User talk:LarRan

Welcome!

Hello, LarRan, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

• The five pillars of Wikipedia
• How to edit a page
• Help pages
• Tutorial
• How to write a great article
• Manual of Style

I noticed your interest in aircraft-related articles. There is a group of editors here at Wikipedia who have come together to form WikiProject Aircraft in order to improve aircraft-related articles. You are invited to check us out and, if interested, join our team. Our project page has a lot of resources as well as article guidelines that you might find helpful.

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and ask your question there. Again, welcome!  AKRadecki^Speaketh 23:29, 6 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hi and thanks for your note, and for correcting the spelling of the test-pilot's name. To anser your questions, the name is important because it is interesting and encyclopedic (there might even be an article on him one day!), and the date headings were (in my opinion) unhelpful because the article is not (currently) so long as to require further headings. Best wishes, and thanks for all your good work. --John 22:24, 9 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I posted this to the DYK page, but wanted to make sure you saw it ASAP so the article can be used. It seems to me that this should either have a general reference that discusses all of the incidents, or should have at least one in-line citation per incident, so users can research them. Most of them do, but there's a couple without one. Could you add citations so they all have one? Rigadoun (talk) 20:54, 10 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'll see what I can find. LarRan 21:00, 10 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The ISO 639 code for the Swedish language is sv, not se. -- Prove It ^(talk) 13:11, 11 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I recently discovered that when the templates and categories I had created had been deleted. LarRan 18:16, 11 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

On 12 July, 2007, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article List of Gripen crashes, which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

--GeeJo ^(t)⁄_(c) • 10:49, 12 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

-WarthogDemon 21:39, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The latest crash was a JAS39C as that was mentioned both by the air force news and various military forums, as well as that type recieved temporary restrictions afterwards.

The plane that crashed on Långholmen was a prototype aircraft nr 39102 ot JAS39-2 it was equipped like a standard delivery aircraft at the time but was a test aircraft shown in it's designation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Darkwand (talk • contribs) 02:54, 5 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please note that to get correct sorting on the English wikipedia, the sort key cannot have accented characters; only the character ranges a-z and A-Z sort correctly, with characters such as "ö" sorting after "z", instead of with/near "o". For example, {{DEFAULTSORT:Soderlund, Jezper}} is correct; {{DEFAULTSORT:Söderlund, Jezper}} causes the Jezper Söderlund article to list after Maria Szyszkowska in Category:Living people, instead of between Robin Söderling and Mats Söderlund, where it should be. See also Wikipedia:Categorization_of_people#Ordering_names_in_a_category, which says:

Punctuation, such as apostrophes and colons (but not hyphens) should be removed, and accented letters and ligatures should be replaced by their unaccented or separated counterparts.

Studerby 03:51, 6 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You're apparently try to apply a foreign collation order, probably a Scandinavian one; different languages collate (sort) differently. For example, Swedish and English collate (sort) the letter "Ö" differently; English puts it before Z and Swedish puts it after. As this is the English Wikipedia, we use English collation. As someone with degrees in Linguistics and Computer Science and who has worked off and on in internationalization of software, I'm deeply aware of the issues involved here and could go on at length about why Wikipedia's choice is correct, however there's no reason you should accept my opinion by itself. Fortunately, plenty of people have covered this topic before me, so I'll suggest some brief reading for you:

• Sorting it all out: An introduction to collation, microsoft.com note: an example of English versus Swedish collation
• MySql.com discussion with an example of Swedish versus English collation Note: MySql is a Swedish product
• Diacritic#Alphabetization_or_collation - note: Danish and Swedish collation orders conflict
• Alphabets_derived_from_the_Latin#Collating_sequences
• Computer Alphabetizing -note: points out that Italian and French have conflicting rules for sorting "é" and "è"

Finally, I'll point out that Wikipedia practices are based on consensus; that consensus is listed in Wikipedia:Categorization_of_people#Ordering_names_in_a_category, and is contrary to what you're doing. If you want to change Wikipedia practice on an issue as fundamental as sorting, I suggest you discuss the topic there before trying to change the way things are done. People have actually though long and hard about this before you and have arrived at the policies and guidelines we currently use. While those are subject to change and improvement, you might want to discuss those changes and see if you can develop a new consensus instead of working against the one we have. Studerby 14:00, 7 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your input, Studerby. Being somewhat handicapped by not having English as my native language, I will not go on at any length making my points. Instead, I'll try to be brief.

1) Å, Ä and Ö are not accented letters, they are separate, individual, independent letters, whatever you'd like to call it, that once upon a time may have - I'm not sure, and it's not relevant - originated from A, A and O, respectively.

2) Not only are they sorted differently than A and O, they also behave differently in other ways. E.g.: A and O are both hard vowels, but only Å is a hard vowel, while Ä and Ö are soft vowels.

3) What you're saying about collating sequences does not seem to be correct. When I look at lists, the entries are presented in the correct alphabetical order, with Å, Ä and Ö placed (in that order) after Z.

4) I have not found any consensus on Å, Ä and Ö (unless you called them accented, which is wrong). If there is, please point it out to me.

Best regards. LarRan 14:21, 7 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Your first point is true for Swedish, not for English; native English speakers view those letters as accented variants of a base letter, which is why Microsoft and MySql sort things differently when sorting for English versus sorting for Swedish. That's the point of the links in my earlier reply, there are some good examples there, including one authored by Swedes. Swedish sort order is appropriate on the Swedish Wikipedia; English sort order is used on the English one (mostly); the "en" at the beginning of the URL is for English. (Some people argue that nation-specific categories should be sort ordered according to that nation's language - I'm unconvinced but I don't generally argue about it - in fact I don't generally argue on Wikipedia at all, but you're busily undoing many hours of many peoples work, including mine).

I do agree that all the Wikipedias are international resources, my use of the word "foreign" was ill-chosen; I think "non-English" better expresses my intent.

By the way, the Wikipedia software appears to be sorting based on a UTF-8 encoding of the letters; that's a superset of ASCII encoding, and ASCII encoding encodes the Ö character as the number 153, well after the Z character. That's a very poor approach, it sorts A-Z in front of a-z; every natural language intersorts, for example English sorts AaBbCc... (or aAbBcC or rarely even no sub-ordering between a and A - there's no widely accepted standard). Just because you get the sort order you like isn't evidence that what you're doing is correct. As a side issue, in UTF-8, there are actually multiple different encodings of a-z and A-Z, buts it's incredibly unnatural to enter the other encodings through a web interface. However, if someone were to do so, they could easily have an "A" that sorts after "Z", it would not display correctly on the many computers that don't have extended character sets though. Studerby 15:51, 7 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

OK, Studerby, point taken. I was vaguely aware that the fact that the articles were being presented in a seemlingly correct order did not constitute the ultimate proof. I will modify my updates. I hope - and also doubt - that I haven't undone hours of work, since I don't have put in that many hours myself. I've been adding the defaultsort template to many articles about Swedes - one has to start somewhere - that missed it, and most of them did not contain Å, Ä or Ö. LarRan 16:57, 7 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, and please keep up the good work. This conversation has been helpful for me as well; I've realized the guidelines in Wikipedia:Categorization_of_people#Ordering_names_in_a_category aren't very well expressed - they assume a native speaker's understanding of what is or isn't a basic character, which is culturally dependent. I knew that professionally, but wasn't applying that knowledge to the Wikipedia world; it's a classic "blind spot". The guideline obviosuly needs some editing or rewriting to be clearer.

Also, sorry about the "hours" remark; I've been extremely short of sleep lately, and irrationally irritable. I think that slipped into my phrasing a little too much. Studerby 20:04, 7 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

No problem. On the contrary: my impression was that you expressed your opinions in a very diplomatic way, which I guess is quite helpful in defusing 'disputes' of this kind. Maybe you've done this before? LarRan 17:08, 9 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, sorry about the warning, I'm using VandalProof, which involves clicking on "rollback - removal" button, and the edit is reverted and a warning is automatically posted. It seems that some coding has gone wrong somewhere! It was an IP address who blanked the page, not you, and I am at a loss as to why the automatic warning was directed at you! Thanks for contacting me in such a calm, polite tone, I'm sure that there are other users who have been less acommodating! I've removed the warning, and my deepest apologies! -Toon⁰⁵ 12:50, 10 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've just split off the Accidents and incidents involving the V-22 Osprey page from the V-22 Osprey article. I'm intending to follow the pattern of the Accidents and incidents involving the JAS 39 Gripen page as far as layout goes. Unfortunately, my health is acting up today, so I can't put in much time on it right now. YOu did a good job shepherding the Gripen crash page, so I thought I'd give you a chance to help out on a similar page. Both aircraft have drawn criticisms for similar reasons, except more people have died in V-22s because it carries passengers. Thanks for whatever you can do. - BillCJ 19:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'll see what I can do. I'm afraid it will be purely layout changes, as I'm not in the position to perform any research. Get well soon. LarRan 13:58, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

There is an ongoing discussion about the naming of the Talk:Saab_37_Viggen and whether the Vigg(swedish)=duck=canard(french) was official or coincidental. Do you have access to any published info about this? I do remember reading about it in a book in Swedish about the Viggen, but I don't have it here in the US. T96 grh 03:46, 18 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'll see if I can find any info about this. LarRan 08:34, 18 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, i'm so sorry! I appologize! I know how sensitive it is when you add things about sexuality regarding historical royalty! You are perfectly correct that i should have sourced it. The truth is, that i read so much about these things that i do not not always remember from exactly which book i got this and that. Charles XIII of Sweden is described as having a "harem of mistresses" in most book iv'e read. Some of them which mentioned this are; "Den gustavianska tiden" by Signum förlag, and "Gustavianskt" by Ingvar Andersson; the later book also sourced his relationship with Charlotte Eckerman. His relationship with Marie Marguerite Morel, later married Dulondel, member of the French theatre troup of 1753-1771, is mentioned in "Frihetstiden" by Signum förlag. Exactly which book i read about his relationship with Mariana Koskull, i cant remember right now (though i can find out about it); i do remember, that when she at one point flirted with the future Oscar I, a nobleman replyed: "For God's sake, miss, spare the third generation!" Once again; i know how sensitive these things are, and i appologise for adding this information! I they are deleted, i won't defend them, as i hate to fight and argue with people. I hope this was of some help to you though. My best wishes! --85.226.235.206 (talk) 11:38, 22 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Content is moved to Talk:Denmark national football team season 2007 kalaha 15:10, 23 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I noticed that you removed the wikilinks from several of the dates in the Swedish language article. According to WP:OVERLINK#Dates and WP:DATE#Autoformatting and linking, full dates should always be linked. This has also been discussed in the talk page. So it would be helpful if you could change the dates back. –panda 15:17, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding my unlinking of some dates in the Swedish language article: Dates referring to when links were retrieved, et cetera, are not significant in relation to the article. There is no meaning whatsoever in linking Swedish language to a certain date, just because a reference was retrieved that date. LarRan 18:08, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

(This was my reply to panda on his talk page. I have copied it here for the sake of clarity in the discussion. I have increased the indentation of the following replies accordingly. LarRan 21:18, 2 December 2007 (UTC))[reply]

The purpose of the linking is not necessarily for looking up a date was retrieved -- it is for date preference formatting. See the above links for details. (BTW, you can reply here as I'm watching your talk page.) –panda 18:13, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Contrary to what you're saying, it is not recommended to link all full dates. In fact, the very first sentence of WP:OVERLINK page says "Only make links that are relevant to the context." Maybe you should read the recommendations yourself.

