User talk:Encephalon

εγκέφαλον: notebook

WP:MCOTW · WP:CLINMED · WP:MOS · WP:FN · Scribble

εγκέφαλον: history

Template:Ent 20:05, 2005 August 5—22:32, 2005 September 18 Template:Ent 23:03, 2005 September 18—16:42, 2005 September 24 Template:Ent 16:42, 2005 September 24—19:38, 2005 October 11 Template:Ent 19:43, 2005 October 11—20:16, 2005 October 19 Template:Ent 20:21, 2005 October 19—23:22, 2005 November 5 Template:Ent 02:49, 2005 November 6—10:01, 2005 November 15 Template:Ent 12:10, 2005 November 15—01:39, 2005 November 17 Template:Ent 01:47, 2005 November 17—18:41, 2006 January 22 Template:Ent 18:49, 2006 January 22—13:01, 2006 February 15 Template:Ent 16:24, 2006 February 15—20:05, 2006 February 22 Template:Ent 18:31, 2006 February 22—04:57, 2006 March 5

On responses

I respond on my page, unless there is good reason to respond on yours. Regards—encephalon εγκέφαλον

Articles using cite.php

Per our discussion on the awb talk page, i scanned the database for all articles containing <references/>, it picked up just over 3000 results, do you want me to email you them in a txt file, or paste them somewhere? Martin 11:05, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies for butting in here again, but it's for the sake of keeping related things together. I'd be very interested to know which of those 3000-odd also contain {{journal reference}} to be able to effect its final removal. There may only be a very few. Since Whatlinkshere is bust from the pov of templates inside in <ref> tags, I wonder if there is a database query that would reliably find the intersection of those two sets? -Splash^talk 14:35, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hey Splash. You need never apologize for editing this page, so don't. :-) As to your question, it is as you have probably guessed well beyond my modest technical capabilities, but I have emailed Martin and he should be aware of your post. Incidentally I hadn't known that templates inside the ref tags aren't discoverable by Whatlinkshere. I have already noticed articles using both the cite extension and {{ref}} {{note}}, together; one wonders what unforseen complications this might lead too. I say, when you say you're removing {{journal reference}}, do you mean you're replacing it with {{cite journal}}? Adrian Buehlman has been doing that with AWB. All in preparation for a delete, I suppose? Let's see... indeed. WLH shows a very small number of inclusions left; I doubt there are very many hiding behind the cite extension. Anyway, see you around the wiki, Superadmin ;-) —Encephalon 16:42, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I think perhaps a protected redirection rather than deletion, but yes. It's because of the case sensitivity in template parameters and the second law of thermodynamics making it more or less impossible to keep two separate templates the same. The usages are discoverable by WLH, but not until the article has been (null-) edited post the collapse of the template link tables. A couple of weeks ago, for example, there were apparently no links to {{journal reference}} in article space. The bug that was hiding them inside ref tags has since been fixed, but the template linkage side of things doens't automagically fix itself, apparently. One obvious thing if you mix your referencing systems is a discontinuous numbering scheme, but that might actually be useful in some case. -Splash^talk 17:04, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

~~Hi, as far as I can tell, no articles have both {{journal reference}} and <references/>, largely because very few (if any?) articles have {{journal reference}}. thanks~~ Martin 18:24, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, i made a mistake, the articles that have both as of a few days ago when the database was dumped are:

Martin 18:42, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Great of you to do all this Martin, thanks! —Encephalon 20:20, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Martin. That's interesting, in a slightly unfortunate way. -Splash^talk 02:08, 7 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reference style

Hi, I notice you changed the text size for the reference section in Alain Gerbault to 90%. Can you tell me where it is written that this should be so? The reason I ask is that

I was told in an FAC that it should be 85%
Wikipedia:Footnotes (an official guideline) shows standard-size text
Wikipedia:Citing sources (an official style guide) shows standard-size text (or at least doesn't talk about reducing it)
Wikipedia:Cite sources/example style specifically shows standard-size text

I just don't want to get into a situation where various cliques are running around making conflicting edits based on discussions that they've been having on a variety of talk pages. Talk pages are not policy, and are very hard for someone not involved to know about. It would be much better to write down the policy somewhere central first, then do the edits. If this has already been done, then I humbly apologise for this diatribe, and would be very grateful for a pointer to the relevant policy. Cheers, — Johan the Ghost _seance 22:55, 6 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi there Johan! No need to apologise at all, it's not a diatribe—it's a very sensible post. :-) I'm reasonably certain that there's no requirement in the MoS pertaining to the size of footnotes and references. The non-negotiable, mandatory requirement on WP is that references are provided; the method of placing the references in the article, the style of the references, the size—these are left to the discretion of the editors of a given article. The non-uniformity of WP in this regard reflects the non-uniformity of scholarly publishing: editors and publishers and disciplines have their own rules and norms, and when articles in various subjects are written on WP its writers import these choices into the encyclopedia.

