User talk:Kwamikagami/Archive 10

to do list
original version


 * Canis Major
 * Capricornus
 * Cassiopeia
 * Centaurus
 * Cepheus
 * Cetus
 * Corvus
 * Cygnus


 * Draco
 * Eridanus
 * Gemini
 * Hercules
 * Hydra
 * Leo
 * Libra


 * Ophiuchus
 * Orion
 * Pegasus
 * Perseus
 * Sagittarius
 * Scorpius
 * Taurus
 * Ursa Major

obscure etymologies: Nusakan, Mesarthim, Phact, Alifa al Farkadain, Subra, Zeta Puppis (suhail ħađ̧ar or xađ̧ar), Kakkab, Alya (yet to look up), Spica (alt names), Skat/Pi Aquarii, Albulaan (spelling), Theta Columbae (etym.), Phact (yet to look up),

Na'vi
Kwami, just curious, but what did you mean with this edit that the Wiktionary Na'vi appendix was "dated"? — Huntster (t @ c) 09:53, 31 March 2010 (UTC)


 * It's no longer being maintained, and is significantly behind the dictionary at Wikibooks. kwami (talk) 14:53, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

IPA on Victoria, British Columbia
Hi Kwami, would you please have a look at this Talk:Victoria,_British_Columbia?Skookum1 (talk) 14:47, 31 March 2010 (UTC)

[lisˈɡoʁ] vs. [səɡoʁ]
Your edit to Holam is probably OK, but something weird happens: In the actual article view the third character from the end in [lisˈɡoʁ] and in [səɡoʁ] appears differently, even though it's supposed to be the same character ɡ.

In the editing field they appear correctly.

I have a suspicion that it may have something to do with the stress sign ˈ, but you seem to be the IPA wizard, so you probably know better. Thanks in advance for solving this mystery.

If it helps, i use Firefox 3.6 on Windows XP. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 18:06, 1 April 2010 (UTC)


 * You're probably using one of Microsoft's defective fonts. They're really bad with formatting IPA, and yes, it's a problem with the stess. You might want to download Charis (more complete) or Gentium (prettier) from SIL. AFAIK, they're the best free IPA fonts available. kwami (talk) 18:11, 1 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I have Charis, Doulos, Gentium and other IPA-friendly fonts installed - how else would i be able to type Linguistics papers? :)
 * But i still have this problem with ɡ...
 * I tried looking at the page using Mozilla DOM Inspector and i get "font-family: inherited" for class IPA. Isn't it supposed to be "Charis SIL", "Doulos SIL", Gentium, GentiumAlt etc.? --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 20:55, 1 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Try putting

.IPA { font-family: Gentium, Charis SIL !important; }
 * on your (username)/monobook.css or monobook.js (I forget which). kwami (talk) 21:02, 1 April 2010 (UTC)


 * It helped! Thanks.
 * See my comment at Wikipedia talk:IPA. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 21:57, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Stress symbols in IPA
I see you massively replacing IPA stress symbols. An example that has me worried is this one. The use of a doubled stress symbol is not standard IPA. Why are you using it? Where was this discussed in WP:MOS? I don't see it in the key to IPA. &minus;Woodstone (talk) 13:15, 2 April 2010 (UTC)


 * It's prosodic stress. Dinner and tomorrow have normal (primary) stress, but in the right context may receive additional prosodic stress. Doubling a symbol for extra pronunciation is standard IPA usage (including, which has been on our IPA pdf chart since 2005), but now that I look for it, I can't find a good description on WP. I suppose we could change it to 2ary vs. 1ary, though that would imply that all words have only 2ary stress inherently, and that 1ary stress is prosodic rather than lexical. Not wrong, but not AFAIK the way it's normally portrayed, since a language's default phonemic stress is normally transcribed as 1ary.


 * Anything else that worries you? That article was unusual; mostly I'm just replacing apostrophes w stress marks, or deleting stress marks from unstressed syllables per the MOS. kwami (talk) 13:32, 2 April 2010 (UTC)


 * No it's just the double mark that I saw on one of my watched pages, and I had no idea on how many articles you applied it. If doubling even the stress symbol is standard use, we should describe that in the help:IPA for English page.
 * Another (vaguely related) point is the stress symbol in (isolated) single syllabe words. To me that is nonsense, but I see it quite often in WP. Any thoughts? &minus;Woodstone (talk) 15:54, 2 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It's phonemic. Some monosyllabic words are stressed, and some aren't. Many prepositions, for example, are not stressed except prosodically, whereas most nouns and verbs are lexically stressed (except be etc.). Some differ in pronunciation depending on whether they're stressed, such as the but . Personal names are stressed, as is clear when you string them together: Jack in Jack McGee is stressed like Gee, not like Mc, and so in a phonemic transcription should take the same stress mark as Gee.


 * Anyway, if you want to change Eng. Phon. to 1ary vs. 2ary, go ahead. Just do it for all the eg's & not just the ones I changed to match. That's what prosodic unit does, which is other the article I remembered having dbl stress marks. kwami (talk) 16:18, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Thou
Hello. The Featured Article Thou is currently up for review, and needs some active editors to help restore it to a high-quality. I noticed from the history that you were active there previously, and so thought I'd let you know. Thanks. -- Quiddity (talk) 22:15, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

WP:CIVIL
Kwami, I take a pride both in my  contributions and in  my  collaboration  with  others in the Wikipedia. However, I'm getting tired of your constant lies and  insults in RfCs and article talk space, and you  and I  need to get something  sorted out  very  soon, otherwise rather than raise a RfC on the issues at  which  we appear to  be at  loggerheads, I  may feel that  my  only  recourse will  be  to  escalate to  an area where your constant  personal attacks and abuse may  require some explanation, and where your knowledge of linguistics will  not  help  you.--Kudpung (talk) 01:54, 4 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Answered this typical nonsense on your page. kwami (talk) 05:09, 4 April 2010 (UTC)


 * - as usual with further insults and WP:CIVIL. I've asked you politely to keep  off my  talk  page, please respect  my  wishes, and perhaps try  to adopt  a more friendly  attitude to  your fellow collaborators. --Kudpung (talk) 10:04, 4 April 2010 (UTC)


 * And you've promised to stay off mine. Yet here you are. Again. If you want civil debate, all you need to do is engage in honest debate. It took me a month to figure out what your actual point was, despite reams of verbiage. That's quite frustrating, and frustration is not a good climate for civility. kwami (talk) 13:40, 4 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't see where I ever promised to keep off your page.  I  had however hoped that we would not  need to  meet in  a discussion ever again. Nevertheless, others reader/users continue to post  fresh enquiries about  your IPA policy, and in particular on articles and in  Wikipedia projects in  which I  have a special interest. At least  I  don't  post insults in  every  message to  you and I'm trying  to  resolve this in as friendly a manner as possible, but  I do feel you are the one who is not  prepared to  drop the aggression. My  points were always clear, at least  to many  watchers, sometimes even made in the form of bulleted lists for extra clarity. It's not  my  fault that  you declined, on your own later admission, to read them properly.
 * A lot of people have not  appreciated your highly technical explanations which although they  demonstrate  your excellent  in-depth  knowledge of the IPA, are often not  strictly  on topic. People still  do  not  follow your explanations  for the simple reason that most of them are not  linguists, and don't, and should not need to be, to read articles about  non linguistic subjects and hope for some fairly accurate information about  the pronunciation  of English place names.--Kudpung (talk) 10:19, 7 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Your comments are very seldom comprehensible to me: Sometimes you mean things literally, and complain that I don't understand them that way; other times you don't, and object that I take you literally. Other times I simply cannot make heads or tails of what you're saying. When I ask you to explain, you refuse point blanc, with the excuse that you're acting on the behalf of s.o. else and so don't need to explain yourself, but you have never directed me to the reader you are acting on behalf of. That is not engaging in good faith, and hardly "as friendly a manner as possible". If you refuse to converse in good faith, then I feel no obligation to be civil. You have said you'd never be back, and have told me to stay off your user page. You haven't kept your side of the bargain, but expect me to keep my side, which is hypocritical. You're inconsistent in other ways, such as saying that repeating this debate on every page is undesirable, but then insisting that we repeat the debate on every page, by not generalizing the discussion to anything not on the immediate page under discussion. It's all quite ridiculous. kwami (talk) 14:25, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Bánffy
Why do you keep changing the IPA of Katalin Bánffy from to ? Yes, there is nasal place assimilation, but to and not to ! - Matthew Beta (talk) 14:33, 5 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Check WP:IPA for Hungarian. That is not a distinctive allophone for either Hungarian or English speakers, and so is not transcribed. (We do transcribe [ŋ] for foreign languages, because English speakers find that distinctive even if native speakers do not.)


