Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 00:39, 15 October 2012

Hello Art: I"m a new user and see that you made a comment on my page and wondering if you can guide me. You made a comment about my page called "Media Introduction Events" and that I put the slash behind the world "ref" when in fact is should be before. I"m happy to change this, but I have no idea where the page went or how to find it to edit. Call me blonde, but this is very complicated and I"m completely lost. AlysonDutch AlysonDutch (talk) 23:47, 27 August 2012 (UTC)

• One reason you can't find Media Introduction Events is because the exact title is Media Introduction Event without the "s".

• If you click Media Introduction Event now, it goes to an older article called Media Event. That is because if you click this edit, you will see that someone with the user name "DoriSmith" changed your article to what we call a "redirect". This is already discussed on your talk page at User talk:AlysonDutch#Media Event. A redirect means that if someone enters a phrase into the search box like the misspelling "Phillippines", then they will be redirected to the article whose title is the correctly spelled "Philippines". Or in your case, there already was a supposedly better article at Media Event on pretty much the same subject. So rather than have a duplicate article that had problems like the reference issue, anyone entering "Media Introduction Event" will be redirected to the "Media Event" article. On your talk page, King4057 said that a "Media Introduction Event" isn't really the same thing, but that information should really be included in the "Media Event" article. Whatever; they presumably know more about media events than I do, so discuss it with them. There is more explanation of redirects at Help:Redirect.

• So there are no references to fix, because the page is gone (unless you want to undo that edit, see Help:Revert, but at your level of understanding you would most definitely need to discuss that with Dori first).

• Here is the editing history of "Media Introduction Event".
  • It says that the first edit was yours, creating the page.
  • The second edit was mine, using the correct reference format /ref not ref/ and some related changes, although I think you really wanted wikilinks not references. You might look at that edit to see how I fixed the references. You can look at it by looking at the editing history (my link above), and then click the "prev" button that corresponds to the edit you want to look at. Or if the last sentence was too confusing, just click this instead.
  • The third edit was also mine, uncapitalizing (we now have a Misplaced Pages:Simplified Manual of Style which I hope will be used by newcomers in particular, so see that article's "capitalization" section for an explanation of that edit).
  • And the last edit was DoriSmith's, which removed the entire article and replaced it with a redirect to "Media event".

• When you add a comment to a talk page, either a user talk page like this one or an article talk page like Talk:Media event, the Misplaced Pages custom is to add it to the bottom, not up here. There should also be a heading like you see on the rest of the page, encoded like ==Media Introduction Event references==.

• Misplaced Pages:Tutorial, a generalized introduction to editing, may be helpful. Art LaPella (talk) 04:11, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

Archive

Old discussion is archived at:

2005 thru May 4, 2007 archive

May 11, 2007 thru April 18, 2008 archive

April 19, 2008 thru October 5, 2008 archive

October 11, 2008 thru February 16, 2009 archive

February 17, 2009 thru February 1, 2010 archive

February 5, 2010 thru November 30, 2011 archive

You need to recalibrate your threshold for incivility

Are you serious? Malleus Fatuorum 21:11, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Are you? You could have said, "It should be Bristol, England," and I wouldn't have said anything. Maybe it should be England; I don't know. But instead you said, "Are you arguing that Bristol isn't in England?" Modest Genius obviously knows the map, so why are you accusing him of arguing something absurd? I know you get away with such things regularly, but the rest of us don't. Art LaPella (talk) 21:22, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

If you have a dictionary then now might be a good time to consult it for the meaning of "accuse". Jeez, you people! Malleus Fatuorum 21:26, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

"to say that someone has done something wrong or committed a crime". Yup. Art LaPella (talk) 21:33, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

You have absolutely no insight into your own behaviour, which I find quite illuminating although not entirely surprising for you civility warriors. Malleus Fatuorum 21:39, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

• That was a bit of a stretch as far as instances of incivility go. Art, if you really think this was uncivil, let's run it over to WQA or AN/I and see if anyone agrees with you. Game? --John (talk) 22:16, 5 December 2011 (UTC)
  • Or perhaps the brave Art might like to try for a bigger fish? Malleus Fatuorum 22:54, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

That was about as mild a reminder of the expectation of civility as can be made. WP:CIVIL states "Incivility consists of ... aggressive behaviours that disrupt the project and lead to unproductive stress and conflict." It is not unreasonable to find the tone of MF's response to fall under that description. No formal sanction was being proposed, so John's contribution is disproportionate. Kevin McE (talk) 23:06, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

How are you defining "incivility"? Anything said by an editor you don't like, as it seems that Art does? Malleus Fatuorum 02:30, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Th way wikipedia does. If you don't accept it, please find your way to the exit. Kevin McE (talk) 23:56, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

After you Claude. Malleus Fatuorum 00:20, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

No, I'm not game to run over to WQA; I'm puzzled that anyone would stick up for Malleus under those circumstances, so what I really need to recalibrate is my understanding of Misplaced Pages politics. Art LaPella (talk) 23:30, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Therefore you compound your false charge of incivility by dishonesty. Malleus Fatuorum 02:28, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

If you want a discussion of whether to be civil, years ago I wrote an opinion resembling yours at the civility section of User:Art LaPella/Devil's Dictionary of Misplaced Pages Policy. However, nothing else you write has any resemblance to reality for me. For instance, Kevin cited the policy defining incivility, and your response was to ask how he defines it. So I don't think discussing civility would serve any purpose, other than jumping through the hoop of attempting a discussion for the purpose of any future dispute resolution, to determine why the rest of Misplaced Pages hasn't solved this obvious problem. Art LaPella (talk) 14:49, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

I can think of few things I'd like less than to discuss airy-fairy notions of civility with a misguided zealot. Malleus Fatuorum

FYI

Although you are incidental here, I'm required to notify: Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Civility enforcement/Evidence#Evidence submitted by SandyGeorgia. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:51, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

It's Shakesteak

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet."

