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Wikipedia:Simple talk/Archive 90

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Main page

I notice that the text for our main page sample article is not the text from the present evolution article. No doubt it comes from a previous version, probably early 2009. In principle, all text on the main page sample VGA should come from the introduction of current pages. So admins in charge of the main page should make sure the text from VGAs is updated before each presentation, or else at regular intervals. Macdonald-ross (talk) 09:45, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sofixit. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 15:59, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
So I did: thanks for the pointer. Macdonald-ross (talk) 16:10, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Even though the main page is locked from editing, you can still see the source code and follow the transclusions to the source. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 16:15, 22 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

DYK Oooops

 
Liquid mercury as a mineral

We have mercury as front page DYK, stating it's the only "... liquid mineral ..." while our own mineral article states that a mineral "must be solid". Suggest this DYK is pulled as soon as possible and better research is conducted in future as this shouldn't be allowed to happen. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:05, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah I'd pull it until we get the facts straight. One of them is right, just gotta figure out which one it is.--Gordonrox24 | Talk 17:10, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
English Wikipedia says "Mercury is the only metal that is liquid at standard conditions for temperature and pressure; the only other element that is liquid under these conditions is bromine.<ref>Green, J. and Damji, S. ''Chemistry'', Melton: IBID Press, 3rd ed. 2007</ref>" (wikified and nowikid ref for here)[1].   — Jeff G. ツ 17:17, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Sure, but I'm worried about what the respective articles here on SEWP say. They currently contradict each other directly. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:18, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
 (change conflict) See this. Find a cite for your claim and we can have a cite war. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 17:19, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
No, let's not. Let's pull the DYK and worry about it off-line. This is embarrassing. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:20, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I view it as somewhat amusing. I think some authorities say mercury is a mineral and others say it is not a mineral. Nonmineral on en, uncitedly states that mercury is not a mineral. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 17:22, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I agree, let's pull it and worry about it off-line. Our own article mineral is flat wrong when it says that a mineral "must be solid".   — Jeff G. ツ 17:23, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I've pulled it. Perhaps this should teach us to check all articles linked to in a DYK... The Rambling Man (talk) 17:25, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
Watch this if you're interested. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 17:29, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That PDF cites "Handbook of Mineralogy (Anthony et al.), 1 (1990), 323". Wikified, that would be "Anthony; et al. "Mercury" (PDF). Mineral Data Publishing. Retrieved 2010-12-24. {{cite web}}: Explicit use of et al. in: |author= (help) Also a section of Handbook of Mineralogy, 1 (1990), 323".   — Jeff G. ツ 17:38, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I will, but the point here is that we shouldn't be putting "facts" on the mainpage which contradict themselves. That's the real lesson to be learned here. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:31, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
OK, it was a one time mistake. Lighten up, okay? :) --Chemicalinterest (talk) 17:43, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Not the point. We pay a lot of focus to the bold article in DYK, but it seems we need to pay equal attention to the other linked articles in the hook. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:46, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
enWP 'Mineral' says minerals are solid, and end of intro ref is 20th ed of Dana's Manual of Mineralogy. enWP 'Mercury (element)' says it rarely occurs as the element in nature. Macdonald-ross (talk) 18:57, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
It is rarely found as an element, but not rare enough to have quite a few pictures on Commons. The question is: Which reference will we trust? --Chemicalinterest (talk) 19:42, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I see. It is really a matter of definition. It does occur native as an element, and would certainly be regarded as a mineral if solid. I'm inclined to accept it. Macdonald-ross (talk)

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
What about it being in its liquid state? It is only solid when very cold. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 22:09, 24 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Though chemistry was never my best subject, I always thought liquid Mercury was not a mineral. I've always identified liquid mercury as a metal and a mineraloid. Britannica's mineral article seems to agree with me on this.
If there is still any debate with the actually definition of a mineral and if mercury is classified as one, just change "mineral" with "metal" and cite Britannica or any other source and the problem should be solved. wiooiw (talk) 06:43, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Just to add on, Simple's Mineral article seems to be correct and what Macdonald-ross said about it being a solid is correct from my understanding, also cited in Brit's mineral article. Mercury as a solid is a mineral. Wording the hook with "mineral" in it, and being correct, probably would be difficult to do. Changing it to "metal" is really my best suggestion. wiooiw (talk) 07:24, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I thought we had a hook about "...that mercury is the only liquid metal?" already. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 12:53, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
But I have two sources (above and here) that both state that native mercury is a mineral. The second source also states that mercury is not found in a crystalline form anywhere on earth, which obviously means that liquid mercury is a mineral. The first one is from a mineral authority, which should be the priority source. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 13:14, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
OK, I'm convinced by your refs, and have changed the minerals page so the characteristics are not stated as absolutes. Your hook can go back to the queue now! Congratulations. Macdonald-ross (talk) 16:20, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Huh, I found this and this to be quite useful. It reviews older definitions of "mineral". Pretty much it tells why most sources are now outdated, including Britannica. So by the newest definition, mercury is an exception to the rule. Lets just make sure the mineral page here is updated and is correct. wiooiw (talk) 00:18, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Already done, with refs. Thanks, and end of story. Macdonald-ross (talk) 03:40, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! Normandie Talk! 10:53, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Happy Hanukkah to everyone too, and happy holidays! :) Nifky^ 12:35, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Indeed, Merry Christmas to you, too, Nifky, and dear Normandie! Winter is so cold, yet brings such sweet holidays. :) ♥ingly, Bella tête-à-tête 12:44, 25 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
A bit late for Chanukah guys :P. Merry Christmas, and happy new years to all of you. --ϟ s e c r e t  ϟ 03:44, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Don't forget that this Wikipedia is anti-Christmas. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 18:47, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Note

Since nobody's been using editor review, I've tagged it with {{historical}}. PeterSymonds on IRC said ER is dead. Mr. Berty talk~stalk 22:54, 31 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It's still used though... It's not the most active board, but I think it can still be helpful. It is one of the links on the recent changes bar to, so it does get a fair amount of visibility. I'd keep it without the tag.--Gordonrox24 | Talk 23:59, 31 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Adding the tag without consensus isn't really justified. As Gordon said, it does get a fair amount of visibility. Yottie =talk= 18:38, 1 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Well, it's relatively dormant. However, it is in our Recent changes template. If it's going to be tagged as historical then we should remove it from Recent changes. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:43, 1 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Cactions

Should this work here in its current state? Normandie Talk! 15:00, 2 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Everything seems to be working. wiooiw (talk) 15:09, 2 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Oh well never mind, can't get it to work... Normandie Talk! 15:17, 2 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I logged out then cleared my cache. After that, it started working. wiooiw (talk) 15:19, 2 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Nope, that didn't work either. I also tried using another browser. Its okay, I was wanting to see if I could adapt it. I'll try another way. Thanks anyway. :) Normandie Talk! 15:25, 2 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Lower protection for Wikipedia:RecentChanges/Article Improvement