I agree that the language is confusing. Please also take a look at Template talk:Cite web#Why is the date wikilinked? and Talk:Swedish language#Date reversion. –panda 18:52, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It's an interesting feature (to have the dates displayed according to your preferences), but I find that argument weak. The original - and main - purpose of linking is to create a connection between articles, and connections have to be meaningful. There seem to be various opinions on this, though. LarRan 19:03, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, Panda's assertion that they should be linked is not entirely uncontroversial. He is correct that the style guidelines suggest it though. At least two other editors (myself included) disagree. I personally think it is a deficiency in the software behind Wikipedia that should be fixed. henrik•talk 00:05, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I would encourage you to join the conversation in Talk:Swedish language#Date reversion if you plan on removing date links. –panda 16:48, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I really wasn't sure what to do when I read your note, so I did this, which I hope takes care of it! Feel free to add to it. Noroton (talk) 21:10, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Still working on this one. Noroton (talk) 21:34, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I was a little perplexed about whether they meet notability standards. I'm pretty sure the American does, hoping the Canadian does. I think starting his own publishing house helps. Noroton (talk) 21:41, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

An article that you have been involved in editing, Assassination of Benazir Bhutto, has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Assassination of Benazir Bhutto. Thank you. --BJBot (talk) 22:19, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Diacritics are often a big war on Wikipedia as you have just seen. The biggest reason why people don't want them on pages is because this is an English wikipedia and they are not used in English. Personally I would like to see them on all pages but because of the constant reverting that happens on all these pages a solution was devised at WP:HOCKEY where the NHL related pages don't have them since the NHL does not recognize them, ie they are not on jerseys or in any official publication of the NHL. However, for things such as the Olympics or World Championships and their own personal pages we leave them on. This is how we compromise so that they are not constantly being changed on wikipedia. If you wish to try and change this concensus you are welcome to go discuss it at WP:HOCKEY however, it took us years to get to this compromise so its not likely to change any time soon. -Djsasso (talk) 16:57, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Too bad you didn't say this before. Just reverting people's changes without further comment or explanation is outright rude, and it infuriates people - and you don't have to be a rocket scientist to understand that. So I did it to you, and now you know how it feels. Now you go ahead and change it back. But look carefully, so you don't undo the other changes I did in the same edit(s)! LarRan (talk) 17:41, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, I don't see how what NHL does or doesn't recognize has anything to do with wikipedia. NHL doesn't own wikipedia. But now that there is a consensus in place ... LarRan (talk) 18:30, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well the idea is that it is about NHL information, therefore to be as accurate as possible we fillow the standard they use. That being said the vast majority of users wanted to remove them from all hockey articles. In fact most people in wikipedia want to remove them from all articles on anything because as said they are not used in English. I and a couple others had to fight pretty hard just to get them on international articles and player articles. -Djsasso (talk) 01:15, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Like Djsasso says, respect the compromise. If not for yourself, then for the sanity of the rest of us. GoodDay (talk) 03:30, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I'll respect it, but I just didn't know about it. And I think Djsasso made a very clumsy intervention, not worthy an administrator, reverting my edits without further comment or explanation. LarRan (talk) 13:40, 1 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No problem. The Diacritics dispute had lasted for about a couple of years (off & on) and it frayed alot of nerves. Personally, I prefer diacritics being banned from English Wikipedia, but that's not gonna happen; Oh well. Anyways, the non-NHL articles are open to diacritics. GoodDay (talk) 19:05, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

For my part, I'm having a problem understanding that point of view. Håkan Loob's name is just that - not Hakan Loob - whether it's the English Wikipedia or any other. Anything else is just less accurate, and if one can be accurate, one should be - at least in my book. I have a background of 28 years+ in the IT business, and we have a saying that goes like this: "Every piece of information is less accurate than its predecessor", meaning that everytime information is processed (or derived), there is a potential of an error. That's why I don't like inaccuracies: they will multiply.

If those letters weren't available, then (of course) it would be understandable, and not anything for anybody to do about it. But now that all letters really are there (in wikipedia), I cannot for my life see why we shouldn't be accurate. It's a matter of principle, and not of those letters' non-existance in the English alphabet. An analogy: the Swedish alphabet doesn't have all variants of letters that especially the Slavic languages have. That doesn't stop me from accepting Zlatan Ibrahimović as the correct spelling of his name. (A Swede of Bosnian-Croat descent, and currently one of the world's best football [soccer] players, in case you didn't know.) He also has that spelling on his team jersey, in Inter as well as the Swedish National team.

To prove myself right (in principle), how would you store the article on the Häagen-Dazs icecream (if you banned all diacritics)? It's a position that is clearly not defendable.

Now that there is a consensus (over North American ice hockey pages), I don't think it's worth the fight, and I'll respect it, even though I feel slightly nautious everytime I see "Hakan Loob" (or "Mats Naslund").

By the way, Håkan is pronounced "Haw-cunn". I guess you don't pronounce Hakan like that. LarRan (talk) 23:29, 2 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah we still pronounce it that way. None of the pronunciation seems to change in English when we remove the diacritics, atleast in general usage by the public, gramatically it might but everyone still pronounces it Haw-cunn. -Djsasso (talk) 16:24, 4 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi LarRan.

No, I can't honestly say I mind the tweaking you've done.

However:

• without wanting to seem ungrateful, I guess my basic position is that I regard my main user page and all its sub-pages as generally "hands off" as far as other editors goes. I extend the same policy to other users. If you want to bring something to my attention, you're most welcome to use my talk page. I feel I have to have such a policy because if I allow ad-hoc exceptions, no matter how well intentioned they may be, it becomes open slather; and
• I am very intrigued (and a little flattered) as to why an editor until now unknown to me has enough interest in my (essentially private) list of quotes to bother doing what you did. What led you to this page? Cheers. -- JackofOz (talk) 00:33, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, Jack.

I don't like redirects (from misspellings or other), and was 'tweaking' a number of other pages, using the 'What links here'-function, and one of the pages listed was your page.

I'm aware that one shouldn't normally edit other users' 'home pages', and I normally don't (I may have done it when I was a novice to Wikipedia, I don't remember). But I thought this was 'permissible'.

How did you discover it? Did you get the same message as the one you get when somebody has edited your talkpage? If you didn't, you must have good eyes, 'cause the changes were just barely detectable to the naked eye. Btw, did you notice that one red-link (Snepscheut) was resolved by my edit?

Regards, LarRan (talk) 00:59, 5 January 2008 (UTC).[reply]

Hi, LarRan. Sorry about the belated reply. I noticed it when I was checking the page History for something else, and saw your username there. Cheers. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:34, 2 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

sorry my mistake. i assumed it was vandalism y8c (talk) 22:23, 7 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have responded on my talk page. Can any responses go there please. Thank You Pratj (talk) 20:49, 28 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've added Image:Douglas DC-3, SE-CFP.jpg to the Douglas DC-3 page. We don't appear to have an article on the Flygande Veteraner in en.wiki, but the sv:Flygande Veteraner page looks interesting (I don't read Swedish). Is this something that would be worth finding a person to translate it into English? - BillCJ (talk) 19:49, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I could translate it into an article if you wish. Or do you first want a short summary, to see if it deserves to have an article in en.wiki? Here it is then: It's about a non-profit organization (or association), whose aim is to preserve, and keep in flying condition, the veteran aircraft Daisy. It also tells a little about the history of the aircraft and the association, and present-day activities. LarRan (talk) 18:50, 15 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Point taken... and on the Saab SFO product page they write it as Saab, not SAAB. So let's assume SHK is wrong or at least that Saab is making a mistake but that we go along with making the same mistake since it is established. --J-Star (talk) 12:42, 19 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think the report is available in English. I'm a swede meself so it's read in Swedish and summarized in Wnglish. --J-Star (talk) 23:38, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The article was completely unsourced. It is a poor practice to add sensisitive information like aircraft crashes without using proper sources and violation of WP:V. Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 15:07, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See WP:V. "Editors should provide a reliable source for quotations and for any material that is challenged or is likely to be challenged, or it may be removed." I just did this. Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 15:26, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Look at the article September 11, 2001 attacks. Everyone knows the attack was perpetrated by 19 hijackers. But the fact is properly sourced at the article. WP:V is very much subjective. If you think that you will still work on the article, will add sources, then add "underconstruction" template so that other editors can understand that the article is still not finished. Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 15:41, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Article can be changed if there are new information. But WP:V is must. Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 15:48, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It is not right to add material without proper soure and removal of sensitive unsourced information is appropriate instead of fact tagging. Even Jimmy Wales said that instead of using fact tags, remove unsourced material.

“

In general, I find the "fact" tagging to be overdone in Wikipedia. A better option is to nuke the unsourced material. Sometimes "fact" is warranted, I don't mean that it is always a bad idea. But it is overdone.I very often see completely preposterous claims tagged with "fact", usually because an editor is being excessively cautious. Be bold.

