User talk:Hersfold/Archive 15 (March 2008)

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This page contains discussions dated during the month of March 2008 from User talk:Hersfold. Please direct all current discussions there. Thank you.


March 1 - 10

Wikipedia:Ribbons

Hi. In Wikipedia:Barnstars, there is a barnstar (the "Barnstar of Peace") that doesn't have a ribbon to match it. I tried to get in contact with the creating user, the one who introduced it, but he was blocked. Because you're still here, and you created the barnstar, I ws wondering if you could create a matching ribbon. --Delta1989 (talk) 12:50, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

I certainly can, however I won't be able to get to it for several hours - I'll try to make sure to send you a link sometime tonight, but I may not be able to finish until Sunday. Sorry. Hersfold (t/a/c) 17:57, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Perfectly fine! However, I didn't know that you've responded until just now; if you could post a response on my talk page, that would be great. --Delta1989 (talk) 20:53, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Oh, I'm sorry - I usually do copy my replies to other pages. Just to keep you up to date, I'm about to head to dinner - once I'm back, I'll get to work on the ribbon. Until then, Hersfold (t/a/c) 22:46, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok, the ribbon is done at last! Here you go: Enjoy! Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:50, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

The Graphic Designer's Barnstar
Well done! For creating the Ribbon of Peace, you have earned the Graphic Designer's Barnstar. (I could not find a ribbon for it.) --Delta1989 (talk) 02:53, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, Delta. It's really not a big deal - designing these images is something I enjoy doing, and the way I have my ribbons set up it's not that much work either. Still, it's an honor to have my services requested. Thanks again. Hersfold (t/a/c) 03:14, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Ribbon numeral 7

I need a ribbon numeral 5 for my ribbons. How do you put them on top? George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp 20:59, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

No, sorry, it's a 6 I need. George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp 21:05, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
I'm sorry to keep pestering you but I've just got another one so I need a 7 now. George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp 21:11, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
You need a seven??? Ok, I'll get it as soon as I get back from dinner. Just so you know, however, the ribbon you are using for your hidden page barnstars is actually intended to represent the Invisible Barnstar, a different award. You may want to use the placeholder ribbon instead. Hersfold (t/a/c) 22:50, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Oh, thanks. I've changed it now, it was the closest I could find. Thanks in advance for the seven. George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp 22:54, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
The numerals are finished - since I had to do three of them anyway, I just went ahead and finished the series, making a star to represent ten or more of the same award. I also had a request for another ribbon at about the same time, so I also designed a ribbon for the hidden barnstar while I had the template open. Here's the ribbon, and the necessary code to overlay the number. Enjoy! Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:56, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

P.S. - If you rearrange your user page, you may need to adjust where the number is located to avoid leaving a great white footprint behind (see WP:RIBBON for an example of what I'm talking about). If that's the case, just tweak the numbers in the code there. It may take a few hits of the preview button to get right, but it's easy enough to figure out by testing. Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:56, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp 08:56, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Adoption courses

Hey, I was looking over the vandalism lessons and noticed that it does not state anything in regards to users removing warning templates from their talk page. I went ahead and added it, just thinking that you you may want to know. (By the way, those are really well written courses). Tiptoety talk 02:41, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I probably should put that in there somewhere, that's a good point. Thanks! Hersfold (t/a/c) 03:10, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, i did not even think about it until both of my adoptee's asked about it. Tiptoety talk 03:12, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Adminship

I can't believe you're not an administrator! You deserve the mop and if you want I'll nominate you, you'd pass easily! George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp 22:41, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

The Graphic Designer's Barnstar
For making the ribbon and numerals I needed so quickly. George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp 22:48, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I believe I'm going to go for an RfA sometime in the near future - an administrator who participated in my last two RfAs has also offered to nominate me, and is more or less waiting for me to give him to go-ahead, I think. I will certainly let you know when that happens, however - it's not at all uncommon for there to be co-nominations and I would be honored to have your support.
As for the barnstar, however, I feel obligated to decline. While you are very welcome for the ribbon & numerals, and I do thank you for the award, three of the last four barnstars I've been given were given for almost precisely the same reason, the last one being awarded just last night. I'll add your reason along with that barnstar, but I won't take the credit for being awarded an additional star. Thank you very much all the same. Hersfold (t/a/c) 23:48, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Hey there.

I've reverted your inclusion of the suspect's name in the article and I will ask you not to put it back in. I appreciate where you are coming from, and your point about censorship does not fall on deaf ears... but I think that concerns of basic human dignity, the fact that the suspect is a minor, and the fact that he is only a suspect should override.

Since removing the suspect's name does not loose any useful context from the article, we should err on the side of caution. Wikipedia has a great deal of exposure and publicizing the suspect's name— even if it is available elsewhere— can serve no encyclopedic purpose at this time, and may well cause a great deal of harm to the suspect (who, I should remind you, must still be presumed innocent) and their family.

I hope you understand why I'm taking a hardball stance on this. — Coren (talk) 01:23, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

It seems there is a slight misunderstanding - I've never edited that article, I simply offered the opinion on the Help Desk that the name should be included. I do understand your point, and hopefully the ongoing discussions (and criminal trials) will sort this out. Thanks for the update, though. Hersfold (t/a/c) 05:27, 4 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, it does seem that I have managed to confuse your statement on the talk page with the actual reintroduction of the name.  :-) Ignore me. — Coren (talk) 17:56, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Archived Dispute Template

Hey, I asked about this template on the Help Desk a few days ago and you helped me. You pointed me towards {{Closed}}. I appreciate your help, but I just found the one I was looking for and thought I might drop you a line in case this question ever comes up again. {{polltop}} is the one I remembered. Thanks for helping though! Deflagro C/T 03:00, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Ah, ok then. My apologies, but I'm glad you were able to find what you were looking for. Thanks for the tip! Hersfold (t/a/c) 05:29, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Signpost updated for March 3rd, 2008.

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Maybe you can help

I see you are a template guru, so maybe you can help me. I posted a request for some help here with this template but no one has responded yet. Now I notice a problem with the display of the Portal:Philately where I have used the template. It causes the portal page to display narrow and the template itself is messed up but used elsewhere is displays fine. I hope it is not a problem with the portal itself. Any chance you can have a look or advise me on who to ask. ww2censor (talk) 21:52, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm taking a look at it now. I don't guarantee anything, but hopefully I'll at least be able to fix the display issues. I've already figured out what is causing the problem, I just have to figure out why. Hersfold (t/a/c) 23:00, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
Update: The display error you noticed on the Portal has been fixed. That problem was (it seems) caused by the slew of <div> tags that were present in the navbox - a lot of those tags never got closed off with a corresponding </div>, and so the combined effect was messing up the portal. It's hard to predict what unclosed tags like that will do when interacting with other code, especially when you have a bunch of templates hiding the actual code used.
Anyway, I've pulled out all those div's and fixed the template so that it still looks the same. The Navbox template seems to want all the list content on one line, so I cheated the code to make it think that was happening with comments. I'm going to try to fix the subgroups now - hopefully it's something similar, but we'll see. At least the big issue is fixed. Hersfold (t/a/c) 23:31, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
 Done That actually was pretty easy - the subgroups were all missing the bodystyle= and groupstyle= parameters, so they were completely unformatted and free to do whatever they felt like. Since computers, when left to their own devices, will always contrive to do the most annoying thing possible, they naturally went all over the place. Now that we've told them what to do, they are finally cooperating, and your navbox is fixed. Enjoy. Hersfold (t/a/c) 23:43, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
Wow, less than 2 hours and everything is fixed already - that's one of the great things about Wikipedia - real help when you really need it, usually. Thanks very much. BTW, what do you think of the template? It was a real mess previously but I think it can now grow without getting so overcrowded looking but all suggestions are welcome. Cheers and thanks again. ww2censor (talk) 23:52, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
Holy crap. Never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever put the template back to the way it was. I almost had a seizure. Wow. (That was a joke, but yes, that was one ugly template)
I think the way you have it right now is quite good. If I could recommend one thing, it would be to make the map you have at the top into an imagemap of links somehow, just to give the image some purpose. I don't know if it's feasible with your topic to make "Postage stamps and postal history of <CONTINENT>" articles, but those would work well with the map. But in general, well done! I don't think there's any better way to organize the template. Hersfold (t/a/c) 01:46, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

