User talk:ZH8000

Rhône

Hi, what makes you think that the description of a river is upstream? Normally, the description is from the source to the gulf [1]. I don't get it. Obvousisly you followed the description in the paragraph, but it is awkward to make a river description upstream. Anyway have a nice day. Tschüss --Gabriel HM (talk) 10:49, 30 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, you are right. To describe a river upstream is somehow awkward, counter-intuitive (however, in earlier days, the sources of streams have been discovered exactely that way!).

But as far as I understand the original author, (s)he just wanted to describe a south-northern dividing line between the Alps and the French Plateau by the major line of the Rhône. The remaining part between Lyon and Geneva then became a kind of a collateral, (s)he then only could add writing upstream-wards, so to speak.

And I was just too lazy to rewrite the whole sentance. ;-) -- ZH8000 (talk)

Ya, it was the same for me, i don't really have the energy to rewrite the whole paragraph. Furthermore I didn't see that the contributor was making an upside down description, so I assumed that it was a mistake. Anyhow, the subject is closed. Merci--Gabriel HM (talk) 20:16, 31 August 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Rail usage

Hi ZH, Thanks for your contribution, it was not me that i added the stat for Chineese passenger-km, the data was registered by a chineese user with a chineese link so i could not verify it. However it seems to me that his source is more relevant than the stat given by UIC. Perhaps one should open an item in the talk of the Rail usage statistics by country page to make sure, however what i could find i english is the passenger traffic for 2013 it was 1,059.5 Billion passenger-km source here.

Anyway if you corect something and if you still find the UIC more relevant than the oficial Chineese stats' office at least please do it corectly you still left China in the top of the ranking ;)

P.S. i consider i wrote nothing of novelist i liked only to add a brief introduction about the historical evolution of rail traffic (freight & passengers) as a backbroung to that page, your subjective judgment found it novelist it was your point of view.

Rgrds Rami75013 (talk) 16:41, 8 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

River names

Hello- I saw your edits to river-related articles in France. I realize that many of the edits fixed links to point to the correct article name. But I wanted to let you know that in English, river names are often expressed including the word River (capitalized) as part of the name. It is neither incorrect nor bad style. For example, many anglophone readers will not necessarily know that the Charente is a river unless this has already been established in the context. You might read or hear Rhine or Rhine River interchangeably, the former more in situations where the context is already established. You will also sometimes encounter names with River first, as in River Thames. Eric ^talk 19:06, 2 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, Eric. Thanks for your commemts. Yes, I am aware of these linguistical aspects. During my changes I tried to make sure the context about rivers are given. I will never change a river's naming where River is part of its original language. – Nevertheless, as you probably know, even though in some European languages that despite for lakes is true, that their kind is part of their names, such as in "Genfersee", "Lac Léman", "lago di Ginvera", and so on, this, however, is not true for rivers: "Rohne"~~fluss~~ (ge), "Le ~~fleuve du~~ Rhône" (fr), ~~il fiume di~~ "Rodano" (it) etc. In French, the article is even part of the name! I will always keep speaking about the River Thames, the Colorado River, Lake Tahoe, and Lake Zurich, but I very much prefer to speak about the Rhine, or if necessary at all, the river Charante, while always following the very same motivation: acknowledging their original meaning/usage. -- ZH8000 (talk) 20:15, 10 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Twin cities of Munich

You deleted "Harare" in the "International relations" section with the comment "WP:VER is failing". Actually Harare is pictured on the official plaque and it's well documented in the article as a reference. So do you have a personal problem with Harare? --Einemnet (talk) 15:33, 15 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

No, I actually don't have a personal problem with Harare. And if so, it should not matter. But obviously I deleted it from the list. I am sorry about that. This is clearly a mistake from my side. Please accept my apologies. Sincerely, ZH8000 (talk) 15:46, 15 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Chewa language deletion

I'd be interested if you could tell me which part of WP:SOAP was the cause of your removing the link to a foreign language course on Chinyanja in the article Chewa language. I have read the guidelines but cannot see anything relevant or which might justify deletion. Kanjuzi (talk) 13:54, 19 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The deleted link to livelinga.com, a private company, had been promoted by User talk:Rcb5 on many language articles as a US Foreign Institute service. The user has been "blocked indefinitely from editing for advertising or self-promoting in violation of the conflict of interest and notability guidelines". -- ZH8000 (talk) 16:19, 19 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I see, thank you. It's a pity, though, as it was a jolly useful link for anyone studying Chichewa! Kanjuzi (talk) 17:47, 19 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

List of countries by intentional homicide rate

You have reverted all my edits to the above with the message "everything works just fine". Are you aware that you have reverted edits adding extra functionality? Did you even examine the edits at all? The previous comment is without prejudice to whether any functionality in question does in fact, work "jsut fine". 92.39.201.191 (talk) 00:43, 24 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Pardon-me, I mismatched you with 87.254.72.92, and I did not consider to check the changes. – One good reason to register your own account? -- ZH8000 (talk) 14:21, 24 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Zürich Town Hall

Please see Talk:Zürich Town Hall#Requested move 13 January 2016, where I have started a move discussion. Thank you, EdJohnston (talk) 03:33, 15 January 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Changing Swiss Federal Railways to SBB CFF FFS

Hi.

I notice that you have amended a number of articles on Swiss railway stations to change the link from Swiss Federal Railways to SBB CFF FFS and I'm puzzled why. The target article is definitely called Swiss Federal Railways, with SBB CFF FFS as a redirect.

