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Request for Comment on Wiki Civility restrictions

If you want me to look at an article or a FAC, please provide the link.

I usually respond on my talk page, so watch the page for my reply.
To leave me a message, click here.
The current time is Thursday, 08:05 UTC.

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Tools and other
useful things

Some of
my work

Nice
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Yukky
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Mug shots

I started a thread here: Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard#Mug_shots. Would you mind giving input? Thankyou. The Bookkeeper (of the Occult) 03:54, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Olive Branch

		Olive branch
		My comments at the MFD of the Award Center were neither kind nor helpful, therefore I am sending you this. I hope you can accept my apology.--LAA Fan 16:11, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Question

I've been noticing a lot of problems with the FA Isaac Newton lately. Many citations missing. Many images on the left under sub headings. Many strange uses of centered quotations. No criticism of Newton (there was quite a bit). Structure seems to be strange, as you have biographical bits not integrated into the biography, but completely disconnected. Massive "see also" section. Unnecessary "further reading" section. And on and on and on. However, this is part of many wikiprojects and is connected to many editors, which would make it a logistical almost impossibility, and might have an unnecessary landslide of "keeps" without any true review. What should be done? Would it even be worth me preparing a detailed FAR entry? Ottava Rima (talk) 22:53, 1 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A landslide of Keeps means nothing at FAC or FAR if there are demonstrable issues wrt WIAFA; it's due for review. The External link farm is a fright. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:33, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm going to spend a little time cleaning up the most trivial things (image positioning and captions, See also overload, maybe the external linkfarm, etc). It should go to FAR anyway, but this way only the most substantive problems need be listed there. Maralia (talk) 00:56, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Maralia, will you be willing to help me put together an FAR entry (discuss the initial report) and also help me with some of the fixes (I have some substantial 18th century accounts of complaints lodged against Newton's theories)? Ottava Rima (talk) 02:02, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It would probably be best for you to write the FAR nomination, as I'm largely ignorant of the content issues, which would be the most serious problem. I'll help wrangle it through FAR, though, and do copyediting/MOS cleanup, and if the content fixes aren't over my head, I'll help with those too. Maralia (talk) 02:30, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Samuel Johnson's early life ‎

When you get a chance (not now of course), could you add a section to Samuel Johnson's early life for TS diagnosis to talk about its influences on his childhood/appearances in childhood/the information on how TS naturally progresses in childhood? I'm think that a paragraph about how TS normally develops, then an analysis by Pearce et al on how it appeared in Johnson. Two paragraphs should be fine. Ottava Rima (talk) 02:17, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

While I'm traveling, I'm trying to only keep my watchlist from getting away from me. This shortcut keeps popping up when I want to get out to dinner. I will look at this in a few weeks. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:37, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Johnson's health, including TS and History of TS made it onto the main page. I'm sorry if this brings forth any trolls, but it might bring in some decent editors. Welllll... heres the heads up. :) Ottava Rima (talk) 01:33, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Gosh, thanks. Just what I needed when I just got home at 1 am. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:15, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

WP:FAWCP shortcut at top of Wikipedia:Featured articles with citation problems

After noticing this, I thought that Redirects for discussion was an appropriate venue to resolve assessing the value of this shortcut and its merit at the top of the page by opening the discussion up to the wider community. I think gaining community input is a good way to help resolve disagreements on Wikipedia, but if you feel that there was a way to do so which could have taken less time, please let me know and I will do my best to improve upon that in the future. Thank you, Cirt (talk) 02:29, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What disagreement? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:30, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This one. Cirt (talk) 02:31, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I believe Cirt doesn't understand why the tag isn't on the article, or strongly believes that the tag should be on the article. Ottava Rima (talk) 02:33, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Um, no, I merely thought that the shortcut to WP:FAWCP should belong at the top of the page for which it is a redirect. That was all. :) Cirt (talk) 02:34, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Perhaps Cirt has plans for the page, I don't know. I see no disagreement. The page has been around for years, is just about out of business, no one has ever used that shortcut, and any time spent dealing with the shortcut is time that could be better spent. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:35, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, at any rate, I am glad that the issue was resolved and that the community input helped to resolve it. Cirt (talk) 02:42, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Accessibility

