Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Contract bridge

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Goals and scope

propoasal for better goals and scope I disagree to the concept for several reasons: ?1: To improve Wikipedias coverage of Bridge in General ? Nice suggestion, do whatever you think fit. ?2: coverage of bridge conventions and bridge systems . Clear definition, this might be of use for some players. Very restricted. ?3: create article on every notable bridge player. Who decides on person. What is notable ? Killed a TD after discussion.? Invented No. 299 convention ? Suggestion: only for deceased players. Merits : Jesse Owens did make 100 meters in 9,9 secondes in 1936 Olypic games. There is no such single event in bridge, the numer of pssible distributions exceed 600.000.000. Any sugestions to merits  ? ?4: to improve existing bridge articles to featured standards. What standards? Suggestion: logical analytucal descriptions. ?5: e q u i v a l e n t of the "Official Encyclopedia of Bridge" ? This is the same as number one.

My suggestion:

long term target: Make the "mind sport bridge" equivalent to the "body sport", in number of participants world wide

middle term target: Change existing rules by introducing new features, improving existing rules , delating rules/Laws which make brigde difficult to play.

short term target: Explain bridge in words of common language , give definition of bridge terms when used in articles.

Example for misused habits: When you and your partner meet new pairs in private , you will ask: what system do you use ? And your new opponents will frankly explain to you. Case the deny explanation, you will stop to play with them in future. But this information about system is general, and you will not aks: do you have to spade ace, and queen diamonds and hearts - when the auction of a new a new deal starts. This way to play friendly does not override the basic concept: no player must know the card of the other hand, when auction begins. " Friendly" information cannot be used to claim any rights.

Paul Hauff (talk) 09:10, 1 June 2010 (UTC) Paul Hauff

Moments ago I moved that comment here from the project page. Italics mine.

Italics (mine) highlight what speaks to the development of bridge rather than to wikipedia coverage of bridge. --P64 (talk) 16:16, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

You killed a TD? <gulp> I've been tempted, but have so far resisted. Narky Blert (talk) 02:11, 9 August 2014 (UTC)

Competition, tournament, etc

Re use of these and other terms — discipline, event, meet(ing), championship(s) ... — there is enormous variety in English-language sports and games talk, and great variety even in duplicate bridge talk. Duplicate bridge organizers and players in my experience rarely or never use "competition" and "meet" in the following senses which are common here.

• She won the Friday evening Open Pairs competition and the Open Swiss Teams competition at/in/of the Halifax meet last weekend —where "at/in/of" means focus on the nouns ;-)

Following previous editors re "competition", on my own initiative re "meet", I have tried to use these two terms frequently as in this example, instead of "tournament" in a particular and "tournament" in a collective sense, both of which I consider common in duplicate bridge talk. Does small size save space? (Outside of duplicate bridge talk, I don't use "meet" but I like it because no one uses it with the particular meaning.) (Outside, I use "tournament" in the particular sense and I am inclined to prefer it here, but the collective sense seems inevitably firmly established among organizers and players.) (Outside, I try to use "event" in more particular rather than less particular senses. So I am inclined to prefer "event" as well as "tournament" for what we call a competition, but I know that Wikipedia has a project for multi-sport events, and know that the hospitality industry is influential [cities compete to host events].) (I am inclined against our "competition" as a countable noun, partly because competition is important in more than one other sense, both at the bridge table [competitive bidding; jump shifts in competition] and away from elsewhere [competitive attitude; cities compete to host events].) Sigh

Is it appropriate for WPCB to standardize on such matters of usage?

What do others think of "competition" and "meet" in the sense displayed? --P64 (talk) 21:02, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Kaplan–Sheinwold and its redirects

K–S (dash) and Kaplan-Sheinwold now redirect to Kaplan–Sheinwold which is a new title, old article.

Does this need reporting? Does the project claim redirects? I think not (so that they normally lack Talk pages). --P64 (talk) 16:00, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

Now I have tagged the redirect K–S (dash) and assigned it Mid-importance. This one has importance because KS disambiguates dozens of entries and some of those have claims to K-S or K–S although that is not yet stated.

If I understand correctly this redirect will show up in our assessment table Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Contract bridge articles by quality statistics. --although without any "Redirect" row.

--P64 (talk) 02:01, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

On the other hand, I see there is a feature we must enable in order to report redirects as a class of pages. See Talk:John Wiley & Sons Canada, Ltd. where five WikiProjects all set class=redirect but only three banners report that class.

Evidently we need a custom class (Template:Class mask) --such as Template:WikiProject Companies/class-- with FQS=yes and redirect=yes.

--P64 (talk) 22:02, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

World Mind Sports Games

Another editor, having achieved consensus of two in discussion with me, as created 2008 World Mind Sports Games by split from World Mind Sports Games, which is now general, and main article for the (temporarily messy) category Category:World Mind Sports Games. 2012 World Mind Sports Games and 2016 World Mind Sports Games may now be WP:RED but will be created sooner, as will their eponymous categories later.

"1st W.M.S.G." now redirects to "2008 ...". Articles on the four constituent sports remain titled Bridge at the 1st World Mind Sports Games, and so on, but they will be moved (sooner). --P64 (talk) 22:27, 4 June 2012 (UTC)

Vanderbilt number?

Moved to Talk:Vanderbilt number

 – Newwhist (talk) 18:40, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Vanderbilt number on AfD.

The prod on Vanderbilt number was removed so I put it on AfD. Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 11:54, 18 June 2012 (UTC)

Keshav Samant

I added a reference to Keshav Samant, an article on an Indian bridge player. If you can improve the article, please do so.

Computer bridge excluded?

I do not see computer bridge mentioned at all among goals, objectives and scope of this project? Is there no ambition to have excellent coverage of that, or is it in a separate project? If so, link to it! (The chess project seems to include computer chess...) 85.230.254.123 (talk) 02:27, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

I would certainly view computer bridge as falling under the scope of the project, and wouldn't read anything into its not being specifically mentioned within the objectives and scope sections. I think computer bridge is included within the goal of "To make Wikipedia a world-class reference on contract bridge". JH (talk page) 08:47, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

It is included — computer bridge is tagged with the WikiProject Contract bridge template. To make it more explicit, I have added an entry under Scope. Newwhist (talk) 14:08, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

Slam and Grand Slam disambiguations

I have tagged the WP:DAB pages slam and grand slam (as redirected) and assigned them low- and mid-importance respectively. Slam is historically prior but the contrary difference in importance is indicated by the current leads.

• Slam or SLAM may refer to:
• Grand slam is a term derived from the card game of contract bridge where it refers to a contract to win all thirteen tricks on one deal.

Grand slam or grandslam may also refer to:

If I understand correctly, these two disambiguations will soon show up in our assessment table Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Contract bridge articles by quality statistics. --in a new "Disambiguation" row.

Compare #Kaplan–Sheinwold and its redirects.

--P64 (talk) 02:28, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Yes, the two dab are now covered in that report (row 'Disamb').

To cover redirects under the name 'Redirect' is more complicated (see #Kaplan–Sheinwold and its redirects) but the two redirects are now the only pages covered in row 'NA'. --and that is now adequate for me.

--P64 (talk) 01:12, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for the additions to the assessment table for disambiguation and redirect pages. I am happy to leave these as you have labelled them for now but do believe that since they are administrative/navigational in nature, they do not really need article quality assessment ratings, i.e. they are not articles per se. I would have rated each with "class=NA" myself. Interesting that redirects do not have a proper row header; I will investigate if this is possible at some point - I recall that there is an ability to add custom fields but it has been some time since I dabbled in the assessment templates. Newwhist (talk) 13:15, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

About custom classes see my latest at #Kaplan–Sheinwold and its redirects.