Could an admin lower editing protection for this to autoconfirmed? Since only admins can update stats, it makes the stats more outdated as admins don't update the stats as often as they change. I think it will be better to allow users to update them as well. Thanks, --Chemicalinterest (talk) 17:46, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Didn't a bot usually update that? I thought we have the bot sysops so it could...--Gordonrox24 | Talk 18:14, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The bot's been down for a month or so. I'd suggest starting GB5 but it's not a sysop and neither am I, and I don't agree with reducing the protection following previous vandal attacks. There's enough admins to update it without opening the door to vandals. :-) Goblin 18:23, 26 December 2010 (UTC) I ♥ Yottie![reply]
I used to rely on the number to see whether there were any new hooks, but now almost every time I look the number is wrong. That is why I started this thread. There is an alternate way of resolving this problem. Delete the number and just have a link. Chemicalinterest (talk) 18:41, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Is that not what a watchlist is for? Goblin 18:42, 26 December 2010 (UTC) I ♥ PeterSymonds![reply]
 (change conflict) Gordonrox24, the bot is blocked. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 18:43, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]
...as a security measure. As I say, the bot was not updating (Along with EhJJ's other bots) - the block is nothing to do with the non-updating-ness. Goblin 18:47, 26 December 2010 (UTC) I ♥ Nifky![reply]
Yes, I have it watchlisted, but the number is useless in its current state. It should either be continually updated or removed. --Chemicalinterest (talk) 18:43, 26 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Just removed the numbers. I suggest to either get a sysop with a bot to update it or just leave it as it is now. -Barras (talk) 13:53, 28 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Never really saw the point of having the numbers there to begin with. -DJSasso (talk) 14:31, 28 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I find it highly useful so I can know if there's a new hook that I can comment on. I believe leaving it as it is currently would be a huge mistake because it could bring DYK to a standstill. Kansan (talk) 06:17, 2 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It's been fine since the numbers got dropped. Watchlists are there for a reason, use them and, if necessary, with expanded turned 'on'. Goblin 00:13, 3 January 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Fr33kman![reply]

DYK heads up

Hi guys,

Wikipedia talk:Did you know is relatively unused, so I'm raising this here instead... Please don't comment on the hooks purely because of the image that has been nominated with them. Recently people have been approving or denying hooks purely because of the image, and/or making a big thing of the image. The image doesn't and hasn't ever come under the approval/denial criteria for hooks and can just be selected by any user moving hooks to queues if desired. Why? Because there's no guarantees an image is going to be used if nominated. By all means remove them or change them if they're not topical or there are better ones, but let's not make such a big thing of it? It's about the hooks themselves, not the photo!

Goblin 00:16, 3 January 2011 (UTC) I ♥ S3CR3T![reply]

I think the photo does add an illustrative edge to the hook. Admittedly, I'm more likely to approve a hook if an interesting image is used, to supplement the "hook should be interesting" criterion. Jon@talk:~$ 23:48, 4 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
 
Occasionally, an illustration carries substantial content or helps clarify an explanation. In those cases it could be right to discuss it. A statement like "...ellipses are curves which result from the intersection of a circular cone and a plane that does not pass through its apex" are incomprehensible to most, but the diagram is transparent. Macdonald-ross (talk) 10:09, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

2010 deaths cleanup

There are two lists of people who died in 2010. One is a short list on the 2010 page under the subheading Deaths, the other is a separate much longer article called Deaths in 2010 which is linked from the 2010 page. Many of the people are listed on both lists. There is no reason why people should be on one list or the other. I propose we delete the names from 2010 and simply leave the link to the full article. I would make sure that notable people would not be "lost" in the cleanup. Peterdownunder (talk) 05:42, 2 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  Done Peterdownunder (talk) 06:40, 7 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Coding question

Hey, could somebody fix the code at Template:US-bio-stub so that it generates the category Category:American people stubs? Thanks, Purplebackpack89 23:32, 4 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Should be fixed now. Maximillion Pegasus (talk) 23:38, 4 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It is. The entries will show up in the category pretty soon, right? Purplebackpack89 23:47, 4 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
No the work queue can take days to process. -DJSasso (talk) 02:35, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Bot edit

Why did the bot add two copies of the interwikis to the interwiki section, making three copies? --Chemicalinterest (talk) 23:56, 5 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It happens now and then because people run bots on the Wikipedia namespace and don't realize that different wikis handle things slightly differently. Most bot operators avoid running interwiki on the Wikipedia namespace because of these issues. I was going to have a talk with this operator but didn't get a chance yesterday when I saw him do it on a different page. -DJSasso (talk) 13:18, 6 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

AWB Request

I'm thinking about building a bot for this WP, so I'm requesting AWB access for this Wikipedia. Since we don't really have an AWB page, I thought here would be the place to request Purplebackpack89 05:39, 8 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser/CheckPage. Katerenka [talk]08:27, 8 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Disney

Has anyone else noticed a huge increase in the amount of edits to Disney related articles? Especially by only IPs = Example and Example 2 Normandie Talk! 20:44, 10 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Seems like they all come from or near Maryland, USA. Maybe a school project? [CharlieEchoTango] 20:55, 10 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Could just be a coincidence, but be aware of this:[2]. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:15, 10 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
local version. --98.221.179.18 (talk) 18:16, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah its probably bambi fan again, perhaps we have gotten slack in catching his edits. -DJSasso (talk) 00:15, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
This is what I was thinking, although I never had any experience of this vandal so couldn't be sure. How about auto-confirmed editing for kids related articles for a short period? Normandie Talk! 12:14, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There is no way to implement it....just check the edits when you see them to make sure the edits are ok and I say let them go. -DJSasso (talk) 17:25, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Take a look who edited here and here. Is suggest a CU. The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 18:20, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The creator of the article is definitely Bambi (its a WP:DUCK tbh). Regards, Pmlineditor ∞ 20:07, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Introduction

I am an experienced English Wikipedia editor exploring other languages. The English site will always be my "home", but I'd like to contribute here when interested. Anything major I should know regarding notability requirements, stub creation, major differences between here and English Wikipedia, etc.? I will certainly take a look at the useful pages, but figured an experienced Simple English editor might be able to offer a quick, helpful summary in a few sentences. Any help would be greatly appreciated! Also, is there a newsletter here similar to The Signpost? --Another Believer (talk) 23:52, 11 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Welcome aboard! There's nothing too outrageously dissimilar to the workings of enwiki except that it's a much smaller community and you'll probably meet all of the regulars within your first few days - and know them within a few weeks! We generally go with the jist of 'if en does it it's probably ok here', though there are some exceptions, particularly with regards to things such as QDs etc. The best thing to do would probably be to suggest reading Wikipedia:An_English_Wikipedian's_guide, which is designed specifically for users like yourself! Most prominent here are that we don't allow image uploads, don't have portals, the DYK process is somewhat different and we are fairly strict on article attribution for those copied from enwp. Finally, we do have a newsletter, Simple News, though it is fairly sporadic (I hold my hands up!) and you'll find everything out that goes on often by just flicking through Recent Changes! If I can help further, please ask :-). Goblin 23:59, 11 January 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Fr33kman![reply]
Fantastic--thanks for the assistance! --Another Believer (talk) 00:00, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
No problem at all, you're welcome! :-) Goblin 00:11, 12 January 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Juliancolton![reply]
I could go stub-creation crazy here!, though I am certain editors are annoyed with stubs popping up all over the place. I noticed that some very prominent albums, etc. have been deleted in the past... is this likely due to vandalism, lack of references, or a dislike for stubs? I am just wondering if it is worth planting seeds here or if it is preferred that editors take on articles one at a time and flesh them out as much as possible. Also, if there is not one already, a project to copy over one featured article per week from English Wikipedia and convert it to Simple English might be beneficial to the project (perhaps WikiProject Copy or something similar?). I did notice WikiProject Collaboration, which appears to be inactive. --Another Believer (talk) 16:35, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
That's what I do. See the blue links on here? Half of them are some copys from en that have just been simplified. The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 16:39, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
To give a more fleshed out and useful answer than the one above (Which isn't...), we're not against stubs however we are against mass-creation of short, one-line stubs and will often delete sub-stubs as 'No content', or mass-RFD some if we need to - our article count dropped by a good few k a year or so ago! A lot of them will be vandalism and lack of references etc, though some may be sub-stubs. Planting seeds is very much worth it, though we do always like it if people can take their articles to the next level and turn them into good or very good articles if they can. It's entirely up to you! :-) Regarding WikiProjects, they have a history of not working at the wiki due to the varied interests and smaller numbers, and, while you're more than welcome to try, experience suggests that it will probably 'fail' after a couple of months, unfortunately. If you want to convert an ENWP FA to SEWP then please feel free, and there's several of us involved heavily with those processes that will be willing to lend a hand I'm sure! :-) Just do bare in mind that some ENWP articles have more than enough detail in them, though, and can sometimes be split off into shorter articles, or have more complex (And less important) stuff omitted if required. Hope that helps! :-) Goblin 17:37, 12 January 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Juliancolton![reply]
:( The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 17:44, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, both! --Another Believer (talk) 17:47, 12 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Happy 10th Wikipedia birthday!