You know, more specific comments would be helpful, particularly if you're seeing a particular trend. We make heavy use of templates, so we can probably fix any issues easily. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 03:59, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm seeing one of everything :-) In reading WP:ACCESSIBILITY, notice the order of items in the lead. Within sections, notice that images should be in the section, not just above it, and after other templates, like main. Also, no left-aligned images under level 3 headings. Also concerned about colors in the charts, I'm not up on color-blindness, but that needs to be looked in to with all those colors. On the last FAC, I also found an over-sized font in a template, and a strange new way of adding a See also to the lead. If you want to learn more, you can hop over to the talk page at WP:ACCESS to see what it's like to read through these sorts of items with a screen reader. Best regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:11, 2 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, the order in the lede problem is one we could probably be better at, but the colors have been debated endlessly, and we arrived at a consensus with the aid of color-blind people, so I believe we should be fine there. Images at the end of sections are a last resort when there's a significant layout problem posed by putting the image in the next section, but again, that's not really default operating procedure at all. Titoxd^{(?!? - cool stuff)} 20:41, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Geology of the...

Hey Sandy. Do you mind checking this one:Wikipedia:Featured article review#Geology of the Zion and Kolob canyons area. I know sometimes you've had concerns about MoS on mav's FAR saves. He has done a heckuva lot work on his old ones. Marskell (talk) 08:42, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, and I have no problem if you want to move Synge off the list. As long as you're happy with it. Marskell (talk) 10:06, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can you give me an extra day? With travel, I'm not likely to get to it today. Or maybe Maralia will check the MoS issues there. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:59, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm headed out to dinner; if I'm not out too late, I'll try to take a look at it tonight. Maralia (talk) 21:16, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am sorry

I apologize about the whole WP:FAWCP thing. I let a discussion get carried away and out of hand as opposed to just ending it and letting it go. Sorry to have wasted your time and I hope we can put this behind us. Yours, Cirt (talk) 09:49, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No problem, Cirt, it really isn't a big deal. It was just a minor irritation because I'm traveling and it kept popping on my watchlist. Regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:02, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Samuel Johnson's politics

Hi, please see here for hasty CSD... apologies all round, best wishes, --Badgernet ^Talk 16:23, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

NO problem, I see it was sorted. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:24, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks

I've been trying to put together a page for both Johnson's morality and politics and I accidentally copied the one into the other. I believe that I could further expand his critical career in its own page, trim it down some by two paragraphs, and add in a further paragraph on both his morality and his politics. This would mean that every one of Johnson's major beliefs will be covered. Ottava Rima (talk) 16:29, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/New York State Route 74‎

~~I just added a withdraw message to it - I can't solve Ottava Rima's opposes and I am a dang idiot with references.Mitch32^(UP) 19:56, 3 September 2008 (UTC)~~[reply]

Disregard that comment, I had a mental breakdown right there, sorry about that.Mitch32^(UP) 20:07, 3 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Does a FA need to have an image?

Hi Sandy. An opposition was raised in this FAC becuase it has no images. Is that valid? Is the wording of criteria 3 misinterpreted (a discussion on this went nowhere at all), or must all FAs have (free or justified fair-use) images? Could you clarify this in the FAC? Thank you. Jappalang (talk) 01:14, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Images should be included if they are attainable; there are many FAs with no images. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 07:07, 4 September 2008 (UTC)\[reply]

