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Chemical Symbols

Please consult the following page to ascertain the proper chemical symbols: http://en.wikipedia.org/List_of_elements_by_symbol (i.e., Magnesium = Mg) Also, SiAl, SiMg are chemical compounds, and while not an exact chemical formula, they do indicate the presence of those chemical elements Jchurchward (talk) 13:54, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Grassmann/Plücker

Thank you very much for the review.

Extended tutorials are discouraged, and perhaps moved to Wikibooks. On the other hand, we also get irate complaints about mathematics articles being completely useless to anyone but an expert. The "Geometric intuition" section which begins the article is deliberately more informal and tutorial; it even includes a picture! (Some of our mathematics editors have complained about silly pictures in articles, though not specifically about this one.) After that, however, the style becomes more Spartan. (No more pictures!) Misplaced Pages has such a diverse audience, we've generally tried to follow this kind of pattern where possible. Still, for a topic only a mathematically advanced reader could absorb, we may abandon the general reader in the opening paragraph. The impossible articles are the ones almost anyone might try to read.

Recently I've had discussions about the scope of the name "Plücker coordinates". For some, it seems that Grassmann has been shoved aside in favor of using "Plücker coordinates" for more than just line coordinates in 3D. That is, what Hodge & Pedoe called "Grassmann coordinates" (both primary and dual), are now subsumed under the Plücker name. Two editors remarked:

• I was actually quite a bit put off by the article itself: in algebraic geometry these days no one talks about Grassmann coordinates, and everyone would scratch their head if you told them that Plücker coordinates apply to Gr(2,4) only!
• I have to say that 'Grassmann coordinates' holds no appeal for me as terminology. It would be better to have some good history, but to use 'Plücker coordinates' everywhere, IMO.

Do you have a strong opinion either way? (Skimming your home page at UNICAMP, it's hard to tell what you are actively pursuing, so I don't know if Plücker coordinates are a distant memory or a daily tool.) --KSmrq 22:55, 22 April 2007 (UTC)

Image:HeNoHeNoMoHeJi.png

(Complaints by MER-C 12:47, 26 May 2007 (UTC) and Aksibot 22:11, 2 June 2007 (UTC) about the uncertain copyright status of Image:HeNoHeNoMoHeJi.png. Not sure of it myself; there was an original image, which someone else had provided. I may have made cosmetic edits to it. I may provide a new one if I get a round tuitt.

Earth Mover's Distance

I have tagged this article in several ways. Could you get some peer-reviewed articles and web pages to verify this subject and the details of the article? Bearian 21:21, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Raster graphics cf. vector graphics

I am quite impressed by your user page. So much expertise!

I am interested: what is the use of raster graphics in contrast to vector graphics? The two articles did not resolve the question for me. In particular, which graphics editing (raster or vector) is better for analog pictures? Thank you, Dogru144 16:45, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Pseudo-Geber

Hi, as far as I can see, you've added information about work made of pseudo-Geber.

It's something wrong with either his time of birth (the article said he was born in the 14th century), or the time his works was made (1310), unless he was less then 10 years old when he made the work.

The sentence saying "Pseudo-Geber was instrumental in spreading Islamic alchemical theories throughout western Europe", doesn't make sence if you compare it with the sentence saying "In any case, Pseudo-Geber's work reflects 14th century European alchemical practices rather than earlier Arab ones".

I don't know where you got this information, I don't have any sources. But something is wrong in the article-. Grrahnbahr 18:27, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

from learnportuguese

Hi! :) I'm really interested in the Portuguese language. I found your page through the talk page of an article on Brazilian Portuguese. Just put a watch on my user page and talk page if you want. I am American, by the way. Um, if i get this right, Quero aprender Português porque quero ser jornalista (for radio). :) learnportuguese 23:11, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

learnportuguese

I'm interested very much in the Portuguese language. Just check out my user page and talk page. If you put a watch on my user page, Misplaced Pages software will automatically also watch my talk page. Have fun! :) learnportuguese 01:54, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Vijay Park

An article that you have been involved in editing, Vijay Park, has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Vijay Park (2nd nomination). Thank you. --B. Wolterding 19:15, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Removal of In Plain English section

Hi, please don't remove the plain English section, it is definitely clearer to me and to the people that I have shown it to than the rest of the article which is laden in heavy mathematical terminology. If you feel it's misleading, consider improving it instead of deleting the entire section. Thank you. -- itistoday (Talk) 22:49, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Venetian Ceruse

It is the name of the cosmetic so both words should be capitalize like Toronto Blue Jays. In future, before you move an article, please discuss it on the articles talk page to get a consensus. Chessy999 23:02, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

No it is a brand, that is what it is called. Chessy999 21:24, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

hi

Hi. I found you in categories of users who can contribute in English and Portuguese. I myself am a native speaker of English, but I'm well on my way to learning Portuguese. Just check out my user page and talk page, and join in any of the discussions. To keep updated, you can even put a watch on my user page, which will automatically watch my talk page. :-) learnportuguese (talk) 20:24, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Voynich Manuscript at FAR