As one of the newest editors(and youngest) of Wikipedia, I wish everyone a Happy 10th Wikipedia birthday! Although it is quite sad that Simple English Wikipedia is not really celebrating it... Maybe we could on our 10th birthday? Hydriz (talk) 14:30, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oklahoma

I've made a comprehensive list of issues at Talk:Oklahoma. These issues should be fixed for the article to remain at its current position. Thanks, Albacore (talk · changes) 19:15, 15 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You should probably raise your concerns at WP:PAD and then link to it from here as it requires the community's approval before the article can be demoted, issues or no issues. That linked page is the required one to initiate the process, not here, which is probably best to just direct people to thefemoton discussion. Thanks! Goblin 10:13, 17 January 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Fr33kman![reply]

How do you do this?

I'm trying to make a template. A WikiProject one, I've been inviting people without a template and it's getting annoying having to type all that "Hi, I've noticed that you've edited (Name Warriors article here) and I want to invite you to [[User:IanP/WikiProject Warriors|WikiProject Warriors]]! It's where many people edit Warriors articles and improve Wikipedia in this area! Thanks, ~~~~". It's getting really annoying! I want to make it myself but I just don't know how. Please, help! I also want to be a certain user's mentor. The user is User talk:Ally.friend. Thanks for your help. Loudclaw (talk) 00:10, 17 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Making a template for your/your WikiProject's own benefit is usually done on your userspace. Just create another page, such as User:IanP/WikiProject spam and write what you plan to tell them when you invite, and instead of typing it all down manually, you just have to type, {{subst:User:IanP/WikiProject spam}} and it will appear.   Your WikiProject seems interesting, and if I had enough time I would join it—unfortunately, I don't, and I also don't know a single fact about what the "Warriors" are. I hope your invitations work, though, and keep up the good work editing here. ♥ingly, Bella tête-à-tête 00:51, 17 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
In terms of making a template then the way that Belinda had suggested is the best option; however, whether it is needed is another thing, as most - if not all - of your invites are basically spamming any of the wikis users who have no interest in the field of the project and also have never edited an article to do with the subject. Considering that WikiProjects aren't popular or well-used here anyway, spamming users probably isn't a good idea... Goblin 10:28, 17 January 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Yottie![reply]
It's not Wiki Project "Spam" but WikiProject Warriors "Template".

Notification of WikiProject

Hi, I'm just here to say that I've made a WikiProject. WikiProject Warriors. My invitation template is here: Hi! I noticed that you edited an article that's in our scope and I was wondering if you were interested in Warriors. I thought, well, maybe that person is interested in WikiProject Warriors! There's a link here, and you can join if you like. It'll have links to every Warriors article that need to be fixed and there's a LOT in there. I haven't gotten around to finishing it yet so I would accept your help in it. It covers all articles about the series Warriors and so it is very easy to do. Thanks! Loudclaw (talk) 04:56, 17 January 2011 (UTC) and It will help everyone. Loudclaw (talk) 23:25, 17 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Pseudo queue and Soft heap

  Resolved.

Can someone who knows a lot about computers take a look at the message here. I know little about computers, so I can't help too much. wiooiw (talk)

Deleted A6 wiooiw (talk) 04:50, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Add word to definition of Quickly!

  Resolved.

Add the medical term ( STAT or stat) to the definition of Quickly!...i looked and did not find this useage in the wikipedia definition...It is used in crossword puzzles.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.244.16.185 (talk • contribs)

We don't do dictionary definitions here. Have a look on the Simple English Wiktonary or the normal one. The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 17:33, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Somebody close Pmlineditor's request for 'cratship please.

  Resolved. -DJSasso (talk) 18:59, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It should of been closed two hours ago. The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 18:12, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Two hours!! OMG, go crazy! It is just 2(!!) hours not 2 weeks. Don't spam this board with such threads, thanks. -Barras (talk) 18:15, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Since when are closing RfXs emergencies? Pmlineditor (t · c · l) 18:16, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Help with table

I have been working on my Geography of Taiwan project and I am wondering how to make an info list on the side of the article THX! HAVE A NICE DAY 23:35, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Well, the one you used only had to be closed, if that was the problem. -- Mentifisto 23:58, 19 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Refs

how do you make links blue idk. Hux21 (talk) 17:16, 20 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well create the page! The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 17:27, 20 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Criteria for bureaucratship seems inconsistent

There seems to be a bit of inconsistency with regard to the closure of bureacurat nominations. Recently Wikipedia:Requests for bureaucratship/Pmlineditor was closed as unsuccessful at 17/4, which was under the current bar of 85%. However, I want to have a discussion about this bar, because I think it should be lowered.

Recently, we introduced a (fairly successful) system of appointing bureaucrats after two endorsements from other bureaucrats. The two endorsements ensured the candidate's success, without having to wait the standard seven days for community opinions (note that I'm aware crats may defer to the seven day election in the case of divided community opinion early in the process). However, now that we have this system, we need to be more flexible on the requirements. 85% seems absurdly high for a community election in which two crats could simply end the process by promoting the user anyway. At 81%, it is incredibly clear that the community was happy about this promotion.

