Talk:A/Archive 1

References... 0
Basically it. This is yet ANOTHER one of wikipedia's no reference articles. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.247.241.241 (talk) 04:49, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Fuckin' A?
What about the phrase "Fucking A" ? AnarchyElmo 06:31, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

I second This- Me — Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.245.109.87 (talk) 09:35, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Breathing
I'm sorry, but could someone explain what a 'breathing' is in the Phoenician alphabet? Seems a little confusing. Is it just a breath space? Intake? outtake? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Atorpen (talk • contribs) 00:08, 4 December 2002 (UTC)

Yes, I could only assume so and a friend studied this language(to what extent, I do not  know), and he says it signifies a small breath space.Sakurato (talk) 01:44, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Commercial at's
What are all the @ symbols doing in the middle of the article. They look to me like placeholders for what ought to be inline images. -- SGBailey 2004-02-24 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.24.129.50 (talk) 10:52, 24 February 2004 (UTC)


 * The article seems to be adapted from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica. The @'s are also present in Project Gutenbergs version. To fix it, we will need someone with the paper version of EB or knowledge of the subject. I have listed the article in Cleanup. Hopefully someone will notice it. Rasmus (talk) 11:16, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Top grade
I cut the limitation that A is the top grade in English-speaking school systems; it's much more widespread than that. Markalexander100 02:03, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Yeah, I wasn't sure, but changed it to that cause it certainly is used outside US!

Zoney 13:15, 13 Mar 2004 (UTC)
 * "A" is also the top grade in the Philippines, and that's not an English-speaking country. Useight 15:39, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Eagle
According to Microsoft Encarta, an early ancestor of the letter "A" is an Egyptian hieroglyph for "Eagle". —Preceding unsigned comment added by Mpninegazillion (talk • contribs) 05:45, 30 September 2004 (UTC)

Writing
What about writing, I only see printing characters here. --ShaunMacPherson 10:09, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Lax open front unrounded vowel
I Googled this and found only 'open front unrounded vowel' as we don't have a finished entry for it. Seems like that should be the link (which we do already have an entry for). Anybody disagree? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lyle (talk • contribs) 13:53, 31 October 2004 (UTC)

Suggest 2 possible wiki links for A.
An automated Wikipedia link suggester has some possible wiki link suggestions for the A article:

Notes: The article text has not been changed in any way; Some of these suggestions may be wrong, some may be right. Feedback: I like it, I hate it, Please don't link to &mdash; LinkBot 11:15, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)
 * Can link aspect ratio: ...international paper sizes]], A is a series of sizes with an aspect ratio of roughly 70% width to height, with A4 being an example po...
 * Can link British rock: ... (band)|Jethro Tull]]; see A (album). ** A is a British rock band; see A (band)....

Alfa
Thank you, Georgia guy, for making me feel free to discuss this. But for your permission.... You, likewise, should feel free to read the page NATO phonetic alphabet, where three of the four authorities listed spell it ‘alfa’, including the ICAO, which is the authority described as sponsoring the NATO phonetic alphabet in the opening paragraph. I see no reason to further clarify things in this article, since they are fully discussed in the other one. If you do, please leave ‘alfa’ as the principal spelling.&mdash; Ford 06:51, 2005 Feb 11 (UTC)
 * It's my understanding, as a former US Army member (though which I would use the NATO phonetic alphabet) that using "Alfa" instead of "Alpha" is because not all languages recognize the digraph "ph" as having the "f" sound. The pronunciation of "niner" for "9" comes from the German word "nein" ("no") and why US radio procedure calls for using "negative" (and conversely, "affirmative") instead. See NATO_phonetic_alphabet Fwgoebel 02:25, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

Next Page in Wikipedia?
I started here on "A" hoping there was a next page button so I could (eventually) read through the entire Wikipedia. Any way of getting that functionality? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Swirsky (talk • contribs) 14:59, 21 March 2005 (UTC)
 * It would have to be added to the mediawiki software. It's open source, so if you can program, you could create the feature, send it to the developers, and hope it makes its way into the official version.  16:14, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)
 * To put it another way, there are currently about 500,000 articles on the English Wikipedia. If you read through them for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, spending say 10 minutes on each, it would take you about 40 years to read through the encyclopedia, during which time the number of articles would probably have increased many times over, and many of the articles you read at the beginning would have changed since you last read them. So I would suggest that reading through the encyclopedia from A to Z is not realistic (and by the way the alphabetical sequence doesn't start at A, as there are many articles with numeric headings, typically about particular years).