Voynich Manuscript has been nominated for a featured article review. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to featured quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, articles are moved onto the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article from featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Reviewers' concerns are here. Nishkid64 (talk) 21:20, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Portuguese Settlement, Malacca

I have nominated Portuguese Settlement, Malacca, an article you created, for deletion. I do not feel that this article satisfies Misplaced Pages's criteria for inclusion, and have explained why at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Portuguese Settlement, Malacca. Your opinions on the matter are welcome at that same discussion page; also, you are welcome to edit the article to address these concerns. Thank you for your time. Do you want to opt out of receiving this notice? H2H (talk) 09:28, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Superellipsoid and superquadrics

Hi, I noticed that you have written some interesting content for the two articles on superellipsoid and superquadrics. These are now linked to the computer vision category but there is nothing in the articles which relate them to this field. Can you please write something about their application in this field? Should they also be linked to the computer graphics category? --KYN (talk) 19:15, 9 October 2008 (UTC)

Hello. The category "Computer Vision" was already there when I started editing those articles. I don't know of any major application in that area. Superquadrics and superellipsoids are indeed popular in computer graphics; e.g. the simplest model for a CRT screen in POV-Ray is a flattened superquadric. All the best, -- Jorge Stolfi (talk) 14:03, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I have now changed the categories for the two articles to "computer graphics" instead of "computer vision". --KYN (talk) 20:49, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Speedy deletion of Spindle (disk packaging)

A tag has been placed on Spindle (disk packaging), requesting that it be speedily deleted from Misplaced Pages. This has been done under section G1 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the page appears to have no meaningful content or history, and the text is unsalvageably incoherent. If the page you created was a test, please use the sandbox for any other experiments you would like to do. Feel free to leave a message on my talk page if you have any questions about this.

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, you may contest the deletion by adding {{hangon}} to the top of the page that has been nominated for deletion (just below the existing speedy deletion or "db" tag), coupled with adding a note on the talk page explaining your position, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the article meets the criterion it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the article that would would render it more in conformance with Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines. Lastly, please note that if the article does get deleted, you can contact one of these admins to request that a copy be emailed to you. Rwiggum (/_Contrib) 03:47, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Caucasian

You have a link under lingustics to Caucasian which is a disambiguation page, I'm the one who is maintaining Caucasian now and was wondering if you had meant it to link there if you might have meant something like Peoples of the Caucasus —Preceding unsigned comment added by Arenlor (talk • contribs) 10:00, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

citations missing

Hi Jorge, Sorry to be crossing swords with you again but I just saw that you moved the "citations missing" template from the top of the Subroutine article down to the very bottom, and I don't think that was the right thing to do, so I have undone it. Here's why:

• This template tells readers that an article (or section) does not satisfy the verifiability test (one of Misplaced Pages's three core content policies) which says:

The threshold for inclusion in Misplaced Pages is verifiability, not truth—that is, whether readers are able to check that material added to Misplaced Pages has already been published by a reliable source, not whether we think it is true.

• If the template is at the beginning of the article or section, readers are alerted to the lack of verifiability before they read the content. This means they look at it in a different way - as a blog rather than as an encyclopedic entry. When you move the warning to the end of an article, some readers won't see it at all, and the remainder will have to re-read the article with a more critical mind set.
• In the specific case of the Subroutine article, it is really quite shocking that it has got to this stage ... 3,484 words (excluding examples) with only one minor reference! And bear in mind that some of the statements in the article are based on edits by Wiarthurhu, an account that has since been banned (e.g. some of the stuff about the HP-2100) - so it is all the mroe important to have citable references.

You may well be thinking "but that is an impossible task - it would take ages". Well, that's true. It can take hours to track down individual references. It could take weeks to fix the Subroutine article. But until someone puts that effort in, IMO the warning should be displayed loud and clear at the top of the page. - Pointillist (talk) 23:42, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

DYK for Minatogawa Man

On 23 November, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Minatogawa Man, 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.

07:02, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Pun

Hello, I have recently reverted material that you have added to Pun. Please try to find a third party source that describes the shows etc. as "pun-based" before re-introducing them to the article. Unlike term papers for schools where it is encouraged for writers to take primary evidence and place them together to support a claim or analysis, wikipedia considers that original research and does not allow it in articles. Instead, we find material published in reliable sources that has already made the claims and analysis - we simply collect work that others have done. If you have more questions, let me know either on my talk page or the Pun talk page. -- The Red Pen of Doom 20:41, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

I guess we have different priorities, and I am less willing to assume that material in articles has been added by experts who have forgotten where they acquired the knowledge. Cheers! -- The Red Pen of Doom 21:54, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

File:Aliasing-plot.png listed for deletion

An image or media file that you uploaded or altered, File:Aliasing-plot.png, has been listed at Misplaced Pages:Files for deletion. Please see the discussion to see why this is (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry), if you are interested in it not being deleted. Thank you. Skier Dude (talk) 02:21, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Navboxes