We currently allow CheckUsers and oversighters access to the tools at 70%. We allow administrators access at 75%. Since the bureaucrat user group is not particularly controversial or dangerous, especially now we have the two-crat rule, we need to even out the percentages here. PeterSymonds (talk) 20:27, 21 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think it would make sense to change criteria. It makes absolutely no sense that it'd be easier (percentage-passing wise) to obtain CU and OS ("controversial" positions) than to become a 'crat. Personally I think it should be 75% across the board... Also think the system should be a bit more flexible. If the running candidate has 73% support, I don't see how failing them just because of 2 or 3 or 4 percent makes any sense... Especially with the amount of editors/voters we have. --j e r s e y♥ 21:40, 21 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I don't agree, if a user can't find two crats that will support which should be easy if they are good enough for the role, then the RfB should have a really high bar. If anything I think 85% is low...its generally 90% on en. It's 75% for admin, and crat should definitely be higher than it. I would also mention since you are using the 81% as an example, you have to also take into account the fact that there were a huge number of people in the neutral who weren't comfortable with the promotion which also has a significant weight in any discussion when you factor them in its a much different picture. And personally I would rather make CU and OS higher than lower Crat.-DJSasso (talk) 00:11, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm fine with Jersey's 75% myself. I doubt that the percentage matters all that much, since everybody knows everybody here and if you can't get two crats, you'd likely fail RfB anyway. I do think we probably have enough crats for the time being...there are almost always multiple crats on at any given time Purplebackpack89 01:22, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I won't comment on the particular case, but am against any weakening of the criteria. Macdonald-ross (talk) 07:51, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Re PBP89: Every handful of days we do have a few hours where no crats are online. That said, a period with no admins would be a concern, but crat actions are relatively small in number and rarely urgent. Given our large number of crats and attentive community, is lowering the passing percentage—only needed when no two bureaucrats are willing to support—really necessary? I agree with DJ that if anything, CU and OS should be closer to unanimous; this community is not in such desperate need of flagged individuals that lower standards are a necessity. sonia♫ 09:02, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Hello all, I wlil not comment on the ongoing request, as this might influence it. I do however state my opinion: Bureaucrats are able to give bot status, and to promote / demote other users. The "visible" part of the first privilege is that edits no longer show up in the recent changes;"behind the scenes", bot status also disables certain editing limitations (number of edits per minute raised considerably). The second of these privileges is what makes bureaucrats dangerous. For this reason, the "suggested percentage" they need is higher than for admins. (Note that RFCU is a guideline, not policy). Oversighters can change what is shown of the different logs, CheckUsers can associate users with the IP addresses they edit from. The foundation wants "legally adult" people for CU/OS, probably to show the responsibilities they have. Note also, that we do have perhaps 30 users, so a "difference" of 10% votes would be about 2-3 votes, which is largely within the "margin" crats have for their decisions. As to the "two-crats-support-insta-promote" rule, I'd prefer a week-long vote, with a given support percentage - No matter what we do we should do it with the consesus of the people editing here, and not because two people believe it is best. When we discuss the CFA, we should also provide a means to "demote" people. I know less than ten named regular users with no other flags (except perhaps "rollback"). When we start the discussion, we should do so when on other RFA requests are pending, and once we have settled with the new rlues we re-allow requests. --Eptalon (talk) 15:58, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • I agree it is odd that the crat percentage is higher than CU and OS, but also think the percent should not be lowered. Can we raise the OS/CU percent, or are we unable to do that locally as that rule is controlled by meta?--Gordonrox24 | Talk 16:16, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    • Well, raising the percentage for CU or OS is probably possible, as long as it doesn't dip below the minimum stipulated by the Board. However, I don't see much point. It is also a requirement for there to be 25 supports, and with the user base sometimes not being able to meet this, getting 25 supports and being below 85%, let alone 70%, is somewhat unlikely. PeterSymonds (talk) 16:33, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I see what you mean. I know how crats possibly get through. The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 16:42, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
We are free to choose different percentages for bureaucrats, but those for CU/OS are (to some extent) regulated by the foundation. We could also appoint bureaucrats by divination, or other obscure practices.--Eptalon (talk) 16:48, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. Screw the stats; appoint on merit. The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 16:49, 22 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Pages milestone

Just noticed that sometime in the last few hours we reached the 200,000 mark for pages. Either way (talk) 14:45, 23 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It was Twenty20‎ created by Peterdownunder, not too long ago. Will update the Milestones page. Goblin 14:48, 23 January 2011 (UTC) I ♥ The Rambling Man![reply]

Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District

Made a list of general fixes that the article should have if it is to stay a GA. I don't want to list it at PAD only for it to be snowed three days later when all the issues are dealt with. Thanks, Albacore (talk · changes) 21:54, 25 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Same at Little Red Riding Hood. Albacore (talk · changes) 21:44, 26 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think that's a good idea; it's far better to just fix the issues than to go through the whole deletion process. (And it's certainly important to visit all promoted articles every once in awhile.) Kansan (talk) 23:14, 26 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I would suggest listing Little Red Riding Hood immediately, as it's had at least one previous PAD nomination and somehow got through it (and is now back!), so would be worth, imo, going through a full demotion suggestion without an early close and see if it does get fixed. Besides that, good idea to list them as Kansan says and I will see if I get time to work on one of them! (And go through my own, which I try to do every now and then!). Goblin 23:45, 26 January 2011 (UTC) I ♥ S3CR3T![reply]
Listed at PAD for comment. Albacore (talk · changes) 00:20, 27 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Green Score Thing

What is that green number, surrounded by parentheses and preceded by a plus, between the time I edited an article and my Username on My watchlist. --Kierkk (talk) 17:32, 30 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It shows how many bytes the article has changed. If green, the article has increased in bytes. If red, the article has decreased in bytes. Albacore (talk · changes) 17:37, 30 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ah. Thank you, that was a speedy response.--Kierkk (talk) 17:44, 30 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hello

Hello, I am User:Usaairforce and decided to just create a new account rather than change my account name as it had very little edits. I am an experenced editor and if I can help in any way just tell me. Random Fat Guy (talk) 18:25, 31 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Without many intorductions: Pick the subject area you like to write about, and write articles about that subect. If you like to improve articles more than writing new ones, just look at good and very good articles. Idea would be to have more of both, in the long run (though getting them is a lot of work). Anyway, welcome to Simple. --Eptalon (talk) 19:38, 31 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Census 4

Howdy all; just dropping by to administer the next WP:CENSUS. If you consider yourself active, please add yourself to the tally, so that we can get a vague estimate of the current userbase. Regards, — μ 01:19, Tuesday February 1 2011 (UTC)

Lord can we stop with these already....they are never remotely accurate with people signing that are never here and people that are active here that don't sign....lol there isn't really much point. :P -DJSasso (talk) 02:50, 1 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Earth

Comments at Talk:Earth. Albacore (talk · changes) 21:20, 1 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the comments. It would have been nice if you could drop me a notice in my talk page, seeing that I was the original nominator of the article at PGA. I'm going to attempt to address your concerns. :) Pmlineditor (t · c · l) 11:53, 3 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Community unblock discussion for Samlaptop85213

I have been asked to reblock Sam so that a community discussion regarding unlocking him. I've pasted this notice here rather than on WP:AN top more people see it. Feel free to ask any questions of Sam. fr33kman 02:49, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Interwiki linking

Does anyone know why this link en:Internet doesn't work?

What about this one?

No link is shown at on my browsers. If there is none on yours too then the above statements might make more sense if you look at the code.