I was not intending to do that!! I did see imagemaps mentioned but doubt it would work for stamp issuing entities because individual countries would be so small to click on and there are no continental articles, nor do I ever see any happening. It is not really logical to group many of these together. Also many entities exist for previous countries and territories that have different postal authorities now, making selecting from a map a difficult task especially due to possible same locations for two different articles. I did have the map at the right but thought it took up too much space so placed it into the "above" section. Anyway, thanks for you work. Cheers ww2censor (talk) 02:56, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Asking a small favour

I saw that you help newcomers. I am new and would also like help with making my talk page a bit more... how shall you say... attractive. Please reply on my talk page ASAP. Thank you! Chimchar monferno (talk) 04:48, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

I usually help newcomers get going with encyclopedia-related things, but I'd be willing to give it a shot. What sort of "attractiveness" are you looking for? Just a header like I've got, or something a little more fancy like what is at User_talk:WBOSITG? Hersfold (t/a/c) 11:28, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
From the reply on my talk page.:
So far, I'm okay with the the yellow box about leaving me a message and such. However, I really need help with my Menu bar. As you can see, I tried coping the code from Stwalkerster's talk page, but I failed. That's what I kinda want the most right now. All I need are talk page buttons, the contributions buttons, and the user page buttons. Please inlude the words underneath. Chimchar monferno (talk) 03:02, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
You actually had it really close - what I did just now was a little cleanup of the code, and that was enough to make the background of the one image go back to transparent like it was supposed to be. If you'd like, I can set it up so that you can have that same menu displayed on your talk page. Hersfold (t/a/c) 04:31, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks for the help on the deletion thingy. I had proposed other schools for deletion before, and people always said delete and redirect, so I figured I would cut to the redirect chase but didnt really know how to do that correctly. Thanks for clarifying though. --DerRichter (talk) 07:58, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

You're quite welcome. I think I actually may have misspoken somewhat - in some rare cases, pages are deleted and then redirected, but usually in those cases the original page is complete vandalism or has absolutely nothing useful aside from the title. In general, though, we try to save whatever we can. Although in this case it was a little bit difficult. Hersfold (t/a/c) 14:55, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

It was a mistake. I think what happened is that I did a different editprotected, but marked the wrong one as done. I've made the change now, anyway. --ais523 15:34, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Ah, ok. Thanks! Unfortunately, I just realized I messed up the code - the category link should be displayed as this: [[:{{{category}}}|Redirect]] so that the link actually appears. Otherwise we just get this gray box with no words in it (see Talk:6.5x39mm). If you wouldn't mind fixing it again.... Sorry! Hersfold (t/a/c) 15:52, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, I should really have noticed that... --ais523 15:56, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Haha

Nice job creating the article that I approved. *cough* ;) Nousernamesleftcopper, not wood 00:53, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Yeah - the script edit conflicted, but somehow I beat you to the actual article. That was odd. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:54, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

DC Meetup on May 17th

Your help is needed in planning Wikipedia:Meetup/DC 4! Any comments or suggestions you have are greatly appreciated. The Placebo Effect (talk) 19:12, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

THANKS!!!!!

The Original Barnstar
Thanks for the assessment help with the code, it works! I was a bit confused!! Fattyjwoods (Push my button) 02:02, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
You're quite welcome, glad I could help. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 02:09, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, um could I just ask a for a little thing? I would like to put the importance (top, high, mid, low) bit on as well. And Im not sure how. Could you add to it? Fattyjwoods (Push my button) 02:10, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Sure. I'll make the changes to the template now, as well as add some documentation in for you. Hersfold (t/a/c) 02:13, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks Again! Fattyjwoods (Push my button) 06:35, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
PS, I've been checking out your contributions - they've been all quite good. So when your edit count gets higher I might nominate you as an RFA. (Just to let you know) :} Fattyjwoods (Push my button) 07:04, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

AFC FA-FL drive?

See here. Nousernamesleftcopper, not wood 03:53, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

RFA

Hi Hersfold! As discussed ... sorry it took me a day or four to put together:

The RFA is done, all you need to do is sign it and then feel free to add it to the main RFA page (see here for precise instructions if you need them). Drop me a note when you have opened it - I am positive it'll be okay this time. Good luck! Neıl 15:01, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much, Neil! I've got a few people who have offered to co-nominate me in the past few days - I'll let them get their statements up, and then it should be ready to open. Thank you very much for the glowing introduction! Hersfold (t/a/c) 15:56, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
My pleasure. Neıl 18:06, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Barnstar

Thanks for the Barnstar! Much appreciated.--Torchwood Who? (talk) 20:34, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Length of Titles / Curious

I noticed in your edit summary on Night of Dawn of the yada yada movie that you questioned how the article's title could be within length restrictions. I wasn't aware there was actually a limit on title length. Is there a resource that talks about it? Also, just because it's somewhat related, do you know if there's a limit on the byte size an article can be?--Torchwood Who? (talk) 20:46, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

There is a limit on article length - I can't remember the name of it, but there's some article on a chemical compound that has an ellipsis in it because it's over 400 letters long, and a title can only be 255 letters long (see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (technical restrictions)). As for article length, the answer is "sort of". There is an eventual limit as to how much text you can include, but your internet connection would blow up before you could finish saving the page. When you include templates, though, the software will eventually stop transcluding templates because there isn't enough room to store their content. For that, and how to avoid it, you can see Wikipedia:Template limits. Hersfold (t/a/c) 20:54, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Interesting. I had wondered about the article length question because I wondered if there was a built-in limiter to ensure that people couldn't paste in an endless string of garbage characters. I've used the article export tool before and found that I that I have to break up the files in a text editor in order to import to certain other wikis. In fairness some of these export files are in excess of 50MB. Thanks for pointing out the technical manual and your edit summaries aren't going anywhere near too far, this one just caught my eye.--Torchwood Who? (talk) 21:03, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
Those are some pretty big exports - glad to help, and thanks for the reply. Hersfold (t/a/c) 21:10, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

UMBC

If I went there, I wouldn't need to sneak into the gym. Keepscases (talk) 23:07, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

A good call indeed. Your secret is safe with me. And the rest of the RfA, I guess... :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 23:10, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

March 11 - 20

Re: RFA

Nicely done! I added a couple more, but regardless, I've supported. Good luck! - Milk's Favorite Cookie 01:27, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks very much! I'll respond to them in just a second - right in the middle of a Help Desk thing. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 01:28, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
 Done and good luck. Fattyjwoods (Push my button) 03:01, 11 March 2008 (UTC)
Unfortunately, after you answered my other questions, I can't support. I have to strong support. Nicely done! :) - Milk's Favorite Cookie 20:06, 11 March 2008 (UTC)


The saga continues

See my talk page. I was nice this time :) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.238.172.212 (talk) 21:48, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

So it was. I'll post a reply in just a second, thanks for the update. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 22:02, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

No GNUs is good gnus

WikiThanks
WikiThanks

Thanks for describing my rationale as humorous but accurate. I guess that's precisely what I was aiming for. I expected (perhaps wrongly) that one to get a bit heated so thought I'd try pre-emptively lightening the mood (plus it was a sitting duck I couldn't resist). I'll try have a look at your RfA later on, but work calls now. Regards, Qwfp (talk) 15:39, 12 March 2008 (UTC) (PS even your lowres user page is slightly too wide for my laptop's 1024×768 screen in IE7 with the default textsize and skin).