Navboxes are used all over the place in articles, so I don't really understand your objection, but if I changed them to footer boxes, would that assuage your "screen real-estate" qualm? --Cybercobra (talk) 14:27, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Note also per Misplaced Pages:Categories, lists, and navigation templates that categories and templates (and lists) serve distinct roles and aren't to be merged into the "one true organizational system", so your "use categories" suggestion isn't applicable. --Cybercobra (talk) 14:30, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

In point of fact, the Chinese dynasties navbox is actually vertical, not horizontal, but your point is understood. --Cybercobra (talk) 18:18, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Okay, I made some further modifications that I think address the issue. --Cybercobra (talk) 20:37, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Gerolf Steiner

Before you edit, please actually read the policies that are quoted to you. Per WP:DATE or, more specifically, WP:MOSBD, it states very clearly the following: Locations of birth and death are given subsequently rather than being entangled with the dates. Maybe this isn't the way it's done on other Wikis, but that's the policy here. 71.42.216.98 (talk) 04:46, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

License tagging for File:Carbon Monoxide timings Jorge Stolfi 2009-05-17 20-30.png

Thanks for uploading File:Carbon Monoxide timings Jorge Stolfi 2009-05-17 20-30.png. You don't seem to have indicated the license status of the image. Misplaced Pages uses a set of image copyright tags to indicate this information; to add a tag to the image, select the appropriate tag from this list, click on this link, then click "Edit this page" and add the tag to the image's description. If there doesn't seem to be a suitable tag, the image is probably not appropriate for use on Misplaced Pages.

For help in choosing the correct tag, or for any other questions, leave a message on Misplaced Pages:Media copyright questions. Thank you for your cooperation. --ImageTaggingBot (talk) 00:05, 18 May 2009 (UTC)

Templates

I finally fixed not fixed everything. I remembered that there are problems with expansion of {{{1}}} expressions inside wikilinks. Ruslik (talk) 17:52, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, it does not appear to be so simple. Still does not work. Ruslik (talk) 18:51, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Well, I spent so much on this! But the error was trivial: there is no #ifexists parser function! There is only #ifexist parser function! Simple error indeed. Ruslik (talk) 19:18, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

In short-form references " should be used instead of quote symbol ". Ruslik (talk) 19:42, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Carbon monoxide

I've noticed that you reverted my edit to carbon monoxide. I rearranged it to conform to the Chemistry Manual of Style WP:CHEMMOS which has been discussed and ratified by Wikiprojects Chemistry/Chemicals. Much thought indeed has gone into the manual of style. Particularly, the placement of the sections are supposed to have a logical flow:

1. What is it? (Structure & properties)
2. Where does it come from? How do we get it? (Occurence and production)
3. What can we do with it? (uses and reactions)

As a side note, the biological properties should either go under "safety" with regard to its toxicity, and "biosynthesis" with regard to its production in the body.

The article as you reverted lacks this flow. I fail to see how it is any more useful to the reader. While the Chemistry/Chemicals wikiprojects may not be the final word on articles in general, we do do things for a certain reason, you know. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 15:06, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Sorry I missed your reply. I do understand your point of view, (that these are of interest to non-chemists). Also, the WikiProject Chemistry/Chemicals does not pretend to "own" articles on Chemistry. However, bearing in mind that our editors are the ones with more expertise in this area than your average editor, and that we are the ones spending the most time on these articles, I do believe the MOS should be followed. The MOS is afterall, designed to give a consistent look and feel of related articles. As you said, this is an encyclopedia, not a random collection of monographs.

If you do have a disagreement with the principles behind it, perhaps you should bring it up there for further discussion, such that we can come to an agreeable solution which we can apply across the board. After all, CO is not the only "common" chemical out there. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 15:48, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of @@/63318-s

A tag has been placed on @@/63318-s requesting that it be speedily deleted from Misplaced Pages. This has been done under section A1 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is a very short article providing little or no context to the reader. Please see Misplaced Pages: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.

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, you may contest the deletion by adding {{hangon}} to the top of the page that has been nominated for deletion (just below the existing speedy deletion or "db" tag), coupled with adding a note on the talk page explaining your position, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the page meets the criterion it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the page that would render it more in conformance with Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines. Lastly, please note that if the page does get deleted, you can contact one of these admins to request that they userfy the page or have a copy emailed to you. Ridernyc (talk) 09:45, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Your template

{{@@/63318-s}} I can't begin to imagine the purpose of this template. It's simply some text which can be put into an article manually. The title is also bizarre. Could you enlighten me? :) ╟─TreasuryTag►hemicycle─╢ 10:26, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Surely it's possible to give it a name which isn't quite so random? Like Template:Bibliography proposal/whatever ? ╟─TreasuryTag►hemicycle─╢ 10:36, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

A better solution for references

Just to say that, though I don't have time to get involved in this right now, I agree this is an issue that needs rethinking and wish you luck with your analysis. - Pointillist (talk) 22:53, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Reference

Hi, Regarding Vade retro satana and the statement (you said it is a fact) that there was no mention prior to the 15th century, do you:

• a. Have solid references that say that?