I know you withdrew it, but couldn't resist.--Wehwalt (talk) 01:13, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Ah, you resubmitted it. Well, I shall leave this here.--Wehwalt (talk) 01:15, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Máj (literary almanac)

Happy (but at least not last:) New Year. Here is my first article in it. Thank you in advance for checking my worsening English.Aloysius (talk) 22:17, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

I didn't change this phrase because I didn't understand it: "that renounced to reflex actual situation". To renounce something (it's a transitive verb) is to say that you won't do it any more. For instance, to renounce a religion is to leave that religion, or to renounce alcohol is to say you'll never drink alcohol again. At a baptism, the pastor says "Do you renounce the Devil and all his works?" I think you meant "denounce" or "announce". A reflex is a reaction. Literally, when a doctor taps your knee, your foot will move by itself; that is a reflex. Or in politics, an automatic reaction to something is a reflex. I think you meant "reflects". Or in more natural English, the books were denounced for criticizing the government – or maybe you meant that the books were proclaimed or honored for their political analysis. Art LaPella (talk) 21:50, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for your correction. By the phrase I meant that they wrote about topics which did not touch the difficult political situation of the country so that they escaped to the idealized childhood in past (The Grandmother) or fairytales and myths (Kytice). It might be something like "abandoned to reflect" or "waived to touch" or something like that? Thank you for advice.Aloysius (talk) 12:57, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

"avoided reflecting the political situation too explicitly", but I'm not sure that's what you mean either. Were the fairytales an indirect political comment, in the same way that Animal Farm indirectly criticized the USSR without naming it? Or do you mean the books were unrelated to politics in any way? Art LaPella (talk) 19:47, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

They "avoided reflecting the political situation" at all, no relation to the police system of the time so I used the phrase without the ending words, sounds ok, doesn't it? Thanks again Aloysius (talk) 19:58, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, if you understand the difference between "political" and "police"; "political" relates to rulers, their supporters and opponents, such as the Bach government you mentioned; "police" look for thieves and other criminals and take them to jail. Art LaPella (talk) 21:07, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

MOS discussion that may be of interest

Because of your previous input on various iterations of the debate about the lower-casing vs. capitalization of the common names of animals (domestic cat, blue whale vs. Domestic Cat, Blue Whale), you may be interested in this thread proposing key points that should be addressed by the guidelines: WT:Manual of Style#Species capitalization points. — SMcCandlish Talk⇒ ʕ(ل)ˀ Contribs. 05:50, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Josef Jiří Kolář

Hi Art, can you please check my hook and language of the article? Template:Did you know nominations/Josef Jiří Kolár Thank you! Aloysius (talk) 19:38, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

The article includes several 20th-century dates. They can't be right because Kolář died in 1896. Art LaPella (talk) 22:04, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! I have corrected the dates.Aloysius (talk) 08:34, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

Umlaut

Thank you for your correction at Blucher (horse). I wrote firstly "umlaut" and was surprised to get a bot message to tell me that was a disambiguation page. I dealt with it badly, and diaeresis was wrong. You corrected that to "umlaut", but on searching I find there is a page called "Germanic umlaut"! If "Germanic umlaut" covers the primary meaning of "umlaut", which I think it does, do you feel that umlaut should redirect there, or else Germanic umlaut be moved to umlaut, with the dab page at umlaut (disambiguation)? Moonraker (talk) 01:53, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

Maybe but there is a discussion at Talk:Germanic umlaut#Splitting, again continuing to the next section. Some there think "umlaut" has other meanings, so that would be the place to ask. Art LaPella (talk) 02:16, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

MSU Interview

Dear Art LaPella,

My name is Jonathan Obar user:Jaobar, I'm a professor in the College of Communication Arts and Sciences at Michigan State University and a Teaching Fellow with the Wikimedia Foundation's Education Program. This semester I've been running a little experiment at MSU, a class where we teach students about becoming Misplaced Pages administrators. Not a lot is known about your community, and our students (who are fascinated by wiki-culture by the way!) want to learn how you do what you do, and why you do it. A while back I proposed this idea (the class) to the community HERE, were it was met mainly with positive feedback. Anyhow, I'd like my students to speak with a few administrators to get a sense of admin experiences, training, motivations, likes, dislikes, etc. We were wondering if you'd be interested in speaking with one of our students.