Dashes

Hi; thanks for your message; I was changing them because in the bulk of the biographical articles I have seen, endashes are used consistently; in the two links you provided I didn't see anything directly related to the use of dashes in dates. I'm certainly happy to stop changing them as it will reduce my editing. Your thoughts appreciated, thanks. FeanorStar7 (talk) 08:19, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, I see. thanks for the clarification. FeanorStar7 (talk) 08:24, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/The Great American Bash (2005)

Hi SandyGeorgia, this FAC is supposed to close today, but there are only commments, and no supports or opposes. What will result from this? Best, iMatthew (talk) 19:03, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

FACs don't run for set periods like FLCs do. I can't say what Sandy will do, but there is no set period of time that an FAC runs. Ealdgyth - Talk 19:04, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) Supposed to close today? There is no such thing :-) I have been traveling and will catch up on FAC tonight. In the meantime, I suggest you add it to the Urgents template; no one maintains that template regularly, and I periodically give up on it. I don't usually close a nom with no commentary unless I can see that policy concerns raised about images or reliable sources haven't been addressed. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:06, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see, can you comment on the FAC? iMatthew (talk) 19:33, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure what you want me to comment on? It looks like images are clear, reliable sources are clear, and Buddingjournalist is suggesting a copyedit. Have you re-contacted Buddingjournalist to resolve those concerns? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:37, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

New York State Routes

I brought those three pages to the featured article review board to get an unbiased opinion of the articles. The only users who will see a discussion on those route's talk pages are those who put the article together. Obviously they will all say to keep them at FA status. I am looking for this discussion to be seen by people who are outside observers as well. If the consensus is to keep FA, then that's fine. I'm just looking for a fair discussion. Please let me know what I have to do to list those articles for discussion. Thanks! --BurpTheBaby (Talk) 20:57, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You have to read and follow the instructions at WP:FAR. [1]

First, we don't include three articles in one FAR.

Second, you didn't correctly set up the transcluded FAR page.

Third, you shouldn't nom three articles at a time, even if you set up separate files.

Fourth, you didn't specify any actionable aspect of WP:WIAFA that these articles violate. Even if you brought them correctly, one at a time, they would be dismissed if you don't specify a breach of WP:WIAFA.

Fifth, per WP:FAR instructions, you should allow three to six months from time of promotion before bringing a FAR; in this case, probably six months, since the articles appear to have no noticeable breaches of WIAFA.

So, there were multiple issues with your nomination of these articles, the most important being that they don't appear to breach WIAFA in any way. Spending some time reviewing our notability policies may be helpful. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 21:42, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