Yaris678 (talk) 18:25, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You have to put a colon before it to link to it on another project. I've fixed the above examples. Maximillion Pegasus (talk) 18:27, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Cool thanks. Are all the examples on Wikipedia:Interwiki wrong? None of them have a colon at the start. Yaris678 (talk) 18:31, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
No because when you are doing real interwiki links you don't use the colon. Only when you want to have the link show up on the page like in this discussion. -DJSasso (talk) 18:38, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move

I would like to move Symphony no 7 (Shostakovich) to Symphony No. 7 (Shostakovich). However, I do not see the tab that makes it possible to move it, which I can see to the right of the star showing whether the page is on my watchlist on the English Wikipedia. Could someone please move the page? It would also be good to know if or how I can move pages in the future, if anyone knows that. --Opus 113 (talk) 21:00, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  Done Sure, mon. Also, if you're autoconfirmed there should be a tab at the top saying "move". The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 21:02, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. I realized what the problem was. I have not yet made 10 edits on this wiki.--Opus 113 (talk) 21:06, 2 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A call for DYK nominations

Just a general reminder to the community that we've been slacking on our WP:DYK hook nominations. Yes, it does matter because if you look at articles that have been featured on DYK in the past and check them with a page view count engine, you'll consistently find that those articles' page views go way up for the specific days they're featured on the front page, so people do view these articles, so let's get some more nominations in. Kansan (talk) 17:31, 4 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Problem with raw statistics

5 hours ago there appeared a problem with extracting raw statistics for simple Wikipedia. When link http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Statistics?action=raw is opened, it seems that option "raw" is ignored. This poses a problem for my bot which collects statistics for all Wikipedias. This problem appeared only in simple Wikipedia, please compare the output with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Statistics?action=raw. Can this be fixed? — Ace111 (talk) 11:53, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Hello and welcome to the Simple English Wikipedia! Your issue with raw statistics is due to the differences in MediaWiki versions. Simple English Wikipedia is currently the only Wikipedia using 1.17wmf1. The English Wikipedia is using 1.16wmf4. If this issue continues to be annoying you, please inform the developers at #wikimedia-tech (you need an IRC client for this) or report this as a bug on Bugzilla. Thank you. HydrizTalkBot 14:17, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It was rolled out to 5 other wikis as well. --Bsadowski1 17:36, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It'll take it's time, bear with. The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 17:41, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I don't understand why the MW version change should have anything to do with it. Anyone care to explain? - dcljr (talk) 12:52, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Hello Dcljr. Whenever there is a MediaWiki version change, large changes to the code would be made. However, I do not have the knowledge of what this change has anything to do with the "&action=raw" value. Please bug the developers on #wikimedia-tech (you need an IRC client for this) to find out why. Sorry for any inconvenience caused. HydrizTalkBot 12:58, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I have taken the initiative to ask the developers about this and they claimed that this value is removed in this new version of MediaWiki. We apologise, but you need to use the API for this. See this. HydrizTalkBot 13:03, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Lots of things will go a bit funny with MW 1.17 (my popups aren't working). The one and only...Mr. Berty! talk~stalk 13:08, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
 Please do not post messages into Simple English Wikipedia about MediaWiki 1.17wmf1. If you need to test, please use test2wiki. Thank you. HydrizTalkBot 13:13, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

O.K., you told about test of MediaWiki 1.17wmf1, but where discussions of bugs/features in MediaWiki 1.17wmf1 can be made? I don't use IRC. — Ace111 (talk) 16:48, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If you are reporting new bugs, please proceed to Bugzilla. For others, please use IRC. You can connect to IRC using a webchat. Remember to fill in #wikimedia-tech as the channel name! HydrizTalkBot 16:52, 12 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There's also wikitech-l. You want #wikimedia-dev, not #wikimedia-tech. — μ 16:55, Saturday February 12 2011 (UTC)
This is incorrect. The channel topic for #wikimedia-tech says that bug reporting for the deployment of MediaWiki 1.17wmf1 is to be done here (which is #wikimedia-tech) HydrizTalkBot 03:00, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Little Red Riding Hood PAD

The following discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not change it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No more changes should be made to this discussion.

Hi everyone, just a notice to let you know that Little Red Riding Hood, a fairly early GA, has been up for demotion for a few weeks now and is now approaching the time that it should close (Or should have closed, if we take the two week limit stated there rather than the three weeks for (V)GA...) and there's only been two of us pitch in so far. If you don't want to see it demoted (Or do!) then please drop by ASAP. Thanks! Goblin 13:55, 13 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ GoblinBots![reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not change it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No more changes should be made to this discussion.

Category/Nobel Prize

We have a category 'Nobel Prize for Medicine winners' whereas the actual Prize is for Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. In this case I think the category title should match the Prize title because many of the winners were not for medicine, and quite a few did not even have medical degrees. Notice, too, that all categories in the Nobel set use 'for' instead of 'in', but that's less serious.

I bring this here because there is a whole bunch of pages which would need changing, and I'm sure one of our 'category' specialists knows how to do it! Macdonald-ross (talk) 10:34, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You are right, the category name should fit to the name of the prize. Any entry needs to be changed, means we need to replace the category on every page with the new name. Maybe one of our bot ops can do this quickly? -Barras (talk) 11:03, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I could run AWB through it tonight. -DJSasso (talk) 13:16, 10 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Please go ahead and do it. Macdonald-ross (talk) 17:21, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah I forgot last night, Barras reminded me this morning. So I will have to do it when I get home. I don't have AWB at work. Will only take a few seconds to do. And there is no rush. :) -DJSasso (talk) 17:23, 11 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Now done, thanks all. Macdonald-ross (talk) 06:31, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Oops, forgot to post here- I recatted the manually categorized ones (via my automated account), but the great majority are placed in those categories by Template:Nobelprize; I have fixed that to render the correct categories. Problem is, I've somehow messed up the parser for putting the articles that are currently in Category:Nobel Prize in Peace winners into Category:Nobel Peace Prize winners. Could someone with more template know-how help me figure out what I did wrong? sonia♫ 03:39, 16 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

New messages bar

Is blue if you're using Vector now that we're on MediaWiki 1.17. If you'd like it in the old orange like I do, copy 

/* change the new message bar back to orange */
.usermessage {
	background-color: #ffce7b;
	border: 1px solid #ffa500;
}

into your vector.css. I'd actually prefer this to be added to MediaWiki:Vector.css as a project-wide 'hack', because I feel the blue bar is just far too easy for new contributors (or us, for that matter) to miss. sonia♫ 03:13, 13 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It might be a good idea to put it in MediaWiki:Vector.css, but some users(like me), would prefer to have the blue bar since it kinda blends perfectly into the vector skin, which makes it a bonus. Cheers! HydrizTalkBot 14:40, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
You've just completely contradicted yourself there, rendering your comment somewhat useless. Nonetheless, personally I would oppose a project-wide change and would encourage users that want it to set it up themselves as Sonia has suggested. Goblin 14:45, 17 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Barras![reply]

For science buffs

I've added the category Experiments under the science category. You can use it for famous experiments in any branch of science. Macdonald-ross (talk) 06:29, 15 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Mac, makes good sense. fr33kman 01:02, 16 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Not my mothertongue

English is not my mothertongue therefore I would like to find somebody who can read my edits and change severe mistakes — Preceding unsigned comment added by Werner100359 (talk • contribs)

I took a look at the page you just made and made a few small changes. Welcome to Wikipedia! Kansan (talk) 15:05, 17 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
No worries, you aren't the only not-native speaker here. -Barras (talk) 09:33, 18 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal. for GoogleTrans-Speak to be a gadget on simple Wikipedia

As one of the aims for the simple English wiki is to help people learn English, I propose my GoogleTrans-Speak gadget for the wiki.

