User talk:Debresser/Archive 4

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Archive 2

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William Allen Simpson

Because I have had so many incidents with this user, I decided to dedicate him a section on my talkpage where I will put all posts that are connected to him. Not that I am so fond of them...

CfD by month category deletions and renames

Exactly where was this discussed? Vegaswikian (talk) 05:52, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(miscellaneous)#From.2Fsince_in_maintenance_categories. Debresser (talk) 12:51, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

Don't take William's comments personally, it is the way he always conducts himself. See for example [1]. Rich Farmbrough, 21:25 20 May 2009 (UTC).

I know you want me to revert my changes. The bigger issue is with your changes, especially now given that there is a strong consensus that the names you created are wrong. Since those were out of process and contrary to policy, it makes sense at this point to return to what was and then discuss what should be. This discussion is not helping get to the right set of names. Vegaswikian (talk) 22:46, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

I'll also remind you that the dispute resolution policy says 'Resolve disputes calmly, through civil discussion and consensus-building on relevant discussion pages'. The relevant discussion page is WP:CFD and you have not brought the proposed rename there as suggested by several editors. I want to get this resolved. But I feel you need to show an interest in moving to resolution rather then trying to fault me. Vegaswikian (talk) 22:56, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

As you can see on this same page, I've been convinced by my betters, that your bad behavior was dealt with more or less in the right proportions, and I resign my opinion in the view of theirs. I have continued to contribute to the discussion, expressing my agreement with Rich' proposal here. For one reason or the other he has not yet made it on Category:Categories for discussion. Debresser (talk) 00:33, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Admin actions

I was surprised to see the CfD matter posted at ANI. I hope everyone can calm down and just work this out. Among other things, categories should not really be a big deal. If it takes redoing a process in order to get things right, then let's do that. That's far, far better than arbitration, which can't be started until other processes (third opinion, RfC, mediation) have been at least offered; if those are actually initiated, the process could take weeks or months, with incredibly detailed arguments about when how do what, and why, and what they could have done, and why the didn't do something else, and on and on and on.

In other words, can we just consider this a learning experience, let editors reverse the changes (temporarily) if they are so inclined, and then start a hopefully productive discussion about how things should be? -- John Broughton (♫♫) 20:27, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

As I explained on Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#CfD_categories_renamed I think no editor, and for sure not an admin, can be allowed to revert edits that aren't vandalism or the like in the middle of a discussion. I have proposed he should undo his actions pending the outcome of the discussion. If he will not, and he doesn't seem to be so inclined, I want to open an RfC on him as a user. The guideliness require that two users call him to compromise first, on his talk page. Are you willing to do so? Debresser (talk) 22:42, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

I would agree that there was undue haste to revert everything, while there was clearly still discussion to be had. But I wouldn't go as far as ANI let alone RFC. Arbcom is - well horrendous. Rich Farmbrough, 22:54 21 May 2009 (UTC).

So you too would let User:Vegaswikian go completely unreprimanded after this? Debresser (talk) 23:00, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

I think he should be reminded that it is unwise to use admin powers to undo what another admin did. Rich Farmbrough, 14:16 22 May 2009 (UTC).

Why don't we focus on category changes? And keep in mind that no one but ArbComm is authorized to "reprimand" anyone, and - as I think both Rich and I believe - going that route should be reserved for only the most serious of cases (if only to keep ArbComm's workload somewhat reasonable). Yes, it's not a perfect world, but there are a lot of things that are far worse, both at Wikipedia and in the real world, than an admin doing something incorrectly during a content dispute. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 14:40, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree with both of you. Any suggestions how to remind him of how he should have behaved without going to RfC? Debresser (talk) 15:09, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

The final comment in the ANI discussion, made by Rich, was Admin actions were reverts on protected templates, hence theoretically a wheel-war, but lets just sort out the substantive issue.. I consider that to be a reasonable reminder to User:Vegaswikian.

Please also keep in mind that we don't pay admins anything for what is often a thankless job of cleaning up after vandals and mistaken newcomers and misunderstandings between experienced editors. Sometimes an admin does make a mistake. We can make a big deal about that, which will make that admin (and others) less willing, in the future, to do anything requiring much time to analyze ("I'll just let another admin handle it"), or we can shrug it off as something that happens every once and a while, and go back to working on whatever was being improved. As you might guess, I prefer the second approach. That's not to say that we should ignore an admin with a pattern of abuses, but it is to say that assuming good faith is the preferred way to handle mistakes. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 18:47, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

I hadn't seen that note by Rich. Ok. Debresser (talk) 18:51, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Wikiquette alert

Please visit Wikipedia:Wikiquette alerts#User:Debresser.

--William Allen Simpson (talk) 23:24, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Edit warring report

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring#Debresser and Kotniski reported by William Allen Simpson (Result: )

--William Allen Simpson (talk) 14:40, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

This editor is predictable. I reported him, now he reports me. Debresser (talk) 15:04, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Protection of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories)

Hi, I notice that you're still involved in a dispute on WP:NCCAT. In order to prevent any more blocks of any parties to the dispute, I have full-protected the page indefinitely. Once the dispute is resolved, you may request unprotection at WP:RFPP.--Aervanath (talk) 14:06, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Fair enough. Sadly... Thank you for your initiative. Debresser (talk) 14:08, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Edit warring on ethnicity and nationality templates

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Edit warring#User:Debresser reported by User:William Allen Simpson (Result: )

--William Allen Simpson (talk) 14:19, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. I have replied there that your owning ofthese templates has caused all the trouble. Debresser (talk) 14:48, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

You and William Allen Simpson

The edit war between you two is obviously getting out of hand. I have no dog in this fight, and I don't particularly care what the templates say, or what the naming conventions for categories are. I do care that this doesn't get further out of hand. Therefore, I'm going to place the same restriction on both of you: as of now, you are restricted from editing any page that William Allen Simpson has edited in the last month, excluding discussion forums (talk pages, noticeboards, deletion discussions, etc.). Any edit to a page in which both of you have an interest must be performed by a third party. Violations of this sanction will result in a block. William Allen Simpson is under an identical restriction. This sanction will last as long as I deem necessary, or until a consensus of editors determines that it should be repealed or modified.--Aervanath (talk) 19:32, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

See your talkpage. Debresser (talk) 18:05, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

More commentary by admins in the WP:AN3 report

Hello Debresser. Please see the recent updates at the 3RR report. If you have a proposal for how to resolve the dispute with WAS, or take it to dispute resolution, you are welcome to add your own comment there. EdJohnston (talk) 17:46, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

NB

I came across this, a work in progress. Occuli (talk) 13:00, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Sanction

I have finally commented at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#Request_to_revoke_sanction. I apologize for the delay in responding.--Aervanath (talk) 20:53, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

Your removal of a protection template from my user page

I believe this edit was in error. Yes I know that the page was not protected but given the obvious nature of the page as a test page for a protected template I think the continual inclusion of it on the page was appropiate. I can understand why this template should not be added to the majority of unprotected pages but can not see how it does any harm when added to obvious sandboxes which are user subpages. As it happens the page has now served it's purpose and has been blanked I am worried about the wider issue and would prefer it didn't happen again. Dpmuk (talk) 11:01, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Will answer on user talkpage. Debresser (talk) 11:04, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

OK, I knew there was a policy page on the issue but couldn't find it (the difficulty of finding policies and the like is one of the biggest gripes I have with wikipedia). I see that you proposed the relevant bit of policy and added it when there no objections (or indeed any comments). I don't know how it was done in this case but I would imagine many people would just copy and paste the code from the new version (in user space) to the actual template (in template space) - I'd imagine this would be particularly likely when the user is an adminsitrator so can make the changes themselves. If someone else has edited the new version without them knowing they may miss the removal of the template. In my opinion common sense suggests that when a user subpage is clearly being used to test a new version of a protected template (and that testing is actively ongoing) then it should be allowed to have a protection template despite not being protected. Dpmuk (talk) 15:14, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Well, there was one other guy in this last half year who had a problem with it that I removed a protection template from his work. But he was an admin and protected the page himself within 24h. So it seems you are the only one in over a hundred editors who sees that logic.

And frankly, if you want to ask for protection, ask for the admin not to forget the protection template, and that is all. Or add it in remark tags meanwhile, if you don't trust the admin, and remove them at the last moment. But basically, you can just rely on our admins.

Don't forget that most templates don't need protection, and that many templates are under construction for a long time. So it really isn't logical that we should have an incorrect protection template all that time. Debresser (talk) 15:26, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

I think you may have missed my point. I never wanted this page protected and that's not the reason the template was on the page. It was there because I copied and pasted the code from the actual template while I worked on the new version and so it make senses to keep it there while this takes place for the reasons I outline above. The template is there to inform users that a page is protected so I see no harm in it being incorrectly placed on a user subpage, which is being used as a sandbox, given that no other users are ever likely to navigate to that page. Dpmuk (talk) 15:34, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Not really. People tend to work on templates a long time. Then they forget about them altogether. That may happen both if they did or did not do anything constructive. It just isn't reasonable that the protection template should be there all the time.

So again: 1. You can add it at the last moment. 2. You can put it in remark tags. 3. You can rely on the admin to add it. Just consider that I am helping you remove the template that you should have removed yourself as soon as you copied the template to your userspace. Mind you: not only are you the first to disagree, I have even received thank you notes for doing this. Debresser (talk) 15:40, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

BTW, I fix this category usualy only once a day, so you should have a statistically 12h to work on the template before I come along. Debresser (talk) 15:43, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

We're obviously not going to agree on this and as I think it's a wider issue I've started a RfC here. Dpmuk (talk) 16:19, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Leave other editor's user space alone

I object to this edit and have rolled it back. --Jc3s5h (talk) 16:23, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Your response is no response. Read the diff; it has nothing to do with protection templates; it has to do with changing instances of citation templates. --Jc3s5h (talk) 18:35, 16 September 2009 (UTC)

Technical

Hm very odd category! Rich Farmbrough, 02:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC).

OK I'm getting some shut-eye. Good luck with your templating. Rich Farmbrough, 02:44, 23 September 2009 (UTC).

Made it "U" for upper. Edit conflict. Should work now. Rich Farmbrough, 11:54, 23 September 2009 (UTC).

incidentally there is a parser function #ucasefirst: Rich Farmbrough, 11:57, 23 September 2009 (UTC).

Wasn't an edit conflict. I noticed the "U" but thought it was a slip of mine somehow. Don't know that parserfunction. Sounds like magic to me. So now we have Upper and nethercase? Shouldbe "l" for lowercase then. Debresser (talk) 12:02, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Well if it's blank - it's kind of a hack, but it's used a lot. And that template is only likely to be used by template coders. And you are right "demospace" will only affect the box style unless we start testing for it all over the place, and passing it to all our called templates. My original plan was to merge technical, expert and expert multiple. But this is a reasonable solution for technical I think. Rich Farmbrough, 12:32, 23 September 2009 (UTC).