 * Sorry, I hadn't noticed that I had edited that article twice, or I would have explained myself. If you wish to change the convention, please bring it up on the IPA for Hungarian talk page, as it will affect other articles. kwami (talk) 14:35, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Please check Hungarian phonology. It is the case of nasal place assimilation nf. Last week I also included it in the WP:IPA for Hungarian page, you mentioned! It should be, but as it is hard to pronounce, it changes to. - Matthew Beta (talk) 16:24, 5 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, I understand that. But it is a minor detail that both Hungarian and English speakers accommodate automatically, and so is not necessary for correct pronunciation: It would be nearly impossible to get it wrong! I can't even pronounce [mf]. Moreover, it is an additional symbol that people will need to memorize, and so makes the transcription less accessible. Your assimilation charts are wonderful, but belong in the phonology article. The whole point of having a key is quick reference so that people don't have to read all that! But your examples of assimilation will make a valuable contribution to the examples in the main chart. kwami (talk) 16:31, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry but I must disagree. Assimilations should be shown in IPA transcriptions. And nf is just as the same as other ones, we should be accurate. On the other hand, there is for example tv, for which I couldn't decide if I should pronounce or  if I wasn't a Hungarian. - Matthew Beta (talk) 16:54, 5 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, of course we need to show assimilation. But we don't need to show meaningless detail. We should show enough detail for readers to pronounce the word correctly, but no more. That's been the consensus on all the IPA keys. You'll notice there is no [ɱ] in the English or any of the other IPA keys, despite the fact that that sound occurs in all those languages. kwami (talk) 16:57, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Hello! I thought about your arguments but I'm still not statisfied. The way I pronounce Bánffy is nothing like bámfi (but also not like bánfi either), anyway [m] is not a solution I think. The other thing is the IPA for Hungarian. I think my charts were a lot easier to understand than the current ones :)... at least now I wouldn't know how to transscribe the letters due to the new examples... - Matthew Beta (talk) 14:53, 9 April 2010 (UTC)


 * The point of the key is as an aid to the reader clicking on a Hungarian IPA transcription. It's not meant to be a guide for the editor.
 * When an English speaker sees [mf], they will automatically pronounce it correctly. If you want to add, please bring it up on talk, or better yet, on Wikipedia Talk:IPA.
 * We still have the chart on the talk page, where you can look it up. If you prefer, we could add it to WP:pronunciation, which is intended to guide the editor, perhaps as a sub-page. (They're trying to consolidate the MOS-pron pages, but this is too detailed IMO for the main page.) kwami (talk) 15:02, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

New site planned
Hi Kwamikagami, I wonder if you'd be interested in a site which aims at encyclopedic serious scholarly coverage of the aboriginal languages of (for starters) Australia, New Guinea and South America, with an orientation towards (though not limited to) taxonomy and historical phonology. Original research is encouraged, but can't be too speculative, and must proceed with an understanding of the comparative method where applicable. Citation is required where appropriate (i.e., it's someone else's work) but not a barrier to publishing new findings. I have several other participants in mind, at least one of whom might expand our coverage to include some regions of Africa, and my own plan is to extend it to North America in the medium term. We'd all be using our real names, which isn't a drawback but a benefit, as we can point to our work. It's not wiki, but either GoogleSites or WordPress (still evaluating which would be best,) though there might well be an associated wiki at some point. This will be kept invite only, though, since our intention is to stand proudly behind every single word we publish.24.22.142.28 (talk) 07:27, 6 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Intriguing, and thank you. Problem is, I've been cutting down on WP, as I need to do some print publishing. I don't think another outlet would be good for me right now. Keep me in mind, though, in case things change. kwami (talk) 14:17, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't remotely blame you - even at its best, Wikipedia fails to reward competent and dedicated contributors with much more than barnstars. When I started, I'd actually thought Wikipedia might be something one would be proud to put on his resumé - and it should have been - but that sounds quite fanciful now. You may have figured out that I'm one of the very most banned users on this site - nothing to do with content, about which what passes for management here shows no sign of even caring, much less taking responsibility.
 * At the same time, Wikipedia fills a vacuum left by academic web linguistics projects, which are typically hijacked by programmers to create search tools with no useful content behind them - I am sure you aware of several such sites which promise information on most any language, only to lead us back to the ethnologue stub we'd have found already, or even to google and/or Wikipedia. As bad as Wikipedia's articles usually are, they are often the only substantial (non-pdf) information to be had online besides ethnologue's stub farm.
 * What I'm really inviting you to do is to take part in an epic recension of the sum of the New Guinea literature. I'll toss you a link when I have something up and viewable.24.22.142.28 (talk) 06:36, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

5 April 2010 Perfect aspect‎; 18:30 . . (-162) . . Kwamikagami (talk | contribs) (Undid revision 354133161 by Eldin raigmore (talk) - pls give refs. I've only seen ANT = PERF)

 * I hope this answer doesn't overwhelm you. I hadn't realized you'd posted a question in my "user talk".  I've answered it there, and it's probably a better answer there.Eldin raigmore (talk) 16:56, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

You said: "pls give refs. I've only seen ANT = PERF" But where have you seen it? You've given no references, either. Please bear in mind that I personally won't be convinced by just one secondary source. I have seen a textbook that had it wrong. So you'd need two or more for me to feel outvoted. As for what "anterior" means, check out Comrie's "Tense". pages 58-64 and also pages 31, 118, 100, 105, and 119. For what "perfect" means, check out Comrie's "Tense", pp 80, 79, 82, 32, 81, 74, 126, 100, 33, 63, 107, 128, 25, 84, 77, 69, 34, 31, 125, 26, 59, 95, 64, 8, 106, and others. "Tense" is published by the Cambridge University Press, copyrighted 1985, first published 1985. Its Library of Congress catalog number is 84-23832. Its author is Bernard Comrie, and it is a part of the series "Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics". Its ISBN numbers are 0-521-23652-5 (hardback) and 0-521-28138-5 (paperback). Also, to see whether or not "Perfect" is an aspect, for the "yes it's an aspect" side of the issue, see, which is Comrie's "Aspect". (It's part of the same series published by the same publisher, and was copyrighted and first published in 1976. Its ISBN numbers are 0-521-21109-3 and 0-521-29045-7.) Chapter 3, "Perfect", which runs from page 52 to page 66, is about the "perfect"; but note Comrie says that "The perfect is rather different from these aspects" and discusses "one way the perfect differs from the other aspects". On page 64 he introduces the idea of calling it "retrospective" rather than "perfect". See also these books: and these books:  Other books to see:                 Eldin raigmore (talk) 16:29, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Bulgars
omg!! you are an admin and you protect the people who vandalise the "Bulgars" article. these attackers are pan-slavic ultra-nationalists and they dont want to see the word beginning with "Turk". you help them remove reliable sources. Old Bulgars are changing into slavs by your hand... great!--Finn Diesel (talk) 23:44, 8 April 2010 (UTC)