• b. Deduced that yourself from as a fact because you see no mention.

If case a), please provide a few references that say that. if case b) that is your own deduction and amounts to WP:OR and can not be included.

The sentence that it has appeared on the St Benedict medal for centuries does have solid references, e.g. J. of Brit Arch. society and must be included. I am hence restoring it.

Please inform me of a. vs b. so I can make a decision. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 20:32, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Hi, I already responded on teh talk page for the article. And modified teh article to give a year. Please let us talk on the article talk page to be clear.

By the way your user page lead me to the Voynich manuscript... very interesting.... I think it is a hoax. Do you? Cheers. History2007 (talk) 21:50, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Carrão vs "Vila Carrão"

I'm sorry, but we must have in the article what is officially recognized. "Vila Carrão" is only a minor and not formal division of the city. Moreover, one article per district for each city in the world is enough, and there is no reason for creating two separate articles, one for the administrative division and other for the historical area. Any mention for minor subdivisions should be placed in the main article about the district.Fsolda (talk) 15:50, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Pun and WP:PROVEIT

My comment is that all content involving analysis and interpretation must be attributed to a reliable third party source, and not a Misplaced Pages editor's original research. The fact that any of the authors actually used this form of punning must be shown to have been identified by a third party source with appropriate citation. Does that help clarify my edit summary?-- The Red Pen of Doom 22:43, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

The fact that Hamlet dies requires zero analysis. Recognizing a pun exists, particularly in a dead dialect, DOES require analysis. Thank you for your work in bringing the article up from a truly horrible state. It is however still lacking in sourced content and I do not feel bad about pushing for continued improvement. -- The Red Pen of Doom 02:26, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Columbus's egg

Just FYI, regarding your statement, "AFAIK Columbus's is correct spelling and Columbus' isn't.", both are valid. You see "s's" more often in England and "s'" in America, and each is argued as correct by various style guides. I left your version per WP:ENGVAR rules, as it was there first. DreamGuy (talk) 16:28, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for the conflict on HMT

Sorry, but I loaded my extended edit over yours and probably lost some of your changes, which I will try to recover. If you have any questions about my edits, feel free to ask or challenge them. I think we are both trying to do the same thing, improve the clarity. The gist of what I did/do: The refs were useless, I dont consider methylene a functional group; empirical formulae are in the table, so I tend to use only structurally descriptive formulas; organic and medicinal tend to over-rate their applications vs the drudgery of material production, etc. Cheers,--Smokefoot (talk) 17:40, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

thanks for the note. I am going to suggest that we move the article to "hexamethylenetetramine," which is what we call it around the lab. The pattern in the majority of articles is to minimize repetition with the ChemBox, hence the tendency to use a more descriptive formula presentation vs the empirical formula in the ChemBox - maybe this policy is something I should bring up in the Chemistry user group. I am a highly imperfect proofreader, so feel free to check up on me.--Smokefoot (talk) 19:40, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Phosphazenes and octachlorophosphazene

Hi again, I see that you are working on the phosphazene article. You do have good taste in interesting species. My own opinion is that the applicability of phosphazenes is over-hyped; I don't think that any commercial applications exist. Some missing aspects of these articles is their formation pathway, which involves P-N things related to PPNCl, and the hydrolysis of the phosphazenes which gives phosphate and ammonia, the benign nature of which is one of the selling points that Allcock pushed so hard.

If you are considering creating an article on octachlorophosphazene. My advice would be to not create a separate article on the tetramer, but to retitle the trimer article to something with a name that captures both the trimer and the tetramer. Their behavior and uses are intertwined.

So with those comments, happy editing. --Smokefoot (talk) 14:00, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. I would disagree with your comment "so they must be placed in two separate articles (with separate infoboxes and such)." There are no "musts" around here. It is possible to have two Chemboxes in the same article, stacked up. This suggestion follows from my preference for one beefy article vs a very thin parallel articles. The Wikichem goal is not to become a catalogue of chemicals, but an encyclopedia (rich discussion of with emphasis on context). Also having separate trimer and tetramer articles requires more editorial work in the sense that one must maintain them in parallel (because the underlying principles and properties are so very similar). So I would recommend a unified article on cyclophosphazenes.