'Disamb' (and 'Redirect' if in use) is a class alternative to {Stub, Start, C, B, ...}, same as List, Book, File, Portal, Project, Template, etc. So genuine quality assessment is not applicable to any of them, which is ridiculous for List and Portal at least, and unfortunate for some instances of the others.

So it is importance not quality that I have assessed for Grand Slam. I'll upgrade it to High when its otherwise time to revisit its Talk page. Probably there never be an article about grand slam in contract bridge, as there is about g.s. in baseball and G.S. in lawn tennis and real tennis. But most other uses are derived from contract bridge, ultimately from whist; the exceptions may also be derived from whist. So grand slam at the card table is notable for the disambiguation page and mentioned in the lead.

The Disamb. Grand Slam is not unique here; Bridge (disambiguation) must be Top importance. Beside Slam (disambiguation) that I have already graded Low, other candidates include at least contract, double, honor, trump, ruff. ... Evidently it's time that I visit WP:GAMES and skim, at least. --P64 (talk) 17:54, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

My apologies for my earlier comment. I erred. I intended to say that disambiguation and redirect pages should not have importance ratings other than NA. To parse degrees of importance for these administrative/navigational pages is unnecessary. However, I do agree that List pages (and some others that you mentioned) ought to be able to have an importance rating. Newwhist (talk) 21:48, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

List pages should commonly be graded for quality too but current wiki-tools do not enable that.

A few dab pages have importance and quality attributes. Broadly I suppose that is true insofar as they are not purely navigational, which may in turn depart from some guideline. If they later become purely navigational they can be re-graded of no importance and NA quality.

--P64 (talk) 22:39, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Today I completed major revision of the disambiguation Grand Slam where the grand slam in contract bridge is (as it was) featured in the lead sentence although not as a formal primary topic. Mainly I added dates, put subsections in chron order, and revised wording primarily with knowledge acquired as a I located dates.

Along the way I learned that the derivation from contract bridge of "grand slam" as used for the particular comprehensive or great achievement --my words now in the Grand Slam lead-- is respectively mentioned, covered, and featured in the golf, baseball, and (lawn) tennis articles. Where the origin of the term is featured (section Grand slam (tennis)#Origin of the term "Grand Slam"), I have recently added whist, etc, with source "slam" at Online Etymological Dictionary. --P64 (talk) 22:39, 1 February 2013 (UTC)

Ira Rubin

This newly-created stub needs some work. Bearian (talk) 20:21, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

WBF website redesign

Unfortunately, a broken link may return some unhelpful general page[1] rather than this helpful ERROR MESSAGE:

We have totally redone this site as of February 23, 2013 and so all the page names are different. Our apologies!

Please use the menu above to find what you are looking for. ...

If you have many pages linking to us try changing the .asp to .aspx, this will work for most tournament results and people. In some cases also remove the folders. If you need assistance with your links to us please contact our webmaster

Some related discussion: Template talk:WBFpeople#New pathname

--P64 (talk) 20:15, 14 June 2013 (UTC)

Examples

Let me record examples here as I encounter them.

Bobby Levin --player international record

http://www.worldbridge.org/people/person.asp?qryid=11125

http://www.worldbridge.org/people/person.aspx?qryid=11125 [insert 'x']

N.B. Template {{WBFpeople}} works. Its use saves keystrokes and eases maintenance of links to player records (where it has been used in the past, we have recovered all links to player records by revising the template once). Please use it. If/where it is inadequate please discuss at Template talk: WBFpeople.

World Team Championship(s) --top page for Bermuda/Venice/Senior Bowl

http://www.worldbridge.org/competitions/worldchampionships/teamchampionships.asp?qmenuid=20

http://www.worldbridge.org/world-team-championships.aspx

[1981] 25th World Team Championships --aka Results & Participants

http://www.worldbridge.org/competitions/worldchampionships/TeamChampRP.asp?qmenudetid=213

http://www.worldbridge.org/TeamChampRP.aspx?qmenudetid=213

I have improved Bobby Levin, following work on the new article Steve Weinstein. Among other things --something I didn't expect when I visited two hours ago-- I have updated the official player record and Bermuda Bowl links in the Levin biography only. --P64 (talk) 20:56, 14 June 2013 (UTC)

Bridge Winners

How commonly have we linked to Bridge Winners member profiles --as at Bobby Levin#External links? A template may be useful for that. --P64 (talk) 20:56, 14 June 2013 (UTC)

I do not know but guess that links to Bridge Winners member profiles have been very few in number - can't really remember any but have not searched. The question raises a broader issue - should links to websites which have a public membership profile be added? Such as Facebook, BBO etc.? Does WP have a policy on this? Newwhist (talk) 02:20, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

I have looked at the WP policy page on External links and find three relevant sections:

1. Links normally to be avoided. See item 10.
2. In biographies of living people
3. Sites requiring registration

The policy statements contain the weasel words "usually" and "generally". For further discussion. Newwhist (talk) 12:47, 15 June 2013 (UTC)

Now I doubt that a footer template is warranted.

But it's clear that the link is appropriate where we don't know any other official web presence for the subject of the article. The preface to WP:EL section 4, Links normally to be avoided clearly qualifies the list of 19 items and does so without weasel words: "Except for a link to an official page of the article's subject", which links WP:ELOFFICIAL.

I have added a few such listings to biography footers, or re-located or re-formatted them--recently, all as at Bobby Levin#External links. --P64 (talk) 17:36, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Tom Townsend

Hi, I have created this stub but don't have access to the OEB and wondered if someone who has could add a bit to it, please? The Whispering Wind (talk) 00:16, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

I couldn't resist being flippant

Looking at the project page, I see that under "User userboxes and categories" we have three templates. The first displays a banner saying "This user plays bridge" and the second displays a banner saying "This user enjoys playing bridge". I assume that the former must be intended for those who play bridge but don't enjoy it. :) JH (talk page) 21:56, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Positioning the TOC

WP:TOC permits positioning the TOC within the lead section rather than after it,

(quote) Although usually a heading after the TOC is preferable, __TOC__ can be used to avoid being forced to insert a meaningless heading just to position the TOC correctly, i.e., not too low.

and permits floating the TOC with {{TOC right}},

(quote) when it is beneficial to the layout of the article, or when the default TOC gets in the way of other elements.

It doesn't explicitly permit both exceptions. On the contrary,

(quote) If floating the TOC, it should be placed at the end of the lead section of the text, before the first section heading.

That restricts what the first quotation grants; conflicts with the permission in the first quotation.

In several articles (all my doing?) we use both exceptions, or perpetrate them. Some instances have recently been undone by script-assisted edits using AWB, as at Camrose Trophy yesterday.[2]

Experiment at Bermuda Bowl shows that floating {TOC right} immediately before section 1 --the second exception alone-- may be useful. There the lead section is not very long and the fixed-width element below the lead is narrow enough.

--P64 (talk) 23:39, 15 February 2014 (UTC)

Template {{TOC right}} displays the Contents table at far right, beginning at the point where it is located in the code. And displays the following content to its left—permits what follows to flow around it.

The template will not survive prior to or anywhere within the lead section except immediately preceding the section 1 heading. That displays the Contents table in the upper right corner of section 1. For some explanation see See recent edit summaries of major championships articles for one explanation.

The two alternatives are

Vanderbilt Trophy - default

Venice Cup - {TOC right} immed. prior to section 1 heading

The alternative may not be viable where section 1 begins, or nearly begins, with content other than flowing text. Such as a table of past results (World IMP Pairs Championship).