So a few things about the interviews:

• Interviews will last between 15 and 30 minutes.
• Interviews can be conducted over skype (preferred), IRC or email. (You choose the form of communication based upon your comfort level, time, etc.)
• All interviews will be completely anonymous, meaning that you (real name and/or pseudonym) will never be identified in any of our materials, unless you give the interviewer permission to do so.
• All interviews will be completely voluntary. You are under no obligation to say yes to an interview, and can say no and stop or leave the interview at any time.
• The entire interview process is being overseen by MSU's institutional review board (ethics review). This means that all questions have been approved by the university and all students have been trained how to conduct interviews ethically and properly.

Bottom line is that we really need your help, and would really appreciate the opportunity to speak with you. If interested, please send me an email at obar@msu.edu (to maintain anonymity) and I will add your name to my offline contact list. If you feel comfortable doing so, you can post your name HERE instead.

If you have questions or concerns at any time, feel free to email me at obar@msu.edu. I will be more than happy to speak with you.

Thanks in advance for your help. We have a lot to learn from you.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Obar --Jaobar (talk) 15:39, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

I don't think I'm who you want. My experience as an administrator is completely unique and atypical, so your questions would likely be irrelevant to my experience. I was made administrator to fix typos on the Main Page. I have never blocked anyone, and I have almost never used my administrator power for any other purpose except to edit protected Main Page sections. Art LaPella (talk) 16:05, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Would You like to Help?

Hi, I am starting Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Ravidassia. I would like to get help from people who are interested. You may sign up for the project on the ]. McKinseies (talk) 15:11, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Mariánská Týnice

Hi Art, I think this time there will be a lot to correct (not because of the article lenght but due to my state of ingnorance last days). Thanks in advance.Aloysius (talk) 22:16, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

• I changed "12.000 goldens" to "12,000 goldens". In German, and I think in some other European languages, twelve thousand is written as 12.000 . But in the U.S., I never saw big numbers written that way until I was about 15, while studying German. Anyway, if there were only 12 goldens, I don't know why you would use a decimal point.

• "golden" means made of gold, so is it also the name of a coin? Or should it be "12,000 golden coins"?

• "Legal disputes between the monks and the House of Griespek were ended in 1613 when king Matthias returned the site to the Cistercians. The Griespeks lost their property due to confiscation after the battle of White Mountain" in 1620. But if the Griespeks had already lost the property in 1613, how could they lose it again in 1620?

• Twice you described an "alter" as "ilusive". I corrected Wiktionary:alter to Wiktionary:altar, but I couldn't guess what you meant by "ilusive". Wiktionary:illusive? Wiktionary:allusive? Wiktionary:elusive?

• I didn't understand the last paragraph very well, but I changed it to what I think you meant. In the old version, the phrase "herbs wall paintings" was confusing because the herbs are part of one of the two paintings on the ceiling, not the wall; it was as if several words must be missing in between "herbs" and "wall". Does it mean there were four different groups of paintings: ceiling paintings, wall paintings, portraits of abbots, and pictures of the monasteries? Art LaPella (talk) 00:37, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

• Thank you. I tried to correct or explain the first four points in the text of the article. You were right in the last point. Aloysius (talk) 13:24, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

DYK Not exactly

Thanks for correcting my error at Misplaced Pages:Did you know/Not exactly. Before I made the change, I spent several minutes looking for this rule referenced as "P1" and never found it, and in a random check, it appeared that other pages listing just sections of the full list of supplementary DYK guidelines, such as Misplaced Pages:DYKFN, identified them by the same prefix letters as in the full list (and you yourself had it as D8 on the "Not exactly" page when you first created the page 3 years ago), so I concluded this was supposed to be identified as D9. Actually, even now, I still cannot find a rule "P1" anywhere else in the DYK pages, even on the "One page" page, which doesn't list any rules with a "P" prefix – but I'm sure you must be correct (I'm being sincere), because you probably have more DYK experience than I do. For my edification, can you tell me where the "P" shortcuts you referred to in the edit summary are located? SJ Morg (talk) 10:06, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