 * No, I expect you to cooperate with other editors. I gave you the links to dispute resolution if the other editors are not cooperative, but from what I've seen, the problem seems to lie mostly with you. I have no idea which side is correct, and I don't much care. kwami (talk) 23:46, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

you don't care? those referances are from the academic publishes of USA. which country do you care? --Finn Diesel (talk) 23:50, 8 April 2010 (UTC)


 * What I care about is your misbehavior. Learn to play by the rules: no edit warring, no calling people names, learn to cooperate. If others refuse to cooperate, that's what we have dispute resolution for. kwami (talk) 23:55, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Short question
Hi Kwamikagami! You're using AWB quite a lot. So can you explain me the difference between {{unicode and {{IPA? If they're the same, always using the shorter (though more specific) IPA might be more elegant ... G Purevdorj (talk) 06:21, 9 April 2010 (UTC)


 * As far as display goes, they're more-or-less the same, though readers might have them display different fonts. But there are certain conventions the IPA should follow, so {{unicode is more generic. For example, IPA [y] is the sound of German ü, not of English y, which is [j]. Likewise for various specialty transcriptions which include non-IPA characters. IMO those should either be {{unicode or a dedicated template; if they're coded with {{IPA, I might flag them as dubious or incoherent. kwami (talk) 06:38, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Compass on the moon


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Thank you for your knowledge in astronomy. No-one at the local science museum knew the answer! I am surprised you know that! A p 3 rson ‽   18:39, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

File:WritingSystemsoftheWorld2.png picture
Hello, i saw this picture and it has a small mistake on the Balkans (Serbia). Serbia uses both alphabets, Cyrilic and Latin. Latin is the official alphabet of the northern province Vojvodina, even in the central Serbia Latin alphabet is used on a daily basis, only on some government documents Cyrilic is mandatory. Serbia should be shaded in color, or Vojvodina should be in the Latin group. Kosovo is also in the Latin group. Just a little suggestion. Greetings iadrian (talk) 19:34, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

IPA Font Issue
This might seem a bit odd but I figure you're among the best to ask on this. I'm having a lot of trouble figuring out a font compatible with the necessary (transliterating) characters for the Wadi el-Hol paper... to the point that I've had to embarrassingly rescind submissions I've made to various professors for comments. I found an IPA font that can handle things like ص\ث\ش in transcription, but I'm not sure how to do this without a separate font pack - that would make it even more difficult to send it around. Any ideas? Thanks. Michael Sheflin (talk) 20:25, 10 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Charis SIL should work, and doesn't look too bad. Gentium is prettier, and might have the characters you need.
 * Which program are you using? If Word, you can embed fonts. Otherwise you can make a pdf file. That would be the best way to keep your formatting.
 * Sorry, gotta go. Let me know if I'm just saying things you already know. kwami (talk) 02:53, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Yea Word. I'll look into embedding thanks. This is really weird, but I got an anonymous email suggesting just that... Michael Sheflin (talk) 05:21, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Request for mediation not accepted
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Ion Section g block


Hey Kwami, Lets fix the G Block page with IONS!

There is a catch, though. I was scrolling around and found out that Roentgenium111 is going to change back ANYTHING to an ionless state. We need better refs. I am going to try to find refs and stuff. I will save it. You chat with him and i'll get busy. I'll add ions. I will keep posting on this and the talk page for the g block thing so check often. BUT, I am very new to wikipedia so i will need help. We will K. I. T., right?

Marioman798 22:59, 14 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I created the ion block because I found refs stating that outer electrons would violate relativity beyond about Z=173, but that this effect would not limit nucleons until about Z=210. Thus it didn't make sense to treat these potential elements as regular members of the periodic table. However, the refs weren't very good, and could well be inaccurate or dated. I'd say the first order of business would be to post the relevant extract of R111's ref (I don't have access to it), and then look for anything more recent. Note that we also have refs stating that certain researchers don't expect elements to exist beyond Z=130 regardless of relativistic effects, so this might be an exercise in futility. It might also be a few decades before we know for sure. kwami (talk) 00:32, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

I would need a ref for that. Talk to Roentgenium111 about it. Marioman798 21:55, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

please provide edit summaries
Thank you for your contributions to Wikipedia. When you make a change to an article, please provide an edit summary. —EncMstr (talk) 02:27, 15 April 2010 (UTC)

Cantonese Ausbausprache
Hi kwami, there's currently a discussion on Template talk:Chinese language on the status of Cantonese as an ausbausprache and whether it should be listed as such on the template. Seeing that you were heavily involved in the discussions on the scope of the Cantonese article, I thought you might want to give your opinion here. Thanks! &mdash;Umofomia (talk) 18:30, 19 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks! kwami (talk) 19:20, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

AWB
Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser  Snowolf How can I help? 01:41, 20 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Thank you! I didn't recognize that as relevant at first because I did have an .exe file. kwami (talk) 01:46, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Ugh hang on, I wanted to list something completely different, I meant to link Wikipedia_talk:AutoWikiBrowser where reedy gives the working updater file. Sorry,  Snowolf How can I help? 01:55, 20 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Same solution, which is why I put the link on the main page, though I've been reverted. kwami (talk) 06:44, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Croatian
Some basic facts that you should know about Croatian, before you do some changes in the text. Croatian consists of three (3) major dialects (štokavski, kajkavski and čakavski). Standard Croatian language (that is the difference) is based on the štokavian dialect with the ijekavian reflex of yat (ije). When you put the definition "standardized form of the štokavian dialect", you apriori excludes other two dialects, and thats incorect. Thnks--Ex13 (talk) 07:14, 8 April 2010 (UTC)


 * But Serbs or Bosnians speaking those dialects would be speaking Serbian or Bosnian, not Croatian, correct? And Shtokavian is also Serbian and Bosnian and Montenegrin. Kajkavian, and Chakavian are just the dialects with majority Croat speakers. Croatian is not defined according to dialect, but according to the culture/religion of its speakers. kwami (talk) 06:52, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

When Arab speaks English as their mother tongue, is that consider that they speaking Arab English? No, its not correct that what you says.--Ex13 (talk) 07:34, 21 April 2010 (UTC)


 * You can hear the difference, accentuation, grammar, wording, etc.--Ex13 (talk) 07:49, 21 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I dont want to discuss with you about the fact - is it Croatian language South Slavic langugae or not. That's notorious fact. As I see futher, you are edit warrior. --Ex13 (talk) 08:06, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
 * At least I discuss the reasons for my edits. If you do not wish to discuss them with me, fine. I gave you the links for dispute resolution. No-one believes that Croatian and Serbian are as distinct as Serbo-Croatian and Slovenian; your own source, Ethnologue, lists Serbo-Croatian as a macrolanguage within South Slavic that does not include Slovenian. Arguing otherwise would appear to be spouting nonsense, and I can only assume it's politically motivated. If you have evidence that the differences between Serbian and Croatian are on par with the differences between SC and Slovenian, please provide them. kwami (talk) 08:13, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Please, Kwamikagami, if you don't know anything about the historical development of Croatian language and the history of standardization of Croatian language, please, don't mess into thing you're not informed. Kwamikagami, do you know anything about subdialects of Štokavian dialect? Do you know anything about the speeches? Do you know the difference between dialect, subdialect and the speech? Do you know the history and geographical distribution of these? Do you know their features? Or we have to teach you all features of those subdialects? Kwamikagami, do you know anything about the scripts in use among Croats? Do you know anything about the development of these? About the readers of those scripts and importance of that for the development of Croatian? Do you know anything about the support of Catholic Church for these Croatian scripts? About the language privileges that Church gave to Croats/Croatian language (and later continued by Catholic Church)? Do you know anything about the Croatian redaction of Church Slavonic? Do you know anything about the grammars of Croatian? Dictionaries of Croatian? Do you know anything about the use of infinitive in Croatian, use of two infinitives, future II, short infinitives, verbality of Croatian, Russian loanwords specific to Croatian (not to Serbian), tendency of use of possessive adjective? Or your sole argument is the argument of threat. Kubura (talk) 02:37, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I actually do know some of those things, though I'm sure not as well as you. But if you're going to posit the frankly bizarre claim that Serbian and Croatian are not more closely related than they are to Slovenian, against opposition from several editors, then you're going to have to come up with some convincing references. This is an encyclopedia, not a political blog, and that's what we have the talk page is for. The one edit of yours I said was near vandalism *was* near vandalism. Imagine if I were to say that "Slavic" was a fiction perpetuated by Russians trying to impose their language across Eastern Europe, and that Croatian was not Slavic but a separate branch of Indo-European. You'd call me an idiot, and you'd be right, and you'd be right to revert me. kwami (talk) 05:01, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * You are in war? Problems?--Ex13 (talk) 09:10, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * No, you're trying to start a war. This is an encyclopedia, not a political blog for petty jealousies. kwami (talk) 09:12, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Kwamikagami, do you know anything about the history of Croatian? Is Croatian more close to Serbian than to Slovenian is not the issue here. Point is that you cannot put Croatian and Serbian into same bag. Similar is just similar, similar is not the same. If you think that similar is same, try to wear the shoes one size smaller. Kubura (talk) 00:41, 25 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I never said they were the same, and being closer to Serbian than to Slovenian is the point here. If you had read any of my comments you would understand that. kwami (talk) 00:45, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