--P64 (talk) 18:28, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

Albert Dormer

I see that Albert Dormer has recently died. His obituary was in the Daily Telegraph earlier this week. If anyone has the time to spare, he might be worth an article. JH (talk page) 17:58, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

Seeing his obituary in the latest edition of the EBU quarterly magazine English Bridge reminded me of this. I've created an article for him, but it's pretty basic and could do with a lot of expansion and refinement. JH (talk page) 18:24, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Coverage of bridge writers

In several respects I have completely covered all the person articles, a.k.a. biographies, in Category:Bridge writers; that is now 92 of 95 pages in the category. See Category talk: Bridge writers#Coverage for details.

Most likely to be both new this fortnight and useful in expanding, eventually updating: footer links to Library of Congress Authorities, a point of convenient entry to LC Catalog(ue) records, and to WorldCat, with less consistent records from participating libraries everywhere.

Both these sources are available even for the barely-writer Hamman (Bob Hamman#External links) but they are absent for some barelies and for several writers in other languages such as Westra (Berry Westra#External links). --for whom I linked the WorldCat search report; not done if it's empty as for Marx (Jack Marx (bridge)#External links).

--P64 (talk) 20:18, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. That was a major undertaking! JH (talk page) 21:02, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

WBF, EBL players database

Evidently the player database, or Results & Participants database, is shared by WBF and EBL (WBF People Finder; EBL Player Lookup).

interjection They use the same numerical ID, eg 685=Sally Brock

• WBF Sally Brock
• EBL Sally Brock

WBF features World Masterpoints and ranks in the header, where EBL features European MP and ranks --both historical and current, a nice touch that WBF lacks.

--P64 (talk) 19:54, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

For some early time period its European coverage is limited to high finishes in IBL (1930s) and European Bridge League events. --perhaps Open and Women teams championships alone.

Eg, 4th EUROPEAN TEAM CHAMPIONSHIPS identifies only two Open and one Women teams, and indirectly links all of their players. That view doesn't show the database omits all players who have no such high results, but so I infer from some more investigation (Talk:Nico Gardener#Pat Gardener).

Evidently the database covers the European Teams fully from 1979. Compare 33rd Euro Teams, 1977; 34th Euro Teams, 1979.

Euro Pairs? For the Open Pairs, first contested 1976, EBL provides via database long lists of Final Results, at least, from the 4th, 1987 to the 15th, 2009 --only 1st or 1st/2nd before 1987; only 1st/2nd/3rd, 2011; and nothing yet, 2013.

Other WBF Zones? For Gabriel Chagas of Brazil, the "Team Events" record includes only one result from South America and that is not linked to any details (59th CSB CHAMPIONSHIPS / Santiago 2009 - Open Teams; 3rd place). For Marcelo Lerner of Argentina similarly, only the one dead listing (59th CSB CHAMPIONSHIPS / Santiago 2009 - Senior Teams; 1st place). Three prominent players with Far East/Asia Pacific championships have only world results displayed at WBF.

--P64 (talk) 18:07, 18 June 2014 (UTC)

Note the international records for Sally Brock (linked above) incorporate links to her Master Points records. (WBF provides two links to a single WBF record. EBL provides four links to a single EMP record and four links to four distinct Euro rankings.)

This information is not generally available for old players.

begin copy from Talk:Fritzi Gordon#NYT obituary where I posted it last hour -P64

General notice. WBF Master Points (wbfmasterpoints.com) is better maintained than the main WBF website on some points. For example, it now lists Bep Vriend #20 among Women Grand Masters [3] while the main site lists her #9 [4] --down only from #8 since April 2011, relying on our biog, presumably lacking update for 2013 if not also 2012.

There is no WBF Master Points record for Gordon, however. See the first homepage link "Pre-2002 deceased player records rebuilt" ... that material now shows WBF Master Points records for 61 old players have been rebuilt, including Rixi Markus but not yet her partner. (Rixi Markus rebuilt) (provisional all-time WBF Women)

end copy

2015-02-19, evidently the absence of European achievements from "Rixi Markus rebuilt" is a mistake. Contrast the reconstructed Anna Valenti (1917–2000).[5]. (WBF masterpoints records were deleted upon death, pre-2002.) ...

That "Rixi Markus rebuilt" is limited to WBF events. WBF Master Points: Nicola Smith shows World MPs were/are awarded for Euro events at least from 1975 and Markus was a member of the same 1975 Great Britain team. WBF Master Points maintainer Mark Newton requests help, says nothing to indicate whether the rebuild will cover EBL events, has partly done so, etc.

--P64 (talk) 18:34, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

continued

Eight months later it remains true that WBFMP hosts a reconstructed Player Master Point History for Rixi Markus, none for her regular partner Fritzi Gordon. Ipso facto Gordon does not appear on the WBF All time Women's Ranking. The same holds for Pierre Ghestem and René Bacherich. Ghestem is one deceased-pre-2002 player in the WBFMP database (Code=20048) and on the all-time Open list; Bacherich is not, yet.

Walter Avarelli (1912–1987) played on all six Italy teams that won EBL and BB championships from 1957 to 1959. His record WBF Master Points Walter Avarelli shows (and others confirm) that the award of WBF Placing Points begins in 1959 for both European and world championships. WBF was established in 1958 and became Bermuda Bowl sponsor a few years later. Its current award of Master Points (MP, which do decay) covers the Bermuda Bowls from the beginning in 1950 and alone prior to 1959.

--P64 (talk) 22:49, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

and award begins 1959 for South American championships, namely 1959 Open Zonal 3. --P64 (talk) 23:01, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Old bridge and whist books

Unfortunately the Library of Congress Catalogue (LCCat) uses the subject heading LCSH "bridge whist" for many mid- and late-19th century books. And the sort by date does not work for me now. Nevertheless Bridge whist (72 records + 91 "from old catalog" + a few more) is interesting and maybe fruitful to skim. (There are 277 and 1026 records in Auction bridge and Contract bridge, so-called narrower terms.)

The heading Whist may be used with integrity in a useful sense; 145 of the 160 records have pre-1900 dates. (Sort by date, which doesn't work for me now at Bridge whist.)

--P64 (talk) 16:38, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

Smolen question

I just started playing Smolen a week ago. Tonight partner opened 1NT and I had 5-5 in the majors. I bid 2C and partner bid 2D. What do you do if you play Stayman, Jacoby transfers, and Smolen? Bubba73 ^{You talkin' to me?} 03:27, 9 July 2014 (UTC)

List of national/supranational bridge organisations

New page needed imo.

Not to mention that several national bridge organisations are missing from WP and really deserve their own articles. Like e.g. CBAI, IBU, NIBU, SBU, WBU. Creating a list page might encourage editors to get their fingers out.

Narky Blert (talk) 02:06, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

The foregoing acronyms have been added to the table listing new article nominations.

Newwhist (talk) 17:07, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

WBF championships official coverage

Our articles on WBF championships include numerous references to official sources with {{dead link}}s --dead for more than a year if i recall correctly. Many of them, perhaps a vast number, are broken in the same fashion.

• http://www.worldbridge.org/competitions/worldchampionships/TeamChampRP.asp?qmenudetid=546 (old)
• http://www.worldbridge.org/TeamChampRP.aspx?qmenudetid=546 (new)

These two are previous and current eddresses for the "[final] Results & Participants" of one particular event rendition, the 2012 World Mixed Teams Championship -- at the main WBF website, where it is integrated to the players database.

