Wikipedia:Simple talk

Simple talk
	This is the place to ask any questions you have about the Simple English Wikipedia. Any general discussions or anything of community interest is also appropriate here. You might also find an answer on Wikipedia:Useful, a listing of helpful pages. If Wikipedia is not working or is very slow, you might find news about this at "Wikipedia's Status". You may reply to any section below by clicking the "change this page" link, or add a new discussion section to this page. Please sign and date your post (by typing ~~~~). Please add new topics to the bottom of this page. Please note that old discussions on this page are archived periodically. If you do not find a discussion here, please look in the archives. Note that you should not change the archives, so if something that has been archived needs discussing, please start a new discussion on this page. Some of the language used on this page can be complicated. This is because it is used by editors to talk to one another, so sometimes we forget. Please leave us a note if you are finding what we are saying too hard to read.
Are you in the right place? See WP:CHU to change your user name or take another user name. See WP:ANI to speak to an administrator. See WP:RFCU for CheckUser requests. See WP:OS for oversight. See WP:RFRB to request the rollback feature (which administrators can grant). See WP:VIP to report vandalism. Add this page to your list of watched pages —    change

Contents

Check Wikipedia schedule for Simple

For those who use Check Wikipedia, I learned that the info for our site is updated twice a month: a couple of days after the first, and on the 20th. --Auntof6 (talk) 05:35, 19 August 2018 (UTC)

How simple?

Are the very good articles those I can use as examples of how to write for the Simple Wikipedia? I've been using tools to help me write Simple English. I may be writing too simply. Can an experienced editor take a look at a few of my contributions to let me know if I am doing okay? Barbara (talk) 11:37, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

I looked at a few of the changes you made to articles about the female reproductive system. I think the level of simplicity is good.

One thing I did notice is that you changed wording in articles (for example, Uterus) to be primarily about human anatomy, whereas the article should apply equally to animals who also have the organs. Although it is we humans who write the articles and we may be more interested in our own anatomy, from an encyclopedic point of view we should not give humans more weight unless there is an objective reason to do so. Can you revise the articles you changed to reflect that? If not, we can revert them for now until someone wants to re-add the information to be more inclusive. --Auntof6 (talk) 20:07, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

When I began editing the Uterus article it did not contain any information on animals. The sentence that was there was unreferenced. I removed the sentence as I found references to support the information that is there now. I will be more than glad to cover animals in the organ articles I work on. It would be discouraging to have my contributions reverted. In the meantime is there a template that can be added to the top of the article that would indicate that information on animals is lacking? Best Regards, Barbara (talk) 20:13, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

Uterus is only one of the articles I looked at. In Vulva, you removed the mention of animals (mammals). I don't know of a specific template to say that particular info is lacking. I only noticed this because you asked. Other than that, I think you've done good work here! --Auntof6 (talk) 20:45, 25 August 2018 (UTC)

Proposal to delete Simple English Wikiquote and Wikibooks

There is a now a proposal to delete Simple English Wikiquote and Wikibooks. Agusbou2015 (talk) 22:11, 26 August 2018 (UTC)

Proposal withdrawn, and the projects will not be deleted. StevenJ81 (talk) 14:48, 28 August 2018 (UTC)

Editing of sitewide CSS/JS is only possible for interface administrators from now

(Please help translate to your language)

Hi all,

as announced previously, permission handling for CSS/JS pages has changed: only members of the interface-admin (Interface administrators) group, and a few highly privileged global groups such as stewards, can edit CSS/JS pages that they do not own (that is, any page ending with .css or .js that is either in the MediaWiki: namespace or is another user's user subpage). This is done to improve the security of readers and editors of Wikimedia projects. More information is available at Creation of separate user group for editing sitewide CSS/JS. If you encounter any unexpected problems, please contact me or file a bug.

