Portal talk:Germany/Archive 1

Colour
I don't like this black and white design. It's so dark and not friendly at all. Would anybody mind changing it to, well, whatever but not black. 19:45, 25. Oct 2005 (CEST)
 * I've changed it to black-red-gold like the German flag. Angr/ talk 23:30, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Huge improvement. Bold too.  I like it!  :)  --Mmounties 03:18, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I have changed to the new portal syntax found on other portals, so the boxes should auto-resize now. The source code is also more readable, and we should think whether we want to incorportate some of the (commented out) suggestions. Kusma (討論) 04:07, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * It looks good! I commented out the Categories of States because I really don't think that's necessary in addition to the regular category box. I wonder how necessary the "Where to start" box is, too. The title (but not the content) rather suggests it's redundant with "Things you can do". There's also the possiblity of making it much longer, like de:Portal:Deutschland and fr:Portail:Allemagne. Angr/ talk 08:05, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Very good! What`s about the recent news and topics like in the German Portal?Alopex
 * I've been trying to keep the newsbox up to date with things happening in Germany, taking them from Wikinews and from Current events. Angr/ talk 12:31, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Gold with red border doesn't look good. The table should only have one real colour as background. Either red or gold. 83.109.190.10 19:52, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I have tried something else that is black-red-gold again to match the flag colors, with black border instead of red. Kusma (討論) 20:09, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I don't like the gold letters on the red background. And the blue letters of "edit" on the red background really make my eyes hurt. Angr/ talk 20:11, 11 February 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree. I preferred the red on gold black on gold over the current gold on red. Olessi 20:42, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * The edit links indeed don't look good. I have just swapped red and gold, better now? Red-on-gold doesn't look as good as black-on-gold, though :-( Kusma (討論) 20:53, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * You're right, black on gold is what I meant- brain cramp. Olessi 21:41, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Since everyone seems to like black on gold best, I'm moving it back to that. And I still don't think the red border looks bad, so I'm restoring that too. Angr/ talk 22:09, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I rather like the red border. Adds an element of style. (And I don't like colors the de:Portal:Germany at all.  Way too boring.)  Red on gold labels hurt my eyes, so your first design is the winner as far as I'm concerned too.  --Mmounties 22:46, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Noticeboard?
Is there any German Wikipedians noticeboard or a place to reach many German speaking wikipedians? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 17:45, 24 November 2005 (UTC)
 * Now there is: German Wikipedians' notice board. Please join us there! Kusma (討論) 04:46, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Selected article and picture
Are the selected article and picture listed here to be taken from Featured articles and Featured pictures only? It seems like a good idea. Angr/ talk 06:37, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

I found the following featured pictures that may be of interest to this Portal. There may well be others. Angr/ talk 06:46, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Image:Cathedral of Magdeburg Inside.jpg
 * Image:Castle Neuschwanstein.jpg
 * Image:Windbuchencom.jpg
 * Image:SonyCenterAtNight.jpg
 * Image:1936NurembergRally.jpg

Here is a list of Germany-related featured articles from the toolserver. I found (after removing some House of Hanover people):
 * Albert Einstein
 * Anne Frank
 * Anschluss
 * Athanasius Kircher
 * Battle of the Bulge
 * Blitzkrieg
 * Carl Friedrich Gauss
 * Cathedral of Magdeburg
 * Colditz Castle
 * Eifel Aqueduct
 * Enigma machine
 * Frankfurt School
 * Franks
 * Karl Dönitz
 * Max Weber
 * Paragraph 175
 * Prince-elector
 * Sino-German cooperation (1911-1941)
 * Swastika
 * Triumph of the Will
 * Volkswagen Type 2
 * War of the League of Cambrai
 * Warsaw Uprising
 * William the Silent
 * Witold Pilecki
 * Zeppelin

The disadvantage of using only featured articles is that this creates some overlap with the Main Page. The obvious advantage is quality control. The list shows we need to work to get some more post-1945 topics up to featured status.