Contrast the contemporary coverage, session-by-session and in Daily Bulletins, at microsites devoted to one meet such as the 14th World Bridge Games (microsite). But I see that session detail down in that 2012 WMSG microsite is linked to the player database too.[6]

--P64 (talk) 22:23, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Comment on the WikiProject X proposal

Hello there! As you may already know, most WikiProjects here on Wikipedia struggle to stay active after they've been founded. I believe there is a lot of potential for WikiProjects to facilitate collaboration across subject areas, so I have submitted a grant proposal with the Wikimedia Foundation for the "WikiProject X" project. WikiProject X will study what makes WikiProjects succeed in retaining editors and then design a prototype WikiProject system that will recruit contributors to WikiProjects and help them run effectively. Please review the proposal here and leave feedback. If you have any questions, you can ask on the proposal page or leave a message on my talk page. Thank you for your time! (Also, sorry about the posting mistake earlier. If someone already moved my message to the talk page, feel free to remove this posting.) Harej (talk) 22:47, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

ACBLhof tag

The ACBLhof tag no longer works. ACBL seems to have changed their HOF references on the web site. The numerical ID no longer works. This means that someone needs to go through all of the ACBLhof and change to using an name, not an ID. Example. See Kit Woolsey. His HOF ID is 88, but the link on his page does not work any more. ACBL changed their web site in early 2014. Someone needs to update all of these templates.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 02:26, 22 October 2014 (UTC)

Likewise for the WBF people links. I am not a website guru so have no idea how these two links can be salvaged without tedious one-by-one effort. Editor P64 was involved in their initial creation and may be of assistance. Newwhist (talk) 12:13, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

I don't know that {{WBFpeople}} links have been permanently broken, ever. I do know that WBF people database service is sporadic (awful, awesome, awespirational, ...). Newwhist, I guess you noticed broken footer links during a timespan when service was down, but valid eddresses have been stable.

With template {{sfhof}}, which has the same function for the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame, the citations/biographies of all inductees/members were in the Internet Archive. When the organization unpublished them a couple years ago (at least at their known eddresses, which is the crucial point here), I was actively working on FSF coverage, noticed the broken links soon, and revised the template almost trivially to formulate an Internet Archive eddress using the same template parameter. ([7]). To revise the template once is to revise every one of the biography footer links,

When I created template Citation at the ACBL Hall of Fame (archived) and added it to several biographies this spring, ACBL still served the citations/biographies at their old eddresses. Its history shows that I revised this template in similar fashion, presumably during the transition. Perhaps I checked Internet Archive, altho I don't recall that, sorry about the oversight. Checking now I see that Internet Archive does have copies from numerous about/hall-of-fame eddresses, but mainly from last fortnight, copies of the Page not found notice perhaps prompted by activity here. Only a few with genuine old content, not enough citations to be valuable here now.

This is a complete list if i clerk correctly. From 2008, only the alphabetical list members.php, 2008-03-08 (first of 20 dated page copies) and the citation of Eddie Kantar (id=35). From 2009, the top page, 2009-02-15 and HBaron 1; 2010, an index by induction date, 2010-01-07 and CGoren 24; 2011, EKempFreilich 17 and LStansby 76; 2012, none; 2013, DTruscott 81 and RFreeman 16.

After general use of any external link template here, many a rearrangement of material published out there is innocuous, including relocation to a new domain. But ACBL changed the HOF member ID. And the material had not been archived out there--at least, not by the Internet Archive.

--P64 (talk) 19:12, 2 November 2014 (UTC)

The 'correct' way to solve this problem, and all other similar problems, is to have a file, somewhere, that correlates player names to WBF IDs. Keeping this file separate from player profiles, means when we add a new player, we just add a symbol/tag pointing to this file and we automatically get their profile.

For the ACBL HOF, one step is to modify the macro, then go through all players that have an ACBLhof tag, then manually edit that tag. That's painful. Better is to use the approach I recommend, but this means that someone needs to create the macro/symbol/tag. I have no desire to become a tag programmer. Are there others out there? I can describe what is needed, but someone else would need to do the work. The WBF player links have been working for me, not sure about the WBF HOF links. Nicolas.hammond (talk) 13:49, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

I'm willing to revise both template {{ACBLhof}} and all of its uses, which doesn't amount to "pain" for me. And willing to check something else along the way.

I hope to wait two days for the conclusions of our annual American baseball championship :-)

--P64 (talk) 19:23, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

The WBF user ID is also useful. Some players have the link, some don't. I added about 50 the other day. Manually editing all of these files seems to be very painful. Is there any way that someone can reference an external or Wikipedia utility to do that?Nicolas.hammond (talk) 20:36, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

List of Winners

I have created an automatically generated list, with references, of Bridge achievements. It is on https://github.com/njhammond/generate_bridge_wikipedia_entries/tree/master/results Then look in the directory that contains their first name. For example, for Zia, go to the Z directory.

If you edit any players, please see this list and c/p as necessary. Nicolas.hammond (talk) 23:00, 21 October 2014 (UTC)

Nicolas, can you provide some documentation? What should I find somewhere there, which is appropriate for copy and paste somewhere? Do we have a biography (sub)section that is literally created by copy-paste from that utility? (I'll try to remember to visit from my public library as I get the message "Please note that GitHub no longer supports old versions of Firefox.") --P64 (talk) 19:34, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

I don't know which browser you have, so can't comment on access to Github for you.

For documentation on this tool, see the README file in the home directory of the project. Basically, if you have a player, say Zia Mahmood, go to the directory of the first letter of the first name, in this case the Z directory. You will see several players. Click on the Zia Mahmood link and it contains the generic information that would be cut/paste into their "Bridge achievements". As I find more achievements, I will add them time permitted. Each time I do this I re-run the tool, and update the entries. There are about 2,500 player entries. But this is for everyone that has won an NABC+ event. The file https://github.com/njhammond/generate_bridge_wikipedia_entries/tree/master/10winners.txt contains those that have won 10 or more NABC titles.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 11:49, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. Welcome to the WikiProject. JH (talk page) 08:18, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

You're welcome. I actually did Dickie Freeman several years ago so not exactly new. For the Bridge accomplishments, we need someone to write a fairly complicated macro/tag (not sure the right world). We should have all of the winner data in separate files. When there is a new championship, e.g. current world event in China, we just update the file of winners. This should then automatically update the Bridge accomplishments of all players on the Wikipedia without having to manually edit each/every one. I have the necessary files for ACBL events, ACBL HOF, King/Queen of Bridge, most World events. See the Github page. Rather than having this on Github, it should be on the Wiki somewhere. This type of data - winners - should not have to be updated on all players pages, we should be able to put somewhere centrally.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 13:52, 23 October 2014 (UTC)

FYI: Editing dozens of bridge biographies several months ago, I frequently ignored and never systematically checked the tournament accomplishments subsections/lists. In the Bridge accomplishments section, I gave systematic attention only to the ACBL Hall of Fame listing (add listings; revise listings to use the template {{ACBLhof}}) in the first subsection.

I support semi-automation of winners and runners-up listings in principle. I don't understand how much Nicolas.hammond's suggestion would automate, how much work that design would require, or how robust it would be to the retirement of particular editors.

It would need a template. You include the template, "Bridge accomplishments". That template would look in databases/flat files, however it is designed, and generate their accomplishments. As someone decides more accomplishments are useful, e.g. European championships, they can easily be added. Right now, if you wanted to add European Championships in Wikipedia you would need to manually edit every Bridge player that won one. That's absurd given the power of computers.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 11:49, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

I consider other shortcomings to be severe in practice. We don't clearly distinguish world/WBF championships (nor european/EBL ch'ips). We list world, euro-, and other zonal ch'ips irregularly and incompletely, relative to the American-NABC/ACBL ones. These lengthy and relatively flat lists obscure as much as they reveal (eg, some NABC championships really are secondary, some tertiary). We don't systematically do all that we should to remedy that in prose (where I believe that the original-research proscription permits us to do more, in practice, than we may do in lists).

