If I've posted something on your talk page, please reply there rather than here. Any new question or comment at the bottom of the page, please. If you post something here, I'll reply here.
Hi Hoary. Am I right in guessing that this post in in regards to English modal auxiliary verbs? I don't believe there is a script to automate the work, but it's a task I've taken on for other editors before (at History of Christianity for instance). If I can help just let me know, I'd drop a message on the talk page today and could do the work tomorrow. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested«@» °∆t° 13:09, 26 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
That's a very generous offer, ActivelyDisinterested. Yes, that's the article that's probably the most unsightly, and it promises to become more unsightly as I get around to revising the large percentage of its content that I've so far only tinkered with.
Here is the 12 December '23 edit in which I added Rp templates for the first time.
You'll see such grotesqueries as
Both can and could can be used to make requests:[1]: 865 Can/could you pass me the cheese? means "Please pass me the cheese" (where could is more polite[1]: 940 ). Either can be used with possibly: Can/could you possibly pass me the cheese?[1]: 768, 770 Requests with can't may sound impatient (Can't you be quiet?)[1]: 940
That's a short paragraph; as long as the article is using Rp, why does it not end:
. . . Requests with can't may sound impatient (Can't you be quiet?)[1]: 768, 770, 865, 940
? Answer: because I think it very likely that I haven't finished shuffling sentences and clauses around. A fanatical attention to detailed referencing should help conscientious and informative referencing in the event of reshuffling. When I'm fairly happy with the article, I might simplify (defanaticize) the referencing somewhat; but till then, I'd prefer it if the Sfn-referencing is as "granular" as the Rp referencing is now. And another matter with later reshuffling in mind: Conversion of consecutive Sfn indices to singular Sfnm indices is probably something better left till later.
History of Christianity certainly has complexity: footnotes that have not one but multiple references, etc. I particularly appreciate cartographic illustration of a footnote.
NB I'll be away from my computer during much of the 29th (UTC+09:00), and from the 31st to the 2nd. -- Hoary (talk) 05:42, 27 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I could convert all the refs to sfn, and once you done with the article and all the refs are in there final place compound the sfn templates into sfnm for the sake of tidiness. I've dropped a note of the articles talk page, just in case anyone wants to object. It's probably unnecessary but I don't want to get caught up by WP:CITEVAR. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested«@» °∆t° 12:36, 27 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Thank you, ActivelyDisinterested. No, I too don't think that anyone will object. However, when I invite objections to changes that I propose, I usually give people one week. I mean, if people can complain about unilateral changes, I think they can also reasonably complain about the short period within which they were expected to learn of a proposed change, evaluate it, and agree/object to it. -- Hoary (talk) 12:49, 27 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Yes, that's for the better. -- Hoary (talk) 22:35, 27 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Using ((sfnp)), and for multi-cites ((sfnmp)), would be more consistent with CS1 output. I have no idea why people keep using the inconsistent ((sfn[m])) pair; I guess just because they're a letter shorter? — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 08:03, 29 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
My first impressions of Sfnp/Sfnmp are (i) that they differ from Sfn/Sfnm only in adding parentheses, and (ii) that the added parentheses don't help explain anything and are entirely superfluous. I am of course open to being shown either that I've misunderstood what I think I understand or that I've overlooked some other and more important difference. I think what you're saying is that when mousing over a link, clicking through, and eventually landing at, say, "Sorabji, K. S. (1947) Mi contra fa: The Immoralisings of a Machiavellian Musician, the path to the latter (with year in parentheses) will be a slightly smoother experience for the reader if the intermediate stage is "Sorabji (1947)" than if it's "Sorabji 1947". Is this right? -- Hoary (talk) 10:00, 29 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I have no input on this, sfn Vs sfnp is a stylistic choice that doesnt effect the conversion work I offered to help with. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested«@» °∆t° 13:35, 29 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
ActivelyDisinterested, let's see what SMcCandlish says. Incidentally, the (featured!) article Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji is a conspicuous example of an "sfn-ish" (?) kind of referencing that put me off Sfn(p) for a long time: click on the index number to a reference and you are told, say "Roberge (2020), p. 251"; you then are not given a link to, but instead have to look for yourself within an alphabetically arranged list in order to find, "Roberge, Marc-André (2020). Opus sorabjianum: The Life and Works of Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji. Retrieved 1 August 2020." I find Rp hugely preferable to that implementation of a two-stage process; though of course Sfn(p) doesn't have this major flaw. -- Hoary (talk) 00:55, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Yes text based short form refs are problematic. There are a large number of articles with reference styles similar to Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji were many of the cites are missing, but there is no indication that there's anything wrong. It's not a referencing style I'd use or support. One of the benefits of sfn or similar templates is that they both provide a direct link and emit error messages is the cite is missing. When it comes to sfn vs sfnp, even though I've spent years doing detail obsessed edits, I can't bring myself to care whether a displayed cite is comma or period separate. I'm more worried that the cites actually exist. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested«@» °∆t° 01:27, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