With regards to your interest in CO oligomers, it is a fairly well developed theme. Ditto for many binary phases: C-S, C-N, etc. Cheers,--Smokefoot (talk) 18:41, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I must have been feeling disagreeable yesterday (by nature, I am a merge-ist): I cant think of any good reason not to create the tetramer article. --Smokefoot (talk) 17:38, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Pedro I of Brazil

Don´t worry, that was nothing! - --Lecen (talk) 22:20, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Pirahã features

Hi, I didn't remove the list of Pirahã features because they're controversial. If you read my edit summary, you'll see that I removed them because all that information is elsewhere in the article and lists like that are not good wikipedia style. Best, Arxack (talk) 23:42, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Hello, that's a good point, but if we're going to do that, do you think we go further and have a section actually about the controversy? Arxack (talk) 04:14, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

General apology on behalf of the New Page Patrollers

I just wanted to extend an apology to you on behalf of all new page patrollers; there is no way that Urostealith should have been tagged for speedy deletion by anyone. (I have since declined that speedy). I hope this doesn't scare you off from writing in the future; we need more people like you creating content in those areas. Happy editing, NW (Talk) 03:38, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Propylene oxide

To chemists, there is essentially only one propylene oxide (the one made on the billion kg scale per Ullmann article on "Propylene oxide"). The second isomer is of minor importance and usually called trimethylene oxide. The nomenclature is imperfect, which irritates purists and some others. In any case, I recommend that we move good ole propylene oxide back to its old name. You are welcome to contribute to the discussion on the Wikichemicals page. PS you are doing interesting and welcome work on the carbon oxides. Try the sulfides!--Smokefoot (talk) 22:07, 1 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the note. I think that I will move the article back. Your words encouraging accessibility to non-specialists resonates. For this reason I try to spend time on general topics like ketone and alkyl. It would be interesting to know a lot more about who exactly is reading these articles. My guess is that our main readership includes those interested in the ingredients in consumer goods and technicians and students that are tasked to work with or write about these materials. My thinking on propylene oxide is not just about preserving legacy names, but is motivated by optimizing the approachability of an intrinsically difficult topic by using familiar names. To wander off the subject, did you see that one of the most consulted articles is oxiclean, a product that contains one of your favorites - peroxycarbonate - as the active ingredient. --Smokefoot (talk) 00:15, 2 August 2009 (UTC)

Your change to Set (computer science)

I've reverted it because it's plain wrong to make void "the same" as unit type in that context because Void type cannot actually be stored; it's one of the key differences between unit type and void, as explained here. Honestly, despite your CS professorship, you're starting to act like a WP:RANDY. Pcap ping 19:39, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

COBOL was NOT the first language to use records

The IBM/360 Assembler language contained numerous ways of defining records. eg.

      CARD     DS   0CL80       describes a collection of fields in the record (0 multiplication factor, implied length 80)
      NAME     DS   CL20
      ADDRESS1 DS   CL20
      ADDRESS2 DS   CL20
      CITY     DS   CL20

or

      CARD     DSECT            describes a 'dummy section' representing offsets from a 'pointer' register
      NAME     DS   CL20
      ADDRESS1 DS   CL20
      ADDRESS2 DS   CL20
      CITY     DS   CL20

or

      CARD     DS   4CL20       4 unamed fields of 20 bytes each comprising a record

or

      RECORDS  DS   9CL80       reserved storage for up to 9 card records

ken (talk) 09:09, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Vainakh medieval towers

I understood my fault. This will never happen again. Should I change something on already existing works? Nakh 09:40, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

Organic chemistry

Hi Jorge. I slashed your definitional section in organic chemistry. In my opinion, the article on organic chemistry is probably not the right place to discuss some highly specialized compounds that fall into the gray area. The page is viewed thousands of time each day by readers who, I am guessing, mainly want to know about regular organic compounds. IMHO, readers are probably not interested in the "hair-splitting" definitions that fascinate you and me. The topic is sufficiently broad that we could continue the conversation on the Chemistry project page, if you wish.--Smokefoot (talk) 18:54, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your note. I used to be interested in the inorganic-organic distinction (and like you was amused by the irony that Woehler's urea is inorganic). You'll find however that organic chemists find the distinction completely trivial. I hope that you liked the cluster that I inserted into carbide, which you have expanded so well. There are zillions of these things. In Fe₅C(CO)₁₅, the carbon is square pyramidal: http://www.3dchem.com/inorganicmolecule.asp?id=245#. Best wishes,--Smokefoot (talk) 20:41, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Using in article names.

Hi, i've looked at your question a bit and i found the following:

<div id="title-override" class="topicon" style="float: left; position: absolute; left: 0; top: 0px; width: 100%; padding-top: 5px; display:none"><div style="background: {{#ifeq:{{PAGENAME}}|{{FULLPAGENAME}}|white|#F8FCFF}}; font-size: 190%; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0.4em; position:relative; left:0.5em;"> Propellane</div></div>

It should override the Article name. Cosmetic only: no real solution though and on the Vector skin it's not properly aligned. Jarkeld (talk) 23:06, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Journal of Applied Electrochemistry

Hi Jorge. Me again. I noticed that you are editing more widely. You do seems to write well, and many of these articles need fresh eyes to make them more intelligible. So your service is very welcome.