I agree. What did you mean "it's blank"? Is that {{Artipage|{{{1|U}}}}} or {{Artipage|U}}? And why would that be a hack? Do you mean to say that the demospace parameter isn't working correctly? Debresser (talk) 12:42, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

No I mean the choice is between "U" and nothing - although any "non-U" value will give lowercase. But it's the wiki-way and you can't dig too deeply into template syntax, because 1. it's a waste of time, 2. the resulting render time if we did it everywhere would be horrendous. Theoretically we should be writing - maybe -

switch {case}
|u=
|U=
|Upper=
|l=
|Lower=
|L=[category:Uses of template "The artipage" that use non-canonical values of the "case" parameter]
switch lcase{case}
|l=
|lower= ACTUAL CODE HERE
|u=
|upper= ACTUAL CODE HERE
|#default=[category:Uses of template "The artipage" that use invalid values of the "case" parameter]

if 1 [category:Uses of template "The artipage" that use un-needed default parameters]

(but in proper syntax). But we don't, because no one is going to use the template wrongly and if they do it doesn't matter, someone can fix it. And in 5 years we'll have a scripting language instead of templates. (But for something like Asbox with over 1 million uses more care than we might take with The artipage is warrented - however it is still very controlled, so we can relax a little.) Rich Farmbrough, 13:02, 23 September 2009 (UTC).

Which version is (more) correct though, {{Artipage|{{{1|U}}}}} or {{Artipage|U}}? Debresser (talk) 13:06, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

{{The artipage|U}} because you don't want to pass the default parameter that Technical was given on to The artipage. {Technical|I gave it a parameter 1} should render the same as {technical}. Rich Farmbrough, 13:11, 23 September 2009 (UTC).

Passive voice

Where is the consensus to avoid the passive voice? I checked the talk page and found only two editors discussing it. Strad (talk) 05:09, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

I have show the roots of this consensus in the discussion. Debresser (talk) 05:36, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Passive voice seems to be something that Strunk and White got hung up on, and Microsoft and generations of American schoolchildren were frightened by. It seems also mostly harmless. Rich Farmbrough, 11:55, 23 September 2009 (UTC).

It all depends on how much. Sometimes, removing one or two passive voices can be really refreshing to a text. Debresser (talk) 12:08, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Don't you mean "Fears about the passive voice were greatly exaggerated"? TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:47, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

What are you referring to? Perhaps you mixed me up with somebody else? Debresser (talk) 14:51, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

I was responding, tongue in cheek, to Rich's comment. (Note the indent level of my comment.) By rephrasing his statement in the passive voice, I sought to elicit a small amount of gleeful amusement on the part of my fellow editors. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:02, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps my talkpage was not the right place for that. Debresser (talk) 15:09, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Ok, ok. I take that back. Debresser (talk) 15:31, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Adding title to Cite web on Dave McCurdy

Definite oversight on my part. Thanks for fixing that. Cheers, NMS Bill (talk) 13:36, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

My pleasure. Debresser (talk) 14:39, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Protection template, Cagayan de Oro City

Hi. :) I always have a hard time remembering which protection template to use, so I don't doubt there's a better one than the one I selected for this article, but the one you fixed it with, [2], doesn't seem to exist. I've restored the one that I had placed for now, but wanted to let you know so you could put in whatever you had meant, since it seems that there may be a better one than that which I selected. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 15:58, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Fixed. That was just a typo. Debresser (talk) 20:12, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Congrats

You seem to enjoy learning. Rich Farmbrough, 19:33, 23 September 2009 (UTC).

I do! Debresser (talk) 20:13, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Re: Would you?

Sure, let me just re-read the discussion first. Jafeluv (talk) 11:03, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Done. Jafeluv (talk) 11:30, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

FTA

The post-expanded size is too great. I.E. after the mediaWiki software expands all those templates. I left a note with Robofish(?) the main editor. He has a plan. Rich Farmbrough, 12:55, 24 September 2009 (UTC).

See also User_talk:Rich_Farmbrough#Believe_it_or_not. Rich Farmbrough, 12:59, 24 September 2009 (UTC).

Moved here from my userpage

Thanks for the minor fix you kindly added to my edit this morning. I'm exhausted and should have caught it; luckily , you were there to catch it for me :) Spiral5800 (talk) 12:03, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Help:Cite errors updates

With the updates at Help:Cite errors, User:Debresser/My work on Wikipedia#Cite error sorting is now incomplete and outdated. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 17:06, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

First of all, thank you for letting me know. I wasn't aware. Would you update it? Debresser (talk) 17:14, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

I checked it, but found no information there that was wrong. So perhaps there is missing information. Debresser (talk) 17:17, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Nothing really wrong on your page, but Help:Cite errors is much more complete— all of the messages now have the category. If you really want to duplicate it, you could just copy the content from the help page. ---— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk 22:34, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Filmr

File:Charandas_Chor,_1975.jpg - article parameter seems not to be dealt with. Rich Farmbrough, 22:34, 24 September 2009 (UTC).

Why would you say so? {{Film cover fur}} also takes an "article" parameter. Debresser (talk) 22:49, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

I redirected Filmr to highlight any problems. Maybe article vs Article? "This is the cover art for {{{Article}}}. The cover art copyright is believed..." doesn't look right. Rich Farmbrough, 22:55, 24 September 2009 (UTC).

BttFCharacter

Hi, Debresser. At Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2009 September 25#Template:BttFCharacter, the template you nominated is the same name as the one you say it is redundant with. Just wanted to make sure you nominated the right template. --RL0919 (talk) 02:49, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

Oops. Fixed. Debresser (talk) 02:54, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

Bit and rein templates

Hi, Message to you here rather than on the discussion page. The two templates you tagged, personally, I'd just as soon see deleted altogether as they are badly done and filled with POV problems and OR. However, the person who created them also created a massive editing dispute at the time across several horse templates, and I frankly do not want to deal with her at all. See also the alternative, the horse tack template, that I was working on at the same time (which I'd be glad to move to a sandbox if it's cluttering up bandwidth). There was sort of a project to create a nav template across these articles, but because of the editing disputes, we just gave up on it. But I guess if both bit and reins were deleted and went away, I wouldn't object. Montanabw^(talk) 04:00, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

I'll look into it. Frankly, I was just working on a maintenance category, without knowing all about the histories ofthe specific templates and their connections to their specific fields. I'll keep you informed. Debresser (talk) 09:10, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

They are not in use. Now that in itself is not sufficient reason for deletion at wp:tfd, but if you can claim that the templates are not likely to ever be used, or (best) that they are redundant to another template, they will probably get deleted. And don't be afraid of anybody. As soon as you nominate them for deletion, the administrative part of Wikipedia will not be obstructed by anything. Debresser (talk) 09:25, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

LOL! I'll think about it. But there's a history here... ;-) a looooooong history that has been quiet for the last few months, to my immense relief. Not wanting to hit the beehive with a stick at the moment, but maybe later... Montanabw^(talk) 21:13, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

Now that you started it with the bit template, I added reins and tack. I think we need to just toss the whole category. I moved "mine" to a sandbox and when the time comes, we can fix it up and reintroduce it to the world. Montanabw^(talk) 05:47, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

D, we are now having trouble getting the templates deleted. I voluntarily nominated my own for deletion to avoid a COI with the deletion of the other two, and mine was tossed per my request, but instead we now have people suggesting we improve the other two, which is the opposite of what I wanted! I went and put the tack template into my sandbox here User:Montanabw/Tack sandbox and I guess I'd like your suggestions what to do here. Montanabw^(talk) 04:25, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Category:Sports scandals

Hello, Debresser. You have new messages at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 September 17.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

Thank you for searching, and for letting me know. I have now added my full support to the nomination. Debresser (talk) 17:07, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Ramona

Thank you for fixing my error. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 19:07, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

You're welcome. Debresser (talk) 17:05, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

YYYY-MM-DD numerical dates (again)

Hi, I wondered if you felt like coming back to Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(dates_and_numbers)#Revised_summary_of_the_present_state_of_play_on_YYYY-MM-DD_in_footnotes, where I am trying to drum up support for putting out for wider discussion the proposal that we deprecate this format in footnotes. Also, I don't know how in practical terms to proceed, so maybe you could help with that too? Thanks, -- Alarics (talk) 21:06, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

I have left a comment with my opinion there. Thanks for keeping in touch. Debresser (talk) 22:58, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

RfC on this question is now open for your comments at Wikipedia:Mosnum/proposal_on_YYYY-MM-DD_numerical_dates. -- Alarics (talk) 08:50, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Incorrect protection template error fix.

Why is {{sprotected2}} an incorrect protection template? --PBS (talk) 21:54, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Because it redirects to Template:Pp-semi-indef, which is for indefinite protection, while this page was protected only for two months. Debresser (talk) 22:57, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Filmr

I'm sorry - it's my mistake - feel free to turn it into a redirect again. --Shahid • ^Talk2me 08:17, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Ok. That works even better for me. Thanks for your reply. Debresser (talk) 10:01, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Redemption

I just saw a recent edit you made to Judaism. I am not questioning your specific edit, but raising a question about the sentence - it refers to "redemption" but the link actually sends people to the Salvation article. Is the jewish notion of redemption the same as salvation? have you followed the link? I suggest you do and read the lead. Is this really representing Jewish thought? Slrubenstein | Talk 11:37, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

I remember your post about the salvation issue on Wikipedia:WikiProject Judaism some time ago. I decided right away that it was a tricky issue, with which you surely will deal adequately. If you need any specific help with it, write me here. Debresser (talk) 11:40, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

I cannot touch it - I am in a conflict with the principle author and don't want to stir the pot. My sense is that their is a Jewish notion of salvation in the sense that God "delivers," "rescues" or "saves" (the word in Hebrew can be translated any of these ways; Christians always favor "saves.") Israel from danger or despair. I believe that this is fundamentally different from the Christian view. If so, what we have is not a clash between two different points of view, but rather views of two different things. If so, the Jewish concept deserves its own article. If you agree with me, the thing to do is to create the new article and ask other knowledgable (I highly respect Shriahadasha) editors to help out. Then, make sure that all the links referring to the Jewish concept direct to the new article, and delete any Jewish stuff from the Salvation article, otherwise leaving it intact. I fail to see how this could offend Christian or Jew. IF you disagree with me, then we do have a thornier problem because it is a mater of rewriting th salvation article so that it complies with NPOV. This can be thorny but it is not something you should shy away from, it is merely an execise in applying policy and let WP:NPOV itself be your guide. The best educated Christian editors (e.g. CTSWYnekan) will not be upset, they will welcom the clarifications. Sorry I can't take part, now is a sticky time for me. Slrubenstein | Talk 15:54, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Happy New Year! Slrubenstein | Talk 15:54, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

You too. I'll have a look, but really am too busy for this. Debresser (talk) 17:16, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Kambojas

Your corrections to the refs did make sense, thanks for fixing them. You'll appreciate the article is so complex it is easy to make minor errors. Itsmejudith (talk) 16:37, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Indeed. Thanks for the note. Debresser (talk) 17:16, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Cfd speedy rename

A comment of yours gave me some food for thought. I've started a discussion at WT:CFD#Speedy rename - Criterion 4 which you might be interested in.