”

[1] Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 16:02, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Which is why I said you to use a "underconstruction" template when you think the article does no meet WP:V and you will add sources later. By that template, other editors will understand that the article is still under major rework. Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 16:24, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You are simply repeating your argument. I say if you are a responsible editor, then you need to follow WP:V, and if you think the material should not be challenged, then use an "underconstruction" template. Thanks. Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 18:59, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The problem here is that you are not supporting removal of unsourced material, nor you are willing to use "underconstruction" template. While I am saying that unsourced material should be removed per WP:V, if not, then use an "underconstruction" template for that period of time unless you can provide sources for the information. Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 19:18, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia:Consensus does not give you the freedom to avoid WP:V. The question here is WP:V. Otolemur crassicaudatus (talk) 19:54, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Welcome to Wikipedia. Although everyone is welcome to make constructive contributions to Wikipedia, at least one of your recent edits, such as the one you made to Portal:India/Quiz/Archive6, did not appear to be constructive and has been reverted or removed. Please use the sandbox for any test edits you would like to make, and take a look at the welcome page to learn more about contributing to this encyclopedia. Thank you. Σαι ( Talk) 10:24, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have not made any unconstructive edits to the article you mentioned. Please check more carefully who made them, before you post any messages. LarRan (talk) 13:10, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I am very sorry. I was trying to warn User talk:75.165.46.208 and warned you instead. I'm very very sorry. Σαι ( Talk) 09:41, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Er, oops. Sorry about that edit on the Gripen article. I mixed up my news stories; the first SAAF Gripen will be officially delivered to the SAAF sometime this month, but it hasn't happened yet. So you were right. I'll update the article once the actual hand-over occurs. — Impi (talk) 15:21, 5 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Good thing that you mailed and asked about the Thai Gripens. Yes, the information on various homepages are unclear about the deal, it will be nice to get some real answers on this question. But the info I have found points towards that it will be brand new ones for Thailand. The fact that it is FMV who is selling the Gripens to Thailand is just because the Thai's wanted i government to government deal, FMV buys the planes from SAAB and then selling them to Thailand,I've read that somewhere but I unfortunately can't remember where. I apologize if I sounded rude, it wasn't intended.

Good luck in your search for the facts! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Henke87 (talk • contribs) 12:22, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

See WP:MOS#Captions, image captions should only end a full stop if they include at least one full sentence. Please also make sure that your edit summary reflects what you've actually changed in an article - your most recent edit to Opera stated you had edited to avoid a redirect, but you had actually added full stops to captions. Though I see on second look you had changed the spacing in W. H. Auden as well. David Underdown (talk) 12:50, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes I did manage to spot your other chagnes as well in the end - but remeber that changes of spacing don't show up particualrly well in diffs. If you disagree with the style guide, discuss it on the relevant talkpage. David Underdown (talk) 13:15, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, thanks very much for the work you did tidying up links etc. in Eastwood, Nottinghamshire. I have duly noted the errors I made - it's my first major contribution, and a total rewrite of the older article. I'm still learning about wiki syntax.

Thanks again.

--  Chzz  ►  15:14, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You're welcome. Impressive first article, I must say. LarRan (talk) 11:53, 12 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi,

I made a comment on the discussion page of hockeyplayer Douglas Murray regarding your text on the hit against Alexey Morozov. I haven't made any changes to the actual article, but you're welcome to say what you think on the issue.

I have looked through the Manual of Style and not found any rule about this. As far as "consensus", that seems only anecdotal on your part. If you Google this issue in manuals of style, you will find that different ones come down on different sides. I think literary tradition is on the side of no space. As far as "childish", it is childish to make these changes without clear motivation. Thank your for your input though.

{{helpme}} 

Where can I find guidelines on whether to write "H.G. Wells" or "H. G. Wells"? There seems to be a consensus or guidline somewhere on similar article names (with initials), but I can't find it. LarRan (talk) 21:47, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I would recommend the unspaced version, it really makes very little difference...... Dendodge .. Talk^Help 21:48, 18 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Howcome there is a consensus on article names, then? All articles are named T. S. Eliot, D. H. Lawrence, W. H. Auden, etc. LarRan (talk) 17:14, 19 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

why don't you just put it the way the other articles are written?If they are written like that then it only makes sense to have H.G Wells the same way. Mr. Green^{Hit Me Up}Userboxes 17:34, 19 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please answer the question. If you don't know the answer, then don't place a response here. If you know that there are no such guidelines, that is a valid response, of course. LarRan (talk) 08:23, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Hi, please refer to this article for more information. See below. Bjelleklang - talk Bug Me 09:04, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. I just had a good hunt through procedural guides, and was unable to find a specific mention of the spacing. The closest I've found was in WP:NCP - however, it doesn't explicitly state that spaces should be used. The examples do have spaces; and I would personally go with that. Remember that Wikipedia has no 'hard and fast' rules. It has policies, and guidelines, but nothing is set in stone. Many style elements are left to the individual author - i.e. it's your encyclopaedia, so you can write it whichever way you like. I will, meanwhile, keep looking. --  Chzz  ►  09:04, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• • It would seem that Chzz is correct, there doesn't appear to be a specific policy for something like this (I was a bit too quick with my link). But as he says, you can write it any way you'd like; if someone has strong feelings for one or the other they'll just move it and / or create a redirect. :) Bjelleklang - talk Bug Me 09:09, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, guys! LarRan (talk) 09:16, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Having poured over the WP:MOS and some other related articles, I'm pretty sure that there is no mention of this in policy. However, all articles I looked at appear to put a space after the initials. I think that this is something of a convention in the English language, and the majority write the name that way without thinking about it - hence it's not been documented. I'm sorry there's nothing definitive (unless I've missed something) - but that's the way it goes, sometimes. Always remember to obey WP:IAR. Cheers! --  Chzz  ►  09:25, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If there is nothing on this subject, maybe it's time to try to reach a consensus on it? Who will raise the issue? I don't know "howto". LarRan (talk) 17:09, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi LaRan - thanks for the edit on the Damon Young page. The case change makes sense (e.g. consistency). But I don't quite understand the 'avoid redirect'. Can you enlighten me? Strether (talk) 22:05, 19 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. You may not have noticed that I inserted a space into the link to T. S. Eliot (between T. and S.). The previous version said T.S. Eliot. The first is the actual name of the article, and the second is a redirect, which points to the actual article. If anyone clicks on a redirect link, there will be two data accesses; one to the redirect page, and then one to the page it points to. Thus, linking to the actual article instead of the redirect is both upholding consistency in spelling and saving some bandwidth. I admit that my edit description was a bit brief and maybe cryptic. LarRan (talk) 08:20, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, right - I can see it now. It's not how I prefer to cite (obviously), but I don't mind the change - particularly for Wiki consistency and bandwidth. Thank you. Strether (talk) 09:52, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If redirection were as serious an issue as you conjecture, then there should be policy on this matter. As there is not such a policy, your argument is, as noted, specious. If consistency were the only concern, why not demand that no spaces be allowed between initials, which would save not only bandwidth but storage space: imagine all the megabites of server capacity wasted on blanks! But since it is not in the spirit of the Wikipedia to force everyone to use the same spelling or style, your attempts to force others to conform to your standards is nothing less than bullying. Your first comment to me concerning this matter in Calling the Swan was that I was being "childish", with no regard to my motivations. Had you been the principal author or a major contributor to the article, or even pointing out a question of factuality, then I would say you were justified in your insistence on this insignificant stylistic point. As I am that author, and concerned with monitoring vandalism on it, I think my concerns trump yours. I did concede some of your points, so I am not a megalomaniac; but clearly you have showed your true colours in your behaviour, words, and feelings.--Alwpoe (talk) 10:49, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Who's bullying who? I made a good faith edit, which you reverted without motivation. By chance I came across the same article again, and made the same change, supported with a motivation (that was my first comment, stick to the truth!). You reverted me again. After having been reverted twice, yes, I thought your actions were childish.

You being the creator of the article - or a major contributor - does not constitute ownership, in your case a presumed right to be a bullying watchdog. In your reply above, I still can't distinguish any argument as to why you oppose consistency in spelling and reduction of bandwidth (other than you "being the owner" type of argument). If you - against all odds - can come up with any, please use the phrase "I prefer inconsistency in spelling because..." or "I prefer increased bandwidth consumption because...". I'm not saying consistency in spelling or avoiding unnecessary redirects are seriuos issues - what I am saying is that consistency is better than inconsistency, and less bandwidth consumption is better than more. Why do you bother? What's it to you?

There is also a third argument: the "Related changes" function. If you link to a redirect, that function will show changes to the redirect page (by nature being rare), but not changes to the actual page. Is that what you want?

Regarding your argument on "megabytes megabites of server capacity wasted on blanks", that could be used for any letter of the alphabet. (Imagine the space we could save if we omitted all Ms.) Spaces fill a purpose too, in case you haven't noticed: theyseparatewordsfromeachother.

And another thing: if you want respect from others, you've got to show it to others too. It goes two ways. Your reactions and behaviour is in sharp contrast to that of Strether (which can also be seen in this section). I'm not at all surprised to learn from your talkpage that you have been blocked previously.

LarRan (talk) 16:51, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The facts remain that you were the first to call me "childish", which shows your level of immaturity; that I am the author of the article, and while that doesn't give me "ownership", it certainly gives me a stronger vested interest in it than a pedantic marauder like you; that I have never been blocked (your interpretations are always suspect, obviously you are neither a careful reader or thinker); and that I did acknowledge your legitimate contributions to the article. As for consistency, I'm all in favour of it; therefore, I suggest you spend your time eliminating the spaces between initials in every article here on Wikipedia. You obviously need a project to occupy your mind, such as it is.--Alwpoe (talk) 19:00, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oops, you were "only" almost blocked. Missed that. My mistake. But I guess that's just a matter of time. Of course I was the first to call you childish. I probably won't be the last. You seem to be adopting the position of "he who said it, was it". That's childish too. LarRan (talk) 20:21, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Frankly, I find your belligerent rudeness and intellectual lacunae amusing. Pray continue. --Alwpoe (talk) 01:25, 21 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Personally I find your total lack of valid arguments baffling. I thought your repeated reverts were childish. According to you, that proves I'm immature! That position could be summarized as "he who said it, was it", no matter how big clouds of words you try to disguise it in. LarRan (talk) 15:38, 21 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

For the record, I don't mind changing style - it's academic habit. But, as it happens, I now know how to keep my 'spaceless' initials, while avoiding a redirect (with the [[|]] code). Strether (talk) 11:01, 20 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, I misread the table. I thought it said that Franzen won a gold medal playing for the Latvian team. Sorry; I'll be more careful. TheMile (talk) 20:28, 30 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A tag has been placed on Ulf Sandström (ice hockey), requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is a very short article providing little or no context to the reader. Please see Wikipedia:Stub for our minimum information standards for short articles. Also please note that articles must be on notable subjects and should provide references to reliable sources that verify their content.

Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself. If you plan to expand the article, you can request that administrators wait a while for you to add contextual material. To do this, affix the template {{hangon}} to the article and state your intention on the article's talk page. Feel free to leave a note on my talk page if you have any questions about this. Justpassin (talk) 20:20, 7 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I just noticed you did what appears to be a Copy/Paste move of Jean-François Labbé. In order to be GDFL compliant we are not allowed to do that because we have to still have the edit history present on the page for credit purposes. If you can't move a page because you need an admin or something like that just make a request at the request for moves page. I have fixed this particular page now however. -Djsasso (talk) 14:20, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, thank you. I didn't know how to go about it, when the article's correct name already existed as a redirect. What exactly did you do to "fix" things? I mean with regard to the article's history? LarRan (talk) 20:26, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Deleted the page you copied things to and them moved the other page to its location. And then added in your changes. I am an admin so I can delete pages when there are redirects in the way. -Djsasso (talk) 21:54, 30 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Per this diff, when you add "Saab responded on 2 July 2008", it would be helpful if you added what their response actually was. It does not say whether the response was positive or negative, and someone should not have to read the source to find that out. I'm not trying to be overly critical, but am trying to make sure the text is as clear as possible. I realize English is probably not your mother tongue, but you are fairly fluent in it, from what I have seen. I know words don't always translate equally, and the connotations of words can differ even more.

I did not rewrite or add anything to what you wrote, because I'm unsure of the exact terminology Saab would use. (And it's very late here, so off to bed after this post!) If I did rewrite it, I'd say something like, "Saab responded on 2 July 2008 with proposal/bid/(whatever word is appropriate)." Thanks. - BillCJ (talk) 08:50, 16 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, made some adjustments. Hope you like them. Cheers. LarRan (talk) 11:48, 16 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm leaving you a note as you may be interested in this opportunity.

People from all six Nordic Wiki-communities (sv, no, nn, fi, da and is) are coordinating a bid for Wikimania 2010 in Stockholm. I'm sending you a message to let you know that this is occurring, and over the next few months we're looking for community support to make sure this happens! See the bid page on meta and if you like such an idea, please sign the "supporters" list at the bottom. Tack (or takk), and have a wonderful day! Mike H. Fierce! 09:09, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Replied on my Talk:

Ah, awesome; you're a star :o) — OwenBlacker (Talk) 20:50, 10 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

{{help}} I just nominated the template Template:, ({{,}}) for speedy deletion - and speedy it was! I thought it would take 7 days, but it took 7 seconds. I didn't have time to remove the use of the template from the few pages (c. 60) that used it before it was deleted. Does anybody have any idea on how to search out these pages when the "what links here" function cannot be used? I tried searching for the string {{,}}, but it didn't work. LarRan (talk) 20:27, 10 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• Here you go. Ten Pound Hammer and his otters • ^{(Broken clamshells • Otter chirps • HELP)} 20:31, 10 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! LarRan (talk) 20:42, 10 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for noticing the little stuff over at The Plays of William Shakespeare. Ottava Rima (talk) 20:27, 19 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Can you cite the "new convention" you are referring to? It makes sense to be able to link dates, so that one can have some background context for the year.Ryoung122 01:01, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Look here: Wikipedia:MOSDATE#Date_autoformatting

Cheers. LarRan (talk) 07:25, 17 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have been unlinking dates on my recent hockey based edits, would it be okay for me to use your edit summary for these. I thought I'd ask about, I don't want to 'steal' anything here. Raphie (talk) 02:46, 6 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you're referring to the text "Unlinking dates (new convention)...", I don't think that is covered by any copyrights. If you want to use it - by all means.

Cheers, LarRan (talk) 08:09, 6 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No problem, thanks for that. Raphie (talk) 11:55, 6 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Handy how I don't have to start a new topic. There is no guideline for player bios, but the new convention you cite makes it clear that "Links to articles on a topic in a specific chronological period, such as 1441 in art, 1982 in film, and 18th century in United States history, may add significantly to readers' understanding of the current topic." The links to season articles that you were removing would fit into that category. Since you're making the changes, the onus is on you to make good changes, not remove relevant links. Really, I can't be arsed to correct all your mistakes. So please don't engage in mindless busybodyism and ignore the details. It's up to you to go that extra mile and make the constructive change. --Pwnage8 (talk) 20:11, 7 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, wait a minute! I'm not the one citing a convention - you are. Only problem is it obviously doesn't exist. It's a very generic recommendation that you have chosen to interpret and implement in a very specific way, that lacks logic, as well as support of any convention or consensus. Most people realize that there should be some kind of logical connection between what is linked and the link itself.

So my changes were not mistakes. They were deliberate and constructive, and don't need "correction". If you want support for your specific interpretation, I suggest you start a thread. Meanwhile, I'll keep on with my constructive edits. I leave the unconstructive reverting to you.

"Mindless busybodyism", yeah right! Look who's talking. LarRan (talk) 20:51, 7 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There is a logical connection. What's not logical about linking to seasons? You tell me, since you made the claim that it isn't. --Pwnage8 (talk) 13:49, 8 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As I explained earlier (in one of my edit comments), calendar dates obviously refer to calendar years, not seasons or drafts. "July 1, 2001-02 NHL season" simply makes no sense. Since dates, according to WP:MOSNUM, should not be linked, the end result after de-linking is "July 1, 2002". If you want to link to a season or a draft, there are much better ways of doing that. In the example mentioned, a better alternative would be "July 1, 2002 - [[2001-02 NHL Entry Draft|drafted]] by the ... ", i.e. in the flow of the text, and logical with respect to context.

You can't possibly mean that every calendar year mentioned in the article should be linked to either "2001 in ice hockey", "2001-02 NHL season", "2001-02 Colorado Avalanche season", "2001 NHL Entry Draft", or another similar target? (If that's the case, you've missed quite a few places.) This would not only violate WP:MOSNUM, it would also constitute WP:OVERLINK. (The page is overlinked in this respect even in its present state.)

Of course there should be links to this kind of targets. But they should be placed logically, with respect to the context, so it would feel "natural" to have them precisely there. A specified calendar date is most often not such a place. To be more brief: when speaking of seasons/drafts, link to seasons/drafts, when speaking of calendar dates, don't link to anything (since dates should not be linked).

Lastly, why do you call my edits "mistakes", and why do you label me a "mindless busybody"? I find that rude, and in violation of the five pillars of wikipedia. That kind of behaviour does not belong here. Why didn't you - as I suggested on your talk page - post a polite message stating your opinion, in stead of blankly reverting all the changes that I, with some effort, had done? What is your comment to that?

LarRan (talk) 20:29, 8 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Already commented in that Wikiquette thread. I don't want a fragmented discussion. --Pwnage8 (talk) 17:44, 9 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. In the past you have contributed to Orienteering, so you might like to know the article is getting a makeover. If you would like to help, please see Talk:Orienteering. Thanks. --Una Smith (talk) 20:08, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What does sorting by a player's name at List of National Hockey League players with 500 goals offer in terms of meaningful information? Just because a list is sortable, that doesn't mean every column should be made sortable. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 14:18, 8 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

An easily found example is when you are matching two lists. One of the lists is sorted in a certain order, and that order is 1) not changeable, and 2) not the same as the other list. If the other list - the re-sortable wikitable - then could be sorted in another way, that would be very helpful.

You may, for instance have a list of goaltenders or goal scorers in a certain context, sorted alphabetically.

Can you come up with a strong argument against having all columns sortable?

LarRan (talk) 14:43, 8 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see how sorting is helpful for matching lists, or maybe I am not entirely sure what you mean by that. Do you mean something like a comparison between this and the 1000-points list? Can you offer a specific example of how this makes things easier? (Using a browser search function is quicker than sorting the lists.) If you look at List of elements by symbol, for example, you will see the "Etymology of Symbol" column is not sortable. The column's sortability doesn't offer anything to the list. I would say that pretty much every other column in the 500-goal list—including the goalie scored against (note: Patrick Roy is on the list three times)—offers something meaningful to someone analyzing the list, but not the name. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 04:15, 9 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok. Let's say that we have a table of goaltenders (table B) that have something special in common. Let's also say that this table has a significant number of entries, and that the only common element between the tables is the goaltender column. Now, if we wanted to know which of the goaltenders in table B, if any, have also conceded a goal that happened to be 500th of the goalscorer in question, we would naturally sort both tables in "goaltender order". That is, if such a thing is possible. Which is why you have sortable wikitables. Having both tables sorted, the answer can be found pretty easily. If not, you are left to perform a manual one-by-one find in one of the tables, which could be a pretty tidious job, depending on the number of entries in the smallest table.

You could also have a list of goalscorers: which (if any) of the goalscorers have (or have not) been inducted into the HHoF, or scored their 1000th against the same goalie as their 500th goal (or have appeared in whatever specific context)?

I realize that the most relevant order for the article is the order in which these 500th goals occurred. That is also the order in which the goals are entered, and thus the default order. But as I explained above, it could prove useful to be able to sort the table in alternative orders. What's the point in having a table sortable on only one column? And what's the big disadvantage in being able to sort a table on more than one column? What's the big advantage in excluding the goalscorer and goaltender columns from that functionality, apart from saving a few bytes?

LarRan (talk) 11:33, 9 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I only made the goal-scorer's column unsortable. The advantage of removing it is that there is less extraneous information for the reader. Having that column sortable just offers users something to click, but the names of the players don't tell us anything about the data being presented. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 11:52, 9 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As I illustrated above, it could be useful. I don't think you have provided any convincing argument against. If a user clicks that column unnecessarily, so what? LarRan (talk) 12:20, 9 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see how the above example is useful—as I said, the goaltender column was still sortable after my change. What list are they comparing to? How does comparing a person's name offer anything meaningful? Why would they be using Wikipedia software as their analytical tool, rather than copying the information from Wikipedia to appropriate software such as Excel in order to do this comparison? — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 13:05, 9 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know how to explain this further, I'm close to exhausting my pedagogical skills. Are you sure you've read my explanations thoroughly? Let me see if I can get this straight: you don't object to the goaltender column being sortable, right? That leaves the goalscorer column as the one you object to being sortable by name, is that right? What if - as I illustrated above (bolded) - one has another list of goalscorers (or skaters in general) that appear in a specific context? If one wants to check which of those players (if any) have also scored 500 goals, one way of doing it could be to match that list with this wikipedia list, right? If, for instance, you'd want to compare the list of hockey players inducted into the HHoF with the 500 goals list, it would be much easier done if both lists are sorted on the goalscorer column, right? The HHoF list is probably in the order the players were inducted, which is not necessarily the same order has they scored their 500th goal. That's pretty much it.

