User talk:Lar

Note: Being a "bear of very little brain", I get confused easily trying to follow conversations that bounce back and forth, so I've decided to try the convention that many others seem to use: If you start a conversation here, I'm most likely to answer here too... so set a watch for a while. If I start a conversation on your talk page, I'll set a watch there, so go ahead and answer there. I may mess up, don't worry, I'll find it eventually.

My real name is Larry Pieniazek and I like LEGO(r) Brand building elements. Feel free to mail me with comments or concerns. I will archive this page if/when there is a need but will not delete comments.

Welcome

Hello Lar, and welcome to Wikipedia. Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

• The Five Pillars of Wikipedia
• How to edit a page
• Editing tutorial
• Picture tutorial
• How to write a great article
• Naming conventions
• Manual of Style

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! By the way, you can sign your name on Talk and vote pages using three tildes, like this: ~~~. Four tildes (~~~~) produces your name and the current date. If you have any questions, see the help pages, add a question to the village pump or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome! --Dmcdevit·t 21:43, July 14, 2005 (UTC)

glad to be here! Been here a while but mostly as a lurker, if you look at my contribs you'll see a few teeny edits here and there but nothing major. Most of the good links you gave me are already in my bookmarks although I confess the one I read the most is the how to edit a page one. ++Lar 21:53, 14 July 2005 (UTC)

Bots

Hi Lar, your particular case for using a bot is actually one of the safest. There are a couple problems with bots: they request too fast, they make changes that are unexpected, and they can run away if not careful. However inside your particular domain you don't need to worry so much about it. Be nice to the wiki software and sleep for a couple seconds between requests to the web server. Add in checking so your bot won't overwrite a page if it already exists (it is also a good idea to log this so you can fix anything unexpected that happens). Don't write your bot in such a way that it requests data from your wiki then uses that as other instructions for processing; that will leave lots of possibilities for problems to creep in. The safest way is to combine the previous rules of thumb with an explicit list of things you intend to create (your list of LEGO colors here) and make requests only off that data. If you verify that your list only contains the proper template names (and you are properly identifying them as templates when you publish them) you have little room for error. Its really the larger bots that tend to get into trouble, things like "we need a bot that will fix the case of every occurrence of this person's last name." That type of program, if not done correctly, can wreak havoc on a wiki. If you have any other questions I'd suggest we continue this over email. Good luck and you are on the right track: let the machine do the boring bits! Triddle 06:17, July 26, 2005 (UTC)

Christmas tree

Thanks! :-) Just noticed the anon removal too; when anons do anything I often check to see what else they've done (usually in case they've vandalised lots of pages), and this one turns out to be a shared IP number for the US House of Representatives . . . so fairly high-powered! - MPF 19:06, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Greetings, and ArbCom election stuff

Hi there! First of all, it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance! As well, thanks for your kind words; I really appreciate them! I hope something truly comes of this ... whether I'm in the trenches or on the periphery.

Thanks as well for the feedback regarding my edit style. I know: it's a personal failing I acknowledge and need to rectify. I'm often so eager to put new stuff up (and am a perfectionist of sorts), that I often click 'Save page' instead of 'Show preview'. I will definitely be more diligent with this in the future.

I hope this is sufficient. Please let me know if you've any questions. Thanks again! E Pluribus Anthony 00:49, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Hi; thanks again for your note and for your feedback ... I appreciate it! I hope that our collective efforts regarding process bear fruit, but being bare – or a vegetable – is not bad either. :) E Pluribus Anthony 06:35, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

John Alexander Low Waddell and John Alexander Waddell

They certainly do seem to be the same person so a merge would definitely be in order. Probably easier to merge into John Alexander Low Waddell as it is the more complete article. Caerwine Caerwhine 22:29, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Agreed. They both mention the same bridges in the list of accomplishments and link to the same page on Structurae. Whichever way the merge is done, the article should keep the name John Alexander Low Waddell since that seems to be most common (along with "J.A.L. Waddell"). Mike Dillon 22:38, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

I shall take a crack at it and use the shorter as augment for the longer, and then leave the shorter as a redirect. Thanks guys... ++Lar 22:40, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

Ichthys

To answer your question in brief. Ichthys is a transliteration of the Greek word ιχθυς, which means fish. It was adopted by the early christians because it is also an acronym for Ιησους Χριστος, Υιος Θεου, Σοτηρ. Pronounced Iesus Christos, Hüios Theu, Sotér. It translates to Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior. The important question, of course, is "Why the hell does a good little Jewish boy like me know that?" Daykart 19:44, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Oh, my bad, I misunderstood your question. I think it's because there are some evangelical types who find the term "Jesus fish" to be derogatory. Also, because the word Ichthys has alot to do with why the fish became a christian symbol. Daykart 22:33, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

TfD nomination of Template:NYC Hudson River crossings

Template:NYC Hudson River crossings has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at Wikipedia:Templates for deletion#Template:NYC Hudson River crossings. Thank you. --Chris 16:34, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

another map source

This serch engine is a great tool for finding TIGER maps of specific features very quickly. Cheers! Cacophony 04:15, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

