User talk:Lightmouse/Archives/2010/October

WP:OVERLINK and WT:BISE
(Now there's a subject I never in my wildest dreams imagined I'd ever write about!)

User:Lightmouse/monobook.js/script.js does WP:OVERLINK fixing, which has recently been discussed at WT:BISE (a forum for discussing use of the term "British Isles"). It looks like the script is de-linking every instance of "British Isles" (and other articles), including the first. Is that expected? I understand that certain words and phrases probably shouldn't be linked at all, but "British Isles" seems to be something that should be linked to on the first occurrence. Help! TFOWR 20:23, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

AWB units settings
I was wondering if you be so kind that you could share the settings you use for AWB when you are inserting Convert? Thanks Themeparkgc   Talk  07:26, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Conversion bot
Not sure if it's a bot doing this or not, but .... ship engine cylinders are measured in centimetres, not millimetres. Regards, Gatoclass (talk) 11:42, 16 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks. In any case, 110 inches is rather a lot of mm. Lightmouse (talk) 12:24, 16 October 2010 (UTC)


 * It is indeed :) Gatoclass (talk) 02:40, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Use defaults with convert
When adding the convert template, please do not include a target unit, let the template decide. In some cases you are choosing units that don't match what the template would use, and while I have not checked, may not match other conversions in the article. Acre is one of these. Vegaswikian (talk) 17:51, 16 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I prefer to choose the target unit as do lots of editors. If the choice shouldn't be available, then it's probably best discussed at Template talk:Convert. Lightmouse (talk) 18:16, 16 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Which causes conversions to be done different ways in the article. That is not good.  Better to take the default in these cases, especially with an automated process.  Oh, and don't change what is already there, even if mixed. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:25, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

OK, I'm going to ask that you stop converting acres to km2 and if you are doing nautical miles to anything but the default you also stop. I am convinced that by forcing acres to km2 you are using the wrong option. Vegaswikian (talk) 19:48, 17 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It is not a reasonable request. Some degree of judgement is essential. That probably explains why the template is chock-full of alternative parameters to choose from. I don't agree with blindly following the default conversion which you seem to prefer. It often results in nonsense and wholly misplaced number of decimal places. I would like you to please justify why using the default is always appropriate, and that our brains should be left at home whilst editing. -- Ohconfucius ¡digame! 05:08, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Hi Lightmouse. I too have noticed you doing this. Ohconfucious is right that sometimes an editor's judgement does need to over-ride a default, but unfortunately your judgement seems to be misleading you. Generally if acres are an appropriate unit for an area, the appropriate metric unit is hectares. I noticed in one case (Grazing) you used square kilometres for 30,000 acres, and in another (Godalming) square metres for 40 acres. Both of these result in silly juxtapositions of units, making the conversions difficult to understand. In the case of 30,000 acres, either we should use square miles and square kilometres, or acres and hectares (in fact personally I'd find the former clearer for this scale). In the case of 40 acres the result of your conversion is 160,000 square metres, which is a meaningless figure to anyone used to metric measurement: this size of area would normally be measured in hectares for general purposes, and in agriculture it would always be in hectares (as a farmer when I report areas to the UK government I even have to use hectares for buildings and ponds, down to the nearest 0.001 ha – which as you'll know is 3.9×10−6 square miles...).

You may have some personal objection to hectares, but I'm afraid it is leading to confusion. If you relied on the template default in every case you would be making fewer mistakes, which is I think why Vegaswikian requested you did that. Richard New Forest (talk) 09:27, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I recommend that people don't think of metric units as a word-for-word translation of a non-metric units. The metric system is not a word-for-word translation of a non-metric system, just as French isn't a word-for-word translation of English. The whole point of the metric system is that it abandons the notion of 'choose the correct unit for the domain' that is prevalent in non-metric systems and gains the learning/comprehension benefit of repeating the same few units.


 * Kilometres and metres (and their squares) are present to a greater or lesser extent in all domains, and are easier for ordinary people to understand than hectares. I'm told that farmers and people from the antipodes find hectares easier to understand. However, Wikipedia isn't an in-house publication for farmers and isn't read only by antipodeans.


 * Tony suggested a compromise that could work on the basis that 'small units for small values, larger units for large values'. Thus areas up to 10,000 m2 (1 ha) in m2, areas over 1 km2 (100 ha) in square kilometres.


 * There are lots of articles in need of metric units. Many would remain in need for a long time if it weren't for editors that put in metrication effort. It's frustrating to put in effort and then be criticised for it. Let's work together to ensure that metric units are provided. Trying to help. Lightmouse (talk) 09:31, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Replied under below.  Richard New Forest (talk) 13:31, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Strange edit
Looking at this edit you appear to have inserted 1 space. I would have expected a non-breaking space and the full set of 4 to have the space inserted. I have added the spaces and placed nowrap template round them. Keith D (talk) 18:33, 16 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I don't like nbsp so I don't add them. There's nothing to stop anyone else doing so. As you've seen, I don't always detect cases where a space is needed, unfortunately it's a consequence of the need to be cautious. Lightmouse (talk) 10:37, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Is your objection because of "text stretching" or clutter in edit mode? Tony   (talk)  05:32, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Both. It seems to be a programmer toy. People seem to care more about the addition of nbsp than they do about many other issues of higher value to readers. Lightmouse (talk) 08:22, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Quick Question re: consistency.
Heya. Just wondering why in this edit you used both the convert tag and manual conversion? I'm assuming it's because you can do one in your head ;) It's no big deal, I was just curious. -- WORM  MЯOW  14:19, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * It isn't because I can do one in my head. It's because the template can't do numbers in full ('six'), as far as I know. Lightmouse (talk) 14:21, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Makes sense, thanks for answering! -- WORM  MЯOW  15:17, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Mostly units using AWB
Thank you for adding convert templates to articles, as it's tedious to do just by hand. However, is there some reason that you are overriding the default acre=ha for units and using are=m2? As far as I know, m2 is the equivalent of sqft, and the metric land unit equivalent to acre is hectare. The templates seems to be telling me the same thing, as I usually just leave off the "destination" unit and get "ha". thanks Donlammers (talk) 18:35, 16 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Lightmouse, is it possible to provide at least a provisional boundary, in words, for when acres might be (i) definitely, (ii) perhaps, and (iii) never, converted to square metres? I myself favour acres -> ha, but I realise there are some issues to take into account—concerning value, geographical location, and field. We need something to go by. Tony   (talk)  03:30, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

I recommend that people don't think of metric units as a word-for-word translation of a non-metric units. The metric system is not a word-for-word translation of a non-metric system, just as French isn't a word-for-word translation of English. The whole point of the metric system is that it abandons the notion of 'choose the correct unit for the domain' that is prevalent in non-metric systems and gains the learning/comprehension benefit of repeating the same few units.