Thanks!
Tgr (talk) 12:40, 27 August 2018 (UTC) (via global message delivery)

Is consensus to give this permission to all administrators? If not, how should we process requests for this permission? Vermont (talk) 13:12, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

As I think I've mentioned elsewhere, if the community notionally agrees that all sysops should have this permission, then the preferred way to execute that (for the purposes of security) would be that if a sysop needs the right, s/he contacts the 'crats, who without further delay would grant the flag for however long the sysop needs it. Ordinarily, though, it's better (for security) if people not making active use of the flag not have it in their account. StevenJ81 (talk) 14:58, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

Yeah we should just handle it as we always have for these types of flags. If you need it add it and then remove it. -DJSasso (talk) 15:08, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

Could you add it to me for a few hours? I need to use it to fix Operator873's broken user scripts. Vermont (talk) 16:35, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

Above is confirmed by me Operator873^talkconnect 16:37, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

@Vermont: Added it for an hour. Hopefully you are still around. -DJSasso (talk) 16:50, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

It's fixed. Thanks! Vermont (talk) 16:58, 27 August 2018 (UTC)

Helpful, humorous essay from The Signpost

The latest Signpost has this essay on "Principle of Some Astonishment". It's a fun read, and at the same time illustrates some things we can use to make articles simpler here. --Auntof6 (talk) 02:37, 30 August 2018 (UTC)

I write for the Signpost. Would you like to set a Simple English Version here? Best Regards, Barbara (talk) 21:42, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Simple News. It's been inactive since 2011. Vermont (talk) 23:04, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

If some users are interested, I think we can restart it. We need a group of 5-7 editors for that.-BRP ^ever 03:08, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

I've been an intermediate-editor on Wikipedia for several years, yet today is the first time I've seen Simple English Wikipedia. I immediately wanted to know more and be involved in this project, and I was looking at this Talk page for something like the News page. I would be interested in it restarting, and would be willing to help as an editor if that would be useful. (And this is my first time trying to write a Talk reply in Basic English - it's harder than I thought it would be.) CleverTitania (talk) 04:27, 5 October 2018 (UTC)

I'll note that we don't strictly keep to Basic English. Rather, we use a simple version of English; we have the use of most words except we commonly wikt:link them to Wiktionary or articles. Anyways, welcome to the Simple English Wikipedia! I don't think we currently have enough activity to support a monthly news, although I would be in support of a periodic news source, not strictly set so as to allow more time for the smaller community. (note that this post is not in Simple English; I don't usually keep to it on administrative/discussion boards) Vermont (talk) 09:52, 5 October 2018 (UTC)

Read-only mode for up to an hour on 12 September and 10 October

Read this message in another language • Please help translate to your language

The Wikimedia Foundation will be testing its secondary data centre. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster. To make sure everything is working, the Wikimedia Technology department needs to do a planned test. This test will show if they can reliably switch from one data centre to the other. It requires many teams to prepare for the test and to be available to fix any unexpected problems.

They will switch all traffic to the secondary data center on Wednesday, 12 September 2018. On Wednesday, 10 October 2018, they will switch back to the primary data center.

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop when we switch. We apologize for this disruption, and we are working to minimize it in the future.

You will be able to read, but not edit, all wikis for a short period of time.

• You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on Wednesday, 12 September and Wednesday, 10 October. The test will start at 14:00 UTC (15:00 BST, 16:00 CEST, 10:00 EDT, 07:00 PDT, 23:00 JST, and in New Zealand at 02:00 NZST on Thursday 13 September and Thursday 11 October).
• If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message. We hope that no edits will be lost during these minutes, but we can't guarantee it. If you see the error message, then please wait until everything is back to normal. Then you should be able to save your edit. But, we recommend that you make a copy of your changes first, just in case.

Other effects:

• Background jobs will be slower and some may be dropped. Red links might not be updated as quickly as normal. If you create an article that is already linked somewhere else, the link will stay red longer than usual. Some long-running scripts will have to be stopped.
• There will be code freezes for the weeks of 10 September 2018 and 8 October 2018. Non-essential code deployments will not happen.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. There will be more notifications about this. Please share this information with your community. /User:Johan(WMF) (talk)

13:33, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

Infobox person template

Would any roaming sysop please import a fresh copy of Template:Infobox person when able? I want to start working on fixing the deprecated errors and have learned it's best to start with a fresh import. Thanks! Operator873^talkconnect 02:41, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

Done; doesn't look like there was much change. I imported both the template and its doc page. --Auntof6 (talk) 04:32, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

A million thanks Auntof6. Operator873^talkconnect 04:54, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

IRC Participation

Have you checked out the Wikipedia community IRC channels?