Other portals do not always use featured articles. I will investigate more about the rules used here tomorrow. If you dislike my choice of articles, just use something else, I won't mind. Kusma (討論) 07:13, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I know they don't, and that's always bugged me. I don't think there's likely to be overlap with the Main Page, as the chances of the Main Page and this Portal having the same image or article at the same time are very slim. Keep in mind a lot of Featured Articles and Pictures never make it to the Main Page. If we do need to widen the pool, we could also use Good articles as well as de:Wikipedia:Exzellente Bilder that are Germany-related. Angr/ talk 08:39, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
 * And Germany-related pictures from commons:Featured pictures, such as Image:Zwickau Rathaus.jpg and Image:Werdau Rathaus.jpg. Angr/ talk 10:21, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
 * There is some discussion on the terminology here: Wikipedia talk:Portal/Archive_3. It seems we are free to do whatever we want as long as we don't call anything "featured" that isn't a "featured article". Anyway, for quality control it is probably best to just use "featured"-quality things. If we change the article once per fortnight or once per moth, we should not run out of them anytime soon. Kusma (討論) 15:26, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I read that. If we do include things that aren't technically Featured, we shouldn't use that term. I think, especially for images, we should allow ourselves to include those that are Featured at de: or at commons, even though we can't call them Featured here. As for articles, we have to stick the ones that are on English Wikipedia, so sticking to the FA's is probably a good idea as much as possible. Angr/ talk 15:56, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I'm starting a subpage where we can list articles and pictures that we can consider using on the Portal page in the future. Angr/ talk 12:58, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

suggestion for layout
perhaps we should follow the Main page layout and not have all the sections on on the portal on all days. Or, in the alternative, we could reduce the sections in size (on screen) so that the need for scrolling will be minimal, at least for users with 1280x1024 resolution? - yes, that's what I have, but since I'm notoriously behind on technology that should almost be standard of what users look at.- ;-)  any thoughts?  --Mmounties 07:05, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
 * On a further note, it seems like the links under "where to start" and "Categories of States" are identical. In the interest of making this a multi-national portal for all those speaking German as an official language I'd vote for canning the "Categories of States" and perhaps replacing it with something that would link to Provinces in Austria, ahhhm, cantons in Switzerland, and States in Germany.  We should probably also choose between the start here and the Categories so not to duplicate.  --Mmounties
 * While I'm all for making German Wikipedians' notice board transnational for things of interest to German-speaking Wikipedians anywhere, I do think Portal:Germany should stick to Germany. Austria and Switzerland can have their own portals if they like. That said, I don't see the need for a separate "Categories of States" box. I'd rather just expand the "Categories" box vertically. Angr/ talk 08:31, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
 * That makes sense. The orientation of the portal is different. Agreed.  --Mmounties 14:18, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Next selected article and picture
Any suggestions how we should handle this? How often, do we vote, or do we just do as we please? After removing a couple more articles from Portal:Germany/Selected articles and pictures (the most borderline one I removed was Warsaw Uprising but I think that one should rather be on the Poland portal than here), I count 22 articles, of which only Volkswagen Type 2 and Paragraph 175 are post-WW2. Probably we should try to find some more somewhat recent topics to use here. Personally, I would like to see a "modern" article combined with an "old" picture or vice versa. For a start, I propose the following procedure: we change the selected article and picture on the 1st of each month, after deciding here about a week earlier. We could either discuss or vote on the next article; as long as there's not many of us here, discussion will probably do.