(edit conflict) Yeesh. That one's a trainwreck because someone has manually done <ref name=au>Roberge (2020), p. 308</ref> throughout the page. The vast majority of that name=au stuff is not needed at all because these specific-page citations are not being reused, and the entire thing could be done with ((sfnp|Roberge|2020)) syntax (I used to think that <ref name="au">((harvp|Roberge|2020|p=308)).</ref> was needed for a named reference that is actually reused, but this turns out not to be the case, at least not any more; ((sfnp)) will now create merged single references when reused with the same page number.) — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 01:44, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
As for why to use ((sfnp)), it is because the "stylistic choice" as you call it has already been made; it is built into all the CS1/CS2 templates, which are used in over 99% of our articles. So we should not, per WP:CITESTYLE, be veering confusingly back and forth between "Smith (2012), p. 17" formatting in one citation (short or long) and "Smith 2012, p. 17" in another (short) one. And the parentheses/round-brackets are not superfluous; it makes it perfectly clear what the date of the publication is, which can matter more than one thinks, especially given titles that contain dates and even organizational authors that contain dates ("Foo Convention Editorial Committee 2012" or whatever), which may not match the actual publication date. So, yes, there will be the "smoother experience" when going from a short "Smith (2012), p. 17" citation to the long "Smith, A. B. (2017) "Some Title Here", Journal Name, ..." full citation, but there are other considerations.
Ultimately, there's not really a way to force people to use ((sfnp)), and we're unfortunately stuck with ((sfn)) looking like it's "the standard" or "the default" simply because its name is shorter, but when I encounter ((sfn)) in a CS1 article and change it to ((sfnp)) to get consistent citation formatting per CITESTYLE, no one reverts me. I have yet to run into anyone demanding the no-paren style, probably because they already understand that it's forced by the main citation templates (((cite book)), ((cite web)), even CS2 ((citation))) already. If someone's doing all-manual (untemplated) citations to enforce some particular off-site style manual's citation style, and it demands dates in "2012" format instead of "(2012)", then I wouldn't change it; while that manual formatting is a butt-pain for everyone and serves no real purpose, it is technically permissible by WP:STYLEVAR. "I'm more worried that the cites actually exist." Certainly, but we might as well be consistent with them while we're creating them or cleaning them up. — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 01:44, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
OK, SMcCandlish, you've persuaded me. ActivelyDisinterested, let's go with Sfnp. Now, I tend to think that far too many new articles are created (benevolent suggestions such as this make me feel slightly ill), and whether for this reason or simply out of laziness create few myself; but in future when I do I'll try to have them use Sfnp. -- Hoary (talk) 04:03, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
No worries, I'm good either way. I'll get started on it in the new year, per your suggestion. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested«@» °∆t° 04:06, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I've always thought pointing new editors to article creation was an exercise in sadism. They write the article and submit, and only afterwards are notability standards explained and after that come the explanation of how their sources aren't reliable. It must feel like being trapped in a Kafka novel. Starting to edit Wikipedia can be a steep learning curve, starting to edit Wikipedia by creating an article is a sheer cliff. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested«@» °∆t° 04:17, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
No, ActivelyDisinterested, it's worse. This is a suggestion made to somebody who'd hoped, and probably still hopes, to create an article about an author. It's not very obvious that she's notable, in the Wikipedia sense, though she might be (I haven't started to investigate). It's obvious that she's had a lot of books published, and although I happen not to have heard of any of them, it's easy to imagine that at least a few have got three or more reviews in newspapers, magazines or similar. My suggestion: If the aim is to create a draft about the author, start by looking for substantive reviews of the books, and summarizing those. (I had this in mind. But then I don't know jack.) The countersuggestion (not mine!): Aim for an article on each of several of the books, urgh. -- Hoary (talk) 04:42, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Williams is probably notable. I cleaned up the draft a little. Haven't done any sourcing work on it. I don't have much sympathy in this specific case, because it appears to be a paid editor, and he's rude to everyone. But the general idea of "use Articles for Creation', yeah, I wouldn't wish that on anyone. You're much better off reading the core content policies, then doing your best in userspace and putting it in mainspace when you think it'll float, where the burden will be on deletionists to prove your article should be deleted, rather than on you to convince various drive-by AfC reviewers that it is good enough to pass their personal muster. More than half the drafts I've significantly tweaked have already been good enough to pass GNG before I got there, and just needed work on encyclopedic writing quality, formatting of citations, MoS tweaks, proper categorization, etc. Yet they have mostly stayed stuck in draft-space. (The other half were dreck, either on patently non-notable people/companies/products, or just non-encyclopedic ideas like "Internet meme trolling in Kerala" which isn't any different from online goofing off everywhere else in the world.) — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 05:46, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