Quite welcome - it's good to have a sense of humor about these things at times for just that reason. As for the lowres thing, I can't really make it much smaller without causing the ribbons from my awards page to go all over the place, and making them much smaller means they look funny on the full size. Sorry, hopefully it's not too bad. Hersfold (t/a/c) 15:46, 12 March 2008 (UTC)
Ah, the perils of having too many awards... I quite understand, it's been awfully windy this side of the pond too just recently and it does tend to play havoc with one's pectoral adornments. Don't worry, it doesn't look too bad, it's only the last couple of letters that go off the side unless I scroll sideways. Now I really must get back to work... Qwfp (talk) 15:58, 12 March 2008 (UTC) PS I had actually closed my browser then someone went and sent me a (genuinely) work-related email with a wikipedia URL in it....

I have hastily knocked together a sample treatment of an alternative format for the aforementioned page and posted it to the article's talk page. As you have weighed in on the previous version, I would invite your comments on the alternate I am proposing. Do you think this would make the page more worth keeping? Is it worth the effort to redo the whole page? Is the whole concept a lost cause? Inquiring minds want to know. OlenWhitakertalk to me or don't • ♣ 20:26, 12 March 2008 (UTC) 20:26, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

I've replied on the talk page and changed my opinion to strong keep. Well done! Hersfold (t/a/c) 20:33, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

I please you to make the template be able to have two different maps and two captions too as the template for countries has. Please!! It is necessary! Dimboukas (talk) 20:30, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I've updated the code, and the documentation. Here's the additional code you'll need to stick in:
|image_map2 = Example.jpg
|image_map2_caption = Heeere's Johnny!
It should work without blowing anything else up, I've already checked it in my sandbox and in an article that's not using a double map. Enjoy. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 20:53, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks!!Dimboukas (talk) 20:54, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Your much appreciated advice to a new user

Hi, Hersfold. I just wanted to copy this message, with some additions, from my talk pages, to be sure you got both my thanks for your speedy and friendly help on my question as well as my further thoughts and questions (I hope that I have done this correctly!). My original response is copied below, but since writing it I have thought of this further question: Was the nature of my participation in the debate in question in any way objectionable, or was it merely the newness of my account? I tried, to the best of my ability, to research the relevant policies, and to be conscientiously polite and respectful to other members, and I was also careful not simply to restate opinions that were being raised by other users, which I understand is a frequent complaint about the nature of new users' participation in these sorts of debates. Also, I am curious about why it is that vote to keep articles are considered more suspect than votes to delete when they come from new users? Anyway, many thanks for your guidance! The following is the original response.--Porpentine (talk) 05:00, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your speedy and very informative response, Hersfold. I want to make sure I understand you correctly: are there certain sections of Wikipedia (like deletion votes) in which it is considered inappropriate for new users to participate? If so, shouldn't that be clearly labeled at the top of discussion so that users like me don't feel stigmatized for the fact that they have an opinion as readers of Wikipedia about what should be included (although surely that opinion should be valuable as well as the long-time editors?)? I was led to the article by the fact that I have a distant connection to a very large community to whom the figure under discussion was very notable indeed, and was extremely surprised to see it nominated for deletion, so I thought (perhaps incorrectly?) that this was a good place to start my editing career. I had thought that deletion debates were increasingly a subject of interest to newcomers, who often feel a vested interest in maintaining a wikipedia that is as expansive in its bounds as possible. The source of my impression was this article in the New York Review of Books [1], which surely led many new users to join in deletion debates because of its sympathetic portrayal of that side of the debate. I am afraid that the knowledge that there are sections of wikipedia in which I, as a new editor, am not welcome (and the fact that there is no way I can see that I could have anticipated the suspicion I was greeted with when I tried to participate by presenting new points of view in a polite manner) makes me feel very reluctant to try my hand at editing again. On the other hand, I feel reluctant to confirm the suspicions that I was a mere single-purpose editor, so I feel caught between the rock of having had a very unpleasant first experience and the hard place of wanting to disprove the negative stereotypes that were applied to me.--Porpentine (talk) 05:00, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Sorry for the long delay, I just got out of an exam. I'll answer your second questions first, since they were asked first.
  • There is a section on the AfD main page that addresses the problems of being a new contributor in a discussion, under "How to discuss an AfD": "Unregistered or new users are welcome to contribute to the discussion, but their recommendations may be discounted, especially if they seem to be made in bad faith (for example, if they misrepresent their reasons). Conversely, the opinions of logged in users whose accounts predate the article's AfD nomination are given more weight." I do admit it's not easy to find, but we do expect that people read instructions before participating, even though we know nobody actually does it. As for other areas that experienced editors are expected, there aren't any others that are immediately coming to mind - input from a wide range of editors is important in all of our discussions, and the only reason we get paranoid at Articles for Deletion is because of the way this has been abused in the past. However, please feel free to participate wherever you'd like. As I said, this in no way reflects poorly on your standing as an editor here - if you continue to edit, there will be no reason for anyone to make that sort of claim against you again.
  • The main objection was the newness of your account. Your argument, while it didn't completely relate to policy, was well reasoned and you did a good job in defending it. It was the fact that your first and only edits had been to that debate was what aroused suspicion.
  • Votes (or what we more properly call "not votes" or "!votes", since the decision is made on consensus and not simple voting) from new users are looked at just as critically no matter what the opinion is. We just happen to see a lot more sockpuppets voting to keep an article, because they're often created by the author of a page who doesn't understand policy and wants their page to be kept. We do get sockpuppets for all opinions, however, and occasionally a sockpuppet will be created for the sole purpose of advocating the opposite view of its creator, so that the creator's main account can throughly bash every point it makes to make their own argument stronger. Either way, it doesn't work very well.
I hope this helps to answer your questions. Let me know if you need more help. Hersfold (t/a/c) 18:02, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi i have a problem and you answered

Hi, i am user happyapple. I am not new to wikipedia, i am some old though.

Basically what i want to ask it is.

How could i denounce the abuse of power an specific administrator?.

I dont know if i am explaining myself correctly, but i recently posted this on Mediation cabal. But i think it would take long time until i find answer. Anyways i would like to know what i can do to find an advocate. Because really feel very frightened regarding that issue. I think it is very serious. --HappyApple (talk) 12:03, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

It looks like you've got things fairly well settled over at the Cabal. Unfortunately, if this is happening on the Spanish Wikipedia, there may not be that much we can do. Each language of Wikipedia operates independently from the others, with differing policies and means of enforcing them. I'm sure the Cabal will help you out as much as they can, but I am afraid that's all we'll be able to do here. Hersfold (t/a/c) 18:08, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Hi, sorry for doing that, but i had decided to walk away from my case and i requested it to be closed on Cabal mediation discussion page. --HappyApple (talk) 07:29, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Commons picture edit

Hi Hersfold, Thanks for the help on my talkpage. I do have an account on the Commons, that is no problem. The problem is to get to the scripts to be able to modify them. If this is not possible I can see only two solutions: 1. to give a list of dictionary translations under the drawing, or 2. to download the picture onto my pc and use my photo imaging software to rub out the writing, substitute it and upload it again as a new Commons document. The first one is a bit clumsy, the second too onerous. Can you think of something else? Regards, LouisBB (talk) 05:50, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

The only way to edit a picture is to edit it on your computer and re-upload it. If your intention is to provide dictionary translations, then it may be easier to simply edit the description page, but that's the only means I see to get around it. Sorry. Hersfold (t/a/c) 22:21, 15 March 2008 (UTC)


Many thanks Brett, for your efforts. (Sorry for the slipup with your name)


I've put a dictionary translation list under one of the diagrammatic drawings I wanted to re-script, but its use will be awkward.
I've copied another one onto my computer, printed it and scanned it to get an editable picture. I've managed to wipe out painstakingly the script, except that which was on a non-white background for which I could not find matching colour.
Unfortunately the picture edit programme does not write vertical text, so I'll have to re-copy it onto an MS Word file and use the Paint programme. When all that is done I'll have to upload it.
If you really cannot think of anything faster (and no other helper bothered to reply, perhaps they agree with you) then either I'll have to carry out all that or leave the text in English and let the poor old guys find the meanings of the rather difficult technical terms. Hard luck for them. Thanks again. LouisBB (talk) 04:59, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

GA Review of Bertrand Russell

Hi there!

