User talk:Rich Farmbrough/Archive/2005 May

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Islamofascism VfD

Could you please explain the reasoning behind this decision? BrandonYusufToropov 20:01, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification, and for the suggestions on future edits. I'm partisan, I know, but it seemed to me that the "merge/redirect" + "delete" constituency was a working majority, and that it constituted something of a mandate for change. Could it have gone the other way, do you think? BrandonYusufToropov

Not sure how harmless it is, given the depth of anti-Muslim sentiment in the US and elsewhere, and the tendency of people to point to things like encyclopedia entries as evidence for the legitimacy of ideas that might otherwise be considered extremist and unacceptable. BrandonYusufToropov 22:00, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

I see your point. Thanks again for the ideas on editing. It seems to me it should be a much shorter article if it remains. BrandonYusufToropov 22:50, 1 May 2005 (UTC)

Germans vs Germany links

On several articles related to Czech Republic you changed link from Germans (as people) to Germany (as country). For example in Jihlava article the people link would be better - it is about events hundreds years ago when no state existed (and the people were identified more as Saxons, Bavarians etc than Germans). Pavel Vozenilek 10:29, 14 May 2005 (UTC)

Hmm, you are right. An article of its own would be needed for complete coverage. Pavel Vozenilek 10:56, 14 May 2005 (UTC)

Bot? (Nobot)

No I'm not using a bot. See User:Rich_Farmbrough.

Are you using a bot? [1] seems rather odd ([[September 11, 2001 attacks|[[11 September]]]] really won't work, honest). Please note that running a bot without prior permission is a Bad Thing, most especially so when you don't even leave an edit summary

James F. (talk) 10:06, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

Nor does one of the changes in this edit of Hansie Cronje. Well intentioned, but wrong. The template sorts out the linking, so it displays as "As of [[1 January]], 2005" -- ALoan (Talk) 18:17, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

this diff rather Rich Farmbrough 08:32 7 June 2006 (UTC).

Glad to sort out the Kissinger link; looks like there are problems on similar pages. Are you using a bot? Mackensen (talk) 18:20, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

No, no bot. Search and replace, then checking the diff. I was editing the Kissinger one when you fixed it. Rich Farmbrough 19:32, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

Disambiguation pages (sticky)

I noticed that you've done some disambiguation on [[British]] and others. I've been trying to do this as well. Any possibility of starting a project to do it? You can reply to this section. Thanks, Alphax ^τεχ 09:47, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

How would you envisage this working? Rich Farmbrough 11:24, 6 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Ok, people check Wikipedia:Disambiguation pages with links (and the more updated one) and Category:Disambiguation for things to disambiguate. Where there is a clear alternative for a link target (eg. United States vs. America), it is inserted; where there is not, it is discussed. I realise the difficulty in maintaining such a thing, but ultimately, links to disambiguation pages lead to 2 pages being loaded per link followed - increasing server load and slowing down Wikipedia. Alphax ^τεχ 09:18, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps we need a Wikipedia:Disambiguation queries page. OTOh the people who are best placed to decide will be the regular editors of the page, if any. Rich Farmbrough 13:37, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

The hardest part is determining which disambiguation pages have the most incoming links - best determined by database dumps. In some disambiguation cases it's difficult to decide which alternative is best suited, so we need language & grammer experts working this (I'm neither). I wonder if we should post an expression of interest to the Village Pump or mailing list... Alphax ^τεχ 15:56, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I'm statting the diambiguation links from a database dump. Rich Farmbrough 19:35, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Cool! Where will you put them? Alphax ^τεχ 04:14, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Offline reports/This is one of the most linked to disambiguation pages Note that these sub-pages don't seem to update the main page unless it's edited. This could be due to using the Paris caches. Same could apply to the "You have new messages" Rich Farmbrough 10:14, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Have you seen Template:Purge? Or my monobook.js and monobook.css (copied from ABCD's? Anyway, good to see the list updated again. How often will the script be run? Alphax ^τεχ 12:37, 13 Apr 2005 (UTC)

It takes a few minutes of user time to do it, so whenever I notice the databse has been updated I will run it. Rich Farmbrough 16:47, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Time to reset the indent level... Now to rope in more people to help... Alphax ^τεχ 07:31, 18 Apr 2005 (UTC)

New database dump being d/l'd as we speak. Rich Farmbrough 15:57, 25 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Cool... do you know of any other people that would regularly check these? I was wondering how long it would take to de-populate the incoming links. Alphax ^τεχ 00:22, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Page updated now. Rich Farmbrough 11:00, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Hey! The page was moved and is now part of Template:Active Wiki Fixup Projects. Good job! Alphax ^τεχ 12:13, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

BTW an new list is now uploaded. Rich Farmbrough 10:44, 19 May 2005 (UTC)

Neat. Alphax ^τεχ 05:48, 20 May 2005 (UTC)