Regards, Xdamr^talk 18:14, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

I was hoping somebody would do just that. Debresser (talk) 17:28, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

In the section called Y-DNA testing

Debresser, I'm glad you helped the WP readers, as I try to do also, by removing the phrase "such as in this success story" from the section Y-DNA testing. I think it's better your way and I appreciate your helping the readers.

Let me add that I don't think removing the source reference itself helps the readers, however, and I hope you agree. That would be "throwing out the baby with the bath water". For7thGen (talk) 22:23, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

I though it was just plain spam, because that is the way it was presented. The way it is presented now is acceptable to me. Debresser (talk) 17:20, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

User:SimonTrew/reverse

What I was trying to do here is testing recursion, which indeed seems to fail. I imagine this is not because it couldn't be done by the grammar, which I imagine has a stack and thus can handle that as a free context grammar rather than simply a regular expression language, but that it deliberately spots the loop so as not to put the server under excessive load. It was a test piece for doing something genuinely useful (at least to me).

"reverse" simply reverses the characters in a string, so "a string" comes out as "gnirts a". It does so in the following way:

If the string is empty or one character, return that string, otherwise:

Take the first character of the string off the front of it

Reverse the rest of the string, using "reverse"

Stick the front character on the back

This will reverse the string. Inefficiently but it will. Thus the template must call itself, which as you say, unfortunately is not allowed.

The real aim was to reverse Hungarian names, which are written surname- given names-, into English name order. This would not be quite a simple "reverse" since the given names, if there are more than one, keep the same order, e.g. my old trout Petro Mónika Tereszia becomes Monika Teresyia Petro, there are slight (but only very slight) problems with titles since if she were Dr. or Prof. that would also take its place. But unlike English, in Hungarian these always (I am told) have their stops so there are not a plethora of cases "Dr", "dr", "dr." and so on. This could go farther into general Eastern Name Order if more titles were added as, essentially, an exclusion on the first word. Of course if someone was called Imam Imam, just as if they are called Doctor Doctor, things get a little absurd, but if we can handle 99 times out of a hundred I would be happy.

This can be done with the ParserExtensions supposedly, but I have never managed to get that to work. Wikipedia directs you to Wikimedia, so I can only assume that it is not enabled on Wikipedia servers (and archive discusions that editors such as I would use it for natural language processing and they Dont Want That tends to emphasise my opinion there; this of course is written by people who don't want to use one template to translate 2500 infoboxes but instead want us to handcode them in god knows how many languages each in different ways that are then not linked so no way, automatically, of fact checking.)

My best wishes and thanks for your concern. It is a failure, I don't think I can get recursion to work (I might try jumping through a redirect or something, I have lots of tricks up my sleeve, but I imagine has been tried before.)

SimonTrew (talk) 01:08, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Tricky. There used to be an editor around who was really good with templates, but he was offended and decided to go on an indefinite break. There are a few other editors that are not bad with templates, but none that really has the expertise and the time, as far as I know. Perhaps just post on Wikipedia:Village pump (technical). Debresser (talk) 17:23, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

I should declare my hand, I have been a professional software engineer for twenty-five years poor old sod I first got paid for it when I was twelve years old. I think I have the hang of it. And the test was exactly that, I was trying to find away to get it going. Thanks for the suggestion but really I just know, now, that it will spot the loop. I will maybe try to force it to, through a double redirect or something. It is rather cunning.

My very best wishes SimonTrew (talk) 23:01, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Reference template help

Hi, thank you a lot for including a link to the ref template documentation in your edit summary on Water on Mars. I (admittedly by laziness, probably) missed that. Next time I will be more careful. --Cycl^opia - ^talk 23:32, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

That's good. That's why I include it. Debresser (talk) 23:36, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

Category:Neighborhoods in New Rochelle, New York

You tagged Category:Neighborhoods in New Rochelle, New York for deletion but have not immediately created the corresponding discussion for the proposal, at wp:CFD. Procedurally, u need to do that. Or would you please just delete your proposal? doncram (talk) 01:31, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

One of the two: or give the guy some time, or look better. Debresser (talk) 01:35, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

I would suggest just doing it, if u intend to. I'll watch here for reply. doncram (talk) 01:42, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Hey, dude. Did you have alook at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_September_28#Category:Neighborhoods_in_New_Rochelle.2C_New_York? Or just press the text where it says "this category's entry on the Categories for Discussion". Debresser (talk) 01:45, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Ok. I see the problem. Thay are listed on the wrong day. Let me try to fix that. Debresser (talk) 01:46, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Fixed. Debresser (talk) 01:50, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Yep, whatever u did fixed it, so clicking on "this category's entry" now works. Thanks! doncram (talk) 01:51, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

All 24 my nominations were on the 28 September page. That I can understand, now that I think about it. Debresser (talk) 01:54, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Refs

Does not involve? Rich Farmbrough, 03:24, 29 September 2009 (UTC). It is always driven off that category. A few weeks back I tried to get it to look at wider errors, but that's about it. Rich Farmbrough, 03:31, 29 September 2009 (UTC).

Most likely I suppose that WP has stalled the bot. That has happened over the past week or so. but not often to the references run as it is so short. Rich Farmbrough, 03:46, 29 September 2009 (UTC).

Wikicite / Wikiref

Several months ago, I did some research and realized that there were only three articles that transcluded both Wikicite & Wikiref. A careful examination of the other articles that transcluded them showed that they were almost never used in a way that worked. In almost every case, Wikiref provided a link that went nowhere and Wikicite created an anchor that was never used. The two exceptions were Romani orthography and Pearse Jordan. In these two articles, Wikiref and Wikicite were working properly. That's two out of several thousand.

Note that Wikicite had been marked as deprecated since 23 August 2008 by someone other than me. I think this is a good idea, because it does nothing in the vast majority of the articles that transclude it. (When you "undeprecated" {{Wikicite}}, you mentioned there was no discussion. The discussion of {{Wikiref}} is here: Template talk:Wikiref and it consists of me talking to myself. Is there another venue to discuss deprecation? If so, let's meet there. If not, this is the discussion.)

Since the beginning of the summer, I have gradually gone through the five or six hundred articles that transcluded Wikiref and fixed them. Typically, the articles used {{cite book}} instead of {{Wikicite}}, so it was relatively easy to substitute either {{Harv}} or {{sfn}} for {{Wikiref}}, which creates a simple link that works. I started with wikiref, because those articles were actually broken in terms of functionality -- they had a link that led nowhere. I thought about fixing the Wikicites as well, but there are more of them and they are invisible to the reader, so they are relatively harmless. I put in a bot request to remove them, but alas, no one responded. In all of my edits, I was careful to be certain that the article looked and functioned exactly as intended by the local authors, and I was careful never to add a citation template if none had been used before my edit. At this point, there are less than ten articles left, and all of them require a major edit. I hope to finish this project eventually, but this is the kind of thing that takes time.

I was depressed to find out that, this week, the simple to use anchor in {{cite book}} was removed, which broke all my fixes. But, as we discovered, there are a lot of broken links of this kind, and eventually we will get around to fixing them. (See Template talk:Citation/core#Fixing what's broke, if you haven't already.)

By the way, I left Romani orthography alone specifically because it had no functional problems. It used standard WP:CITE#Parenthetical referencing and each of them was properly linked to the citation. ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 22:00, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Something interesting happened today. I fixed all instances of Wikiref. Then I saw Romani orthography and Pearse Jordan. And I understood that I had missed the whole point. That Wikiref and Wikicite are supposed to go together. And that together they can do things that I have been looking for, and that people have told me are impossible with the existing templates. But that is another story. So I decided to continue only with Romani orthography, and to undo all the my other edits clearing Wikiref. Now, from your words, I understand that apart from Pearse Jordan I could have left my edits. If so, then it will be a small task to revert my reverts, and remove all instances of Wikiref, with the exception of Pearse Jordan. Debresser (talk) 22:14, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

Done. But I still would be unhappy to deprecate such a template. Debresser (talk) 23:09, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

What exactly were the things that you were looking for? ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 06:05, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

A reference that can handle different pagenumbers. As you well know, the only way to handle them with the {{Cite ...}} templates is have the book/website/journal as a general reference in a bulleted list and then refer to them like this "Asimov p.2", "Asimov p.3" etc. Debresser (talk) 06:13, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Yes, WP:CITE#Shortened footnotes is the most common way to handle multiple page numbers in Wikipedia. Is it the alphabetized bullet list that you don't like? ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 07:52, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

In a way that is precisely what Wikiref and Wikicite do. Debresser (talk) 07:57, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Did you see my post on Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Inline_Templates#Deprecated_templates? If you keep me updated on discussions, I will take part in them. Debresser (talk) 07:57, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

I guess the real issue is this: {{Harv}} - {{Citation}} vs. {{Wikiref}} - {{Wikicite}}. The first is a standardized pair, which defines the form of the display text and automates the link/anchor connection under the covers. The second allows an editor to be more creative in the display text and requires them to define a link/anchor name themselves. We agree so far? ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 08:05, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

We do. Which is precisely the reason why I feel they can not be deprecated, even if they are not in use. Just explaining my initial point of view. By the way, have you noticed what I did to {{Cite science}} and {{Ref num}}? Debresser (talk) 08:15, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

That looks fine. I never intended to screw up the deprecation process. Basically, I'm sweeping up the trash -- replacing non-working and truly useless templates in the articles themselves. The only template I think I marked as deprecated was {{Wikiref}}, and I gave my reasons on the talk page. The templates I moved into Category:Deprecated citation templates were either already marked as deprecated or baldly useless and unused. I see your point about keeping Wikiref/Wikicite around, but I think that more standardization in this area is a good thing for Wikipedia: it makes it easier for new editors to learn the whole system, gives it a more professional appearance and help bots to catch and correct more errors. ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 08:56, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

I definitely agree with you here.I am doing an overhaul of Category:Deprecated templates at the moment. If I had the time for it, there are a lot of templates there that can be deleted or redirected. The problem is that nobody makes that into his "project". Debresser (talk) 10:00, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Userfy request

Hi there, I hope I'm doing this correctly. I have a question regarding the information on the Paul Bonin page you erased. I'm trying to create this as a fully-fledged page. Could you assist by reinstating the information? I know I probably put it in the wrong place - could you help me and get it created as a page in its own right, or tell me the procedure I have to go through to achieve this? Many thanks, PaulWellardPaulwellard (talk) 00:33, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Of course I'll be glad to help you.