It seems that it was launched by her husband (yes of course, COI) and subsequently paying editor. It's not obvious that the paid editor did anything, though I can't really be bothered to look. That first editor has fessed up to the payment, which he now regrets, and to the COI. He's been rude, but fairly selectively and I think only when provoked -- and look, he's Australian, and Australians have a robust turn of phrase. I can easily imagine that the subject of the draft is notable, but these days I'm soft-pedalling help with drafts: It's too time-consuming. (Most recent example.) -- Hoary (talk) 06:17, 30 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Agreed. I barely touch drafts other than to do some "watch and learn" cleanup on them. Actually trying to do the source research for them is often wasted effort. Same goes for most AfD/prod targets, and user-space drafts, and CoI edit requests for that matter (though I get asked to do an inordinate number of the last, just because I've taken the time to do some in the past – kinda coming back to haunt me). — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 00:40, 31 December 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
There's so much boosterism hereabouts that there's a risk that every draft (example) seems to the tired reviewer no more than part of an ad campaign. A recipe for reviewer cynicism indeed. (I'm glad I later did this, even though I'm still not happy with the result.) -- Hoary (talk) 06:42, 2 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
And not some weedy bowler or beret. Instead, a real hat.Amazing conversion job done! A tip of the hat to ActivelyDisinterested for this series of edits, which at first glance seem to have taken 94 minutes, and which certainly result in a greatly improved look 'n' feel. But then I start to wonder how long it took for ActivelyDisinterested to work on the first of the series edits before clicking the "Publish changes" button. I fear that it would have taken me most of one day. Thank you, ActivelyDisinterested! (And now I have to get down to improving the article.) -- Hoary (talk) 04:36, 3 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Hello hoary I have a question about pictures, so I created a page on African hair threading, and I just wanted to ask a quick question. When it comes to the pictures of famous people that is widely used by social media, magazines, blogs do I need to get permission from the photographer who took the picture of the celebrity before uploading it and making a use of it on Wikipedia. Because am trying to make use of a Nigerian celebrity in a threaded hairstyle. Bernadine okoro (talk) 03:22, 2 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Yes, you need that. Bernadine okoro, the photographs you're describing, if they can be uploaded at all, should be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons. So you're asking a Wikimedia Commons question and not a Wikipedia question. Regardless of either (i) how often the photograph is reproduced or (ii) how famous the person shown is, the copyright holder (usually but not always the photographer) must explicitly permit its reproduction in Wikimedia Commons, from which it can be used by Wikipedia, or anyone else (even for commercial purposes). If you can't determine whether/how an image is copyrighted, then you have to assume that it's conventionally copyrighted ("All rights reserved"), and therefore is unusable. Please see "Must be freely licensed or public domain". -- Hoary (talk) 05:06, 2 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Yes am actually not done with the article unfortunately I don't have a lot of time so I often create pages like this and then come back to the page to add more things. Am assuming that by designating the article as an orphan that means it needs to be linked to other pages ie like this right [ [hair] ]? Bernadine okoro (talk) 15:35, 5 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Bernadine okoro, if African hair threading was/is worth making, it's worth reading. But in order to read it, people hove to encounter it; and few people will encounter it because they guess that it might exist and therefore type "African hair threading" in the "Find" box. (After all, it could instead be titled "Hair threading" or something else.) Rather, they'll encounter it via links from elsewhere. A few such links already exist, but adding African hair threading to Template:Human hair seems a good idea to me. -- Hoary (talk) 22:31, 5 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
"You restoring/ reverting an edit, whether it was by yourself or someone else = your edit, since you are the last editor to implement/ introduce, that edit.
Not only did you introduce/ re-introduce non factual information or fabrication (original research) into the encyclopedia, this also results in misleading readers as well as other editors having to clean up (fix) your instigated, disorder.
Please refer to the previous responses above, if you are still confused and/or need any more information regarding this section."