Several members of our community are very active on IRC and I wanted to invite those of the community who do not currently participate to join us. There are a few different channels specifically for Simple English Wikipedia. If you are an editor who enjoys monitoring New changes, you should really check out the Counter-vandalism Network channel called: #cvn-simplewikis ^connect. Would you rather participate socially while editing? Check out #wikipedia-simple ^connect. While standalone IRC clients are preferred by some, no special software is needed. Just click the word "connect" and join us via your web browser. If you have any trouble, feel free to reach out to either Vermont or myself and we will help you get set up. I'd really like to see an uptick in IRC participation and socializing. While we can't make decisions, influence guidelines, or attain consensus via IRC, it does help bolster interpersonal rapport. Hope to see everyone there! Operator873^talkconnect 04:21, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

Would you talk about the issues of privacy when using IRC? When I used it (which was only a few times), there was something about hiding your identity or something like that...? I don't remember the specific term(s). My discomfort with that is a reason I didn't continue. --Auntof6 (talk) 06:08, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

When using freenode, you can get a username registered, with a login/password. Several channels are restricted in who can join them; there's also one for checkusers, one for stewards. As a comparison: Mail is transferred as plain text, all systems it transits through see it (yes, there are ways to encrypr, but they are rarely used). --Eptalon (talk) 07:16, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

Auntof6, If you means by /whois IRCnick and it shows your IP address, then you can get a cloak (not a proper way but it works) or use a VPN, but other than that I don't think there's any such issue. ‐‐1997kB (talk) 09:52, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

@Auntof6: I believe, like 1997kB was saying, you are referring to the visibility of your IP address. Anyone on the IRC server can use the /WHOIS command to obtain information about the connection you are using. The information obtained looks like this: Nick!Ident@IPaddress(orHostmask). With that information, another user might be use a website like our IP Address tool to look up your IP. As you'll note, I randomly selected an IP address from our New Changes feed to demonstrate no personally identifiable information about the user is available to the public.

In addition, Wikipedia editors are able to obtain a cloak to hide their IP address so the information would be changed to Nick!Ident@wikipedia/WP_nick. For example, my cloak is currently Operator873!sid305313@wikipedia/Operator873. My ident (sid305313) is set by the IRC client I use, is unique to me, but provides no personally identifiable information. If you need help obtaining a cloak, connect to IRC and limit your activities to /join #wikipedia-simple. From there, I openly welcome anyone who wants help getting their account setup and their information masked with a cloak to type in /msg Operator873 help me or say hello to me in one of the channels I mentioned above. IRC may be somewhat intimidating if you are not familiar with it, but the fact of the matter is IRC is fun, easy to use, secure, and safe. I remind anyone concerned about privacy issues that there are plenty of IP editors active across all WMF projects and most veteran editors are familiar with how to WHOIS an IP address and the information it provides. Only the Internet Service Provider information is readily available. And most typical residential IP addresses are not static.

Again, I welcome anyone to email me, leave me a message on my talk page, or find me on IRC if you have questions. I will help you anyway I can including getting the steps taken for you to feel your information is secure. Thanks. Operator873^talkconnect 22:03, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

Auntof6, what I believe you're referring to are IRC cloaks, which hide your hostmask (which could be your IP, gateway address, etc.) from common view. If you connect to Freenode (the IRC server Wikimedia uses) via their website or most other usual means website, the worst that can happen is people see your IP address in the hostmask. This usually isn't an issue for most people, although if it is I recommend creating an account with IRCCloud (irccloud.com), as they replace your IP address/hostmask with a series of letters from the moment you connect, and is generally user-friendly for those who are new to IRC-based communication. If you decide to try IRC, join #wikipedia-simple and ping me by typing "Vermont", and I'll help you get setup. Although nothing binding can take place on IRC, I believe it's a great way for editors to discuss and brainstorm solutions to problems, as well as collaborating together. Vermont (talk) 22:39, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

To support the above, I currently use IRCCloud as my IRC client. It's web based, and nothing directly connects to your computer from IRC. IRCCloud is a bouncer which means there is a middle man between you and the IRC server which makes your connection more secure. It also means you can connect from your smart phone or any computer you happen to be on. Operator873^talkconnect 22:48, 8 September 2018 (UTC)