--P64 (talk) 19:23, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

New biography pages Oct 2014

We have a batch of new biography pages created by User:Nicolas.hammond--at least 21 created 16–24 October, which I added to the list of "Newest Articles ... People" on the main page (section 5.2).

These pages probably incorporate one or more copy-paste of that "automatically generated list, with references, of Bridge achievements" Nicolas announced in the preceding section. Regarding those references:

• 1. Section heading should be "References".
• 2. Some generate red error notices. See Ron Andersen, Manfield, Meyers, Weichsel, at least.
• 3. "Hall of Fame" references are broken. Evidently we have bad pathnames regardless whether the correct ACBLhof alphabetic ID is used:

• http://web5.acbl.org/about-acbl/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (correct)
• http://www.acbl.org/about/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (now in Betty Ann Kennedy#Notes)

1. interject stable link to that version -P64

• http://www.acbl.org/about/hall-of-fame/members/94 (now in Kerri Sanborn#Notes)

• 4. Some need expansion. See the several "List of previous winners" at B. Jay Becker#Notes.
• 5. Some need abbreviation --at least "ACBL" for "American Contract Bridge League" (but that is publisher, not title, at least for particular issues of the NABC Daily Bulletin).
• 6. Repeat use of identical references needs attention.

Most of these points should be addressed by revision of the utility.

--P64 (talk) 21:56, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

Page creations by Nicolas.hammond lists more than 150 created this fortnight, all or nearly of which are biography pages for bridge players (more than 95% American).

2. Pages created (from Richard Freeman, 2011) is slightly more useful. In reverse chron order (as usual), it begins at the bottom with the earliest bridge biography pages that Nicolas created this month, plus the one created previously. -P64

At least a dozen page names were inappropriate, including several that other editors have converted to redirects to our previous pages for those people. I expect (but haven't checked) that some of those other editors have simply deleted Nicolas.hammond's content rather than integrate it with our biographies, and have sometimes done that without notice on our biography talk pages. That is, there may be no trail except edit summaries in the redirect page histories.

After a closer look I think no content by Nicolas.hammond was lost when other editors converted his new pages Kehela, Murray, Lightner, and Stayman pages to redirects. Said to be merged. --P64 (talk) 01:56, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

Unfortunately I don't know that those four are the only ones that were converted to redirects as redundant coverage of one person. I quickly visited the histories of all the new pages and skimmed for the large bright numbers that indicate massive deletions (eg, see history Samuel M. Stayman) rather than moves to preferred pagenames that are not in use. Unfortunately I used a composition window rather than paper to list them, along with other notes, as I worked, and I lost the session. Those four are the ones in this class that I remembered after visiting all.

--P64 (talk) 16:11, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

Nicolas, please please take a moment to check whether we have a page for someone. If not, please take a moment to check how we name the player in tournament articles. (Bluelinks in tournament articles imply that we have a page for the player, of course. Both redlinks and unlinked names commonly, albeit unreliably, show appropriate page names; sometimes preferred page names.)

The list of contract bridge people commonly but unreliably shows preferred page names.

A few particular points. We don't generally use middle initials and disambiguators such as ", Jr."; we never use them simply because ACBL uses that name-form somewhere. By design we always use appropriate diacritic marks.

--P64 (talk) 22:10, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

"Bluelinks in tournament articles imply that we have a page for the player, of course." Not necessarily. In a few cases it's possible that the link is incorrectly to someone else with the same name who has a Wikipedia article, so it's worth checking. JH (talk page) 09:59, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

It was not always clear if there was a link for someone. I used the tournament winners as a reference assuming that if someone had added a name, then they would have created the link to their name in the winners lists. As I have found previous entries, either I have linked them, or deleted my original post and did a #REDIRECT. It is hard for me to tell with people that have multiple names (married/divorced etc.). If I messed up some with Jr. etc, let me know, I'll tweak the code that generates the entries. I have used middle initials where appropriate because I see this all the time on Wikipedia. Larry Cohen is the example. There is a Larry T. Cohen and a Larry N. Cohen. I think it is correct to use when there may be ambiguation later. For players with "common" names, I would suggest that we create player_name_bridge, this seems to be the style. My criteria for inclusion was 10 NABC+ wins, so the majority I added were ACBL players, though I have added a few that are not. The ACBL HOF was broken before I did anything. ACBL redid their web site. Someone needs to go through ALL the HOF entries and update. My suggestion remains that we use an external file to cross-reference this data. Much easier.

3. Template {{ACBLhof}} was broken by a major revision of the ACBL website recently (actually, by ACBL's more recent unpublication of the old website). The template is commonly if not exclusively used in the footer section "External links". But the utility generates broken references with target-title "Hall of Fame". Commonly those are now the first reference(s) in new biog pages for ACBL HOF members, as for Betty Ann Kennedy. See the illustrations in point #4 above (where I have now numbered my six yesterday items). The utility evidently uses a bad pathname stem(?), http://www.acbl.org/about/hall-of-fame/members. -P64

interject 2014-11-03 Serious problem, further report. As I write, ACBL serves the path fragments web5.acbl.org/about-acbl and www.acbl.org/about-acbl indifferently but does not serve www.acbl.org/about and (some? all?) recent new pages use the latter.

http://web5.acbl.org/about-acbl/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (ok)

http://www.acbl.org/about/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (now in Betty Ann Kennedy#Notes)

— stable link to that version of the biography

http://www.acbl.org/about-acbl/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (ok)

--P64 (talk) 01:04, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

"I have used middle initials where appropriate because I see this all the time on Wikipedia." I think the Wikipedia guidelines say that one should use the version of their name by which the person is most commonly known (though of course sometimes it's appropriate to have redirects from plausible alternatives). I think in the bridge world Larry Cohen is commonly known as simply that, so I'd favour using that unless there is already another Larry Cohen on Wikipedia, when I'd choose "Larry Cohen (bridge player)". But that's just my opinion, and I've noticed that Americans seem to use middle initials a lot more than we tend to over here in Britain, so it may be a cultural mindset. If there's no ambiguity currently, I don't think we should worry too much about ambiguity possibly arising at some future date. JH (talk page) 16:34, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

There are 2 Larry Cohens that play bridge in the ACBL. Both have won 10+ NABC events.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 20:45, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

My apologies. I hadn't realised that there was more than one. JH (talk page) 09:44, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

NP. I live in the US, so more familiar with the US players. One is famous for a cheating scandal (Cohen-Katz (Richard)), the other more famous as an author. And the latter more famous as a bridge player. The former has won enough titles to justify his own Wikipedia article.

See User talk:Nicolas.hammond. --P64 (talk) 01:56, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

4. The Manual of Style WP:MOS covers page names among other things.

I never heard of "the tournament winners" list until after I posted here 24 hours ago (and haven't yet visited). I suppose the other methods I mentioned then are more likely to be reliable guides.

Do you know Wikipedia's "What links here" tool? It works for redlinks, which is valuable in this context. Many of the most important bridge players and some who are not so important, such as Björn Fallenius, are linked red in the lists and tables of winners and runners-up that most tournament articles contain.

Visit a tournament article; select a redlink player; select "What links here". Or visit any other article with a redlink player name, such as Namyats for Victor Mitchell. The tool returns a list of pages that currently include the same redlink (current example for Mitchell).

In particular, if another editor adds the {{orphan}} template to one of your new pages --as User:BattyBot did Bjorn Fallenius (under that name without diacritic mark) last week[8]

--P64 (talk) 22:40, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Serious problems yet unnoticed by other editors, evidently.