Why people wouldn't want to use Excel? If they could just press the 'sort' button, wouldn't that be easier?

LarRan (talk) 11:32, 10 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

They would still have to flip back and forth between tabs to check each list, line-for-line. Do you think anyone is even doing this (and, if so, wouldn't someone exhibiting such obsessiveness devise an easier way to compare them)? Oh well, even if no one actually exhibits the behavior you describe, I no longer care if it's sortable. I'll leave it in that article. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 16:35, 10 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Most people have a printer to their computer, so they would not have to "exhibit the behavior" of flipping between tabs, whether they are "obsessive" or not. And don't you think people would have to check line-by-line in Excel?

But thanks a lot for leaving it in the article. You've been using much time and trouble, both yours and mine, for just nothing. Thanks again.

LarRan (talk) 17:36, 10 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I appreciate the opportunity, courtesy of your inquiry, to examine some of the details involving the use of DEFAULTSORT. In the period between the appearance of English Wikipedia's first article in January 2001 and the introduction of the categorization system in May 2004, numerous discussions raised competing issues as to the technical details surrounding the immediately obvious need for an orderly arrangement. As categories multiplied in 2004, 2005 and 2006, each one had to be individually alphabetized through the use of piping and surname (in biographical entries) or piping and title (without "a", "an" or "the"). The thousands of templated categories on discussion pages did not have individual components compatible with piping and thus remained unsorted (or, rather, sorted by given names and titles with definite and indefinite articles, as well as hundreds of Unicode symbols [accents, umlauts, diacritical marks, punctuation, letters from the Icelandic alphabet, etc.]). The development of DEFAULTSORT in January 2007, obviated the need for individual alphabetizing, streamlining the process of categorization and, simultaneously providing the first opportunity to bring alphabetical order to the neglected templated discussion-page categories (a measure of their neglect and lack of usable elements may be gauged by the fact that despite having thousands of entries, most did not even contain a table of contents [some are still bereft of one]). A sorting feature specifically designed to be used within the discussion page templates came into use in April 2007, shortly after the introduction of DEFAULTSORT. The feature, listas, is programmed to work in the same manner as DEFAULTSORT, and generally does, but both are technically imperfect and developed sorting issues. Due to various programming quirks and peculiarities within individual templates, some respond only to DEFAULTSORT, some to listas and some to neither. A partial list of the unresponsive templated categories can be found here. Hundreds of thousands of biographies have not even been furnished with listas (332,845 at last count) and can be found at Category:Biography articles without listas parameter. Manual addition of DEFAULTSORT improves the situation somewhat but, due to its own technical issues, it must be positioned below the Wikitags, and will be unable to perform its alphabetizing function if placed above. There are numerous other details concerning this matter and if you would like to discuss them further, I would be glad to do so, but since your question was so brief, I felt that an equally brief response, "yes" would appear inadequate. It should also be noted that these discussion-page additions of DEFAULTSORT are a continuing process begun in May 2007.—Roman Spinner (talk) 02:55, 12 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please don't remove non-breaking spaces like you did on 2007–08 Pittsburgh Penguins season they are an important part of article's formatting, and essential in GA and FAs. Blackngold29 17:53, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, but what's the point in having non-breaking spaces in the middle of a paragraph? And why especially in FAs and GAs? It doesn't seem important to me if "102" is on the end of a line, and "points" on the start of next. Is there a consensus/convention on this? LarRan (talk) 17:59, 20 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you check out WP:NBSP it has WP's view. I usually use them for a numeral follwed by a unit (ie. 200 people). It may seem like it's in the middle of the paragraph, but you never know when someone else will add or remove a sentence and then it'll be needed; so I just add them everywhere to stay on the safe side. Thanks about the re-directs by the way, I guess nobody else caught that. Blackngold29 12:30, 21 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I understand your comments. However, as Wikipedia: Ice Hockey protocol controls the page, I believe it is standard operating procedure to link to the appropriate seasons. If you see the other head coaches featured lists, with one exception they link to the season. I have opened a discussion on the Ice Hockey project page to confirm this. I am notifying you that if I receive confirmation of my suspicion, I will be reinstating the links to the seasons, and request that you no longer remove them. I hope we can come to an understanding on this dispute. Anthony Hit me up... 15:06, 27 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't go so far as to call it a dispute, and I haven't reverted the reinstated links. But thanks for notifying me.

LarRan (talk) 15:38, 27 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

According to our sister project Wiktionary, the spelling for pronounciation is incorrect. Cheers. ←Signed:→Mr. E. Sánchez ^{Get to know me!} / _{Talk to me!}←at≈:→ 23:25, 6 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, thanks, I've realized that now. Kind of strange, since I'm the kind of guy who immediately notices a typo or misspelling (as perceived by me) -- and I have never seen the other spelling before. So I was convinced that the correct spelling was "pronounciation" (and I still find it hard to believe that it isn't), and assumed -- as always -- that I was right. Obviously I wasn't. LarRan (talk) 23:35, 6 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

• See User talk:Anthony Appleyard#Bob Charles Beers. Anthony Appleyard (talk) 22:12, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Just noticed this. His name is Bob Beers. Charles is just his middle name which we used to disambiguate him from other Bob Beers in ice hockey. Thought you might like an answer incase you never found out. That being said now that I think about it I am not sure why this one was done like that since there are no other Bob Beers in ice hockey that I can think of and since it was me that requested the move back to the full name I have reversed it. -Djsasso (talk) 03:19, 9 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You changed Zdeno Chara to Zdeno Chára. Just wanted to let you know we don't show diacritics on North American pages, per here. I personally think it's a stupid rule, but yeah. RandySavageFTW (talk) 21:31, 1 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, this is a player page, and not a North American ice hockey page. Check for yourself, at the link you provided. LarRan (talk) 09:08, 2 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hey do you have a source that Eric Godard uses an accent? I don't recall ever seeing it anywhere. Thanks, Grsz¹¹ 02:04, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I might be wrong on this one. I checked the French wikipedia (which is not a reliable source, I know), and they used an accent. But when I search the French Google, I find that other French language sources seem not to use it. LarRan (talk) 14:53, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think he's French Canadian, but I could be wrong. Grsz¹¹ 23:24, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'll post a message on the talkpage of the French article on Godard to see if anyone there knows. LarRan (talk) 09:10, 4 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Greetings! I noticed some of the work you've been doing today, and I wanted to drop you a note in case you're not familiar with the WP:R2D section of the Redirects guideline. As a general rule, "bypassing redirects," which several of your edit summaries make reference to, is NOT something that editors really should be doing. The reasons are spelled out at the guideline. Having said that, I also notice that many of your edits are doing more than merely changing redirects to piped links, and those cases of correcting punctuation (hyphens to en dashes where appropriate) or avoiding a disambig page is good work. Also, I'm not altogether sure if there's a reason to use piped links for names with diacritics (my gut instinct is no, but I don't want to go through and revert you in case there is). Anyway, happy editing. Croctotheface (talk) 14:00, 4 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Croco, and thanks for your input. Having read the WP:R2D, I see your point. However, I don't think this is applicable on my changes. There is a consensus in the hockey project that player articles should be stored at their correctly spelled name, and North American hockey articles referring to player pages with diacritics should hide the diacritics in piped links (and thus should not link to the redirect, which will only cost another access). Non-North American articles should not hide the diacritics. Check here. What I think the WP:R2D is about, is the case when the link is something other than what is visible in the link. Cheers. LarRan (talk) 00:07, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think the part of the policy he is getting at is that you shouldn't change a redirect if that is the only thing you are changing on a page. Because it takes 10,000 clicks or so to make up for the bandwidth you used to change the redirect, and most of these links will never see that kind of ussage. Basically you should only change redirects when you are also changing something else on the page. You are right our prefered way to do it is to have the piped spelling, but you shouldn't make changing that on a page your only edit as its more of a burden on wiki's servers to have you change it. -Djsasso (talk) 00:40, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That being said he shouldn't have reverted you once it was done as that only worsened the situation. -Djsasso (talk) 00:48, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, I see your point (too), but on the other hand there are bots performing the minutest changes imaginable, is anybody viewing that as a problem? In any case I try to household with bandwidth (and storage), and do as much changes as possible in one edit; in my last edit to Minnesota Norths Stars, I counted to 54 redirect replacements and a handful of unlinked dates. LarRan (talk) 01:05, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Personally I have no problem with it and I don't think anyone else did or we probably would have told you since you have been doing it for months. I actually think he is making a mountain out of a molehill and actually making the situation worse by reverting you. -Djsasso (talk) 02:36, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Would you mind dropping by the Islanders talk page to give your reason for wanting them piped. This edit warring is pointless. Lets see if we can come to a decision that will stop it. -Djsasso (talk) 22:50, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Can you point out what change you made here? I have done a diff but it looks the same to me. I don't mind, just I don't want accidentally to overwrite it. The article gets vandalised a lot at the moment because it was a featured article.

SimonTrew (talk) 11:05, 26 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I just inserted a period that was missing at the end of a sentence.

Cheers.

LarRan (talk) 12:27, 26 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

No worries, I have been tidying it up anyway. Thanks for that. I couldn't spot it. The diff tool on Wikipedia is dreadful, might as well ask the cat.

(By the way, since it is a UK article, you should not have inserted a period, but a full stop).

SimonTrew (talk) 12:38, 26 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I see. Thanks for pointing that out.

In the diff tool of the Swedish Wikipedia, the backgrund colour changes for the specific characters that diff between the compared versions. That's really helpful in detecting if periods, commas, and even spaces, have been changed. Maybe that could be adopted into this wiki.

LarRan (talk) 12:51, 26 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That's a very good idea. To spot a single period (full stop) in a diff is very hard, and I scanned it a lot. I wrote a text editor myself and I was really keen to highlight stuff, you don't want it being christmas lights but to show up what is important. I can't understand why it would differ between languages, I had assumed that for technology each wiki was the same.