The name Swiss Federal Railways is the normally used English language name for the organisation, and whilst the individual language specific acronyms (SBB, CFF or FFS) may be more common in their respective linguistic regions, I don't think I've ever heard anybody call it SBB CFF FFS in normal usage (in English, German, French or Italian). Yes, I know that is what they write on their assets, but that is surely a multi-lingual compromise rather than a real name. As WP:EN is the English language version of Wikipedia, surely we should prefer the perfectly good English name over an awkward compromise that is pretty irrelevant to the English speaking world, however necessary it is within Switzerland.

In support of that view, I would also cite the fact that the German, French and Italian versions of this article are called respectively de:Schweizerische Bundesbahnen, fr:Chemins de fer fédéraux suisses and it:Ferrovie Federali Svizzere. Just as on WP:EN, SBB CFF FFS is merely a redirect.

-- chris_j_wood (talk) 14:57, 9 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Hi @Chris:. First of all, excuse my very late response. I just forgot about it. MY apologies!

My reason was: I prefer to use abbreviations, especially in overviews, such as the info box. For the ease of use and especially the much better recognizability. In General. Well, it's a brand finally.

We–here on WP–do it for every other case of a railway company as well: We prefer to use ZVV instead of Zürcher Verkehrsverbund. And ZVV is even less prominent than SBB to the outsider!!

Secondly, "SBB CFF FFS" is THE official brand and by far most often used by SBB, not their language-specific abbreviations, though you can use them as abbreviations (but not as a brand).

Thirdly, if I see the "SBB CFF FFS" written, I of course do not read the whole thing, just SBB, me as a German speaking person. And eventually a Romand reads it simply as CFF. And so forth. And no, I do not think it is a compromise, not at all. Especially not a bad one, quite the contrary!

Fourthly, even on international travel sites, they very much prefer SBB over Swiss Federal Railways, such as on forums like by tripadvisor!!

Fifthly,

Finally, I used to add "(Swiss Federal Railways)" as a fast hint on its first apperance. I think, together with the link, this should sufficient, by far.

Therefore, I think, that, especially for info boxes, the usage of the no. 1 brand by SBB, accompanied with the written-out name on its first appearance is not only suitable and prefered for its ease of use and recognizeability, but also a must for the uneducated reader to learn about it. -- ZH8000 (talk) 10:10, 4 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. No problem about the lateness, no need to apologise. First let me say I have no problem with the use of abbreviations, and on the whole I prefer to use names in the local language rather than over-translate into English. Thus ZVV or Zürcher Verkehrsverbund are fine, and I think both are much preferrable to using Zürich Transport Network. I've no problem with using SBB as an abbreviation where the linguistic context is clearly German, and indeed I've just done so in my recent changes to tabulate the routes of the Zürich S-Bahn. Likewise obviously CFF or FFS in their respective linguistic contexts.

My problem is specifically with SBB CFF FFS, which is hard to say, write or think about. It comprises no less than nine consonants, with no vowels, so it is unpronouncable and you cannot mentally deal with it as anything other than a string of nine unrelated letters. A three word name (like Swiss Federal Railways) is much easier to think about or remember. Whilst I'd prefer a local name (I would never, for example, write German Railways rather than Deutsche Bahn), the multi-lingual nature of Switzerland means that in some contexts that isn't available, and I think using a English name rather than a nine-letter not-quite abbreviation is the lesser of two evils.

I think you explain the way SBB CFF FFS works in Switzerland quite well when you say if I see the "SBB CFF FFS" written, I of course do not read the whole thing, just SBB, me as a German speaking person. The point is that I, as a native English speaker, do not have that option. I'm forced to read and process the whole thing. And the target audience for WP:EN is English speakers.

However from a practical perspective, I seem to remember that the articles you were amending were about railway stations in the German speaking part of Switzerland, and where therefore there is a valid local language context. If my memory is correct, I'd have no problem if you were instead to replace Swiss Federal Railways with SBB. Indeed I'd probably regard that as an improvement. -- chris_j_wood (talk) 11:57, 4 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

In these scenarios I usually prefer to use whatever official English name the organization has chosen. Many Swiss government agencies have done so. WhisperToMe (talk) 07:30, 26 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry

Sorry for this edit. I didn't mean to duplicate it (or edit war with you). Thanks for catching it. Kind regards -- Marek.69 ^talk 10:19, 27 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

No problem! -- ZH8000 (talk) 09:41, 4 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

La Tzoumaz

Please tell me about wrong information in the La Tzoumaz article. I fixed (with later help) the Infobox, and I can see more WikiLinks are needed. --DThomsen8 (talk) 00:04, 22 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Lauterbrunnen Wall

Thanks for the alert and your precision. I'll change the intro to state that it's a term used (quite widely) in the English-speaking mountaineering world, cite multiple sources for this, and add that it has no official status. Then I'll remove the deletion template. Regards, Ericoides (talk) 09:59, 4 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Swiss international schools recognized as such by the Swiss federal government?

I expanded Template:Swiss international schools to include multiple Swiss schools, some of which are listed by the Swiss government and others not. Do you have a definitive current list of schools approved by the Swiss government?

I also heard somewhere the one in Accra, Ghana used to be recognized as an official Swiss school but is no longer considered such...

WhisperToMe (talk) 17:26, 25 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note

I apologise to you for being unreasonable yesterday. As always, I take full responsibility for my actions, good or bad. This was in the bad category. Regards Irondome (talk) 15:39, 13 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

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SP Switzerland

ZH8000, this Party is officially considered in Switzerland as Left-wing. In their program they want to get rid of the capitalism system in Switzerland, plus the latest sources as the swiss media specific states that the party is left-wing. Take a look on their politics first on their German website. Can I ask you not to change sources? We already had this discussion six months ago and we should aim to stay neutral in Wikipedia but Autospark keep changing the sources. Thanks