Linking dates in references

I've noticed you're linking dates in references (e.g. here). I'm not sure if this is helpful - it just creates blue text that nobody will ever click on. Is your purpose to force the wiki to use local date settings? JFW | T@lk 21:17, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Indeed per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Dates Rich Farmbrough 21:27, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

And why are you switching month and day order, when the MOS does not suggest it, and the actual articles linked to have the opposite format to the one you are switching to? Jayjg ^(talk) 22:59, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Because it looks the same. [[17 october]] [[2003]] renders as 17 october 2003 wheras [[October 17]] [[2003]] renders as October 17 2003. rgds, Rich Farmbrough 23:06, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, I don't get it. Why switch October 17, 2003 to 17 October, 2003? Jayjg ^(talk) 23:11, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Let me be a lttle clearer. I make no effort to keep the original order becasue it doesn't matter. I am using search and replace to make the change. However, now you mention it there is one advantage, from time to time I have to revert a change, which is simple, more infrequently I part revert, manually. This would be easier with the same order, so thanks, I'll probably do that. Rich Farmbrough 23:22, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, it's not much clearer; why is it easier?

Because in the case in point I would edit "[[May 31]]" to "May 31" if I decided a change was wrong - less keystrokes and less chance of error. (E.G. date in a link, a direct quote, a template which imposes wikifying of dates, a URL.) (Except of course that in the case in point the date order wsn't changed anyway)

Also, don't you think the original authors had something in mind when they used that order?

Not in the vast majority of cases. Any more than they have something in mind when they say Anemia or Anaemia. When the layout is more important than the content, then the change should not be made, as in the examples above, or a proper name. When the idea is to refer to a period of time, then it is good that the users can see it in their desired format.

And finally, since the articles inevitably linked to say October 17, why not just link there? Jayjg ^(talk) 23:30, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Neither format will be a redirect, so what does it matter? Rich Farmbrough 23:47, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

It's disconcerting, for one thing, and Wikipedia policy generally encourages leaving alternatives like this in the form created by the original author. It's much the same for English/American spellings. Jayjg ^(talk) 23:56, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

I don't see why it's disconcerting, since it's invisible, still never mind, with the changes I talked about I'll be doing what you want anyway. The example of Anemia/Aneamia was chosen to illustrate just such a point, generally it would be left alone, but in the article Anemia it's been regularised - it's not a big deal. Cheers, Rich Farmbrough 08:45, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

The MOS does not actually suggest linking dates in references. Also, the dates in references often follow a specific format (year, month, day) that is not actually dependant on locale (see Pubmed entries, such as PMID 15908442). May I ask you to not link dates in references. JFW | T@lk 10:22, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

What????

"... volume 31, September 1989" means that the September 1989 issue of a journal is a part of volume 31 of that journal. It is absurd to link that to 31 September, even if (or perhaps especially if) the month of September had 31 days. Michael Hardy 22:20, 26 May 2005 (UTC)

Bergen

• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Pomerania&action=edit" title=\"Pomerania">1 Pomerania</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special_Air_Service&action=edit" title=\"Special Air Service>2 Special Air Service</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Bergen%2C_New_York&action=edit" title=\"Bergen, New York>10 Bergen, New York</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Hans_Delbr%FCck&action=edit" title=\"Hans Delbrück>11 Hans Delbrück</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=IAAF_Golden_League&action=edit" title=\"IAAF Golden League>15 IAAF Golden League</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Timeline_of_the_Faroe_Islands&action=edit" title=\"Timeline of the Faroe Islands>16 Timeline of the Faroe Islands</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Arnold_Ruge&action=edit" title=\"Arnold Ruge>17 Arnold Ruge</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Bergen_Region&action=edit" title=\"Bergen Region>20 Bergen Region</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Austrian_postal_codes_7500_-_7599&action=edit" title=\"Austrian postal codes 7500 - 7599>24 Austrian postal codes 7500 - 7599</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Westfriesland&action=edit" title=\"Westfriesland">25 Westfriesland</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Fana&action=edit" title=\"Fana">28 Fana</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Melih_Kibar&action=edit" title=\"Melih Kibar>29 Melih Kibar</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Jan_Ove_Ottesen&action=edit" title=\"Jan Ove Ottesen>30 Jan Ove Ottesen</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Riemke&action=edit" title=\"Riemke">31 Riemke</a>
• <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=West_Scandinavian_Norwegian_dialects&action=edit" title=\"West Scandinavian Norwegian dialects>33 West Scandinavian Norwegian dialects</a>

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Rich Farmbrough (talk • contribs) 13:52, 9 May 2005 (UTC)

Al Qaeda dates

Yeah, my first impulse was to revert, then I thought, well some of these seem kosher so I'll try editing... but then I saw you'd edited a date inside a link, at which point I figured I'd just revert. :) --Golbez 16:48, 18 May 2005 (UTC)