Using GoogleTrans a popup will appear near the cursor, having a foreign language translation of the word (or selected text < 500 characters), when the cursor is over a word in a web page and the SHIFT key is pressed.

The help file on the enwiki for the gadget is at:

en:User:Endo999/GoogleTrans

The gadget has been running on the enwiki for around 18 months now and has had around 8500 installs (after 6 months of use). It is currently running on 12 wikis.

It can be run on the simple enwiki by including the following javascript in your vector.js file:

importScript("User:Endo999/GoogleTrans.js");

This version has the following text to speech addition: 

   if you select some text (<4000 characters), put the cursor within that text, and hold the ESCape key down for a second, then a sound bar will appear. By clicking on the play bar of the sound bar, you will then hear the text selected.

The idea is that people wishing to learn English may not just want the translation of a word or two (or a sentence or two) they don't know, but also may wish to hear the sentence to train their ears (and thus learn to listen to English as well as read it).

I use the gadget (on my private test system) to read French and Spanish webpages, including the eswiki and the frwiki, since I can read those languages but cannot understand spoken speech of those tongues.

The Text To Speech is actually done on my LINUX box in Canberra Australia, so I would like to try out the feature on a small wiki (like the Simple wiki) so the number of requests isn't too large.

Open Source Text to Speech systems are used: 

   Festival for English and Spanish
   Espeak for the other languages
   Mbrola contributes the voices for espeak in French and some other languages.

On Firefox 3.5+ a HTML5 audio tag plays an OGG sound file. On IE9 a HTML5 audio tag plays an MP3 sound file On other systems, Flash is needed, a Flash sound bar will play an MP3 sound file.

I think some people learning English may like to play a computer voice of some text in wiki articles. It's a good way to learn to listen to English. You can have the translation into your native language, and then you can listen to the English text selected right in front of you. Listening to the radio and TV is often difficult because the native speakers speak too fast. Festival TTS does not speak too quickly.

You can play the sound bar more than once if you need to listen several times.

It's a good language learning tool and I thought it would be a good gadget for the simple English wiki, which is a language learning wiki.

Endo999 (talk) 06:38, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This is a good idea in my opinion. Suggest the script be made a gadget. Pmlineditor (t · c · l) 18:37, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Template:Constellations/modern/modern-list

I'm not sure whether to put this here or in Peer Review, but would appreciate some feedback on Template:Constellations/modern/modern-list. Background: I started on some constellation articles. This seems like an obvious set of articles that should be improved for students to use, and they really need simplification from the sometimes very technical pages on En. Hope to get to the rest of the constellations over time--seems like a fun and useful project.

All the pages on En have a Template for the 88 Modern Constellations. I copied and pasted that over and the required Constellations/modern/modern-list. I began adding the template to our existing constellation articles and realized that some have _(constellation) added and some do not. This is also reflected in doubled up pages such as Scorpius and Scorpius_(constellation). I added _(constellation) to some obvious ones like Lyra and Apus which do not yet exist but could have multiple meanings.

I think the right thing to do would be to just standardize on adding _(constellation) to all constellation pages and setting up redirects or disambiguation from the common name. Even if something does not have a duplicate meaning now, it may in the future. Companies like to use these for branding etc. It seems to make sense to just standardize on one style. I thought I'd ask here before I amended the list and started all of those redirects since it would be a pain to undo if it was the wrong way to go. Any advice? Thanks, Gotanda (talk) 01:38, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe I didn't wait long enough, but no objections, so I went ahead and started changing all of these. It will take a little while, but basically consolidating/unifying on a plan like this. NAME_(constellation) to be the article on the group of stars, NAME to redirect to NAME_(constellation) if that is the most prominent use, and NAME_(disambiguation) as needed. Surprisingly, most of these do need disambiguation pages, even ones you wouldn't think have multiple uses. Gotanda (talk) 06:52, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I do not see a problem, keeps things organized. wiooiw (talk) 07:27, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Talk:Oklahoma

Comments. Albacore (talk · changes) 21:51, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"My watchlist" and "Simple talk" are flaky? Or, am I missing something?

Hi,

I've had this page, Simple talk, on my watchlist for quite some time. It seems that many (most) changes to this page are never reflected in my watchlist. I have namespace set to "All", and not hiding anything. If I look at the last seven days, the only change that shows on my watchlist is Sonia's recent comment on "New in this here in Simple Wikipedia land". Some other changes on watched pages seemed to not show up on my watchlist in the past, but it wasn't so obvious. Here is a screenshot. Is "My watchlist" reliable? Or is there something I have to do? (But, if you reply, I might not see it!) Thanks, Gotanda (talk) 01:57, 26 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I believe the watchlist only shows the most recent change. So, other changes could happen, but you are only gonna see the most recent.--Gordonrox24 | Talk 02:02, 26 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
OK. Thanks! That would explain why I never saw the previous two topics (Autopatrol flag and Oklahama). Those two fell in-between checks and the last addition by Sonia cleared everything out. That's too bad, but it explains how I missed entire discussions in the past. So, the only way to be sure is to go and check and Simple Talk directly each time I return to Simple Wikipedia? Likewise, watching a given page isn't going to reliably show you everything. One minor change might clear out indications of lots of big, previous changes. The only way to be sure is to check the history of a given page if you really want to make sure you see everything that happened since last login. Is that correct? Or, is there another way? Gotanda (talk) 02:31, 26 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Go to "my settings" and look for the "watchlist" tab. Go down until you find "Expand watchlist to show all changes, not just the most recent". Check mark it. wiooiw (talk) 07:24, 26 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Done! And, thank you! Gotanda (talk) 08:28, 26 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

simple → en interwikis

This is a rather selfish request from someone who lurks at Simple English Wikipedia and actively edits on English Wikinews. At present, n: will go to the "Wiki not found" notice. As English and Simple English are so inherently similar, why not redirect simple.wikinews.org to en.wikinews.org (and simplewikisource → enwikisource, etc), if only so that the interwikis work in a slightly nicer way. — μ 20:30, Sunday February 20 2011 (UTC)

Sounds like a good idea to do for everything but Wiktionary, considering Books and Quote are now closed and there won't be any more Simple English projects started due to it not being a 'proper' language. If/when this gets support I'll file a bug into Bugzilla for the change to be made (Assuming it can be, which it should - just a change to the interwiki table). Goblin 22:26, 20 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Juliancolton![reply]
It's slightly more complex than that, considering that we'd want simple.wikinews.org to redir to en, not just the interwiki table (afaik) — μ 23:05, Monday February 21 2011 (UTC)
Oh... I might've misunderstood if you want the actual domains changing, and I wouldn't be in support of that (per below). I thought you meant only the interwikis, which is what I am supporting. Goblin 22:14, 23 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ PeterSymonds![reply]
(replying to first comment)   Support There are some errors around the encyclopedia that uses the wrong interwiki (like n:). So it would be a good idea for Bluegoblin7 to file this bug with community consensus backing it up. HydrizTalk 10:57, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think it should redirect. It would only add to the confusion that simple and en are the same thing. -DJSasso (talk) 23:17, 21 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure about actually redirecting the domains, but I at least think the interwiki links (n:. s:, v:, q:. b:, everything except wiktionary) should be changed. Maximillion Pegasus (talk) 18:19, 22 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with DJ that redirecting simple to en would lead to confusion. However, the interwiki links should definitely be changed (except Wiktionary). Pmlineditor (t · c · l) 18:38, 23 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Afaik this was only for the interwikis themselves (See my comment above) though it seems I may have been slightly confused. Just for the record, oppose any redirection of domains but support the alteration of all interwikis except Wiktionary, per my initial comment. Thanks, Goblin 22:14, 23 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ PeterSymonds![reply]