• I don't understand the reference to DYKFN as an example of "identified them by the same prefix letters as in the full list". F2 at DYKFN, for instance, matches A4 at supplementary guidelines. It doesn't match F anything at supplementary guidelines.
• P1 was D8 when I first started transforming it from what is now supplementary guidelines. But it was P1 by the time it left my user space.
• "One page" doesn't include everything, on the theory that you could understand the rest of the system without that exception. However, we could change that if people use it the way you did.
• The "P" shortcut means Misplaced Pages:DYKPN, whose upper right hand corner names that shortcut. Every page in the Learning DYK system has a similar shortcut, all the same except for the identifying letter, which is "P" in this case. So if I want to refer someone to rule P1, I know without looking that I can link it as ]. Unfortunately, nobody else seems to have learned that technique.
• The original idea of Learning DYK was to replace (not add to) the existing lists of rules at WP:Did you know, the supplementary guidelines, and unwritten things regulars just expect people to know, with one system where people could really find things. Each page in the hierarchy can be understood as one piece of the puzzle at a time, to avoid beginners being overwhelmed by everything at once – that is, with one unfamiliar abstraction defined in terms of more unfamiliar abstractions, and no place to begin. But others didn't agree with me, so in addition to "One page" we have an additional layer of rules instead of a simplification. It should probably be all condensed down to one, but as my influence on that subject is limited, I have moved on. Art LaPella (talk) 20:16, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Sorry about my reference to the "F" rules, as an example; I failed to notice that the "One page" page and supplementary guidelines pages didn't match in their F-prefixed rules. As to "P1", I think I understand now. It seems that "P1" was a designation you gave to that rule yourself, on its shortcut page (which you created), as it made sense to you for it to have a designation independent of the other guideline lists (seems logical). But I still don't find a mention of a "P1" guideline anywhere else in DYK, and I suspect this is why (quoting you) "nobody else seems to have learned that technique" of referring to this guideline as "P1". However, it appears harmless, other than the potential for confusion such as happened in my case, and if that has only triggered a discussion once in three years, then I cannot really argue it's an issue worth our spending any more time on. Anyway, I greatly appreciate the time spent on DYK and other WP maintenance by editors such as you, and I know that the DYK process has become more complicated and undergone extensive changes over the past year or so. Some editors such as myself don't have enough time or patience to keep up with all of that, so I do appreciate your (past) work helping editors understand DYK, and I also thank you for taking time to respond to my confusion over P1. No need to reply to this message. Even if my understanding is still wrong, rest assured I am dropping the subject and moving on. SJ Morg (talk) 03:25, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Just caught you on the recent changes, and lucky for you, your name came to the top of the list. Anyway, I need help. I just created this account, been editing from IP's, and all I ask for is to edit protected pages. But I can't. I need someone to solve this problem for me. Can you help me out? AvampostoVeneziano (talk) 21:43, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Helloo

Just caught you on the recent changes, and lucky for you, your name came to the top of the list. Anyway, I need help. I just created this account, been editing from IP's, and all I ask for is to edit protected pages. But I can't. I need someone to solve this problem for me. Can you help me out? AvampostoVeneziano (talk) 21:44, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Ah, never mind me. I just figured it out. I'll go find an administrator... AvampostoVeneziano (talk) 21:46, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

One comma good, one comma bad for DYK on front page

You just added a comma in the "Doe v. Shurtleff" entry that does not belong. The "a Utah law" phrase is not parenthetical, and the comma you added, before "was ruled constitutional", turns a perfectly good sentence into one that no longer makes sense. Can you please remove that final comma you added? Thanks. (As noted, the comma added to the DYK before it makes sense. The WP:ERRORS report was in error, a fact that has been noted on that page. BlueMoonset (talk) 22:03, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Oops, fixed. Art LaPella (talk) 22:10, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Gate of languages

I wanted to remark the 420th anniversary of Comenius so I added the article about his masterpiece - Janua linguarum reserata. Can you please check its English? Thanks. Aloysius (talk) 11:25, 17 March 2012 (UTC)

"1000 sentences which are divided into about 100 chapters." That is an average of 10 sentences per chapter. In modern books, 10 sentences would be a long paragraph, not a chapter. But there wasn't an easy way for me to check if those numbers were right. Art LaPella (talk) 21:39, 17 March 2012 (UTC)

Urgent review request for Template:Did you know nominations/Anthony Davis (basketball)‎

I have had an urgent review request at Wikipedia_talk:Did_you_know#Anthony_Davis_.28basketball.29 that is being ignored. Can you review this?--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 04:40, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Sorry. I have copyedited hooks for years, but I have never reviewed a complete article, a task requiring judgments on several issues I haven't studied. Art LaPella (talk) 04:46, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

Dispute resolution survey

Dispute Resolution – Survey Invite Hello Art LaPella. I am currently conducting a study on the dispute resolution processes on the English Misplaced Pages, in the hope that the results will help improve these processes in the future. Whether you have used dispute resolution a little or a lot, now we need to know about your experience. The survey takes around five minutes, and the information you provide will not be shared with third parties other than to assist in analyzing the results of the survey. No personally identifiable information will be released. Please click HERE to participate. Many thanks in advance for your comments and thoughts. You are receiving this invitation because you have had some activity in dispute resolution over the past year. For more information, please see the associated research page. Steven Zhang 23:28, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Tirumala Venkateswara Temple

You are invited to join the discussion at ]. Pavan 23:40, 11 April 2012 (UTC)Template:Z48
Please participate in the RFC discussion of whether Thondaiman has built the Tirumala Temple. Pavan 23:40, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Apparently all administrators are getting this request, and others are explaining to Pavan that Misplaced Pages doesn't work that way. Art LaPella (talk) 23:53, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

ITNR for elections

As someone who regularly contributes to election articles: Due to recurrent discussions that lead nowhere, an open-ended discussion and proposals are invited Misplaced Pages talk:In the news/Recurring items/Elections for ITN on the main page as to what should be recurrent without ITNC discussionsLihaas (talk) 07:24, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Actually, I only contributed to the current discussion, and to copyediting spelling and such on the Main Page (this issue is an example of why I usually avoid the more political parts of Misplaced Pages). But I've been watching. Any of the proposed alternatives are better than microstate-centrism. Art LaPella (talk) 23:17, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

Endash space

Hi Art, In (this edit), did you intend to change a hyphen in the final paragraph to a space?
—Telpardec  TALK  23:07, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

No. I fixed it. Sorry. Art LaPella (talk) 23:47, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Blurb for transit of Venus