STOP YOUR EDIT WARRING
Please refrain from undoing other people's edits repeatedly. If you continue, you may be blocked from editing Wikipedia. Note that the three-revert rule prohibits making more than three reversions in a content dispute within a 24 hour period. Additionally, users who perform a large number of reversions in content disputes may be blocked for edit warring, even if they do not technically violate the three-revert rule. Rather than reverting, discuss disputed changes on the talk page. The revision you want is not going to be implemented by edit warring. Thank you. I've lost count of the number of times you have moved this one of three articles in an almost circular fashion, so I consider that this 3RR warning is appropriate. Futhermore, I believe that you have, by once again using (sic) your admin powers to move the article in the absence of a clearly demonstrated consensus, violated WP:UNINVOLVED. I have therefore asked Regents Park to revert your disruption. Please take your POV-pushing elsewhere. Ohconfucius ¡digame! 06:53, 23 April 2010 (UTC)


 * What are you talking about? 3RR? He reverted a consensus move without discussion. Inappropriate on his part. kwami (talk) 06:55, 23 April 2010 (UTC)


 * That's total crap, and you fucking well know it. You've been unsuccessfully pushing this agenda of yours for over a year. Not many people are buying you; people are losing their patience with you. What's more, you ignore the talk page discussion in favour of moving it back, and say RegentsPark acted against consensus... You have a nerve! Now, why don't you just go away. Ohconfucius  ¡digame! 07:00, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
 * So, do you truly not understand how things work around here, or are you just upset that the RfM didn't go your way? kwami (talk) 07:05, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I understand perfectly well how things work around here, and how you do things, having observed you for the best part of a year. I believe you're among the worst example of abusive admins I've come across, and I just don't get why somebody hasn't stopped you dead in your tracks yet. Ohconfucius  ¡digame! 07:10, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
 * RegentsPark can say something to me if s/he wishes. kwami (talk) 08:14, 23 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, at least you have the decency of moving it back, for now.  Ohconfucius  ¡digame! 10:08, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

Watchlist
Both articles are on my watchlist, let me know if this spreads elsewhere.

(In an area where it's hard enough to keep the politically-motivated edits to a minimum, it's a shame that for the linguistic side so many editors take as gospel just one source, without being aware of the limits of its accuracy and consistency. In nearly all cases, it would only be two clicks more to go direct to source papers or standard textbooks from the experts in the field.  Sigh.) Knepflerle (talk) 10:19, 23 April 2010 (UTC)


 * We've forked SC phonology across four articles (S, C, SC, and B), and the grammar across six (S, C, SC, a stub at B, plus more detailed S gram, C gram). That seems really silly. The only non-political reason I can think of would be for the two scripts in the inflection tables, but we shouldn't be writing WP-en articles in Cyrillic anyway. I'd like to merge either to SC or to a separate "X grammar" article for both the phonology and morph/syntax. The minor diffs that exist we could discuss there, or just leave for the 'differences' article we already have. kwami (talk) 10:24, 23 April 2010 (UTC)


 * That's not a bad idea. It's quite a big project though and I doubt it will go uncontested in certain quarters(!) - has something similar been suggested at WP:LING?  It'll be much easier to carry out efficiently with a small group of editors, and if it is decided in advance which sources' approach we want to follow.  I quite like Sussex' "The Slavic languages" and I think it reflects the academic consensus well but other suggestions would be good.  I'd particularly welcome a decent quality, comprehensive reference for material on Montenegrin. Knepflerle (talk) 10:43, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

The ?redundant "IPA vs other symbols" styleguide page
Kwami, I'd like to get this moving. Can I copy it across and remove it from the MoS category to kick things off? Tony  (talk)  09:10, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Copy it across on the MOS page, you mean? I'm not sure it belongs there: it's a help page rather than a style guide, but go ahead if you like. kwami (talk) 09:16, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
 * OK, I'll remove it from the MoS category and leave notes at both pages to that effect. Tony   (talk)  10:18, 24 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Oh, you want to clean up categories. Sorry, I forgot that! Yeah, no need IMO for it to be in the MOS cat; it's a peripheral article for editors trying to follow the MOS who do not understand the IPA, or who aren't comfortable converting from US dictionaries. kwami (talk) 10:39, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

BLOCK WARNING
"Reverted referenced material, especially against consensus, is considered vandalism. If you continue, you will be WP:blocked. kwami (talk) 09:19, 24 April 2010 (UTC)"


 * Same you did here --Ex13 (talk) 09:21, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * No, I did not do there. I left both the reference and the datum that it was used for. You, on the other hand, deleted both the reference and the datum it was used for. I am improving the article, you are sabotaging it. I'm sorry for you, but no-one here will accept you pushing your politics on the rest of the world. kwami (talk) 09:24, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Nope, its a different reference.--Ex13 (talk) 09:24, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Huh? Of course it's a different reference. It's a different fact, on a different page of the ref. What's your point? kwami (talk) 09:26, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * If you want another ref, what about the US govt. Foreign Service Institute? They came out with a new edition of their Serbo-Croatian in 1997. That is, US diplomats and military are taught "Serbo-Croatian". Does that not establish that the term is used in English? What of the other post-Yugoslav refs that other editors have pointed out to you? kwami (talk) 09:30, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

First, according to you, Croatian was a dialect. Then it was Slavic language ignoring the South slavic branche, now is a part of macrolanguage. You are little bit confused in your "improvment" of article. In infobox was the reference for croatian language lineage. Now you deleted that reference, and put the reference for "Macrolanguage of Serbia". And you are ignoring all what people wrote on talk page. And i saw that you are doing the same thing with Bulgarian and Macedonian. --Ex13 (talk) 09:33, 24 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Please show me where I said any of those things. Perhaps you did not actually read the things you reverted.
 * I deleted that ref because it was duplicated a few lines below, and no-one contested the idea of Croatian being Western South Slavic. I'll put it back if it makes you happy: it's a minor point. kwami (talk) 09:38, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

This is vandalism. Blatant deletion of almost 2,000 bytes of basic linguist info. Attitude "I don't like it, write it again". Things cannot work like that here. Kubura (talk) 02:02, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes they do. You've demonstrated that you are not willing to cooperate with other editors, so go away until you learn to play nice. kwami (talk) 02:06, 25 April 2010 (UTC)


 * For me there is no good editor per se, but only good and verifiable sources, do not call on good editors, but on arguments and sources. Your edits regarding South Slavic languages are actually original research. --Roberta F. (talk) 11:45, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, you're correct, good sources is what we want. If Kubura were willing to provide that, we would overlook his behaviour. kwami (talk) 14:30, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