Kilometres and metres (and their squares) are present to a greater or lesser extent in all domains, and are easier for ordinary people to understand than hectares. I'm told that farmers and people from the antipodes find hectares easier to understand. However, Wikipedia isn't an in-house publication for farmers and isn't read only by antipodeans. Tony is Australian so it doesn't surprise me that he's familiar with hectares. Note that familiarity and understanding are two different concepts, there are metric people that are familiar with nautical miles but find kilometres easier to understand.

As far as Tony's suggestion is concerned, a compromise could work on the basis that 'small units for small values, larger units for large values'. Thus areas up to 10,000 m2 (1 ha) in m2, areas over 1 km2 (100 ha) in square kilometres.

There are lots of articles in need of metric units. Many would remain in need for a long time if it weren't for editors that put in metrication effort. It's frustrating to put in effort and then be criticised for it. Let's work together to ensure that metric units are provided. Lightmouse (talk) 11:27, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I did not mean to sound critical, and apologize if I sounded that way. I agree that it's far more important to have the units than not, regardless of whether they match my personal preferences. I grew up in Northern japan -- very agrarian at that time -- and it was hectares for land, tsubo for buildings, and shaku for stage sets (I have been away from Japan long enough that this may no longer be true). I default mostly out of lazyness -- it's less typing -- and was more curious if there was some guidance on Wikipedia outside the defaults. It seems there isn't, and I agree with the rule of thumb that Lightmouse states above. I think I've pretty much been following it anyway, but I will try to be more aware of the issue in the future. Donlammers (talk) 13:01, 17 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. Keep up the good work. Lightmouse (talk) 17:19, 17 October 2010 (UTC)


 * In re-reading, it seems my answer was somewhat ambiguous. I concentrated on 'small units for small values, larger units for large values'. However, unless I have a really good reason, once I pick a unit I generally stick with the default, i.e., in2->cm2, ft2->m2, acre2->ha2, and mi2->km2. Mixing units that essentially represent a difference in orders of magnitude just doesn't make sense to me, and the template makes this easy to avoid. I'm sure there are cases where mixing maxes sense, but at least in the zoo articles I have not run across them yet. Donlammers (talk) 12:22, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Please slow down
Hi there. Thinking in SI myself, your efforts are appreciated. It was a partially converted range of acres that brought me here, but I'll now simply ask you to either slow down or apply for a bot account (if you have done so already please link to it somewhere). More than a dozen edits per minute is clearly discouraged per the AWB rules of usage and having edit conflicts on your talk page is also a sign, that slower may be better here. Seriously, use it at a rate that is consistent with manual verification and in line with the AutoWikiBrowser. Thanks --Tikiwont (talk) 15:19, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Point taken. Thanks. Can you provide a link to the partially converted range? Lightmouse (talk) 15:21, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * It would be this one.--Tikiwont (talk) 15:25, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. Both ends of the range done now. Lightmouse (talk) 15:28, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks. As a side note, I fiddled with this one myself to see how the template works. Converting acres to ha is just fine in agriculture since i) they are used also in the metric parts like France for wineries and ii) they scale more similarly.--Tikiwont (talk) 15:53, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I went to the website of the vinyard and obtained the values. See parcelas de 1,2 a 2 hectáreas (in Spanish). Lightmouse (talk) 16:05, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * What I would like to see is some kind of codification of the balancing act that is necessary to determine which unit acres are converted to. Then might or might not then be taken to MOSNUM for further discussion. Apart from anything else, I'm interested myself to know how to do it. Are there not three issues (amount, geographical location, and topic) that might potentially be taken into account? Even if there are sometimes grey areas, this would still be useful. Tony   (talk)  16:07, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * See numerous comments above. Codification is simple: convert to hectares unless there's a good reason not to.  Richard New Forest (talk) 20:27, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Possibly. I'm glad you haven't focussed on 'word-for-word translation' of whatever a non-metric person has written. That's the concept that I find least useful in writing for an ordinary metric reader. Lightmouse (talk) 16:13, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

[Replies at above. Richard New Forest (talk) 21:17, 19 October 2010 (UTC)]

Edit summaries
You've producted a batch of edits with a summary of "mostly units". I've looked at a couple of these (Ebola and Silicon dioxide), and they're mostly removing wikilinks. Regardless of whether those removals are justified, could you please see your way making your edit summaries more accurate. Lavateraguy (talk) 14:38, 19 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I'd be happy to consider a different summary. Do you have a suggestion? Lightmouse (talk) 14:53, 19 October 2010 (UTC)


 * How about "removing wikilinks"? Also, as discussed extensively above, please convert acres to hectares and not square metres, and do not add a conversion where there is already a conversion there, as you did for example to Swineshead, Bedfordshire.  Ehrenkater (talk) 15:06, 19 October 2010 (UTC)


 * If it's just a case of "removing duplicated wikilinks" then that would be a reasonable description. In cases where a unique wikilink is removed, should there be such, a justification for doing so would not go amiss. Lavateraguy (talk) 15:22, 19 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Agreed -Ehrenkater (talk) 16:21, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Point taken. I've mentioned the delinking now. Lightmouse (talk) 16:32, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Iron
Hi there

I noticed your edit, and I reverted it because it seems to have removed many useful wikilinks. I note that you were using AWB, which doesn't really like multiple wikilinks, but for an article of this length, most users are going to be reading in chunks. They probably are not going to spot the wikilinked article title when it was first mentioned. What do you think? --Rifleman 82 (talk) 15:05, 19 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks. As far as the links are concerned, I've gone over it again but leaving some of the duplicates:


 * There were six links to the common term 'hemoglobin' so I removed three.