I think changing the interwikis, would lead to just as much confusion. -DJSasso (talk) 18:32, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not so sure that it would to be honest, and better to have a valid interwiki than a broken, non-existent wiki as some of them do link to. If there were going to be more Simple projects I would completely agree with you, but as there aren't we need to assist our readers as much as possible I think. Goblin 09:12, 28 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Bsadowski1![reply]

New in this here in Simple Wikipedia land

I want to help here but I dont know if I can adapt content from normal the normal Wikipedia here? The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 02:34, 25 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A great page on this topic - Griffinofwales (talk) 02:37, 25 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you I was having trouble with finding that. Its like starting all over again The Resident Anthropologist (talk) 02:40, 25 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Speaking of that page, I think it's treated as more than an essay now; would anyone object if I were to "promote" it to a guideline? sonia♫ 03:09, 25 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm cool with it. fr33kman 17:26, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know if it should be, all it really is, is an essay pointing you to places that are guidelines. Probably the best way to have it so we don't have competing guidelines. -DJSasso (talk) 17:28, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah I agree. It's less of a guideline and more of a start here page. I think it's fine staying as an essay.--Gordonrox24 | Talk 17:48, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Stewards

In light of the recent, and previous, steward elections, it might be a good idea to see if the community wants some sort of guideline now that quite a few of us are now also stewards. Things to think about are; use of global rights locally (i.e. CU,OS,crat). Thoughts? fr33kman 01:51, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'd   Support this for transparency, but imo I !voted. Frozen Windwant to be chilly? 01:54, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure what you mean, Frozen Wind. Could you rephrase for me? Thanks, — μ 01:55, Monday February 28 2011 (UTC)
I   Support the idea, of course! :p Frozen Windwant to be chilly? 02:00, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, still don't get what you're supporting! That there should be a clarification of what local Stewards can do locally? Goblin 09:32, 28 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Chenzw![reply]
It sounds like it to me. ? fr33kman 09:51, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

┌─────────────────────────────────┘
It's not required to establish something because steward policy already tells us what to do, the question is whether or not, like meta, enwiki, commons etc... and have a local guideline/policy. I think it's a good idea because we now have a disproportionate amount of stewards within our project for the size of it. I think it'll help keep us all clear who can/can not do what. For instance, I can now technically use oversight once again, even though I've resigned. Of course, I won't use it as I am not locally elected to do so any more. It's questions like these that need clarifying for greater transparency imo. fr33kman 09:51, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

What about something really simple: 'In normal circumstances, the "steward" flag is not taken into account'? - People with the flag do what the other flags they have permit them to do? - I say "in normal circumstances", since there may be situations where overruling is better for the project--Eptalon (talk) 10:04, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, you should only do what your other flags already allow you to do. I believe this is already laid out for all Stewards across WMF wikis is it not? For your home wikis I mean. Stewards are not supposed to take action on their home wikis. -DJSasso (talk) 14:10, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Well, enwiki expects emergency actions to be taken, for instance the OS of abuse usernames in cases where a local is not around quickly. fr33kman 14:52, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah I would just copy over what they have and simplify it...after all we have that policy of where our policy doesn't exist use ens. (which I can never remember the shortcut to). I would say this is probably one of those situations.... Though I would probably suggest even then to let another steward do it if one is around. But thats not such a huge deal. -DJSasso (talk) 15:04, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • I thought we only used the stewards on simple for CU and OS when a local CU and OS is not around, and that stewards can't take action on a wiki where they are active. Would that not mean that stewards can act here in emergency, but people who are active here cannot use their steward tools here? That is what I thought was the rule.--Gordonrox24 | Talk 18:01, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
You are interpreting the policy correctly, I think he just wanted to have a written version of that. Atleast thats my take. -DJSasso (talk) 18:10, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Most CUs I have seen are not time-critical...--Eptalon (talk) 23:11, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ok I really don't see the need for a local policy, the steward policy seems clear enough. Stewards don't use their steward tools on wikis they are active on. we have enough CUs and OSers that we won't need steward intervention anyway, and if we do I'd rather an uninvolved steward handle it.--Gordonrox24 | Talk 23:26, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

KISS: If a Steward is given the flag locally they can use it, if they're not they cannot unless there's some ueber major crisis when no other non-local Stewards are around. Make sense? :P Goblin 23:43, 28 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Clementina![reply]

Yeah. So in other words, never, because there will always be another steward around or a local CU/OS.--Gordonrox24 | Talk 23:57, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Pretty much! Just covering ourselves for the time when all the Stewards but one local one go on holiday together. You know, the special Steward Cabal Breaks that you can get special deals on if you're a Steward - or so I'm told. TINC! ;-) Goblin 00:02, 1 March 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Chenzw![reply]

Where's the village pump?

Wikipedia notoriously hides its tools and most stuff relating structuring Wik. It would really be nice if there were an easy-to-find way of finding out how to do stuff, for example, a search box for meta-Wik. I'll give you an example of why I need this. A lot of editors through around abbreviations. They make texts ununderstandable at times and, if not blue-linked, unsupported in many cases (since if I don't know the basis of an argument, I can't accept it. For example, 'your artilce on X is WP:NonNot, so I'm erasing it.' Well, how can I tell if it is or is not if 1) I can't tell what the abbreviation stands for and/or 2) I can't know the policy criteria? This problem varies from Wik to Wik, but Simple English Wik in particular pretty much has me baffled.05:49, 1 March 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kdammers (talk • contribs) --Eptalon (talk) 09:07, 1 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

SEWP is much smaller than EnWP; For this reason, there are just two "boards", this one, and the administrator noticeboard, often shortened 'WP:AN'. WP:NOT contains a list of things Simple Wikipedia is not; WP:RULES has the general rules, and WP:HELP an overview of all pages.--Eptalon (talk) 09:12, 1 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
This is the equivalent of Village Pump. As for what policies and guidelines we have see the relevant categories that are full of them. Category:Wikipedia policies and Category:Wikipedia guidelines. -DJSasso (talk) 12:21, 1 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Let's use words.

I am a word person, not a symbol person. I searched for some time in SE Wik to find a tab indicating that I wanted to follow an article. I would have given up if I hadn't gotten a message that i wasn't following any-thing. Finally, out of desparation, I clicked on the star. That led me to also click on the inverted triangle. I don't have any-thing against icons, but PLEASE let's have visible text as well.Kdammers (talk) 05:49, 1 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

usability: — μ 10:24, Wednesday March 2 2011 (UTC)
If you go to your settings, click on appearance, and then click on "Monobook" there are words instead of symbols. It might also be good to go to the link above.--Gordonrox24 | Talk 12:34, 2 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal. for GoogleTrans-Speak to be a gadget on simple Wikipedia

As one of the aims for the simple English wiki is to help people learn English, I propose my GoogleTrans-Speak gadget for the wiki.