Nothing ever gets lost. It's all there in the page's history. If you want to see the page the way it was before I erased all information, you should do like this:

Write "Paul Bonin" in the search box and press enter That will bring you to "The Jetset". At the top of the page there will be a notice in small letters "(Redirected from Paul Bonin)". Press it. That will get you to the real Paul Bonin page. Press "history". Press "prev" of your last version, which is one below the top. Then press "edit this page".

Et voila, all the text is there, ready to be pasted anywhere you want.

Now if you want the page to stop being a redirect, you should just delete the line "#REDIRECT [[The Jetset]] {{R from member}}". But first make sure you have enough information there that it won't get deleted at once. Most important is establishing notability, including at least one good reference.

If there will be anything more I can help you with, please write. Debresser (talk) 06:09, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Parameter pass through

{Xxxx= {Xxxx|} menas that we pass the parameter we receive on to the template we are calling unchanged. Particularly useful with a parameter called (for example) "subst" which can be set to "subst:" in the first tempalte and passed down to all the called templates as needed. Of course it requires that each of the called templates supports (where necessary) and passes it on (where necessary). Demospace is used to override the namespace, again the choice of "demospace" is arbitrary but sensible. Rich Farmbrough, 15:46, 30 September 2009 (UTC).

Setting demospace=yes would probably enocurage default behaviour in the called template which may or may not be good (people will for example assume that parameters of the namespace type can only take certain known values). Rich Farmbrough, 15:48, 30 September 2009 (UTC).

OK, it is nothing special in the way it works;

Fred = {bloggs|}

is simple enough?

It just so happens that a template we are calling has a parameter called "Fred" and this template was called with a parameter "bloogs" that we want to pass on.

demospace ={demospace}

is just the same

It just so happens that a template we are calling has a parameter called "demospace" and this template was called with a parameter "demospace" that we want to pass on.

However we might suspect that there is design not coincidence at work with the names. In particular this means we can refer to "demospace" in both templates and be talking about the same thing.

Example

template "My demo box" called {My demo box|demospace=User talk}

code is

{switch:{demospace|namespace}|{ns0}=Ambox|user talk=Tbox.... |size = {my size|demospace=(demospace)} |color= {my color|demospace=demospace} |

then my color might be <style color= switch {demospace|namespace}|talk=blue|cat=red.....

taking liberties with the syntax.

Rich Farmbrough, 16:04, 30 September 2009 (UTC). 16:04, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Template variety

This is a usability/HCI issue.

For example we could have {cleanup|merge|from|3|to|1|article|article|article....} or indeed we could always use "Article issues". There is a tendency for people who do a lot of work in an area to want more templates, and for occasional visitors to want less. Sometimes the difference between one and many templates is not great for example {merge to} vs {merge|to}. here the important thing is what is easier for users to remember or guess. Rich Farmbrough, 16:18, 30 September 2009 (UTC).

No a redirect is a redirect. everything after ]] is ignored for those purposes. You would call a merge/core template

Merge from= {Merge/core |direction = from |first = {1|} |partner = {2|} ... }

Merge to= {Merge/core |direction = to |first = {1|} |partner = {2|} ... }

Merge = {Merge/core |direction = unknown |first = {1|} |partner = {2|} ... }

I'm not sure it is worth it, though there is little enough maintenance on three templates, all the style stuff is in Mbox. Rich Farmbrough, 16:28, 30 September 2009 (UTC).

Correct that won't work either. Rich Farmbrough, 16:41, 30 September 2009 (UTC).

Totally disputed

Mean POV and disputed. TfD was because it was redundant with article issues. Arguably so are almost all clean-up templates. Rich Farmbrough, 11:34, 1 October 2009 (UTC).

That's the process for TfD, orphan, deprecate, wait.... The advantage of waaaaaaaaaaiting is that while the template is not used currently (I replaced it on tight lacing) it is used in historical versions of pages. Rich Farmbrough, 12:05, 1 October 2009 (UTC).

Temporary categories

Better to create a category then have it speedied when you are done. But not a big issue I guess. Rich Farmbrough, 11:37, 1 October 2009 (UTC).

New template

Template:FULLFULLPAGENAME

Rich Farmbrough, 12:35, 1 October 2009 (UTC).

Inline

For deprecating templates such as {{Cn}}. Rich Farmbrough, 14:36, 1 October 2009 (UTC).

Category:Wikipedia requested photographs of comics

The structure is actually at Category:Wikipedia requested photographs of comics, I'm misremembering what I was supposed to do, which was set up stat counting, and what I had done, which was set up the cat structure. I think there was discussion somewhere to deprecate images in favour of photographs, whether that ever caught on I don't know, but I recall moving them based on that discussion. I'm just not very tidy, as you can see. Anyway, I've deleted the cats. Thanks for bringing it up and sorry for messing you about. Hiding T 11:24, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Apology

It turns out my answer on the village pump was very wrong. I have corrected myself there; I didn't want to leave you with the wrong idea. — Carl (CBM · talk) 13:18, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much. Debresser (talk) 13:20, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Infobox UK cathedral

Hi, thanks for all your work in merging the redundant templates into {{Infobox church}}. I initiated discussion on the matter twice some time ago, and there was a fair degree of opposition so I didn't take the matter further. I'm actually quite amazed you were able to achieve the merger without any hoo-ha.

By the way, there is one more infobox that could potentially be merged into {{Infobox church}}: {{Infobox UK cathedral}}. However, there might be quite a lot of opposition to this – see [3].

Also, do you think {{Infobox church}} should be renamed {{Infobox Church}}, in line with how other infoboxes are generally named? — Cheers, JackLee ^–talk– 05:36, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Hi. I just came walsing in, asking no questions, and was gone before anybody noticed it. :) That's the secret. On Wikipedia we call it "be bold".

Actually, infoboxes are usually without capitals, or should be at least, like {{Infobox writer}}, unless they include a proper name, like {{Infobox Australian year}}. see Wikipedia:Infobox_templates#Design_and_usage#5. I'll have a look at {{Infobox UK cathedral}}. Debresser (talk) 17:09, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

~~It can be done, but there are a few different parameters. Luckily there are only some 80 pages using it. I'll try and do it tonight. Debresser (talk) 17:22, 3 October 2009 (UTC)~~

There are too many parameters in {{Infobox UK cathedral}} that {{Infobox church}} doesn't have. And others they have in common but under slightly different names. So it is not possible to merge these two templates without adding parameters to {{Infobox church}}, and that is not something I want to do on my sole responsibility. Debresser (talk) 03:29, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for having a look. No worries; I figure that if the popularity of {{Infobox church}} grows, eventually there will be a consensus to merge {{Infobox UK cathedral}} with it. I'm not sure of the convention regarding the naming of infobox templates, but was under the impression that a large number of them use a capital letter even though the word after Infobox is not a proper noun. — Cheers, JackLee ^–talk– 07:16, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

I honestly doubt it, but could be. This template is very specific. It uses strictly English geographic parameters, parameters that apply only to official cathedrals, and many architectural details. I don't think it will be merged soon with {{Infobox church}}, even though the other three templates have been merged. Debresser (talk) 11:31, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Hi There

No need to respond to this message, All I have to say is, I think you are a FASCINATING guy, your user page just "freaks"(as in delights me exceedingly) me outOntoyinsimon (talk) 10:37, 3 October 2009 (UTC).

Ok. I'll take that as a compliment. Debresser (talk) 17:14, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

New dated categories

I've added the following six categories since they were suffering from backlogs between 2000 and 10000. Most of the templates are dealt with I think, progress boxes and the categories are updated, also {{Article issues}}, I am creating the dated cats now. Can you please update the various lists, since you probably know that stuff better than I do now.

Rich Farmbrough, 06:40, 3 October 2009 (UTC).

Good job! I will. Believe me there is nothig to know there. Debresser (talk) 17:15, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

You missed {{Peacock term}}. I took care of it. You might want to tell SmackBot about that one. Debresser (talk) 17:52, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

You wrote me once about the "In-universe" templates. Actually, there was potential for order in them, just that it needed somebody to see it.

I changed the categorisation of {{In-universe}} to allow for all the subcategories, and to have those subcategories sort also into a general dated category. This probably means that you should add those subcategories to SmackBot. You can find them on the template documentation. Debresser (talk) 18:33, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

In the process I renamed most of the templates. Please delete all redirects below, because they will confuse editors. I have eliminated all their occurances. As far as I am concerned you can eliminate all other redirects as well, with the exception of Template:TV-in-universe. Debresser (talk) 20:29, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Template:In-universe/VG
Template:In-universe/Warhammer
Template:In-universe/TV
Template:In-universe/ST
Template:In-universe/SW
Template:In-universe/ME
Template:In-universe/D&D
Template:In-universe/Book
Template:In-universe/Animanga
Template:In-universe/3K Debresser (talk) 01:42, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Why not let {{Prose}} sort into the general Category:Articles with sections that need to be turned into prose if there is no date specified. This is highly unusual. Debresser (talk) 02:17, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Hm. It should I'll check it (looks OK to me). The in-universe templates just needed adding to the list, I don't have to mess with any categories. As I understand it an article will be in the Tolkien sub-cat and the July 2009 subcat. I don't worry too much about missing templates (off my list) as I will generally get to them when SmackBot has a few articles left over at the end of a run - but it can get tedious "oh another redirect to XXX" which is why I have SB deal with the redirects automatically. Rich Farmbrough, 02:53, 4 October 2009 (UTC).

That is correct. But please delete the redirects I listed above (and any other you feel like). They are a source of confusion, because they are in the list at {{In-universe}}. Could you also delete the documentation pages I tagged there with {{db-g8}}? Debresser (talk) 02:58, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Three more templates:

Template:Generalize
Template:Generalize-inline Did you mean Template:Generalize-section? Yes.
Template:Where is it Rich Farmbrough, 11:34, 5 October 2009 (UTC).

I added Category:Vague or ambiguous geographic scope to {{Where is it}}, analogous to the inline template {{Where}}. Debresser (talk) 15:11, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

I ~~redirected~~ {{Generalize-section}} to {{Generalize}}, together with a section parameter. Debresser (talk) 15:33, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Page list

Very well done!

FULLFULLPAGENAME would avoid overriding the given namespace for Template:X1 in the first and third examples below.

Type this	To get this
`{{Pagelist/sandbox\|template:X1\|X2\|X3\|X4\|X5}}`	Template:X1, X2, X3, X4 and X5
`{{Pagelist/sandbox\|nspace=Template\|Template:X1\|X2\|X3\|X4\|X5}}`	Template:X1, X2, X3, X4 and X5
`{{Pagelist/sandbox\|nspace= \|delim=''\|Template:X1\|X2\|X3\|X4\|X5}}`	Template:X1, X2, X3, X4 and X5

Rich Farmbrough, 17:56, 4 October 2009 (UTC).

Template edit

Looks OK. Rich Farmbrough, 01:33, 5 October 2009 (UTC).

