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Which WP articles have you brought up to GA or FA?

I notice that you are fond of pointing out that many of Wikipedia's energy-related articles need work (see, for example [1], User:Teratornis/Energy#Articles that need cleanup. I think I would be able to take you more seriously if I knew you were an editor who is experienced in contributing high quality content yourself. So could I gently ask please, which WP articles have you brought up to GA or FA? I'd genuinely like to have a look at them... Johnfos (talk) 22:24, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

None yet. I'm working more at the bottom, i.e. improving articles that are a long way from good article status. See the debate in Wikipedia:Wikipedia is failing, which notes the very small percentage of articles on Wikipedia that have attained good or featured status. Because so few articles are top quality on Wikipedia, I like to work on articles that need lots of improvement, doing the early stuff - standardizing terminology, adding links, fixing typos, adding standard sections, adding references, creating or improving navigation templates, etc. Also, it's not about taking me seriously, but about looking at articles and noting their needs for improvement as defined by Wikipedia's policies and guidelines - and in some cases, other users have already marked articles with messagebox templates noting their deficiencies. See for example New Manhattan Project for Energy Independence - I agree with the other user(s) who put the messageboxes in the article indicating that it needs work. On Wikipedia There is no common sense, so I try to do everything with reference to some instruction document that reflects consensus, and I often link to the document(s) I followed, in my edit summaries. Then the question is not whether I personally have any credibility, but whether I objectively followed Wikipedia's instructions, something that any knowledgeable user can decide just by reading the instructions and checking my diffs. Many energy-related articles are new because the field is rapidly expanding, particularly in the area of renewable energy. Some of these attract editors who are new to Wikipedia and come to edit just an article or two in their area of interest, without taking into account related articles that use different terminology to mean the same things, and so on. For an example of some improvements I made, see the references in the Panicum virgatum article, and compare them to this revision (see Talk:Panicum virgatum#Citation repair). That article received contributions from users who knew about the subject matter, but very little about Wikipedia, in particular WP:FOOT, WP:CITE, and WP:CITET. So with some effort I cleaned up the references and put them into one of Wikipedia's standard forms. --Teratornis (talk) 02:25, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
I might add that my editing history on Wikipedia is rather idiosyncratic. Approximately half my edits are on the Help desk. I seem to have more edits on the Help desk than any other Wikipedia user. A large fraction of what I know about Wikipedia, I learned by answering questions on the Help desk, and from studying other users' answers. As a result of the time I have spent on the Help desk, I have probably spent more time reading and searching Wikipedia's internal documentation pages than most Wikipedia users who have the same (relatively low) number of article-space edits that I do. Of course that doesn't make me immune to error, but on Wikipedia there are 48,205,772 other users to clean up my mistakes. I might add that I'd like to bring some articles up to good or featured status, because that would be helpful if I ever stand for an RFA. Do you have any articles in mind? --Teratornis (talk) 02:39, 13 August 2008 (UTC)
I might add as a late comment that I tend to focus more on specific kinds of problems, such as creating navigation templates, or learning to use citation tools, and then applying what I learned to many different articles. This does not, by itself, result in bringing individual articles up to good or featured status, but if enough people specialize in fixing different types of problems, they may collectively advance a large number of articles toward higher quality. I applaud the efforts of anyone who brings a specific article up to high quality, but there aren't many Wikipedia users who have learned all the separate editing skills to do that. It might be more efficient for a user to learn to do a few things well, and then do them to many articles that share the same deficiencies. There might also be a tendency for a person who has made substantial contributions to a particular article to then feel a sense of ownership, which we aren't supposed to do. Someone who has made smaller edits to many articles may be less likely to feel attached to them, and better tolerate the inevitable editing by other users. --Teratornis (talk) 03:50, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

WP:HD#Teacake problamatique

I suppose it might be Ouija, but since all he's doing is making a perfectly sensible move suggestion, I don't think any action needs to be taken. Algebraist 00:19, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

RE: Google template

Thanks for fixing that up for me. :) GlassCobra 01:41, 27 September 2008 (UTC)

RE: Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)#user_identity

Hello, Teratornis. How useful is Cygwin in terms of installing User committed identity ? Is there any other usefulness of the program? Ktsquare (talk) 15:18, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Cygwin is approximately as useful as Unix, since it adds a pretty complete Unix-like environment to Microsoft Windows. Anyone who is experienced at using Unix or Linux will immediately find lots of things to do with Cygwin. Lots of people have written lots of books about all the things you can do with Unix. Installing Cygwin might be a bit of overkill if the only thing you want to do is create a user-committed identity, as there are probably easier ways for a Windows user to generate hash keys. But since I have used Cygwin for years for a variety of tasks, naturally I would use Cygwin, since that's what I know. Software you know is always more powerful than software you don't know, regardless of the features, since you cannot use the features of a software package until you learn how. --Teratornis (talk) 17:35, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Hello!

Hi, Teratornis! This is for your comment here. Nice idea :D

Chamal talk work has given you a cookie! Cookies promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Spread the WikiLove by giving someone else a cookie, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Happy munching!

Spread the goodness of cookies by adding {{subst:Cookie}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

Chamal talk work 03:25, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. How many cookies equal one barnstar? --Teratornis (talk) 10:28, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

conference

I thought this might interest you....hope it is not spam! / against the rules!

http://www.claverton-energy.com/conference

"Is There A Climate And Energy Emergency? - If So, What Are The Likely Solutions? 4th CLAVERTON ENERGY GROUP CONFERENCE - 24th to 26th October 2008" — Preceding unsigned comment added by User:Engineman (talk • contribs)

Main Page redesign

The Main Page Redesign proposal is currently conducting a straw poll to select five new designs, before an RFC in which one will be proposed to replace the Main Page. The poll closes on October 31st. Your input would be hugely appreciated! Many thanks, PretzelsTalk! 09:22, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Template:Bioenergy

Hi Teratornis, the interwiki links on Template:Bioenergy are showing up on article pages List of energy topics confusing interwiki bots, i tried a quick fix doesn't seem to work. Cheers Mion (talk) 00:43, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

I guess you mean the interlanguage links that some other users stuck in the wrong place. They belong in the documentation subpage, to put them inside the noinclude tags. (See WP:DOC for details about how the documentation is supposed to work for templates now.) I will fix them. What's more, some of the interlanguage links might be just wrong, as they seem to point to articles rather than to navigation templates (I don't see what looks like a template namespace prefix in some of them). I'll check them out. Thanks for calling my attention to this problem. I hadn't noticed it yet. --Teratornis (talk) 02:34, 7 November 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for the fix. Mion (talk) 09:48, 7 November 2008 (UTC)

