User talk:Philcha/Archive 3

Manual archive Philcha (talk) 21:11, 18 September 2008 (UTC)

Cambrian explosion
Fair points. My approach was to lay down the evidence first, then interpret it in the later section, but it doesn't seem ideal. Perhaps as you say each section could conclude with a "why are you telling me this, then", then the article could conclude with a semi-repetitive "conclusion" drawing things together. Pretty much any good piece of writing ends with a conclusion, but they seem to be frowned upon at WP. In terms of "types of organism preserved", what are the salient points that would define a "type"? Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  12:41, 28 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm sorry, I didn't realise you were referring to the sub-article. Yes, these need a lot of work.  One could probably write a book on "Burgess shale type preservation", and I certainly intend to spend some quality time with that page at some point. Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  13:58, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Refs / URLs
DOIs act as URLs, and usually lead to at least an abstract. PMC and PMIDs are usually useful too. The citation tool has no way of finding a URL that doesn't fall into the previous categories unless it is explicitly supplied (for example, if you access it via the "scholar" interface). Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  13:47, 28 June 2008 (UTC)


 * There was recently a debate at Template_talk:Cite journal about whether the title should be linked (to point to the doi) if a DOI, but no URL, was specified. I can't remember the details but I think it fizzled out somewhat. Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  14:04, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Agronomic revolution
Hey, I've just started work on the article for the Agronomic revolution. If we get it up to a decent standard in the next four days, it could be featured on the main page as a new article (in the "Did you know" section). Just thought I'd flag it up if you wanted to help expand it a bit! Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  14:44, 28 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Neither had I! (-: I'll be largely basing it on the Seilacher paper, and if I get keen on references within. I asked because you sounded like you knew a bit about the chemistry of things - as soon as anyone mentions  to me I tend to switch off! Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  14:55, 28 June 2008 (UTC)


 * So we're to stagger into it leaning on each other like a couple of drunks? Philcha (talk) 15:41, 28 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, I know next-to-nothing about at least 90% of the articles I create before I start writing them. But one reference tends to lead to another, and I like to think that most of my contributions end up being reasonably comprehensive.   Better to knock something together than to wait for an expert to become a wikipedia editor (or vice versa). By the way, how's it looking now? Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  15:57, 28 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Hey, I like your image! But, is that a gastropod I see munching away in the background?  They didn't evolve until the late Cambrian - according to WP, at least!  If the edit's easy to make, it might be nice to also illustrate the burrow of an "undermat miner", which follow the boundary between the mat and the underlying substrate.  Thanks again for the addition! Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  23:28, 28 June 2008 (UTC)


 * Well, I guess "after the revolution" doesn't have to imply immediately after... and the snail is cute! I guess the obscure term can be attributed to Seilacher's German mother tongue.  As I understand it, the revolution worked its way from shallow waters to deep - Burgess type preservation could have continued until each little backwater had been reworked by burrowers. Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  08:54, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

End-Ediacaran extinction
This collaboration lark's quite good fun, isn't it! If you fancy taking a quick look at End-Ediacaran extinction, I've just created a stub there... Maybe you'll be able to expand that one a little, too? Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  11:28, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Cambrian explosion
Go ahead - I thought I was done but realised that my attempts to keep your edit intact had failed... Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  22:41, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Howard Staunton to GA nomination
Hello Philcha, you will probably be interested to know that I have nominated Howard Staunton for the GA-class, as you can see both on Talk:Howard Staunton and on Good article nominations. I think the article is good enough to pass the test, and I prefer to nominate it already because it can take a month before the review actually begins. Let's keep the quality increasing! SyG (talk) 18:27, 6 July 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Palaeontology
Hi Philcha,

I've noticed your interest/excellent edits at Lystrosaurus and, I was wondering if you'd be interested in joining the Palaeo project? Best, Mark t young (talk) 19:49, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

Wikimedia Commons
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Microbial mat timeline
Hi, in this revision you restored the complicated version of the code at the timeline. I just wanted to check whether this was solely to use your own selection of colours, or whether there is a problem with the "period" syntax which I hadn't noticed. Cheers, Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  16:31, 15 July 2008 (UTC)


 * In that case, for futureproofing (if they decide to change one of the boundaries, etc) and template simplicity, would you mind if I change the syntax back, preserving the present colours? Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  18:46, 15 July 2008 (UTC)


 * You have to be careful when specifying image sizes, as you did at microbial mat. Users who set their thumbnail size to default to 300px in their preferences will now see the image as smaller than they otherwise would.  This creates the unfortunate problem that 300px is the minimum size that a thumbnail can be "enlarged" to. Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  23:14, 15 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Not that I know of, unfortunately; there was certainly nothing documented at Help:Image last time I looked. You might be able to do something clever by using the css "background-image" attribute, but I suspect this may be disabled. Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  09:16, 16 July 2008 (UTC)


 * The new CSR pic looks fine, by the way. Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  12:59, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Archiving talk page threads at Talk:Racism
Hi, Talk:Racism is waaaay too huge with over 115 talk threads. Would you be willing to help tag talk sections with resolved and stale as appropriate so we can start archiving old talk threads? Even a few at time will help! Thank you! Banj e b oi   22:05, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Small shellies
Two possible solutions are in the edit history. Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  20:03, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Alexander Alekhine
Thanks for your opinion! I am going to improve the chapter Accusations of anti-Semitism (list of the best Jewish and non-Jewish chess masters according to Alekhine, and an information on Lionel Kieseritzky and Carl Schlechter). --Mibelz 09:53, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Dear Pkilcha,
Hi! thankyou for your opinion on my latest article, the "Big Five." I've taken your opinion to hand, and I have been having thoughts of merging my article to "Extinction Events." Thankyou once again!--Dr. Dale S. Satre (talk) 15:44, 19 July 2008 (UTC)