Please see Talk:Transit of Venus#Almost four where I am asking for a change to the "3 1/2 times" text that you put in the protected blurb for the June 5 TFA. Johnuniq (talk) 08:30, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

I don't have a strong opinion about which version is "ugly", and I'm waiting to see if anyone else shares your opinion. I notified WP:ERRORS. Art LaPella (talk) 13:57, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. Sorry about my careless description. Johnuniq (talk) 00:32, 5 June 2012 (UTC)

Tennis ITN

Hey. While you're at it, could you de-bold the French Open article? It has no prose update at all. Instead, the two winners' articles have the required updates and should be bolded. Thanks! —Strange Passerby (talk • cont) 15:34, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

That has been fixed by Tariqabjotu. Art LaPella (talk) 16:17, 11 June 2012 (UTC)

Sandgrouse DYK: what's up?

Art, instead of fixing this on the main page, where the problem was, you resurrected the entire main page set in Prep 4 and fixed it there, which makes no sense that I can see. I'd like very much to start a new set in Prep 4; in any case, a set that's on the front page shouldn't also be sitting in a prep area, unless for a very few minutes. It's been twenty. I'm going to revert in another ten. BlueMoonset (talk) 20:41, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

That's what must have happened. Sorry. Art LaPella (talk) 21:47, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Glad to see you got it squared away on the main page. Thanks. BlueMoonset (talk) 22:23, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Miroslav Tyrš

Hi Art. Can you please check my next Czech hook and its subject - Miroslav Tyrš article? Did you know that Miroslav Tyrš, the founder of Czech national sport movement Sokol, was born into a German family? Thank you! Aloysius (talk) 09:02, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

"Johann Joachim Winckelmann, ... Johannes Overbeck or Giovanni Morelli" It would be strange to list all the authors whose books Tyrš might have read. I might have read all those books too, but I haven't. I think you meant to say that Tyrš read books by all those authors. So I changed "or" to "and". In the next paragraph, I similarly changed another "or" to "and".

"The History of Art for Jan Otto" I think you meant that "The History of Art" was the title of the unfinished book, so I italicized it (The History of Art) according to MOS:TITLE. But if you meant that he wrote a book about the history of art, whose title is different or unknown, then it should be "a history of art for Jan Otto" ("a" not "the", and uncapitalize).

In the hook, you probably know it needs an ellipsis, but I wondered about the link to German nationalism. Is there evidence that his family took unusual pride in being German, or would the Germans article be more appropriate? However, I'm not sure there is a really good solution because our usual rule is to remove links to articles like the Germans article according to WP:OVERLINK, but at the same time to avoid treating nationalities like Czechs and Germans unequally. Our "Easter egg" rule also creates a problem; when one clicks a link to "Czechs" or "Germans" one expects to simply read about Czechs or Germans, not just their nationalistic movements. Art LaPella (talk) 15:51, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for the thorough job! As for the first two points it was what I meant, in the third I just thought I linked it to German nationality not nationalism but (as I see now) it redirects to German nationality law so the best should be to try the Germans and hope it is still not seen as overlinked. Thank you for noticing all these kinds of details. Aloysius (talk) 17:39, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

Almost – German nationalism and German nationality law are two similar but different articles. Art LaPella (talk) 18:21, 6 July 2012 (UTC)

The Mandarax Barnstar of Excellence

		The Mandarax Barnstar of Excellence
		I just mentioned you on my talk page, and I thought I would come here and award an MBE to you to thank you for all of the corrections which you make. I know that little gnomish edits often don't get much acknowledgement, so I wanted to let you know that your work is noticed and is greatly appreciated! MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 00:56, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. I'll copy it to my user page. Art LaPella (talk) 01:01, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

You're welcome. I've refactored it slightly. I always mention MBE because that's how I arrived at the name, and the image is a modified MBE, which most people – certainly most non-British people – probably don't recognize. MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 06:04, 8 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks!

Just wanted to say thanks for your helpful edits on the List of killings by law enforcement officers in the United States 2012 page! It was like a fairy came and cleaned my room.Michellecornelison (talk) 03:16, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

You're welcome. (What does a Misplaced Pages nerd say next?) Art LaPella (talk) 03:30, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

Simplified MOS

Thank you for your excellent work on a Simplified MOS. You may be interested in the discussion here related to MOS issues. LittleBen (talk) 02:26, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

You're welcome. It looks like people in that discussion are already aware of WP:JOBTITLES, so I don't have any new ideas. Art LaPella (talk) 02:40, 21 July 2012 (UTC)

• I don't know whether you've seen this previous discussion in favor of a better organized/simplified MoS, which—guess what—seems to have been forgotten already. ;-) LittleBen (talk) 16:22, 31 July 2012 (UTC)
• RfCs on Diacritics seem to have repeatedly failed to achieve consensus (other than agreeing that the most COMMONNAME in English should be used as the article title), and there has been quite a lot of trouble over diacritics in the past. However it seems that IIO and others have been renaming virtually ALL articles using diacritics without bothering to research usage, though it's easy to research usage by using Google Insights for Search—and it seems that several people who supported a NPoV on diacritics are being blocked or banned. Not good for Misplaced Pages. LittleBen (talk) 16:37, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

I haven't forgotten WP:SMOS. I just haven't had much time lately.

