to coincide with or immediately follow a related event. (This is most likely to impact ITN, but it could affect the other sections.) That way, all of us would have plenty of time to prepare (and settle any possible disagreements) instead of scrambling (and potentially stepping on each other's toes) at the last minute. —David Levy 21:30, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

On the final point, yes, I'll see what I can do. As I said, all scheduled TFLs are available for everyone to see, but we will endeavour to notify interested parties of time-critical lists. The Rambling Man (talk) 09:30, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks.

I'm interested in your opinion of yesterday's TFL pointer in ITN. —David Levy 09:35, 3 July 2012 (UTC)