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Category:Communities in Ontario and other provinces

Oh, I also wanted to seek opinions about another issue. Category:Communities in Ontario contains almost all Ontario communities, but excludes those that may be categorized elsewhere (eg - Category:Greater Sudbury, Ontario). I think this would be a good example of allowing exceptions to the rule (see Misplaced Pages:Categorization#Creating subcategories for details, fourth paragraph). Most people won't find Capreol, Ontario, for example, if they don't know it's part of Greater Sudbury. I think we should list all communities in the provincial category, including those in sub-categories. Mindmatrix 4 July 2005 17:25 (UTC)

My first concern with this is that no other category for "Communities in X" exists on Misplaced Pages; we really need to find an entirely different way to structure and categorize these kinds of articles (eg. separating them into "Towns in Ontario", "Villages in Ontario", etc., but there may be other ways.) One example of why this is a problem is that the "Communities in Canada" category has been filed for months in a nonexistent (redlinked) "Communities by country" category (which is never going to exist.) Bearcat 21:23, 9 July 2005 (UTC)
Every country seems to have its own standards; for the US, there are Locations in X categories (for example: Category:Locations in Maine). I don't object to Villages in etc, since we already have the equivalent Cities in and Towns in categories, but how do you handle the distinction between incorporated and unincorporated communities? For example, Osgoode Township, Ontario consists of a number of communities (see this) - how do you classify them? Words like communities or locations are generic enough to capture all those places. Mindmatrix 22:59, 9 July 2005 (UTC)
Hmm, I should have inspected more categories for US states. They've created Category:Unincorporated communities in Alaska etc. for some states. For the larger states, they also have Villages in and Hamlets in categories (see Category:New York). I wouldn't object to using similar categories for Canadian locations. Mindmatrix 23:08, 9 July 2005 (UTC)

Canada geography stubs

Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Stub sorting has just split the Canada geography stub category. With nearly 1500 stubs, it was becoming too large to be of practical use to editors, so separate subcategories have been made for the four provinces with the most stubs (Ontario, Quebec, BC, and Alberta). We've only split these top four because none of the other provinces had a very large number of stubs, so it would have been unprofitable to split off the rest (if they get too big at a later date, they may also be split, but there's no point at the moment in making a separate stub category for eight PEI stubs, for instance). The new categories are all subcategories of Category:Canada geography stubs, and use the following templates:

At the moment the areticles are yet to be sorted into these new categories, but hopefully they will be in the next week or so. We hope this will make it easier for you 9and other editors) to find Canadian geography items to expand! Grutness...wha? 08:31, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)

  • Is there a precedence for using BrColumbia? I have never seen this abbreviation before and don't think it is useful. It should either be British Columbia or BC. I would argue for BC since it is the most used way to refer to the province even in speech. DoubleBlue (Talk) 14:06, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • This British Columbian has never seen/heard "Br. Columbia" before, and so I'll second that request to use "BC" instead. It seems analogous to using "{{UtdStates-geo-stub}}, which would be clearly weird. -The Tom 19:36, 25 Jun 2005 (UTC)
  • For those who have an opinion one way or the other, the discussion is at: WP:WSS/C DoubleBlue (Talk) 05:04, 26 Jun 2005 (UTC)
Apologies about Br. Columbia - it's what most of the world calls it, and it never crossed anyone's minds at the Stub sorting project that it wouldn't be known as that in Canada (a fairer analogy might be USA-stub - widely used outside the US, but rarely used there). Still, BritishColumbia-geo-stub can also be used, since one redirect to the other. BC is a bit too ambiguous though - other parts of the world call themselves BC. Grutness...wha? 09:53, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

I re-stubbed most of the Canada-related geographical stubs; for BC, I used {{BritishColumbia-geo-stub}} since it was the most descriptive and least ambiguous. It currently redirects to {{BrColumbia-geo-stub}}, though I hope the former will eventually replace the latter. Mindmatrix 6 July 2005 15:50 (UTC)

BTW: here are the current counts for those stub categories:

The Ontario category is growing very quickly; an extra 100+ stubs have been added in the past week, after the re-categorization was done. Mindmatrix 6 July 2005 15:56 (UTC)

...And there's been yet more growth in some of the provnces which didn't have separate stubs, so WP:WSS has created two more:

The first of these is for geography stubs from NS, NB and PEI - currently there are about 125 of these, and uses {{maritimes-geo-stub}}. The second is for what it says, Newfoundland and Labreador geography stubs. To avoid having a huge template name - and also to hopefully stave off any claims of neglect from Goose Bay et al if the obvious shortening was used - this can use either {{Newfoundland-geo-stub}} or {{Labrador-geo-stub}} (the latter redirects to the former, and the wording of the template names both!). Grutness...wha? 09:46, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Department of Marine and Fisheries

The article Department of Marine and Fisheries (Canada) seems redundant to the article Department of Fisheries and Oceans (Canada). It's the same department, but under the original name. There has been some confusion with naming as the Department of Fisheries and Oceans is also known as Fisheries and Oceans Canada (I know the confusion first hand, as I'm currently working with the Governemnt.) I suggest merging DMF into DFO, but I'd like to hear what others have to say before I flag it for VfD. Zhatt July 8, 2005 20:22 (UTC)

