User talk:Rich Farmbrough/Archive/2008 February

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Please Refrain from Illegal Activity
I have left the following message on the Talk:Dudjom_Rinpoche page in response to your raising of a NPOV objection without commenting as to why. Please state your reasons.

In future try to observe the regulations in the process of claiming to defend them.

Illegal NPOV behavior by Rich Farmbrough (SmackBot):

Rich Farmbrough acting as SmackBot has disputed the neutrality of the article but has not provided an explanation as required by the rules. As a result the initiation of this NPOV is not proper and has commenced on an illegal footing. (User:Thegone) 1:15, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Hi, thanks for your message, SmackBot does not generally add tags, but merely dates those that are already there. Regards,

--

Thanks for your reply: 1- Who has raised the NPOV objection that you have dated?

2- What are the basis as they would have to state a reason, otherwise it is illegal?

3- The warnings on my page have all been by GlassFet. I maintained from the beginning that he was a sockpuppet of Ekajati who was banned and had many other illegal names too. Finally this was proven and he was banned. Someone, I do not know who, probably a bot or an admin, had set his warnings invisible. They are now again visible after your interaction. I consider them an honor. I will monitor for his presence in any way possible vigilantly in future. Are you in any form in contact with that person or his cult of Aro (in England) which is dismissed by Tibetan lamas and considered anti-Buddhist? 

4- If no comment on the objection is forthcoming, please reverse your dating action as it is reinforcing an illegal procedure.

I will post a copy of this reply in the article's talk page for the record as well.

Thanks. User:Thegone 5:29, 10 February 2008 (UTC) --

thanks for moving the ref tags
I hadn't noticed SmackBot moving tags to follow punctuation before. Is that new? I had been doing that myself and would be happy to stop. --Jtir (talk) 15:55, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
 * The move of refs is a WP:AWB "general fix". For the last few months I have had GF's turned of because they were implementing Reflist which I disagree with. I had turned them on with the latest release of AWB, but they're off again awaiting some bug-fixes. So... all AWB bots with GF turned on will correct those, whether you carry on manually, is up to you.  I suppose I could do a run to fix the problem specifically once AWB is re-fixed... Rich Farmbrough, 15:39 5 February 2008 (GMT).
 * Thanks for your clarification. I didn't realize SB is an AWB bot. I got AWB approval last week and have used it only once for a search/replace task. I'll use AWB for ref tag moves then. --Jtir (talk) 16:06, 5 February 2008 (UTC)


 * How does the bot know the ref is for the last part of the sentence (ref before fullstop) and not for the entire sentence (ref after the fullstop)? If it changes this it looks like a ref can be for the entire sentence and not just the last part.
 * Also, does it still remove spaces between refs, because that breaks tables when there are a many refs following one another and now no breaking spaces. -- Jeandré, 2008-02-08t21:28z

Congrats?
Hi Rich, I see you congratulated me for something...what did I do?--MONGO 19:08, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks anyway though...I don't think the community is ready for my getting the tools back anytime soon...best wishes to you.--MONGO 23:50, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

SmackBot - Big diffs
Hi, Rich. Your generally cool bot's edit: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Stanley_Hotel&diff=next&oldid=187666550 is not incorrect, but the diff is unnecessarily huge. Is that a bug? What are you doing? Changing spacing? (Or is there a bug in the diff viewer itself?) --76.21.22.240 (talk) 19:12, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
 * The tiny changes are part of the WP:AWB "General fixes", which is removing spaces between "." and refs, quite correctly, if a little pedantically. It is a fine question as to what should be included in General Fixes, and what not to, but on balance I think the developers have it more or less correct, and I chose to have General Fixes turned on (generally) for three reasons, firstly to get the most value from each edit, secondly to make other edits looking for GF problems unnecessary, and thirdly because of the number of AWB edits occurring it's likely articles will get a GF hit at some point, and this reduces the chance of big diffs.  Having said that, there have been GF's in the past that have caused me to turn GF off for longish periods.  Rich Farmbrough, 09:50 1 February 2008 (GMT).
 * Ok, thanks; makes sense. Couldn't find an option to make the diff tool not hide these spacing edits, or an edit summary.  --76.21.22.240 (talk) 18:29, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
 * FYI, WP:POPUPS displays that diff fairly clearly. Sometimes I have to try both diff displays. BTW, you will need to register to use popups. --Jtir (talk) 20:25, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks. (Would if I could, but it's not an option for reasons I don't want to get into.) --76.21.22.240 (talk) 21:09, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Nandikeshvar
Please proceed to further cleaning, if you can, and rid the article of the tag. Thanks?--BobClive (talk) 10:00, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