Lorenza Lauria = Lorenzo Lauria

Talk:Chuck Said, article does not exist

Sorry, I am out of time, and I may not have used it wisely. To be continued. --P64 (talk) 22:42, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Nor was Chuck Said created and deleted, if i understand the tools correctly. Perhaps it shouldn't exist. Stray talk page isn't really "serious".

During the last two days I revised the list Wikipedia:WikiProject Contract bridge/NABC multiple winners heavily as I worked. See its [[Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Contract bridge/NABC multiple winners NABC winners talk] for the key, now slightly out of date. I'll revisit soon.

Primarily I worked long and hard on the women who played under multiple surnames. Generally I didn't touch their pages, merely fix unify or fix/unify (in my edit summaries) our linkage to them, from competitions articles mainly. Eg, create redirects such as Mary Jane Kauder and piped links such as Kitty Munson.

For the two most important NABC multiple winners overlooked by Nicolas last fortnight I yesterday (overnight 1031/1101)

- created Sally Young, a brand-new stub {{underconstruction}} without the NABC section;

- determined that James Jacoby is an appropriate pagename (consistently used as book author and columnist) and fixed false links to Jim Jacoby thruout EN.wiki

I expect to create James Jacoby today. My work will not include any listing of NABC "accomplishments". --P64 (talk) 16:11, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

 Done James Jacoby, as well as Sally Young, is a Start {{underconstruction}}.

I added accomplishments for Sally Young. See Sally Young accomplishments for details. Same with all other players. Nicolas.hammond (talk) 00:04, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Serious problems .... Fred Stewart (bridge) gives "World Team Championship Winners" (inadequate anyway), linked to the WBF directory of Bermuda/Venice/Senior winners, as the formal reference for Cavendish Invitational Pairs (twice separately, as usual, for Winners and Runners-up). That is original to the page as created by Nicolas. --P64 (talk) 00:34, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Task force

Perhaps we should have a Players task force (or Players, People, Persons, Biography, or Biographies). Among other things, User:Nicolas.hammond might recruit people to register as editors and join that task force, rather than simply to edit player pages. (Nicolas recently mentioned bringing new editors to EN.wiki by creating new player pages.)

Creating a task force, even without any members, would stimulate creating a top subpage of WPCB project space that is devoted to bridge Players/People/Biogs. Good. We now have at least two subpages devoted to the matter

WikiProject Contract bridge/Manual of Style/Appendix 5: Notable people criteria --with talk page to which many sections of this top talk page were moved a few years ago, a practice that seems useful to me

WikiProject Contract bridge/NABC multiple winners --with talk page by me last week

We also have other non-article pages (eg, Categories), and the quasi-Project article List of contract bridge people.

Of course weI might create a useful top subpage without a task force to justify it.

--P64 (talk) 19:27, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

References templates, etc

0. We have one references template for citing the The Official Encyclopedia of Bridge by edition and page, namely {{OEB}}. An alternative or an option with a shorter display would be useful.

1. Source lists of past winners.

Nicolas.hammond now/recently generates automatically for biographies a set of longish yet incomplete references to the official lists of previous winners for all of the NABC results on a player's resume. I suggest instead that we use one template for each event, such as template {{spingold}} [now empty] for uniform adequate reference to an official list of past Spingold results/winners/whatever. The Nicolas.hammond utility, and commonly manual work as well, would use the template --essentially [ref>{spingold}</ref>-- and we would maintain our Spingold-winnerslist-references at once. Eg, maintain by updating to a new issue and page of the NABC Daily Bulletin if we do use that occasional periodical (such as Daily Bulletin 80.4, pp. 10–11, with scope 1934–2007). Or maintain by updating occasionally the URL of some ACBL.org webpage or database view (presumably now [https://web3.acbl.org/nabcwinners?event=Spingold+Master+Knockout+Teams display Spingold; All Years], with scope 1938–2014).

2. Formal Citations under number references.

Regardless whether we do that, we should fully cite the NABC Daily Bulletin occasional periodical once in every article where we use it as a source --something we might in turn do by template {{NABCbull}}-- rather than never, per the current Nicolas utility, or once for every Daily Bulletin article that we use as a source.

Suppose we cite the online NABC Winners database as our source for past winners of Spingold, et al. That, too, we should do once in a formal citation below the numbered references rather than do never or do once for every competition on a player's resume.

3. Insofar as differing Retrieved date formats a stumbling block for use of simple reference or citation template, we might (or might initially, before complicating the template) leave Retrieved dates out of the template display and append them manually. On this point I have other ideas that pertain to publication dates also, and as we do or don't pursue the {spingold} and/or the {NABCbull} lines that I have indicated here.

(Concerning retrieval dates as a stumbling block, I prefer that WPCB agree to use Retrieved YYYY-MM-DD in all page creations, and wherever there is no competing claim.)

4. My previous related thoughts, not shared, concern our formal references to WBF bulletins, webpages, databases. As far as I know, the discussion may as well be specific to ACBL.

--P64 (talk) 20:15, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Having done all this work, my recommendation is that we have a {bridge accomplishments} tag that automatically displays what "we" consider to be their accomplishments. 1st/2nd in ACBL events, 1/2/3 in WBF events, etc.

It is silly that we are manually trying to edit all this data when this is what computers are for.

There are >100 people in ACBL HOF. ACBL changes their web site, "we" have 106 pages to update instead of 1.

Same with all the WBF tags.

We need a centralized DB that can provide all this information.

My utility can easily add additional sources (I added World Youth Pairs/Teams today), but it is still not the answer. In a few minutes I changed all the ACBL HOF in my generated files, but someone manually has to edit everyone's profile. This is silly given the power of computers.

We really need someone to create proper tools for data that should be auto-generated or in a single place.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 03:08, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Agree 100%. Unfortunately, most of us editors do not have the technical skills to do this programming. From my reading of the foregoing, it seems to me that we have two complementary concepts:

(1) Programming that assembles data into a data warehouse somewhere

(2) Programming that automatically 'writes' into articles from data that has been assembled into a warehouse

The first is easy to imagine, the second less so. Who is this technically skilled programmer? Who can even judge who is competent? How do we go about finding such a person - such a volunteer editor as is the way at Wiki? I look forward to assisting them but my contribution would be from the 'user' perspective not the programming perspective. Prior to such programming effort, there should be discussion on the proposed contents of the proposed warehouse and on 'standard' presentation format of data incorporated into articles. (Had Nicolas been assisted by some of us computer Neanderthals, he might have avoided some of the issues he encountered with his recent work - such as duplicate names - by the way, excellent work nevertheless!) Do we first create a 'tool-making task force' within the contract bridge project to organize this undertaking or simply continue to have each editor do their individual best as is the current practice? Newwhist (talk) 13:07, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

SportAccord Athlete Information

The SportAccord World Mind Games Athlete Information database is likely to be a valuable source. My first visit is thanks to PL.wiki Polish Wikipedia pl:Sylvie Willard.

Other-language WikiP. Somewhere I have mentioned the certain value of some bridge player biographies at other-language wikipedia editions. Polish Wikipedia (PL.wiki) provides pages for a great number of players, pl:Kategoria:Brydżyści. (28 of 58 Americans are new or newly categorized during November, perhaps some response to our October creations or November activity.)

IT.wiki provides few pages--even for Italian players, it:Categoria:Giocatori di bridge italiani, half the number at PL.wiki-- but they do have it:Eugenio Chiaradia whom we and PL.wiki and all others lack.

--P64 (talk) 22:00, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Athlete Information: Sylvie Willard gives birthdate 7 August 1952, which we/I use here --rather than September per FR.wiki (where i left a talk-page notice) and, ironically for me, PL.wiki. --P64 (talk) 03:11, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

Honor tricks, etc

Glossary of contract bridge terms includes one entry "Honor or honour tricks (also known as quick tricks)" and another "Quick tricks : see honor tricks".