Now, there is a convention in scholarly publishing that references and footnotes be of a smaller size than the main text. This is a convention of print publishing, the motive being, I'm quite certain, monetary: you save on ink costs if you print smaller. Some WP editors also make their refs/footnotes of a smaller size. There are some advantages to this, I suppose, especially in articles with extensive citations: it helps demarcate the body of the article from the appendages like footnotes and refs, it arguably looks nicer and neater (the refs tend to stay on one line each), and if printed out I daresay it looks better too. It must be made quite clear however that this is optional: if an article's principal editors find it desirable to simply keep everything in one size, I don't think it's appropriate to try and mandate different sizes. Certainly, in my experience, I have never had a problem getting an article promoted to FA status on account of text size—indeed I've never seen the issue even being raised. I'm quite surprised someone told you on FAC that it was some sort of requirement.

However, if editors decide to go with a smaller text size, I personally feel they should be careful designating the figure. I've seen 95%, 90%, 85% and even 80% being used. This prompted me to look into the issue of on-screen legibility recently. I tested font sizes in three browsers (F 1.5.0.1, F1.0.7, IE 7 Beta2) on a Win XP Pro SP2 and on a laptop. I think 80% is clearly out of the question: too small. 85% is better but still quite small. 90% seems to offer the above benefits without posing a legibility problem (to be precise, 92% seemed the best in all browsers). So generally, if I come across an article while doing clean up that has a reduced font size in the 80s range, I might notch it up to 90%. I very rarely reduce the text size from normal, where this hasn't already been done by the regular editors; the only time I might do that is if the refs are quite extensive, or if they seem to look better owing to citation lengths. If I edit an article in this way, I do not expect it to be unquestioned, of course: other editors are welcome to revert or edit as appropriate. Hope this helps explain my view. Best —Encephalon 00:29, 7 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the response, that's most helpful. I'm jolly impressed by the research you've done on this. If I recall right, I wasn't actually told to make it 85%, but it was changed to that by one of the long-standing FAC reviewers, so I assumed that it was an FAC-desired style. My issue is that there seem to be quite a few of these that aren't documented (eg. don't use inline links, contrary to what WP:CITE says.) Anyhow, your response seems very sensible, and given the research you've done, I'll be happy to use 90%. But I really think it would be good to have this kind of thing standardised; that way, everyone benefits from the kind of thinking that people like you put into these issues. Cheers, — Johan the Ghost _seance 12:02, 7 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, Johan. The instinct to formally enact size rules in the footnote guideline is a sensible one—in my "younger days" as a Wikipedian I would probably have gotten right to it. You'd be surprised however at the amount of feeling and controversy the simple issue of footnotes and citations can engender—there has actually been an ArbComm case involving a footnote-related dispute. However, I can see this being a fairly straightforward addition, and will consider suggesting it soon. —Encephalon 19:52, 7 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Welcome back

Um, apparently I'm a little late to the party, but I didn't notice your return from wikibreak until you edited Alexander Hamilton. Good to have you back on board! Christopher Parham (talk) 08:48, 7 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hey Chris! Thanks, always nice to hear from my favorite wiki-political scientist. ;-) Yeah, I did a bull-in-a-china-shop jig with the Hamilton article—getting used to some of these new-fangled toys everyone seems to be using. Hope I patched it up properly. Good to see some steady hands still around ;-) See you around the wiki buddy. —Encephalon 09:47, 7 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

My RFA

Thanks for your support in my RFA. The final vote count was (66/2/3), so I am now aadministrator. Please let me know if at any stage you need help, or if you have comments on how I am doing as an admin. Have a nice day! Stifle 17:02, 7 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, no problem. Good luck with adminship. —Encephalon 19:42, 7 March 2006 (UTC) PS. I'm just going to remove the HTML stuff around your message if you don't mind. I like to minimise its use on my user pages following last year's HTML Tidy incident. —Encephalon 19:42, 7 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Adminship and You

Hi Encephalon,

You aren't an admin?!?! I'm sure that I'm not the first person to be dumbstruck by this. While I'm sure many far nobler and more experienced than I have offered to nominate you, but please add my name to the mile-long list. Best wishes, Xoloz 15:07, 8 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies

I appologize if I inadvertantly offended you in the new main page vote. It was not my intent. I was basically attempting (and failing miserably, apparently) to say exactly what David Levy eventually said... that the rational was simply user based. Rereading it, I can see where what I said could have been misinterpreted, and indeed, David said things much better than I did. I hope there are no hard feelings. Fieari 20:14, 8 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The Art of Naming

Be not jealous, but proud! :) Admire Splash though I do, his is a name that lends itself to replication. On the contrary, of you it may be said, "There is only and always one Encephalon, peerless forever." I'd only start naming my pets for you if one of them to managed to capture a Nobel Prize for something. Best wishes, Xoloz 04:55, 10 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

<5 minutes detectiving later...>Goodness, what archives of what must you have been reading?! I must try to emulate those features of the fish more... :) -Splash^talk 13:35, 10 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

embarassedNow I remember...perhaps I'm emulating the wrong goldfish features... -Splash^talk 15:59, 10 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Image Tagging Image:Vesuvius.jpg

Thanks for uploading Image:Vesuvius.jpg. I notice the 'image' page currently doesn't specify who created the content, so the copyright status is unclear. If you have not created this media yourself then you need to argue that we have the right to use the media on Wikipedia (see copyright tagging below). If you have not created the media yourself then you should also specify where you found it, i.e., in most cases link to the website where you got it, and the terms of use for content from that page.

If the media also doesn't have a copyright tag then you must also add one. If you created/took the picture, audio, or video then you can use {{GFDL-self}} to release it under the GFDL. If you believe the media qualifies as fair use, please read fair use, and then use a tag such as {{fairusein|article name}} or one of the other tags listed at Wikipedia:Image copyright tags#Fair_use. See Wikipedia:Image copyright tags for the full list of copyright tags that you can use.

If you have uploaded other media, please check that you have specified their source and copyright tagged them, too. You can find a list of 'image' pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Wikipedia page when you are logged in), and then selecting "Image" from the dropdown box. Note that any unsourced and untagged images will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. Dethomas 17:56, 10 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi there. Actually, I did specify where the image came from when I uploaded this as a relative newbie, quite a long while ago. I've updated the page now with more information to further clarify its licensing status. Given the tag problem, it might actually be best to simply delete the local copy, as the primary is safe on the Commons under what is to all intents and purposes a GFDL license. Regards —Encephalon 18:35, 10 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

My RfA

Bonjour Encephalon. I wanted to thank you for taking the time to consider my RfA, which passed this morning. Admins are sort of like vultures, cleaning things up and whatnot... well, as long as you don't think too much about it. If there's ever anything I can help you with, just ask; you know where to find me. ×Meegs 09:34, 11 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, and congratulations! —Encephalon 16:32, 12 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

My RfA

Thanks for your support in my RfA. It passed, with a final tally of 62/0/1. I'm touched by all the kind comments it attracted, and hope I'll be of some use with the new tools. You know where I am if you need to shout at me. Flower party? 15:54, 11 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Congratulations, good luck. —Encephalon 16:32, 12 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's time

It’s time for you to give in and accept a nomination for adminship. You've put up a good fight for months, but I think now would be a good time to run. You're one of the Wikipedians I highly respect. Let me know, bud.

                                                  ______
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]====================<==||(__)        .'          `------'
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I'm going to leave Star Trek pictures on your page if you don't accept hahahaha. — Knowledge Seeker দ 09:15, 13 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

And, if you feel lucky, you could be a test subject for the nomination cabal. - brenneman ^{T}^{L} 00:09, 14 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It is times like this when I miss the days of being able to nominate someone without asking their permission. Dragons flight 02:01, 14 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed. Paul August ☎ 03:19, 14 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, what can I say, after all... Tito xd^{(?!? - help us)} 03:29, 14 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Naaah, I mean the days where one could write out a nom, post it on the RFA page, get a bunch of support, and then decide to tell the candidate about it. Fun times. Dragons flight 03:45, 14 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Aw shucks, guys. :-) This is very nice of all of you—thank you very much, I appreciate the encouragement. I suppose Seeker's infernal trekkie pictures leave me little choice, really, so yes, I'll go up for it. However, would you mind holding off until the weekend, KS? —Encephalon 15:44, 14 March 2006 (UTC) PS. Aaron, is it ok if I give this particular innovation a pass? —Encephalon 15:56, 14 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hehehehe I knew we could get you—the combination of peer pressure and my threat worked! This weekend's fine. Cool! — Knowledge Seeker দ 08:23, 15 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

And there was much rejoicing, huzah huzah. - brenneman ^{T}^{L} 10:34, 15 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Scientific peer review

I don't know if you've seen this one, but do you think it could be useful? Tito xd^{(?!? - help us)} 01:51, 14 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I've just looked, Tito. It does seem a splendid idea, although I note Splash raises some interesting views on the talk page. I looks to me like an excellent step forward, and to those who don't mind not having (very much) anonynimity on WP, it can be a very good way to serve. There are quite a few medical editors I can think of who'd be able to do a fantastic job for the biomedicine side of things.