Reference tags

Thanks for the information that they can include spaces if the name is in quotes. That will save trying to find torturous single words ;-) --GraemeL (talk) 20:38, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Ah, your talk page could use an archive. --GraemeL (talk) 20:38, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Good point. I'll move the prior years to archive subpages. --Teratornis (talk) 06:32, 29 November 2008 (UTC)
Done. (A few days ago.) Much better now, I can actually find the bottom of this page again. --Teratornis (talk) 01:01, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Renewable energy in Scotland

As you know, things are moving quickly with renewables, and it is difficult to keep articles up to date. I am particularly concerned about this one, and wonder if you could take a look at it please. Johnfos (talk) 03:25, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

I made a couple of edits and pointed out a problem with units on the talk page. The Renewable energy in Scotland article is actually in pretty good shape compared to most of the energy-related articles I've looked at. When I see a statement that will date quickly, I try to edit it to have a specific date so it will still make sense in a year or three. Articles will go out of date, but at least they can still be correct. I've been trying to recruit more people with an interest in these topics to join Wikipedia and learn how to edit here. We don't have enough of such users yet. You can go to lots of energy-related discussion sites on the Web and see thousands of people who post comments and such. If all those people could come to Wikipedia and learn what to do, we could bring every every article about energy up to featured quality while we're still alive. I've been trying to make the argument on peak oil discussion sites that editing on Wikipedia is not only useful for building an encyclopedia of energy, but also I believe Wikipedia editing represents a possible future for work in a petroleum-constrained (and thus mobility-constrained) future world. That is, if the supply of petroleum begins declining faster than electric vehicles can compensate for, people are just going to have to travel less. Wikipedia shows the way to get work done with distant people without having to leave one's chair. Wikipedia is the most efficient system for telecommuting I have seen, and if enough people could learn Wikipedia's way, we'd be much better able to do all sorts of other kinds of work without depending on so much travel. --Teratornis (talk) 07:59, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Save Western Ohio

"This "to do" entry has been COPIED TO THE OFFICE OF THE INSPECTOR GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES on this day, November 13th, 2008."

Wow - is this guy for real - what on Earth is he talking about? Is this supposed to be some kind of threat? As for his contribution further down the page I've got no idea what he's getting at. What does he mean by "dwarfing" and deaths per TWH? Damn! he must have realised we're all just puppets of the wind energy industry - it looks like our cover's been blown! Wait a minute - there's someone knocking on my door....................... Richerman (talk) 23:39, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

On questioning the rules

Hi Teratornis and thanks for your explanation of WP:NOSHARE's purpose. I guess I was taken aback by the word policy when I came across it (I understand policies are reserved for really really important rules). Although, if the GFDL demands that edits be linked to individuals then that's fine. The other reasons for this rule don't imo warrant a policy. But nevermind, the issue I wanted to raise here is in response to your comment:

"Thus the real question to ask is not why do we have this rule, but why do some people want to violate it?"

