User talk:Sroc

Commas

I have amended the proposal to make it only apply to titles and not sentences within an article. You mentioned adding something else to the proposal. If you will specifically tell me exactly what you mean (I can be a little slow sometimes), I will consider adding it to the proposal before too many editors comment. United States Man (talk) 15:43, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying your proposal. As I mentioned in my reply at the RfC, I still wouldn't support it, but I don't want to dictate what you propose.

I would say that I think it would be more reasonable to suggest that the rule be exempted in cases where the date or place is used as an adjective, e.g.:

• July 12, 2007 Baghdad airstrike
• Graniteville, South Carolina train crash

Some may be more inclined to make an exemption in such cases where the date or place is used as an adjective (i.e., modifying nouns, such as airstrike or train crash), which seems to be in line with Garner's Modern American Usage cited by Dohn joe. Personally, I still disagree with this style, although I may be more willing to accept it if it were only applied in article titles. Although I acknowledge that the second comma makes for an awkward construction, my preference is to re-phrase such cases, e.g.:

• airstrike in Baghdad on July 12, 2007
• train crash in Graniteville, South Carolina

That's just me. Others such as Agnosticaphid, Arthur Rubin, Dicklyon, Frungi, HandsomeFella, LtPowers and Stfg all supported the second comma in the earlier discussion you mentioned regarding Rochester and I'd be interested to see their views on your proposal, too. —sroc 💬 16:36, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

I just saw the second note that you added, but it now looks like you're looking to make two separate exemptions to the general rule. If I understand your proposal correctly:

• General rule: include a comma after the year in m–d–y dates (e.g., On November 24, 1971, Cooper hijacked a Boeing 727 aircraft.)
• General rule: include a comma after the state/country (e.g., The plane off from Portland, Oregon, and was headed east.)
• Exception: as an adjective (e.g., July 12, 2007 Baghdad airstrike or Graniteville, South Carolina train crash)
• Exception: in titles (I can't think of any examples that aren't adjectives)

Is this correct? Do you mean to exempt the last comma in adjectives in the body of article or only in titles? —sroc 💬 17:14, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

I changed it to say that the adjectives only apply to titles and not sentences within an article. Do you mind if I use this above "list" to better demonstrate what I mean in the RfC? United States Man (talk) 18:15, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

I don't mind if you use my examples, but I'm still trying to understand your proposal — not that I would support it in any case, but it seems that the proposal is either poorly thought through or poorly expressed. The way that you have written in your second comment, in relation to the use of dates or places as adjectives, "I propose that this also be made optional", the "also" implies that you would also propose that the comma would be omitted from the title in other cases (e.g., Journey from Graniteville, South Carolina to Austin, Texas instead of Journey from Graniteville, South Carolina, to Austin, Texas) — is this what you meant? If this is what you meant, then your second note is redundant because you mean to exclude the second comma from titles whether they are used after adjectives or not ; if you meant that your proposal only applies to adjectives in titles, then this is unclear from what you wrote. —sroc 💬 22:51, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, I know what I did wrong. When I did that earlier I was watching NASCAR and football and really wasn't paying attention. I will fix it (again). If I can't get it this time... United States Man (talk) 01:55, 27 October 2013 (UTC)

Please comment on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style

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Talkback

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Odd ultimatum

Please heed the "important point" from the final paragraph added in this diff [1] -- most important. EEng (talk) 07:52, 21 January 2014 (UTC)

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Object to html comment

I object to the html comment in this edit because it is very difficult to find or discuss. Jc3s5h (talk) 22:51, 23 January 2014 (UTC)

Do you mean this?

<!--This seems illogical. If someone is aware that ISO8601 is restricted to years 1583-9999, then on seeing a date outside that range he'll know immediately that it's not ISO8601. So what is this potential mistaken assumption/confusion/whatever we're trying to avoid hereby?-->

hat's a comment from EEng in the Alt 2A table which I copied to make Alt 2B. —sroc 💬 02:57, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

I don't know who created the comment or why. I object to any proposal that contains html comments, because it's just to hard to see that they are present, or find them in amongst all the discussion when the browser find feature won't find them. Jc3s5h (talk) 03:10, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

It's not any kind of "proposal". Comments in the markup are an established (if little-used) means of f communicating minor, non-urgent points to other editors -- please don't make me go through the exercise of digging up backup on that if you don't already know it. If no one sees it that's my loss since my pearl of wisdom has gone unnoticed; what do you care if it's not found? Anyway, you found it. Why are you bothering poor Sroc about this?

If you feel like opening a section on the Talk, go ahead and do so -- you're the one with the bee in your bonnet about 8601. Otherwise, go ahead and ignore it. EEng (talk) 04:03, 24 January 2014 (UTC)

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Your edit to "Manual of Style/Dates and Numbers"

In [this edit] you removed any mention of Universal Time. By making this change you eliminated any recommendation about how to write times in a global manner before 1962, because Coordinated Universal Time did not exist before 1962. Please fix this error so that times on the prime meridian may be expressed for dates before 1962. Jc3s5h (talk) 15:01, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

Your edit changed the reference from "UTC" to "Universal Time" but left in examples using "UTC" and a suggestion to "just include the UTC offset". These would be either meaningless or confusion to a reader who was not familiar with UTC and UT (and recognised that these are different) since there was no longer any preceding reference to "UTC" in this section. In any case, your edit was bad because UTC is perfectly acceptable (and widely used) for events since that system was introduced.

In addition, as stated in Universal Time, "the expression 'Universal Time' is ambiguous, as there are several versions of it," so it seems a bad idea to recommend this over specific systems that were actually in use at any given point in history. Hence, my next edit added the explanation: "Similarly, the term 'UTC' is not appropriate for dates before this system was adopted in 1961; Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) was used before this since the 1800s." —sroc 💬 22:27, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

"Greenwich Mean Time" is a horrible term because before 1925, the GMT day began at noon, but after 1925, it began at midnight. "Universal Time" is ambiguous in that the various versions might differ from each other by a second or two; this is inconsequential except for articles about astronomy and precision timekeeping. A day is a much more important ambiguity. Jc3s5h (talk) 15:22, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

This is a discussion for Wikipedia talk: Manual of Style/Dates and Numbers, not here. —sroc 💬 00:13, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

If you want to change it, change it, but don't mess it up. —sroc 💬 00:16, 1 March 2014 (UTC)

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math signs

Let me suggest we skip the xt and !xt for now since I suspect there will be lots of new and changed examples soon, and that will be easier without all the template clutter. EEng (talk) 05:44, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

If they're examples, they go in example templates. If the examples change, they can be edited within the example templates. That's how all the other examples are shown. —sroc 💬 05:47, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

You may want to tinker in a sandbox and/or use the preview function while you get your adjustments right before making your edits live to save on having to make corrections later. Just a thought. —sroc 💬 05:48, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Why did you revert my division of the rows in the maths table? After we've just been through the use of <br> vs {{plainlist}} and separate rows on the units table, why can't you apply the same logic here? I actually find it confusing to read "''x'' − ''y'' −''y''" in one cell of the table because the width of the column is so narrow that it looks like a single string that has wrapped over the line (which is actually what <br> is for) rather than two discrete examples (which is what is intended). Someone without the benefit of the visual display who relies on a screen reader is at an even greater disadvantage. These need to go on separate rows. —sroc 💬 06:02, 8 March 2014 (UTC)