User:Marc Kupper/Check talk

Hello - I did not understand when you did in this edit to User:Marc Kupper/Check talk. I had made a personal copy of a protected template so that I could test/debug a proposed change which I then asked for on Template talk:Check talk#Allow for category override. I wanted to understand what you did to see if the same needs to be done to the main Check talk template. TIA --Marc Kupper|talk 04:59, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

I found the template in Category:Wikipedia pages with incorrect protection templates, because you copied it from a protected template into your unprotected userspace. So I commented out the protection template. And the {{{category|...}}} is prettty superfluous. That's all. And the capitals, because my mathematician's feelings like to have them. Debresser (talk) 08:46, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank makes sense then. The {{{category|...}}} was the purpose of the exercise. The {{Tlrow}} template is used to document some of the hatting and categorization templates and as part of this it displays the template itself. To prevent documentation pages from being added to whatever categories the templates puts pages in Tlrow passes "|category=" to the template among other things. For example, ideally {{BLP unsourced|date=October 2009|category=}} would show the {{BLP unsourced}} hat but not include the page in whatever categories that template normally would add the page to. --Marc Kupper|talk 09:45, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

I see. I just came back home, and while walking I thought about this, and decided to check whether any template passes a category to this template. You were quicker. Debresser (talk) 09:59, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Re: Request for comment

Hi! As I said here just last month, I think a rename would be a good idea and that seems to be the general consensus as well. It would probably be a good idea to list the page at WP:RM to get more eyes on the discussion. Regards, Jafeluv (talk) 07:02, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Since at this moment Wikipedia:Templates for discussionis already a redirect to Tfd, in view of the fact that we now have merge templates, as well as 4 people (among them 3 regulars of Tfd) all agreeing, I think it should be uncontroversial. Or at least uncontroversial enough to be bold about it. Will you insist? Debresser (talk) 08:37, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

If you feel bold enough, go ahead :) I sure don't, even though there seems to be consensus based on the few discussions so far. If you do it right and nobody complains, the better. If someone has a problem with it, there's always WP:BRD and WP:CENT, if necessary. I would prefer a more widely publicized discussion, though, since renaming internal processes is never really uncontroversial. Jafeluv (talk) 09:01, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Ok. That's what we will do then. Debresser (talk) 09:03, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Merge discussion for Template:Anglophone states

An article that you have been involved in editing, Template:Anglophone states , has been proposed for a merge with another article. If you are interested in the merge discussion, please participate by going here, and adding your comments on the discussion page. Thank you. — ^.`^) Paine Ellsworth ^diss`cuss (^^`. 10:43, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

PS. I know you've already commented, and thank you very much for that. I'm dropping this {{Mergenote}} template on the talk pages of all editors who have been recently involved with these templates. Didn't want to leave you out.

Thank you. Are you nominating all templates from Category:Items to be merged, or just this one? Debresser (talk) 10:45, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Just this one, Debresser. Haven't really checked how backed up things are. Pretty bad?

— ^.`^) Paine Ellsworth ^diss`cuss (^^`. 10:54, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually not that bad. I already got rid of 110 cateories there. :) Did you use my new {{Tfm}} template to nominate the merge? Debresser (talk) 10:58, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, mine is more of a "renominination". The actual nomination was about a year ago by editor Dbachmann. I came across the two templates about two weeks ago and thought the merge was a good idea. It's age is why I thought there was a long waiting list.

— ^.`^) Paine Ellsworth ^diss`cuss (^^`. 02:56, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Defaultsort

It's the sort order presumably the WikiProject German Military has decided on, since numbers go up to the hundreds it seems not unreasonable. However if you look at [4] you will see that possibly better sort orders exist. Rich Farmbrough, 18:24, 5 October 2009 (UTC).

Stops accidental recreation. Rich Farmbrough, 18:34, 5 October 2009 (UTC).

But I just created Category:Wikipedia_soft_redirected_categories - and its (more important) sub category Category:Wikipedia_non-empty_soft_redirected_categories. Rich Farmbrough, 18:53, 5 October 2009 (UTC).

Looks like a wikimedia bug. But could be a form of lag. Rich Farmbrough, 22:03, 5 October 2009 (UTC).

Hm, it seems a bit undecided maybe ask the project whether tis "foos of the Royal Netherlands Navy" or "RNN foos"? Rich Farmbrough, 22:43, 5 October 2009 (UTC).

I look strictly from the technical side of things. Nothing undecided in this case. The mammal case is harder. Debresser (talk) 22:47, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Well the project should sort it out. No point having two cats doing the same thing. I cleared down a bunch of combined hard/soft redirects too. And emptied the biggest cat (29 articles). The Chinese cinema thing I would be inclined to either leave, remove the soft redirect or drop them a note, or some combination. I have been working on a template {{Project table}} which doesn't work because of a wikimedia limitation - but that sort of thing would be broken by non-standard naming. You can fix the mammals thing I would say. The netherlands target is a sub cat of a netherlands navy cat, which shows what the sister cats look like. Rich Farmbrough, 23:40, 5 October 2009 (UTC).

"Want to delete the empty cats?" This is where we came in. Rich Farmbrough, 01:28, 6 October 2009 (UTC).

Yes, {{Related category}} is the ticket. Rich Farmbrough, 11:31, 6 October 2009 (UTC).

Epic poems

Just drawing your attention to this close. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 08:14, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. I'll get on it in another few minutes. It is a good thing you allerted me, because I usually don't watch the outcome of discussions (for a lack of time). Debresser (talk) 08:18, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

I started. Did the categories and the unalphabetised articles. Have to run now. Will continue later. Debresser (talk) 08:50, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Done I read that discussion again, but did not see where I volunteered for this job. Debresser (talk) 16:17, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Lol—sorry, I thought when you said, "I propose creating Category:Epic poetry and then divide the articles among Category:Epics [which the later commenters suggested should be Category:Epic poems ]for the epic stories themselves..." you were volunteering to do it. It's good that you did it though, otherwise I would have closed the discussion according to your suggestion and then nothing would have changed. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 21:25, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

It is not that I am above doing an occasional job that needs to be done. Just that I like to call things by their names. This is called "being volunteered". :) Debresser (talk) 22:30, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Switchover from Infobox Parish church to Infobox church

Hi, I just wanted to check that when you switched the articles using {{Infobox Parish church}} over to {{Infobox church}} you dealt with the parameters in the former template that no longer exist in the latter, namely, |canon1=, |canon2=, |canon3=, |canon4=, |vicar1=, |vicar2=, |curate1=, |priest1=, |priest2=, |priest3=, |minister1=, |honpriest1=, |organist1=, |laychapter1=, |warden1= and |warden2=? Someone flagged this up as an issue on the template talk page previously. — Cheers, JackLee ^–talk– 07:13, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

I hadn't. I have now. I manually checked each and every one of them and removed these parameters where they were empty and merged them with the others where necessary using <br />. Did minor fixes on the way. I also ran into two articles that hadn't applied the parameters in the correct way even for {{Infobox Parish church}}. Thank you for pointing this out to be. Debresser (talk) 11:56, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

No problem. I was going to suggest that a request be lodged at "Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Tasks" if you hadn't done that. Thanks for the hard work! — Cheers, JackLee ^–talk– 12:27, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

It was my responsibility, as the editor making the edits. Debresser (talk) 12:29, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Templates

Probably the template passing mechanism removes trailing spaces.

{{merge |fred }}

Rich Farmbrough, 19:43, 7 October 2009 (UTC).

Not that strange. Leading spaces can be important for sorting and are generally content-like. Trailing whitespace is going to muck stuff up in general, the template should be passed "just the facts" and sort the formatting. Since Tl/tlx are used behind the scenes I wouldn't worry. The solution lies in the Tl/Tlx templates doing the formatting. Note, by the way, that almost all infoboxes would go crazy if they accepted trailing white-space (mainly carriage returns). Rich Farmbrough, 20:27, 7 October 2009 (UTC).

Template:Unlink, no, I could write one. Rich Farmbrough, 22:15, 7 October 2009 (UTC).

Ok this works, but it assumes the arg is a link. {{Unlink|[[User talk:Debresser]]}} => User talk:Debresser Rich Farmbrough, 22:50, 7 October 2009 (UTC).

Don't know why it line-breaks there, possibly to do with the problem I raised at VP:technical. Rich Farmbrough, 22:51, 7 October 2009 (UTC).

Hm well I don't "understand" but I do know that it's failing on the non-alphanumeric characters, which is due to the parser functions escaping them as some kind of &amp#45; type expression. And since I have spent so many hours trying to get them to behave, unsuccessfully, when the devs could just give us the string parser functions at the flick of a bit, it's something I don't really want to get into right now. If, of course, you are interested enough to define their behaviour, and want to let me know what you find, I'd be most interested. Rich Farmbrough, 00:07, 8 October 2009 (UTC).

cool

I fixed the sandbox to recognise 1 [] two is just too special.

So what is needed is to pass the trimmed version to another iteration.

I'll sort that out.

Rich Farmbrough, 01:05, 8 October 2009 (UTC).

{{Unlink|fred}} => fred
{{Unlink|[fred]}} => fred
{{Unlink|fred}} => fred

Rich Farmbrough, 01:17, 8 October 2009 (UTC).

Of course it will still probably break if here are any special chars in there. Rich Farmbrough, 01:19, 8 October 2009 (UTC).

Probably the best bet is to have #ifeq: {str index|{1}|1}|[|Category:Articles where a link has been unexpectedly passed} with the usual abuse of notation. Rich Farmbrough, 01:22, 8 October 2009 (UTC).

Yes it is linked I think it's all to sdo with which piece of the software parses which string at what stage. The underlying functions just say "limited character set". I copied that limitation when I created Str right. Also as I say these are Bad Ways to do stuff, because the basic functions (Str len for example) are really only allowed to live because we are denied proper parser functions - if I remember correctly, str len more or less says "if replace all the characters with something (say x) and compare with X if it matches return 1 otherwise replace all the characters with x and compare with xx if it matches return 2 etc... Rich Farmbrough, 10:55, 8 October 2009 (UTC).

Help

I don't know how to attain my goal at Template_talk:Album_cover_fur#Request_for_detection. Can you please help? Debresser (talk) 21:52, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

Looks like this is working now. But the guidelines are for lower-case spaced parameters. We have just made the change at {{Infobox French commune}}, I would be reluctant to see anything going backwards. Rich Farmbrough, 23:49, 7 October 2009 (UTC).

Thank you!