The discussion you linked wasn't about WP:SMOS, it was about renaming pages that once had names like Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (Islam-related articles) to subpages like Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style/Islam-related articles (with a slash instead of parentheses). It's misleading to say that discussion was forgotten, because the debated change has been made.

As for diacritics, I don't normally decide style issues themselves, other than secondary issues like mentioning civility on the MoS talk page. For one thing, I don't have easy access to an academic library with style manuals. I can, however, repeat arguments I have read elsewhere that counter the above (regardless of whose argument is more valid):

It isn't obvious that Misplaced Pages should copy other sources that don't use diacritics, because it could be that other sources had less time and/or software for dealing with diacritics, so it doesn't necessarily prove they prefer no diacritics in English. If people are being blocked or banned for an opinion on diacritics then of course that is bad, but the only such discussion I found was this. And although that sockpuppetry accusation doesn't seem to be sticking, it was valid enough to sway some editors who I don't think have any opinion about diacritics. Art LaPella (talk) 20:43, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

SMOS "More" template

Hi Art, the problem with the extra linefeed with the More template was due to a misplaced <noinclude> tag on the line after the last part of the template code, which allowed the carriage return at the end of the template code to be included. Shifting the noinclude tag to the end of the previous line cured that problem. The box itself was too big and overlapped with other boxes and with text in sentences above the box. (And it was a bit overbearing and distracting to the reader.) I did a re-design to make it smaller, and wrapped the box formatting only around the word "More" in the template, so it would be the same color as the link text. —Telpardec  TALK  17:35, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

• What do you think of the idea of making the template more generic? That is, don't include the "MOS:" name place, so the template can be used on other projects where a More prompt is useful. I was thinking about moving it to something like "Template:More box".
  Thanks. —Telpardec  TALK  17:35, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

My contribution to the "More" template was to take Neotarf's suggestion to the Help Desk, and then copy WikiPuppies' software and install it. Yes, your version is better; in particular future users won't have to remember to use &nbsp; afterwards to avoid the linefeed. This morning, I was going to add nbsp to all the More boxes so I could add visible linefeeds and get closer to WYSIWYG, but I found you had already solved that problem.

I thought about removing MOS: myself (since it's just text and I wouldn't have to know much about the software). As it is, I had to make a new redirect MOS:YEAR because that was the easiest way to make WP:YEAR start with MOS: . A link to a section in MOS:NUM needs a non-intuitive parameter of the form NUM#Paragraph heading, so it can start with MOS: . So that would also confuse future users.

The name "More box" isn't taken, so I don't see anything wrong with using it. As for "the template can be used on other projects", that much politics is pretty much beyond my Wikignoming experience. Art LaPella (talk) 19:45, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Okay. I'll go ahead and work on the transition to generic, and handle the resulting changes to SMOS coding.
Thanks. —Telpardec  TALK  07:04, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

Great work, guys! I think the "More" template is wonderful; but it needs to be a notch or two smaller. The overall effect on the page is pretty intrusive, and we wouldn't want this to work against so valuable an innovation. Noetica 08:11, 10 August 2012 (UTC)

If you followed the above, Telpardec has demonstrated much more understanding of the relevant software than I have. Art LaPella (talk) 00:47, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Sure, Art. I'm simply congratulating both of you on good work so far, and putting out the idea that the template might work better if it rendered smaller – for possible discussion and possible action. What do you think, anyway?

Noetica 00:54, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

I'm experimenting anyway ... Art LaPella (talk) 01:04, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Got it. (Although this message didn't get saved when I thought it was.) Art LaPella (talk) 02:40, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

And I see your point. The existing "More" links are the first thing I notice, and distracts somewhat from reading the rest of the page. Art LaPella (talk) 02:42, 11 August 2012 (UTC)

Failing to exclude compared object from the rest of the universe being compared

(sorry, a pet peeve of logic, not grammar)
Your home page: "I do as much, or more, than anyone to keep simple errors off the Main Page."
You are a member of the group of "anyone", so the missing word is "else". (Art LaPella cannot possibly do more than Art LaPella does.)
"I do as much, or more, than anyone else to keep simple errors off the Main Page."

More flagrant illustration: ""Wyoming has fewer residents than any state in the US" clearly implies that Wyoming is not a state in the US.
Correct: ""Wyoming has fewer residents than any other state in the US" -- which now includes WY among US states.

Note that the questioned way is correct if the superlative, rather than the comparative, is used:
"Wyoming has the lowest population among US states" (-est vs. -er)
"Of all Wikipedians, I do the most to keep simple errors off the Main Page." (most vs. more)

Don't feel bad; this is ubiquitous (and probably hopeless). But to this writer, who created the following userbox,

. Best regards, Unimaginative Username (talk) 07:23, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

Done, although it still says "I do as much ... than anyone else". Oh well, it isn't an article. Art LaPella (talk) 18:30, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

If "as much" was the only comparator used, without "or more", it doesn't change the need for "else":

"I do as much as anyone else to keep simple errors off the Main Page."

Obviously, you do as much as Art Lapella (who is part of the group of "anyone") does. Stating a tautology, so to speak.

