Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2013 May 1

= May 1 =

Limit
Is there a limit to the amount of kilobytes wikipedia can host? Or limitless? Pass a Method  talk  13:29, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Please read WP:NOTPAPER. The answer is "of course" since there is not an infinite amount of storage space in the universe.  However, Wikipedia is not currently in any danger of running out of storage space, and one of the Wikimedia Foundation's primary jobs is keeping it that way.  So, yes there is a limit, no we're never going to reach it because if we get close, it can be raised as often as needed.  -- Jayron  32  13:42, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Fortunately the issues that Wikipedia faces are orders of magnitude less severe than the issues that a site like Youtube faces. A single media file can easily take up more space than thousands of text files.  The images stored on Commons are probably the most taxing thing, but even so, in the broad scheme of things there are not that many of them. Looie496 (talk) 16:20, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * (The English) Wikipedia is one website that runs the mediawiki software; this is a collection of front-end (user-facing) PHP scripts, a set of back-end scripts, both of these talk to an instance of mysql, which is a database program. I don't know what limit mysql places on a database, but it's probably in the exabyte range, and not even large RAID sets are that big. For reference, the current size of the English wikipedia database is 42Gigabytes. This includes all the talkpages, userpage, project pages (like this one), and their histories, and some of the images . CS Miller (talk) 16:23, 1 May 2013 (UTC). Redacted 42GB includes talk pages and history, as Jaron32/JIP pointed out, I was mistaken. CS Miller (talk) 10:37, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Only 42 gigabytes? That could easily fit on my personal hard drive. It would take me about a day or two to download all that information. Are you sure it includes everything in Wikipedia itself, including the actual articles and their histories? I imagine it would exclude all image files. J I P  &#124; Talk 20:08, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Size of Wikipedia has some information. If printed, Wikipedia would occupy about 1781 volumes  of 8,000,000 characters each.  At 1 byte per character, that's 1781*8,000,000 = 14,248,000,000 bytes.  If you use 1 decimal gigabyte = 109 bytes, that's 14.248 gigabytes.  If you use 1 binary gigabyte = 1,073,741,824 bytes that's 13.26 gigabytes.  Now, that's just article text.  If you include all the other namespaces AND all of the past revisions we're getting a LOT bigger.  I'll look to see if I can find what the latest estimate for that is; that is if it is really 42 gig.  I suspect it's a lot bigger than that, but I am not sure until I find the reference. -- Jayron  32  20:20, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Here we go. According to Database download the size of the full, uncompressed database of English Wikipedia is 42 gigabytes.  -- Jayron  32  20:22, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * It says "current revisions only". I image it excludes page histories. A dump including all the histories could easily extend to several terabytes, or am I imagining things? J I P  &#124; Talk 20:25, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * The text itself is pretty tiny - but the photographs and diagrams completely dwarf that 42Gbyte number. A little thought experiment is the key to understanding that number.  Pretty much every word here is typed by someone at some time.  We have about 100,000 regular editors - so you can see that typing in 42Gbytes requires something like a half million keystrokes per editor...and that's assuming that we never revert, re-edit or delete...which we do A LOT!  So it's not entirely unreasonable that the text is so very small.  It's in the nature of how fast mere humans can type.  But pictures are another matter entirely.  SteveBaker (talk) 21:08, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * "Pretty tiny" compared to what, Steve? And "so very small" compared to what?  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  06:09, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Pretty tiny compared to pictures. That is, the number of bytes dedicated to storing the text of Wikipedia is much smaller than the number of bytes dedicated to storing the pictures that illustrate that text.  For just one example, File:Willem-Alexander, Prince of Orange.jpg, which is on the main page right now, has a full resolution version which takes up 2.75 Mbytes.  That means that single picture, used to illustrate one article, takes up about 1/3 of a "volume" as noted above.  That is, the space dedicated to saving the full-resolution version of one image from one article would occupy 1/3rd of a standard-sized volume of a print encyclopedia.  At that rate, the entire text of Wikipedia would the same space as a mere 5,300 images or so.  English Wikipedia (NOT including images at Commons transcluded here) is already storing  files (most of which are images, though a tiny number are sound files and other media).  Throw in the fact that Commons stores another 16,851,454 available for use at Wikipedia (the vast majority of images used in articles are transclusions from Commons) and you start to see the scale of the issue. -- Jayron  32  12:35, 2 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Pretty tiny compared to a typical modern hard drive (2,000 Gbytes)...or compared to a typical Blu-Ray DVD (50 Gbytes)...or compared to the amount of stuff on my PC's hard drive right now (90 Gbytes)...or compared to the size of Wikipedia WITH the pictures (Not sure - but it was over 400Gbytes in 2007 and the number of articles here has grown by about two and a half times since then...so probably over 1,000 Gbytes by now)...or compared to the number of digits of pi that have been computed (10,000 Giga-digits)...or to the size of the human genome (1 Gbyte)...or to the estimated memory capacity of a human brain (100 Gbytes). 42 Gbytes just isn't that much these days.
 * It's likely that the whole of Wikipedia - including talk pages, old revisions and all of the pictures - would fit on a single $170 four terabyte hard drive. Put another way, the company that hosts my web pages would charge me less than $20 a month to host a Wikipedia mirror for me.
 * Add a Raspberry Pi computer, a touch-screen and a battery - and you could hold the whole thing in the palm of your hand for less than the cost of a decent cell-phone. The temptation to write "DON'T PANIC" in large, friendly letters on the back would be almost overwhelming!
 * The technical difficulty with "storing" wikipedia isn't the volume of data - it's the bandwidth and fault-tolerance that's needed to host one of the ten most popular websites on the planet. SteveBaker (talk) 12:42, 2 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Thanks for explaining those relativities and what was in your mind. --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  20:15, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Coffee and cognac
How am I supposed to drink coffee and cognac served together? One first and the other later, or take sips of both in turns, or pour the cognac into the coffee? J I P &#124; Talk 19:26, 1 May 2013 (UTC)