My personal suggestions for March are:
 * Prince-elector using Image:Balduineum Wahl Heinrich VII.jpg (featured article)
 * Image:SonyCenterAtNight.jpg (featured picture) We had Berlin already in the last picture. Kusma (討論) 19:38, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * How about Image:Deutsche-Bank-Frankfurt-am-Main.jpg, then? That's modern too. Angr/ talk 19:55, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Fine with me, but I also like Mmounties' picture suggestion below. Kusma (討論) 19:59, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Of course we can also change to better content than Cologne and the Reichstag right away, but keeping Cologne during Carnival also has some merit. Any thoughts? Kusma (討論) 02:42, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I was thinking a new article every other week or so should be pretty good (not too much and not too little), but once a month would be fine with me too. Did we decided to only go with featured articles or do we want to check into the good articles list too (there is a list like that, isn't there)?  Perhaps that way we would get some more post WWII subjects.  Re selections, I like:

&mdash;The preceding unsigned comment was added by Mmounties (talk &bull; contribs) 06:08, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Eifel Aqueduct using Image:Roemerkanal buschhoven.jpg
 * Image:Musiktheater im Revier.jpg
 * I think once a month is better, especially since we don't have that many articles and images to choose from. As to how to go about it, I suggest that around the middle of each month someone propose next month's article and image, and if no one else objects, we go with it. And maybe over at the German-speaking Wikipedians' notice board we can implement an improvement drive on an article relating to the German-speaking world, which would then hopefully increase the number of FA's available to us here, especially ones on post-WW2 topics. Angr/ talk 07:12, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Sorry about that missed signature before. It was late.  ... As to how and how often, anything is really fine with  me, so long as it happens every now and then.  I just wanted to provide an alternative for discussion.   Regarding "Featured" vs. "Good" articles, I think the improvement drive is a good idea.  But I also think that just because a good article didn't make it to the home page shouldn't eliminate it from our pool of choices.  We'd be unnecessarily limiting ourselves.  Therefore I vote for including any Germany related articles that have been put on the list of good articles.  --[[Image:Smiley.png|20px]]Mmounties 18:16, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * The thing about that it is, anyone can put anything they want on the list of good articles. There are no criteria for inclusion on the list and no discussion about what belongs there. That's why I'd like to limit ourselves to Featured Articles and, to broaden our range a bit, almost-Featured articles (articles that lost at FA but still got a lot of support). Angr/ talk 19:34, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree that unfortunately, "Good article" doesn't mean very much. It would be great if we had a somewhat controlled quality level between normal and Featured, but this one isn't really it. Let's just write more Featured articles and use only those for the moment. Kusma (討論) 19:38, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I like the idea of including the almost FA's as suggested by Angr. As to the "good articles", if there is no real quality control on the "good articles" then yes, I agree, they shouldn't make the list. --Mmounties 22:06, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * The only failed FAC I could find in a quick browsing that I would qualify as an almost FA is Berlin Wall, which is a wonderful topic for the Portal page. And a perfect topic for improvement drive and main page featured article, too. Kusma (討論) 22:22, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Great. Sounds like a plan.  --Mmounties 22:54, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

I have just been bold again and made some decisions for March: Portal:Germany/Featured article/March 2006 (electoral princes) and Portal:Germany/Featured picture/March 2006 (Musiktheater im Revier). Feel free to change these to other articles, but please don't change the image sizes without further discussion -- the image sizes are hard to get right for all screen resolutions and all browsers. Kusma (討論) 03:23, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Nice picture for the selected article there (of course I like the selected picture too. [[Image:tongue.png]] The only concern I would have with the article is that it seems to have a lot of text for the space.  Have you tried to see what it would look like with so much text?  Looks like you included the entire introductory paragraph.  Perhaps we can just cut it off at some point and put a "more..." link at the end where we cut it off? --Mmounties 05:51, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

What you can do section
I suggest to change the language as follows:


 * Visit the German-speaking Wikipedians' notice board and help to write, expand and improve Germany-related articles
 * List newly created articles
 * Update News and Did You Know
 * Suggest Selected article and Selected picture on the Portal talk page
 * Help to expand the Germany stubs
 * Assist with our Wikiprojects and Wikibooks