Pore Ewen Suspension Bridge stats

From National Bridge Inventory:

• ID#: 1007350, intersects: DOCK STREET, RONDOUT CRE, location: 12.5MI N JCT RTS 9W+299
• Owner: State Highway Agency, Maintainer: same. Toll: No
• Built: 1921.
• Avg. daily traffic: 15,700 (1975)
• Material: Steel continous, Type: Suspension
• Main Span length: 323.6 meters = 1 061.67979 feet I made a mistake at or near this point, so there is more info that I need to gather after I troubleshoot my spreadsheet error. Let me know if any of that sounds funky. Cacophony 07:17, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

That all strikes me as correct (working from memory, we moved away from NY in 1995, but 1000 feet total span feels right to me, for example). Thanks muchly for sharing this data! Good luck with your spreadsheet debugging efforts. ++Lar 15:06, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Howcheng's RfA

Thank you for your support in my recent request for adminship. I was successfully promoted with a final tally of 74/0/0. I will endeavour not to let you down. Thanks again. howcheng {chat} 07:27, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

William Bemister

Thank you Larry for your edits and suggestions. I have added some more comments on Usertalk. >chat 09:45, 27 December 2005 (GMT).

DYK

Did you know? has been updated. A fact from the article American Bridge Company, which you recently created, has been featured in that section on the Main Page. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

Pedantry

Thanks for your note, Larry, but your fears are groundless (on my part, anyway!) The true pedant goes beyond all that stuff. Whether you put the comma after "and" is a matter of taste, likewise splitting infinitives & whatnot. Your run-of-the-mill pedant just tries to score points, whereas your formidable pedant knows that the purpose of language is communication. He directs his energies to that. If you don't know Modern English Usage, it's beautiful. He cuts through all the crap and achieves an almost Zen-like state of clarity. My vigilantism will be inspired by that. Lots of people reading the English Wikipedia will have ESL (English as 2nd language) and the clearer we can make it, the better!

Francis Tyers has uploaded some nice pix for the Cassiobury Park article, if you want to take a peek. (Note the impressive bridge.)

P.S. You're right about Wikipedia gobbling up vast amounts of time. I should have had my shower an hour ago, and here I am still in my pyjamas. Puffball 08:37, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

American Bridge Company in Template:Did you know

Hi! I couldn't help but notice that the ABC article I started and self nom-ed didn't last long in DYK. I was quite honored that it was chosen but rather disappointed that it didn't last very long at all... Was there something about it that made it unsuitable? I saw that the target text I put in the suggestion got rather mangled to the point that it didn't quite say what it should have. It was my first nomination so while trying to avoid WP:OWN about the whole thing, I'm still rather curious. Thanks! (I've set a watch here so feel free to respond here, I'll see it) ++Lar 03:52, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Sorry about this all. ABC was actually put back onto the DYK a half-hour after my change, and stayed up for 7 hours after that. The minimum time for DYK to appear is six hours, and since there was a backlog of unused DYK facts, I automatically assumed that no one had updated the space for a while. -- user:zanimum

Thanks

Thanks for the kind words, someone has offered to nominate me soon actually, if you don't mind I'll give you a shout when I'm nominated so you can vote if thats ok? :) - FrancisTyers 11:25, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

No need to shout, I'll be watching for it... shouting can sometimes be perceived as soliciting for votes by those looking for reasons to oppose. ++Lar 16:29, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

ANCOT&ASD - Puffball 18:28, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm 'murrican (if anglophilic) so a cuppa's not really what I tend to hanker after... LOL! But the sentiment, not the drink, is the point! Regrettably, it is a sentiment often wasted on those who are looking for reasons to oppose. ++Lar 18:51, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Boldly go ...

Hello! Thanks for your review and praise of my burgeoning article. How did you find it, by the way? Another Wikipedian actually suggested the article and he perused it for me a few days ago. Amidst other things, I'm still editing the ST article and will not publicise it until I can source it properly and get another set of eyes: much of it is derived from one of the online sources noted. I will do so, and will also add a concise version to the Star Trek article (which was the original intent!) in the next few days.

Moving an article is often the way to go but, given my many minor edits therein and as this is rather a singular venture (analogous to preparing a manuscript before submission or publication), I'll be copying it when it's complete: there's no reason for these many minor edits to pollute the article's history ... after which it can garner an edit history all its own. :)

I did know about Star Trek New Voyages (and I have an issue of Wired in which this series is profiled), so I'll briefly mention this too.