To give you context I edited a page and added a different genre of music which I felt best describes a song i later on reverted the editing as a result leaving the edit as I originally found it. But some other user is giving me a warning even after I explained to the user that it wasn't me who initially put in the original genre i told the user that my edit was a revert to how I found it but the user still insists that am wrong because i was the last person to edit the page. There is also another user who gave me a warning about another edit that I didn't make I found this puzzling because this other editor has been on Wikipedia for a long time and seems to be a pro on the platform and as such I was expecting this user to make use of the view history tab to figure out who made the initial edit but this user didn't do that. Am guessing since I was the last person to edit the page the user is giving me a warning. So my question is if I edited a page and later reverted the page to how I found it and it turns out the information I revereted back was wrong am I the right one to give a warning to? also if an edit I never made on a page is wrong since am the last person to edit the page should I be given a warning since am the last person to edit a page? Bernadine okoro (talk) 14:53, 19 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Bernadine okoro, most of Wikipedia's articles are somewhere between "problematic" and "bad". Let's say that I'm keeping an eye on one that's "not satisfactory, but decent on balance", and that somebody suddenly makes a lot of edits to it that, taken together, in my opinion, damage it, and that I revert these edits. The reversion is indeed my edit, and I'm responsible for it. However, I'm not responsible for the veracity/quality of every part that I restore, and I'm not claiming that nothing that I deleted was an improvement. All I'm saying is that the version I'm restoring is, as a whole, superior to the one that I reverted.
An argument seems to have developed on your talk page. I haven't read it. I do notice that one user is raising their voice via boldface and underlining. This is about as bad as WRITING ALL IN CAPITALS, and it's a major reason why I didn't read. Another major reason is that I know nothing about the subject area. Anyway, as you continue to discuss this, avoid talking about who did what or who was/is responsible for what; instead, concentrate on what the article says, and how this is (or isn't) based on reliable sources. If you need more input, perhaps invite people at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Nigeria or Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Songs to go to the article's talk page. (Try to avoid phrasing your message in a way that might start up a parallel discussion. It's far better if a discussion goes on at just one place.) Hope this helps. -- Hoary (talk) 01:12, 20 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
It looks like you declined Draft:William Keiser before me. Checking the history shows that most of the same sources were cited that are now. What are your thoughts on the analysis I did on the talk page? Would you still decline it or do you think it would have a decent chance in mainspace or an AfD? TipsyElephant (talk) 01:54, 3 February 2024 (UTC)
I think my biggest concerns are WP:BLP1E and the fact that the coverage is so local. TipsyElephant (talk) 02:15, 3 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
The name was utterly unfamiliar, TipsyElephant, and when I clicked on the link what I then saw was utterly unfamiliar too. So I'm relieved to see that this was over a year ago. In the lead, WK was described as a "choreographer and podcast host". There was no further mention of choreography; and the podcasting appeared to be of a single, three-part podcast. The podcast "discusses" such and such; but to what effect, we weren't told. So I'm not at all surprised that I declined the submission. ¶ According to the lead of the current version, he's no longer a choreographer; but he's a "screenwriter, dance critic, essayist, and podcast host". There is no further mention of screenwriting or dance criticism, no further mention of essays (aside from "two op-eds in the LA Times"), and no mention of podcasting other than of the single, three-part podcast. ¶ I certainly wouldn't have accepted it as an article, but I can't be bothered to click on the references (let alone to search for other sources) and decide whether he's "undersold" by the article in its current state (which, for living people, is a rare occurrence in en:WP), and, if not, to launch an AfD. -- Hoary (talk) 06:36, 5 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Hello, please review the article that i created. Thank you Akhinesh777 (talk) 09:54, 9 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Akhinesh777, I declined your submission Draft:Redmi Note 13 for two reasons. One was that it had a total of one sentence. Now you want me to review the submission again. It now has a total of one sentence. Do you really believe that I will pass it? You also haven't dealt with the second reason. Where are your summaries of what reliable sources have said about this product? -- Hoary (talk) 11:40, 9 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I provided an reliable source to Reference. From official Xiaomi Website and gsmarena about the smartphone. The source are reliable Akhinesh777 (talk) 12:22, 9 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
and what was the second reason? Can you explain please Akhinesh777 (talk) 12:22, 9 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Reliability requires independence. Xiaomi's website is obviously not an independent source. The second reason? That when I declined the submission and when I last looked, your draft had just one sentence. -- Hoary (talk) 12:36, 9 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Akhinesh777, you may, if you wish, remove comments from your own user talk page. You may not remove them from other talk pages. I am reverting your removal of comments from this user talk page. -- Hoary (talk) 21:24, 9 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I have provided reliable sources to Reference, i changed everything and found some reviews about this phone on website so i provided it to the Reference. I don't know how to resubmit this article Akhinesh777 (talk) 05:26, 13 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Hello dear friend. I almost completely rewrote the article and indicated authoritative sources. The article showed the importance of the site and what it does for the citizens of Kazakhstan. Please check. I hope my article is valid. I will be extremely grateful if you publish my article in full!
MNewnham, that article looks very dimly familiar, no more. Ah, I see. And yes, the article is still feeble. -- Hoary (talk) 03:06, 20 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
The infobox tells us: "Years active 1999–2006". But it has fewer "past members" than it has "members". Then again, perhaps 2006–2024 have been "years passive". -- Hoary (talk) 03:18, 20 February 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]