You don't read my messages?
Hi, Kwamikagami. You've written here on 20:53, 25 April 2010 "There is even that (perhaps apocryphal) story of a Bosnian demanding a translator in a Croatian court (or was it the other way around?), the point of which was to illustrate how this is as much politics as anything". One day earlier, on 03:37, 24 April 2010, I've written on the South Slavic talkpage this : "I know what these women are talking about here . Do you know?" Have you opened this link ? It's Serbian magazine Danas. Article Sunđer, pardon, spužva. Subtitle is: "Čime se u Srbiji i Hrvatskoj bave sudski tumači za hrvatski i srpski jezik  ". Branislava Čolović: Potrebna je mnogo veća koncentracija kad prevodite sa srpskog na hrvatski, nego sa srpskog na engleski * Antonela Zjakić: Mladi Hrvati uopće ne znaju da čitaju ćirilično pismo... See the line in the text "Opasno je tumačiti po sistemu “razumemo se” naročito u pravu, farmakologiji, građevini". They (court professionnal translators from Serbia and Croatia) speak about court translators for Croatian and for Serbian and problems they regularly meet (and about the needs for those translators). Therefore, these stories weren't apocryphal as you wrote here. So, you got the answer one day before. Please, don't unnecessarily perpetuate the discussions with questions that were already been answered on your talkpage. Please, read the messages. If you don't know the matter (differences between Croatian and Serbian language), please, don't make mess with your interference. Kubura (talk) 02:38, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Unblock request
This user has requested an unblock. It seems the IP address has been reassigned and I'm inclined to drop the block length to "time served". However, I wanted to get your opinion as the blocking admin. Thanks! TN X Man 12:52, 25 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Done. kwami (talk) 14:19, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks! TN X Man  14:21, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Vandalism
As a admin on three projects of Fondation, and a member of SWMT, I know well what is a vandalism and what not. Deleting of well sourced edits, as you have done, is called vandalism. Your edits are without any source and so called publishing of original tought. There is noone talking about that those two grammars are not quite simmilar, but the article is about Bosnian (which have own grammar rules), and not about SC (which also have own rules but no more publications)! Following your opinion, we should delete all articles about south slavic languages, even SC, and just make a article about slavic-church language. This will also include deleting of Slavic and Czech. So please rollback your edit or give sources which can aprove your opinion. And please, don´t call again someone vandal without citation of rules he broke. Thanks in advance --WizardOfOz (talk) 16:39, 25 April 2010 (UTC)


 * First, I didn't call you a vandal. I said your edit could be considered vandalism. Big difference. Second, as an admin, you should know better than to delete talking points until they've been resolved. Third, the point of the merger is not to paper over any differences, but to consolidate the commonalities. Please see the talk page at Croatian, where nationalists are trying to impose a walled garden on this very idea, that there is anything common to the SC standards. I have deleted nothing supported by RS's. If you believe otherwise, please indicate specifically what I've done wrong. (Not just "revert your edit", which as an admin you should know is unreasonable.) You also should know that that pathetic stub in the grammar section was not encyclopedic. Since all the info is in the main article, it should not be there: see WP:Fork. As I've said, if you want to write a summary of the main article at Bosnian language, as we have at Croatian and Serbian, by all means do so; if you wish to discuss the development of distinctive elements of Bosnian, even better. That would be encyclopedic and most welcome. (Though note there is already an article on the differences between the BCS standards.) kwami (talk) 16:51, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I haven´t take a look at the other articles, mea culpa, but have saw those redicoulus entries in the summary on this one. About nationalistic POVs on the talk of Croatian language, I will never take a part in one of those discussions as I am blocked on hr.wiki by one nationalist. But in otherway, even if I not agree with users like Roberta F. in other cases, in her post above she has right. Compilation of one language without publications since 1992 with three living languages (let us leave macrolanguages by side), is truly original research. Prefering of SC as "the only one", is also a political wiew. The proclamation in Vienna 1875 was just a only possible solution for accepting of an "unified" language in whole Yugoslavia on that time. The solution was maded as a political base to show the accepting of each other. The end result was the war in the 90´s :). As a solution for those discussions all across the wikies, I prefer a "stand alone" variant of each. In educational point of Wikipedia, such edits and marging just leave the reader in an labyrinth of uncertainty. It´s like (beside that most of USA readers don´t even know where Bosnia or other countries are) giving something to reader without conclusion and just saying: try to search elsewhere, we are writing, but we don´t know it. If we now take a look at this article, from a readers point, what will we conclude: Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian, are just a part of Serbo-Croatian. Ok. In which country is this language spoken? Is there any official publication on this language? Whatfore are the other languages which are official spoken in few countries if it is simmilar? What are the differences?, thats what i will ask myself as a reader. If we suspect, that some of readers have a middle degree of any education, they will search for solutions elsewhere. That is the point, where the scientific world is loughing about million of editors here: they are writing nonsense on Wikipedia. I know that there are enough rules on every single project, but the fact is that those rules just glorify some political decisions in the past. I will wait for some time and perhaps include the grammar part of SC article. But untill then, it will be nice to see an admin leading trough the discussion and leaving some room to move, and not reverting with such explanations. Hope for a good cooperation in future. Best regards --WizardOfOz (talk) 17:30, 25 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Kubura, really! He's one of the principal irritants on this project too. I sympathize with you: He appears to be completely irrational.


 * I see where our difference lies: The difference between the meaning of the word "Serbo-Croatian" in English, and of srpskohrvatski in BCSM. Here we are using SC simply as a cover term for the language standards based on Shtokavian. That's how English speakers understand the term: Serbs, Croats, Bosniaks, Montenegrins speak a mutually intelligible language, for which this is the label. For example, the US Foreign Service Institute, which trains American diplomats and other officials, has a course in "Serbo-Croatian". That's just how the word is used in English. (It may also be used for the old official standard of Yugoslavia, but that is clearly a secondary understanding in English; since that standard is now defunct, it is rarely used with this meaning anymore except in historical writing.) SC may leave something to be desired as a name, but it's better than any of the alternates (BCMS, Central West South Slavic) and is far more WP:Common. To the average English speaker, the fact that SC has four national standards (Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian, Montenegrin) is no more relevant than the fact that English has separate US, UK, Canadian, Australian, NZ etc. standards. If they want to call those separate languages, fine, but that's just terminology. Meanwhile, you wouldn't claim to be pentalingual because you understand English, Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, and Montenegrin! That would only count as bilingual. Since the grammar (incl. the phonology) is essentially identical, per WP:Fork it should be covered in one place. Since the WP:Common name in English is SC, it should be covered at SC. We do the same thing with Hindi-Urdu grammar, rather than duplicating that info at Hindi and Urdu. It's simply much easier to maintain the info when it's gathered together in one place.


 * This has nothing to do with any claim that there is an official SC standard, nor does it deny that there are separate BCMS standards. In fact, all articles go to pains to point out that out. In other words, use of the term "Serbo-Croatian" in English does not have the political connotations that it does in BCMS. While Bosnians, Serbs, and Croats may find it offensive, that is carry-over from their own culture and history, and is largely irrelevant to an English-speaking audience. Of course, we do try to address those sensitivities by taking care to address the issues of language standardization, but that cannot be allowed to dictate how everything else is presented.