Firstly, I see no problem with questioning the rules on WP - understanding the purpose of a rule greatly helps in interpreting it. I usually understand the purpose of policies and guidelines when I see them and I also usually understand why policies are policies (and not guidelines) but not this time. That's why I asked. Secondly, the second part of your comment doesn't really embrace WP:AGF (but that's only a guideline). Zain Ebrahim (talk) 06:18, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments. I was somewhat ambiguous; what I meant by that sentence was that merely questioning a rule is not necessarily sufficient; I want people to criticize a rule. That is, don't merely ask me to justify the rule (which really only says what I like about the rule, which may be irrelevant to you); also tell me what you think is wrong with the rule. I may not be aware of the problems you have in mind about the rule. If you tell me what you don't like about the rule, that is if you tell me why you want to violate the rule, then we can have a discussion. I might, for example, suggest another way you can attain your goal without violating the rule; or if I can't think of any such way, then we have something to weigh against the points in favor of the rule. By "the real question to ask" I mean that's the question I'm asking - why does someone want to violate the rule? If the rule is preventing someone from improving Wikipedia, then WP:IAR might apply. If someone asks "Why do we have this rule?" that puts the burden of proof on the person defending the rule - but that person doesn't know how the rule might be hampering the original questioner, so the generic justifications might be wide of the mark. If the original questioner doesn't like the rule, a more productive basis for discussion would be for the original questioner to explain exactly how the rule is getting in his or her way. In the case of a group account, I don't see how the group account gives group members any more editing ability than they would have with their own accounts. Thus I don't see any advantage to violating the rule. If there is some advantage that I'm not seeing, someone is going to have to tell me what it is. Then I can decide whether (in my opinion) that advantage outweighs the advantages of following the rule. Unfortunately this kind of discussion is usually hypothetical, because Wikipedia's rules are pretty solidly entrenched - it takes a tremendous amount of work to change a rule around here, in the rare event that changing a rule is possible. Thousands of people have already hashed out every rule, and it's unlikely that we are going to think of any arguments they haven't already thought of. We're probably not going to get any rules changed, so our only real choice is to decide whether to live by Wikipedia's rules, or go find some other wiki to edit.
I'm not sure I understand your reference to WP:AGF. Supposedly the Arabs have a saying: "trust Allah, but tie your camel." Wikipedia purports to trust people, but this trust is so far from blind that I wouldn't really call it "trust" in the usual sense of the word. To me, "trust" is when you give someone else some power which you can't take back. Wikipedia's revision control system tracks every edit by every user or IP address, allowing anyone's edits to be un-done by others. By having this revision control system, Wikipedia in fact assumes the worst about everyone. Everybody is subject to oversight and correction by everybody else. In contrast, members of a group account are implicitly saying to Wikipedia, "We don't need to be subject to the usual oversight as individuals, because we are better than that." That's not how it works on Wikipedia. On Wikipedia, nobody is better than that. No matter how high and mighty anyone becomes, everything they do is still subject to oversight and correction. Wikipedia likes to keep all the camels tied while paying lip service to trust and respect.
Therefore, editing on Wikipedia means having to be humble enough to submit to a level of oversight that is greater than most people experience in most areas of life. I wouldn't expect everyone to be comfortable with that, and it seems some fraction of people who dabble on Wikipedia find they'd rather not be constantly second-guessed, so they leave. Wikipedia does not try to be all things to all people.
In closing, I'd like to point out that some rules on Wikipedia are simply arbitrary, as far as I can tell. A great example is that Wikipedia does not require users to log in before they edit. I've read arguments for and against this policy, and the arguments on both sides are pretty weak, because we don't have any clear data on which to predict the effects of changing the policy to require logins to edit. One argument in favor of the existing policy is that Wikipedia has always had it - and the person who presented this argument, seemingly in all seriousness, seemed unaware that he was making nothing more than an Appeal to tradition. (Appealing to tradition is merely to point out that a tradition exists; the existence of a tradition argues neither for it nor against it. A tradition might persist because it is useful, or it might persist simply because it is a tradition.) Some rules on Wikipedia are arbitrary, but Wikipedia needs lots of rules. We can't let 48,205,772 users improvise as they see fit, because There is no common sense. Having a rule reduces the scope for conflict, because it limits the number of contradictory approaches different people might otherwise take. Wikipedia is a better place for having so many rules, even if you or I don't agree with all of them. It's the same as living in a country which has a few laws we don't agree with - on balance, that's often better than living in anarchy. --Teratornis (talk) 07:44, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
Thank you for that clarification. I hope I'm not totally missing your point but it sounds as though you're saying the following:
  • WP has many many rules and the purposes for some of them may not be immediately clear.
  • If you question the purpose of a rule, you should first explain why the rule impedes you in improving WP.
I accept all of your points in your first paragraph above but I'm merely saying that:
  • WP has many many rules and the purposes for some of them may not be immediately clear.
  • All of these rules were created to fulfill a certain purpose.
  • If we know what that purpose was, we would be better equipped to interpret the rule and explain it to people who wish to violate it.
Basically, I encountered a rule whose purpose I didn't quite understand. The fact that it was a policy implied that it must be very important. I wanted to understand why we have this as a policy because all of the reasons put forth in defence of this rule (aside from the GFDL) don't warrant a policy imo. I wouldn't have questioned it at all if it was a guideline but I wanted to understand why we believe this rule is more important than WP:N for example. The GFDL argument convinces me. I think we agree with each other.
Regarding WP:AGF, I apologise for misinterpreting your comment. I assumed that you were implying that anyone wishing to violate this rule would only do so to harm WP. My bad! Zain Ebrahim (talk) 08:33, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
No apologies necessary. If I wasn't clear, I should learn to write better. The goal of expository writing is to write in such a way that readers can only interpret it to mean what we meant. Of course this can be very difficult in practice. I agree with this:
  • If we know what that purpose was, we would be better equipped to interpret the rule and explain it to people who wish to violate it.
The justification for every rule should be in the documentation for the rule. When you find a page that describes a rule, but not why we have the rule, you could start a discussion on that page's talk page asking other editors about how to edit the page so it explains why we have the rule. Yes, we cannot expect users to blindly accept every rule without understanding why Wikipedia has the rule. In some cases, the justification for a rule appears elsewhere, such as in general philosophical discussions of Wikipedia that float around in various pages. Ideally we should be able to find all of this stuff from the Editor's index. Note that the famous document How to Ask Questions the Smart Way hectors the person who wants help with a problem to explain clearly their larger goal, for which whatever they got stuck on may have been the particular path they chose to reach their goal. The analogy for Wikipedia's documentation pages is to clearly explain the goal(s) that motivate every Wikipedia guideline and policy. Wikipedia has so many rules that in many situations the various rules can conflict. And of course Ignore all rules conflicts with every other rule (including itself, I think). When one has to weigh contradictory rules, understanding the reasons for each rule may allow one to decide which is more important in a given situation. However, what we are really trying to do on Wikipedia is to predict what everybody else will do. The rules are really there to help us guess how other people will react to whatever we do, so we can avoid wasting time doing things that other users will simply revert. Thus when we decide how to weigh conflicting rules, we are really trying to predict how other users will weigh the rules when they decide whether to clobber what we just did. Wikipedia is a MMORPG where the objective is to write something that other users will not change. --Teratornis (talk) 10:11, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
Actually it's fine if people change what we did in a way that we like. The objective is to not have other users simply throw away our work. --Teratornis (talk) 10:14, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
Yep - you're absolutely right about asking questions the smart way. Having to decrypt and interpret some of the questions we get at the Refdesk should have taught me better! Profound apologies. Btw, I intend to use that MMORPG analogy - it's brilliant. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 12:04, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
I stole the analogy from somewhere else. Maybe from one of the thinkers I'm writing notes about on User:Teratornis/Theory of Wikipedia. I'm not brilliant, but sometimes I'm a pretty good parrot. The notion that the rules exist to help us predict what other users will do may be sort of original with me, as I don't know if I've read anyone who put it exactly that way before. Most people tend to reify the rules, as if they become a reality in themselves, but the real reality on Wikipedia is whatever Wikipedians decide to do next. To the extent that Wikipedians do not ignore all rules, the rules have predictive value, and thus begin to take on a bit of their own reality. This reminds me to get serious about getting started on my essay User:Teratornis/Do not fear complexity, which I intend as a counterpoint to WP:CREEP, an essay which I think disparages instructions a little too much, because the people who wrote that essay don't seem to be aware of what Wikipedia's instructions actually do - namely, they help us predict what other Wikipedians will do, enabling us to avoid wasting our time doing things they will un-do. --Teratornis (talk) 19:20, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Reference desk

Having noticed your answers at the HD to Refdeskish questions (and the effort you make to answer them), is there any particular reason why I don't see you at the RD? Zain Ebrahim (talk) 12:04, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