MacBook Air
Looks like User:SmackBot made a slight mistake on this page. See around line 58 of this change to MacBook Air. It looks like the bot broke the text 802.11n and converted it to 802�n. PaleAqua (talk) 02:21, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for reporting, should not happen agin, let me know if it does. Rich Farmbrough, 16:38 5 February 2008 (GMT).

SmackBot
The article has been improved with further references to the publication sources quoted previously. Feel sufficient references/citation has been provided to have the tag at the top regarding unverified material be removed.

Article Name : A.W.H. Abeyesundere —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nibiruet (talk • contribs) 02:20, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
 * If you think a tag can be removed, do so. If in doubt see the articles talk page. Note the SmackBot oesn't add the tags, just dates them. Rich Farmbrough, 16:15 5 February 2008 (GMT).

SmackBot adding stray {
It looks like when converting company-importance tag to Notability|Companies, SmackBot is adding a stray opening curly brace. See. Jfire (talk) 17:22, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks, fixed, and checking last 2500 entries for this error. Rich Farmbrough, 21:59 3 February 2008 (GMT).

Updating cleanup tags
Hi. I'm a little confused about why you think it's good to update the date on cleanup tags. Those dates really should never be changed, since they indicate how how the tag has been in place, a vlauable piece of information when evaluating whether the tag should be removed or not - don't you think? Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz)  (talk / cont)  21:10, 3 February 2008 (UTC)


 * This edit was fine as far as the date is concerned. I believe the issue is how to stop SmackBot from removing certain spaces. Is there any special markup that could be used to hide spaces from SB? --Jtir (talk) 22:28, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Spaces... again this is an AWB GF feature. Personally I think this is a good spacing regeime, but certainly there are a lot of AWB users out there implementing it.  Incidentally statistics were gathered some time ago showing that this is the preferred spacing of editors (by use), although MOS is neutral on the subject.  Rich Farmbrough, 16:32 5 February 2008 (GMT).
 * Thanks. I was hoping to help Ed retain the spacing he likes without reverting SB. I've been known to add an extra space just above the footer navbox myself. --Jtir (talk) 17:21, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Fiat X1/9
The Smackbot has made a bit of a mess of the opening paragraph of Fiat X1/9 that I have corrected twice today. I'm not quite sure what it thinks it's doing but the result is a bit of a jumble, please take a look. Thanks. Dino246 (talk) 22:47, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Obsure AWB bug. BUg report rasied. Rich Farmbrough, 17:28 5 February 2008 (GMT).

Citation needed
I'm a Luddite when it comes to things like this. In the Genesis section of the P-51 article, some Wiki-editor has asked for a citation regarding the increase in the Packard Merlin order. The data behind this is from Anthony Furse's biography of Wilfrid Freeman, which I have added to the bibilography.

Can you make head or tail of the way to add a citation, because I can't! pepperrell (talk) 16:59, 4 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I put the citation in, that article uses as simple style, can you page reference? It should be obvious how, but if you get stuck let me know. Rich Farmbrough, 15:34 5 February 2008 (GMT).