This would remove the reference to anniveresaries as we don't have that section on the page and modify the language on the line about Featured Article. I wasn't clear whether we want to only talk about the Portal:Germany or also include the Main Page. If we want to include the Main Page then perhaps the 4th item should read: Nominate and collaborate on a future Featured article and Featured picture. --Mmounties 23:09, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I agree we can do without Anniversaries at the moment. Inviting people to this talk page is also a good idea. As long as we don't have an improvement drive running, I don't think we need to mention that in the "What you can do" section. What Wikiprojects and Wikibooks do we have? Kusma (討論) 23:20, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I just removed the "associated Wikimedia" because there is no article "Germany" on Wikibooks or Wikisource. The links were thus rather pointless, unless we invite people to create them. I know nothing about the Wikisource and Wikibooks culture, though, so I won't do anything about it. Kusma (討論) 23:22, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I don't know much about Wikibooks; Wikisource would only have a page called "Germany" if there were either a work (book, poem, essay, what have you) or an author named "Germany" included there. Angr/ talk 23:28, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Ok. I posted the revision as proposed above and also remove the Wikibooks from the last item for now.  --Mmounties 13:31, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Anniversaries
I put an auto-updating Anniversaries section on the page. (Well, it will be auto-updating once I have written the 366 pages necessary). Questions: I would also like to hear ideas what else could be / should not be on the Portal page. Kusma (討論) 04:15, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
 * Is this a stupid idea?
 * How large should the anniversary section be?
 * How long should the texts be?
 * Should this be on the left or on the right?
 * Should the texts be longer and include a picture?
 * I wouldn`t prefere this idea. Who whoud be? Only politicians or also other people?Alopex
 * Interesting people or events related to that day. Have you seen my selection on Portal:Germany/Anniversaries/February 21? It does not only include politicians. Tomorrow's selection (see Portal:Germany/Anniversaries/February 22) has scientists, resistance fighters, sportspeople and so on. I chose these from February 22 and de:22. Februar. Do you have a general problem with including events/births/deaths on that day? I thought it is a nice addition to the portal that makes it change every day, with very little effort. Kusma (討論) 16:33, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
 * My two cents:
 * I think it's a great(!) idea and would be a wonderful feature. The main issue I see is to ensure it is going to be updated.  Auto-updating would be wonderful (if that's possible), and we should perhaps designate at least two individuals to preselect anniversaries for say a week at a time and get them queued up so that it won't be necessary to update daily.  We need to set it up so the onus isn't just on one person and so that it will continue even if the main "caregiver" goes on a wiki-break.  To that end it would also be important that the individuals who take the lead communicate with each other so that it continues to be taken care of.
 * The size (vertically) that you had today looks fine to me.
 * Length of the text: the Main page uses up to two lines.  Two lines would allow a little background for each selected item but it would mean perhaps not as many items each day.  I think we should keep it to the roughly the window size it is now (vertically) so if we use more words to describe one anniversary we wouldn't put up 6 but perhaps 4 or 5.  Alternatively, or in addition, we could remove the section headers (Births, Deaths, that sort of thing) and gain that space.
 * If we put it on the right side, we don't really have room for a picture. If we put it on the left we could include a picture very nicely.  Perhaps we could move the Featured Picture to the right as it doesn't seem to need as much space horizontally as we gave it room for, and put the Anniversaries underneath the DYK (because the DYK is only 3 items long so both would show on the screen and guide readers to scroll down some).
 * What kinds of anniversaries? I'd vote for no sub headers and choosing from all sections, for instance, I'd put up that the Comedian Harmonists were banned in 1935, perhaps also the earthquake in the Upper Rhine River Plains in 2003.  But if we choose from more than just Births and Deaths we almost have to go to two lines of text for each item.