I guess the reason would be the opportunity cost of the time I happen to be spending on the Help desk, which is a sizable fraction of the time I allocate to Wikipedia. I might get bored with the Help desk eventually and look for interesting things to do elsewhere. To the extent that I appear to be making an effort, that's probably illusory. I edit Wikipedia purely for recreation; if it felt like work, I'd expect to get paid. Wikipedia to me is rewarding because the overall system works so well that I have almost no sensation of effort while I use it. (The only real effort is complying with WP:CIVIL when I answer stupidly ambiguous or misleading questions - it irks me when people omit essential information or do the other things that "How to Answer Questions the Smart Way" says not to do.) My brain must be making some sort of effort when I answer those questions, but it doesn't feel like effort because I'm attaining the psychological phenomenon of flow. In much the same way, when I ride my bicycles, I'm expending more calories than when I, say, clean my basement, but bicycling feels like fun and cleaning the basement feels like an unpleasant chore (and the decrepit state of my basement reflects this). My article-space edits lately have been mostly on energy-related topics. I'll keep editing those as long as they stay interesting. There is positive feedback when one concentrates on a certain area of Wikipedia. For example, I've answered so many Help desk questions by now that I not only find it easy and for the most part fun, but I also see ways to build or improve tools that help people look up answers to questions (e.g., Wikipedia:Help desk/How to answer, WP:EIW, {{Google custom}}, {{Help desk searches}}). My interest is not only in the Help desk, but in the process of the Help desk. Ultimately, success on Help desk will be when the Help desk becomes unnecessary because we have built tools that allow everyone to answer their own questions as easily or better than by asking a human. Similarly, in the energy-related articles, I've read and edited so many of them that I'm able to help standardize their terminology, design {{Energy templates}}, build the web by adding links on the jargon terms, etc. --Teratornis (talk) 19:41, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Barnstar

The Working Man's Barnstar
Thank you for your tireless contributions relating to wind power. I'm particularly impressed with the images you have sorted recently and the Austria and Italy articles which you have created. Johnfos (talk) 05:19, 25 November 2008 (UTC)
Thank you very much. I also plan to create "Wind power in ..." articles for the other major countries that currently have none (Wind power in Japan, Wind power in Belgium, Wind power in the Netherlands, etc.) unless someone beats me to them. I agree that photos can really make a difference in otherwise dry technical articles. However, I haven't actually uploaded any images yet, so maybe we should deduct one point off that barnstar. I have merely been sorting through the somewhat disorganized categories on Commons, putting images of wind turbines that other people have uploaded into some clearer categories, such as by country. It's like going on a treasure hunt. Commons has some remarkably good photos of wind turbines - some users clearly have professional-quality photography equipment and skills. However, some of the photos on Commons are inconsistently organized, and some of the descriptions take some decoding to determine the location and make/model, starting with the fact that they are in several different languages (fortunately, Google Translation does a pretty good job when you know the subject matter). I guess many of these photos appear on other language Wikipedias so we don't see them. When I see a good photo on Commons, I then look for places on the English Wikipedia to plug it in. It's much easier to start with the photo and find the article, than to start with the article and go looking for photos. I have a few notes on commons:User:Teratornis if you want to see what I'm up to there. Also see commons:Special:Contributions/Teratornis. There are more wind turbine photos on other language Wikipedias which are not yet on Commons, so I have to figure out how to move them. I've seen the general instructions in Wikipedia:Moving images to Commons but I have not actually slogged through the details yet. On top of all those photos in Wikimedia projects, there are perhaps even more wind turbine photos on Flickr, and I've seen some which are very nice. Some are under free licenses so we can copy them to Commons. But I have not yet worked through the procedure for that. --Teratornis (talk) 05:56, 25 November 2008 (UTC)
No points deducted. Enjoy your treasure hunt! Johnfos (talk) 06:18, 25 November 2008 (UTC)
Incidentally, I found it hard to believe that Italy actually had more wind power capacity installed at the end of 2007 than the United Kingdom. Before I started working on the Italy article, I don't think I had ever heard of a wind turbine in Italy. In contrast, the U.K. seems to generate more wind power news per wind turbine than any other country on Earth. At least news that reaches me. --Teratornis (talk) 07:18, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

More cut and paste from Claverton-energy.com

Greetinsgs Terratornis -

Thought this might interest you: ps you might want to look at the Claverton-energy.com site - some interesting stuff where this discussion continues. kind regards. Engineman (talk) 03:27, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

Physchim62 said:

  • COMMENTS FROM ENGINEMAN AND WILLOTHEWISP
    • World gasoline consumption is around 800 billion tonnes per year, and world diesel consumption around 600 billion tonnes a year. World ammonia production is around 150 million tonnes a year, roughly ten thousand times less. To produce this ammonia takes about 1% of the world's harnessed energy resources. Yes, ammonia can be produced from renewable energy resources, but on nothing like the scale of current production, let alone the production which would be needed to replace petroleum-based fuels. THIS IS JUST WRONG. I SUSPECT PHYSCHIM62 HAS SAID "TONNES" WHEN HE MEANS GALLONS. THE US REPRESENTS 1/4 OF THE WORLD'S OIL CONSUMPTION AT APPROXIMATELY 20 MILLION BARRELS A DAY. 365 DAYS A YEAR. ABOUT 70% OF THAT GOES FOR TRANSPORTATION USE. ASSUME, FOR SAKE OF ARGUMENT THAT A BARREL (42 GALLONS) YIELDS 42 GALLONS OF GASOLINE OR DIESEL. SO, THAT WOULD BE 307 BILLION GALLONS TOTAL OF OIL AND DIESEL PER YEAR FOR THE US. THEN, THE WORLD WOULD BE 4X THAT OR 1230 BILLION GALLONS ANNUAL GASOLINE AND DIESEL WORLDWIDE. AT A COMPOSITE DENSITY OF ABOUT 0.8 KG/LITER, THAT WORKS OUT TO 3.7 BILLION METRIC TONS PER YEAR, A FAR, FAR CRY FRO 800 + 600 = 1400 BILLION TONNES. PHYSCHIM62 IS RIGHT ABOUT THE WORLD ANNUAL NH3 PRODUCTION. I USUALLY QUOTE 130 MILLION TONNES, BUT IT'S PROBABY GONE UP SOME. I DON'T KNOW WHERE PHYSCHIM62 GETS THE 1% FIGURE FOR THE FRACTION OF TOTAL WORLD ENERGY CONSUMPTION TO PRODUCE NH3. I SUSPECT IT'S ALSO WRONG, THOUGH. IT TAKES ABOUT 9 TO 10 MWH ENERGY TO MAKE A TONNE OF AMMONIA WITH NATURAL GAS. (AND THAT TONNE OF NH3 CONTAINS 5.2 MWH (LHV).) IT TAKES ABOUT 12 MWH TO MAKE A TON OF AMMONIA USING AN ELECTROLYZER TO SUPPLY THE H2. [BTW, OUR PATENT PENDING SSAS PROCESS OF DIRECT AMMONIA SYNTHESIS FROM WATER AND AIR (NO INTERIM H2 FORMATION) USES ONLY 7.5 MWH PER TONNE. I'VE ATTACHED A BRIEFING.] SO, BOTTOM LINE IS YES, OF COURSE, NH3 PRODUCTION WOULD HAVE TO BE INCREASED MULTI-FOLD TO BEGIN TO ADDRESS A SIGNIFICANT FRACTION OF OIL CONSUMPTION. BUT NOT THOUSANDS OF TIMES, LIKE PHYSCHIM62 SUGGESTS. THERE IS PLENTY OF UNTAPPED WIND AND SOLAR TO PROVIDE THE ENERGY FOR THE NH3 PRODUCTION INCREASE.
  • Engineman comment on above: Yes agree with the above points and there is no way that any other potential alternatives can replace gasoline and diesel and that point needs to be more generally recognised.....But the same argument applies with much greater force to the use of hydrogen which is routinely touted as an alternative liquid fuel. Yet hydrogen has much greater disadvantages than ammonia. Whilst hydrogen can be produced with the same sort of energy efficiency from renewables or nuclear as ammonia it has much greater barriers to use age - namely you can't store enough of the stuff in the vehicle except under enormous pressure and with the loss of energy in compressing and cooling the gas. It appears to me that ammonia can be a replacement for the very small residual vehicle population we will be forced to adapt to as oil supplies diminish. YES, ALL OF US NH3 FUEL ADVOCATES ARE REALLY HYDROGEN ENTHUSIASTS, BUT PRAGMATIC ONES. WE KNOW THAT THE MAIN PROBLEM IS H2 STORAGE, WHICH NH3 (ACTUALLY TRADEMARKED "THE OTHER HYDROGEN") SOLVES. OF COURSE, HYDROGEN HAS OTHER PROBLEMS, SUCH AS FUEL CELL COST AND LIFETIME, BUT WE DON'T NEED TO GO THERE.
  • Physchim62 said: You cannot "readily" fit it into vehicles, you must have cryogenic storage and expensively modified engines. THIS IS BALONEY, UNLESS HE'S TALKING ABOUT HYDROGEN AND NOT NH3. AMMONIA IS A HYDROGEN-DENSE LIQUID AT ROOM TEMPERATURE AND 125 PSI.
  • Engineman comment on above: Both these points do not appear to be true if you read the references included above. Ammonia can be stored in pressure vessels and is routinely carried around the country in tankers. IT readily liquefies at lowish temperatures hence its use in refrigeration. It can be burnt in unmodified engines merely by the addition of 5% hydrogen pilot fuel...which quantity can be carried in a vehicle, unlike say 100% hydrogen. ACTUALLY 100% NH3 SI IC ENGINES HAVE BEEN RUN, BUT CRACKING ABOUT 5% TO H2 ON THE WAY TO THE ENGINE MAKES IT RUN BETTER, AND HAVE MORE COMPLETE COMBUSTION. AND, NH3 WILL BURN IN CI DIESEL ENGINES IF THERE IS 5% OF A HIGH CETANE ADDITIVE, SUCH AS BIODIESEL OR DME.

OpenStreetMap

Not sure if you're still involved with OpenStreetMap, but I've been mapping large sections of Greater Cincinnati for the past few months, and I'd be interested in helping out with your bike route–mapping project. (See your user page there.) – Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 10:18, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the information. I will examine the links you gave. I have not looked at OpenStreetMap in some time. --Teratornis (talk) 03:25, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Windpower in Italy

(My initial query was on User talk:Giancarlo Rossi#Moving some images from the Italian Wikipedia to Commons (permanent link). I have copied it here ahead of Giancarlo Rossi's replies, to maintain the coherency of our discussion thread.) --Teratornis (talk) 00:22, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Hello, I noticed you edit on both the English Wikipedia and the Italian Wikipedia. I have added some photos that were already on Commons to commons:Category:Wind power in Italy. (I am seeking photos to add to a Wind power in Italy article I am starting on the English Wikipedia.) I searched on the Italian Wikipedia for wind power images not already on Commons, and I found two which I would like to use on the English Wikipedia:

Are you familiar with moving images to Commons? I may try to move them, but I hesitate somewhat because I don't speak Italian, and I am not sufficiently familiar with the image moving process to try it for the first time on a Wikipedia I cannot easily read. If nobody beats me to it, I might attempt the move after I practice the technique from some images on the English Wikipedia. --Teratornis (talk) 00:03, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

Plöckenpass-pass-wind-generator.jpg is now in Wikipedia Commons

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I must say that WP in Italy is not very developed, but We have interesting research as the it:Kitegen and other vertical blades/tower windgenerators. If You want I can translate Your page from english into italian. Probably there will not be any problem about taking the images of wind generators from the italian section to commons, since ussually the policy aplied in the Italian Wikipedia is much stricter than in the english version (free use is banned, and images of uncertain copyright are erased in a very fast way). Yet I think it would be better if the Author of the images actually is the one who moves them to commons. --Giancarlo Rossi (talk) 19:13, 30 November 2008 (UTC)
Actually, the plocken-pass wind generator is located in Austria. The other picture is about a small windfarm (10 x 2 Mw) in Tuscany, belonging to the Spanish company Endesa, and it's name is it:Parco_eolico_dei_Poggi_Alti --Giancarlo Rossi (talk) 19:51, 30 November 2008 (UTC)
Responding to separate items:
It will be interesting to see if KiteGen can beat the trend. I myself am skeptical about claims of low cost per kWh before there is even a working prototype. Conventional horizontal-axis wind turbines have had no major breakthroughs in the last 30 years, just steady incremental improvement through real-world use. That is how long the technology took to become competitive with the more expensive fossil-fuel power plants. In the 1970s, people had all the basic ideas for modern wind turbines, but they were still decades away from getting enough of the details right. One questionable aspect of the KiteGen scheme is the huge size of the rotating ring, which makes the installation all-or-nothing, in contrast to conventional wind farms which continue operating when some individual wind turbines are down for repairs. I have wondered about the possibility of attaching very large traction kites to an ocean-going tanker vessel, and letting it cruise endlessly around the Roaring Forties. It could generate electricity by running its screws as water turbines, and use the electricity to generate ammonia. When the tanks fill up, it could dock somewhere and deliver its cargo. --Teratornis (talk) 00:22, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Hydrogen + Methane in Italy: Hythane

In the northern city of Bologna, the bus public transportation, is doing an experimental service with buses going with a mix of 90-70% Methane and 10-30% Hydrogen (Hythane), at 600 atmosferes of pressure, and at 25 C. --Giancarlo Rossi (talk) 20:31, 30 November 2008 (UTC)