We used to have a very active IRC community for this wiki. I stopped using it because I found that an active IRC community lead to a lot of rule breaking such as making on wiki decisions based on discussions that occurred off-wiki. It often led to a lot of problems on wiki. -DJSasso (talk) 12:30, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

Yes but I think that depends on the user and how they use it. One should always remember that IRC is not the community and the discussions in IRC are not formal. It is an informal way of interaction used to share information, help and opinion.-BRP ^ever 07:15, 11 September 2018 (UTC)

Oh its definitely on the user, but I noticed the more active the community got on there the more and more people and admins alike started to do it. So I personally no longer take part. -DJSasso (talk) 18:30, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

Notice on the National Museum

Hello,

Please, someone could turn the article Notice on the National Museum into Simple English? Thanks, Erick Soares3 (talk) 01:50, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

Long lists prone to vandalism

I want to suggest that lists like List of countries by continents are long-term protected because they are prone to collect fluff and cruft over time, and the content rarely needs appropriate changes, and when it does it needs a regular user to do it. Have just picked up all kinds of little things in List of countries by continents, no doubt by our usual IP visitors. Macdonald-ross (talk) 08:11, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

• Support as suggested by Mac. May need to find or develop a banner tag to direct those not autoconfirmed to the talk page to propose additions. Operator873^talkconnect 04:11, 13 September 2018 (UTC)
• Oppose I sympathize with Macdonald-ross on the issue. However, we are the wiki anyone can edit. And protecting pages just because they are lists goes against that key pillar. If it was getting hammered by vandalism of course I would protect it. But they odd vandal edit here and there really doesn't rise to breaking one of our key tenets. -DJSasso (talk) 16:15, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

contributing?

i need a list of red links to create. thanks. Gassywood (talk) 21:22, 12 September 2018 (UTC) I like sports, history, and science primarily. Gassywood (talk) 21:22, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

Have you visited the requested articles page yet? Operator873^talkconnect 21:31, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

@Gassywood: You could also check Special:WantedPages, although you'd have to search for the kinds of things you're interested in. Another place to look is in navbox templates, because many of those have red links for articles we don't have yet. Try these for science-related Nobel Prize winners to start with:

• Template:Nobel Prize in Chemistry
• Template:Nobel Prize in Physics
• Template:Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine -- This one doesn't have red links, but many of the links are redirects to lists instead of being individual articles. If you want help figuring out which ones are redirects, let me know.

Let me know if you want help finding other navboxes with red links. Hope that helps. --Auntof6 (talk) 22:05, 12 September 2018 (UTC)

Article footer order

Do we have a defined order for the bottom of the page? I know the English Wikipedia uses stub templates after categories, but I have seen both before and after categories here. Nunabas (talk) 14:17, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

Technically they should be after the categories. But there is a bug in AWB for our wiki which causes them to get moved above the categories sometimes. I keep meaning to bug the AWB guys to fix that. -DJSasso (talk) 15:41, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

And in case you were also asking about this, see WP:ORDER for the order of certain optional sections at the end of an article. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:53, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

That's what I ran across, but there is nothing documented about category, stub, or navigational template placement. Nunabas (talk) 17:40, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
Navigational templates go after all sections of text, but before categories and stub templates. Most navigational templates are graphics-intensive, take up the full width of the page, and visually look like a big block, so you want all the text stuff before that. So the order would go like this:

• Related pages section (which is Simple's version of enwiki's See also)
• References
• Other websites (which is Simple's version of enwiki's External links). Links to sister projects usually go at the top of this section, but occasionally go in other sections.
• Navigational templates: usually succession boxes would go before the usual kind of navbox because they're narrower and less dense.
• Categories
• Stub templates

While we're on the subject, I'll remind everyone that any article with references should have a References section explicitly coded, including a header and {{reflist}} or equivalent. If that's missing, the software now displays references at the very bottom of the page, but we want the section actually coded. --Auntof6 (talk) 18:18, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

Help needed: Something is broken and making Pakistan look wrong

For some reason, it looks like template documentation is displaying at the top of Pakistan. I suspect a template or module was changed. Could someone who knows the code better than I do take a look at it? I haven't checked to see if any other articles are affected, because I don't know what might be causing this. Thanks. --Auntof6 (talk) 00:17, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