A long two cents, I know. I'll keep my eyes open for other features we might want to include in the future. Thanks, Kusma, for taking the initiative. Our Portal is growing into something really good. --Mmounties 20:41, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
 * The auto-updating every day is easy. The Portal page already does that, I put in the correct magic words :-) It will also update the Selected article and Selected picture automagically on March 1. Check at midnight server time and you'll see it change (possibly after purging the page cache) without further human intervention. Concerning the image question, I will make some test pages using different formatting tonight, and then we can agree on what looks best. Once we know the size and are sure whether or not to use images, I will set up an overview page so we can share the work of choosing anniversaries. Kusma (討論) 20:49, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
 * What can I say?! You're good!  Btw, I just rechecked on what location on the page would be better for the anniversaries -  above or below DYK if we put it on the left - it probably wouldn't matter either way.  Ideally, what I'd like is that the features left and right move down in a step sort of fashion, so to guide readers to the further down items.  And I just realized  that would happen almost automatically.  --Mmounties 21:29, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
 * So I have tried a couple of things. Look here: Portal:Germany/Test1, Portal:Germany/Test2, Portal:Germany/Test3 and Portal:Germany/Test4. All of them are quite bad at resolutions below 1024x768, but to make it all work in 800x600, the pictures need to be really tiny. I currently like number 3 best (especially if the "Selected article" is made a little bit shorter) but am sure there is room for further improvement. Kusma (討論) 02:53, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I like 3 and 4 with a preference to 3. 1 and 2 don't show side by side columns at 1024x768 and I think most users probably have that resolution.  The only thing I was thinking to perhaps change in 3 is to get the What you can do and the Categories sections adjacent to each other but even that is not really necessary.  And yes, I think we need to make the selected article language shorter, on a 1280x1024 resolution screen perhaps as many as 5 or 6 lines (talking about bold). Nice work all around!  --Mmounties 05:46, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
 * The problem with 1&2 is an image size problem that causes totally different results when viewed in IE or in Firefox. I have tweaked Portal:Germany/Test3 a bit and changed the selected article text. If you could check it again and think it looks good, I will implement that format for the main page. Kusma (討論) 06:43, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I like it! A very nice and balanced look now.  Let's go with it.  --Mmounties 15:05, 22 February 2006 (UTC)
 * I have implemented the new layout. The Selected pic is so small because it also works in 800x600 now. Kusma (討論) 17:39, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Linking to the Portal
We should make sure there are links to the Portal page from as many categories and articles as makes sense. Should we use an image for the Portal link?

The standard produces:

A choice with the German coat of arms would be, which produces

Any thoughts or ideas for a better picture? Kusma (討論) 20:14, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I think we should stick to the standard image, so that it's consistent with the other portal links. Angr/ talk 12:42, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Selected article and picture for April
We'll need new selected articles soon. Here are my suggestions (taken from our repository at Portal:Germany/Selected articles and pictures): Are there other (better) suggestions? I admit I didn't follow my plan of having a modern article and an old picture or vice versa. We need more modern Featured articles for that, or need to lower our quality requirements (if we do that, we could also move to a faster update schedule, but then I'll really have to rename all the pages that still say "Featured article"). Kusma (討論) 11:47, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Image:Lichtenstein Castle: Image:Castle Lichtenstein at Lichtenstein-Honau, Baden-Württemberg.jpg (featured on en and commons)
 * Article: Cathedral of Magdeburg (featured article), using featured picture Image:Cathedral of Magdeburg Inside.jpg for illustration


 * Maybe you're being too strict in what you consider "modern": I'd call anything from the 20th century on modern for our purposes, so I'd say Albert Einstein, Anne Frank, Anschluss, Battle of the Bulge, Blitzkrieg, Enigma machine, Frankfurt School, Karl Dönitz, Paragraph 175, Sino-German cooperation (1911-1941), Swastika, Triumph of the Will, Volkswagen Type 2, Western Front (World War I), and Zeppelin are all modern by my estimation. The danger, looking over this list, is that people will start to think this is Portal:Nazi Germany rather than Portal:Germany. Angr/ talk 12:00, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
 * That is indeed why I don't want to use more than one or two of these articles per year, especially if they are on the Portal page for a full month. On the quality requirements: I just noticed that WP:GA has changed the process to be used to choose "good articles", and these might actually be usable for us here, giving us a larger choice. Kusma (討論) 12:17, 21 March 2006 (UTC)