The correct name is HCNG, hythane is a copyrighted brandname which was later introduced. Cheers Mion (talk) 00:29, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Those are some interesting articles. I have noticed a number of transportation-related articles which have no navigation templates yet. I may try to address that if nobody beats me to it. --Teratornis (talk) 01:04, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

NREL wind power docs

Hi T, Thought you may be interested in this series of state-by state wind power docs from NREL: Economic Benefits, Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Emissions Reductions, and Water Conservation Benefits from 1,000 Megawatts (MW) of New Wind Power in Arizona. Johnfos (talk) 00:16, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

That looks like an interesting report. Something to keep in mind when we write the Wind power in Arizona article. Water is a big deal in Arizona which is basically an overpopulated desert (albeit one of the world's relatively wettest deserts, which is not to say it's actually wet). Saving water would be a huge advantage for wind there. In the eastern part of the U.S., there are a lot more major rivers and lakes. The Great Lakes, for example, are for the most part deep and cold, so they make excellent heat sinks for the thermal power plants all around them. This in turn has led to a well-developed electric grid, which is why there is interest in building offshore wind farms in the Great Lakes, where they would be relatively close to existing grids and population centers. Unlike, say, North Dakota which has outstanding wind resources but is far from major grids and cities. --Teratornis (talk) 01:13, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Template-making

Thanks, Teratornis, for cluing me in about how to work on Templates. I generally do pretty well by adapting examples, and I'm sure the examples you suggested will steer me in useful directions. -- Cheers, Deborahjay (talk) 01:19, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

You may want to practice your template coding on some user subpages. I have several I use, such as User:Teratornis/Sandbox. --Teratornis (talk) 03:05, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
I'm all about examples. One of the best things about Wikipedia is that we can see the code behind most of what other people do. Plus Wikipedians have a greater tendency than most humans to explain what they did, in writing. --Teratornis (talk) 05:08, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Barnstar!

The Help Desk Barnstar
In appreciation of your tireless, lucid, level headed and wise contributions ukexpat (talk) 04:21, 8 December 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. WP:COI prevents me from agreeing too exuberantly with any more than the "tireless" part. --Teratornis (talk) 05:11, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Wind power in Texas

You've been doing some good work on this article and I wonder if you would like to take it to WP:GAN. When I tried previously some time ago it was pretty close to passing. Probably just a few more redlinks and blanks in the main table need to be filled in, and the reference list needs to be better formatted. Johnfos (talk) 02:03, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

The references should all be in citation templates; all of mine are. Looking at some random featured articles, such as Geography of Ireland#References, every reference is in a citation template. Featured articles almost always use either citation templates or some other formal system such as Harvard Referencing. Unfortunately, only a tiny percentage of Wikipedia editors seem to have slogged through WP:FOOT, WP:CITE, and WP:CITET to learn how to do it manually, so most editors use the sloppy but simple bare URL method. I try to make everything I contribute suitable for a featured article without further cleanup. So you shouldn't have to clean up any of my references. To me it seemed obvious, as soon as I saw some other people using citation templates, that was the way to go. I guess it's not so obvious to a lot of other people.
But speaking of unobvious, what's up with this edit? define:intermittency produces definitions like this:
Weather systems are by definition intermittent, and a wind turbine extracts power from weather systems. I don't know what sort of word game Amory Lovins wants to play, perhaps he's taking a few laps on the euphemism treadmill (click that link and read it). On Wikipedia, we don't play word games simply to avoid terms that some people use pejoratively, if only because the resulting stilted language is impossible to enforce consistently - will you comb through every wind power article on Wikipedia and remove every mention of intermittency? Good luck if you want to fight that uphill battle. Read the intermittent power source article; the lead section says it applies to both "variable" and "intermittent" power sources. WP:BTW says to link to relevant topics. Whenever one of our dozens if not hundreds of wind power articles starts talking about intermittency/variability, it should link to our definitive topic (Intermittent power source) which represents (or should represent) Wikipedia's consensus on the issue. If you want to battle over the precise term to describe the inherent uncontrollability of wind, that's the article to battle in, not in locale-specific topics like Wind power in Texas. Wind obeys the same laws of physics everywhere in the world, so we need to use consistent definitions whether we are discussing wind in Texas or New Zealand etc.
Also note that the limitations of wind turbines tend to transform the variability of the wind into actual intermittency. Even if the wind never completely dies at a particular location, often the wind speed will be outside the operating range of a particular wind turbine, either too fast or two slow. (Because of engineering and economic trade-offs, a practical wind turbine cannot operate at all possible wind speeds; if the wind speed is below the cut-in speed for the turbine, the wind cannot turn the generator; and if the wind speed is above the cut-out speed, the turbine must feather its blades and stop the rotor to avoid overspeeding and damage.) Thus there will be many hours out of the year during which the wind turbine produces no power at all, and these hours are unpredictable - if that is not intermittency, what is? The wind itself may be a variable resource, but the wind turbine is certainly an intermittent power source, and since we have to use wind turbines to transform wind into electrical power, for all practical purposes the wind itself might as well be an intermittent resource. In any case, the point seems entirely moot, because even if we had a power source that met Amory Lovins' definition of "intermittency" (whatever that is), we would integrate it onto the grid in the same way we integrate "highly variable" power sources. --Teratornis (talk) 08:41, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
As far as I'm aware, there is no requirement to use citation templates at GA level. Lovins & co. summarise some thoughts on variability here: [2]. Diesendorf discusses the issue in Greenhouse Solutions with Sustainable Energy, pages 117-127. In part, he says "For several dispersed wind farms, total wind power generally varies smoothly and therefore cannot be described accurately as "intermittent". Johnfos (talk) 09:49, 11 December 2008 (UTC)
Well sure, if you have a big enough grid, the wind is always blowing somewhere. I think there is a mathematical proof that the wind cannot stop blowing everywhere on Earth at one time. However, there is not a big difference between having 10% output and 0% output from a collection of wind farms. If the output can drop to as low as 10% of collective nameplate capacity, it might as well be zero from the grid operator's point of view. All the grid operator cares about is that they have to run some backup power plants, a few more or less don't make a big difference. I think the biggest worry with wind may be the seasonal variability. For example, this study found four times as much wind energy in the winter months as in the summer months:
  • "Lake Erie Wind Resource Report, Cleveland Water Crib Monitoring Site, Two-Year Report Executive Summary" (PDF). Green Energy Ohio. 2008-01-10. Retrieved 2008-11-27.
That's like having 3/4 of a wind farm at that location being seasonally intermittent. Seasonal variability is a big problem because currently there is no practical method of seasonal-scale grid energy storage.
There may be no requirement to use citation templates at a GA level, but the easiest way to meet requirements is to exceed them, especially if the goal is to get to FA eventually. If an article is slightly deficient in one requirement, exceeding another requirement may make a better impression on reviewers. I think a similar reasoning applies to having navigation templates. A GA may not need them, but the lack could be especially glaring in an article like Wind power in Texas. These are the extra touches that denote a well-thought-out article.
In other news, I have found (only) one more wind farm image on Commons from Texas:
There is also a related article: American Wind Power Center which seems to be the site of this Vestas V47 wind turbine:
Currently that article is kind of stubby and it has a complaint template on it. I'll see what I can do later. --Teratornis (talk) 01:44, 12 December 2008 (UTC)
Apropos your second sentence, you may be thinking of the hairy ball theorem, which implies that there is always a point on the Earth where the wind is not blowing. Algebraist 01:56, 12 December 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, that's it. Probably a different (physical) argument would be necessary to show that wind is always blowing somewhere, because there is always differential solar heating of the Earth's surface. --Teratornis (talk) 04:41, 12 December 2008 (UTC)


