User talk:Killing sparrows/3R1C

Hi 3R1C,

Here is our talk page. I've transferred our previous stuff here.-- killing sparrows  (chirp!) 05:46, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

adoption offer
Hi there 3R1C, I see you are on the list of users seeking adoption but I also see you have been around WP for quite some time. Are you still interested in adoption? If ou are not you could remove the 'adoption box' from your user page. If you are interested, drop me a note on my talk page. Thanks!-- killing sparrows  (chirp!) 05:20, 27 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Alrighty then, I've changed the box on your user page

I think it works best to have a dedicated page for adopter/adoptee conversations and have created one here, you should put that page on your watch list. I have some other adoptees using the page also. If our conversations get long I'll move them to a seperate page for ease of use.

I am on WP off and on throughout the day and usually late into the night (I'm currently in GMT-8) so I should be able to respond pretty quickly when you have a question. I will do a review of your edits to see what's what and probably look over your user page, talk page and contributions now and then just to see how you are doing but otherwise I'll wait for you to ask questions. Fire away!-- killing sparrows  (chirp!) 16:44, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Hi there 3R1C,

The first thing I do with a new adoptee is look closely at their edit count and history and I want to say that you are obviously a valuable member of the WP community. Thanks!

I read through your participation in the various conflicts on the FDA page and was very impressed with your even-handed attempts to mediate and come up with wording that would be acceptable to both parties in the dispute. I didn't read everything but it was obvious that you were acting in an exemplary manner in the face of some really outlandish claims by one of the parties. For that alone you get an A in my book. This stands out even more in that the article appears to be outside of your areas of main interest. Thank you very much.

If I have any criticism of your general pattern of edits it would be that you don't add an edit summary often enough. I'd guess around 30-40% of your edits lack a summary. Edit summaries are important, even when making a minor change as they help other users track large vs small changes and are valuable for spotting and reverting vandalism. You can see more about why it is important here. Even a small note like, fixed typo or reverted vandalism is good.

Another reason they are important is that if you would like to be an administrator on WP (and you should, you have just the type of fair-mindedness an admin needs), a history of poor edit summary use will be held against you in the nomination process. In view of your overall history here this is a minor matter but one which will help you out if you correct it.

You mentioned wanting to learn more about WP policies. I think one of the best ways to learn about policy as it relates to mainspace articles is to hang out at AfD and read the discussions and articles nominated and follow the WP:THIS and WP:THAT arguments that are thrown around there. Most of the pages referred to are actually prettty short and clearly written, although interpretations vary, and you will quickly come to understand the various criteria and arguments used. This is another place that your mediation skills would be valuable, and will also be a big plus if you decide to apply for adminship.

I would especially have you look at the debates going on about school related articles. There is a huge amount of time and energy being wasted over this issue and though I feel very few schools are truly notable (we're talking about primary and Jr High schools here!), I think a decision to just say that all schools are inherently notable is in the best interest of WP if only because it would let us all move on to other things.

Truthfully, I don't know how much help I can be for you. You've been around quite awhile and seem to have the basics down pretty well, in addition to your obvious maturity and civility. I would actually like to extend an offer to you to join the Adopt-a-User program as an adopter. You more than meet the criteria with your edit count, your length of time here (longer than me!) and especially your attitude.

That said, I am more than willing to answer any questions or even be your 'adopter' if you feel you need some help. Let me know what you think!

Cheers!-- killing sparrows  (chirp!) 02:37, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

Adoptee Question
Not sure if you wanted this to go on your Adoptee subpage, so I figure you can move it at your discretion. I have an implementation question for you. I am working on List of Half-Life 2 Mods and I was trying to figure out it there is anyway to have inline-references style links appear in the External Links section (as opposed to the References section). My plan is to find a way to have clean, inline links to the developer and project pages appear dynamically in the External Links section. The normal [link] brackets are so ugly :[ // 3R1C 16:07, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Note, I have this paged watched, so for the sake of continuity, you can reply here // 3R1C 16:09, 30 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Sorry to not have replied sooner, I have been busy in real life and there has been somewhat of a mini-crisis in Adopt-a-User. I will look into this and get back to you in detail later today. Again, apologies.-- killing sparrows  (chirp!) 19:11, 30 April 2007 (UTC)


 * No need to apologize :] It's hardly time-critical, it's just something I'd like to have done for this article sometime :D // 3R1C 23:19, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict, I was just answering as you left the above message:).
 * Hi there,
 * I have to admit that this question is probably over my head but I will offer some thoughts. I would check The Manual of Style, and especially the external links section to make sure you are following the policies and guidelines with the changes you want to make. I notice from looking at the page you are working on that there are several mods already linked to the valve software site. I think this is OK as the site doesn't have ads, but you should check. I also see that the years of all the awards are linked, this is probably unecessary as are the 'accessed on' dates in the refs section, and every instance of 'Mod DB' in the awards section. I might be wrong about the date thing, I know that dates are usually linked in articles so that they show up correctly based on user preferences in some browsers, but I don't think in the refs they are needed. If the policy/guideline pages above don't answer your question you could try leaving a message on those page's discussion pages (they are pretty active so you should get an answer quickly,) or also try at the help desk. If you still have questions let me know and I will ask an admin I know if they have a person in mind who could help you with this question. Hope this helps!-- killing sparrows  (chirp!) 23:38, 30 April 2007 (UTC)
 * I guess that kind of makes sense, but from my discussions with other users on the topic, the access date attribute is probably necessary (given the fact that website could change at any time). Additionally, articles and statements about other items winning awards (including other video games, movies, and novels) usually are followed by the year of their awarding.  // 3R1C 11:24, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I wasn't clear about my meaning. I was referring to the wikilinks of each year in the awards and the wikilinks of the 'dates accessed', and also to wikilinking each mention of 'ModDB'. Looking at the page it seems redundant to wikilink 'Mod DB' on every line and the same with the years of the awards. The year wikilinks especially, do not lead to any relavent information in the award lists and if 'Mod DB' is linked to each award on nearly every line that too, seems excessive. See the Manual of Style for Links which spells out the problems of over- and under-linking within the wiki and the Date conventions on linking stand-alone year dates. I hope this is clearer.

I looked at some of the various articles for the mods on your list and if you are feeling especially energetic you might also want to add an 'awards' section to the articles of games that have won the various awards. I only checked a few, perhaps some of them already have such a section. -- killing sparrows  (chirp!) 13:57, 2 May 2007 (UTC)