 * There were three links to the common term 'aluminium' so I removed two.
 * There were three links to the common term 'coke (fuel)' so I removed two.


 * There were two links to alpha process very close so I removed one.


 * There were two links to the common term 'blast furnace' so I removed one.
 * There were two links to the common term 'cast iron' so I removed one.
 * There were two links to the common term 'earth' (planet) so I removed one.
 * There were two links to the common term 'mars' (planet) so I removed one.
 * There were two links to the common term 'paint' so I removed one.
 * There were two links to the common term 'red meat' so I removed one.
 * There were two links to the common term 'water' so I removed one.


 * There were two links to 'inner core' (of the earth) so I removed one.
 * There were two links to 'outer core' (of the earth) so I removed one.

I left the many other duplicate links. Remember that too many low-value links will dilute the effect of high-value ones. I hope you don't feel the need to revert again. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 16:31, 19 October 2010 (UTC)


 * In Silicon dioxide you removed links to silicon and oxide from the lede, this presumably being because they were in the ChemBox, which comes before the lede in the source. I realise that many people deprecate multiple wikilinks from one page to another, but my rule of thumb is that duplication between infoboxes such as the ChemBox and TaxoBox and the text is acceptable. Otherwise, the lede is probably a better place for a wikilink than the bottom of the ChemBox. (I also notice that you've left a wikilink for silicon in the formula SiO2 in the lede, but removed it from the word silicon.) Lavateraguy (talk) 17:43, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

I put the links to oxide and silicon back in the lede. Feel free to amend the others as you think best. Lightmouse (talk) 17:46, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Please slow down!!
As requested above, please stop making inappropriate automated changes without manual verification. -Ehrenkater (talk) 13:14, 20 October 2010 (UTC) Many of the edits you are making are inconsistent in some way. Also, most of the edits you are currently making are to articles on buildings in the United States which are not notable for users outside the United States, and therefore no useful purpsoe is served by including metric equivalents of measurements.
 * Ehrenkater, I believe you are downplaying the potential interest of readers outside the US in anything US-related. The whole project should aim to make itself accessible to an international readership, and it is certainly in the interests of people involved in topics that involve US buildings that this be done. Could you provide some diffs? Tony   (talk)  13:55, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Absolutely, there are very many United States related articles which are of interest to and need to be as accessible as possible to readers outside the US - many of these just don't happen to be of so much interest that the lack of metric equivalents will be material. -- Ehrenkater (talk) 14:03, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Quite contrary to what you are saying that "no useful purpsoe (sic) is served by including metric equivalents of measurements", these additions of alternative units of measure serve to increase the mutual understanding in an international encyclopaedia for others who are not in the colonies ;-) Here in Wikipedia, we would categorise these edits under commonality and accessibility. Please don't try and pin your objections on some theoretical and unproven complaint of 'automated changes without manual verification'. If you were honest, you would be using WP:IDONTLIKEIT as an argument. -- Ohconfucius ¡digame! 14:04, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

Inappropriate removal of links! Yes, slow down.
I did not appreciate your edit to the HeNe Laser article after I had gone to the trouble of adding a number of HELPFUL links. I am wondering if you could convince me not to simply undo your edit (also the issue of "microns," see below). Otherwise I can go through it and redo the links which I think should have been there: most of the ones you removed.

I can see that you automatically removed links because they were considered "duplicates" but you didn't bother to consider that the DISPLAYED TEXT differed between links which pointed to the same page, so that they performed a different role, that is, giving a reference to a different term that the reader would not have realized referred to the same subject (or when it indeed was a different subject that happenned to be covered inside the same reference article). What's more, you consistently leave the first occurrance of a link, not considering that the second or third might be much more important in context, because the first time it was used in a tangential or qualifying role whereas in the following instance it was extremely pertinent to the topic of discussion! So do you want ME to go through and remove all but the most important one? That would be more reasonable, but I think I would be wasting more time doing that then whatever harm you might think is done by having a term twice linked within one article. Please comment. (And tell me how we should resolve our disagreement in regards to the HeNe Laser page). Interferometrist (talk) 13:44, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Feel free to re-add the links that you think are best. Lightmouse (talk) 13:47, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

That's not right. You can't run through thousands of articles with a tool and tell people, sorry, the tool is what it is, fix it yourself. If you are getting this many complaints from other editors, you really should stop what you're doing and re-evaluate. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 13:49, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree: you cannot expect to win an argument by being more prolific than other editors. You should fix your own mistakes.  Richard New Forest (talk) 20:12, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Can you provide a link to another article that concerns you? Lightmouse (talk) 13:51, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Excuse me? --Rifleman 82 (talk) 13:56, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Yup, it is in the project's interest that we get down to specifics. Running automation is a two-way learning curve that works best when there is specific engagement with other editors. Can you provide some diffs, Rifleman? Tony   (talk)  14:00, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm here because one of the articles I edit was visited by Lightmouse. When I came here I saw all sorts of exhortations for this user to slow down. This is what concerns me. Bots or bot-like work should be clearly uncontroversial. Occasional "whoops" mistakes are fine, but if it happens several times a day, then something is wrong. --Rifleman 82 (talk) 14:11, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia. Although everyone is welcome to contribute to Wikipedia, at least one of your recent edits did not appear to be constructive and has been reverted or removed. Please use the sandbox for any test edits you would like to make, and read the welcome page to learn more about contributing constructively to this encyclopedia. Thank you. -- Ehrenkater (talk) 13:57, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Ehrenkater, editors are welcome to revert and discuss (the specifics, please), but inserting a stock message such as this to an experienced editor is not considered helpful. I'm at a loss to contribute, since I don't know what issues you're referring to. Thanks. Tony   (talk)  14:00, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * This editor certainly appears to be experienced in terms of the number of edits they have made, but I am not the first to point out that a large number of edits they have made are unhelpful. They constitute vandalism, even though it is not as serious as some other vandalism. The specifics, including examples of specific examples, are shown above on this page. This is my last contribution to this issue, I don't propose to waste any more of my time on it. ---Ehrenkater (talk) 14:10, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * That is a pity. The opinions of editors such as you are important if the issue is to be talked through by the wider community. Will you reconsider? Tony   (talk)  15:16, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * At first I too felt that this standard notice was inappropriate for an experienced editor. However, by sheer prolificness Lightmouse is imposing their idiosyncratic views on WP, and shows little sign of listening to the arguments of others.  At some point prolific editing by an experienced editor in the face of concerted criticism becomes disruptive, and disruptive editing is by definition vandalism.  I think Lightmouse is edging towards that threshold, and I can understand why one might be tempted to post such a notice.  Perhaps Lightmouse and Tony1 could take the notice as a hint to think carefully about how such edits appear to other experienced editors.  Richard New Forest (talk) 20:12, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