Thanks to all

User:Fuhghettaboutit
User:PrimeHunter
and,
User:Teratornis
in regards to:
[[3]]
Wikipedia:Help desk
"Question for Wikipedia regarding monetary contributions"
"I got this feeling, Wikipedians are watching me"
"language interwiki question (linkings)"
"language interwiki question (size and number of articles)"
and to,
User:Dcoetzee
in regards to
[[4]]
2 questions: one about contributions
Yartett (talk) 19:49, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

You're welcome. --Teratornis (talk) 04:53, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

This is what I call a wind turbine on public display

Copied from User talk:Johnfos because I want to save it, and Johnfos deletes instead of archives his talk page. --Teratornis (talk) 04:53, 20 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm noticing a tendency in the photos of wind turbines on Commons, Flickr, etc. - most people tend to photograph the wind turbines themselves, which of course is the obvious thing to do, but fewer people photograph the visitor displays (if any). I think it is interesting to show how various people around the world present their wind turbines to the public. Since wind turbines often visually dominate their surrounding landscapes, it strikes me as suboptimal public relations to put up towering, anonymous machines without providing some facility to inform the viewers. Illustrating the various wind turbines on public display might show some wind farm owners how to do a better job. Of course one physical display location cannot inform everyone who sees a wind farm from miles in all directions, but it might be a start. --Teratornis (talk) 23:48, 19 December 2008 (UTC)

So that is the actual base of an operating wind turbine... fascinating... and I've been watching Category:Wind turbines on public display with interest too. Any more thoughts on becoming an Admin?
Oh, and have you seen this one: Review of solutions to global warming, air pollution, and energy security I found section 10 particularly interesting. Johnfos (talk) 01:24, 20 December 2008 (UTC)
This is also apparently the actual base of an operating wind turbine, being used for something other than its intended purpose, probably:
These Flickr photo sets of the Fowler Ridge Wind Farm show some wind turbine bases; I may upload them to Commons if I get motivated:
Fowler Ridge seems to be the nearest large wind farm to me. The Buckeye Wind Project will be closer, but not larger. Where I live is a low wind resource area (class 1 and 2), so I probably won't see any large wind turbines unless I go out of my way. I know of two wind turbines within easy bicycling range, of 10kW and 7kW nameplate capacity respectively. When I get a digital camera I will photograph them (yeah, I have no camera, how lame is that). They are both working wind turbines, but their capacity factors must be low. The 7kW turbine is a low-wind model by Aventa (a Swiss company). The site is very accessible, so I could get some good photos.
I'm thinking about starting a separate article: Wind turbines on public display to house a comprehensive list (or possibly call it "List of ..."), and trimming down the existing section: Unconventional wind turbines#Wind turbines on public display to a few notable examples. Reasons:
  • The more I look, the more examples I find of wind turbines on public display, and new ones are getting built. These are virtually all wind turbines of conventional horizontal-axis, three-bladed design, so they are somewhat out of place in the "Unconventional" wind turbine article, and will eventually overwhelm that article if I keep adding every one I find, let alone if anyone else starts adding theirs.
  • I would like to add an "On public display" entry to the "Wind turbines" group in the {{Wind power}} navigation template, but I haven't yet because the template already has a link to Unconventional wind turbines.
  • It's a staple of wind-NIMBYism to decry wind farms as eyesores. However, wind farms around the world are becoming unintended tourist attractions. I think the phenomenon deserves its own article. Wind power tourism is not really a suitable topic for the Unconventional wind turbines article. Environmental effects of wind power mentions it briefly, but a detailed treatment would be out of place there.
As to pursuing administratorship, it turns out I don't immediately seem to need it as much as I thought I might. After I copied a bunch of images to Commons with CommonsHelper, some Wikipedia admins deleted the now-redundant images off Wikipedia after a few days. Nobody complained, so I guess they don't mind doing it. The process appears to be partly automated so I guess it's not a problem. Similarly, after I uploaded a few images from Flickr to Commons, eventually other users "Flickreview"ed them.
The Jacobson article looks interesting. I read the abstract, and I've heard of some of the points he mentions, such as the number of large wind turbines that could power all of U.S. road transport. Battery technology will need to improve, but building enough wind turbines seems to be completely realistic. I'll probably cite the article to address a misleading claim about nuclear power vs. wind in the Pickens Plan article. It looks like Jacobson considered only some power generation options, and not efficiency improvements. I would like to see a report on the scope for virtualizing physical travel with information technology. Wikipedia itself seems to be a good example (possibly the best example available to the public) of how much people can do without moving. Not many organizations can claim to be doing anything much more complicated than what Wikipedia does, and Wikipedia does it all with negligible face-to-face contact. To the extent that existing workflows could be wikified, people would need to travel that much less. In the U.S., travel depends on petroleum for 97% of its energy, and the U.S. imports steadily more of its petroleum (almost 70% now), so any reduction in physical travel goes directly to carbon dioxide reduction and energy security increase. --Teratornis (talk) 04:49, 20 December 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for that. I think a Wind turbines on public display article is a great idea... Johnfos (talk) 06:45, 20 December 2008 (UTC)
I read some links under WP:EIW#Lists and now I think the article title should probably be List of wind turbines on public display. The article should have a good chance of sticking because there are so many examples to list, and we have either photos or reliable sources for most if not all of them. I will follow the WP:SPLIT#Procedure. --Teratornis (talk) 19:32, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