 * BTW, if you can suggest an alternate name that would (1) be recognized by normal English speakers, and (2) not cause offense to nationalists, that would be fantastic, but so far we've not been able to come up with one. We could debate whether the article should be renamed Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian, but I don't think that's likely to succeed. Anyway, the debate over what we call the article is largely irrelevant to the need to merge duplicated material. kwami (talk) 18:02, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Didn´t know that you also have expirience with Kubura LOL, have just seen the discussion above and didn´t tought that there is deeper "contact".
 * About your link to the FSI, i know the problematic. One of my friends has been a assistant professor on the departement of speech on the Southern Illinois University, and she is a bosnian origin. I´ve heard about the tries to explain the different behind the most common name and the differents between those languages. She gived up and moved to NYC :). That is one of the problems of the en and de wiki; using common names no matter if they are right or wrong. As you say "better solution for article name than SC", we can´t call it others. It is a language and that is a fact, even if we dispute it. But also, the fact is that there are three other languages which have been the base for the creation of SC. We claim that SC is the one with the most common name, and it is for sure, but SC is just a result of approximation of the serbian and croatian. It has been unified 1875, long after other two had they own grammar and dictionaries. Now we are trying to move to the base, but we are just on the crosspoint. Serbian and Croatian have been unified to Serbo-Croatian and now are leaving this "federation" in two different ways. Just like the states do. The croatian is have token the german way and the most of the new solution are based on the german grammar. The Serbian is based (in his developement) on the Framkophonetical ground. Bosnian is trying to be a different and take the SC as a base, including some borrowed words form the Ottoman empire. But the fact is that SC is on his end, and the others on the start. As I sayed above, I will try to include some parts of SC article in to the bosnian, perhaps you can take a look at my english grammar then? --WizardOfOz (talk) 18:48, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 * The different traditions of written grammar books is to be distinguished from the objective grammar of the language itself. (The English word "grammar" is polysemous that way.) So yes, the tradition of describing Bosnian as opposed to Croatian or Serbian grammar should be the subject of this article. But the actual grammar itself (inflections, syntax, etc.) should be consolidated in "SC grammar", since it's practically identical for the different standards. Also, dialectical variation within Bosnian may be of interest. Again, you're still thinking of SC as an official standard. On the ground, Shtokavian has always been a single dialect, regardless of what it was called, and that's what we cover in the SC grammar article, regardless of what that's called.
 * I'll be happy to review your English, though how long I take will depend on how prolific you are! kwami (talk) 19:04, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 * But if you take a look at the article SC, the presentation shows it like a shtokavian holy mother. There is no presentation like it is a parallel of others (i know my english is horrible) or a result of the unification. That is what leads the nationalistic parts to such discussions. If someone shows up that it is one family but different children (even if one is a stepchild), it will be much easier for all :). And by the way, I will try not to keep my edit small for correction in the next days :) --WizardOfOz (talk) 19:40, 25 April 2010 (UTC)


 * If you have particular suggestions for how to improve it, that would be nice. I imagine that it was originally written for the Yugoslav official standard, and only later coopted as a cover term for modern BCMS. As with many articles, the editing probably wasn't very good when it was refocused. Also, SC in the general English sense isn't just Shtokavian, but all Serb and Croat dialects. We might even be able to split the article: "SC (spoken language)" vs "Standard Serbo-Croatian" or "SC (Yugoslav standard)" or some such. One could cover BCMS as a mutually-intelligible spoken language, and the other as the defunct official standard of Yugoslavia. I won't make such a decision myself, because I'm not familiar enough with the subject to anticipate the consequences, but it would be worth bringing up on the Talk page. kwami (talk) 19:48, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Perhaps we should transfer the whole conversation to the talkpage of Bosnian? I´m sure that there are some others who can participiate. --WizardOfOz (talk) 20:43, 25 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I was thinking exactly that. Except for the part in the beginning where we were sniping at each other! That can die a slow death when I archive it here ... kwami (talk) 21:13, 25 April 2010 (UTC)

Infobox Language
Hey, you. Quit breaking infoboxes! ;) ... While you're there, do you think you could add the ability to keep track of language features, like word order and morphology type? Thanks. :) &mdash;Gordon P. Hemsley&rarr; &#x2709; 04:31, 26 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I probably could, but that's so subjective that it might count as OR. Probably best to discuss that on talk. (I don't think adding dialects & standard forms should be objectionable, so I'm just doing it.)
 * Sorry about screwing up! I thought it was going to be a quick fix! — kwami (talk) 04:34, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
 * No worries, I was only joking. I was like, "Who broke the infobox? It was just fine a few minutes ago, so they must be messing with it now.... Oh, it's just Kwami." But you're probably right about the OR claim, although there are sites now that list tons of different features about languages. It'd be nice have some of the basics along with all the other useful information. And morphology type (e.g. polysynthetic) is often written in the prose, so it probably wouldn't hurt to include that one. Ah well. I'll raise the issue on the talk page eventually. I'm just lazy, is all. :P Keep up the good work. &mdash;Gordon P. Hemsley&rarr; &#x2709; 05:02, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I kept writing "dial1" for "dia1" in the parameters, and it took me forever to see it. No wonder it freaked out!
 * Morphology types are not entirely factual. They're largely theory-dependent. Do we use a one- or two-dimensional classification scheme? What if our ref uses the opposite? Whose def of "polysynthesis" do we use? What if our ref uses an incompatible one? Same for word order. I mean, are we going to claim that a lang is SVO if it's ergative and doesn't have an S? Or if it's AVO but VS? Or if lexical noun phrases almost never appear in both slots, so that we have to depend on PNs, but PN order is frequently different than lexical NP order? Or head- vs dep-marking: is subject marking on the verb really comparable to genitive marking in an NP? Do they form a coherent class? (Personally, I seriously doubt they do.) In the text we can get into the intricacies of such things, but that's difficult in an info box. Yes, I know a lot of lang summaries provide such info, but it's often misleading or largely worthless. Clear as a bell for some languages, utterly confounding for others. — kwami (talk) 05:11, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Eesh, when you put it that way.... But couldn't the same be said for dialects? Sure, there are a number of "recognized" dialects for many languages, but there will also wind up being claims that are disputed or socially-constructed "dialects" that don't actually exist. Wouldn't dealing with those issues on a case-by-case basis be the same as dealing with controversial syntactic and morphological property conclusions? &mdash;Gordon P. Hemsley&rarr; &#x2709; 15:09, 26 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Well, dialects will be controversial for the same kinds of reasons as the family structure will be. IMO there aren't the same kinds of fundamental theoretical issues involved. Also, not every language is going to be broken down that way. My motivation was partially as a navigation aid: dialects that warrant their own articles should be linked through the info boxes of their parent languages, and the same for national standards, so that if you start at the top of the family, you can work down through every article on a lect or register within that family using just the info boxes. (Dialects could then link to sub-dialects where we have them, as in Chinese.) But morphological type: someone will put a huge amount of effort into adding this "essential" info to every language article we have, only to cause confusion because it conflicts with other sources or because different editors use different definitions or parameters. I foresee it being a big mess, a lot of assumptions, and leading to a lot of argument, that can be avoided if we stick to prose in the main text. But maybe that's just me: it's certainly worth bringing up for discussion. — kwami (talk) 17:42, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Basque provinces
Kwami, a totally different request for a change. We have had a long (relatively speaking, for the Basque project anyway) debate on the province names and related adjectives (see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Basque) for which we had invited participation not only from Basque editors but also WikiProjects France and Spain. I was wondering whether it was in the realms of the doable to, on that bases, move Guipúzcoa to Gipuzkoa? There had been a rather unfruitful debate on a one-sided move in 2007, which was part of the reason why I wanted to encourage a wider debate and I think we managed to work out a decent consensus solution. Or do we have to run the same debate on the Gipuzkoa page again? I hope not, especially since I deliberately invited people on the Gipuzkoa talk page to take part too (see Talk:Guipúzcoa). What do you think? Akerbeltz (talk) 11:18, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Kinda weird that some are Spanish, some English, some French, and one Basque, but okay, will move. — kwami (talk) 14:58, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Restored years of the page history before the move, and merged more after. Anything else? — kwami (talk) 15:13, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * That should do fine I think, thank you very much. The reason for the mix is that some (Biscay, Navarre, Labourd and Soule) are arguably establish forms in English literature. Álava hardly features in English publications, and if, usually under the Spanish name; Gipuzkoa was the biggest headache, various forms kick around but few historically in English speaking literature. Since the tendency is definitely for the official form Gipuzkoa to be used, including in English, we ended up agreeing on that. It's a mixed bag but at least we were all reasonably happy with the outcome. Akerbeltz (talk) 15:16, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Stephens City
I am unsure how my edit is "factual incorrect" and this is, when you have the name of the town mispelled and you have left out one word of the town, that is factually incorrect. I actually live in the town, so I think I know how the town's name is spelled and pronounced. I am willing to discuss this, but if it is going to just be more snipping, I will revert and ignore. -  NeutralHomer •  Talk  • 16:42, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, but you link to a pronunciation key that completely contradicts your transcription. And the transcription I gave, besides being identical, is more accessible. (Yours is insular to the US, whereas our audience is global.) I don't see the problem, unless you think people reading WP don't know how to pronounce "city", nor where to look it up.