They are together because they are from the same set of routes in NY and if one gets demoted then all three should. If one stays then they all should too. It's like putting Lake Ontario and Lake Erie in the same group because they are part of the Great Lakes. --BurpTheBaby (Talk) 21:45, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think you really misunderstand featured article criteria. You wanted to initiate a review of the FA status of those three state routes, on the basis of your belief that only articles about particularly popular subjects should be eligible for featured article status. This is not how the FAC and FAR systems work. Featured article status is not in any way dependent on the popularity of the article or its subject. If an article meets WP:N then it is generally allowed to exist on Wikipedia. If an article exists, then it is eligible for evaluation against featured article criteria and, ultimately, FA status if it is deemed to meet the criteria. Long story short: FAR only reviews articles against the FA criteria, which do not include popularity or importance. If you want to discuss the criteria, the proper place to do so would be Wikipedia talk:Featured article criteria. Maralia (talk) 22:01, 4 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, seems everytime I turn around, some of my New York road FAs are being disputed here. :) –Juliancolton ^Tropical ^Cyclone 00:45, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just an odd way to promote Wikipedia with a meaningless road that travels in mostly rural areas of New York. But Maralia, if that is how FA status works than I don't really have an argument. --BurpTheBaby (Talk) 03:28, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, I suppose, in which case to me such road articles are not meaningless. –Juliancolton ^Tropical ^Cyclone 14:17, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No offense to you Julian, but a NY state route is a very narrow topic that only roadgeeks are going to get excited about. When I think of a featured article, I would like to see something more broad. An article of Abraham Lincoln or the 2008 Presidential Election would be examples of these. --BurpTheBaby (Talk) 20:40, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A narrow topic it might be. A useless topic? Certainly not. I'm the farthest thing from a so called "roadgeek", but I work on articles on roads that I drive because I have knowledge of the topic. If you dislike the obscurity of a page, don't read it. And also, I have no interest whatsoever in politics, so I'm going to go ahead and say only politicgeeks would be interested in reading United States presidential election, 2008. –Juliancolton ^Tropical ^Cyclone 21:00, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Julian, read what you wrote. Comparing the presidential election to NY 22, 32 or 28. Come now, you know better than that. The presidential election effects the WORLD! The northern terminus of NY 22 being truncated effects no one. --BurpTheBaby (Talk) 22:49, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I meant what I wrote, and I wrote what I meant. Me comparing the presidential election to these routes is just as irrational as you attempting to demote them from featured status because of their popularity. I find it disappointing that I must keep explaining why I work on the articles that I choose. This is a volunteer project, and I can work to get any sorts of articles for featured status that I want, and I shouldn't be badgered for that. And I bet more people have driven on any one of those roads than are in the presidential election, so I suppose one could say the roads have more of an effect on individual people? –Juliancolton ^Tropical ^Cyclone 00:13, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hey Julian, chill; I completely agree with you. One of the articles I'm most proud of is Manchester Mummy, because I know that there's no better account anywhere than the one that that I wrote. One of wikipedia's strengths is that it has comprehensive articles on notable subjects not covered in other encyclopedia. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 01:16, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for that, I feel quite a bit better now to think of it in that sense. (Manchester Mummy is quite an interesting article, by the way). –Juliancolton ^Tropical ^Cyclone 01:58, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Excitement is not one of the FAC criteria. If it was, we wouldn't have an article on every episode of The Simpsons. ;-) --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 20:52, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Good grief, Malleus; you made me get my head out of Johnson for an orange bar with a bit of Simpsons' wit!!! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:54, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The Simpsons is a show that is known by everyone whether you like it or not. You cannot compare a show that has lasted 20 years to a state route. --BurpTheBaby (Talk) 21:11, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As it happens I very much enjoy The Simpsons. But I also understand the featured article criteria, whereas it appears that you do not. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 21:15, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I understand the FA process well. Wikipedia does not take into consideration the reach of an article to the general audience. It is purely how well done a page is that gets it there as long as its something barely notable. --BurpTheBaby (Talk) 21:18, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I could argue that a highway has a wider impact on society than an individual episode of any TV. As such, under your train of thought, why is an article on an episode of The Simpsons any more notable than a highway in New York or Michigan? We have feature articles on TV Shows and individual songs as well as academic topics. FAC isn't the forum for notability. If an article can survive AfD, it potentially can survive FAC and succeed. Imzadi1979 (talk) 23:15, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Burp, I think, confuses the idea of our "best work" with that of the articles most worthy of that "best work". But this is a volunteer project, and so editors will work on whatever attracts their interest and attention. That is both wikipedia's strength and its weakness. There are many far better encyclopedia articles in wikipedia than can be found anywhere else, but there are also many poor articles on what many might regard as core topics. I guess that's at the root of Burp's comments, but it's just in the nature of this beast. --Malleus Fatuorum (talk) 23:27, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

That's fine and with the current rules for FA I don't have a leg to stand on. While it is outrageous to compare the Presidential Election and a show that is among the top shows of this generation to a NY state route, I respect your hobbies, especially you Julian. This isn't an attack. These are just my concerns about very narrow topics being featured on Wiki's main page. The rules are in your corner, so I don't pose a threat to your articles. In fact, I think you and your fellow editors did a tremendous job. The NY state routes are so very well done and are really better than most of what Wiki has to offer. This will be my last post on the topic unless someone directly asks me a question. Regards --BurpTheBaby (Talk) 18:56, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What is . . .