 * I suggest that you follow your particular interests by searching for article names, and following links and categories, or if you just want to explore it serendipitously, hit "Random page". rossb 17:05, 21 Mar 2005 (UTC)


 * There's already an index of all pages, and pages starting at A (already some way into the index). 81.178.31.210 13:33, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Alpha-number articles
This was brought to my attention when I studied RC and saw Gdr edit several Alpha-number articles. Anyone interested in making a template for them?? (To clarify what this means, an Alpha-number article is a Wikipedia dis-ambiguation page that is a combination of the letter A and a numeral.) Georgia guy 18:22, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Blackadder
I have moved the following from the article:
 * "it doesn't really mean anything at all!"&mdash;[[Prince George (Blackadder character)|Prince George]

because I feel that it needs more context. Specifically, we should state the episode from which it comes, the character to whom it was addressed, and the circumstances.&mdash;Theo (Talk) 21:05, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Adding link to 1911 Encyclopedia project
I've added a small box that adds a hyperlink to original text from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britanica Wikiproject at Wikisource. I'm sorry if I've messed up your page here, and feel free to move that box, although I would appreciate a link somewhere to our project on this page. Any help is appreciated. --Robert Horning 17:29, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

Sign Language
I was wondering about putting sign language pictures on the individual letters. Here is a link for ya. Commons:Category:LSF_fingerspelling What do you guys think? Could I get some help? :) --Mattwj2002 05:47, 29 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Sign language seems like a cool idea, but I think there are many variations. I'm used to American Sign Language, which looks reasonably different from the LSF pictures you linked to.  I'm not sure how to deal with this without having a few pictures (though perhaps side-by-side it wouldn't be so bad...).  --Erik Demaine 23:07, 12 October 2005 (UTC)


 * I also think it would be a great Idea but Im used to a different version of sign language again; BSL or British sign language, which makes the most of using two hands! but they should be there all the same or at least a link to a websites for each type!Emallee 21:03, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Braille images
As an experiment, I tried replacing the ASCII art (&lt;PRE&gt;) Braille pattern with the image used on Braille. What do you think? If you like the idea, let's propagate it to B, C, etc. --Erik Demaine 00:54, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

School Matters
I also heard, though, that in Britian, "a" means "Acceptable", which would be a "c" or "b" here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.0.202.213 (talk) 03:41, 3 December 2005 (UTC)


 * although most primary or seccondary schools have there own systems for grading, when it comes to external exams A is the highest grade (or a* at GCSE levels) followed by B,C,D,E,F,G and finaly U-unclassified. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Emallee (talk • contribs) 21:08, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Problem with Illustrations
Though not incorrect, the illustrations at the top of the article (ox-head to A) take such specific examples and suggest such a broad, easy evolution that they misrepresent the complexity of the history of letters and letterforms. Archaeology, epigraphy, paleography and typography are dense with variants of these forms and to suggest such a simple evolution (or an evolution at all) from pictograph to modern letter strains scholarly credibility. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.158.211.28 (talk) 19:45, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Kwamikagami's changes
First, the plural version of a can be as, so I undid the deletion of that. Second, in the first sentence of Alternative spellings, Kwanikagami made the word alpha bold, which is stylistically incorrect (italics are generally preferred for words and characters referred to as words and characters, unless they're new). Finally, his rewording of that sentence was more confusing than previously, so I undid that. I kept his remaining changes, though.

Primetime 09:36, 7 January 2006 (UTC)


 * Plural as yes, but never ās, which is what I deleted. kwami 10:21, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Cite source for possible Egyptian origin?
This is the first time I've heard it have any connection to Egyptian hieroglyphs. I've always understood it to be semitic in origin. -Casius 14:49, 9 May 2006 (UTC)


 * the proto-semitic alphabet is usually understood to have derived from a simplification of Egyptian hieroglyphs. --Krsont 19:37, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

No sure for the shape
In history section, what is the shape described in phrase or by the angle at which the cross line is set.? What is a cross line? &mdash; HenryLi (Talk) 01:08, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Pictures of various A's
The third A in the set of different styles of A (the grey medieval-style one) doesn't have a caption. What font is that in, because it should be entered as a caption. - Im.a.lumberjack 21:12, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Hello world!
It's a great day for correcting spelling and fixing grammar errors on wikipedia!!!

a —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.185.201.19 (talk) 16:23, 1 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Agreed. Actually, it's a great day for fixing grammAr errors. ;-)  Zouavman   Le   Zouave   17:16, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Differences in a
Could we add something on how a written a and a typed a are different? Mouse is back 00:30, 20 December 2007 (UTC)