 * That would be great! But for April, why don't we go with a modern non-Nazi article like Volkswagen Type 2 with, say, Image:Vw bus t1 v sst.jpg. Angr/ talk 12:39, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
 * That is a good suggestion (better than architecture and architecture as my first idea was), I actually like this better than my suggestion above. If we alternate "modern"/"old", we'll also have time until late May to find another nice "modern" article. Kusma (討論) 12:51, 21 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I have created the pages Portal:Germany/Selected article/2006/April for the VW type 2 and Portal:Germany/Selected picture/2006/April for Lichtenstein, since there seems to be no opposition to these choices. Kusma (討論) 14:48, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

major power
For me its a little bit un specific and sounds like selbst beweihräucherung wich is not OK for a country which did not do this we ar big and powerfull thing since 1945. Power as:
 * military one is neglectable because the use is very strongly limited by the government and the pressure the people make up if there is any casualties.
 * politicaly the government is weak because of the involvment in the EU, the electorals system, the Bundestag and Bundesrat competition, and several other things.
 * in the world, because germany has now a tradition of 60 years of not getting to involved in major crisis around the world.

So the power is limited more than that of others!--Stone 07:36, 23 March 2006 (UTC)


 * How about "major economic power"? I think that's true and not too aggressive sounding. Angr (talk • contribs) 08:16, 23 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Sounds fine. It was only a suggestion. The germans themselve have always the bigger problem with stating being powerful. Flags, hymn, parade, national day or even to be proud to be german. --Stone 09:15, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I know what you mean. My impression is that the only German things Germans allow themselves to feel proud of is their bread and their beer. Angr (talk • contribs) 14:55, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Overview of Germany project pages
Would this fit anywhere on the portal page? Overview of Germany project pages Saint|swithin 08:37, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
 * I moved it to Wikipedia namespace, since it's not appropriate for article namespace. Angr (talk • contribs) 08:53, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
 * oh, thanks, forgot that bit :-) Saint|swithin 14:50, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Excellent page, thanks! I have linked to it from the "Things you can do" section. Kusma (討論) 15:18, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
 * Pulled it all together in one place. Very nice indeed.  --Mmounties ( Talk )  [[Image:pawprint.png|20px]] 16:16, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

Selected article and picture for May
How about instead of doing the old/new thing this month, we pair up the newly featured article Sanssouci with the featured picture Image:PotsdamSanssouciChineseHouse.jpg? Angr (talk • contribs) 21:50, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
 * For the selected article, I totally agree. I don't really want to insist on this new/old thing, it will probably prove to be impossible to implement soon, given our selection of pictures. I would prefer some more variety (just on principle), but I don't really have a better suggestion yet. For the Sanssouci article box itself, I would suggest Image:Bronzelettern Sanssouci.jpg if we go with twice Sanssouci. Kusma (討論) 23:36, 19 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I like your idea, Angr. I didn't realize we have a featured picture to go along with that article.  I also like the Bronzelettern Sanssouci.jpg image but went to the Commons real quick to see what alternatives are available (just to be on the safe side) and found Image:Mittelbau Sanssouci.jpg.  Same idea, just a little more building context.  Either would be very nice.  --Mmounties ( Talk )  [[Image:pawprint.png|20px]] 17:50, 25 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I like Image:Mittelbau Sanssouci.jpg much better; let's use it! Angr (talk • contribs) 18:26, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
 * I have created Portal:Germany/Selected article/2006/May and Portal:Germany/Selected picture/2006/May following this suggestion. Please check if they look fine for the Portal page -- I am unfortunately quite busy and on wikibreak for another week. Please do not change the image sizes when you edit the pages -- wider images break the formatting in 800x600. Kusma (討論) 09:27, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Selected article and picture for June
I think we should use a biography article this time, we haven't used any of these. How about Albert Einstein, using Image:Albert Einstein (Nobel).png? As for the picture, I suggest we don't use any of the castles and churches, we have had enough of "old" architecture in May, but use Image:SonyCenterAtNight.jpg. Any comments? Kusma (討論) 17:51, 20 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I like both a lot. Fully agree with the modern picture, too.  --Mmounties ( Talk )  [[Image:pawprint.png|20px]] 06:44, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
 * Dafür! ;-) Angr (t • c) 07:54, 26 May 2006 (UTC)
 * They are at the usual places Portal:Germany/Selected picture/2006/June and Portal:Germany/Selected article/2006/June now. Kusma (討論) 03:10, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Did you know?
Is the "Did you know?" section for this portal generated internally, or does it simply pull Germany-related "Did you know?" entries from the main page? — BrianSmithson 12:45, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
 * It's "generated internally", i.e. we make it ourselves. Angr (talk) 14:01, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Okay; I was going to point a mainpage DYK that had been missed, but guess that's not the case. Thanks. — BrianSmithson 14:26, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
 * If it is good, you can just be bold and add it here. The DYKs here are done in a very informal way. Kusma (討論) 14:39, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