"Microns" not an acceptable unit??
Regarding your edit to the HeNe Laser page: I was disappointed that you automatically changed every instance of the VERY COMMON term "micron" to the perhaps more official term "micrometer" which is infrequently used in writing or discourse. Is this a specific policy of Wikipedia which has already been decided? If so please point me to that decision (and I will consider whether to challenge it at a higher level). Otherwise I protest this change and wonder if I shouldn't just go change them back, which will make it easier to read.

Now I have looked through some other Wikipedia articles, and indeed I see that "micrometer" is used very often in preference to "micron." But I wonder if that is because you (or someone with similar intentions and/or using the same script) went through and made such a change to those articles as well.

In my field (optics) but also most other fields dealing with distances best expressed in millionths of a meter, the term micron is MUCH more common. "Micron" is a SYNONYM for micrometer and is very well understood. Since I work largely in infrared optics, wavelengths are most often expressed in microns/micrometers, so I went through one of my email boxes and did a search for both terms. Among 3992 emails in that box, there were a total of 4 unique emails in which the term "micrometer" appears. There were too many emails with the term "micron" to count, but I could easily say that over half the emails used this term at least once. So the use of micron to micrometer was at least in a proportion of 500:1. Are you proposing that "micrometer" is a better term AND that Wikipedia should be the vehicle for promoting that change in language?

I suppose we could compromise and just change all occurances of either term to the symbol μm and leave it at that. But then you would have to reprogram your script to go back through the pages that have been made difficult to read with the term "micrometer" and change those also to μm. What do you propose? Interferometrist (talk) 14:02, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * There is the additional problem that the US spelling of "micrometer" also means an instrument for measuring small distances. Either "micron" or "μm" would be clearer. --Ehrenkater (talk) 14:06, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

The term 'micron' was [officially removed] from SI 40 years or so ago. The benefits of SI are that they do away with special names that have to be learned or explained. It has a simple format (prefix plus unitname). From that simple format, you can guess the size and/or the unit. Somebody may not have heard the term microwatt before but they should be able to realise it's 'micro' plus 'watt'.

Scientists are aware of both terms and there is no field or geographical region which doesn't use the SI term. Although as you say, the term 'micron' is used by some scientists in some domains. But some ordinary people don't know what a micron is (as is shown by the multiple cases where it has to be explained in text). Thus the SI term is more accessible. Although the American spelling of micrometer is ambiguous as a single word, the meaning is always clear from the text (e.g. "the wavelength is 54 micrometers", "we measured it with a micrometer"). I'd have no objection to replacing the full form with the symbolic form (μm) but there are cases where the full form is needed. Lightmouse (talk) 14:24, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Well I still disagree. Yes, someone who has never heard of a word won't know what the word means, and in that particular case it would indeed be faster for them to figure out what "micrometer" means (using the rules pertaining to SI units) than taking 10 seconds to lookup the word "micron" after which they will always understand it. Most of the people reading an optics article will already be familiar with the term but if they aren't then they SHOULD learn its meaning. Otherwise, as I said, they would have trouble making sense of 99.8% of my emails (where an infrared wavelength is specified) which use that term rather than "micrometer." And again, micron isn't just used by "some scientists in some domains" but by MOST scientists and non-scientists (in every domain, as far as I know) when they need to refer to .000001 meters. Can you not think of any other aspects of the English language which are more irregular? Are you on a crusade to make the English language perfectly logical and concise in every such manner, and to remove the use of every synonym where there is no difference in meaning? Then you sure have a big job ahead of you.....

Interferometrist (talk) 15:01, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Interferometrist, would you be prepared to engage in a discussion if this is taken to WT:MOSNUM? It needs to be talked through not by two editors, but by a larger field of users, don't you think? Tony   (talk)  15:15, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, absolutely! I'm rather new to Wikipedia (as an editor) so please let me know how/where/when to contribute to that discussion. Briefly, my position is that the term "micron" IS an SI unit (it means micrometer), just not the official SI name. It is widely used and understood and I don't think it is the role of Wikipedia to "correct" the English language. I didn't want to have an extended discussion with Lightmouse in particular, but would be happy to contribute to decisions regarding issues of style and terminology that would be applied more universally within Wikipedia.