More on Brettingham

Hi Encephalon, I've replied to your excellent points over at FARC#Matthew_Brettingham. If you have a chance, could you look them over and see what you think? Thanks! Mikker ^... 12:35, 14 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hey there, thanks for the heads up. ;-) I'll be sure to drop in within the next 24 hours or so to read and comment. —Encephalon 15:56, 14 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

various deletion review templates

Hi. Thanks for the tip, but I've got to say there isn't actually a template for the circumstances faced at Patrick Alexander (cartoonist), at least as I see it. It has not been temporarily undeleted, so allowing Template:TempUndelete nor is it an article which have obtained a "keep" (or "no consensus defaulting to keep") decision on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion, which is what Template:Delrev is for. At least that's what the talk page at Template talk:Delrev says. Looks like we do need a template for pages which have been deleted and not had their deletion restored temporarily. Steve block talk 19:33, 15 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Argh! *Insert image of brenneman with templates stuck all over him like that giant cell that infected Spock and then they had to blind him to kill it* No more templates! *Insert sound of swinging machete, followed by a sort of papery gurgling as templates are destroyed* I am confused by the panoply of existing ones...
brenneman ^{T}^{L} 00:13, 16 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, sorry Steve. I meant to write {{Deletedpage}} rather than {{Delrev}}. However, I can see that this might not be satisfactory in this instance, as {{Deletedpage}} is (rightly) used in those instances where the content has been deemed, convincingly, to be unsuitable for WP; here, a good faith case is being made that previous deletions have been in error. I hesitate over the creation of a new template however. As gurgling, hypercellular Brenneman amply indicates, we've got so many of them it can be hard to remember which goes where for what. :-) As a devotee of simplicity, I urge an attempt at simplification. Logically speaking, these are the permutations:

Article goes to AFD, is kept, and appealed at DRV. Template: {{Delrev}} on the article page, to direct interested editors who might not be aware of the Review discussion.
Article goes to AFD, is deleted, appealed at DRV, with temporary history undeletion. Template: {{TempUndelete}} on the article page + page protect, to enable versions of the article to be viewed by ordinary editors as they mull over the DRV discussion, while legitimately leaving the main space free of an article that (in most cases) was determined, at least once, to be unencyclopedic by the consensus of editors acting in good faith.
{{Deletedpage}}, to discourage persistent purveyors of paltry piffle.
Now, this should cover the lot, except for the parent of #2 where no undelete is requested. I wonder if we can address this unconventionally. Instead of creating a template to serve the niche, remove the niche. I have thought for quite some time now that we'd be better off with a more-or-less automatic history-only undelete of articles on review at DRV. We seem to be getting ever more complex cases there—articles with multiple recreations, multiple AFDs, prior DRVs... looking at versions of the articles is increasingly necessary, if one is to be confident of making a good call at DRV. A lot of the folks at DRV are admins, of course, so it doesn't make a difference to them, but I'm a proponent of enabling ordinary editors to participate fully and intelligently in WP discussions, and removing technical barriers in their way is a good thing in my view.
So how about we decree (or something) that any deleted article on review at DRV gets an automatic history-only-undelete. That way those who wish to look at versions while considering the DRV can do so, plus there's no need to create new templates because we can just use {{TempUndelete}}. Having some kind of template in the page while a discussion is going on is probably a good thing for newbies too, who might be confused at a blank page they could have sworn was just fine last week before they left for grandma's.
Thus we only really need these three templates, and we can make it so that every page under review has a template directing everyone who ends up at that page to the DRV, probably diversifying DRV participation. —Encephalon 01:30, 16 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm personally loath to see this made into any sort of "rule" or anything, as the process is already slightly Byzantine. Whenever someone does an undelete/tempundelte/protect there is not a peep of protest, so what's the downside to simply doing it more often and not having a decree? - brenneman ^{T}^{L} 02:01, 16 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, Aaron, that's what I meant actually: that we do it roughly as a matter of course (or "more often", if you prefer). It should not be done invariably, I agree: as in all such things the practice should be tempered with common sense. If the nomination is such that it's mind-numbingly obvious what the outcome will be then one needn't bother. It's simply a suggestion for improving our discussions, albeit in a small way, which would additionally obviate the need for one more template. Regards —Encephalon 10:41, 16 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]