For the template lesson, [5]! As you might have guessed it was a copy paste from: cent, but now I think I understand how it works. --HappyInGeneral (talk) 18:16, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

That is precisely what I tried to accomplish. Please feel free to ask for advise if you ever need it. Debresser (talk) 18:44, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you again, that is very generous of you. Hopefully I will realize what I don't know, but when I do that I will ask you. Thanks! --HappyInGeneral (talk) 18:48, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

October 2009

Constructive contributions to Wikipedia are appreciated, but a recent edit that you made to User talk:Collectonian has been reverted or removed because it was a misuse of a warning or blocking template. Please use the user warnings sandbox for any tests you may want to do, or take a look at our introduction page to learn more about contributing to the encyclopedia. Thank you. Your warning template was beyond inappropriate. The discussion was clear - no consensus for a merge, and no TfD was made. It has now been over an hour since you did it and STILL no TfD. -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 01:02, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Go have a look at wp:tfd and you'll understand why it took me some time. You might have checked my contributions also. Debresser (talk) 01:05, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

And your warning template here was pure insolence again and NOT APPRECIATED. Debresser (talk) 01:05, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

We don't need consensus. I nominate, and now let's see what consensus is. Debresser (talk) 01:07, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

(EC) Your warning template on my talk page was beyond inappropriate. The discussion was clear - no consensus for a merge, and no TfD was made. If you want to start another discussion, start on the talk pages, or wait to add your TfD tag AFTER you actually make it. You don't put the tag on hours before any TfD has been started. I did check your contribs - NO TfD started for THIS template. I just checked again and STILL none. And "insolence"? Sorry, but you are not an authority figure here nor are you "higher" up than me in any way shape or form. Your warning template was ridiculous. You seem to have decided that the talk page discussion was worthless and are starting your own TfD. If anything is insolence, that is. -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 01:07, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

If you have not seen the various errors you have made, then I am not going to waist my nerves on trying to explain them to you. I hope this arrogant behavior will not repeat itself in the future. Debresser (talk) 01:19, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Neal Zaslavsky

I was watching for a bot to fix up that page! Rich Farmbrough, 18:15, 9 October 2009 (UTC).

Neal Zaslavsky

Hi Debresser

Your edit summary to this edit to the above-captioned article, whether intended in jest or not, is likely to perceived as offensive to a significant number of Wikipedia editors or readers. If you wish to have it removed or refactored, I believe that is possible by means of a request for oversight. The procedures can be found here Wikipedia:Requests for oversight.

Also, on a related topic, it would be helpful for you to expand your comment made with these edits. Or perhaps move the comment and expand at Wikipedia talk:Notability, where discussion on the guideline is followed by interested editors.

Regards, ^Bongo_matic 17:11, 10 October 2009 (UTC) Should you wish to reply, please do so here. I will watch this page for a few days, so no {{talkback}} or other comment on my talk page is required.

Hi. You are, of course, correct as to the first point. I think, though, this is not a serious enough matter for oversight. Definitely not. As to the second point, which is also correct, please allow me to vent my frustration at least once a month. :) Thank you for your understanding, and wishing both of us happy editing, Debresser (talk) 17:30, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

As you can see below, other users rather seem to like this first edit. Debresser (talk) 19:58, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

User talk:66.172.171.34

An experienced editor such as yourself really should know better than to make such a pointed personal attack. 98.248.33.198 (talk) 17:23, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

Please indulge me. Debresser (talk) 17:27, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

If worst comes to worst, I'll just have to say viduy. Debresser (talk) 17:33, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

Your use of {{editprotected}}

Please request deletion in cases like this with a speedy deletion template, and not with the editprotected template. In this case {{db-g6}} would be appropriate. — Jake Wartenberg 02:02, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

I though of that too late, but have done so in later cases. Thank you. Debresser (talk) 02:06, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Redirects

No R'n'B was right to change it, although I have put support for the category categories in "soft redirect". Soft redirect is still useful for other soft redirects, importantly to Meta, but also some cross-namespace redirects. Rich Farmbrough, 02:23, 11 October 2009 (UTC).

Thank you for your reply. Debresser (talk) 02:26, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

re: /version1. Yes that editor made many sub-pages by moving stuff which he should have deleted to make way for redirects. Rich Farmbrough, 02:41, 11 October 2009 (UTC).

Ah OK it's empty versus full. Migrated the parameters to normal case spaced from a mixture of mainly underscored names. Rich Farmbrough, 03:10, 11 October 2009 (UTC).

{{Ifempty}}. Rich Farmbrough, 21:58, 11 October 2009 (UTC).

What happened? Category:Other information had 11,000 entries the other day. Rich Farmbrough, 22:33, 11 October 2009 (UTC).

Well there are thousands of infoboxes. Rich Farmbrough, 00:22, 12 October 2009 (UTC).

Yes they are all non-caps with spaces (for that template). Some of them support legacy values with Sentence case , Title Case or underscores. But thy all support lower case with spaces. It is the nature of the beast that there is a transitional period. Whether we go and change all the legacy parameter names, is open to question, I personally think we should, and will probably do it at some point. Rich Farmbrough, 00:38, 12 October 2009 (UTC).

Well I understand your feelings. I did try to point this out "But the guidelines are for lower-case spaced parameters. We have just made the change at {{Infobox French commune}}, I would be reluctant to see anything going backwards. " Rich Farmbrough, 14:35, 12 October 2009 (UTC).

Re: Linking

I understand your concern about over-linking, but I don't really see how those links are unnecessary? I doubt every reader will be aware that "Persia" refers to modern-day Iran, or that the "India" in the article is mainly referring to modern-day Pakistan, or that the "Turkic" in the article does not refer to modern-day Turkey. How will the reader be aware of these things if we do not link these terms? Regards, Jagged 85 (talk) 20:33, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Ok. Debresser (talk) 20:45, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Attachment theory

Thanks for fixing that link. How do you find them and fix them so quickly? Some kind of clever programme? Fainites ^barleyscribs 21:32, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

I just happened to be active on Category:Pages with broken reference names at the moment. AnomieBOT is a bot active in the same area. That bot fixes after 5 minutes. Debresser (talk) 21:36, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

You revert

Debresser, I suggest you revert your revert of me, or I'll take this to AN/I. Jayjg ^(talk) 04:55, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

May I point out that we are already at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#mentalblog.com. It would be more befitting to await the outcome of the discussion there and on the talkpage. Have no doubt that if after proper discussion consensus will be not like me, I will submit to the majority view without external pressure. I do appologise for using the rollback feature. That was wrong. Debresser (talk) 05:01, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

It was all wrong. Please revert yourself now, as I am preparing the AN/I report. Jayjg ^(talk) 05:03, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

If you want to defend in front of WP:ANI that you can not be reverted for making an edit in the middle of a discussion, then I wish you good luck. Please post me a link as soon as you put it up. I can't escape the impression you are being a little too heated over this, though. Debresser (talk) 05:07, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Please also notice that I am no longer the only editor who thinks you are wrong. That is one of the reasons to wait for the outcome of a discussion. So that other people may voice their opinions and add new arguments . Debresser (talk) 05:13, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Zsero's comments are irrelevant, for obvious reasons. On the advice of a third party, I'm going to give you a day to restore the information you removed with the admin rollback. Think it over. Jayjg ^(talk) 05:18, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I will. Thank you. That surely will allow for continuous discussion as to the reliability of these sources, and help us calm down a little. I'll make an effort to find the pagenumbers. Debresser (talk) 05:31, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

The rollback feature is not an admin tool, and I am not an admin. And I have already appologised for making use of that tool. Although I would have done the same thing with a regular undo in any case. Debresser (talk) 05:32, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I still see no justification for removing all the material cited to Ehrlich. Nor do I see any reason why you couldn't return it, while retaining the blogs as sources. Not doing so is going to look very bad when this is reviewed. Jayjg ^(talk) 05:44, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Please also notice that a third editor has appeared who seems to agree with me. Debresser (talk) 05:34, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

There is one other uninvolved editor who agrees with you to a very limited extent. I still don't see anyone agreeing that Lipkin is reliable, and especially with removing the material from Ehrlich. Jayjg ^(talk) 05:44, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

{outdent} I do not see any obvious reason to discqualify Zsero's comments. I agree with restoring the material you added from Ehrlich. I would have done so myself (have to take care of the kids). It is not your additions I disagree with, only the deletion of what I consider to be good enough sources. I regret my hasty revert. I have a good idea on how to properly use them, and would appreciate it if you'd give me the chance to do so within the next few hours (after I see my children off to school). Debresser (talk) 06:02, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I find it odd that you were willing to quickly and repeatedly jump to the fairly absurd conclusion that I had a "COI", but fail to see why Zsero might be an involved editor in this instance. Jayjg ^(talk) 19:01, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I restored your text completely. Then added the blog as a second source (which seems reasonable to me, even though it is "only" a blog, because it says precisely the same things). Then I added the sentence "He made up two wills" and added a link to the pdf file and the book as places where these document can be found, but not as sources of information. I hope this is satifactory for you as well. BTW, I found out an unexpected way to retrieve the pagenumber: I called him. He'll be home tonight. Not that I know him, but I live in Israel anyways. Debresser (talk) 07:38, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for restoring my text. I have no objection to your added sentence. I'm still concerned about linking to the blog (or archive of the blog); the RS/N discussion by uninvolved editors is strongly against it as a reliable source. Jayjg ^(talk) 19:01, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I have had fierce disagreements with Zsero before, and I know he is a good and discerning editor. I agree with you that the blog is not a good source. But let me tell you frankly, that if we were to be serious about that, we would have to remove many many sources from Wikipedia. I hold the point of view (which is also in some part supported by the guidelines) that a blog is acceptable in certain cases (e.g. when the information is non-controversial). In this case, where the information in the blog is the same as in the other source (which, as you have seen, is also not accepted by all), I see no problem in having it as a second and secondary source. Let me call Lipkin now. Debresser (talk) 19:07, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Category:Incomplete media renaming requests

Hi there. You added {{cfr}} to this category but have not started a discussion on the categories for discussion page. Regards So Why 13:12, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. I tagged them in order to add them to the discussion at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_October_9#Category:Wikipedia_media_requiring_renaming, but forgot to fill that in. I have done so now. Thank you again for reminding me. Debresser (talk) 14:53, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Soft redirected cats

Yes should but see the discussion at User talk:R'n'B. Rich Farmbrough, 15:44, 12 October 2009 (UTC).

User_talk:R'n'B#Redirected_categories I am absolutely fine with you cleaning them up in the meanwhile. Just not sure whether to try and fix Russ's "other wikis" or write seom bot code to do the fixing myself. Rich Farmbrough, 15:59, 12 October 2009 (UTC).