I'm reviewing the aforementioned article, which you nominated. If you also happen to be significant contributor, you might want to take a look at the talk page and fix or discuss some of the issues raised there.

Regards, Malachirality (talk) 19:19, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll get to work on it. Hersfold (t/a/c) 22:23, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Ribbon Request

Hey Hersfold, I was wondering if you'd take time out of your busy schedule and make a Copyeditor's Ribbon. I am in dire need of one (well, not dire need... but still). Thanks! --Sharkface217 19:56, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

I will be more than happy to, but I'm afraid I might not be able to until Wednesday. I'm getting ready for a trip Monday-Wednesday, and I've got some other WP projects that need working on (fixing up an on-hold GA candidate, a few debates I'm involved in), as well as school work to get done. If you don't mind waiting that long... :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 20:01, 16 March 2008 (UTC)
I can probably survive that long :-P. Good luck with your trip/RFA. --Sharkface217 20:03, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Card


Happy St. Patrick's Day, Hersfold!Kitty53 (talk) 20:13, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, Kitty! Hope your green day went well! Hersfold (t/a/c) 17:50, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

You are now an administrator

Congratulations, I have just closed your RfA as successful and made you an administrator. Take a look at the administrators' how-to guide and the administrators' reading list if you haven't read those already. Also, the practice exercises at the new admin school may be useful. If you have any questions, get in touch on my talk page. WjBscribe 21:15, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

CONGRATULATIONS! 99%! That's amazing! Congratulations again, George D. Watson (Dendodge).TalkHelp 21:50, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
Congratulations. seresin | wasn't he just...? 22:08, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
Congrats! I really did mean what I said on the RFA. It's unfortunate that judging from my first three edits on Wikipedia, we are going to become enemies on Friday. --JayHenry (talk) 23:39, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
Hey, congratulations on your promotion! — scetoaux (talk) (My contributions.) 02:01, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Congrats my friend. Tiptoety talk 05:21, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
You deserve it! Tiddly-Tom 06:56, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks, everyone! Your support means a lot, and I hope not to let you down. Anyway, I'm off to put this mop to some use! Hersfold (t/a/c) 17:55, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
This is rather late (I haven't been on wikipedia lately) but let me the the [last] to congradulate you on a sucessful RFA.--Sunny910910 (talk|Contributions|Guest) 19:33, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Augh yeah! Congrats, fo'rly tho. Your life as an editor as you know it has ended. It's like getting married. Welcome to our hell. :D LaraLove 20:18, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Another late "way to go"... just don't forget us little people. GtstrickyTalk or C 20:23, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
YES! NHRHS2010 |  Talk to me  20:24, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
The admins' T-shirt. Acalamari 20:23, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Congratulations on your successful request for adminship. I am glad you passed, and you are welcome for the support. For information on using your new tools, see the school for new admins; you will find it very useful. Good luck! Acalamari 20:23, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Congrats on the adminship. Hope your trip went well. --Sharkface217 20:55, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Congratulations on your RFA, either way I still think your cool :P.--KerotanLeave Me a Message Have a nice day :) 20:58, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Congratulations! Master of Puppets Call me MoP! 23:44, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

AfC

Hey Hersfold, I noticed you chatting on the Articles for Creation talk page and thought you might be a good person to ask. I do actually like creating articles but can never seem to find subjects that aren't covered lately, so I'd like to be part of the AfC project as a reviewer. Is this an admin only position or can any editor sign up?--Torchwood Who? (talk) 19:12, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Oh, no, certainly not - anyone can join! I only just got adminship myself, you know that! Here's some links that should help you out:
Don't forget to install Henrik's reviewing script, either - there's information about it at the bottom of the WikiProject page, and it makes reviewing most articles very easy to do - with that, you'll only have to manually edit a submission if they broke the formatting with a level 2 header or it needs a special explanation. Glad to have you on board! Hersfold (t/a/c) 19:59, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Sweet. Let me read up on this and hopefully I'll get into it in the next few days.--Torchwood Who? (talk) 20:04, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
I've been going at the list on AfC. Thanks for the pointers. --Torchwood Who? (talk) 07:14, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Rfa

You're welcome...to be honest I already thought you were an admin. Now that you're an admin you can still continue to contribute to Rfa's...sadly most people forget to after their nomination was successful. Keep up the good work elsewhere. Have fun with the tools! Regards --Camaeron (t/c) 22:30, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

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Thanks

Thanks for removing the autoblock: I did eventually get the right template :P--NeoNerd 00:10, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

No problem, glad to help. Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:14, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

AFC drive

WikiProject Articles for Creation Featured Article Drive

WikiProject AFC is holding a one month long featured article drive!
The goal of this drive is to fill the empty Category:FA-Class AFC articles category. Good articles are welcomed as well.

Awards to be won range from the AFC barnstar to... well, the AFC barnstar. The drive page is located at Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation/Featured Content Drive.

This drive was organized by Nousernamesleft. Nousernamesleftcopper, not wood 03:57, 9 March 2008 (UTC).

A little reminder... Nousernamesleftcopper, not wood 01:28, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll try to chime in at some point. Hersfold (t/a/c) 01:30, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Recall

Two things. Eligibility criterion #2. I would assume that this does not include the lesser-edited namespaces, e.g. portal, category, Media-Wiki? Might be best to modify :) Also, you forgot to finish your last sentence in the first paragraph under How This Works. seresin | wasn't he just...? 01:35, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Eh... there's a few reasons why I'm not restricting it. First, categories and portals do still provide some encyclopedic content, so I don't see much need to exclude those. Secondly, anyone with 1,500 edits is likely to be editing a lot more than just those anyway. Finally, MediaWiki is open to admins only, and there's no way anyone is passing an RfA with only 1,500 edits - in practice, less than 5,000.
As for the sentence, thanks. I've fixed it. Hersfold (t/a/c) 01:47, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
I'm confused then. Do you mean 1500 edits total? Because it reads to me that an editor must have 1500 edits in each namespace. seresin | wasn't he just...? 01:56, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
OH! I see. I've clarified it now, I didn't even realize it read that way. Hersfold (t/a/c) 02:02, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Reminder

Congrats again on the RFA. I hope your trip went well. Not to add another item to your lengthy list of stuff to do (supposedly, every admin has one), but you said you'd be able to make that ribbon for copyediting when you found the time. Thanks --Sharkface217 02:21, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm so sorry, I completely forgot! Here's the finished ribbon: Image:Copyeditors Ribbon.png I'm sorry that took so long.
The trip went... well, but not as planned. It turned out to be a lot colder than we expected, and all the water sources we had hoped to find were frozen or marked as contaminated, so we ended up camping our second night in someone's basement. Hersfold (t/a/c) 02:51, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the ribbon. I'm sorry that your trip didn't go as planned, but I am glad to see that you're back safely. Wikipedia needs all the admins it can get. --Sharkface217 02:29, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Regarding your block of User:Wtfloljkok