Smackbot insists on dates, but they are officially optional
Smackbot deleted an NPOV tag on this page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plain_English_Campaign because it had no date, but the official page says dates are optional. What gives? It feels kind of like your bot just gets to make its own rules and hijack pages. I know that's not the intention, but at the moment, can you forgive a bit of frustration? Angela Harms (talk) 15:00, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Here is the removal, not by the Bot. The reason dates are optional is that a Bot will add them.  Given the number of mis-spellings of "February", mis-formatting of the date etc., it would actaully be better (i.e. mean less corrective work for humans - mainly me - although the SmackBot does pick up many such errors now) if people left the dating to the Bot, many I know do so. Rich Farmbrough, 15:30 5 February 2008 (GMT).

Thanks! Sorry... I've been letting this get to me. Silly, isn't it? Angela Harms (talk) 16:02, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

Speedy deletion of Testpagepleasedeleteifoveradayold
Thank you for experimenting with Wikipedia. Your test worked, and the page that you created has been or soon will be deleted. Please use the sandbox for any other tests you want to do. Take a look at the welcome page if you would like to learn more about contributing to our encyclopedia

If you think that this notice was placed here in error, you may contest the deletion by adding  to the top of the page (just below the existing speedy deletion or "db" tag), coupled with adding a note on the article's talk page explaining your position, but be aware that once tagged for speedy deletion, if the article meets the criterion it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag yourself, but don't hesitate to add information to the article that would would render it more in conformance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. Toddst1 (talk) 17:09, 5 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Yh, deleted it now. (B- obvious... :)

Signpost updated for February 4th, 2008.
You are receiving this message because you have signed up for the Signpost spamlist. If you wish to stop receiving these messages, simply remove your name from the list. Ralbot (talk) 08:34, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

BetacommandBot unblocking
Hi Rich. Please see here for my thoughts on the unblocking. Thanks. Carcharoth (talk) 12:00, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

London Gazette again
Could you possibly gnerate another list of articles which are linking direc to the London Gazette, rather than via the template? In the meantime, I've noticed that www.gazette-online.co.uk also works (as opposed to www.gazettes-online.co.uk), so could you include that as well? David Underdown (talk) 12:10, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, will do. Rich Farmbrough, 10:25 7 February 2008 (GMT).
 * See User:Rich Farmbrough/Article lists/Gazette. Rich Farmbrough, 03:46 8 February 2008 (GMT).
 * Thanks. David Underdown (talk) 13:35, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Jorge Julio López
His name is actually Julio Jorge Lopez. Could you change this or let me know how. See: (This official missing person report agrees with other accounts I've seen.)

The date is wrong on the chart, too. It should be September 18. The link to his record (footnote 1) is either wrong or broken. I couldn't find the correct one. See if you think the above link would be a sufficient replacement. Cheers, --Beth Wellington (talk) 22:28, 7 February 2008 (UTC) Jorge Julio López

AfD nomination of Sectarian fighting in Iraq
An editor has nominated Sectarian fighting in Iraq, an article on which you have worked or that you created, for deletion. We appreciate your contributions, but the nominator doesn't believe that the article satisfies Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion and has explained why in his/her nomination (see also "What Wikipedia is not").

Your opinions on whether the article meets inclusion criteria and what should be done with the article are welcome; please participate in the discussion by adding your comments at and please be sure to sign your comments with four tildes ( ~ ).

You may also edit the article during the discussion to improve it but should not remove the articles for deletion template from the top of the article; such removal will not end the deletion debate. Thank you. BJBot (talk) 19:59, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Complaint about pointless activity by SmackBot
What is the point in replacing citations with nofootnotes? It seems just another pointless bot edit. Personally I wish there was a way of disabling these bots.--Toddy1 (talk) 21:13, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
 * SB dates maintenance templates, this effectively creates a queue to insure that they all get dealt with, it also canonicalises and fixes certain template usage such as to {Wikify|date=January 2008}} Clearly sometimes this is a functional change and sometimes not, however it is a. difficult to separate the two types of change (non-functional changes will be a very small percentage normally) and b. canonicalisation is a Good Thing because other processes, such as searchs, scripts, internal functionality are safer from pathological cases. Rich Farmbrough, 14:49 9 February 2008 (GMT).