Edit of the day

Congratulations! I knew there was a reason for my lack of progress in the world. Drmies (talk) 19:46, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

As you can see above, other users rather didn't seem to like this edit. Debresser (talk) 19:59, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Homelessness article

Hi. You removed the semi-protect on the Homelessness article. Is there any chance of extending it? It's been a real joy not having to revert out the constant vandalism and be able to work on real material for a change ! Best wishes. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc (talk) 19:50, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

I only removed the protected template, not the protection itself, which was set in this edit to expire yesterday automatically. If you notice vandalism returning, just post at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection. If the vandalism is too much, they will protect the article again. Debresser (talk) 20:03, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Hi. Thanks for your kind reply. The Homelessness article is an incessant target of vandalism which might be a societal sign of the times. Here's hoping against hope and history the vandalism won't come back in full force again. But if it does, I'll follow your directions. Best wishes and thanks. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc (talk) 20:31, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the guys at wp:rfp are not easily convinced that an article should be protected. Very stiff people. But if things become too bad, they will act. If it gives you any consolation, I summarily revert 10+ vandalism edits a day. Debresser (talk) 20:49, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Oh, I figured as much when I looked at the page link you sent me. It's somewhat understandable to be stiff about it, given the WP mission statement of ordo ab chao although officially denied. ;) It's a consolation, although a sad one, that you have to deal with vandalism too. It's so time consuming to revert out after firstly checking it out and seeing what else might have been vandalized in a sweep by an anonymous editor. Oh well, we'll cope. Many thanks for your kind help. Bests. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc (talk) 21:00, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Of course, two days after the semi-protect was removed, vandalism has begun again on the Homelessness article. [6] ... oh well. Bests. --- (Bob) Wikiklrsc (talk) 17:07, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Need to view deleted article

{{helpme}} I need to view a deleted article, Bayar(singer), see [7]. Can I get a copy here? If it has much of a history, perhaps it can be restored for some time? I am interested in the contents of an infobox, which I suspect was there. Debresser (talk) 08:31, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Userfied it to User:Debresser/Bayar(singer). Just use {{db-u1}} when you are done with it. Regards So Why 08:37, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you very much. I hadn't thought of userfying. Debresser (talk) 08:39, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

I found there precisely what I expected. And that confirmed what I suspected in the edit summary of this edit. Debresser (talk) 08:43, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Glad to hear it. If you need any other help, feel free to ask me at any time. Btw, how come you are not an admin to view that stuff yourself? ;-) Regards So Why 08:46, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Heh, that's what I was asking ... :) Amalthea 09:21, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Just yesterday had a conflict with somebody, see above. Nor do I believe in democracy. Debresser (talk) 09:46, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

List of FlashForward episodes

Re [8]: FYI, you could have pointed me to Wikipedia:Articles for creation/Redirects. I found it myself, but others in a similar situation might not and they depend on knowledgeable Wikipedians to point them to the right places. Please also note that, although I placed my request in the wrong place, it did not concern the unprotected page List of FlashForward episodes but instead the non-existent page Flashforward episodes -- which only registered accounts can create. And finally, <nowiki>'ing a template in order to deactivate is generally preferable over removing its code entirely. --87.79.191.75 (talk) 11:01, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

I did not know about Wikipedia:Articles for creation/Redirects, but I created the redirect now, see Flashforward episodes. I had understood your request as meaning something else.

In general we use {{Tlx}} to render an editprotected request inactive, but in this case, where it was out of place, I decided to remove it completely. Debresser (talk) 11:15, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Ok, thanks a bunch for creating the redirect. And now that you mention it, I remember Tlx'ing, you're quite right about that. --87.79.191.75 (talk) 11:24, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Strike to FC MVD Rossii Moscow

I stroke it because it was excluded from the league for the season and opponents are awarded automatic wins for the rest of the year. Geregen2 (talk) 14:40, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Other people started doing it before me for the teams excluded from the Russian Second Division (in the Template:Russian Second Division), so I figured that it's the established way to do it. Oh well. Geregen2 (talk) 14:49, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Re:Refrences

Your welcome. :) Can you explain better on the issue parameter thing? Thank you. :) – J U M P G U R U ^{■ask㋐㋜㋗■} 19:34, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm sorry can you explain that a bit better. :P – J U M P G U R U ^{■ask㋐㋜㋗■} 20:01, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Oh I get it. Never mind. :) – J U M P G U R U ^{■ask㋐㋜㋗■} 20:02, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Done. :D So how are you doing? :) – J U M P G U R U ^{■ask㋐㋜㋗■} 20:07, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

That's cool. So how do you know about Shōnen Book? I'm a collector of Jump, which that was a precursor to. :) – J U M P G U R U ^{■ask㋐㋜㋗■} 20:26, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

LOL May 1060 AD! XD Never heard of that issue! – J U M P G U R U ^{■ask㋐㋜㋗■} 20:58, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Pleased with this

{{Monthly clean up category}} no longer requires year and monthno parameters! See Category:Orphaned_articles_from_October_2009 for example. Rich Farmbrough, 21:00, 13 October 2009 (UTC).

Wow! Debresser (talk) 21:47, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Ah so there were very long pagenames I didn't know about. I nearly left an over-ride feature in, but it was easy enough to retrofit it. Rich Farmbrough, 23:45, 13 October 2009 (UTC).

Now I fixed the underlying functions to go to 100 characters... Rich Farmbrough, 01:09, 14 October 2009 (UTC).

Broken Coord

Hi. I'm trying to clear out Category:Coord template needing repair. Some change you made to User:Doco/sandbox/Infobox Ort in Deutschland is causing the instance of that template on User:Doco/sandbox/test2 to interpret

|lat_deg           = 53
|lat_min           = 28
|lon_deg           = 08
|lon_min           = 39

as 531°N 81°E. I'm not clear on the syntax,

{{Coorord|{{#if:{{{lat_min|}}}|<includeonly>|</includeonly>{{{lat_min|1}}}}}{{#if: {{{lat_sec|}}}|<includeonly>|</includeonly>{{{lat_sec|1}}}}}<includeonly>|</includeonly>N<includeonly>|</includeonly>{{{lon_deg|1}}}{{#if:{{{lon_min|}}}|<includeonly>|</includeonly>{{{lon_min|1}}}}}{{#if:{{{lon_sec|}}}|<includeonly>|</includeonly>{{{lon_sec|1}}}}}<includeonly>|</includeonly>E<includeonly>|</includeonly>type:{{#switch: {{{Art|}}}

but at a guess it's losing the minutes and appending the "1"s from the seconds to the degree values.

—WWoods (talk) 23:47, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm on it. My first edit made that a lot better, but still not perfect. At least it has the degrees normal now. The second one added the minutes also. And removed it from the error category. But added it to another error category. :) Debresser (talk) 00:14, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

{{!}} Rich Farmbrough, 01:34, 14 October 2009 (UTC).

Oh and you probably want to use Cord|1={lat_min}|2={ ... instead of un-numbered paramters. Rich Farmbrough, 01:36, 14 October 2009 (UTC).

IN fact, use that instead. Rich Farmbrough, 01:44, 14 October 2009 (UTC).

Fixed in the end through an improvement in {{Coord}}. Debresser (talk) 00:22, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism by Didiecunha

Shouldn't user Didiecunha finally be blocked due to his repeated vandalism? Pavel Modilaynen (talk) 06:02, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

I might actually agree with that, but Wikipedia policy is not to block that quickly. After all, he is making just a few of those edits a month, and it might be argued that he does so in good faith. Again, I personally am less patient, but that is the rule. If it would get worse, like when he would start an active edit war, then you could report him. But even then it would be hard to get him blocked indefinitely. We'll just have to live with him. At least post a warning on his talkpage, so that you may show afterwards that he had been warned. All the best, Debresser (talk) 11:40, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Re: Wait a second

Oh, I noticed that it was kept separate (I just nominated Category:Templates for deletion templates for merging, though). I've just been correcting links to the TFD page itself. Did I break a category link? If I did, it was an accident. Jafeluv (talk) 14:28, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Sure. I didn't mean to touch category links, only links to the main TFD page. Go ahead and revert if I messed up any category links. Jafeluv (talk) 14:33, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I'll withdraw it later if nobody argues to the contrary. I don't think speedily merging and redirecting it would be controversial. By the way, this was an accident – that's what you get for using the search tool without looking closely enough :) Thanks for correcting that. Jafeluv (talk) 14:41, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

That's fine by me. I see you've already moved the pages to the correct category. Good job. Jafeluv (talk) 16:03, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Category question

I am not good on categories, other than creating one occasionally but see you are active over on the Cats for discussion. I posted this to another editor but he seem not to be active right now, so maybe you can comment. I saw that Quadell was involved in the approval of Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/Erik9bot 9 and came across it tagging an article I watch with this category: Category:Articles lacking sources (Erik9bot). This seems quite odd because the owner is a blocked sock per the user page User:Erik9bot though the edit was made before the bot was blocked. So based on that should this category page even continue to exist? ww2censor (talk) 16:42, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Category:Articles lacking sources (Erik9bot) is a know category with the above mentioned bot actively populating it. This is no contradiction to User:Erik9bot being blocked as a sock-puppet. No problem here. Debresser (talk) 16:50, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

That was quick! Thanks for the info. ww2censor (talk) 16:56, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Erik9bot is blocked too. Rich Farmbrough, 17:01, 14 October 2009 (UTC).

And I am trying to empty the cat. 4000 gone so far. Rich Farmbrough, 17:02, 14 October 2009 (UTC).

Favicons

#25 is the Dust Puppy from the webcomic User Friendly. DS (talk) 22:28, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

#22 is the Neowin logo. --Bsa dow ski1 22:45, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

#7 might have been the old radioshack one. — Jake Wartenberg 22:47, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you! You must have gone there together, because I hardly ever get any responses about my favicons. Which makes it an all the more pleasant surprise. Is there any way to verify if #7 is indeed the old Radioshack icon? Debresser (talk) 23:08, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

RE

Sorry, I saw that he replaced own with socialist, my imediate guess was that this was vandalism. If you want you can revert it.--Coldplay Expert 23:19, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

Template:Blpwatch

Problem? The template appears to be both unused and related to an inactive proposal. "Oh boy..." is not the most constructive of edit summaries. PC78 (talk) 13:05, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

I'd have expected an editor who feels he can decide on deprecation of templates to know that he should use {{Tdeprecated}} and to remove the protection template. That is what I meant. I have no problem with the deprecation per se. Debresser (talk) 13:09, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Erm, no. {{tdeprecated}} is for depreacted templates that have been replaced and are still in use or have historical value; if you look at the documentation you'll see that you're using it incorrectly. Since I believe this template meets neither of these criteria, {{deprecated}} was an appripriate tag to use. If you have no problem with deprecation, I assume it's deletion that you're opposed to, otherwise you really will have me confused. PC78 (talk) 23:28, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Chabad's work to help the Cantonist's

Hi Dovid, would you be able to comment here: Talk:Cantonist#Yohanan_Petrovsky-Shtern_on_Rabbi_Schneersohn

Thanks Shlomke (talk) 15:44, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Done. A clear case of POV pushing. And a source who engages in "bad science". Debresser (talk) 21:06, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

And an irritatingly immature editor opposing. Debresser (talk) 13:58, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Total Drama Action template

I found that template on discussion page about deleting the "future templates". Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Deprecating "Future" templates tablo (talk) 23:14, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Historical

I have marked Wikipedia:List of monthly maintenance categories as historical. The 5 reasons for its existence are all moot or better served elsewhere. Rich Farmbrough, 15:30, 17 October 2009 (UTC).