The issue was the need for "else". With "or more" being closest in position to "anyone", our ears tend to find "than" to be natural, but I'd certainly not argue with

"I do as much, or more, as anyone else to keep simple errors off the Main Page."

In fact, a good case could be made by purists that this is actually the correct syntax. The real issue was what the title said, the need for "else" or "other". Thanks for humoring the madman and his globally-ubiquitous pet peeve. I shan't harass you any more. Cheers! Unimaginative Username (talk) 03:30, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

OFF WITH HIS HEAD!!!! As a math guy, I have little formal training in language, but I can read the Manual of Style: WP:HYPHEN (search for "a newly available home") clearly states that "globally-ubiquitous" should be de-hyphen-ified!!! Of course if you want to argue that the Manual is wrong, I shall quickly direct you to its talk page ... Art LaPella (talk) 03:46, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Oh, and "I do as much as anyone to keep ..." would surely be OK if it were a math formula like a+b=b+a, without bothering to exclude the case a=b as a tautology. Art LaPella (talk) 03:57, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

Hyphem -- just checking to see if you were awake. Kidding -- touché, Sir, although I believe that the elimination of hyphen from *ly-**ed XXX may be fairly recent, linguistically speaking. (In other words, after I was in elementary school, although one must allow for all the turmoil that followed in the wake of the US Civil War.) No desire to argue the point, though!

The problem is that it's not a math formula. In a Venn diagram (talking your language now, are we?), the set of "anyone" (all humans on the planet) will *always* include ALP, for so long as he is among us. (Long Live LaPella!) To put the diff in math terms, you quoted an equality, while the cited statement is a comparator, > or GEQ, or < or LEQ. "ALP > Anyone" = "1 is lower than any positive integer". 1 isn't lower than 1, which is indeed a member of the second category. ALP is an *included member* of superset Anyone, so how can ALP be *greater* than its superset? OK, did this on your terms; now let's both get back to stuff that matters. Cheers! Unimaginative Username (talk) 07:22, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

United States Military Date Proposal

A discussion on the encyclopedic need for the use of military dates on United States military related articles is taking place at Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers#Proposal to strike out the requirement that American military articles use military dates. Please join in.--JOJ 23:28, 23 August 2012 (UTC)

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A cookie for you!

Thank you for correcting my horrible English in Enedina Arellano Félix's article! Enjoy the virtual cookie. ComputerJA (talk) 03:34, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. Art LaPella (talk) 04:40, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

Precious

	corrections
	Thank you for quality educational correction of mistakes in spelling, grammar and meaning, to make articles look their best on the Main page, - repeating: you are an awesome Wikipedian (4 June 2010)! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 07:54, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. I put it with my barnstars. Art LaPella (talk) 16:09, 10 October 2012 (UTC)

Link?

Help me out. I followed your link, hoping it would lead me to the Arbcom decision, but instead it just goes to a discussion page on the endash draft. While it includes snippets of the Arbcom decision, and I am aware that there are sanctions on some well one editor topic banning them from the MOS, it is not the actual decision. "If after two months, a determination isn't realised, a case will be opened and conduct violations will be dealt with severely." is pretty easy for me to understand. But it seems odd that a deadline would be imposed, as we had a MOS long before 2011, and I see no reason that something critical needed to be decided by any particular date. And since when has WP ever waited to deal with conduct violations severely? Please reply here. Apteva (talk) 08:40, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

I think I found it, but as expected it is hardly a decision to use endashes but a slap on the wrist for using endashes: "Unless a 'hyphen only' policy is ultimately adopted there are going to remain good grounds for replacement in body text and references." What apparently had been going on is edit warring on moving pages and so Arbcom imposed a temporary moratorium on page moves involving endashes and hyphens, no? Apteva (talk) 10:09, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

The deadline was imposed with the thought that our endless edit warring could morph into a more productive settlement with Arbitration Committee supervision. Our existing WP:DASH guideline is the eventual result of that settlement, with few changes since then. Septentrionalis, also known as User:Pmanderson, is currently blocked. I now realize that there was no Arbitration Committee decision in their usual format; but there was a motion requiring a monitored discussion.

Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style/dash drafting is the link I probably should have provided. As its brown introduction indicates, it resulted from this. The "hyphen only" quote is definitely not a slap on the wrist for using en dashes. It is a reaction to a reaction to edit warring over hyphens versus en dashes. So first, the reaction was a temporary moratorium on changing dashes to hyphens or vice versa until more permanent rules could be devised. If you call that slapping, then both sides were slapped. Iridescent's reaction to that reaction was to say that the moratorium applies only to titles. The moratorium has long since expired, so it isn't very relevant any more. What is relevant is that they also required us to agree to comprehensive rules about dashes, with arbitrator Casliber monitoring that discussion to ensure it comes to a conclusion. I recall multiple deadlines being passed while we argued, but the final result is pretty much the WP:DASH guideline we have today. That may help you understand why any attempt to laugh off that whole history and start over is a non-starter. Of course any consensus can change, but you would surely need to find a great many people who agree with your "proper name" theory before there could be any question of overturning that hard-fought settlement. Art LaPella (talk) 18:07, 13 October 2012 (UTC)