I wanted to pass on some comments on referencing journals. I would guess that tens of thousands of chem journal articles appear each year (J. Phys Chem. A-B-C published ~45000 pages last year). Many journal articles are quite specialized. I raise this point because referencing journal articles requires a plan, otherwise Misplaced Pages entries will be overwhelmed by references. See WP:SECONDARY. Within the Chem editing community, the gradient seems to be: textbooks < monographs < reviews < journal articles. Journal articles are usually cited only when they describe discoveries of historic interest. --Smokefoot (talk) 04:45, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

My message more plainly is that just that if you dont know the journals and the work, I recommend against cite primary references. Because chances are that you are citing something that is inappropriately specialized. The reason that I raise the point is that many well intentioned editors feel pressure to cite references. References can always be added subsequently by experts after the basic article is framed.--Smokefoot (talk) 14:07, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the note. I see your point too. I just wanted to make sure that you know the situation. Most publications are not b.s. but most are extremely specialized and not very useful to a reader of an encyclopedia. I am sensitive to the problem because within WE, the removal of citations can be highly controversial. Some large articles are simply dumping grounds of hyper-specialized cruft. I reworked the fluorene thing. I hadnt realized that one can get the dipotassium derivative. Maybe that aspect should be even more amplified. Anal-retentive point: few carbanions are really anions - the alkali metal is alway stuck tightly on carbon. At least that is my impression.--Smokefoot (talk) 18:34, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

"TooCuteForWikipedia"

What are your definitions of "TooCuteForWikipedia"? Are there any common definitions?

Warmest Regards, :)--thecurran let it off your chest 06:04, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:@@

Template:@@ has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Thank you. — This, that, and the other (talk) 10:04, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Your accurate two-phase model

Your new section at Misplaced Pages:Modelling Misplaced Pages's growth makes very good sense. You seem to have resaerched this extensively. Some people might argue that you can model anything with 10 parameters, but you explained quite satisfactory (to me at least) what the purpose af these parameters are.
The seasonal pattern for article creation peaks at February and August. Have a look at Google Insight for Search for the seasonal pattern for Misplaced Pages as search criterium. It is quite the contrary of the editors, with valleys at summer and Christmas.
A few questions about predicting the future:

• the technical report mentions 2 different values for the Limiting size: At paragraph 7 you mention about 5.9 million articles, but in the abstract a finite limit a little over 8 million articles.
• can you provide the is modelled values for future article numbers? I would like to add them in the monthly graphs, if that is OK? HenkvD (talk) 20:26, 30 November 2009 (UTC)

Benin na pt

Olá Jorge, poderia por gentileza dizer qual o título que você quer que fique no artigo Benin ou Benim, uma vez que você criou o artigo como Benim no título e no texto colocou como Benin. Veja a discussão no artigo da pt. Um abraço Jurema Oliveira (talk) 02:57, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

User:Jorge Stolfi/Oxocarbon test

It appears you can use relative path names as well. Feel free to revert if you don't like it. Thanks! Plastikspork _―Œ 17:17, 15 December 2009 (UTC)

Putting editorial guidelines in articles rather than talk

Your comment at User_talk:Rich_Farmbrough#Editorial_tags_should_go_in_the_Talk_page piqued my interest.

On the whole, I agree with you. Talk about articles should go on the talk page. There are two provisions here, I think.

• If it would create a legal issue that would not be laughed out of court.
• If it would warn readers that an article is incomplete (in the sense that its active editors know it is incomplete, i.e. are adding stuff) beyond what readers should expect from Misplaced Pages not being complete or perfect.
  • Caveat: One can use a sandbox. There are many practical difficulties why this is not so.

I agree with you wholeheartedly that edit markup such as (as I do, and use it solely as an example) {{Expand Hungarian}} which means please translate a fuller article from the Hungarian, should not appear on the article's page. The especial thing there, if you look at it (and it is just an example not a special case) is it says "once doing so, {{translated}} must be placed on the talk page." So we have a situation where while the translation is in effort, to obey the rules, we damage the page, and whence done, our efforts are essentially hidden, and no-one knows it is a translation unless they look at the talk page. Which is not for plaudits (which are welcome nonetheless) but so editors can then ask "why did they write that" and then, even if they cannot read the original themselves, ask the editor   which is usually quite clear from the edit history, and if they have got that far they will do that   "what did you, or what does this, mean?

This comes about essentially because on watchlists talk pages are included with their pages. I agree with you it is an entire mess. Many people do not watch or care for the talk pages, which is why I think these have slowly migrated to the article pages, which was never their intention. For example, you never see at the top of a page "this page has measres not expressed in both Imperial/US Customary and metric measure. See WP:MOSNUM. Love and thanks, {{convert}}." I totally agree with you that these kinds of templates, and especially with the last they take a LOT of work to make (not mine), should be seen and not heard

Best wishes Si Trew (talk) 00:00, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Please stop moving tags off articles

See Template:Unreferenced and others, where the documentation clearly backs up what is obviously the long-time convention, which is that these tags go on articles, as opposed to on talk pages. Please undo your disruptive rampage of trying to reverse this convention. Dicklyon (talk) 00:38, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