New format for new articles section?
I think we should lose the dates and names on the section of the Portal itself; details like these and the bragging should be done at Portal:Germany/New article announcements. What my suggestion looks like can be seen (with tomorrow's Anniversaries) at the usual test page: Portal:Germany/Test3. If nobody disagrees violently, I'd like to adopt this for the main portal page. Kusma (討論) 19:25, 10 June 2006 (UTC)
 * I have implemented my suggestion. Kusma (討論) 17:52, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

Selected picture and article for July
July is approaching rapidly. How about Featured article Cathedral of Magdeburg, using Image:Cathedral of Magdeburg Inside.jpg and Featured picture on dewiki Image:Leuchtturm Arngast.jpg? As we just had a biography, I'd like to wait for at least another month before even suggesting recently featured Georg Forster. Kusma (討論) 01:16, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Looks good to me! User:Angr 05:46, 24 June 2006 (UTC)
 * As usual, please check the pages at Portal:Germany/Selected picture/2006/July and Portal:Germany/Selected article/2006/July. Ideally, somebody should translate de:Arngast to an Arngast article to go with the picture, and link to it from there. I will be mostly on Wikibreak until mid-July, so I won't be able to do it. Kusma (討論) 19:56, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Article and picture for August
How about Georg Forster, using Image:Georg Forster.jpg as selected article and the castle of Wernigerode as selected picture (Image:WernigerodeCastleWinter.jpg)? Georg Forster is a Featured article and Wernigerode Castle is a Featured picture on Commons. Kusma (討論) 09:09, 24 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Done, but perhaps still a bit too long at Portal:Germany/Selected article/2006/August. Kusma (討論) 15:21, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

September article and picture
This time I can't really make up my mind. Zeppelin and Paragraph 175 would be possible candidates... (non-bio, newer than 18th century are my constraints for this month) ... anybody else want to decide or suggest something else? For the image, I like Image:MarxEngels 4a.jpg (Featured on de:) but as usual am open for any good suggestion. Kusma (討論) 11:11, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Why don't we use Zeppelin for September and save Paragraph 175 for October, to recognized National Coming Out Day? User:Angr 11:39, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
 * The perfect day would be 17 May of course, but October is fine. Any takers for a short summary of Zeppelin at Portal:Germany/Selected article/2006/September? Kusma (討論) 11:59, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
 * I have summarised it (not very well). The pic is also ready. Kusma (討論) 11:25, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
 * A translation of de:Marx-Engels-Forum would be nice, BTW, if anybody feels like doing that. Kusma (討論) 11:40, 28 August 2006 (UTC)