First of all, if you do merge them, you should not VfD. The correct procedure is to create a redirect at the old article pointing to the merged one. Secondly, I'm not sure I understand the problem. Fisheries and Oceans Canada redirects to DFO as it should and DMF clearly states it is a former department. It may be desirable to keep an article about the former department as a history of the ministry or it might be better to keep the history with the current department article. I haven't decided yet. DoubleBlue (Talk) 8 July 2005 21:30 (UTC)
OK, no VfD. Didn't know that. Thanks. Does anyone else have an opinion on if DMF should be merged into and redirected to DFO? If you notice, on DMF, there is a list of departmental name changes at the bottom. What gives DMF the right to have an article but not these other variations on the name? Zhatt July 8, 2005 21:47 (UTC)
Go for the merge and redirect like DoubleBlue suggested. It's interesting stuff that should be under a history section in the main DFO article. I would argue that it should be in the same article because the function of the former department are very similar to the current DFO. At a minimum, there should be a "See also" link in both articles. See Misplaced Pages:Merge for instructions. — Luigizanasi 8 July 2005 21:56 (UTC)

Article merged. Thanks for your help and comments. Zhatt July 8, 2005 22:44 (UTC)

Yes, you were right Zhatt. It's better merged. Well done. DoubleBlue (Talk) 8 July 2005 22:48 (UTC)

Generally, my rule is that if something merely changes name but is essentially the same thing other than the name change, then the old name should just be a redirect to the new one and the history should go in the current name's article. However, if two or three or four things merged to create one new thing, or one thing got taken over by another thing that already existed, then I'd do separate articles. Bearcat 17:34, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. That seems like a reasonable rule of thumb. DoubleBlue (Talk) 18:06, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

Canada geo stub redirects listed for deletion

Some redirects to the four canada geography stub types are up for deletion on WP:SFD. Please comment if you think these redirects are useful, or if the main stub names suffice. -- grm_wnr Esc 19:02, 10 July 2005 (UTC)

New Provincial geo-stubs names up for discussion

WP:WSS/C#Newfoundland-geo-stub, NovaScotia-geo-stub Should Newfoundland and Labrador be {{NewfoundlandandLabrador-geo-stub}} or just {{Newfoundland-geo-stub}} or something else? DoubleBlue (Talk) 10:07, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

I'd go with {{Newfoundland-geo-stub}}. I'll add comments to the proposal page. Mindmatrix 12:50, 11 July 2005 (UTC)
Created as {{Newfoundland-geo-stub}}, with redirect at {{Labrador-geo-stub}}. In the end, NovaScotia-geo-stub wasn't created - but {{Maritimes-geo-stub}} was in its place, to cover NS, NB and PEI. If that gets to be too big a category, it may be split further in the future. Grutness...wha? 09:59, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
Re-stubbing of the articles is complete. Mindmatrix 18:53, 15 July 2005 (UTC)
Wow, that was quick. I was going to help. :-) Good work all. DoubleBlue (Talk) 19:16, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Ever wondered why there are so many of us?

I'm sure that I am not the only one to have felt that there are an awful lot of Canadians on Misplaced Pages. Jimbo just released a table ranking countries by Misplaced Pages page views per capita. Among English speaking nations Canada was first with 0.26 page views per person during the period studied (believed to be one day). 4.10% of Misplaced Pages traffic came from Canada, placing us fourth in total traffic after the United States, Germany, and Japan. Most surprising is that Canada is ahead of the larger UK by a significant margin, and has almost double the per capita page view rate of Australia. Of course this jsut raises the question of why Misplaced Pages is so popular in Canada. - SimonP 14:20, July 11, 2005 (UTC)

Canada has the highest internet penetration among anglophone nations. We also have a healthy distrust of experts, and a traditional citizen participation in public life. Put the two together, and voila. For example, see Progressive Bloggers.--Simon.Pole 19:08, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

New Article Notification

I'm a new user to Misplaced Pages and I think it's great. A suggestion would be to have a method whereby an individual can be advised when a new article is created concerning a topic of interest. I have a watchlist, it only advises me of changes. HJKeats 15:15, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

You could put a category page on your watchlist. Zhatt 17:18, July 11, 2005 (UTC)
You can watch articles that don't yet exist. For example, visit this non-existent article and click watch. When someone creates it, it'll pop up on your watchlist. You can also do this with templates, categories etc. You can do it even more quickly by adding an action to the URL, like so (note: clicking that link will add This_non-existent_article to your watchlist). You can simply paste that URL into your browser's location bar, and change the title to the article you want to watch. I hope that helps. Mindmatrix 18:55, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