WP:NSBSPs? That is what you said for me to look out for in the Jena Six article.--Wehwalt (talk) 02:13, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Probably WP:NBSP - non-breaking spaces? Gimmetrow 02:14, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

So far, I found one on a time; review for others. I wish Wiki had better articles on legal jargon; I'm coming up short. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:17, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

By the way Wehwalt, would you mind if the cite fields date=2008-08-13 were changed to date=August 13, 2008 ? Gimmetrow 02:19, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It wasn't a concept I was familiar with, I'll puzzle through it, but I hope someone gives me a heads up if I screw up. Still on Jena Six, Sandy, I don't know if you noticed, but in the first paragraph of the Mychal Bell proceedings section, aggravated battery is defined. All the same, I'll link it to Assault#Aggravated_assault. Is there any other legal term you want to see defined? I won't make any edits until 15 minutes after you stop editing to avoid EC's. And no, Gimmmetrow, I don't mind in the least.--Wehwalt (talk) 02:22, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'll stop for now and check in later. In general, just do another runthrough and keep in mind that laypersons don't know a lot of legal jargon, perhaps you can link more terms. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:27, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm on it, Sandy. I've already got links for a couple. This may be why there are so few law FA's.--Wehwalt (talk) 02:30, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, Gimmetrow, while you're here: this sort of thing is kinda troublesome. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 02:31, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Why don't you take another look, see what you think?--Wehwalt (talk) 03:11, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Almost through FAC, then will look. Poor Gimmetrow is probably waiting for me. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:16, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Gimmetrow, I'm on my way. Vacation afterburn; took me four hours to get through FAC. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:38, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, Sandy. It's my first "solo" FA, after I was left holding the bag when all the other editors wandered off after the J6 left the news. I'm very pleased.--Wehwalt (talk) 04:50, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's unusual for someone to stick to it after the news dies down; I've got a few I should get back to and clean up myself <sigh>. Anyway, the thanks go to the reviewers; I just push the buttons. Congratulations ! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 04:53, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I'm a stubborn cuss, you know that by now! I've got a couple of historical articles I'm thinking of working on, but it is going to take time to whip them into shape.--Wehwalt (talk) 04:56, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed moves

Blnguyen proposed that these article be moved: [2] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:44, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I thought that the list was just there to keep tabs on weakly referenced articles - I didn't understand your edit summary. Do we have to get a consensus before it is put on the "endangered" list? Blnguyen (bananabucket) 03:45, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I responded there. Best, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:49, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

LMS FAC

Hi, I had a question about the Little Miss Sunshine FAC that you closed. I was just wondering if there was a time limit that a nomination needs to be closed by? There was only four days since the last person commented, and I had planned on asking the people to continue their discussions, but didn't want to rush asking them so quickly to come off sounding pushy or desperate. There were a few issues that required discussion from new reviewers, which I guess I could have used more of. I thought that I had read somewhere that the nominations were usually closed if there had been no major changes in a week's time (or if there were numerous oppose votes). Thanks for your help, I am just curious in the actions I need to take in my next attempt. Happy editing! --Nehrams2020 (talk) 05:00, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I can respond faster if you link me in. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:21, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks :-) No, time limits are rarely the issue. In this case, it was a matter of the issues that were accumulating: content and copyedit issues as well as sourcing and image issues. It will have a better shot at FAC if it appears with all sourcing and image issues sorted in advance. Very often, when a nomination has been up for two weeks with a variety of issues and without a lot of support, the fastest route to the star is a fresh start after ironing out issues raised. Hope to see you back soon! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:33, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your reply. This was my first attempt at FAC and it is an interesting process. It may be a while to try again, if ever, since I have other projects and school to deal with. Hopefully I can convince more people to take a look at it if there is a second attempt. --Nehrams2020 (talk) 05:58, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