Interesting. Without looking at the code, it looks like Template:Infobox country has a missing noinclude tag. Xenrose 00:20, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

I moved a noinclude tag in Template:Lang-ur, and that seems to have fixed it. Jared837 (talk) 00:22, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

Thanks. It looks like the change by User:Wekeepwhatwekill caused the problem. --Auntof6 (talk) 00:32, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

Yeah I ended up updating that template as it wasn't using the module yet anyway. And ended up fixing a bunch of other issues that they made. Decided to take the time and make sure the all the other templates were on the lua module now since I think that might have been what caused the mistaken edits. -DJSasso (talk) 13:41, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

If the problem was in Template:Infobox county then no I hadn't. I hadn't touched that template. I did touch Template:Lang-ur, and the change I made was cosmetic. | I added in Template:Lang-x/doc , I did this as a test because I saw an error in the Zulu language template and was checking to see if that template was buggy itself, short story, it isn't. It's fine. The | second addition was to close the noinclude tag opened in the wikilink. Thats pretty standard in any mark up language, close the link so it doesn't spill into the next section. (For example, in my first attempt to make my signature I missed neglected to close a span and caused all text below mine to take on the same characteristics of my signature. Necromonger Wekeepwhatwekill 14:00, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

That second edit wasn't done by you. That was Jared fixing your edit. -DJSasso (talk) 14:04, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

@Wekeepwhatwekill: Just to be clear, your edit that added documentation to Template:Lang-ur caused the problem, because you put it outside the noinclude tags. No worries, though: it's fixed now. --Auntof6 (talk) 16:59, 21 September 2018 (UTC)

Dr.Kumar J. Doctor

Can someone figure out what this person's actual name is? We need to rename the page to 1) eliminate the title and 2) use his actual name. --Auntof6 (talk) 08:38, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Looks like the surname is Doctor here so it's probably best to move this page to Kumar J. Doctor. And I think this page should be taken to RFD as most of the sources are unreliable and the awards are not significant.-BRP ^ever 09:12, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

I've moved it to remove the title. Vermont (talk) 09:33, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Proposal to adjust Level 2 warning templates

Hello community. I've given this alot of thought recently, and I'm aware this issue was previously discussed a couple of years ago. However, I want to approach the subject of the Level 2 warning icon in user warning templates. It was previously proposed be changed to to mirror English Wikipedia. This proposal failed as the community felt the orange icon was too threatening. The problem is, with the same icon, there is no apparent progression from the point of view of the warned editor. Therefore, I suggest be replaced with on Level 2 warnings. This would make the warning progression look like this. The blue color is preserved, it doesn't seem to be as threatening, but does indicate a progression towards a limit. I feel this progression towards a limit is very important to deterring further vandalism. I request community input on this issue and consensus. Operator873^talkconnect 16:49, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Comment - I am able to custom make an icon for this purpose, if needed. Operator873^talkconnect 17:36, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Counter proposal: I suggest that is kept as the Level 2 warning icon, but that is used as the Level 1 warning icon. This would make the progression look like this. Jared837 (talk) 17:30, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

That is partially the point, in the first couple warnings there really isn't a progression. (It is why many of us start at 2. The first one is more a heads up than a warning) It isn't till the 3rd or 4th that we have progressed. The wording itself is what indicates the progression. That being said I don't really think it matters one way or the other. -DJSasso (talk) 18:28, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

I tend to start at 2 or 3 if it's blatant or really bad. Perhaps we should distinguish in warning templates. Vermont (talk) 18:30, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

I only use 1 if it could in some way be seen as good faith which is rare. I almost never use 1. But then I also think too many here stick too stringently to the warnings. We were never meant to go step by step through them. They are only different levels so we could use stronger wording when necessary. There are times when 1 warning is necessary, there are times when 2 might be necessary, and there are times when no warning is necessary. -DJSasso (talk) 18:33, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