Honor tricks is a redlink while Quick tricks is a redirect to Hand evaluation, whose section 5.1 heading is "Quick Tricks (NOT the same as Honor Tricks in the Culbertson system)".

Offhand I recall reading of defensive and playing tricks, which have no glossary entries, as well as honor and quick tricks. Perhaps some have not been quantified and some have been quantified more than once, differently.

The ACBL NABC Daily Bulletin 57.7 (March 27, 2014), page 5, is our formal source for past winners of the Whitehead Women's Pairs in many player biographies. The page 5 article "Women's Pairs compete for Whitehead Trophy" says that W.C. Whitehead invented among other things "the quick-trick table of card values, the Whitehead system of requirements for original bids and responses". I don't know whether Whitehead related those two.

--P64 (talk) 22:21, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

WikiProject X is live!

Hello everyone!

You may have received a message from me earlier asking you to comment on my WikiProject X proposal. The good news is that WikiProject X is now live! In our first phase, we are focusing on research. At this time, we are looking for people to share their experiences with WikiProjects: good, bad, or neutral. We are also looking for WikiProjects that may be interested in trying out new tools and layouts that will make participating easier and projects easier to maintain. If you or your WikiProject are interested, check us out! Note that this is an opt-in program; no WikiProject will be required to change anything against its wishes. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you!

Note: To receive additional notifications about WikiProject X on this talk page, please add this page to Wikipedia:WikiProject X/Newsletter. Otherwise, this will be the last notification sent about WikiProject X.

Harej (talk) 16:57, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

World Grand Master

Two preceding sections pertain to the WBF player titles such as Grand Master.

• #Contact at WBF
• #WBF, EBL players database

The second is a collection of my reports, most recently a couple hours ago. Its heading should now be plural, players databases, because the later reports concern the Master Points and Placing Points (MP and PP) database maintained by Mark Newton, http://www.wbfmasterpoints.com or 'WBFMP' in my notes.

Beside the player records, including ongoing reconstruction for players deceased before 2002 (see above), WBFMP publishes "Players Whose WBF Titles Have Changed This Year", which is commonly revised more than annually. I have made the current 2014/2015 version one of our formal sources for four of the players who became World Grand Masters in October.

The Internet Archive holds numerous copies of that page from late 2002 to present! [9] For instance, "Players Whose WBF Titles Have Changed This Year" (archived 2002-12-11) shows that nine players including Sabine Auken and Norberto Bocchi (near the top of the alpha list) became Women and Open WGM during 2002.

--P64 (talk) 00:40, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Although WBF Master Points (wbfmasterpoints.com) is new to me during the last year or two, its Home page content is a notice posted by Mark Newton 2002-09-17. I surmise that the site was established that year, with the complete records for living registered players, and that that was the occasion for ending the policy of deletion at death. --P64 (talk) 00:46, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Cheating allegations

Concerning Fantoni–Nunes (Fantunes), I rewrote Fulvio Fantoni#Cheating allegations and Claudio Nunes#Cheating allegations --identically except the two player names. Among other things, the section now begins "Early on 14 September 2015" and gives "approximately 2015-09-14 02:20 (UTC)" in the greatly expanded refnote. This is a change from "On September 13, 2015" by inference from the current timestamp at Bridge Winners ("14 hours ago"). Perhaps "On 13 September 2015 (local time)" would be better, even now, and the detail may be undone later --if/when the article as published carries at least a datestamp. The detail is appropriate now.

Pierre Zimmermann (bridge)#Bridge career will need attention as the team is covered there. --P64 (talk) 17:00, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for those improvements. In reading about the recent allegations against Fantoni and Nunes and reviewing their Wiki articles, it seems that a new article on "Cheating in bridge" might be appropriate to consolidate a number of incidents over the years. This would be analogous to Cheating in chess. Opinions? Newwhist (talk) 17:14, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

As I depart:

1. Early this hour User:RJaguar3 deleted section "Cheating allegations" was been deleted from both Fantunes biographies. Here are convenient links to the two article histories (FF; CN).
2. Quoted at Neapolitan Club ("Allegations of Cheating: EBL's Statement"), the European Bridge League last Monday and this Monday (now yesterday in Europe) announced the commencement of two investigations of alleged cheating at EBL championships. The latter announcement evidently concerns the allegations against Fantoni–Nunes.

--P64 (talk) 00:50, 15 September 2015 (UTC)

@P64: WP:BLP requires unquestionably reliable sources for making extraordinary contentious claims about living people. Also, WP:BLPSPS applies, meaning that we cannot use the Woolsey post as the only source to support the claim. RJaguar3 | u | t 15:25, 15 September 2015 (UTC)

Here's Newsweek covering the cheating allegations. RJaguar3 | u | t 02:58, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

The allegations have also now been covered in various newspapers. JH (talk page) 08:41, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

I plan on starting a draft new article 'Cheating in bridge article' in my sandbox being careful about distinguishing between 'whispers' and facts.Newwhist (talk) 13:32, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

I updated the Fantoni and Nunes biographies ten days ago with Daily Mail and EBL sources as well as the Woolsey reports. Someday soon I will attend to Pierre Zimmermann (bridge), and someday Geir Helgemo and Tor Helness, regarding their participation in major championships of the mid-2010s. --P64 (talk) 18:11, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Regarding the development of an article on or titled Cheating in bridge, I will put the user draft on my watchlist and comment there, as seems appropriate. I suppose you mean a new dedicated sandbox subpage, Newwhist, where dedicated Talk will be appropriate if it is appropriate! --P64 (talk) 18:11, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Is anything being done about this? There seems to be a lot of information out there to report now, and several players' articles need updating (even if being careful about rumors). There is also no information about the current championships (at Bermuda Bowl), either the scandal or the regular play, apart from the sentence I've just hastily added. W. P. Uzer (talk) 05:37, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

I rewrote that Bermuda Bowl blurb. We don't cover even that tournament as a news event, as dozens cover the tennis "majors" and the FIFA World Cup. We barely have a Wikiproject so active to support the word "we".

User:Narky Blert added blurbs to the Cezary Balicki and Adam Żmudziński stubs (which don't even mention professional play on the Zimmermann team or any other). No recent revisions to their pages at Polish wikipedia (PL.wiki), nor any Bermuda Bowl coverage since 2013.

I presume that some English-language news coverage in India will be useful here. Perhaps the 2015 Bermuda Bowl will be pageworthy itself. Future tense. --P64 (talk) 16:06, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Neapolitan Club (neapolitanclub.altervista.org) provides much coverage of official statements from Europe and WBF (Home, English archives). Moments ago at Fantoni [10], for one item of their joint coverage i changed source from NewInBridge --evidently the identical item except the missing original datestamp, and posted one day later. --P64 (talk) 18:24, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

@P64: As yet, there is little in BridgeWinners about B-Z except Wiki-unreliable speculation - which I imagine several of us are following with great interest, hoping for WP:RS sources of some kind. Quotes from people who personally know B-Z (or the others), either pro or anti, would seem to add nothing worthwhile at this stage. I want to hear more from WBF/ZBOs/NBOs; I'm reluctant to link even news reports, unless they add something to an official statement. WP:BLP and all that. Narky Blert (talk) 20:04, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

I'm reading about the whole affair and there is a lot of information on Bridgewinners, but not too much useful in terms of Wikipedia WP:RS apart from the Newsweek article. Here's a collection of useful links (as of 25 august) at neapolitanclub. Basically, the accused have been mostly silent (Lotan Fisher and Ron Schwartz threatening to sue Brogeland), and authorities are carrying out the investigations behind the scenes.
By the way, I noticed that Boye Brogeland is a red link. Not just for his role in this affair, but for his overall achievements, he certainly deserves an article. Anyone? No such user (talk) 13:29, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

I am pretty busy right now with other things but consider a future new article "Cheating in bridge" to be an excellent overarching article which should be created. If someone else wants to start a sandbox page, I will be happy to contribute there in due course, otherwise I will probably not be able to start it until mid October in my own dedicated sandbox.