BTW there is a program that can "encheferize" text (turn it into mock Swedish, like the Swedish Chef). This is incredibly handy because English can understand it and also spot errors. It is recommended by the Swedish firm who make Qt, a cross-platform, multilingual operating system-- I forget the name of the firm. —Preceding unsigned comment added by SimonTrew (talk • contribs) 13:47, 26 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If you can persuade, Djsasso & Krm500 to hide/delete the diacritics from the NHL roster's concerning player birthplaces? Then I'll agree to a Quebec-based hockey amendment, to the North American guideline. It's the old scratch my back & I'll scratch yours. GoodDay (talk) 21:33, 7 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

As I have pointed out to you in a number of locations you have said this....the place name diacritics are there because the actual English languague still uses them in place names. This is a wiki wide standard and has nothing to do with our actual project. -Djsasso (talk) 02:51, 8 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Replied on the WikiProject Ice Hockey talkpage. LarRan (talk) 11:12, 8 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm already getting the feeling that the discussion there, is becoming a Kangaroo Court hearing. GoodDay (talk) 14:37, 8 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Welcome to the mess that is diacritics...I don't think you were around the last time GoodDay went on a rampage and threatening to quit the wiki and threatening to take everyone who didn't agree with him to arbitration. What is ironic is the "compromise" was created pretty much only to stop the edit wars GoodDay was having with any editor that added them. Most of the other major editors of the hockey project never changed them if they had them or didn't have them...along the lines of what engvar says about canadian and english spellings. -Djsasso (talk) 15:15, 8 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Do as you wish. GoodDay (talk) 15:45, 8 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe we should consider his threats as promises? LarRan (talk) 17:12, 8 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm going to concentrate on the topic, today. I was 'very dissapointed' yesterday, thus my grumpies. GoodDay (talk) 14:51, 9 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Great. No hard feelings. We all can have our grumpy days. LarRan (talk) 12:50, 10 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. Thanks for the correction; it makes sense now. :) Cheers, Abraham, B.S. (talk) 12:14, 21 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I realize that we can't be too in-depth about who did not qualify for the team. However, the curling trials are being promoted as a major event. I figured it's worth mentioning now because the trials haven't occured yet. As we get closer to the games, the tables will likely be removed. -- Scorpion⁰⁴²² 03:54, 5 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Allright, I'll buy that. LarRan (talk) 09:46, 5 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I don't really have the time right now. Here is all the information needed, but is height and weight really necessary information? -- Scorpion⁰⁴²² 22:45, 21 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, thanks, I'll see if I can find the time. Height and weight, well, they are relevant factors, but I guess one could do without them, if they're not available. LarRan (talk) 05:15, 22 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

It was already done by Marc87! LarRan (talk) 05:31, 22 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please visit http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1975/. The List of Nobel laureates by country sticks to the information there. Please accept this. If you just want to avoid a redirect, you know how this can be done... Tomeasy _{T C} 21:23, 3 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That site doesn't dictate the content of wikipedia. Such sites have a habit of mentioning people by their full names, especially in formal contexts - such as laureates. It doesn't mean that wikipedia should. Wikipedia isn't a mirror site of its sources. WP:COMMONNAME regulates this issue. Please accept that. LarRan (talk) 07:53, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, I can accept that. Just thought that Aage Niels Bohr was the common name. Moreover, the middle name Niels serves perfectly to hint people on his relationship with Niels Bohr, his father.

Have it your way if you like but please, in the future, provide edit summaries. Tomeasy _{T C} 09:02, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

[2] There really is no bright line rule as to where to place the reference in a case like this. People place it below sections, mimicking the way inline refs are placed after the assertion they support. But that is not a reason to revert in this case. The only thing that matters is which spot is the most plausible. If you think the ref is better placed below the table, that's fine by me. I think it's a bit awkward.

Also, instead of just moving the ref to its "proper" place, you may actually want to check the source I included since it appears to contradict the template you started. --87.79.143.38 (talk) 02:19, 17 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I was inspired by this IP edit. Having the reference floating on its own just below the table looks bad. I will revert your edit; if any article using this template hopes to improve beyond C-class, that lonely floating reference will be an issue. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 16:31, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Okay, I'll buy that. The Olympic hockey pages are coming together Very Nicely Indeed, don't you think? Thanks for your contributions. LarRan (talk) 19:49, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I saw that you are one of two editors who responded to my query on renaming the project. I am planning on moving the article over the weekend, so I'm going to open up a discussion on the project's talk page on what it should be renamed since no one has objected. Your input is thus appreciated. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 23:56, 22 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi there. Thought you should know I've reinstated the medals per capita and per athlete here and here. You removed them on the grounds that they are irrelevant, but I think you must have meant something else (not notable, perhaps?) since discussion of a country's medal performance is obviously relevant in an article on the Olympics. If you would like to discuss removing this material again, let's discuss it on the article's talk pages here and here. --Doradus (talk) 02:42, 7 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No, you start a discussion before adding it back, since you've been reverted by other editors too, your additions are obviously questionnable. You're correct in one sense: the comments are non-notable too. If you think this information is relevant and notable, don't you think that there should be a table with all countries, instead of just mentioning that Norway are way ahead of Austria? Who comes third? Such a table would be rubbish, and that goes to show that medals per capita and medals per athlete is very irrelevant and non-notable. Btw: countries would be able to manipulate at least their number of medals per athlete by just sending athletes with good chances. Btw2: countries that didn't send any athletes must be way ahead of Norway. Division by zero will result in infinity. LarRan (talk) 06:37, 7 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The proper place to start the discussion would be Talk:2010 Winter Olympics medal table, not the Norwegian or South Korean Olympic pages. LarRan (talk) 10:01, 7 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough, I can see your point. I disagree (being in first place on a list can be notable even if the list as a whole is not) but I don't care enough to start a whole discussion over this. However, I still disagree with your procedure of deleting first and asking questions later, an approach I consider contrary to the spirit of a wiki. The material I added was not disruptive, it was not contrary to any Wikipedia policy, and I thought it was interesting, so it seems to me the onus is on you to explain why it was necessary to delete the material from the article. Honestly, it's getting to the point that you can't add anything to any article around here without getting reverted a couple of times. I got reverted no less than ten times on this fairly uncontroversial edit before consensus emerged that my contribution was a good one. I'm not up for another fight right now, so I yield. --Doradus (talk) 20:11, 7 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

On second thought, I've decided not to be so lazy, and take your suggestion of making my case on the talk page you suggested. --Doradus (talk) 20:21, 7 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

As I said, I wasn't the first one to revert that addition. Just waiting few days before adding it back when you think no-one will see isn't exactly wiki spirit either. You're welcome to try to get a consensus (which I of course would respect), but I doubt that, since there has already been some discussion there over this matter. LarRan (talk) 20:36, 7 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hey now... I think it's a little unfair to accuse me of trying to sneak my edit back in when I specifically came here and pointed it out to you! --Doradus (talk) 16:24, 8 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Only that was the second time you re-added it. You've put it there altogether three times.LarRan (talk) 20:39, 8 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I re-added it the first time after it was deleted by an anonymous editor based on an incorrect premise (that my statements on Norway's and Korea's pages were contradictory). The very next deletion was yours, and when I undid your edit, I immediately notified you. I've been trying to keep this discussion lighthearted, but I must say I'm starting to resent being accused of trying to subvert the editing process. --Doradus (talk) 05:06, 10 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, you're correct on that one. I was wondering what you meant by "faulty logic" on the medal table talk page. I thought you meant that the individual reverts were based on faulty logic. What logic, I wondered. Now it makes more sense. My apologies. There you go, it's unfortunate that it's so easy to misunderstand what people have written. LarRan (talk) 14:52, 10 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. I appreciate your patience in all this. --Doradus (talk) 15:17, 12 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Many of our categories aren't confined to listing articles that are within a narrow literal interpretation of the category title. Instead, they include articles related to a particular subject. For example, Category:University of Chicago includes buildings, student groups, and a railway station, even though none of these things is a university. See Category talk:2004 United States election voting controversies#Scope of category for further discussion.

The article on Michael Connell is certainly one that a person interested in the 2004 voting controversies would want to see included in that category; his notability relates solely to that subject. I'm restoring his bio to the category, along with several other such deletions. I probably won't take the time to address other categories, but I think you should consider whether your interpretation of them is also too narrow. JamesMLane t c 17:28, 10 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. I tried to adress that issue once on the talkpage of one of the sister categories of the category you are about to restore to Michael Connell, namely Category:Congressional scandals. I got one (1) response. That single editor agreed with me, so let's say I was bold. One difference between these categories, and the one you're mentioning above, is that they are in plural. To me that indicates that they should contain several instances of exactly what the category name says. "University of Chicago" is in singular, so I wouldn't delete that from any page. If the category was "Universities of (or in) Chicago", it would be totally different, don't you agree? Then all Chicago's universities would be listed there, right? (This is just hypothetical reasoning, I assume there's just one.)

This may be a tricky issue, but I'm pretty certain that I wouldn't categorize Connell - or any other person - as a controversy, no matter what. Instead - and I think this is an important distinction - I would categorize him in Persons (or people) involved in controversy X. The controversy itself I would categorize in Y type controversies. But this is a tricky subject. Maybe we should bring this discussion up someplace? Any suggestions?

Another question is if we should distinguish people who are victims in scandals from people who caused them. After all, it's not a merit to have a "involved in the X scandal" category on your page in wikipedia. But that's another discussion.

LarRan (talk) 15:26, 11 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I wouldn't give the kind of weight you do to whether the category title is singular or plural. A category isn't a "List of" article. We could conceivably have "Persons involved in 2004 United States election voting controversies" as a category, or (more plausibly) as a subcat of Category:2004 United States election voting controversies to accommodate that view. My own preference, though, is to use subcats when the number of entries would otherwise be unwieldy. In the first instance, Category:2004 United States election voting controversies should include all articles with significant relevance to those controversies, i.e., all articles that someone pursuing the topic might want to look at. If the category becomes large -- significantly larger than it is now -- we could add subcats like the "persons" one, just to make navigation easier.

Nevertheless, if the current setup bothers you, I wouldn't object to your creating a subcat for people.

On the tangential question you raise, my answer would be the same -- go ahead and do separate subcats for people who caused a scandal and people who were victims of a scandal if you want, but I don't feel the need to do so. As I see it, having a category listing at the top of a bio page isn't so much a comment about what the person did -- for that, see the text of the article -- as it is a statement that readers interested in the subject matter of that category may find this article to be one of those that's informative. For example, Category:Watergate figures includes some convicted felons but also includes the guard who caught the burglars and the Special Prosecutor who conducted the investigation. JamesMLane t c 19:27, 11 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't agree with you on the "list of" argument. If you look at WP:CATEGORY, you'll see that there are two types of categories: topic categories and set categories. The difference is basically whether the description is in singular or plural. Set categories, described with nouns in plural, are more or less exactly "lists of".

