Talk:Temple Sinai (Oakland, California)

Wikilinks from Notes to References
I put in links from the Notes section to the References section, as described at Citing sources/Further considerations. I found this rather confusing the first time I did it (at Che Guevara) because there are two jumps, from the text to Notes and from Notes to References, but it's not really that confusing when you get used to it. Basically, by putting " some text " in the References section, you create an anchor that you can link to. Then, anywhere else in the article you can put " some more text " and it will jump to where the anchor is. The only reason it's confusing is that this link is then placed within the ref tags, so the link itself gets magically moved down into the Notes section along with everything else within the ref tags. The name of the id doesn't have to begin with "ref", but that's the convention suggested on the "Further considerations" page: " ... " in the References section and " " to link to it: first "ref", then name of author, then year. It's easier to edit the references if they follow a convention like that so you can usually just guess what the id is. ☺ Coppertwig (talk) 18:01, 20 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for doing that. Jayjg (talk) 03:13, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

formally First Hebrew Congregation of Oakland
The word formally is confusing and needs clarification. Does it mean officially (if so, say so) or was the intent to say formerly, in which case, originally would be clearer. clariosophic (talk) 11:02, 6 August 2008 (UTC)
 * Good point. The official name of the congregation is First Hebrew Congregation of Oakland, and the current synagogue building is called Temple Sinai, but the unofficial name of the congregation is also Temple Sinai. This is actually quite common, where a congregation's official name might be "Beth Israel congregation", and its synagogue called "Temple Beth Israel", but the two end up being used interchangeably. First Hebrew/Temple Sinai is unusual in that the two names are so completely different, and that almost no-one uses the official name. Anyway, I've added a source and clarified that now. Jayjg (talk) 02:07, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Michigan or Mississippi
In Note 65, clicking the Mississippi link sends you to the bottom of the page and gets lost. This is probably caused by confusion between Temple Beth Israel (Jackson, Michigan) and Beth Israel Congregation (Jackson, Mississippi). Art LaPella (talk) 23:30, 7 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually, the problem was that the span was missing the class="citation" qualifier, but I've fixed it now, and also fixed the erroneous mention of Mississippi. Thanks. Jayjg (talk) 01:01, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Congregation
The first sentence does not make it clear for an outsider what the Temple Sinai is. It rests heavily on the word congregation. This word is not linked. If it was, the link would be poor help. It is a disambiguation page. The best alternative is qahal, but that article describes an ancent organisational form. --Ettrig (talk) 06:57, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It's a good point, but I've gotten conflicting advice on that subject over the years, depending on the article, and on the GA or FA reviewer. Jayjg (talk) 01:02, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Country
I added 'United States' to the location - as I said in my edit summary I found it incredible that the country was not mentioned in a featured article, apart from in the infobox. User:SlimVirgin reverted me, saying 'I think people know where California is' in his/her edit summary. This is symptomatic of a HUGE problem in Wikipedia. We are writing an encyclopaedia for an international audience, not just a US one, and we should not assume that everyone will know where California is, or make them click on a link to find out.

Here's a test: click on 'Random article' and see how many of the articles about non-US countries mention the country, and how many US ones do. I have done this test repeatedly - it averages out at about 81% non-US articles mentioning their country, and 19% of US ones. This reflects the parochialism and US-centrism of US editors - they don't think they need to add the country because they believe that is is self-evident, even when they are dealing with Knobfart, Wyoming (pop 23). I can't think of a reputable paper encyclopaedia that would omit as basic a piece of information as the country in which the subject of the article is located. 86.147.162.198 (talk) 10:46, 8 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Good call. Was going to do the same when I saw it on the main page. Yes, it's definitely a problem. There should be a wikilink on the country name also. Night w (talk) 15:51, 8 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I haven't much say in this, perhaps except that using name of the country is directly opposed to proper naming convention of United States locales. There are perhaps other meanings of California in the world, but globally for most people California simply means California, without any need to disambiguate or specificate. --ja_62 (t 16:06, 8 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure the United States is required, since California is an extremely well-known state, both inside and outside the United States. And, as ja 62 points out above, it also contradicts our naming conventions. In any event, it certainly doesn't need to be linked: see OVERLINK. Jayjg (talk) 01:10, 9 April 2010 (UTC)


 * What?? As the anon editor has pointed out, it's the most basic piece of information for the reader. Simply omitting the name of the country on the grounds that "most people will know" is not only extremely presumptuous, it's just bad editing for an international audience. What about the reader that doesn't know? Or are you saying that everybody knows? What an assumption. And those conventions you've cited are for page titles, or in instances where the country has already been specified. Or is it also correct to omit "Argentina" from the San Isidro Cathedral page, according to the same conventions? Night w (talk) 18:46, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

Move to Temple Sinai, Oakland, California
The article was recently moved to Temple Sinai, Oakland, California. I've restored it to Temple Sinai (Oakland, California), as the latter is the standard for disambiguation, particularly of synagogues. 18:18, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

External links modified
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I have just modified 9 external links on Temple Sinai (Oakland, California). Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110727135912/http://www.oaklandsinai.org/who_we_are/history.php?page=16306 to http://www.oaklandsinai.org/who_we_are/history.php?page=16306
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20100128013038/http://www.oaklandsinai.org/who_we_are/staff.php?pid=408 to http://www.oaklandsinai.org/who_we_are/staff.php?pid=408
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110727140056/http://www.oaklandsinai.org/who_we_are/extra2.php?page=14927 to http://www.oaklandsinai.org/who_we_are/extra2.php?page=14927
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110727140140/http://www.oaklandsinai.org/uploads/14894Temple_Sinai_Bylaws_as_of_October_2006.pdf to http://www.oaklandsinai.org/uploads/14894Temple_Sinai_Bylaws_as_of_October_2006.pdf
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110727140301/http://www.oaklandsinai.org/uploads/18834Letter_from_Rabbinic_Search_Co-chairs.pdf to http://www.oaklandsinai.org/uploads/18834Letter_from_Rabbinic_Search_Co-chairs.pdf
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110727140332/http://www.oaklandsinai.org/uploads/18834Letter_from_Rabbi_Chester.pdf to http://www.oaklandsinai.org/uploads/18834Letter_from_Rabbi_Chester.pdf
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.jfcs-eastbay.org/aboutus/board.php
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110927150914/http://www.oaklandnet.com/government/ceda/revised/planningzoning/Commission/081108_lpab_item_3_attach_3.pdf to http://www.oaklandnet.com/government/ceda/revised/planningzoning/Commission/081108_lpab_item_3_attach_3.pdf
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20110724120140/http://stockton.urj.net/index.htm?history.htm to http://stockton.urj.net/index.htm?history.htm

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External links modified
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