Tassilo's name
Hello Philcha, I see you are interested in Tassilo's short name. I did some research on the issue a while ago. The best information I found was in the ADB (Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie). It said: Der Beiname 'und der Lasa', obwohl nicht urkundlich, hat zu der unhistorischen Contraction: 'von der Lasa' geführt; eine Kürzung, deren sich auch Tassilo oft als Autor bedient hat. My translation: The cognomen und der Lasa, though not documented (vouched), has led to the unhistorical contraction von der Lasa, in fact a short name often used by Tassilo himself as an author. Much confusion was the result, and, as the source claims, led to a joke by Prussian King (later Emperor) William I saying 'Good morning, dear Heydebrand. How is von der Lasa doing?' The background from all this seems to have been that Heydebrand ('Heydebrandt' is only a misspelling in this case, it seems) was a common name, with different branches of the noble family existing. Finally, 'von der Lasa' is to be seen as self-styled. Just to know: His son, Heinrich von Heydebrand und der Lasa became a conservative politican and (1914-18) member of the Prussian Upper House (Herrenhaus) ---DaQuirin (talk) 02:14, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
 * PS: As for the first name, the source says, both forms 'Tassilo' (more common) and 'Thassilo' existed ...
 * PS2: 'der Lasa' does only exist in English sources and is plain wrong. Strangely, 'von der Lasa' means (grammatically) that 'Lasa' is a female form, so as a contraction 'der Lasa' (which is a male form) is irritating in German ears. For the basic question, as possible short names, there are three: "von Heydebrand", "Heydebrand" or "von der Lasa".

Thanks for the information about abbreviations. I hadn't noticed that City of London Chess Magazine′s notes on Von der Lasa vs G. Nielsen at Copenhagen mis-spelled the name "Heydebrandt", but will update the article to point that out. Can you provide an exampe of the same abbreviation spelt correctly?


 * I don't know sources about "Der Lasa", but I did see it myself in English sources. I don't think, it's important, frankly speaking. You should not mention it in the article. Moreover, the form "Baron von der Lasa" is only used in English sources as well, see here or in the Spinrad article. The source of the joke "Good morning, dear Heydebrand. How is von der Lasa doing?" is the ADB article: W. Uhl: Heydebrand und der Lasa, Tassilo von. In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB), vol. 50, Leipzig 1905, p. 297–305 (p. 297). As for the 'correct' abbreviations: "(von) Heydebrand" is the name of the Silesian noble family. And the most common form "von der Lasa", though incorrect, was used by the chess author. Now to make it even more complex, in the NDB (Neue Deutsche Biographie, the 20th century equivalent) article about von der Lasa's relative Ernst, it is stated that the name is "Heydebrand und der Lase (since 1920: und der Lasa)". Don't try to bring too much clarity in 19th century name issues where no such clarity exists! "von der Lasa" is the most common form and both correct and incorrect in a certain way. --DaQuirin (talk) 13:26, 21 July 2008 (UTC)
 * (PS: the NDB article is about Ernst v Heydebrand und der Lasa, a relative, and another conservative politican, but 'our' Tassilo is mentioned as well in the intro) --DaQuirin (talk)

Orphaned non-free media (Image:GalCiv OS2 main 1.png)
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Orphaned non-free media (Image:GalCiv diplomacy 01.png)
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Cloudina
Looks pretty good! My one suggestion would be that the lead is a bit long, especially the final paragraph which is almost longer than the section it summarises! Perhaps details could be removed. Also, are those images really all your own work? Their source should be noted somewhere, and as derivative works are covered by the same copyright as the original, you should probably add a fair use rationale too. (User:AWeenieMan/furme makes this easier)

As for a GA review, it may be a useful source of comments and suggestions for improvement from an uninvolved reader. I guess it couldn't hurt to nominate it; it doesn't bear an obligation of putting in any more work but could improve the article. I'll leave it up to you though! Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  13:49, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Vernanimalcula
I remember looking for further sources when I expanded the article a while back, and not finding any. As far as I'm aware there haven't been any more discussions on it - I guess there's a stalemate until someone finds and analyzes some more specimens! Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  13:52, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

Small shelly fossils
This looks pretty comprehensive now, although I'm certainly no expert. The one criticism I'd make is that it's a little piecemeal. I'm not sure if there's much that can be done about this – the list of different shells is by its nature very bitty. But I do think the structure needs a bit of a look at – I'd put the list later and introduce the concept of skeletonisation, and perhaps their significance, sooner. It doesn't really flow or "tell a story" at the moment. And one other thing – the iron pyrite gastropod is an very interesting aside, but does it really have a place in this article? Perhaps Exoskeleton would be a more worthy home. (Oh – you got there first!)

Keep up the good work,

Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  14:01, 31 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm just not sure it's 100% relevant – maybe it's a flow issue but it strikes be as misplaced. If you want to keep it then don't let me stop you!


 * I love your "calling card" idea. I've modified a traditional header at Cambrian explosion calling card which you may like to modify and use (-:


 * Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  16:02, 31 July 2008 (UTC)


 * I'm taking a more thorough look through now, and think I would like to see the "minerals used" section expanded a little. I guess that's why the mollusc stood out - you've given the reader some good information about a living creature, but very little about the topic of the article.  Why would calcite be easier to precipitate than aragonite, and what would cause the regional differences you seem to have inferred?  How did the organisms precipitate the minerals in the first place? What are the roles of structural proteins? Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  19:53, 31 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Also, I'm curious as to how "non-mineralised tubes" fall under the juristiction of the small shelly fossils? Martin  (Smith609 – Talk)  20:07, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
 * (P.S. done reviewing)