If anything I said encouraged this, I can only apologise. It was meant to be a discussion, not a green light, and would have WAAAY long way to go before achieving any consensus. Si Trew (talk) 00:45, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Talkback

Or do nothing Si Trew (talk) 01:42, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

:)

Hello Jorge Stolfi, Paradoctor (talk) has smiled at you! Smiles promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Spread the WikiLove by smiling at someone else, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Go on, smile! Cheers, and happy editing!
Smile at others by adding {{subst:Smile}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

Had a good laugh reading user:Jorge Stolfi/Templates that I sorely miss, and wanted to thank you. ;)

Talkback re: Subroutine and the unreferenced tag

Proposed deletion of Jorge Stolfi/Death of Misplaced Pages/Why uniformity should not be a goal

The article Jorge Stolfi/Death of Misplaced Pages/Why uniformity should not be a goal has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

Misplaced Pages is not for personal essays.

While all contributions to Misplaced Pages are appreciated, content or articles may be deleted for any of several reasons.

You may prevent the proposed deletion by removing the {{dated prod}} notice, but please explain why in your edit summary or on the article's talk page.

Please consider improving the article to address the issues raised. Removing {{dated prod}} will stop the proposed deletion process, but other deletion processes exist. The speedy deletion process can result in deletion without discussion, and articles for deletion allows discussion to reach consensus for deletion. Singularity42 (talk) 20:56, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

You created the essay in the main article space. Moved to: User:Jorge_Stolfi/Death_of_Wikipedia/Why_uniformity_should_not_be_a_goal. Jarkeld (talk) 21:15, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for moving that bit of essay to the correct name. I was not aware of the missing "User:", and got quite upset when I got a "deletion" notice on an essay that I had not even finished writing yet. Sorry for the bother, and all the best. --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 21:19, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

No problem. Glad to have been of assistance. Jarkeld (talk) 21:23, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Sorry - I should have caught the missing "User" from the title. Singularity42 (talk) 21:25, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

It is me who must apologize. "Honi soit qui mal y pense". --Jorge Stolfi (talk) 01:31, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

Orphan tags

Very well, I see your point on the tags. Thanks for the input. Quantumobserver (talk) 22:49, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Congratulations

		The Special Barnstar
		For removing the gratuitous {{citations missing}} template from the article List of minor characters from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. HairyWombat (talk) 02:15, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Where you display it is up to you. Feel free to move it to your talk page.

Furazan

Furazan looks like your cup of tea, esp the dicarboxylic acid. The article mentions nitrosocyanacetate, which is one of those special organic things that are barely organic. I am not even sure what it is. Cheers--Smokefoot (talk) 16:45, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Citations

You might find this template interesting {{BarrowTipler1986}}, which looks quite like your proposal for out-of-body references. I share quite a few of your concerns about {{Cite}} and its siblings. In fact, I'm amazed that Misplaced Pages seems to have no major project on bibliography, considering that the literature is the fundament of an encyclopedia. Are you up for talking shop? Paradoctor (talk) 03:27, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Re: Aerican empire infobox

Thank you for explaining your rationale, and thank you for talking it over with me before reverting my changes. It's always nice to meet someone here open to talk through a disagreement. Wish it happened more often.

I don't agree with you about the infobox. The labels on the box are indicative of the subjective claims made by the state; hence labels such as "purported currency" and "area claimed" as opposed to "currency" and "territory" as seen in the standard country templates. The information doesn't have to come from an "independent" source. Misplaced Pages requires that notability be estalbished by a certain number of outside sources, but content in an article about a website can certainly come from that website... it would have to, because you can't assume that an outside reporter will arrange to cover every single fact that someone might want to know. In the case of these microstates, information such as supposed land claims and currencies are essential data to appreciating the content and scale of the project, and the best and most reliable source for that data is the website in question. It's no different that putting up an item of celebrity news based on a press release from their website, which we do routinely. It's a biased but valid source, which is why we use citations to warn people of bias when we quote them. As it happens, I do have a citation to support the "purported currency" and "population" figures, which I'll try to dig up. They were mentioned in a European radio broadcast a few months back...

Lastly, I'd appreciate it if you refrained from making sweeping comments about micronations being games or role-playing. I don't ask you to say that they're valid political organizations, but given that the people involved don't consider it to be playing a game, it's arguably not accurate to say that it is one. Some of these countries certainly openly admit to being games, but by and large, the ones with Wiki articles don't. Obviously, though, I'm biased on this point, and I freely admit that. Timcrow (talk) 03:29, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

You wrote,

Misplaced Pages does not consider "the contents of a website" to be a suitable topic for an article.

I don't recall seeing this as an official guideline, though it's possible I'm mistaken. That said, it happens in quite a lot of articles. Go to Google and type in 'wikipedia "according to her website"' and you'll find that this exact phrase appears on quite a number of articles. The latest news about a person or group is often best found in their own press-releases, despite the fact that, as you say, anybody with a computer and a first-grade reading level can create a website and put news on it. I believe you 100% about how anyone can post fake information online, but if you cite only a group's official website, then barring vandalism, that's usually a good way to get their news and not that of, for example, a rival splinter-group, as with the Talossas.