Please let me know if you have any more feedback or questions. Thanks again! E Pluribus Anthony 16:16, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I found it because I still had a watch on your talk page and scanning the watchlist, the comment about it caught my eye... ++Lar 17:15, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Ah! No worries ... I didn't know I was under the eye of others.  :) Enjoy! E Pluribus Anthony 17:30, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

BrickWiki

Answered there but answering here too... Thanks for the idea/reminder. BW has some (minor but cool) custom MediaWiki extensions. Losing them would be a bummer but might be worth it. We had thought of it before, and that was why we didn't pursue it then. Do you have involvement with WikiCities or should we pursue other channels to investigate? Thanks! (if it makes sense, feel free to email me, I'll copy the admins/'crats of BW in my reply. I am just a user with high edit count there, not an admin) ++Lar 16:20, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Having a Wikicity myself (wag.wikicities.com), I know you can make basic adjustments to MediaWiki as an admin on a particular project, and I can't imagine them not letting you add on any extra stuff. I don't have any connection with Wikicities, but I am a Wikimedia Foundation press contact/Wikipedia sysops/one of only seven "accredited reporters" on Wikinews, so I'm fairly well favoured by the establishment, it seems. Angela would be the one to talk to, she's sort of the general manager of the project, having co-founded it with Jimmy Wales. -- user:zanimum

MTV Generation or XY Cusp

I really appreciate the support and advice Lar. Thanks. r430nb

I need to not forget about these links

(some moved to user page) (these are here because I am not sure whether they belong on my main user page yet)

• find all your user pages [1]
• vandalism report [2]
• collection of thoughtful essays Category:Wikipedia essays
• I should add mine when I have more experience, to do so now would be presumptuous Wikipedia:Requests_for_adminship/Standards

Template

Hello Larry. Can you go to WP:TFD and comment or vote about Template:PD-USGov-LOC ? Thank you - Darwinek 11:11, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

Poll on years of birth/death

Hi, you may want to participate in the poll at Wikipedia talk: Manual of Style (dates and numbers) # "Should the year of birth/year of death be linked in biographies?" -- User:Docu

Userboxes

I'm not upset with you for creating the proposed policy page. Actually I can't say I'm upset with anyone in particular. I just don't like how restrictive some of the proposals are. I was hoping for some lighthearted discussion, but the page turned out to be a harsh debate. Anyway, hopefully the page will produce a usable policy. --TantalumTelluride 21:47, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I was just trying to help out. I sort of wish that it hadn't went to proposals right away, I think some principles would have been good to establish (either points where consensus exists (we are not robots, we are people, but we are here to build an encyclopedia), or points where it doesn't yet (userboxes about polticial alignments do/do not add to the goal)) before getting to proposals but since we did, I put my oar in. ++Lar: t/c 22:38, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

I've reset the debate here with the hope of seeing discussion rather than a vote. I've made that aim quite clear, and so hopefully we'll see a debate rather than a straw poll before we having anything concrete to vote on. If you want to discuss this, see my reasoning on the discussion's talk page. Thanks, and good work staying focused in the mud-slinging fight-to-the-death this almost became/is becoming. Harro5 06:19, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Well done. While I was composing a promise to try to reset things tomorrow (I had an edit conflict because you were posting your statement at the same time I was), you went off and did what I wanted to do. VERY Nice work. Here's hoping it works. ++Lar: t/c 06:24, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Speaking of edit conflicts: Excellent work. Nice refactoring. Hopefully, the discussion will be more productive and less uncivil this time. --TantalumTelluride 06:26, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

The old stuff is archived here: Wikipedia:Proposed policy on userboxes/Proposals. I haven't protected it (should I?) as some debates are still plodding along. No moves towards policy, just bickerinig, so maybe it's best to leave them there to argue away from the more useful discussion we've got now. Harro5 21:47, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

DYK

Did you know? has been updated. A fact from the article Sky Ride, which you recently created, has been featured in that section on the Main Page. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

sponsorVfD

Hi! Thanks for the message on the Sponser thing. I think it has some potential to reduce the amount of work it takes to delete an article and at the same time encourage improving new articles. I created it at a time when there was a lot of talk about replacing AFD. If you think editors would react positively we could float a trial baloon. I guess it depends on how strong your feelings are about replacing AFD or if it's even broken. I've worked a fair bit on Wikipedia:Deletion_reform/Proposals/Uncontested_deletions also, another idea that would reduce the workload. Anyway, thanks! Rx StrangeLove 03:31, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

I'm down with that... maybe wait a bit for things to settle a bit? but I do think Deletion Reform is needful. ++Lar: t/c 03:43, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Cheeky bugger

You've said lots of things I disagreed with, but I don't recall you even saying it in a manner that I disagreed with. I like you just fine, and sticking it to me with "OMFG" gave me the best laugh I've had today. - brenneman^(t)(c) 02:21, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Fair use on userboxes

I thank you for reaching some type of middle ground on this. While I know that some will oppose this rule, but with you and userbox project members helping me, we should be able to deal with this issue fairly quickly. If you have any questions, you can come and see me. Zach ^{(Smack Back) Fair use policy} 07:59, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

No worries. But I am late for bed, we'll see where this is at when I get up tomorrow... ++Lar: t/c 08:01, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

DYK

Did you know? has been updated. A fact from the article orthotropic deck, which you recently created, has been featured in that section on the Main Page. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.