Call it an 'overcite'?
I've noticed this also... and aren't we getting a bit excessive with so tagging every last article? First, having that huge notice hanging over what should be authoritative text already makes it look like it isn't. Second, I think having umpteen citations (especially all going to the same source work, e.g. book quotes, or a biography), or a cite for every last statement in an article, is going to look more silly than authoritative, by the time it's done. (Besides, some of those citation lists get longer than the articles themselves, with full data.) I would settle for a list of works (specific books, articles, authors) to be referred to at the end, for a popular work such as Wikipedia. Zephyrad (talk) 14:33, 9 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Possibly. However SmackBot does not generally add tags, but merely dates those that are already there. Comlatins of over-tagging need to be made to the community, perhaps at one of the cleanup projects. Rich Farmbrough, 14:49 9 February 2008 (GMT).

Passed away
Yes, I used the wikisearch and some filtering to find about 4000! Reformatting these is a little depressing since quite a few instances are in badly written or formatted articles. It's fun stretching my AWB legs again. --Oldak Quill 03:19, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * PS. Why did you choose to open a bot account for AWB? To keep bot edits separate to the rest? So you can edit faster or use bot automation? --Oldak Quill 04:00, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

indefblockedbecause
I created that as a version of template:indefblocked that takes a parameter for the reason, and that template includes that category. Is there a reason why it shouldn't? —Random832 04:11, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * It's not intended as a warning template, it's a userpage tag. The style is different - it goes on the user page, not the talk page. —Random832 19:20, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

research wikipedia
Hi, Rich,Thanks for reading. I am a sociological researcher who really interested in wikipedia and wikipedians. The amazing result of contribution in wikipedia has inspirited me a lot. Would you mind to discuss with me about wikipedia and wikipedians, from which i would like to give people a whole view of wikipedians who have contributed in wikipedia volunteerly. and i also want to focus on the incentive mechenism of wikipedia. I really appreciate if you can give me some help. thanks again. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wikizeyi (talk • contribs) 13:55, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Template "current sport" and smackbot dating
I'd like to interest you in having Smackbot add month/dates to the current sport tags in use, as it does for current. I decided to take a look at the usage of the "sport" template, and deleted about 100 senile uses of the template. (I think actually that the templete is used far too often, and without cause, but that's another discussion.)   I don't know what changes are requred to implement this at the template itself, if any, nor how you revise redirects, consolidating the redirected templates into the primary current sport. Thoughts? -- Yellowdesk (talk) 16:19, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your reply. In a recent inspection of current sport's presence on outdated articles, and its related template redirects, I dimly recall that some had been dated in the manner that current is dated, and cannonicalized. And also more recent uses on articles seemed (less than six or so months, I speculate) that none of these were given dates. -- Yellowdesk (talk) 01:59, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

SmackBot and capitalization.
Rich, I noticed that recently SmackBot has been changing articles only to capitalize a cleanup template, which strikes me as unnecessary. Generally it is doing much more useful work! ✤ JonHarder talk 20:52, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes it will be rare that it does this, but it happens - usually when an article moves out of one of the undated categories during a run, but I have just included two new templates, which may have thrown up a few more cases. Rich Farmbrough, 23:00 10 February 2008 (GMT).