You wrote,

Now, "data" such as the precise areas which the Aericans decided to claim as their territory is of this sort: neither relevant, nor permanent, nor encyclopedic.

I would say that this information is different from bus schedules and numbers of bathrooms in so far as it's essential information to understanding the group. In so far as it's a land-claiming political entity (however dubious), it's land claims are central to it and useful to understanding it. The article on the United States includes information about its states -- information which has proven not to be permanent -- for the same logic. As it was presented in the Aerican Empire article, it was arguably encyclopedic -- meaning it was a complete list -- and seemes to me to be relevant. I can't argue with you regarding permanency, but it was currently accurate, at least.

You wrote,

However the currency info is still pure fantasy.

How so? The coins are physical. They get bought and sold. They're unrecognised in most shops, but they're still a form of currency minted metal currency. At the very least, they're novelty coins, which qualifies them as "purported currency" according to the numismatists.

You wrote,

A Misplaced Pages article about a micronation (or any other entity) should not be written from the group's viewpoint.

You're absolutely right: saying that the Aerican Empire is "not a game" is a biased point of view. Saying that it "is a game" is *also* a biased point of view, and one without any sources to back it up, to my knowledge. This is why the wiki article doesn't say, one way or another. It's left up to the reader to decide if the micronation is a political entity, a political simulation, or a game, without trying to bias their PoV. All I'm asking is that you refrain from comments such as "most of the internet-centered ones --- and Aerica in particular." Anything in life can be thought of as a game, but there's an important distinction to be found in "exists as a game" and "is a source of entertainment value." At the very least, I appreciate the fact that you haven't put such statements into the article itself... I suppose it's not my place to decide what vocuabulary you do or don't use on talk pages.

Timcrow (talk) 13:36, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

You wrote, "all English words should be used with the meaning that they have for the majority of readers." Again, I agree with you. The problem is deciding what the majority of readers think it means. Webster defines a game as "activity engaged in for diversion or amusement" (I assume this is the definition you're using?). You'll note that it doesn't specify "primarily" or "solely" or anything like that, so that if I'm enjoying this discussion with you right now, it's arguably a game by definition. If I enjoy suturing a wound or putting a sample into the mass spectrometer (to take examples from our respective fields of science), if I find it amusing, does that make it a game? What I think you mean (please correct me if I'm wrong) is that you feel that these micronations are founded primarily for amusement, which isn't the case, at least for the Aerican Empire. That's a hard statement to prove, but I can point to it being mentioned in an article or two, I'm sure. It can be fun and diverting without that being its main purpose, and I, for one, feel that means it's not a game. I don't presume to say what the average wikipedia user thinks, since most of them aren't as over-educated as we are.

Next, you comment on members not being united. You're right that most of them don't live in the same region, but I have to dispute you when you say they lack a shared cultural heritage. The members from a dozen countries are united by geekdom... not a national heritage, but certainly a cultural one. This is why most of these groups are called micronations instead of microstates; they're based on an adopted national identity, not a physical border.

You also comment that the word "government" isn't appropriate, but again, how is the word meant to be used? "The body of persons that constitutes the governing authority of a political unit or organization." No mention of states. Schools have student governments. Fan clubs have presidents. The word government, as applied to a micronation, is equally valid whether you consider them a group of kids or a political entity. The same logic is true of the word "politics."

Lastly, as for statements about a group by a group, I still don't agree with you. Yes, a lot of the statements made in the article can only be backed up by their website... but really, how is that different from some of the statements made in the articles for the United States and Canada? When you go to Statistics Canada, for example, are you equipped to verify their claims? When any reporter reports their statistics, they're getting their data from Statistics Canada, not from an independent source. Yes, you can argue that they operate in the "real world" but you already know how I'll respond to that. You can argue that they have thousands of employees fact-checking and verifying, but when you get down to the level of the individual, you or me looking at their publications, it's still just a question of putting your trust into what they tell you. Sometimes, when you're writing an encyclopedic (which Webster, of course, defines simply as "complete"), you have to admit that the best cource for information about a group is the group itself. The group may not be trustworthy, but in absence of better or more up-to-date sources of information, it *may* be necessary so that the article is complete.

Timcrow (talk) 17:08, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

Cleanup

Appreciate the cleanup you have done on the article Kali's Child. There are still problems related to POV and word usage. For ex: "Faluts", "Misuse", "Misunderstanding" should be removed and the titles should simply be "Tantra" instead of "Misunderstanding of Tantra". Then in the section we must write neutrally, so-and-so argues that so-and-so has misunderstanding of tantra....so-and-so argues that so-and-so's understanding of tantra is correct... presenting both the views. This was on my todo list for quite some time and thanks for initiating this. I will chip in once I have some free time. Thanks. --TheMandarin (talk) 06:25, 12 January 2010 (UTC)