Agree that an article on Boye Brogeland is also now of great merit if it was not already! Newwhist (talk) 16:24, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

FWIW, we have an article on bridge ethics which more or less copies the relevant laws, and otherwise borders on OR. Maybe it could be restructured and renamed to focus on violations of ethics... Just sayin', I don't have a clear idea what to do with it.
Maybe I'll give a shot at Brogeland tomorrow...pun not intended No such user (talk) 20:23, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

@Newwhist:. An article on BB is long overdue, on general principles.

A new article Cheating in bridge would slot nicely into Category:Cheating and Category:Sports controversies.

I gave away my back copies of Bridge World a few years ago; but recall that Edgar Kaplan made some observations of general interest in 1977 after the Katz-Cohen affair, and also after the Cokin-Sion one.

A source for anyone interested in working up a Cheating in bridge article: Cathy Chua - Fair Play or Foul? (I don't have a copy). Narky Blert (talk) 20:51, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. FYI for those involved in the contract bridge project, I have all copies of The Bridge World from October 1950 to the present day so can look up things other may remember about. Newwhist (talk) 22:13, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

@Newwhist: Contempt for card cheats goes back to the year dot. However, Vanderbilt (Contract Bridge, 1929, Charles Scribner's Sons, pp. 234-235) did not mention collusion in his list of unpardonable sins; he may have thought that it was inconceivable (WP:OR).

The next reference in my collection, Culbertson's Gold Book (Faber & Faber, 1936, 3rd edn. (1941), pp. 543-544) does not mention the possibility either.

Nor do the 1963 Laws (Thomas de la Rue, paperback, pp. 43-46; hardback, pp. 48-51). The hardback edition admonishes (p. 48) that "Communication between players during the auction and play periods should be effected only by means of the calls and plays themselves, not by the manner in which they are made".

The 1975 Laws (Waddingtons, p. 51) went further, AFAIK for the first time: "The gravest possible offense against propriety is for a partnership to exchange information by prearranged methods other than those sanctioned by these Laws".

(If anyone needs fuller bibliographical information on any of those references - they are all in my collection, just ping me.)

Query: what is the earliest date of an allegation of partnership cheating at a bridge (whist, plafond) type game?

Further thoughts: an article on Cheating at bridge (1) could/should cover all predecessor games and (2) distinguish between (a) solo flights and (b) partnership affairs. Narky Blert (talk) 23:40, 29 September 2015 (UTC)

@Newwhist: I dug out another book. Scarne on Cards, Constable & Co. Ltd, 1974; not its first publication; isbn 0-09-460490-8; see pp. 455-502). Much of the chapter recycles Culbertson. It includes the statement (p. 496) "Although I play bridge occasionally, I don't ever remember holding an honestly dealt eight-card or longer suit in my lifetime"; I would (WP:OR) stress the words "occasionally" and "ever", especially "occasionally". There is also a startled-eyebrow-raising statement on p. 497, "There is no difference whatsoever between Auction Bridge and Contract Bridge except in the scoring".

Pp. 499-502 relate directly to cheating, are relevant, and imo should be cited in any Cheating in bridge article - basically because they are just so so wrong, and are sometimes very very funny indeed. P. 500: "The sixth card from the right protruding slightly above the others but not visibly held by the fingers indicates six no-trump". I've never ever managed to convince any of my idiot partners of the underlying soundness of that scheme – so often applicable, so easy to memorise, and conyeying so much useful UI.

In all seriousness, though - Scarne was a seriously good card magician, who claimed to have saved WW2 GIs several tens of million dollars a month (p. 6) by exposing methods of cheating at cards - and that was the best idea he could come up with? Narky Blert (talk) 04:02, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

@Narky Blert:, @P64:, @RJaguar3:, @W. P. Uzer:, @Jhall1:, @No such user: Mollo in his "Streamlined Bridge' (1947) ends the book with an entire chapter titled "Do you cheat?. He was a rubber bridge player for money in the London clubs and described several cheating experiences, as I recall. I have a couple of Foster's Complete Hoyle (c1897-1926) to investigate as well. Don't have the Cathy Chua book but will try getting a copy. Another very lengthy rant which has insights as to what the ACBL was or was not doing about cheating is in Bobby Wolff "The Lone Wolff" (2008). Maybe one of our first steps is to simply develop a listing of our sources for references.

I have started a sandbox page here. Newwhist (talk) 12:14, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

May 2016

I wrote Boye Brogeland, Lotan Fisher, Ron Schwartz, Ishmael Delmonte . I did not put anything controversial, just their bridge information. It would be inappropriate for me to add anything else at this time. I strongly agree that there should be a "Bridge Cheating" page. The reference should include Reese, Fantoni/Nunes, German Doktors, Fisher/Schwartz, Piemarek/Smirnov, Balicki/Zmudzinski + some to be named later. Each of those should then have their own page.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 01:29, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Thank you Nicolas. I expanded Boye Brogeland to a full biography, giving him a long overdue credit, with a focus on the anti-cheating campaign; maybe we should put it for a WP:DYK to get it on the main page? In the meantime, Vanity Fair published a quite detailed account on the 2015 affair [11], that we could use as a source for other articles, particularly cheating in bridge. Newwhist, have you perhaps done a draft in your sandbox? No such user (talk) 12:14, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

@Nicolas.hammond:. @No such user:. Thanks. I have a draft sandbox for related material, please feel free to deposit stuff. Decisions on what and where to apply the material can be made in due course. Newwhist (talk) 12:25, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Great. Will do, I hope. I took the liberty to refactor our recent comments into this section, as it became too unwieldy to follow (I missed your 30 September reply, obviously). No such user (talk) 13:04, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

I think a lot of the material on Boye regarding the cheating should be moved to a separate page - cheating in bridge.

I know more about the current bridge cheating scandals than just about anyone, so it would not be appropriate for me to write any articles until a current cases has exhausted all of their appeals. If someone else wants to write it. I am happy to edit it for correctness. I think we need a page on each allegation. There is enough to write about each case, along with the details that each deserves their own page. Your sandbox looks close to ready to publish. Once it is published then those with more details about each of the affairs can add more information. For Fantoni/Nunes, Fisher/Schwartz, B/Z, P/S there is sufficient information for each to have their own page. Nicolas.hammond (talk) 16:54, 19 May 2016 (UTC)

Over the next few weeks, I will put more effort into making the material in the temporary Cheating in bridge (draft) page more compliant with Wiki policy and standards, especially with respect to reliable references. When satisfied, I will then move it to mainspace for collaboration by others. I am more concerned with the accuracy of older incidents where references to facts are harder to come by. I am not sure that the older incidents will be worthy of individual pages, but shall wait and see. My personal preference would be to have a master page on cheating in bridge where all notable incidents are addressed at least in synopsis form and, if an incident is of sufficient import, to have the master page link to a stand-alone page on that incident. It is also a question as to how much should be in a stand-alone page as opposed to a subsection in a biography, see the The Buenos Aires affair incident in the Terence Reese biography. Stay tuned and feel free to chip in as I beaver away on the draft page. Newwhist (talk) 17:46, 19 May 2016 (UTC)