I strongly agree that often, 4 warnings are not needed. However, I have encountered issues with VIP reports being declined for users not being warned 4 times (both on SEWP and enWiki), and that being the only reason. This is why I tend to go step-by-step through the process as an anti-vandalism editor. Granted, sysops have much more latitude to make actions. Operator873^talkconnect 19:55, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Oh I understand, some admins here started declining if they weren't all done, I try to encourage them to not do that but they still often do. -DJSasso (talk) 19:59, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Recently I've tried blocking editors for 2-3 hours after they begin a blatant vandalism spree, regardless of warnings. It seems to work well. Vermont (talk) 22:04, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Yup you just have to block them long enough that they are bored and go away. That is why I usually use times like 31 instead of 24...cause it effectively blocks them for 2 days when it comes to bored kids in the school computer lab etc since the block will lift later in the day than when they are in the lab. Which for kids is enough time to forget that simple exists and not come back. -DJSasso (talk) 22:47, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

• SUPPORT - As a vandal fighter, I support User:operator873's proposal for an orange-colored Blue triangle for the level 2 vandal warning indicator. It shows a step up in the warning by color so it's not mis-sable. It's not threatening at all! Necromonger Wekeepwhatwekill 20:53, 25 September 2018 (UTC) _{updated the text Necromonger Wekeepwhatwekill 20:53, 25 September 2018 (UTC)}

@Wekeepwhatwekill: just a heads up, I was not proposing the orange icon. I was proposing the blue triangle. Operator873^talkconnect 20:32, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

• OPPOSE - Yeah not happening. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.105.247.66 (talk) 20:15, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

^^^^ @Operator873: The above comment is from an IP you reverted yesterday , he's been pestering @Auntof6: as well. He's been blocked as well too, so I'm thinking this comment is meant to be a poke at you. Necromonger Wekeepwhatwekill 21:40, 25 September 2018 (UTC) _{Striking out my comment Necromonger Wekeepwhatwekill 14:12, 2 October 2018 (UTC)}

@Wekeepwhatwekill: I'm aware of the IP. WP:AGF and/or WP:DENY apply here. This sort of comment isn't really necessary. Let's stay on topic please. Operator873^talkconnect 22:06, 25 September 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia Asian Month

Hi all. Wikipedia Asian Month 2018 is fast coming up (in November). It's an online edit-a-thon related to Asian topics - participants create articles on Asian related topics, and editors whose articles meet requirements get a nifty little postcard(s) from Asia (I received one from South Korea for last year's competition). The requirements can be found in the linked page, on the Q&A, and on the local page (which will be updated soon).

If anybody is interested, please do not hesitate to leave a message here or contact me - I will be organising this year's event. Hiàn (talk) 19:00, 29 September 2018 (UTC)

Reminder: No editing for up to an hour on 10 October

Note: The normal delivery of this message failed, so I am copying it from elsewhere. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:10, 4 October 2018 (UTC)

Read this message in another language • Please help translate to your language

The Wikimedia Foundation are testing its secondary data center. This will make sure that Wikipedia and the other Wikimedia wikis can stay online even after a disaster.

They switched all traffic to the secondary data center 12 September 2018. On Wednesday, 10 October 2018, they will switch back to the primary data center.

Unfortunately, because of some limitations in MediaWiki, all editing must stop while we switch.

You will be able to read, but not edit, all wikis for a short period of time.

You will not be able to edit for up to an hour on Wednesday, 10 October. The test will start a bit after 14:00 UTC (15:00 BST, 16:00 CEST, 10:00 EDT, 07:00 PDT, 23:00 JST). If you try to edit or save during these times, you will see an error message.

This project may be postponed if necessary. You can read the schedule at wikitech.wikimedia.org. Any changes will be announced in the schedule. Please share this information with your community. /User:Johan(WMF) (talk)

12:03, 4 October 2018 (UTC)

Google+

Hi, I've just added a bit on Google+ being shut down in 2019 but I wanted to ask if someone could check to see if it's simple enough ?, I've tried the best I can but I wasn't sure if it was simple enough ?, Thanks, –Davey2010^Talk 19:06, 8 October 2018 (UTC)

Hi Davey2010, your changes seem to be fine IMO. I've split the one sentence into two and other than that "expose" might be a bit problematic. Hiàn (talk) 03:48, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

I simplified a little more. I found a different way to say "exposed", and I unpiped "software bug" so that readers can immediately see what is meant (jargon can be tricky). --Auntof6 (talk) 05:07, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

Too much detail on userpage?