Merger

It would be great if you could help with this. Let me know if you need any help. Plastikspork _―Œ^(talk) 17:27, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

It turns out there was only one transclusion of "Infobox NFL coach", so I just converted that one to use "player coach", and redirected "coach" to "player coach". I'm not sure if someone else helped out by reducing the number of transclusions, but in the end it wasn't that big of a task (for me). Thanks. Plastikspork _―Œ^(talk) 20:19, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Starting a sentence with a conjunction

I don't know what favor the debates are tipping in, but I have heard that people are beginning to claim that starting sentences with conjunctions is grammatically correct. I believe that Wikipedia should continue to follow the rule that sentences can not start with conjunctions, and agree with you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.184.200.190 (talk) 18:12, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but I have no idea what you are referring to. Debresser (talk) 18:22, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

List of Nobel Peace Prize laureates

Hello, Debresser. This message is being sent to inform you that there currently is a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you. Celestra (talk) 22:39, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

RE: Broken reference

Fixed; thanks a bunch for bringing it to my attention :). Ironholds (talk) 11:14, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks to you for fixing it. Debresser (talk) 11:46, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Issue you fixed with Fort Lauderdale temple

This edit you made is to fix a problem with the transcluding of the article. Could you help me understand what was happening before you made the change because the same problem should be occuring and need to be fixed on the other temple articles announced on 3 October 2009, except for Brigham City - because they use the named reference like Ft. Lauderdale did before your edit. TIA 68.210.58.148 (talk) 12:40, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Of course. The template contains a reference. Which is copied onto all pages using the template. The reference was broken, i.e. had no content. On pages that already have a reference with the same name, that will not be a problem, but on pages that do not, it will leave them with a broken reference and add them to the appropriate error category. The easy way out is to have the full reference in the template. Debresser (talk) 13:21, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

This may be appropriate. Hope it helps!

— ^.`^) Paine Ellsworth ^diss`cuss (^^`. 13:59, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Actually no need in this specific case, probably because of the <pre> tags. I don't really understand why. I am already happy to know it is working now. :) Debresser (talk) 14:02, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Since it isn't needed in this case, I've removed the change so that on List of temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints page the 5 temples announced on Oct 3rd all use the same reference, and the same article isn't in multiple footnotes. 68.210.58.148 (talk) 15:03, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

PS - there is no need for the reference to work on {{LDS Temple/Fort Lauderdale Florida Temple}} page because the reference is meant to be used on the pages on which the template is transcluded - <includeonly> tags could be placed around the reference - but there really is no need since the purpose of {{LDS Temple/Fort Lauderdale Florida Temple}} is to gather the data into one location and not to be viewed seperately including the references. 68.210.58.148 (talk) 15:05, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Blog reference again

The consensus at WP:RS/N was clear, notwithstanding the opinions of movement members on the article Talk: page. Please remove the link, or I'll take it to AN/I. I'll give you a few minutes to think it over. Jayjg ^(talk) 20:15, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

I am none too pleased with an ultimatum, but anyway... you can have another look at that discussion. Even though most of the editors there do not think the blog can be accepted, there are many who say that the copies can be relied on. Add to that all those who have this opinion on the talkpage, and I see no consensus for what you did. Note that I reverted only that half of your edit. If you want to take this to wp:ani, go ahead. I am sure I have not overstepped any bounderies here. Your assertion of consensus is disputable. Debresser (talk) 20:21, 18 October 2009 (UTC)

Template_talk:Citation#Full_stop_at_the_end_of_the_template_2

Aaand you're on: Template talk:Citation#Full stop at the end of the template 2. Amalthea 18:34, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Administrator instructions

Did I do something wrong? • Anakin ^(talk) 19:04, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

No. I just restored the capitals at the beginning of the names of templates. Not a big deal at all. I marked the edit as minor, didn't I? Debresser (talk) 19:11, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Okay. It's just that you told me to be careful, and you have a userbox which says "This user thinks that if it ain't broke, don't fix it". But fair enough. • Anakin ^(talk) 19:17, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I'll remove that box. Thank you. Actually this is part of a purposefull effort of mine to educate people to use capitals in the names of templates (since they are there). So on all Wikipedia pages and in template documentation we should be careful to add them. Debresser (talk) 19:21, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I respectfully disagree. Per $wgCapitalLinks, whichever way you link they're treated identically by the software. It's a matter of style / convention / convenience whether people should manually capitalise the first letter or not. Anything else is WP:CREEP. • Anakin ^(talk) 19:45, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Agree. Which is why I didn't write you about it. Nor did I leave any instructions. I just try to give an example. In this specific case there was also the argument of consistency. Debresser (talk) 20:30, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Your comment on an open category discussion

I had made a nomination to rename a country-specific ship category to match the country's article, here. After you opposed the nomination, I replied to clarify—I had hoped—the reason for the nomination. On the off chance you might not have seen the comment, could I impose upon you to read it and reconsider your opinion? (If you've already seen the comment and it did not sway your opinion, my apologies for this notice.) Many thanks in advance. — Bellhalla (talk) 19:27, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for drawing my attention to your reply. I had not seen it, since I do not regularly follow up on discussions. I have replied there that you have persuaded me in part. If you want to add arguments there, please keep me posted. Debresser (talk) 19:34, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

I responded to your question there. Let me know if you have any other questions. Thanks! — Bellhalla (talk) 20:53, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. You'll no doubt be pleased to see that I have now agreed with the nomination. Debresser (talk) 20:57, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Allied Artists International

An article that you have been involved in editing, Allied Artists International, has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Allied Artists International. Thank you.

Please contact me if you're unsure why you received this message. -- Tom N (tcncv) talk/contrib 01:03, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for this notification. I just hopped in on a regular wikignoming round, so I don't think I'll add my opinion there. Debresser (talk) 09:54, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Barret v Obama ref fix

Thanks for fixing that reference - threw it in there kinda quick, wasn't totally sure what to include and then ran out of time to do anything with it. Appreciate you handling it. Ravensfire (talk) 16:25, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

It was my pleasure. Debresser (talk) 21:02, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Hoedown Throwdown ref fix

Thank you for bringing the broken reference in Hoedown Throwdown to my attention, as well as the fact it had been fixed! Liquidluck (talk) 23:24, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for caring. Debresser (talk) 23:26, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

fyi

WRT Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2009_October_12#Category:Pashtun_Taliban_leaders, I informed the administrator who closed the discussion of half a dozen exceptions.

Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 14:10, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for being so conscientious. Debresser (talk) 16:06, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Citation templates

Since you've been working on some of the citation templates lately, might you have a moment or so to have a look over {{cite IETF}} before we begin deploying it? Other than a lack of examples showing more of the template's features, I think it is about ready for real use. --Tothwolf (talk) 17:03, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

If you have a look at Template:Cite IETF/testcases, you'll see something is very much wrong with the archive parameters. Let me try to fix it. Debresser (talk) 17:43, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Done That one line did it. I'd also advise you to get semi-protection for the template as soon as it is used on 50-100 pages. Debresser (talk) 17:49, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

You may want to remove my testcases from the testcases page after you had a look. Debresser (talk) 17:51, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

That's odd because it was set up to use OriginalURL. I'll have a look at the meta template and see what the deal is. --Tothwolf (talk) 19:30, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Looking at the source for {{Citation/core}} I can certainly see how it works. I'm not sure how that parameter got left out but at least it got caught before someone who needed to use it noticed. I'm not too worried about the semi-protection as I've done that with other templates in the past too. I'm expecting no more than 3000-5000 transclusions based just on link searches so semi-protection will certainly be required but I don't think it will need full protection unless it becomes a problem. --Tothwolf (talk) 20:06, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Congratulations on a nice template. Don't forget to add it to the list in Template:Citation/core/doc. Debresser (talk) 20:08, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Will do, I was just waiting until it had been tested more before listing it there. --Tothwolf (talk) 20:50, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Help! (again)

Hello,

You were kind enough to have helped me fix an edit error in the past, and I was hoping you could do it again. I messed up on an edit to the Joseph Payne Brennan article. My attempt at fixing some minor flaws in the article resulted in my deleting much of the end of it. And, as you can see from its edits history, I tried to undo it; but for some reason my attempt failed. Now I'm stumped. Would you fix it for me? Thank you for you patience. -- Michael David (talk) 22:05, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Please disregard this message. I appears that someone else was able to undo my edit. Thanks, and be well. -- Michael David (talk) 22:36, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Ok. I would have been happy to help, but I was busy keeping the Shabbath. Glad it's fixed already. Debresser (talk) 17:10, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Template loops

Hi Debresser Sorry for removing Category:Wikipedia template cleanup from Category:Template loop warnings. I have a problem in infobox Template. Then I got help Fleetflame (#wikipedia-en-help-free nodeWeb IRC) and solve the problem. Next time i will be careful. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Annilkhan (talk • contribs) 19:32, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

He, no problem, my friend. Debresser (talk) 19:40, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Requested Template

This user likes to sleep.

(use Edit and copy/paste to your user page) _{Guy M | Talk} 04:02, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

T3

Thanks for fixing the template, I had copy pasted the template and didn't think to remove the parameters. I'm not sure why the time wasn't working though, that may be an issue with a change to T3 that hasn't been caught by Twinkle.--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 18:11, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Looks like Prodego doesn't think these need further discussion, no idea why.--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 19:16, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Don't argue with Prodego over it, it's no big deal. See e-mail.--Doug.^{(talk • contribs)} 22:09, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Speedy CfD question

So here's a hypothetical for you to consider with the "new"/old #4. Take a look at Category:Treaties by country. The subcategories are always "Treaties of FOO". Then look at Category:Peace treaties. Some are "Peace treaties of FOO" but most are "FOOian peace treaties". Can I speedily nominate the "FOOian peace treaties" ones one the basis that the vast majority of treaties categories are "treaties of FOO", or do I have to go through a full CfD since a majority of the peace treaties ones are in the FOOian format? Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 06:45, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

In my understanding each parent category has to be considered separately.

Meaning in this case that changing those two that are in the "Peace treaties of FOO" format should be a speedy, but changing the vast majority from its "FOOian peace treaties" format would definitely be a full Cfd.

But you shouldn't ask me. Ask on Wikipedia_talk:Categories_for_discussion#Speedy_rename_-_Criterion_4. Debresser (talk) 12:49, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

What you've said was my sense too. I just wanted to check that I wasn't being overly restrictive in my interpretation out of habit. Thanks, Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 21:49, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Log/2009 October 20#Rulers in Europe by century

This CfD has genarated a lot of talk but only one vote. Nor has anyone proposed an alternative to my proposal. Please read and consider voting. Thanks. ^{Carlaude:Talk} 15:07, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

I saw it before and didn't make up my mind. Now I have looked again, and more thoroughly, and have left my opinion. Thank you for bringing this to my attention. Debresser (talk) 20:54, 27 October 2009 (UTC)