Using GoogleTrans a popup will appear near the cursor, having a foreign language translation of the word (or selected text < 500 characters), when the cursor is over a word in a web page and the SHIFT key is pressed.

The help file on the enwiki for the gadget is at:

en:User:Endo999/GoogleTrans

The gadget has been running on the enwiki for around 18 months now and has had around 8500 installs (after 6 months of use). It is currently running on 12 wikis.

It can be run on the simple enwiki by including the following javascript in your vector.js file:

importScript("User:Endo999/GoogleTrans.js");

This version has the following text to speech addition: 

   if you select some text (<4000 characters), put the cursor within that text, and hold the ESCape key down for a second, then a sound bar will appear. By clicking on the play bar of the sound bar, you will then hear the text selected.

The idea is that people wishing to learn English may not just want the translation of a word or two (or a sentence or two) they don't know, but also may wish to hear the sentence to train their ears (and thus learn to listen to English as well as read it).

I use the gadget (on my private test system) to read French and Spanish webpages, including the eswiki and the frwiki, since I can read those languages but cannot understand spoken speech of those tongues.

The Text To Speech is actually done on my LINUX box in Canberra Australia, so I would like to try out the feature on a small wiki (like the Simple wiki) so the number of requests isn't too large.

Open Source Text to Speech systems are used: 

   Festival for English and Spanish
   Espeak for the other languages
   Mbrola contributes the voices for espeak in French and some other languages.

On Firefox 3.5+ a HTML5 audio tag plays an OGG sound file. On IE9 a HTML5 audio tag plays an MP3 sound file On other systems, Flash is needed, a Flash sound bar will play an MP3 sound file.

I think some people learning English may like to play a computer voice of some text in wiki articles. It's a good way to learn to listen to English. You can have the translation into your native language, and then you can listen to the English text selected right in front of you. Listening to the radio and TV is often difficult because the native speakers speak too fast. Festival TTS does not speak too quickly.

You can play the sound bar more than once if you need to listen several times.

It's a good language learning tool and I thought it would be a good gadget for the simple English wiki, which is a language learning wiki.

(I posted this request on "simple wikipedia" and got one favorable response)

Endo999 (talk) 19:30, 2 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Autopatrol flag

Hello everyone. While patrolling Special:NewPages, I noticed that it was quite backlogged (over 200 pages). Most of the recent unpatrolled pages had been created by active non-admins of the wiki. I suggest we enable the autopatrol flag and give it to these users to reduce the New Pages backlog. This would help admins in patrolling new pages, and would prevent unsourced pages/vandalism/test pages lying undeleted in the wiki. Regards, Pmlineditor (t · c · l) 11:49, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I was asked to raise this about a week ago and it completely slipped my mind, so thanks for bringing it up and reminding me PM. Basically, I was going to raise the creation of a new 'Patroller' usergroup, which has the 'autopatroller' right to mark their own edits as patrolled and the 'patrol' right to allow them to mark other user's changes as patrolled, thereby hopefully allowing New Pages to be more effectively patrolled - many are gone through already before an admin gets to them to actually mark them.
Now then: I understand that this has been raised before and was quickly shot down. However, if my memory serves me correctly that discussion was over a year ago and the wiki has changed rather a lot since then - in particular the number of changes and users. I appreciate and understand the "Oh but we're nearly all admins" argument however that can just as well be used the other way round: we're nearly' all admins. There are a number of users who would find a Patroller bit somewhat useful but are not, for whatever reason, admins. Note also that if we do create this right we would also need to draft guidelines etc, and I also suggest that it is not grouped with or granted in the same way as something like Rollback, which was also suggested previously. Thanks, Goblin 12:10, 24 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Gordonrox24![reply]
 (change conflict)  Yes, please! I'm fully in support of this. Please make it also possible that those people can also actively help to patrol new pages. I'm one of the most active people in patrolling new pages here, and it would be really helpful (especially for me), if we would have this flag. It works very well on Wiktionary, where I also patrol the new pages. It is really helpful for me if people who know the formatting are patrolled. It saves me a lot of time and makes it easier to discover vandalism and to fix new pages. -Barras (talk) 12:14, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Never really seen the point of it myself. Not sure why anyone wastes time going into the patrol pages log as every page is most usually looked at on this wiki since our recent changes is obsessed over. Going through the patrol log just to click the patrolled button which doesn't really change anything is an incredible waste of time. It blows my mind that people are actually using patrolling when I would bet every page is looked at anyways by atleast 2 users immediately after being created or edited. And if the edits that are backlogged are by people that are regular editors then that should be a clue pretty quickly that you don't need to look at them. That being said if they want to use their time that way then I guess we could add the flag. I just think its needlessly complicating things for such a small wiki. -DJSasso (talk) 18:27, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My opinion is that we're probably doing okay with catching new pages that shouldn't have been created for the most part, and the time commitment involved probably doesn't outweigh the risk of one or two slipping through the cracks. Kansan (talk) 18:33, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There are enough examples where pages where here for one or even two weeks which weren't checked (and just crap). While it is true, that this cases aren't that often, but if I don't have the time to check the log every day, it quickly gets backlogged and then there are things which aren't checked. Browsing through my deletion log of the last 3 or 4 weeks surely brings up or 5 examples. I don't remember exactly. However, I'm mostly the only one who goes through the pages and checks them. If it becomes again backlogged (I can't be always around to check it), then it gets again harder to patrol. It would just be helpful, at least for me as an active patroller. I just open all or lots of tabs without looking at the editor, just opening the unpatrolled things and mark and fix them then. That's why the tool would (at least for me) be very helpful. -Barras (talk) 19:20, 24 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

As support seems to mounting for this, I just thought I'd raise the specifics of the issue so that we then have everything that we require to be able to get this accepted in Bugzilla if the consensus appears. I would personally suggest that the right is able to be given out by Administrators (Like the Flood Flag and Rollback) and can be requested in the same way as Rollback on a special subpage of RfP. The requirements for the right should basically be "Is a trusted content creator" imo, though that's probably the bit that needs the most discussion about. I would class a 'Trusted content creator' as someone who has been around for some time and has a need for the flag - i.e. is regularly creating articles. In many ways it's just as "powerful" as Flood and Rollback, though in others much less so - you're only changing something from yellow to white... Goblin 09:10, 28 February 2011 (UTC) I ♥ GoblinBots!![reply]

I've written a draft policy here; comments are welcome. Pmlineditor (t · c · l) 18:31, 28 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've made one tweak and other than that it looks fine to me. Will re-read it again later to see if there's anything else, though. What does everyone else think? Goblin 13:07, 2 March 2011 (UTC) I ♥ Microchip08![reply]

I'm in full support of this. Maximillion Pegasus (talk) 13:48, 2 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • Referring to the rule when/how/if someone should be added to this group: I'd just say use common sense. When you see several good new creations where it is unneeded to patrol just grant the right. Less bureaucratic, imo. There are people I'd just add to the group without any formal request. Just use common sense. -Barras (talk) 09:41, 6 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]


  • Flag enabled! - Admins can grant and remove this right. I'd say (as written above) use common sense for granting this right. People who apparently know how to create entries can have the flag and that's it. Some people now already got this flag. -Barras (talk) 22:07, 7 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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