Interferometrist (talk) 16:10, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Who's going to launch it there at WT:MOSNUM? Lightmouse? Tony   (talk)  16:44, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks both of you. See: wp:mosnum - SI unit 'micrometre/er' Regards Lightmouse (talk) 17:16, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Please see discussion under above, in which Lightmouse has taken a very similar attitude to the hectare.  If "micron" is widely understood, using "micrometre" instead is confusing for users. For example you will find very few in the wool industry who would understand that they were the same thing.  The last change in this edit removes comprehension for the majority of users for whom the sentence has any meaning at all.  Richard New Forest (talk) 20:12, 20 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Richard, can you give an idea about how the rules should be expressed? At least a draft of what might be considered by the community at, say, MOSNUM? Tony   (talk)  16:24, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Semi-automated tools
As I said on the talk for the MOS, keep in mind that the use of semi-automated editing tools is supposed to be only for completely non-controversial edits. If you have people complaining on your talk page, by definition, what you are doing is not non-controversial. Something to keep in mind. Gigs (talk) 01:05, 23 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Unfortunately, there isn't a list of things that are controversial. Wikipedians argue about anything and if I don't have a list of controversial edits then it's hard to know in advance. Since janitorial edits touch a lot of articles (by definition), there will be may be a variety of reasons why people post here, only one of which is controversy. People rarely thank janitorial editors for thousands of edits that they don't notice but if you do one edit that they don't like, they sometimes regard it disproportionately. Sometimes, the edit isn't controversial at all but just a matter of 'we don't like change to our articles' or it may be just people new to the issue who want to repeat the same old debates. Believe, me I don't like having to spend time debating small details with people so I already know what you mean. But I only find out what produces posts after I've done a lot of editing, and even then I can't be sure whether a couple of vocal editors defines a controversy. Thanks for your comment. Lightmouse (talk) 09:57, 23 October 2010 (UTC)
 * One editor complaining is sufficient. Gigs (talk) 18:15, 23 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Of course, it's always up to the operator to judge whether it is a matter which merits deeper investigation; it could be as simple as "Minority of One", or a minority veto – neither of those carry any particular weight here on WP. -- Ohconfucius ¡digame! 03:55, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Odd one
Just reporting. --62.216.124.25 (talk) 01:10, 26 October 2010 (UTC)
 * That edit has now been fixed. However, it's true the underlying source of error needs to be corrected. -- Ohconfucius ¡digame! 04:11, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing and reporting that. It was human error in a manual edit. I appreciate it. Lightmouse (talk) 09:21, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

FYI
No big deal, but for your information, the metric equivalent of acres is hectares (not sq m, not sq km). Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 12:32, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Hmmm. I've noticed you've done quite a few.
 * Then I noticed the above posting.
 * I don't really want to sound stupid in public and make a fool of myself (and I have read and understood what you wrote), but I don't understand why you want to represent acres by any unit other than hectares. Yes, I'm Australian, but so what? As far as I know, (and I don't pretend to be an oracle, or omniscient), I was always taught the SI equivalent is hectares. Please educate me as to where the use of any other factor is advocated. Awaiting your reply. Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 13:02, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * In any case, in any and all circumstances related to Australian pages, I can't see a reason to use anything other than hectares. Your thoughts / comments / etc.? Pdfpdf (talk)
 * BTW: On what basis did you decide sq m was a better unit than ha? Pdfpdf (talk) 13:08, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Kilometres and metres (and their squares) are present to a greater or lesser extent in all domains, and are easier for ordinary people to understand than hectares - Actually, I strongly doubt that. If that was the case, then by analogy, non-metric users would use sq yards and sq miles. They don't. They use acres. Pdfpdf (talk) 13:12, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * As far as Tony's suggestion is concerned, a compromise could work on the basis that 'small units for small values, larger units for large values'. Thus areas up to 10,000 m2 (1 ha) in m2, areas over 1 km2 (100 ha) in square kilometres.
 * I disagree. I would like someone, (anyone! But you'll do), to explain why:
 * sq ft and sq yds should be converted to anything other than sq m
 * acres should be converted to anything other than hectares
 * sq miles should be converted to anything other than sq km
 * Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 13:18, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

It isn't a matter of translating how a non-metric person thinks and trying to find an 'equivalent'. It's a matter of using the unit that WP readers can understand best. Incidentally, the hectare isn't an SI unit. There's only one SI unit for each quantity, the SI unit of length (metre) can easily be converted into the SI unit of area (square metre). The hectare is a "Non-SI unit accepted for use with the International System of Units", see the official SI website.

For small areas, a small unit is appropriate and more understandable. An area of 100 square metres is easily understood as 10 metres by 10 metres. For large areas, a large unit is appropriate and more understandable. An area of 100 square kilometres is easily understood as 10 km by 10 km. More people understand metres and km than hectares. It's a matter of understandability.

The way to test understandability in both directions might be as follows: I hope that helps. Lightmouse (talk) 13:28, 18 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Go into a school field with 100 ordinary WP readers (non-farmers, non-antipodean). Ask half of them to describe it in hectares. Ask the other half to describe it in square metres.
 * Show a map to 100 ordinary WP readers (non-farmers, non-antipodean). Then point to a forested area on the map. Ask half of them to describe it in hectares. Ask the other half to describe it in square kilometres.


 * [Edit conflict]Thanks for the reply. It's past midnight here - I'll think about it and reply in about 20 hours.
 * (FYI, my quick ill-considered reactions are VERY similar to "Richard New Forest"'s, particularly his WP:OR comments.) Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 13:48, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * [Edit conflict] Hectares are widely used wherever metric units are used, and I really don't agree with the idea that square metres and square kilometres will be more widely familiar. It's not just farmers nor just Australians that use hectares, but most English-speaking people who measure land area in metric units.  Hectares are also not a "word-for-word translation" of acres, they are (as Pdfpdf has also noted above) the usual metric equivalent of acres.  Avoiding them is far more confusing than using the default.


 * As for the suggested threshold: no, that does not work, any more than jumping straight from square yards to square miles would (and in fact it is not a compromise). There are conceptual thresholds from square yards to acres, and from acres to square miles, and similarly from square metres to hectares to square kilometres.  If we are in the acre range, hectares will almost always be the best choice for metric units, which is of course why they are the template default.


 * Lightmouse, could you please go back over your acre edits and replace the default: every single one of your acre conversions I've scanned through is confusing as it is. You personally may think they are better as square metres or square kilometres, and you are entitled to think so, but I'm afraid you are forcing WP to fit your private point of view: it isn't an in-house publication for Lightmice either!