I don't see how this username is against the username policy. Could you please clarify that for me? Timmeh! 02:23, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

The name consists of a long string of random acronyms, and also appears to imply a non-serious intent, which is further backed up by the user's edits to Escape the Fate, where he ignored a very blatantly expressed consensus (if you check this diff, there's a huge comment he completely ignored). The username could be considered confusing or disruptive in this way. If the user does want to keep editing, I didn't restrict his ability to make accounts or edit anonymously, so he's able to make a new account if he wishes. I hope this helps...? Hersfold (t/a/c) 02:33, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Questions regarding blocking of username Thpcomm

Thank you for your quick response to my request to unblock username Thpcomm. I am a new user and did not realize that using THP was not allowed; I originally chose the name to be transparent about my role at the organization. As you will see, I have changed my username to Crystal08. I wanted to ask whether it would be OK to post on my talk page, Thpcomm talk page, and The Hunger Project talk page that I am the same user that was known as Thpcomm and that I changed my name to comply with the naming convention? I just want to be open so that other users can see all my previous edits and know that they were by me.

Also, I was glad to see that you think my edits so far have been beneficial. When I read this article, it did not seem to be compliant with Wikipedia policies, particularly NPOV and Verifiability. So, I am trying, in good faith, to help make the article accurate, well-sourced and NPOV. I am not aiming to make it promotional and will do my best to be sure it is NPOV, and I very much hope that you and other editors or administrators will carefully read any edits I make, contribute to the page through your own edits and review the page as it develops to ensure it follows Wikipedia standards and the findings in the arbitration decision covering this page (found at Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Hunger/Proposed_decision).

Again, thanks and as a new user, I appreciate any guidance you can offer. Crystal08 (talk) 20:59, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

You're quite welcome. It might be a good idea to post concerning your change in username in the places you mentioned, in the interest of transparency. Again, I do strongly discourage you from continuing to edit the article proper in an effort to avoid conflicts of interest, however aiding other editors by communicating on the talk page could help make the article more neutral without your direct involvement. Best of luck with your work, however it turns out. Hersfold (t/a/c) 21:24, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

I had planned on reverting The Hunger Project page to the version with my edits (that both you and another user, Pax Arcane, agreed were good), because it has been reverted back to a page that is inaccurate, outdated, poorly sourced, and POV. I was going to do that with the following note on the talk page:

"Well sourced edits to three sections of this article have been reverted without any substantive discussion. In the case of the infotable, the reversions replaced accurate verifiable information and an appropriate template with outdated unsourced information and an inapplicable template. The reason cited, "revert COI edits," is not as I understand it a legitimate reason for reversion. Consistent with Wikipedia policies, under the arbitration decision covering this page (Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Hunger/Proposed_decision), editors associated with The Hunger Project are explicitly permitted to edit this page.

I have therefore reverted back to the page with my edits and if any edits I have made do not comply with NPOV or other policies, or the article can otherwise be made better, I look forward to reading and discussing other users' edits. I have stated my affiliation to be open and transparent and am doing my best in good faith to make the article NPOV and not promotional, so I would appreciate if my edits were not reverted based solely on the fact that I edited the article. Please post on the talk page any problems with specific edits."

Do you think this is OK/acceptable? Otherwise, what would you advise? Many thanks for the advice.Crystal08 (talk) 13:29, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi, just a note to tell you that I undid your edit, because I did not want to confuse this user even more (he is indeed blocked directly). Cheers! -- lucasbfr talk (using User:Lucasbfr2) 22:01, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I knew he was blocked directly, but it sounded to me like he was trying to get the IP unblocked rather than himself - I'll let you guys handle it, though, it looks like you've got it mostly under control. Hersfold (t/a/c) 23:07, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Happy First Day of Spring!

Happy First Day of Spring!
A Beautiful Cherry Tree in Spring Bloom
Theres nothing like seeing a field full of spring flowers.

Just wishing you a wonderful First Day of Spring {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}! ~~~~







If you live in the Southern Hemisphere and are entering the season of Autumn not Spring then I wish you a happy First Day of Autumn {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}!
To spread this message to others, add {{subst:First Day Of Spring}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

March 21 - 31

Thanks!

Thank you very much for unblocking the Ip. I really appreciate it. I a starting to really get involved in Wikipedia matters. -- Ray-Ginsay (talk) 03:44, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

You're welcome. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 03:59, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Possibly unfree Image:Hersfold.JPG

An image that you uploaded or altered, Image:Hersfold.JPG, has been listed at Wikipedia:Possibly unfree images because its copyright status is disputed. If the image's copyright status cannot be verified, it may be deleted. You may find more information on the image description page. You are welcome to add comments to its entry at the discussion if you are interested in it not being deleted. Thank you. Powers T 11:06, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

I have a question about the above - thought I would ask you as you have made some edits. Shouldn't this article have an English title? I can understand why there are articles with foreign language titles on WP when those languages use the English alphabet, but this title is in Cyrillic characters -- how many English WP users will be searching English WP for a title in Cyrillic characters?! Thanks. – ukexpat (talk) 18:32, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Probably so. I'll comment on the talk page discussion you've started. Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:53, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Re: your note

My pleasure, and congratulations! Jayjg (talk) 21:31, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

Another Ribbon Request

Hey Hersfold, I have another ribbon request (I seem to have cornered the market on obscure barnstars). I was wondering if you could make a ribbon for the AFD barnstar, an example of which can be found in my talkpage. If you would be so inclined, I would love for it to be dark green with minimal markings (as per the color of the AFD barnstar). Thanks a ton man, your work is really appreciated. I wait with anticipation for your next creation. --Sharkface217 03:33, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

You certainly do manage to keep getting the ones that don't have ribbons - here you go, hope that's what you were looking for: Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:46, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much. For your efforts:

The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
For your tireless, unending efforts with creating ribbons, I, Sharkface217, hereby award you this barnstar. Thanks for all the hard work! --Sharkface217 19:45, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Enjoy, and thanks again. --Sharkface217 19:45, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

WP:RFA

Belated to the party, but congratz. on the adminship. I knew you'd earn it eventually. :) Sorry I missed your RFA. KTC (talk) 04:11, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:48, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

AFC BACKLOG

Backlogged no more. Wow, that was quick. We need some more ip's in there.--Torchwood Who? (talk) 09:59, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

G4

Just cleared that up with another editor. Thanks for the head's up. Much appreciated.--Torchwood Who? (talk) 01:44, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Sure, no problem. Hersfold (t/a/c) 01:44, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

regarding this change

I'd like to readd the template. If you check out Wikipedia:RAT#Necessary_components the image does not have all of them.--Rockfang (talk) 04:01, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Could you elaborate on what specifically? I can't find that anything is missing from the rationale myself, which is why I declined the speedy. I have just deleted the old version of the image, which I probably should have done previously, but I don't see any reason to delete the current version. Hersfold (t/a/c) 21:09, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Admin

How's the admin life treating you? I'm weighing my options about running, not now, but many in a month or two. I want to become better acquainted with the policy discussion boards and maybe try my hand at patrolling recent changes. If I did run I'd want to be as well-versed as possible. My big debate is I just don't know if I can commit the time. Has the workload changed for you?--Torchwood Who? (talk) 12:29, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