 * And "sniping"? Pointing out that your edit is wrong and that the pronunciation of "city" is "obvious" is hardly sniping. — kwami (talk) 16:45, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Some people may not know how to pronounce "City", which is why I added the full name of the town. The link I provided was from the template I used, that I have no control over.  I used the template, whoever made the template needs to correct that as I suck at pronunciation stuff.  But I think that having the pronunciation of the town, in English, doesn't help the "global audience" learn about the town and how to say the name.  If there is another template with a more correct pronunciation, I think we should use that or just ixnay the whole thing. -  NeutralHomer  •  Talk  • 16:58, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Are you kidding me? Anyone can look up "city" in a dictionary. And there's nothing wrong with the template. Word it "Steven's City" if you like. This is ridiculous. — kwami (talk) 17:02, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * That would, again, be incorrect. There is no apostrophe in the name Stephens City and then name of the town has no "v" in it, it is "ph".  So yes, I am not kidding and this isn't ridiculous. -  NeutralHomer  •  Talk  • 17:05, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * You were the one saying the name is pronounced with a /v/. Now you're saying it's not. Make up your mind. — kwami (talk) 17:06, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I never said it did, the template does. I used the template as it is used on other pages.  The town is pronounced with a "v" but is spelled with a "ph" and there is no apostrophe.  Also, how do you expect people who don't speak or read English to understand the pronunciation of "Stephens" or "City" when it is in English? -  NeutralHomer  •  Talk  • 17:14, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * If people don't read English, they won't be reading an English encyclopedia, will they? We don't explain how to pronounce basic words. This isn't a dictionary.
 * The template doesn't say it's pronounced with a /v/, the transcription does. You have now confirmed that. Yet you want to tell people it's pronounced with an /f/? And of course it's spelled with a  and no apostrophe. That's why we spell it with a  and no apostrophe. — kwami (talk) 17:33, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Since this appears to be going nowhere, I am going to revert back to the previous version of the page and switch to the pron-en template you are seeming to perfer at the moment. If you have anything more you want to add, you know where to find me. -  NeutralHomer •  Talk  • 17:28, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * No, the pron-en template is used for the IPA, which is the Wikipedia (and world) norm for pronunciation transcriptions. That would be like giving a distance in miles and calling it kilometers. As you would know if you actually took a look at the templates you're using. — kwami (talk) 17:33, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * OK, I am going to explain this once more. The name of the town is "Stephens City", the pronunciation of "Stephen" is with a "v", but putting that beside the town's name is incorrect as it gives the reader the idea that the town has two names....it doesn't.  The pronunciation key is correct and can be sourced if need be. -  NeutralHomer  •  Talk  • 17:37, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I deleted it as talking to you is getting me nowhere. Your next revert of the page will put you on 3RR. -  NeutralHomer  •  Talk  • 17:41, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * 'Stephens, pronounced "Steven's",' is intelligible to anyone literate enough to read the article. We're not targeting idiots here, we aim for a normally intelligent audience. This is an encyclopedia, not I See Sam. Yes, the pronunciation is correct. But with your inappropiate template you're claiming it's pronounced "stay-vənz see-tay", with tone as if it were Thai. And now, to make a petulant WP:point, you'll delete it altogether since you're not getting your way. Take it to arbcom if you like, but stop wasting my time.
 * And 3RR does not count when fighting vandalism, which is what your last edit became. Grow up. — kwami (talk) 17:45, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Explain how it is vandalism with you clearly don't understand there is no apostrophe in the town's name, Stephens City....none. -  NeutralHomer •  Talk  • 17:47, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Blanking info is considered vandalism, though here I'd say it's more appropriate to say you're violating WP:point. We never say the name has an apostrophe. We say it's pronounced "Steven's", not spelled "Stephen's". — kwami (talk) 17:51, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I wasn't going to bring this to ANI, but with protecting a page you are clearly involved in, you broke a BIG admin rule. You leave me no choice but to bring this to ANI attention. - <small style="white-space:nowrap;border:1px solid #900;padding:1px;"> NeutralHomer  •  Talk  • 17:50, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Who's violating 3RR now? You were at 4, and would only see the page was protected if you tried 5. So you're a hypocrite as well. And please stay off my talk page. I have better things to do. — kwami (talk) 17:53, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * You're both in violation of 3RR, but an involved admin using their administrative rights to protect a page like that is not appropriate either. --JonRidinger (talk) 17:55, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * As I said, reverting vandalism, whether it's malicious or simply petulant, does not count against 3RR. And as I said on your talk page, I'll be happy to unblock if NH agrees to stop his pointy blanking. — kwami (talk) 18:00, 27 April 2010 (UTC)


 * I will respect your request to stay off your talk page after, as required by policy, I inform you that you have been taken to ANI for your misuse of admin tools. - <small style="white-space:nowrap;border:1px solid #900;padding:1px;"> NeutralHomer •  Talk  • 17:59, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

ANI part II
We are awaiting your input. Would you please take a break from your cleanup edits long enough to come back to the section where your actions were being discussed, and reply to the concerns raised there? thanks - KillerChihuahua ?!?Advice 18:46, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Just a note. I have mentioned a troubling block you made in the ANI thread.--Cube lurker (talk) 19:45, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I've been reading the roasting you're getting over at ANI and think it's baloney (read another word that starts with "b"). This is one of the reasons why Wikipedia is becoming nothing more than a MMORPG.  The rules are becoming more important than the result.  You're a solid wall against crappy linguistics and I appreciate it.  No matter what the admins decide, I think the whole issue is nothing more than game-playing among wikilawyers who have the admin tools.  (Taivo (talk) 22:40, 27 April 2010 (UTC))
 * Thanks. I figured s.t. like this might happen over Serbo-Croatian or one of its standards. I never thought it would be because of s.o. who doesn't literally doesn't know the difference between spelling and pronunciation. — kwami (talk) 22:46, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It was over neither; it was over your protection of a page while engaged in an edit war, protecting your preferred version. This is not bullshit, it is inappropriate use of the tools, and we take it seriously. KillerChihuahua ?!?Advice 23:17, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * And I've already agreed several times that it was inappropriate. Where did I ever say it was bullshit? You've been putting words in my mouth for some time now, and that is also inappropriate: especially when lecturing s.o. on inappropriate behavior. And of course it was over that issue: That's the issue that ended up at ANI! I always figured s.o. would eventually take me to ANI over some nationalist cause, not s.t. like this. — kwami (talk) 23:28, 27 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I have placed words in your mouth at no time, sir. I never said you called it bullshit. My use of the word was my own, and a logical extension of Taivo's "it's baloney (read another word that starts with "b")". I may well have been in error regarding what he meant - I never claimed he meant bullshit, either - but it certainly fits. I have no idea what you mean by s.t., btw - what does it stand for? KillerChihuahua ?!?Advice 00:24, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Sorry if I misunderstood you. I read this, and a couple comments at ANI, as more personal attack than addressing the issues.
 * 's.t.' is 'something', 's.o.' 'someone'. — kwami (talk) 00:29, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks - that makes sense; I've never seen the abbreviations before. Regarding taking things personally: I assure you at no time have I intended for anything to be regarding anything but the issues and problems at hand; it may help for you to remember that text is often misinterpreted. I realize this must be very stressful for you, and hope you are also making allowances for that (by realizing that your stress level might be affecting how you are interpreting things.) KillerChihuahua ?!?Advice 00:48, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually, KillerChihuahua, I am speaking 100% for myself and not for Kwami at all. I am the one who is indignant over what I perceive to be the almost entirely unjustified attack against him.  I am the one who called the wikilawyering by the admins at the ANI "b.s.", not Kwami, and that is my honest belief.  I don't ever want to be an admin, so you don't need to mark my name down in your book of "not on my watch".  Kwami's work both as an editor and as an admin are of very high quality.  He has raised the quality level of all the linguistics articles and all the linguistic information in Wikipedia.  Wikipedia owes him thanks, not the roasting that he's getting at the hands of wikilawyering admins.  I daresay that the ANI is just one more instance of Wikipedia turning into a game and not the reliable encyclopedia that its founder envisioned.  [Kwami, please don't respond to this either way.  As happened above, your response will be misconstrued and twisted against you.]  (Taivo (talk) 04:46, 28 April 2010 (UTC))