 * I do agree that there are very many articles in need of metric conversions: you are otherwise doing sterling work in that area. Richard New Forest (talk) 13:31, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure of the validity or value of imaginary original research on what people are best able to understand. Most ordinary people are hopeless at estimating areas by any unit.  Richard New Forest (talk) 13:36, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Thinking about this further... Lightmouse: if you really do feel that square km or square m are always easier to understand than ha, then why not suggest changing the template default?  Otherwise, I think the existence of that default implies that there is WP consensus that acres normally convert to hectares.  Richard New Forest (talk) 13:39, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

The templates are just pieces of software. It's easier for software to have a single output value but that doesn't mean alternative outputs are forbidden. The template is merely a tool and the developers would be horrified if you suggested that they take responsibility for each template conversion in each article. It's the editor that is responsible. I don't understand the idea that the square metre and the square kilometres are confusing. It's quite the opposite to me. It isn't confusing to see an area described in square kilometres. If you'd or anyone else would like to help add metric units, it would be great. I'm always looking for other people to help out. I'd be happy if we spent this time metricating articles rather than debating each other's valuable edits. Trying to help. Lightmouse (talk) 13:49, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Hey Lightmouse, we're not attacking you. Just asking questions. Please realise we're all on the same side here. Well, it's now even more past midnight. As I said, I'll reply tomorrow. Pdfpdf (talk) 13:54, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I don't mean to suggest you're attacking me. I accept that we all want what's best. Hopefully we can work it out together. Take to you later. Lightmouse (talk) 13:55, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * No, of course alternative outputs are not forbidden, but we do need some kind of reason to avoid the default, especially if we are to do it on every single occasion. Lightmouse, I'm sure as a dedicated metricationist you've had many conversations with people who say things like "acres are easier to understand, we don't need metric units".  I'm afraid you're really doing just the same with hectares.  You seem to have some difficulty understanding them, and so have taken a dislike to them which you have not been able to provide a rational explanation for.  Can I suggest that you take a bit of time to get familiar with them, and I think you may find them less alarming.


 * You seem to be mixing up two types of confusion. You feel that square metres and square kilometres are rational units: you are right, they are, and for someone like you who is unfamiliar with hectares, they are perfectly clear.  However, what we need on WP is units that people generally are familiar with.  The vast majority of English-speaking metric users are familiar with using hectares for similar sizes of area that imperial users use acres for.  They are unfamiliar with using square metres or square kilometres for these sorts of areas, and so will be confused if you do use them.  We are not using hectares because they are a word-for-word translation for acres, but because they are the usual metric unit for areas in that range.  If I see an area of, say "200,000 square metres", I have to remember that a hectare is 10,000 square metres and calculate that what is really meant is 20 ha (actually in my experience many metric users do not know how many square metres are in a hectare and have to calculate that too).  Why should every other user have to do sums in their heads because you are unfamiliar with hectares?


 * Incidentally at least some non-English-speaking people do not share our usage of hectares – I believe that in France ares are widely used, which I am not familiar with and so I'd also find them confusing. Richard New Forest (talk) 20:27, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * In the meanwhile can you please stop doing acres until we have come to some agreement. Richard New Forest (talk) 20:31, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for presenting your debating points which are quite clear and rational in many respects. I think it's worth noting for the record that you say on your user page that you are a farmer and may be a frequent user of hectares in your job and in encounters with officialdom. That isn't meant to undermine your points. Many metric readers are familiar with seeing official statements in units like nautical miles or barrels of oil but that doesn't mean they understand them. Frankly, I suspect that even in the non-metric world, ordinary people may find 4 square miles easier to understand than 2560 acres, even though the acre is commonplace. Similarly, 4 square kilometres is easy to visualise in terms of a square of 2 by 2 km rather than '400 ha' which has no convenient reference points. This is because distance units are used more often by ordinary people than area units and it is relatively easy to find reference points for distance but less so for area, unless you own or work with land.

For the benefit of any onlookers, I'll repeat the understandability test:
 * Go into a school field with 100 ordinary WP readers (non-farmers, non-antipodean). Ask half of them to describe it in hectares. Ask the other half to describe it in square metres.
 * Show a map to 100 ordinary WP readers (non-farmers, non-antipodean). Then point to a forested area on the map. Ask half of them to describe it in hectares. Ask the other half to describe it in square kilometres.

Anyway, I've stopped for now. Regards Lightmouse (talk) 22:12, 18 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks. (Also for the record, I've been using hectares for many years longer than I've been a farmer.)


 * The examples you give are not all well chosen: yes, an area of 400 ha might well be better given as 4 square km, but for exactly the same reason it might well be better given as 1.5 square miles. You have picked an area in the upper range of relevance for both acres and hectares, and which way you go on both will depend on the context.


 * As for your imaginary research, I'm not sure what it would show, even if it were real research – probably just that ordinary people can or can't do sums. You could apply exactly the same test to square yards, square miles and acres and it would mean just as little.  As I've said before, understandability does not just depend on ease of calculation, but also on familiarity with the unit, and the hectare is the standard metric area unit in this range.


 * Finally, I really don't know where you get the idea that hectares are only used by farmers and Australians. As you point out for acres, they are commonplace: they are the usual metric unit used by everyone who needs to understand areas in the relevant range.  Farmers of course form a large part of that group, because the average townie doesn't need to know about field-sized and farm-sized areas.  Exactly the same applies to acres.  Richard New Forest (talk) 14:00, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