Citadel of Quebec

User Montréalais has recently changed Citadel of Quebec to Citadelle of Quebec. I am puzzled by his claim that Citadelle is used in both English and French. If you consult many of the gc.ca sites including http://www.pc.gc.ca/voyage-travel/pv-vp/itm5-/page5_E.asp you will see that the government continues to use the correct English word "citadel". Halifax also has an impressive British-built citadel Citadel Hill. A capital letter is not really required since citadels were built all over the place and the word is in every English dictionary. Understandably in Quebec the complex known as the Fortifications of Quebec will be referred to as a citadelle, but not elsewhere in the English speaking world when a perfectly good English word exists. This complex was built by the British and it is more than ironic that it should be presented to the rest of the world outside Quebec as somehow French. By this reasoning, every powder magazine in Quebec will have to be termed a poudrière in English. French Misplaced Pages should correctly use Citadelle de Québec but English Misplaced Pages should use Citadel of Quebec. Can we have some opinon on whether it is wise to frenchify an historic English word?--BrentS 22:20, 14 July 2005 (UTC)

To be honest, I don't actually see a contradiction between saying that "Citadel of Quebec" is a common term for the thing and saying that "La Citadelle" is its actual proper name. And yes, I would take the Governor General's website as a higher authority on this matter than a government tourism site; a tourist profile isn't bound by protocol to refer to the thing by its formal and proper name, while the GG more or less is. Bearcat 22:36, 14 July 2005 (UTC)

Geo-stub sorting

The new templates for {{Newfoundland-geo-stub}} and {{Maritimes-geo-stub}} have been implemented, and articles have been sorted into their respective categories. Here's the current tally:

We need to work on expanding those articles - that's nearly 2000 stubs, and the list is growing rapidly. Mindmatrix 19:09, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Fraser Institute

Hey folks. I'm in the middle of a dispute with an anonymous user at the fraser institute article. The person keeps inserting material that is found on the fraser institute website. I just reverted the text for a third time and I was hoping that someone might like to weigh in on this problem. Thanks. --PullUpYourSocks 22:04, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

You're right. The user has been copying direct off of this page. The best you can do is ask the user to stop in their talk page (I can see that you did) and if the user presists, list them at Misplaced Pages:Vandalism_in_progress. (By the way, that page is taking a very long time to load). I'll keep an eye on the article in question too.
•Zhatt• 22:22, July 20, 2005 (UTC)

L. P. Fisher Public Library

Hi, I stumbled across this library. I was wondering if anyone knows what makes it notable? I'm afraid Misplaced Pages will now start having articles about every library in Canada.

--YUL89YYZ 17:28, July 21, 2005 (UTC)
Its primary notablilty comes from being a handsome and fairly old public building. It's also linked to Lewis P. Fisher. --NormanEinstein 15:36, July 22, 2005 (UTC)
I suspect it's not encyclopedic. It should likely be merged into Woodstock, New Brunswick and Lewis P. Fisher. DoubleBlue (Talk) 17:34, 22 July 2005 (UTC)

Canadian Government Departments

SimonP and I have been talking about Canadian Government department names. Many of the names are formated Department of TOPIC (Canada). The discussion was prompted when SimonP removed (Canada) from Department of Fisheries and Oceans (Canada) for the fact that disambiguation was not needed. My arguement was that it was not a disambiguation but the fact that mand departments are commonly known as TOPIC of Canada. We were wondering what the names on Misplaced Pages should be? The common name or the official name? I'm not even sure what the official name is anymore: Department of TOPIC or Department of TOPIC Canada? I work at the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs and I remember someone saying that the government made a change a while ago saying that all departpents should have Canada in the name now. INAC (as its commonly called) used to be known as DIAND. Fisheries and Oceans is still known as DFO because no one here likes saying "foc".
•Zhatt• 17:23, July 22, 2005 (UTC)

I like the TOPIC Canada naming but I suspect the official name is still Department of TOPIC. I do not strongly favour one over the other at Misplaced Pages but redirects at the other should, of course, be done.
Misplaced Pages:Naming conventions (government departments and ministers) actually wisely suggests that "pre-disambiguation" be done for instances such as Department of Fisheries and Oceans to be Department of Fisheries and Oceans (Canada) to leave no chance of ambiguity, even if there are currently no other articles with that name. I suggest, therefore, that if there are to be any articles named in that format that the "(Canada)" be added. Obviously, if the TOPIC Canada format is used, the disambiguity is built in nicely.
The general rule for article names is to use the most commonly used and recognisable name rather than the official name. There is a bit of a mix, as you point out, between the popularity of different names: i.e., Department of National Defence vs. Environment Canada and some with equal popularity: Department of Fisheries and Oceans vs. Fisheries and Oceans Canada. I think a good argument could be raised here for using "Dept. of" for consistency with other departments within and outside of Canada. My vote, however, is to use the name given on the official website. For example, although Fisheries and Oceans Canada's website is dfo.gc.ca the name on that site is Fisheries and Oceans Canada and I would go with that. http://canada.justice.gc.ca on the other hand, is titled Department of Justice, and I would go with that. DoubleBlue (Talk) 18:38, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
The Federal Identity Programme: Titles of federal organizations page is an interesting resource for this topic but a bit out of date. DoubleBlue (Talk) 18:52, 22 July 2005 (UTC)
Thanks DoubleBlue. I'm going to start doing some renameing accordingly. •Zhatt• 19:13, July 22, 2005 (UTC)