It's a little more difficult than I was expecting - but as far as time concerns, it's not much more different from how it was; I just spend less time doing the usual "basic editor" stuff I used to do and more time handling block requests, speedies, unblock requests, etc. and so forth. The majority of the time is spent making sure everything you do is backed up by policy, consensus, or a damn good reason that itself could be backed up by one of the first two. You've also got to spend some time explaining your actions when someone comes by with a question, which does happen regularly.
If you're planning on running, I'd recommend looking over these pages and getting acquainted with those various procedures first. These should give you a good understanding of what will be expected of you, and what you can expect as an admin. Some of these you've probably already read or worked with, but it doesn't hurt to double-check.
  • WP:SYSOP
  • WP:AFD - Participate in deletion debates, and consider closing some of the snowball keeps once you've gotten fairly good experience
  • WP:XFD - Other deletion debates are helpful too; also keep in mind you should review some closed cases to figure out what consensus is and how it is determined.
  • WP:PROT - The protection policy
  • WP:BLOCK - The blocking policy (you WILL get asked about something tricky from here in your RfA)
  • WP:COPY - Copyright policies
  • WP:AIV - Report and revert vandalism, and make sure to file reports correctly (only after final warning, or (if an account) when excessively blatant)
  • WP:AN - Admin's noticeboard - while the discussions are aimed mostly as admins, you're not forbidden from posting, and reading through the discussions can help you understand what we deal with.
  • WP:DRV - Deletion review - again, while in most cases you're not going to be able to see the article, it can help to review some of the cases and figure out why X gets undeleted when Y doesn't.
  • Wikipedia:Advice for new administrators - Good to read ahead of time.
  • Wikipedia:Administrators' reading list - For anything I haven't covered above.
  • WP:RFA - Know what is expected of candidates and prepare for that. Can't hurt to participate either, but don't participate for the sake of getting "back-scratching" !votes.
  • Wikipedia:Admin coaching - While not required (I didn't do this), it's basically an adopt-a-user for experienced editors. It helps get you acquainted with administrative procedure and policy while working with an admin.
The most important thing to realize is that while adminship is "no big deal", deciding who IS an admin IS a big deal. Work to make yourself worthy of the trust the community is going to put with you should you decide to do this. It is a great responsibility, but I think you could handle it. Hersfold (t/a/c) 12:50, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Much appreciated. Like I said before, I want to get a hands on feel for all of the different wiki areas before I'd consider running. Copyright policy and page protection are two areas where I don't actually have any experience and don't think I can get much beyond reading up, but I do need to look into both. If I ran I'd really want to focus my work on assisting new users, preventing vandalism and working in AfD related areas. I've never really cared very much about the featured article side of the wiki, I'm just happy when articles can be massaged into something useful... something that I think is somewhat underrated as a goal. Thanks for the pointers!--Torchwood Who? (talk) 13:08, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Template:Infobox Scientist

Hi,

You've indicated that you're a template guru who can work with ParserFunctions, and I was wondering if you could lend your expertise at Template:Infobox Scientist. A recent series of edits (see diff) seem to have produced some undesirable effects, including:

  1. If no value is given for the "image" parameter, the infobox displays [[Image:|225px]]
  2. Every article that uses the template seems to be automatically placed into Category:Zoologists with author abbreviations

There may be other unintended changes, but those are the only two I've noticed. I'm hesitant to modify the template or to revert all or some of the changes, since I have no idea what some of the changes are intended to accomplish and I'm not really good with ParserFunctions.

Could you take a look please? (I'd ask the editor who made the changes, but he's been inactive for several hours.) Thanks, Black Falcon (Talk) 00:46, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Fixed it! The problem was caused because the image= and author_abbrev_zoo= parameters weren't set to have default values. The function that was supposed to check if they existed (#if:) was working perfectly; unfortunately, though, instead of seeing a blank parameter, it saw {{{image}}}, so assumed that there was something useful to print out. I've checked, and both fixes seem to be working. Hersfold (t/a/c) 02:03, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Thank you! I had assumed that the lack of a default value was the problem with the "image" parameter (I tried fixing it with this edit but, as you can tell from the next edit (self-revert), couldn't figure out the series of conditional functions.) Thanks again, Black Falcon (Talk) 03:41, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you and sorry not to've spotted. Sardanaphalus (talk) 04:53, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

It's no big deal - that sort of thing happens all the time, and I've seen far worse happen (you didn't cause whole articles to blow up!). Don't worry about it. Hersfold (t/a/c) 04:56, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I hate to bother you again...

...but, if you have time, would you take a look at Template:Cfd-notify? Whenever the template is added without substitution (as here, for instance), the section "edit" link goes back to the template page. This has, in numerous cases (see revision history), caused editors to accidentally post notices to the template page instead of user pages. In general, this happens when an editor posts the template to a user page (without subst'ing), then clicks the section "edit" link to fix a mistake (usually a mistake in the date format or a typograhical error) and is taken to the edit window for the template.

Is there any way to fix this without removing the automatically-generated header from the template's code? (I have the template watchlisted and am able to revert any mistakes fairly quickly, but it still causes some (temporary) confusion in editors who encounter this problem.) Black Falcon (Talk) 05:13, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, no; that's part of the reason why the template gets substed. Unless the header is hard-coded to the page it's on, it's going to lead back to wherever it is hard-coded (if that makes any sense). I can add in some code that makes a big red ugly warning message pop up when there's no subst:, but there's no way to fix the edit link without removing it entirely. Hersfold (t/a/c) 05:21, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Could you insert the warning message, please? (Is this the type of warning that is displayed when one forgets to subst {{prod}}?) Such a message might not prevent editors from making initial mistakes, but it would make it easier for them to understand why a problem occurred (and, thus, make it more likely that they will avoid the same error in the future). Black Falcon (Talk) 05:47, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, and in fact that's where I'm ripping the code from. Hopefully this will work. Hersfold (t/a/c) 15:11, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks again, and as a token of my appreciation:
The Special Barnstar
For your willingness to lend a hand with fixing those nifty little things that we all use, but often don't really understand that well. :) Thank you, Black Falcon (Talk) 16:10, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! Glad to be of help - let me know if anything else ever needs fixing. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 16:26, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Congratulations, by the way, on your successful RfA. I removed WP:RFA from my watchlist a while ago and didn't notice the nomination until the result was posted here. Black Falcon (Talk) 05:56, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Question about The Hunger Project Page

Hi, sorry to ask for advice again, but I did not get a response to my post on March 21 (see in above section Questions regarding blocking of username Thpcomm) so I just wanted to follow up and see if you saw my plan for The Hunger Project page and if you have any feedback, please let me know. Otherwise, I'll implement the changes at some point today. Thanks so much! Crystal08 (talk) 16:16, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Oops, I'm sorry, it must have gotten lost amid everything else. I unfortunately don't have time to look at it right this moment, but will do so as soon as I can. Sorry for the long delay. Hersfold (t/a/c) 16:28, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Your suggestion looks good to me - just keep in mind, I'm not everyone else, and it is likely someone will object to your editing. You're going to have to expect that someone will contest your edits. Just keep an eye on the three revert rule - don't get in an edit war. Remain civil and assume good faith at all times, even if the other editor isn't. If you need more help, try going through dispute resolution. Keep in mind also that my only involvement in this was unblocking you. I'm not here to review everything you do, however I do expect that you will follow policy as needed. If you need help, I'm always open, but I'm not the only place to go, nor am I the "final word" on anything. Best of luck with your article. Hersfold (t/a/c) 17:18, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