ah, keep going while the iron is hot ... it's too hard to restart again later :-) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 06:03, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you didn't don't worry, but did you see any issues yourself if you looked at the article? --Nehrams2020 (talk) 06:11, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Considering the popularity of the film, I'd expect high quality sources to be available. Some WP:OVERLINKing, for example, no need to link states and the US. A hidden table within the text (in the Awards section, violates MOS, the hidden text doesn't mirror, print and violates WP:ACCESS). But generally, if you have clean sources and solve any image issues, as well as the content issues that were raised, you should have an easier time on your next attempt. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 06:16, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have looked for more reliable sources (looking through my university's databases), but I believe that due to the film's somewhat recent release, there hasn't been too much time for print sources to become available. I saw on the talk page of the hidden template that you were commenting on its use in articles, but I haven't seen anything that exclusively prevents it (I think that if you're printing it and then click show while its in print mode, it may print that way, but I haven't tested it myself). I may be splitting it off anyway into its own list anyway, so the issue may be avoided. Thanks again for taking a look. --Nehrams2020 (talk) 06:22, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

ArticleHistory template

Hi Sandy, with ref to the unprotection of the above template, you would probably need to read what I linked to in the AN thread to get the full story. Basically, the way MediaWiki works ends up with bad category page counts when the servers have problems (as far as I can tell). All I did was change the template to remove the categories and wait for it to update pages on the job queue until the page counts went to less than zero - then they got recounted. I downloaded the latest MediaWiki software and database schemas, read through the source code of the various classes to find the fix is to force the page-count to < 0, and discussed it around before proceeding - in my typically obsessive fashion. It's difficult to be sure who is taking the lead on certain pages, timezones of editors, etc. I gathered my info, felt I had sufficient approval to proceed, and made sure that what I was setting out to do would be low-risk since I knew it could all be reversed. I wasn't aware that Gimmetrow was the lead on that stuff. Is he familiar with MediaWiki too? Or has SQL access to the DB? That would be a definite bonus.

Unfortunately, there is still a problem with mis-counting of pages in categories and I think there may be a slightly different problem too - the second problem I allude to in my VPT thread, referential integrity between the categorylinks and page tables. This might require devs to get resolved. Cheers! Franamax (talk) 05:29, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think Gimmetrow (talk · contribs) could probably have helped you sort it all faster, without the risks that come along with unprotecting (that is, everyone fiddles with the complicated syntax and bombs out articlehistory everywhere :-) Dr pda (talk · contribs) is also up on articlehistory (although I think he's not an admin, so can't help with protected edits). Right after you made your adjustments, that other image problem appeared (being discussed strangely at WP:ANI), so of course I blamed your edits for bombing out the featured star on articlehistory templates :-)) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:37, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've put this to Gimmetrow on their talk page for reference and opinion. You may underestimate my degree of thoroughness, I spent quite a few hours researching the whole thing and determined to simply change two category names by adding "(temp)" to them. I did it that way specifically to avoid any problems with complicated syntax - though you can check at VPT to see elsewhere where I have been able to deal with moderately complicated template syntax. I'm relatively skilled at dealing with running-database type work and I'm defintely paranoid about what I do. (Though I did once during Y2K testing overlay the order-entry system of one business line of the company with a historical image from three months before - ackk! :( ) I can only assure you that I had studied the problem enough that I was confident I had a low-risk way to proceed, and I monitored it throughout.

The image thing, I assume you mean this? It's possible that my edit of the template caused some hiccups as the servers processed the template through the job queue - but that template is used on the Talk: pages, not the article pages, isn't it? And failing a solution at VPT or from the devs, we're left with kludging around the pagecounts for categories, which seems ... unsatisfactory - we should fix our database. Nevertheless, I understand your sensitivity around featured articles, I seem to recall reading something about their being "the best of Wikipedia" :) I take that pretty seriously.