User:Fiery3 has a very detailed autobiography on her userpage, including claims of illness and lots of personal details that would be useful to scammers. Not sure if that's against your rules here, but on basic common sense grounds, perhaps an established user should have a word with her? 129.67.118.138 (talk) 18:51, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

The user is now blocked indefinitely for Long-term abuse so I replaced the user page with {{Blocked user}} after consulting vermont. Thanks-BRP ^ever 20:55, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

None of those details are real. Vermont (talk) 20:57, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

 (change conflict)  for future reference, if the person is an adult, they can put personal details on their user page. (Minors can put some, but certain information such as their age is not allowed.) We have at least one other user page with that kind of detail. However, the content on that page has now been replaced anyway, with a template saying that the user has been indeffed. --Auntof6 (talk) 21:00, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

Might be good to remember that this is not Facebook, and so user pages should probably be project focussed.--Peterdownunder (talk) 21:11, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I prefer not to see user pages used this way, but I think WP:User page (which is a guideline, not a policy) allows it. --Auntof6 (talk) 23:24, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

Weird personal attack apparently posted by an admin

Okay... this is strange. Am I the only person that noticed it?? 95.252.214.67 (talk) 09:48, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Pinging Auntof6 for an explanation. Vermont (talk) 09:55, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Just per Vermont's edit summary, looking at her edits for that day she did revert some edits on the Adolf Hitler page that day so she may have had something queued up and somehow it got intertwined with that edit. Seems pretty out of character for her. -DJSasso (talk) 10:45, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Yeah. It's possible she had "Adolf Hitler" on her clipboard and misclicked. Vermont (talk) 11:11, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

I think that's what happened. I certainly didn't intend to replace the user's name, just to add the paragraph about restoring the article. It looks like I meant to copy the user name from the existing paragraph (to paste it into the ping), but I accidentally did a paste instead of copying. My tablet's controls sometimes seem a little off: I've caught many similar things before I saved them. I apologize, and I will pay closer attention in the future. --Auntof6 (talk) 17:37, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Feedback requested

I'm writing up a page on IPV6 for simple wiki over here in my user space. It's not quite yet done, but I'm looking for feedback on this because I'm a major geek and want to make this as simple as possible so it can be suitable for wiki, and secondly to check for errors. Feel ffree to check it and make corrections as you see fit! Necromonger Wekeepwhatwekill 00:00, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

@Wekeepwhatwekill: I made some changes in the introduction for tone, grammar, and simplicity. I can do more later. Let me know if you have any questions about what I did. --Auntof6 (talk) 00:36, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

@Wekeepwhatwekill: I reallly nuked your article... please revert if you like, I won't be offended... and please don't be offended by my edits. See your talk page. Operator873^talkconnect 01:02, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

merge of articles

Can someone please merge List of hurricanes in Connecticut into List of New England hurricanes? 'Cause I don't think we need two articles about the same thing. Furthermore, the latter article is more specific. Angela Maureen (talk) 05:22, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Stub articles on Greek literary concepts

• 2607:F140:6000:1A:5815:B88E:3EC5:350E (talk · contribs · WHOIS)
• 2607:F140:6000:1A:64F5:3C0F:19EF:D542 (talk · contribs · WHOIS)

These two IPs, probably the same person and both tracing to University of California, Berkeley, have created a number of poor and unreferenced stub articles on Greek literary concepts (example). They all relate primarily to Homer's epic poems Iliad and Odyssey. They are:

• Aristeia
• Ekphrasis
• Nostos
• Xenia (Greek)
• Homophrosyne
• Apologoi

I and another editor have repaired and referenced them all. But most of them should probably be merged into the articles on Homer's poems except for Aristeia and Ekphrasis, which are broader in scope and can stand alone. I'll leave it for others to decide. Voceditenore (talk) 15:09, 20 October 2018 (UTC)

Spacing around stub templates

Please remember to leave two blank lines before a stub template. (That includes the {{multistub}} template.) The reason is so that the text from the stub template is visually set apart from the article text instead of potentially looking like a continuation of it. Thanks! --Auntof6 (talk) 05:55, 22 October 2018 (UTC)