If we return for a moment to Connell, I assume he was involved in only one controversy, the one concerning the 2004 presidential election. If a suitable category for that specific controversy would be applied on the article on Connell, that would be perfectly ok with me. It would then be a topic category (with its description in singular), because it deals with that controversy only. If he had been involved in more controversies, he could have one other category for each controversy, unless it proved practical to collect those scandals on a higher categorization by the common denomitator, like the Category:Jack Abramoff scandals. Yes, I know there are people listed there among the scandals, it's wrong - in my view and according to WP:CAT - and it's cluttering the category, which does need a cleanup.

So maybe I'll go ahead and create "people categories".

LarRan (talk) 22:06, 11 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There was mention of the controversy-controversies issue on Category talk:2004 United States election voting controversies#Scope of category. The article title is in the plural because there wasn't "the one" controversy concerning the election; there were several, such as issues about voter registration, electronic voting machines, voter suppression, etc. That's why you can't assume that any category with a plural title is what you call a "set" category. If a category is cluttered -- as this one isn't -- I'd figure that subcats, for people or whatever else, would help people find specific articles without jettisoning articles that some readers would be interested in. JamesMLane t c 03:26, 13 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

{{help}} I'm trying to work with template syntax in the Template:Jack Abramoff in order to categorize various articles that include the template into subcategories by using a #switch expression. It looks fine on an article when you give the parameter, like the Jack Abramoff article, but when you click on the category, it's still empty. Doesn't conditional application of categories work? LarRan (talk) 19:40, 12 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I think this is just due to a delay in updating the category by the software. When pages are placed into a category from the update of a template, this can happen. Give it some more time. You can read about this at Wikipedia:FAQ/Categories#Why might a category list not be up to date?. Please let me know if there are any more questions. Thanks! --Mysdaao ^talk 19:57, 12 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

In regards to international date formatting on Henrik Sedin: WP:Date states that "articles on topics with strong ties to a particular English-speaking country should generally use the more common date format for that nation. For the U.S. this is month before day; for most others it is day before month. Articles related to Canada may use either format consistently." I know you said that where a player plays is irrelevant, but I would disagree. Where Henrik Sedin has played his career reflects the main topic of the article. He has played it in Canada and although it is said that either format can be used, month before day is easily the more used format. Disagreement is welcome, but please refrain from completely altering the article before lending your side of the argument first. Thanks. Orlandkurtenbach (talk) 09:13, 21 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for getting in contact. I was thinking about placing a note on your talkpage, but you beat me to it. Henrik Sedin may have played part of his career in Canada, but he's a Swedish ice hockey player, he was born in Sweden, and he plays for Sweden when he plays for a country, and that is what counts. In fact, he played for Sweden in the recent Olympics. If that doesn't constitute "strong national ties", I don't know what does. People in general have strong national ties to one country or another, usually the country where they were born (which in most cases is where they live). That means that people have strong national ties to that specific country. Sure, he's got strong ties to Canada too, since there's where he currently spends most of the time, but those ties aren't national - unless he drops his Swedish citizenship and gets a Canadian one. So: this article isn't related to Canada, it's related to Sweden. I would also add that where he plays is of course not irrelevant per se, but in the date format discussion it is. I assume you understood that is what I meant. LarRan (talk) 11:17, 21 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I do see where you're coming from. However, I think the key point of the strongest national tie policy is that is pertains to "English-speaking countries". My understanding of this is that his national tie to Sweden with date formatting in mind should be overlooked because it is an article on English Wikipedia. If one wanted to write an article with a Swedish/international format, it should be on Swedish Wikipedia. Or at least that's the way I see it. This is also the first time I've ever seen someone try to implement such a change on an NHL article, which I realize is not sufficient grounds in itself to reject the change, but I also think it means there is no precedent for it. If you feel strongly about changing the date format on the Henrik Sedin article, then it should follow that all internationally born hockey players and athletes playing in North America should have their articles changed as such, as well. If that were the case, I just can't see other editors agreeing with it either. Thanks for opening up the discussion though. Look forward to hearing back from you. Orlandkurtenbach (talk) 20:28, 21 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Excuse me, but the article on Henrik Sedin is not an NHL article - it's an article on Henrik Sedin. Nothing else. The fact that he plays in that league doesn't change that. Maybe this is where you have gone wrong. Let me elaborate a bit on the national ties part. The Sedin twins were born in Sweden, and grew up there, right? They went to school there, they learned to play hockey there, their parents, siblings and most (if not all) other close relatives live there. They travel back to Sweden every off-season, and when their careers are over, they will with 99.9% certainty move back to Sweden for good. They vote there. Now, Henrik didn't approach Daniel one day, and said "I feel like changing country. I've heard of a cool city named Vancouver. Let's move there." And by sheer coincidence, there happened to be a decent hockey team in the city. Of course, that is not what happened. What happened was that they were drafted by, and ultimately offered contracts with, the Vancouver Canucks. What type of ties did that create? It created professional ties - to the club, to some extent to the city, and possibly (I'm being generous) to Canada. In time, these ties may have grown into personal ties, as they got friends, colleagues, fans, and other acquantainces. The ties might even have grown into emotional ties. What certainly hasn't been created are national ties to Canada. They may well be Canucks (at least currently), but they're not Canadians. Assume that they were traded to, let's say, New York Rangers (like Marcus Näslund). Would they then all of a sudden have national ties with the United States? If they would go to KHL, would they then have national ties with Russia? Of course not. Let's face it, the reason they are where they are, is that they get well paid. (Amazing how adaptable the human being can be when money comes around.) I'm not saying that they dislike being in Canada, I'm sure they find it ok, or good, or even great (I'm really in a generous mood today, ha-ha). This goes for players of all nationalities; there are a few Canadian players in the top Swedish league. I'm pretty sure you wouldn't say that they have strong national ties with Sweden, or would you? They could switch - and they do regularly - to another country from one season to another. That does not change their national ties. What I'm trying to say, is that national ties is something that is very inert. It's quite possible to change one's national ties, but isn't very common. So, until the Sedins change their passports, their national ties are to Sweden. Although this is the English wikipedia - the English language wikipedia - there is no requirement to select an English-speaking country ("the best fit") to have national ties with. So, the Sedins don't have one. I'm a bit surprised that you find this - date format according to the player's nationality - as a new policy. I've been around for a couple of years in hockey articles, and my impression is that most editors have adopted this policy. I'm hoping to convince you too. Cheers. LarRan (talk) 21:56, 21 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry, but I would strongly argue that the issue at hand here is not Henrik's personal tie to a country, but the subject matter of the article (ie. the topic). Yes, I would agree that Henrik likely has closer personal ties to Sweden, but as far as the subject matter of the article goes.. its notability lies in the fact he's an NHL player. If this is as well-adopted a policy for hockey articles as you've indicated, how come no internationally-born players that have been recognized as either FA or GA have such policy? I'm willing to admit I may be wrong, but I'd like to appeal to a general consensus first. How do you feel about copying and pasting this discussion or alternatively starting a new one in the WP:Hockey forum? Orlandkurtenbach (talk) 22:22, 22 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

It seems that much hinges on the definition of the expression national ties (whether strong or not). I imagine that the definition is probably dependent on what the subject matter of the article is. If the subject matter is a person, then in my opinion it's reasonable to assume that that person's nationality is what defines his/her national ties, not which one out of the English-speaking countries he/she currently is active in, or is most known in. And by the way, how would we decide where a person is most known - in absolute numbers, or in percentage of the population in a country? A person who is widely known in Great Britain (like David Beckham) might be more known in absolute numbers in the United States.

About the notability of the Sedins: they are Olympic hockey players, so I'm pretty sure they would have made it into the English wikipedia even if they hadn't played in NHL.

I cannot explain why some internationally-born players here have US dates (I'd like to see a couple of examples). It doesn't seem logical to me, and my only guess is that, given the population figures and the spread of ice hockey, the overwhelming majority of editors on hockey pages in the English language wikipedia probably live in North America. And these editors probably didn't even reflect on the US date format, because they're so used to it. But that's only a guess.

I'd like to clarify the definition of national ties by asking a few questions.

• If the Sedins would go to an NHL team in USA, would their national ties then change?
• If the Sedins would go to KHL, would their national ties change?
• If a non-North American player who plays in his own league becomes notable, and ultimately gets a contract with an NHL club, does his national ties then change?
• Don't American or Canadian players who currently play in Europe have national ties to USA or Canada, respectively?

The answer to these questions may (or may not) clarify what defines national ties, at least for people.

I would also object to your view that the article, the subject matter, or the topic, is what has national ties. The article (subject matter/topic) is only a bunch of bytes, of which, after a few hundred edits, no-one knows who wrote which letter. The article (subject matter/topic) neither plays hockey, nor does it have national ties. It's the person's (for people articles) national ties that should be reflectedin the article.

I don't mind bringing this discussion up in a wider forum. The question is which forum. Ice hockey? Biographies? Wikipedia date format guidelines? Nationality issues? WP:ENGVAR? Do you have any suggestions?

LarRan (talk) 11:06, 23 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I just realized another implication of having to select one of the English-speaking countries to have national ties to. This would mean that the same person could have other national ties in other wikis. In the German wikipedia, a decision would have to be made on which of the German-speaking countries - Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy (German is spoken in northern Italy) or Namibia (a former German colony) - a person has national ties to, provided that there is some kind of style issue that differs between these countries, not necessarily date formatting. And ice hockey is played in four of these countries. The same would go for the French wikipedia: France, Canada, New Caledonia, or some other French colony (the French still have a few).

LarRan (talk) 12:14, 23 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Well. I was thinking WP:Hockey. Which one do you think? Orlandkurtenbach (talk) 08:08, 25 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I've gone ahead and simply put my concerns on Talk:Henrik Sedin. Feel free to summarize your thoughts there. Orlandkurtenbach (talk) 23:26, 27 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, if you check the 1st reference its confirmed by Galiardi himself. hope that satisfies your inquiry. cheers Triggerbit (talk) 15:11, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Do you have a reliable source for the widespread changes you've made in the use of diacritics in Eric Godard's name on Wikipedia? It should be noted that Godard is Canadian, and as such no diacritics are used in the Canadian spelling of Eric. Please discuss your changes on the the articles talk page before making numerous unsourced changes. Thanks. --Quartet 18:21, 17 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Within the same fundamental family of alphabets, in this case the Latin alphabet, personal names are spelled in one way, and one way only. How do you spell your name in French? The same way as in English? Well, that's what I thought.