Smackbot removed a } from templates
At Liberty Van Zandt, with this edit, Smackbot changed and  to {{Original research|date=February 2008date} and {{Plot|date=February 2008date}, somehow removing the } when it inserted the date. Cheers! -- Matthew | talk | Contribs 23:33, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Fixed. Rich Farmbrough, 20:06 13 February 2008 (GMT).

template deleted
the ncite template got dleted. worth discussing at the fact template on wording? cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 10:41, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

RfA
Hello Rich. In a conversation long ago, you suggested I consider this. If you have time, and can look at my Sandbox, I would welcome a review of my current draft of answers. You might check if I tell the story of the ISBN-fixing work properly,  and you might see if I answered everything you'd expect. EdJohnston (talk) 18:59, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
 * All set now. Thanks for your interest and your look at my statement. EdJohnston (talk) 19:47, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Add new template to smackbot's list?
Hi, Rich. I'm not sure how to get smackbot to add the date to the newly-created template. Can you please either do the required magic or tell me how to do so, as applicable? Thanks! —Scheinwerfermann (talk) 23:25, 12 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the quick response. I'm afraid I don't know enough about Template scripting to identify and tweak what needs tweaking. I made this template the ugly/ignorant way (copied the source of a similar template, dumped it into a new-template window, and replaced the source template's name, text, and links with new ones), so it's quite likely I inadvertently introduced errors. Can you show/tell me how to fix them, please? Thanks. —Scheinwerfermann (talk) 01:13, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Much obliged, thanks. I will study what you did, but I promise not to fiddle with/break it! :-) —Scheinwerfermann (talk) 01:34, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I copied . —Scheinwerfermann (talk) 01:42, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

err what?
Were you referring to? Sorry, missed that completely? -- Ļıßζېấשּׂ~ۘ Ώƒ ﻚĢęخ (talk) 23:51, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
 * AOUTP Rich Farmbrough, 11:38 13 February 2008 (GMT).

Signpost updated for February 11th, 2008.
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Dated tags
Good work on fixing these, and the new cat. There are a lot of templates that use the date parameter though. Rich Farmbrough, 11:34 14 February 2008 (GMT).


 * Thanks for the comment. I'm quite aware of the number of templates using the date parameter. A casual look through Special:Wantedcategories can attest to that. However I don't want to add the category to too many templates at one time. I prefer to add it to one template, then remove the backlog before moving onto the next. It also makes you realise just how much easier it would be to let SmackBot add the date instead :) --  Harryboyles  11:47, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Seeing as how you have admin tools and are tweaking things...
Say, thanks for the cleanup on Saddle bronc and bareback riding. While the article is locked down and only admins can get at it, could you also make one more tweak? Change the section header ==Saddle bronc vs. bareback riding== to read "Saddle bronc vs. bareback bronc riding" or something to that effect? I ask this because there is a different article titled bareback riding that is not about riding rough stock in rodeo and I think the clarification would be useful. I believe this would be non-controversial edit (Frankly I think the title of the whole article should also be changed in that fashion, but I want to check the PRCA site for absolutely correct names before doing an actual title move)   Thanks  Montanabw (talk) 18:02, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

SmackBot bug
I noticed that SmackBot is running again, but I never heard if the bug was fixed. I reported it on his talk page. He deleted unrelated templates on 3 separate articles. He deleted the entire template (transclusion request), not just a single brace. JackSchmidt (talk) 09:23, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Ah, it is just AWB deciding whether something is a stub. If there are any problems then, it is just a general AWB bug and not SmackBot in particular. JackSchmidt (talk) 09:37, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Edit comment
"Please cease and desist from removing the Notability template without reasonable justification" Why did you leave this message as the edit comment on my user page? The issue is nothing to do with templates. The issue is that the bot is misbehaving. Xxanthippe (talk) 10:57, 18 February 2008 (UTC).
 * It's auto-generated. And yes I know I should click the + at the top, not edit the last section.. :-) Rich Farmbrough, 20:04 18 February 2008 (GMT).
 * Well, please will you remove it. The placing of unjustified critical comments on my contributions, despite being inadvertent, feels like harassment. Xxanthippe (talk) 21:59, 18 February 2008 (UTC).