Template:Infobox Fishery Characteristics

Would you mind looking at this template which is displaying badly here? --Geronimo20 (talk) 11:46, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

You left out some closing braces. --Teratornis (talk) 19:23, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
You would probably get faster response on the Help desk. --Teratornis (talk) 19:35, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
Thanks. Much appreciated! --Geronimo20 (talk) 21:03, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia needs a tool like lint (software) that checks the syntax of template code and reports any problems it finds. Unmatched delimiters like braces are a very common programming error, and one that is relatively simple for a code-checking program to detect. When a program has thousands of lines of code, a human often needs help from a machine to tell when one half of a paired construct is missing. --Teratornis (talk) 04:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

Translating a Template

Thank you! The templates I'm trying to translate have really nothing to do with a problem in the english wikipedia, but I would apreciate so much if you would help me geting this template working, even if it's not translated from the spanish one. Perhaps you can get someone else to help me. I quite frankly still don't know what I should put in any page in the MediaWiki: namespace once I contact the Lojban administrators. It would be so helpful to the lojban wikipedia. --Homo logos (talk) 18:03, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

P.D. My Username in the lojban wikipedia is Tadre'as

It is hard for me to imagine how I could provide much more help than I already did since I don't know Lojban and I don't know anyone else who does, in fact I don't recall ever hearing of the language before I read your Help desk question. Tell the Lojban admins to read my response to your Help desk question, and if they don't understand it, they can contact me with their specific questions. If they are qualified to be administrators on a MediaWiki wiki, my response should give them enough to start with. I looked at the Lojban article, and while I do have some interest in human-computer communication, I don't see anything that could motivate me to learn a constructed language any time soon. Thus my interest in the Lojban Wikipedia is near zero. (My personal sense of priority leans toward things I consider direct imminent threats to the survival of civilization, such as Global warming and Peak oil. Maybe once we solve those problems, I can think about learning a constructed language that I don't need.) If I were to take an interest in another language Wikipedia, I would probably be more interested in helping a group of people who have no other Wikipedia they can read, such as the impoverished speakers of some African language, whereas anyone who speaks Lojban must certainly be a native speaker of one of the major natural languages which already has a sizable Wikipedia. Therefore, I would view a request for help with the Lojban Wikipedia as being similar to a request for help to clean someone's yacht. Someone who can afford a yacht does not need my help (although I can always give suggestions about how to do it). Similarly, someone who has sufficient spare intellectual capacity to learn an artificial language like Lojban must certainly have the capacity to read and master the MediaWiki Handbook. Wikipedia is a do it yourself system. I can point you to the friendly manuals, but your success on Wikipedia is a function of your willingness to read them. I don't know how much experience you have with collaborative projects such as Wikipedia, but in every open source project there is a strong emphasis on self-reliance. There is also the severe practical limitation of the MediaWiki software, which makes detailed hand-holding interaction with another person almost impossible. For two people to work together productively on Wikipedia, they must both know a lot about Wikipedia. Which means they must both have read lots of manuals. --Teratornis (talk) 19:44, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
I'm sorry, all I meant was a little more instruction. Although I have been working in the spanish wikipedia for quite a long time I had never tried to make a template, I merely write articles. What happens is I don't understand exactly what is the problem, I never heard of style classes: should the text in MediaWiki:Common.css be put in jbo:MediaWiki:Common.css? But I think what you said is right I should contact the lojban admins and ask them.
I never meant you to learn lojban, I can tell you that for most people who like it, it is not very high in their priorities. I hope I didn't upset you --Homo logos (talk) 20:43, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
I have only tried copying style classes between MediaWiki wikis that all use English; in that case, usually you can just copy whole blocks of CSS code verbatim from the English Wikipedia to another wiki, and it works. I don't know what happens to pages in the MediaWiki: namespace on a foreign-language Wikipedia. But I suppose we could look: es:MediaWiki:Common.css. Evidently the CSS code on that page looks exactly like it would on an English-language Wikipedia. Only some of the comments are in Spanish. So maybe all you need is for an administrator on the Lojban Wikipedia to copy MediaWiki:Common.css from here to jbo:MediaWiki:Common.css. However, I don't know whether that is all you need, and I don't know why the administrators did not already perform this seemingly obvious step, which will be necessary to get lots of things to work, not only your particular template. I am pretty sure the Lojban Wikipedia administrators will be able to understand what I wrote to you if they have any sysadmin skills at all. If you aren't familiar with CSS, read the Cascading Style Sheets article. In the past I have looked, but I have not found any page that is a good introduction to CSS on Wikipedia for someone who has never heard of CSS before. Instead, people tend to mention CSS in passing as if they believe everyone already is a CSS expert. Maybe you could write such an introduction as you figure this out. Almost every problem you can experience on Wikipedia will have afflicted many other people in the past, and probably will afflict many more people in the future. Ideally, the first person to suffer through a problem should write all the solutions for the next victims to find. To a large extent, this does occur on Wikipedia. Get to know the Editor's index. The answer to almost every problem is somewhere in the many links on that page. Unfortunately, the precise answer to a given problem may not be neatly documented somewhere. Often one must synthesize an answer by collecting information from several sources. What you (and lots of people) really need is a comprehensive guide: "How to port templates from the English Wikipedia to new MediaWiki wikis". This is a very technical subject and requires knowledge of MediaWiki system administration. You should read the entire MediaWiki Handbook, and you could also try installing your own wiki on a stick. The problem you are running into on the Lojban Wikipedia seems to be like trying to drive a train before someone else builds the railroad track. The average Wikipedia editor cannot be concerned with CSS style classes. Instead, a few technically-inclined users must set that stuff up so the less technically-inclined editors can just use it. The larger Wikipedias have that stuff set up already. When you go to a small, new Wikipedia, it is like being a colonist on the frontier. If you are used to the comforts of city life, living on the frontier can be difficult. To survive on the frontier, you need many skills to solve problems that you never have to worry about in the civilized area. --Teratornis (talk) 06:07, 1 January 2009 (UTC)
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