You may have noticed a few Renés, Andrés, Françoises, Sébastiens, Félixes and Stéphanes here. Are you going to move them all back to their misspelled version?LarRan (talk) 19:30, 17 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Aren't you clever. By the same token are you going to stick in some diacritics to "correct" the articles for non-French players with "French" last names like Daniel Paille, Zach Parise or Manny Legace? In your haste to defend your actions by picking apart my comments above you've overlooked the obvious. You're assuming Godard is French - when in fact most evidence would support he's not French - hence the request for a reliable source. He's from British Columbia which does not have a high % of French speaking residents (in fact, fewer people speak French in BC than they do Mandarin/Cantonese, Punjabi and German) so you're only assuming he's a French Canadian - which doesn't follow Wikipedia's policy on biographies of living people - WP:BLP. Having a French-origin name in Canada doesn't mean you're French or use diacritics in your name. The Godard surname is a variation of Goddard, which is has English, French and German origins. So before you get all snarky - it might have been a good idea to understand why your change was reverted before hopping up on your pedistal and giving a lecture on the Latin alphabet. --Quartet 13:39, 18 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I based my assumption that he is a French Canadian on the fact that his first name is spelled Éric in the French wiki, and they should know whether he's French or not. From my experience, they don't have the habit there of "Frenchifying" English names - as you suggest we should do here (anglifying French names, I mean), if I get you right. Yes, I know that wiki itself is not a valid source, but it's still fairly reliable. Anyway, in January 2009 I posted a message on Godard's talkpage in the French wiki, to see if anyone there would answer. No answer yet, I'm afraid.

When it comes to the other players you mention, it depends. If the person has altered his name and discarded the diacritics, then so be it, and wikipeida should reflect that. That seems to be the case with Zach Parise (nb: Parise's father's name is spelled Parisé, but Zach was born and raised in USA). The same thing goes for Bob Nystrom, who was born Nyström in Sweden. Paille's name is spelled Paille in the French wiki too, so that is probably how he spells his name. Legacé obviously (if you trust the French wiki) spells his name with the diacritic, so his article here should be moved.

So, I made an assumption, based on certain indications. You're also making assumptions, based on the low percentage of French-speakers in BC. I guess we're both sinners, then.

LarRan (talk) 12:01, 20 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia is not a reliable source. I don't see how editors at the French wiki would have any extra inside information on Godard's background or method of spelling his name simply because they're French and Godard "might" be French. There a many individuals with French last names in English speaking provinces in Canada who do not even use the French pronunciation of their names - let alone diacritics - because their families are 2 or 3 generations of English speakers. Manny (Emmanuel Fernandez) Legace is probably not French either - and there's nothing I can find that indicates so. I'm not saying we should anglify French names at all. My point is, you can't assume someone is French because they have a French-sounding name and since the burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material (WP:PROVEIT) it's up to the individuals who are making these edits to show that the player is indeed French and would require diacritics on their name if the edit is challenged. --Quartet 13:08, 20 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I know wikipedia isn't a reliable source. I just said it, didn't I? And how is it possible that you don't see that the French wiki would have any extra inside information on Godard's background or method of spelling his name simply because they're French? If he really is French, then of course they would have what you call extra inside information - they speak the same language, for Christ's sake. Don't you see: this wikipedia contains thousands of brilliant articles in English, and among those, articles that touch on subjects and topics relating to countries where English is spoken are greatly overrepresented. You write about what you know about. You know more about things that take place in your vicinity, and/or in your language. Language is an obstacle. Things that occur in places where another language is spoken are less known. I assume you don't believe the distribution of good articles by topic in the other wikis reflects that of this wikipedia. So, provided that his background is French - which we sofar know little about - I would say they have every chance in the world of knowing better than we do. LarRan (talk) 19:58, 1 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, you're either really obtuse, or you just like to argue. Please tell me how the heck a French speaker would look at Eric Godard's name and automatically know that he is a French-Canadian? What magical powers these French Wikipedia editors possess! I've looked through interviews, biographies, and newspaper articles without finding a shred of evidence he's French or identifies himself as French, but these amazing French editors have it figured out in no-time. Maybe they should tell Eric, because he doesn't sign his name with a diacritic[3][4][5][6] - not reliable sources, but still better than sourcing the French wikipedia.

So save your straw man arguments. All someone editing the French Wikipedia has done is assume that Godard is French because there are a number of semi-famous French people who's last name is also Godard, which proves nothing. He's not from France or Quebec or any former French colony or has any obvious ties to them - so the burden of proof lies with you. Prove he's French

By the way have you ever seen the "The Chinese Woman" episode of Seinfeld? If you have a TV you should check it out. In the episode Jerry assumes that because her name is "Donna Chang", she's Chinese. It turns out she's white and her family changed their name from Changstein when they moved to America. You're doing the same thing with Godard. The moral of the story is find some real evidence and stop dicking around. --Quartet 16:37, 3 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You're obviously running out of arguments, as you put words in my mouth that I've never said. I've never said that any French editor would automatically know that Godard's a French-Canadian by just looking at his name.

What I said was that provided that he's French (I obviously have put this in bold and italics) they have every chance in the world of knowing that better than we do. Read again. (I've assumed that you're familiar with the concept of hypothetical reasoning.)

And for the sake of clarity (I thought you'd realized this by now, but I was obviously wrong): I'm not maintaining any longer that he's of French origin, I don't know whether he is or not. He might not be. I'm objecting to your notion that French-speakers wouldn't know more on issues related to French-speaking areas, French-speaking people, etc, than we do here at the English wikipedia. Of course they do. Are small French towns covered better in the French wikipedia than here? Are topics concerning French history covered better in the French wikipedia than here? Are people well-known in France covered better in the French wikipedia than here? Can fish swim? Get you act together, start reading instead of assuming. The rest of your input needs no comments. LarRan (talk) 21:23, 3 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

"I don't know whether he is or not." So why did you change it in the first place then? Whoops, I don't know if Albert Einstein's middle name is Peter, but I'm just going to go and drop that in there anyways. Why are you editing articles when you have limited knowledge of the subject of the article and no source for your changes?

And I've had the same argument since day one when first posted on your talk page. Prove that Godard is French. Simple as that - without proof it's original research to add diacritics to names where is doesn't belong. If the person doesn't use them on their own name, Wikipedia shouldn't be tacking them. Europeans need to realize that European immigrants and their descendants to North America most often do not use diacrtics (with exceptions for Quebecers), and don't often identify themselves as being anything other than Canadian or American. Many even prounounce their last name the way North American's pronounce it not how Europeans would and they don't use diacritics.

BTW I've never said that French-speakers wouldn't know more on issues related to French-speaking areas, French-speaking people, etc, than we do here at the English wikipedia. This discussion was never about that. I'm just finding it amusing that you think editors editing the French Wikipedia would have an extra ability to identify and label other "French" people without any evidence to support that they're actually French and that you think it's okay. After all - "they should know whether he's French or not" - your words. Yes, they should know - know to add a source to verify their changes. Ha! Goodbye - message me if you ever figure out if Godard is French. --Quartet 22:25, 3 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

This is getting rediculous. I'm not moving the page back to Éric Godard. I'm admitting that Godard might not be - and probably isn't - French. Read my lips: I'm not maintaining that he's French. (So why should I provide proof, which you still require from me?)

And still I'm getting yelled at. Why? I know why: you're angry at yourself because you overlooked the condition "provided by", and kept on steamrolling here in your usual maximum-aggressiveness Quartet-style. You asked me why I moved the page, and I answered. That's not the same thing as defending the move. But I guess subtle differences like that elude you. You're like a crocodile: a big mouth and small ears, and when you come barging in on people's talk pages, you don't notice small things, like people admitting that they were wrong. What will I have to do for you to notice? Roll over and show the jugular? But don't feel bad: I accept your apology. But maybe you should take a couple of steps back, and contemplate your behaviour here.

"BTW": I've never said that French editors have an extra ability. These are your words: "I don't see how editors at the French wiki would have any extra inside information on Godard's background or method of spelling his name simply because they're French and Godard "might" be French." This is the sentence I objected to, because "might" could, like the word means, indicate that he might be French, and if so, French editors would most probably know more than we do about that. Please note this time, that this is purely hypothetical. LarRan (talk) 13:22, 19 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

So you found a source that says he's French? No? Oh, well, keep at it then!! --Quartet 23:58, 20 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

By the way, Canadian, what language is that? Don't you think the French-speaking community in Canada count themselves as Canadians too? LarRan (talk) 19:36, 17 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, I did do some research. I looked at the coaches of this year's final teams. Joel Quenneville and Peter Laviolette have never won Olympic gold medals. As far as I know, there aren't any Olympic Games or World Championships coming up any time soon (I could be wrong, but these things tend to be spaced out).

So considering that, I concluded that there won't be any new coach members any time soon, so there's no need to make a table of one sortable. Simple enough. -- Scorpion⁰⁴²² 20:08, 31 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have added the "reviewers" property to your user account. This property is related to the Pending changes system that is currently being tried. This system loosens page protection by allowing anonymous users to make "pending" changes which don't become "live" until they're "reviewed". However, logged-in users always see the very latest version of each page with no delay. A good explanation of the system is given in this image. The system is only being used for pages that would otherwise be protected from editing.

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To use the system, you can simply edit the page as you normally would, but you should also mark the latest revision as "reviewed" if you have looked at it to ensure it isn't problematic. Edits should generally be accepted if you wouldn't undo them in normal editing: they don't have obvious vandalism, personal attacks, etc. If an edit is problematic, you can fix it by editing or undoing it, just like normal. You are permitted to mark your own changes as reviewed.

The "reviewers" property does not obligate you to do any additional work, and if you like you can simply ignore it. The expectation is that many users will have this property, so that they can review pending revisions in the course of normal editing. However, if you explicitly want to decline the "reviewer" property, you may ask any administrator to remove it for you at any time. — Carl (CBM · talk) 12:33, 18 June 2010 (UTC) — Carl (CBM · talk) 13:05, 18 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

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Category:People involved in Jack Abramoff scandals, which you created, has been nominated for discussion. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the Categories for discussion page. Thank you. Mike Selinker (talk) 15:45, 26 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]

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The article KJ Hippensteel has been proposed for deletion because it appears to have no references. Under Wikipedia policy, this biography of a living person will be deleted unless it has at least one reference to a reliable source that directly supports material in the article.

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