Text size
Wikipedia talk:Accessibility

I had exactly the same reaction after reading several sections that now have autogenerated small text size. Let me know what you think of my proposal. patsw (talk) 20:37, 18 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I definitely dislike the small references, but I use firefox's minimum font size to globally fix such stuff (though my minimum font size is 16!). If you'd like I can make a simple thingy to fix it for your (Patsw) account.


 * I wanted to ask though, are there other routine accessibility tasks for gnomish sorts without admin tools to do? I just found out about WP:ACC where you can help those with screen readers create accounts, but it appears to be under control.  I've been focusing on the traditional accessibility problem of access points by categorizing articles, but it isn't exactly as focused. JackSchmidt (talk) 22:07, 18 February 2008 (UTC)


 * (fix for reflist for individuals), In fact, it turns out to be simple. You can just add:

.references-small { font-size: 100%; }
 * to your Special:Mypage/monobook.css file. JackSchmidt (talk) 22:17, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

SkyHawks Parachute Team
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=SkyHawks_Parachute_Team&diff=174418223&oldid=170360601

A bit old, but just noticed this. Some stub-cats were removed. --Ng.j (talk) 00:05, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Yes, the article is not a stub. Rich Farmbrough, 22:28 20 February 2008 (GMT).

Speedy deletion of Template:Uncited-article/doc
A tag has been placed on Template:Uncited-article/doc requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section T3 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is a deprecated or orphaned template. After seven days, if it is still unused and the speedy deletion tag has not been removed, the template will be deleted.

If the template is intended to be substituted, please feel free to remove the speedy deletion tag and please consider putting a note on the template's page indicating that it is substituted so as to avoid any future mistakes (&lt;noinclude>&#123;{transclusionless}}&lt;/noinclude>).

Thanks. --MZMcBride (talk) 21:13, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Speedied. Rich Farmbrough, 22:23 20 February 2008 (GMT).

Speedy deletion of Template:Unreferenced/whatlinkshere
A tag has been placed on Template:Unreferenced/whatlinkshere requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section T3 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because it is a deprecated or orphaned template. After seven days, if it is still unused and the speedy deletion tag has not been removed, the template will be deleted.

If the template is intended to be substituted, please feel free to remove the speedy deletion tag and please consider putting a note on the template's page indicating that it is substituted so as to avoid any future mistakes (&lt;noinclude>&#123;{transclusionless}}&lt;/noinclude>).

Thanks. --MZMcBride (talk) 22:00, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Speedied. Rich Farmbrough, 22:23 20 February 2008 (GMT).

Request for comment on main page deletion incident
As you made an edit to the incident listed in the Administrators notice board, it is requested that you confirm the details of the incident here (section 1.1.2)

This is as the incident is used as the basis of an argument and needs to be confirm by persons familar with the event

Regards --User:Mitrebox talk 2008-02-22 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.11.244.78 (talk) 07:55, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Category:Transitional syntax
Hi– I think I understand this category now and guess it would be categorized under Category:Wikipedia utility templates...? First, though, I'd like to recreate it (with no changes) as Category:Templates with transitional syntax (or something similar?). May I go ahead? Sardanaphalus (talk) 16:21, 25 February 2008 (UTC)


 * A more accurate but longer title might be "Pages containing a template which is using a transitional syntax on that page"
 * Heehee - move now completed. Have categorized it under Category:Wikipedia maintenance templates rather than "utility templates". Thanks, Sardanaphalus (talk) 01:57, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

What does orphan mean?
Howdy, I seem to disagree with people about what orphan means. I look at Special:Whatlinkshere/Analytic_subgroup and notice that only a single article links to it (and only as a see also that I myself added). Sure there are talk pages, and lists of articles needing cleanup, but within the content of the encyclopedia, there is only a single see also link. To me that qualifies as "there are few or no articles linking here."