And all that said, I see now the template has still not been reprotected, which to me is inexplicable. I'll go back to AN and complain. Hmmm, that shows a need for the tools - if one of us, lets say you were an admin, that wouldn't be a problem, would it? Hint, hint. ;) Franamax (talk) 07:50, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Better you than me !! Gimmetrow is an admin, but he wouldn't protect/unprotect that page, as he's heavily involved there. Regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:39, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Guadalcanal Campaign

Thank you for helping with the article [3]. Cla68 (talk) 07:16, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Automatic licence plate recognition (ALPR)

Automatic licence plate recognition (ALPR) Automatic vehicle identification (AVI) Car plate recognition (CPR) Licence plate recognition (LPR) Lecture Automatique de Plaques d'Immatriculation (LAPI)

I have been trying to compile a list of all OEM for ALPR products including software & online data collection & data mining. I need help locating them. Perhaps an entry in Wikipedia on the ALPR page could be a key part of accumulating this OEM data. Anyone researching ALPR needs this list.

You may reply to me directly to jeffrey.meade.osha@gmail.com or through Wikipedia 70.228.69.239 (talk) 15:33, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not at all familiar with that article or the technology, but it sounds like what you're suggesting may run afoul of WP:NOT. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:38, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/2002 Bou'in-Zahra earthquake

Could you please be more specific? --I'm an Editor of the wiki^{[citation needed]} 19:40, 5 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Lead specialists

Hi Sandy - Do you know any WP:LEAD specialists? Wikipedia's Tokyo article is not even GA-class at this point, which seems to me to be a major problem (Tokyo being the most populous metropolitan area on the planet). I'm sure one FA issue would be the lead (there may well be other issues). If there's anyone around particularly good at lead writing who might be willing to help that'd be great. Thanks. -- Rick Block (talk) 06:44, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Interesting question. In pondering an answer, all I can come up with is that the skill required in writing a good lead is the skill of being a thorough and competent editor with good command of prose: not much to ask for :-)) Writing a good lead can't be done in isolation, because it requires that the editor digest and summarize the entire article. So, our best lead writers would be some of our most thorough editors: Colin, Maralia, Moni3, Karanacs, Malleus Fatuorum, Laser brain and the likes (too many to name). But would one of them really want to take time to digest an entire article so they could add three paragraphs to the lead? There's the tricky part. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:20, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Semi-automated edits to put links in citation formatting

SandyGeorgia: I've started doing some semi-automated edits to modify citation formatting. I'd appreciate it if you could keep an eye on what I'm doing and let me know if you see any problems or have suggestions as to how to do it differently. I'm downloading the wikitext, running it through a Perl script, uploading it and manually checking it with the "Preview" and "Show Changes" button before saving. I have to be careful because I lose some of the unicode characters along the way; I avoid editing parts of the article such as the interwikis, for that reason. I try to check carefully using "Show Changes" to make sure I haven't lost anything. In this edit, the diff shows some lines as if they've been changed which however look identical to me; I don't know what's going on there. The other article I've modified so far is I-message. The purpose is to have links from the Notes section to the References section as described here. Thanks. ☺ Coppertwig (talk) 14:38, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, good: apparently all I had done to make those extra lines show up in the diff was delete blank characters from the ends of lines. I'll see if I can modify my script not to do that, to reduce confusion. [4] ☺ Coppertwig (talk) 14:50, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I had the misfortune of encountering a link to Che Guevara while exploring the links you gave me above: I was surprised to see huge amounts of MoS issues introduced there, it appears even worse than when it left FAR, and it was hard to resist not taking the time to clean it up while I was there, but there's too much to do.