I didn't say that they're 'only' used by farmers and Australians. I was saying that they're less understandable by ordinary people but leaving farmers and antipodeans out of it and not making any claim for them either way. I think we understand each other reasonably well and we both can see the distinction between the concept of 'familiar' and 'understandable' (where that means being able to estimate the area from a number, or being able to allocate the value from an area). I accept that familiarity has a role to play and I hope you also accept that understandability has a role to play. Lightmouse (talk) 14:11, 19 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Hi again. I've given the matter some thought, and so have others I see!
 * There are many millions of people who use hectares in much the same situations that many millions use acres. For those situations, those who use acres do not use sq ft, sq yds or sq miles, and those who use hectares, do not use sq m or sq km.
 * At the risk of stating the obvious, people who aren't familiar with hectares, are not familiar with hectares. However, that's not a supporting argument for avoiding the use of hectares.
 * Thus, for much the same reasons that others have stated above, my POV is:
 * Convert acres to hectares
 * Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 14:24, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I agree with the main thrust of what you've said but not the conclusion. I'm trying to focus on understandability rather than familiarity, although both have a role to play. I think we've both made our points clearly and it's clear that when you do the conversions, you'll use the unit that you choose. I've not examined your edits and don't have any current plans to. I hope we can both go back to editing to improve articles for ordinary metric readers. Keep up the good work. Lightmouse (talk) 14:52, 19 October 2010 (UTC)

breakpoint for editing convenience

 * Lightmouse, if I've understood you correctly, you're suggesting that everyone else can use hectares if they wish, while you'll continue avoiding them. If that's right, no, I don't think it's on (if it's not, please ignore the following).  Your personal war against the hectare has made many articles harder to understand for the vast majority of metric users who do use them.  Please will you use the default from now on unless there is a particular good reason not to, and please will you go back through the articles you have done and correct them.  As I've said every single one of them that I've looked at has been confused by your idiosyncracy.  Thanks.  Richard New Forest (talk) 21:17, 19 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Response please, Lightmouse. Richard New Forest (talk) 20:12, 20 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Response please, Lightmouse. Richard New Forest (talk) 13:14, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

This debate has gone on for quite a long time and a lot has been said, sometimes several times. I'm not your enemy. I merely added conversions where none exist, in order to provide understandability for ordinary metric readers. That's a good thing, not a bad thing. If we don't quite agree that's unfortunate. You'll have to forgive me for getting a little tired of the lengthy and sometimes circular discussion. I find some of the things said in this debate to be impolite and I don't like engaging in discussions where that happens.

If this issue is important to you, you aren't totally reliant on me. If you want to remove metric conversions, go ahead. If you want to modify metric conversions, go ahead. If you want to add metric conversions as you think best, go ahead.

Please can we get back to work? Regards Lightmouse (talk) 13:47, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Lightmouse, we are at cross purposes here. Who in this discussion has argued for removing metric conversions?  No-one is anyone's "enemy", and we all seem to be in favour of metric conversions.  All we are talking about is which is the most appropriate metric conversion for acres.  You have insisted that it should not be hectares, everyone else has said it should be.  Your very numerous semi-automated conversions have avoided them, and you have thereby introduced confusion to many articles.


 * I am asking that you do two things please:
 * Cease avoiding hectares unless there is a good reason to do so in a particular case.
 * Tidy your semi-automated acre edits by going back over them and restoring the default conversion.
 * It is not for me nor anyone else to do your tidying for you. Richard New Forest (talk) 15:32, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

I don't think square kilometres are confusing units. If you think square kilometres are confusing, just remove them. The articles will be back where they started. I say the articles are better than they were, you say they're worse. Can I suggest we both accept that we aren't going to agree? Lightmouse (talk) 15:52, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I am struggling to find any evidence that you have read anyone else's views, and I can understand Pdfpdf's frustration (which in this case was expressed forthrightly, but I don't think particularly uncivilly).


 * I might be prepared to accept agreeing to differ if you had provided some explanation for your position – but I can see no real argument other than "I don't like it". You choose to avoid a default for unexplained reasons of your own, and against the clearly explained views of others, which you have not addressed: it is not enough just to say we're not going to agree when you have not engaged in the discussion.  You suggest that I could go and correct your errors: this is disingenuous, as it presupposes that I have the time and the tools to do that.  You are I'm afraid abusing the power that your extremely intensive use of a semi-automated process gives you: manual editing cannot be expected to keep up with that, which is much what Gigs was saying under  below.  It is for you to put right your own errors.


 * Incidentally I did not say that square km (or square m) are confusing, any more than anyone suggested removing metric conversions, and this supports the view that you have not read other people's comments properly. What I actually said was that they are confusing as conversions from acres. Richard New Forest (talk) 16:37, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

I've been accused of not listening, missing the point, not reading. Unfortunately, that accusation is used by people that disagree with somebody else to suggest that they're not being fair. I did give an explanation many posts ago. So please don't say I'm not being fair. See:
 * ''It isn't a matter of translating how a non-metric person thinks and trying to find an 'equivalent'. It's a matter of using the unit that WP readers can understand best. Incidentally, the hectare isn't an SI unit. There's only one SI unit for each quantity, the SI unit of length (metre) can easily be converted into the SI unit of area (square metre). The hectare is a "Non-SI unit accepted for use with the International System of Units", see the official SI website.


 * ''For small areas, a small unit is appropriate and more understandable. An area of 100 square metres is easily understood as 10 metres by 10 metres. For large areas, a large unit is appropriate and more understandable. An area of 100 square kilometres is easily understood as 10 km by 10 km. More people understand metres and km than hectares. It's a matter of understandability.


 * ''The way to test understandability in both directions might be as follows:


 * ''* Go into a school field with 100 ordinary WP readers (non-farmers, non-antipodean). Ask half of them to describe it in hectares. Ask the other half to describe it in square metres.
 * ''* Show a map to 100 ordinary WP readers (non-farmers, non-antipodean). Then point to a forested area on the map. Ask half of them to describe it in hectares. Ask the other half to describe it in square kilometres.