However, both you and R.e.b. have removed orphan tags, so I'm thinking I must have the wrong idea about it. I want to suggest a de-orphaning taskforce to wikiproject math, but I also don't want to waste people's time if there are not any real orphans.

To be clear, I have no objection to analytic subgroup (heck, it has no content outside of Lie group anyways, and will be merged as soon as Lie group settles down), I just want to figure out if I'm crazy. JackSchmidt (talk) 18:57, 25 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Ah, so you might define an orphan as "an article with few or no other articles linking to it, but which could easily have more." Every article could use copy-editing, but one only puts the copyedit tag on articles where it is quite clear that lots of copy-editing can easily be done.  There's no need to say explicitly on the copyedit tag that you only use it on pages that need it most (or more than a good-class article, etc.), because that is common sense.  Similarly, there is no need for an orphan tag an article with few incoming links, if it can only expect a link or two at most.  Does that sound reasonable? JackSchmidt (talk) 17:55, 26 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks for clearing it up. I'll likely propose the math orphan tag and rescue operation on the math wikiproject in a few weeks.  I think in a lot ways all that needs to happen is for someone to actually read these articles and know they exist.  Some are awful, but some are very good and strangely unlinked.  My hope is that fixing orphans should fix two things at once: not only will they no longer be orphans, but people will actually read the articles and so want to fix all the other problems.  Anyways, thanks again for clearing up tag confusion twice now! JackSchmidt (talk) 18:27, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Signpost updated for February 18th and 25th, 2008.
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Psalm 69
How come it's "Silly" to redirect 'Psalm 69' to the Ministry album, when the bible verse has no special, common meaning? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 129.177.138.109 (talk) 00:29, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
 * It's not a verse. The Minsitry album is almost certainly ephemeral, the PSalm has been around for thousands of years. Rich Farmbrough, 21:53 6 March 2008 (GMT).

Smile!


has smiled at you! Smiles promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Spread the WikiLove by smiling at someone else, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Happy editing! Smile at others by adding {{subst:Smile}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

Rich Farmbrough, 16:34 5 February 2008 (GMT).

Bot-tled fury

 * I originated the Franz Mercurius van Helmont page, but completely abandoned editing this beyond leaving the initial stub outline because of a radical dispute about the breach of Ignore All Rules by the Good Article team in respect of another article. They producing the hypocritical situation whereby an article which had been abandoned by the original editors (I wrote to them all) was adopted as a text in the 2007 Wikipedia for Schools, yet was dumped on as a Bad Text because it didn't meet the GA criteria for annotation. When I took it in hand attempting to annotate it as demanded, they congratulated whoever had started - me - and then insulted me when I checked I was up to scratch. In fact, as the primary sources are listed, and are simply chronicles, there's no need for annotation, the dates cited do that automatically. GA then compounded their offence by stating they didn't respect original sources, which is outright heresy to any historian. They have since withdrawn their Bad Article placard but still plaster the description page with their nonsense - my own protest has not been reacted to.


 * Similarly, your Bot appears to have picked on this article on NPOV grounds which it doesn't state - it's dated December and yours is the only December edit listed, so I presume it's you. Could you either substantiate why, preferably add the other viewpoint, or withdraw the appeal, please?


 * IMHO it's time the super-editors stopped plastering notices left, right and centre and actually addressed problems themselves, or started talking to those who had done recent edits. If you and your peers want to turn Wiki into a billboard, keep right on - some of the pages I've seen recently have more Project claims and complaints than real work. It's dead easy to start a Project and use that as a tool for self-aggrandisement, rather than actually commit yourself to doing some real work on it.


 * If you want to reply, please actually write to me - I'm jelmain at skynet . be
 * Well, the POV was easily removed. And the Bot just dates the tags doesn't add them. This was tagged on 17th of October, however the dated POV categories are fairly new... Rich Farmbrough, 12:11 2 February 2008 (GMT).