I would recommend that you never run that script without gaining consensus on the talk page first. WP:CITE specifically says not to change citation style without gaining consensus, and I personally detest everything about citation styles using the clickable blue links. I realize others may disagree, but I believe they sacrifice editability and ease for editors, while providing little to no return on readability to our readers. And, they chunk up load time while making a mess of text in edit mode. I have recently had to work on a series of articles that use Harvnbs, and have found adding this rather useless option (which isn't intuitive, as our non-editing readers might not realize they have to click to get there, but hit the back button to get back) seriously slows down my editing time, even to the point of discouraging me from wanting to add text, as it takes so much extra work to get the citation in there. Further, the blue links place the citation information an extra click away from the reader; I prefer to click once and click back once. And, as I've seen in articles I've had to work on that use such styles, they open up a new margin for error. There's another drawback: if a series of related articles uses one citation style, and you change it, text can't easily be moved between sub- and daughter articles. (Because Samuel Johnson uses Harvnbs, whenever I want to bring text over from any of the Tourette syndrome articles, I have to spend a lot of time reformatting citations, and I don't consider that this marginal clickability which chunks up load times provides that much benefit to our readers, who likely use the citations a lot less than we do. The loss of my time as an editor to import text and citations is not compensated for by a gain to our readers, IMO.) Tourette syndrome has clean, fast-loading citations; if someone changed the citation style there, they would be quickly reverted, after wasting a lot of time. I will not slow down load time for our readers and editing time for our editors in exchange for a feature that our readers are unlikely to care about, use or understand (the click back is not intuitive, and I really don't believe our non-editing readers use our citations as much as we do). More importantly, because WP:CITE specifically says not to change citation style without consensus, you may want to take care in applying the script. Other than that, I would say to watch out that endashes are preserved on page ranges, and that it handles multiple refs to the same author correctly. My preference would be that Wiki had none of those goofy blue links, and a clean, fast-loading consistent citation style across all articles. Now ask me how I really feel about Harvnbs and other "clickable" citation methods :-)) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:13, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

formatting

Hiya Sandy. When/if you get a moment, could I bug you to take a look at USS Iowa (BB-61) and help me format the referece/notes sections? I think that becuase I am drawing a little more material from print than from the net as I usually do I may need to reconfigure the section to resemble the notes and references sections in the article Iowa class battleship, but before doing enything overly drastic I would like a second opinion. Thanks in advance, TomStar81 (Talk) 20:21, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'll get there Tom, but because I was traveling last week, I am really behind, and have ten critical items on my "ToDo" list at this moment, including three FARs waiting for my input. If I'm not there in a few days, pls remind me again. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 20:31, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Bob Dylan FAR

You have asked me to complete the FAR notifications twice, but the final person to be notified, the original nominator, I cannot find. If you know how to find the user, please do tell. I can't figure out how to find the article milestones. Tealwisp (talk) 21:59, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please give me a link to the FAR so I can check faster. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:07, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Featured article review/Bob Dylan Tealwisp (talk) 22:30, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You deserve this

The coveted (well, not really) **BULLSTAR** is hereby bestowed upon User:SandyGeorgia for putting up with endless BS and yet continuing to do great work.

Basil "Basil" Fawlty (talk) 22:47, 6 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 243: / Line 243: @@
 : Please give me a link to the FAR so I can check faster.  [[User:SandyGeorgia|Sandy<font color="green">Georgia</font>]] ([[User talk:SandyGeorgia|Talk]]) 22:07, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
 ::[[Wikipedia:Featured article review/Bob Dylan]]  [[User:Tealwisp|Tealwisp]] ([[User talk:Tealwisp|talk]]) 22:30, 6 September 2008 (UTC)
+==You deserve this==
+[[Image:Cowbarnstar.jpg|thumb|150px|center|The coveted (well, not really) <font color="ff00000">'''BULLSTAR'''</font color="ff00000"> is hereby bestowed upon [[User:SandyGeorgia]] for putting up with endless BS and yet continuing to do great work.]] [[User:Basil &quot;Basil&quot; Fawlty|Basil &quot;Basil&quot; Fawlty]] ([[User talk:Basil &quot;Basil&quot; Fawlty|talk]]) 22:47, 6 September 2008 (UTC)