There were six deletes, against two credible keeps. The other two keeps came from questionable accounts (which you tagged yourself). Allowing one of the questionable accounts, as that was the creator of the articles, that would still be twice as many deletes as keeps. Would you take a look again? SilkTork *YES! 18:28, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Part of the reason I didn't close as delete (which I suppose I should have mentioned more explicitly) is that redundant information isn't really a reason to delete articles - it's a reason to merge them to the more relevant title, in this case "200x in music". All of the deletes (except your own) rotated around that point, with a couple "per aboves" thrown in. If you'd like, I can have another admin take a look at it (I'm in the IRC channel right now). I hope this helps clear things up. Hersfold (t/a/c) 18:44, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
That does make sense - though I have seen merge discussions in AfD if the merge might be seen as contentious. It certainly wouldn't hurt to have another admin cast an eye over the AfD as I've raised a concern. I have, by the way, tagged the article with a copyvio as I'm still concerned that someone with more knowledge of copyright law than ourselves hasn't given it a clean bill of health. Regards SilkTork *YES! 18:59, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

You stepped in at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Toni Ann Gisondi when things seemed to be degenerating into a discussion of Annie rather than the article at hand. Now there seem to be a couple of editors attacking the article's creator, and a fairly aggressive defender of same. I nominated the article, but I am disturbed by the behaviour in the AfD. Perhaps another word from you would smarten people up. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 05:12, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

It's been closed with a long explanation for my reasoning. Hopefully the people involved in the argument will pick up on the bits pointed at them and take up on my advice, but please feel free to let me know if this continues to degenerate. Hersfold (t/a/c) 15:46, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

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Gucci Gang

Could you explain the "Keep" for Gucci Gang controversy a bit? Can I point out that "User:Lenoil odarama" contribs is basically a SPA as well? I'm just curious as to your reasons. Thanks! -- SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 00:46, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Simply counting raw !votes, and excluding those of the SPA's I tagged (Lenoil odarama does have contributions outside the topic, and from several months previous, so I'm assuming good faith on him) the discussion came out to 7 keeps and 4 delete (counting your nomination). Looking into the discussion itself, the arguments for deletion could be summarized as a violation of WP:NOT#NEWS. While that is a valid concern, this was refuted by the keep arguments - that there is sufficient referencing to justify the article, the article expands beyond the scope of a simple news article, and there is precedent to allow such articles. 9/11 was a horrible example for the last argument, however, I'll give you that - but WP:OSE does acknowledge that "other stuff exists" arguments can be validly used in this manner, as it was by Starczamora with Edison Chen photo scandal. The bottom line is, there was a clear consensus not to delete the article, but rather to continue to expand it and improve upon it as necessary. I hope this explains things. Hersfold (t/a/c) 03:17, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
The more I read this, the more I want to disagree. If you *don't* count Lenoil (who is at least questionable), it's a 6-4 !vote split. But more importantly, the arguments for keep are pretty shallow. The "sufficient referencing" amounts to a flash-in-the-pan flurry of gossip. Unlike 9/11 or Edison Chen photo scandal, there are only four distinct sources. And the time-span involved covers about one week, from the 10th to the 16th. And most importantly, there's been nothing in any RS since then. If the claim of "beyond the scope" were true, there would be later sources referring to the "controversy", but nothing has. Could you review your decision and let me know? Thanks. -- SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 16:02, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
My decision stands. Simply because the article isn't getting expanded any further does not mean it should be deleted. We don't punish articles for being stubs, and certainly not starts, as this one is. If you still feel the article should be deleted, I'd recommend bringing the issue to deletion review. Hersfold (t/a/c) 16:12, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Deletion Review for Gucci Gang controversy

An editor has asked for a deletion review of Gucci Gang controversy. Since you closed the deletion discussion for this article, speedy-deleted it, or were otherwise interested in the article, you might want to participate in the deletion review. SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 16:32, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

re:my block

Thanks so much! Even though your unblock was a little late, it was really encouraging to see how not all admins agree and to know that while my behavior certainly wasn't beyond reproach, it wasn't necessarily block-worthy, either. --Irn (talk) 03:30, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

You're quite welcome. That's why we have the {{unblock}} template - admins are still human, and do make mistakes from time to time. I'm glad to see you got your rollback button as well. Quick tip, though - when your talk page gets too long to handle, make sure to archive it rather than just deleting the old discussions. If your block record ever comes into question for whatever reason, it'll be important that you can provide that discussion as evidence in your defense. Anyway, it's good to see you weren't put off by that incident. Please let me know if you ever need help with anything, and happy editing as always. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 03:53, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Is there a resource..

Is there a section of the wiki that categorizes all article that are unreferenced? I was thinking of starting a sourcing effort and can't seem to find this if it exists. Any suggestions would be appreciated.--Torchwood Who? (talk) 23:58, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

You might be looking for Wikipedia:WikiProject Fact and Reference Check - they're the project that coordinates all such efforts, and their page has links to references that can help you out, including categories that contain poorly referenced articles. Hersfold (t/a/c) 01:02, 28 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! This is perfect. Sometimes it can be difficult to hunt down these projects.--Torchwood Who? (talk) 01:11, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Talk Page

Can you get this to work on my talk page again? I've given up. Thanks, - Milk's Favorite Cookie 01:28, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, it is working...? It's set to put your TOC in a scroll box when it gets longer than the archive list. Since it's currently not longer than the archive list, there's no scroll bar. I just previewed your talk page with about a zillion headers tacked on the bottom and it seemed to be working fine. Hersfold (t/a/c) 02:53, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
It seems fine now. But the TOC, look at it. Thanks for the help. - Milk's Favorite Cookie 13:02, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
The table of contents does not seem to be right. Can you fix this? Thanks, - Milk's Favorite Cookie 22:12, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
I really don't see what's wrong with it - it's displaying fine on my screen. What resolution is your monitor set to? Hersfold (t/a/c) 23:21, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
1280X1024 - I can see some text in the TOC, but you have to scroll to the right to see the whole thing. Can you fix this? - Milk's Favorite Cookie 23:24, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
Oh. Ok. I see now. Um.... the only way to fix that would be to mess with your archive images - which would mean further messing with all the corresponding shapes, which could take forever. I also have very little experience with imagemaps. I might be able to rearrange your page to give the TOC enough room to work, but it'll likely mean putting the archives one on top of the other. Would that work? Hersfold (t/a/c) 23:31, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
Can you have the two archives next to each other on the right, and the TOC to the left? Would that work? - Milk's Favorite Cookie 23:46, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
(indent reset) No. The images are a fixed width, and having both of them and the TOC lined up side-to-side (in any order) forces the TOC to get cramped out of existence. I've just tried some creative coding, and I'm not getting anything to work except putting the archives on top of one another. Take a look at my sandbox and see if you like that layout. Hersfold (t/a/c) 23:59, 29 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok - that's good enough. Thanks, - Milk's Favorite Cookie 00:01, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
Can you replace the huge white space with talk page messages - or rather - is this possible? - Milk's Favorite Cookie 00:15, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
Unfortunately not, especially since it's transcluded from another page. Sorry. Hersfold (t/a/c) 01:04, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
I don't mind it with the TOC crammed. About that....
The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
For much help with fixing mu archives up I - Milk's Favorite Cookie hereby award you this Barnstar. Thanks again! - Milk's Favorite Cookie 02:58, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! It's my pleasure. Hersfold (t/a/c) 03:25, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

[1] I know its a stretch, but the

competitors joining together can be seen as a "group". One has to be a bit creative when obvious non-notables aren't an easy fit for one of the critera. :-) --brewcrewer (yada, yada) 04:00, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Mehhh... when deletion's involved, I prefer to cover my ass and go the least controversial way possible. I was about to delete the page but then changed my mind at the last minute. It'll get deleted eventually, no need to rush things. Hersfold (t/a/c) 04:08, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Tahnks for the page protect, etc.

here. He's no good many times over. C.Fred, Seicer, Rodhallandemu, FisherQueen and DGG helped him, or tried, at various times but he's a fan of burning bridges. I'm keeping an eye on "his" IP (checkuser pending but from the IP contribs I think it's pretty clear) but I'm hoping we're done with him for a few days/week. Good night! TRAVELLINGCARIMy storyTell me yours 06:18, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

No problem, 'tis what I'm here for. Good night. Hersfold (t/a/c) 06:20, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

That is not true. If you were to look I was adding valuable information, not for promotional reasons. It was new information relating to rating sites which was not mentioned anywhere else in the article. It was new information that you all seem to disregard; you are censoring reality. If you look at the rest of the article, I was writing in the same style. I will be in touch with Wikipedia's directors regarding this matter.