(outdent) And my initial response was to both of you, as you're both in this discussion. Much like a conversation with three people at a table. I assumed you were speaking for yourself - you'd be a bit arrogant to even think you could speak for someone else. As far as your outrage, it is misplaced, at least as far as I am concerned. His actions were prohibited, and for a very good reason. He was unaware he was doing anything wrong, which is troubling but correctable. Your sneers about "wikilawyers" are an extreme position - there is a happy place between undue bureaucracy and complete chaos, and that is where this issue (and its handling) lie. I have not seen anyone misconstrue any of kwami's posts, let alone "twist" them. If there has been any misunderstanding, I suggest you let kwami address them. KillerChihuahua ?!?Advice 11:51, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I have noted on the ani thread, but i'll add it here in case you've stopped watching. There are 2 additional IP's who's blocks are still active that were not handled correctly.  It would he helpful if you could correct these.--Cube lurker (talk) 14:01, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I believe I have? One was about to expire, the other had quite some time left on it. — kwami (talk) 18:23, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * It's not only the length. I consistantly see in your log IP blocks with no warnings.  Blocks with no block notices.  I'm just really concerned that you aren't following any of the proper practices.--Cube lurker (talk) 18:27, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Okay, that's easy enough to fix. — kwami (talk) 18:30, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * That's the thing. It is if you really understand the issue and the reasons for the practices.  If you're just saying that -"Cube lurker" whined because I didn't leave a warning or a notice so I'll slap one on- then are we in a better spot?--Cube lurker (talk) 18:35, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I don't think I've accused you of whining. I've gotten sloppy with the blocks with anon. IP vandals. My attitude was they aren't going to care anyway, they're vandals, so why waste my time? But of course if s.o. else takes on that IP, they need to be notified too. (Though for most of these, the chances of s.o. else coming along during the block is minuscule. Minuscule, but finite, so best to be safe.) So I can either put a notice on the page, or if I feel too rushed for that, leave it for some other admin to handle. The only problem is that ingrained habits die hard, so if I slip up, a friendly reminder would be nice. (Not that I'm asking you to babysit, but anything you happen to notice.) — kwami (talk) 18:44, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * For the record 'whined' wasn't meant to be viewed as an actual quote.--Cube lurker (talk) 19:19, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I have made a post at the ANI discussion and am letting you know per the ANI guideline. Basically, the best idea is not to use admin tools when you are involved in a content dispute.  I got the impression you used them in the Stephens City, Virginia case because you were irritated with NeutralHomer.  I had no plans to participate in the ANI, but I think the main point is being missed here.  I certainly wish you the best!  --JonRidinger (talk) 14:50, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks. — kwami (talk) 18:23, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

"Cutting in"
Please, don't do this. Don't "cut in" with your message. Later it's hard to see who wrote what. While it's fresh, it can be somehow recognized who wrote what. But later, we have to dig through the diffs to see the original author, since it's impossible to distinguish it. Rather put your answer under the message. Kubura (talk) 02:14, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

one lakh (100k)
Behold my 100,000th edit. — kwami (talk) 05:55, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Yay! Congratulations :) Iridia (talk) 07:33, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks ... either that, or I should get a life! — kwami (talk) 07:35, 29 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Congratulations here too. Keep up the good work. (And never mind the few detractors.) &minus;Woodstone (talk) 08:48, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Period 1 elements?
Any reason why that article wasn't merged while all other periods were? Headbomb {talk / contribs / physics / books} 10:37, 29 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, because it was a 'Good Article', and it had more detail than I thought appropriate for the combined article. I personally don't see much point to it, as IMO it's not really a coherent subject, but I didn't want to ruffle any feathers. Merge away if you feel it's warranted; I just added a 'mergeto' tag. — kwami (talk) 20:15, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

IPA
<div style="border-style:solid; border-color:blue; background-color:AliceBlue; border-width:1px; text-align:left; padding:8px;" class="plainlinks"> New comments continue to arrive across the encyclopedia from editors and visitors regarding the the use of the apparent  final /r/. I am shortly going to launch an RfC in  the hope that the community  can decide for themselves rather than having  to unravel  technical comments from linguists. Sometimes during a discussion, a small group of contributors might collectively pretend to a majority consensus to negate a minority opinion and try to outmaneuvering the minority into WP:CIVIL, or simply force them to leave the discussion in dismay. Those of us who have been around for a while probably know just how much we can taunt each other without recrimination, but may be committed to an agenda with a personal, or group conviction that goes beyond rational discussion, and express themselves in a combative manner. Enthusiasm is fine if you are right, but caring more about your cause than objective editing is counter productive to Wikipedia. Unfortunately, many attempts to address such issues often end in an appeal to ANI or Arbcom, which is sometimes a waste of time because those with an agenda are likely to do whatever they can to prevent the plaintif from getting a fair hearing. Therefore, apart from neutral comments to keep the RfC on track, and to state facts as necessary, I shall abstain from adding my opinion anywhere. In the light of that, but without admitting to  any  cases of lack of Wikiiquette, I am offering up this olive branch of peace. --Kudpung (talk) 07:50, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I've never been against a fair hearing; I've just insisted that we change the consensus before changing the conventions. If you're now willing to participate, rather than insisting that we need to take your side for you, this might be productive. Anyway, I appreciate the olive branch. — kwami (talk) 14:33, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm doing my  best  to  respect  Wikipedia conventions of civility -  why  don't you  just  calm down, and finally stop using every damned excuse to have another dig at me.--Kudpung (talk) 15:56, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Kudpung, that wasn't a dig. It was simply my POV as to why we never got anywhere. I'm sorry if you took it the wrong way (understandably, given our history), but I didn't intend offense. — kwami (talk) 15:59, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Removal of syllable separators
Why did you remove the syllable separators from /ˈwɛlɪŋtən/ yesterday? You forgot to leave an explanation in the edit summary. Ben Arnold (talk) 08:29, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Please follow the link. The convention is to only mark them when there might be some confusion. — kwami (talk) 14:27, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Misuse of "minor" edit
Hi there! I know you're very busy, but you might want to take care that you don't put in misleading edit summaries. This edit was not "clean up" and should not have been marked a "minor" edit: it was a substantive change to the pronunciation. Btw, I appreciate all the work you are doing and I'm fully behind you in the IPA debate. Can you make sure I am informed if/when the RfC goes live? Cheers! Grover cleveland (talk) 18:20, 30 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Okay, I just unchecked the 'minor' box on AWB. (I was expecting them to generally be minor.) That means that minor edits won't be marked, but I've found that I so commonly forget to adjust the summary when using AWB that it's best not to try!
 * And of course you were completely correct to revert me there. I wasn't paying close enough attention.
 * As for the RfC, I assume Kudpung will post a notice on the IPA page and maybe here. I'm curious about all these people he says are objecting, as I haven't seen all that many. — kwami (talk) 18:25, 30 April 2010 (UTC)