Puncuatation is not previously part of my field of expertise, but article titles is, as I am a frequent contributor to WP:RM and have a long history of examining titles. I do believe that I am up to speed on hyphens and endashes to know what I am talking about, and I believe the MOS is basically correct other than a few examples which violate our own MOS. I already have found a great many people who agree with my proper name theory. Among WP editors is not important. What is important is that according to google, "Mexican@American War appears in 90,000 books with some sort of spelling, punctuation, and capitalization. That is our authority, above all else. "Comprehensive rules" is an oxymoron in a guideline and Arbcom emphasized that there are no hard and fast rules: Apteva (talk) 00:26, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

"The Manual of Style

2) Style guides are used as a means of creating a consistent end result. They do not affect content, but rather how that content is presented. The English Misplaced Pages's Manual of Style (MoS) is a guideline, or a set of "best practices" supported by consensus. The MoS is not a collection of hard rules.

Passed 9 to 0, 22:47, 23 March 2012 (UTC)"

Your user page says you want to be an administrator, but you don't give me the impression you're trying to make the system work, so you look more likely to be blocked than to be made administrator. You've taken over several guideline talk pages for weeks with a crusade that has no consensus, and your attitude is more like giving orders than trying to convince anybody. Nobody knows who anybody really is on Misplaced Pages; we cite sources and gather a consensus. If your sources are good, it doesn't matter if you're ten years old. If they aren't, it doesn't matter if you're the Einstein of style.

Even if we interpret the Wilkes-Barre guideline to say that the Mexican–American War guideline is wrong, where do you get the idea that the former overrides the latter, when the latter was the result of thousands of times more debate? Isn't it better to rephrase the Wilkes-Barre guideline to prevent anyone making the mistake of thinking that the consensus wants to overturn the entire Mexican–American War debate, as in this edit? I claim no expertise on punctuation or titles (although I know the existing text of the MoS better than just about anybody), and you may well be right about how the rest of the world punctuates Mexican–American War, but Misplaced Pages operates by consensus. So of course it matters how many WP editors agree with you. If the rest of the world agrees with you, then it should be easy to convince MoS regulars according to their own rules, that is, by citing style manuals etc. as I argue at User:Art LaPella/Because the guideline says so. Otherwise, if we don't see your supporters, you sound like "The Lurkers Support Me in Email".

If you're going to repeat the Google statistics, then mention that DickLyon showed the ratio is about 3 to 1, after accounting for hyphens that turn to dashes when you click them to get past Google's software. And mention that much of that 3 to 1 advantage represents difficulty in producing dashes, not a preference for hyphens. But don't convince me; I avoid decisions like that. Convince them.

The MoS is not a collection of hard rules, but you consider the Wilkes-Barre rule (before DickLyon's recent edit) to be a much harder rule than the rule that was intended for one specific article, the Mexican–American War. Trying to stretch Wilkes-Barre into a hard rule applying to the Mexican–American War is a much better example of what that ArbCom resolution was expressing. Art LaPella (talk) 03:04, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

I had to check the date of that essay because it sounded awful familiar. One area that I have spent a lot of time at is WP:RM, and a lot of nuances of capitalization and punctuation as a result. WP is by definition a local consensus, because we have far more readers than editors, and have an obligation to try to serve those readers to the best of our ability. My first edit was to fix an error. I have not been able to figure out which article or what, but it was a minor but significant correction. The general process that we go through is excellent, and is the product of thousands of extremely smart people providing their insights. Occasionally we make some wrong turns - saying that all animal species capitalize all words was one of them. From what I can tell using Mexican American War is another, and yes I could be less demanding, but one thing that I know I always have is an open mind. I think that every person has tremendous value, and I carefully read every viewpoint. The worst thing is not having enough input.

"the rule that was intended for one specific article, the Mexican–American War"

Not quite sure which rule that would be. My point is that no policy or rule states unambiguously which punctuation to use - common sense applies - and even if there was a rule number 47 that said that pi was equal to 3 (the Indiana legislature considered making that a law and was only stopped because a mathematician happened to be visiting the statehouse and happened to be able to stop them), an RfC could still be opened to change it back to 3.14, and surely someone would notice rule number 47 and point out that after the article was changed rule number 47 should also be changed. Which is more important, the rule or the article? I get the sense that the MOS specialists think the rule is more important and should be changed first. My view is that without articles there would be no rules, so the article comes first. When I looked at books using Wilkes-Barre I found many that used an accent mark over the final e, but did not pursue why. As I pointed out, Dicklyon's edit did not say what was intended, and was just done to make a point as far as I could see. If there are a large class of proper names that use an endash we can certainly note that, but so far no one has been able to find even one that passes the normal criteria used every day at WP:RM - a majority of books using it, for example. I fully understand the logic of using an endash, but no one in the real world agrees - or at least no more than about 2 or 3%, and I find it odd for WP to go out on a limb and use OE English for example just because they are more correct than common usage, even though there is a small percentage that does. But like you say I am only one of a multiple thousand other editors. So just to clarify, it is not what I think is important, it is what the hundreds of thousands of book editors think - as reflected in the books published - that matters, in interpreting the advice that hyphens are used in names. From what I can see almost all of them interpret it as saying that hyphens are the go to character to use. Apteva (talk) 00:39, 15 October 2012 (UTC)