I did look, and it was blatantly promotional. You might want to check our policies on external links, advertising, conflicts of interest, and neutrality. You're welcome to contact the Foundation, but I'm quite sure they will refer you to the same policies. Hersfold (t/a/c) 01:02, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Re: (User talk:ais523) Your watchlist script

Unfortunately, this isn't easy at all, because of the way the server stores data; it's easy to ignore the top watchlist entry if it was made by you, but in such a case it would cause extra server load to show the second entry instead. If you like, I can write a version of the script which hides the notfication altogether if you have the top watchlist entry, although note that that could be a bit misleading. --ais523 16:18, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

No, it's fine, no reason to make the servers work slower than they do already. Thanks for the reply, though! Hersfold (t/a/c) 20:15, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

re User talk:Joseph A. Spadaro request for unblock.

I have no problem with unblocking, now if desired. If the editor understands that their manner of interaction was inappropriate and undertakes to moderate their future language then the conditions for unblock are met. No need for further punitive sanctions. Do you wish me to perform the unblock? LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:26, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Like I told Joe, it's up to you. I think he's ok to be unblocked now, if you're comfortable with it. Thanks for the reply. Hersfold (t/a/c) 21:31, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
I shall let you do the honours, as you are handling the request. Cheers. LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:34, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
And so cleared. Thanks again. Hersfold (t/a/c) 21:37, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
I wrote this on LessHeard's page, I thought I'd copy it to yours in good faith as well. I understand blocks are there to protect wikipedia, and not to punish people who violate the policy. Even without his block for civility violations, this editor still willfully violating the WP:3RR policy on Abigail Taylor, the article which he's taken ownership of and started all of last night's problems. [2]
He made personal attacks, threats, WP:3RR violations, and used the article on fellatio to tell other editors acting in good faith to, well, I'm sure you understand. After all of that, he apologizes again to an admin who wasn't even involved in the matter, and the slate is wiped clean.
Again, I know blocks aren't there to punish people who violate policy, but I don't feel like this interpretation of policy is protecting the other 6-8 editors who spent time last night being personally attacked. At the very least, he should have his WP:3RR block reinstated, and should be at WP:1RR on the Abigail Taylor article, since his ownership of that article began the mess.
I do appreciate your time in this matter. I hope I don't come across as upset at wikipedia policy or you as an admin, it's just my obvious frustration at someone who spent last night trolling for arguments and violating policy being free to do so again. Thanks again for your attention. Redrocket (talk) 22:03, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

My Meerkat Image

Hi, I got your mesasge about GoogieMan.jpg - I'm not exactly sure how I would go about categorizing this image on Commons. If you don't mind doing that, since I'm clueless, the animal is a Meerkat, recently made famous by the Animal Planet show "Meerkat Manor." They're kind of like a cross between a ferret and a house cat and live in the Kalahari Desert. Take care, Googie man (talk) 23:58, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

That what it was! Ok, thanks, I've categorized it and should be deleting the local version shortly. Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:03, 31 March 2008 (UTC)


Gracias

Thanks for your help with the sockpuppet 75.34.9.214. Those socks pop up about once a week, and get meaner every time. I mean, I'm not a "chronic" douchebag. I'd concede I'm an occasional one, but it's not a regular thing. Anyway, I appreciate the help! Redrocket (talk) 03:38, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

We're all douchebags from time to time. :-) You're welcome. Hersfold (t/a/c) 03:39, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, buddy!

Thanks for fixing my HTML problem. I'm not familiar with tech lingo (nay, I am a total idiot when it comes to computers). Thanks again! --LaPianísta! 04:52, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

And now looking at the text it produced, it seems to have messed up the spacing. Is it because the sig is too large? --LaPianísta! 04:52, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
It looks fine to me. Seems you just added a couple newlines in - if it keeps happening, make sure there aren't any weird spaces at the end of your signature code in preferences. And you're welcome. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 04:54, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Regarding: request for edits and editors on The Hunger Project article

Hi. I appreciate the advice you gave me, and I want to update you on the status of The Hunger Project article and my suggested edits and also ask you for more help or advice. I am having trouble having anyone engage with the substance of the article and my suggested edits. As we discussed, I reverted to my previous, hopefully non-controversial, edits with the note I showed you. The change was then immediately reverted solely because of COI. Since then, I've posted on the talk page the reasons for my suggested edits as well as links to the secondary sources. I've also posted a request on WP:COIN and used the Request edit template to ask other editors to engage with the article and my suggested edits.

I would be very pleased if you or any other neutral editor you can think of would jump in and edit this article -- it needs help. I'd also appreciate if, after reviewing the article's talk page, you have any other suggestions at this time. Thanks! Crystal08 (talk) 16:36, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Adminship consideration

I've always considered running for adminship, and was actually planning to do so by the end of April. Unfortunately, I face a few major challenges. I have been banned at least two times since I've been here (this was years ago) due to ignorance of the rules (specifically with WP:CANVASSING, which I get warned about every now and then due to my propensity for awarding barnstars). I keep a list of mistakes which can be accessed from my user page to maintain transparency, as I wish to be open about some of my mistakes. One major mistake that I have yet to document on there (I can't seem to find it) is a rant I made a while ago regarding deletionists, which was replete with personal attacks, generalizations, etc. Interestingly enough, I've turned into a moderate deletionist since then. I have given myself a bad reputation due to my past antics and I know that I would be slaughtered if I ever went up for an AFD. Of course, I plan on doing so anyway soon. I just need a nominator. --Sharkface217 19:25, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok. Work on those issues, then - when you're ready to be nominated, let me know. :-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 19:27, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
I would be honored if you wished to nominate me. However, I'm thinking that I do a dry run once, and if that fails I go to admin coaching for 6 months. Generally, that does the job. --Sharkface217 19:31, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
Eh - might as well try your best the first time anyway. If you make it, you make it. Hersfold (t/a/c) 19:37, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
I shall be bold and go for it whenever you're ready. --Sharkface217 00:49, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
Ok - let's wait until after April Fools', just in case. ;-) Hersfold (t/a/c) 00:50, 1 April 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, that seems like the best course of action. Although it would be pretty funny to get adminship simply because everyone thinks it's a joke (not to demean my candidacy, of course). --Sharkface217 00:53, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

Formatting an Article

I'm trying to get the New sections to start over on the left. When I have a picture on the left side, a new section starts in the middle of the page.--HB Edit (talk) 20:40, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I understand. Unfortunately, this is an issue with the MediaWiki software that isn't very easy to fix. The only suggestion I can make is to add enough blank lines to force it down, or simply move the image to the right, but then that also poses problems. Sorry I can't be of more help. Hersfold (t/a/c) 20:45, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

dyk

Did you know that "DYK" is short by about 2 or 3 hooks? Victuallers (talk) 21:11, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

I thought 6 was an acceptable number. Sorry, I'll remember it in the future. Hersfold (t/a/c) 22:23, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

O hai!

300px

Bai! east.718 at 21:20, March 31, 2008

Sorry, I forgot. An actual text message generally works better, by the way. Hersfold (t/a/c) 22:24, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
Sorry. :-( I'll remember to behave from now on. east.718 at 23:35, March 31, 2008