 * ''I hope that helps. Lightmouse (talk) 13:28, 18 October 2010 (UTC)

You disagreed with that, but please don't accuse me of not explaining, not reading, not listening, or missing the point. I don't disrespect your opinion or suggest you are idiosynchratic. Lightmouse (talk) 16:46, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I did suggest on my user page that there was no need for you to repeat yourself, but you seem to have done it anyway. Your response does not address the arguments, and all its points have been dealt with.  I respect your right to have an opinion, but I expect you to be prepared to explain it.  All you are saying in that (now twice-repeated) statement is that square metres and square kilometres are easily understood, which is self-evident.  You have not explained what is wrong with hectares, nor addressed any of the points put to you.  Repeating yourself is not an argument.  Richard New Forest (talk) 18:41, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Apparently I'm not allowed to express my opinion. Nor am I allowed to ask questions. As for getting answers ...
 * If I were ... Pdfpdf (talk) 16:55, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

fork

 * Hi Lightmouse!
 * Yes, I agree that: This debate has gone on for quite a long time and a lot has been said, sometimes several times.
 * I find some of the things said in this debate to be impolite and I don't like engaging in discussions where that happens. - Never-the-less, you seem remarkably resilient, and (from my POV) incredible tollerant and polite. ( Considerably more tollerant and polite than I am, and I have to emphasise that I very much appreciate that.)
 * But as you probably expect, I don't entirely agree with you. My POV is that you are missing / have missed the point. I'll say more next month. Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 14:05, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * This discussion has out-sized itself, for we'll never reach anything but a micro-consensus here. It need to be at WT:MOSNUM to get more eyeballs on it. -- Ohconfucius ¡digame! 14:07, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. Many editors try their best but it isn't always good enough in the opinion of other editors, or even in the opinion of the same editor later. The great thing about Wikipedia is that anything can be changed by later edits. I appreciate the way you've responded, Pdfpdf. Hopefully we've all learned some things and can move on. Lightmouse (talk) 14:15, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

back on topic
I am somewhat of an expert on real-world practices as well as the SI. Will someone please explain precisely what the dispute originated over and what editors are still disagreeing over? BTW, it would be exceedingly helpful if the nature of the dispute could be characterized relative to what WP:MOSNUM says. By that, I mean: is the dispute one where an editor thinks the other is not adhering to what MOSNUM already prescribes and proscribes? Or is the dispute over an issue on which MOSNUM is silent or doesn’t sufficiently address? Greg L (talk) 17:02, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Others may (will? / do?) see it differently, but as far as I'm concerned, the issue has nothing to do with SI. The issue is that lighmouse is using a bot to make enourmous numbers of edits, and when anybody says "Hey! Hang on a minute!", his response is: "Well if you don't like it, revert it." The thing is, the majority of people don't have automated tools st their convenient disposal, and although lightmouse can make dozens of changes per minute with his automated tools, the majority of users can not come close to that rate when editing manually. Even using rollback I wasn't able to achieve 10 edits per minute.
 * So thanks for your offer of help, but expertise in SI is not what's needed to solve this problem. Pdfpdf (talk) 17:17, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * I agree with what Pdfpdf has said, but to answer your question, Lightmouse was using the Convert template to convert acres to metric units in very many articles. So far, so worthy.  However, he is preventing the template from using the default conversion to hectares, and forcing it to square metres or square kilometres.  You can judge for yourself whether he has provided any justification for this.  Richard New Forest (talk) 17:41, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * All this lengthy thread over that?? Is this “acre (sq meter)” issue still the case? What justification is there for providing a parenthetical conversion of land-area measurements that are expressed in acres where the parenthetical is square meters? It doesn’t matter if area measurements are best done in strict accordance with the rule of SI if the typical practice in Flood plains is to use acres and hectares (That is a big “if”.) The rule of SI doesn’t stop Wikipedia from expressing the displacement of Honda motorcycle engines in cc nor does it stop us from using lightyears when measuring distances to other galaxies. I think WP:MOSNUM is sufficiently clear when it says editors should follow the practices of "a clear majority of pertinent sources" or "most used by reliable sources". I think the resolution of what Lightbot should be doing can be entirely solved by rigorous adherence to MOSNUM in this case; which is to say, I see no need to revise MOSNUM to handle and exception in this case. Greg L (talk) 17:56, 26 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Fine. Let’s leave the SI out of it. I am also quite expert on MOSNUM and have had a heavy hand in what it says. In these sort of things, I find the dispute invariably boils down to one of two possibilities:
 * The bot-assisted edits are compliant with MOSNUM but someone feels that MOSNUM is in error or is silent on a nuance and the editor would like to have a community discussion on a nuance before more rapid-fire editing occurs; or…
 * The bot-assisted edits are not compliant with MOSNUM.
 * For instance, I noted your above post where you stated as follows:


 * sq ft and sq yds should be converted to anything other than sq m
 * acres should be converted to anything other than hectares
 * sq miles should be converted to anything other than sq km


 * I don’t disagree with that. It’s been a while since I’ve waded through MOSNUM (which could always use restructuring to better find stuff). Were you making that triple-bullet observation because the bot Lightbot isn’t editing per the three bullet points? Or did you add those three bullets to make another point? Greg L (talk) 17:33, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

I have this proposal: Perhaps MOSNUM needs a guideline for large-area measurements. It would rely upon a heavy dose of FCL (Follow Current Literature) but would expand upon that with examples to prime the mind as to the general concept. The given examples would be as follows: Generally speaking, unless specialty fields of endeavor such as flood plains do otherwise (acre-feet being the unit of measure even though the areas involved are truly huge), the land area of cities and towns are typically measured in square miles and square kilometers. The land area of farmers fields are typically in acres and hectares. The land area of sports playing fields are typically in square yards and square meters. The area of residential homes are typically in square feet and square meters. (Generally speaking). Greg L (talk) 20:27, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Please be more careful
Whatever it is you are doing, can you please be more careful. For example, this edit of Hawker Typhoon. This is one of a number of your recent edits that I have needed to correct – have you heard of the expression "sometimes less is more"? In friendship. Jan 1 naD (talk • contrib) 20:19, 27 October 2010 (UTC)
 * The problem was a doubling of the convert word? Any idea how to prevent that? Also, Jan1nad, I've cleaned up the range dashes. A few more double-adjective hyphens are required (please see WP:HYPHEN): five-inch, forward-moving, etc. Tony   (talk)  03:22, 28 October 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for spotting and fixing those double converts. I've gone back over and fixed the remaining ones. The issue is fixed at source now. Much appreciated. Lightmouse (talk) 11:49, 28 October 2010 (UTC)