 * It's up to you, of course, but coffee is often more critical in terms of temperature. If it's too hot when served, I'd start on the cognac, then switch to the coffee when it cools adequately, and try to finish it of before it gets cold, then switch back to the cognac. StuRat (talk) 19:51, 1 May 2013 (UTC)


 * There is no wrong way to do it. You do whatever tastes good to you, seems appropriate, and makes you the happiest.  If someone thinks ill of you for whatever you choose to do, they've proven themselves an idiot whose opinion doesn't matter anyways.  -- Jayron  32  20:10, 1 May 2013 (UTC)


 * If you're looking to fit in, look around at what other people are doing. If you're drinking to get drunk (or just want the extra room), mixing both in one cup seems practical. InedibleHulk (talk) 20:14, 1 May 2013 (UTC)


 * OK, thanks! So far I've been sipping both in turns. Mixing them doesn't seem like a bad idea - the last time I had Irish coffee, I felt that everything tasted wonderful: the coffee, the whisky, and the cream. One woman once asked me to get her an alcohol-free Irish coffee. The barmaid asked me what exactly is an alcohol-free Irish coffee. I told her that it is otherwise like a normal Irish coffee, but simply skip pouring any whisky into the drink. The woman who asked me for the drink was satisfied with her drink. J I P  &#124; Talk 20:20, 1 May 2013 (UTC)


 * I'm reminded of the breadless sandwich, and its legendary cousin, the foodless sandwich. --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  20:27, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * We have an article about a song about loveless love, goal-less goals, milkless milk, and silkless silk. Edison (talk) 21:55, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * In the UK, it's called a "floater coffee", usually for the one who is driving home! Alansplodge (talk) 15:42, 2 May 2013 (UTC)


 * Hmmm... If you're a guest and you are served a glass of Cognac and coffee, it would be rather insulting to your host to dump it in your coffee, the inference being that it's too rough to drink on its own. Conversely, it might also be a taken as a sign that you don't appreciate good brandy. Of course, if you've paid for it yourself and you're not trying to impress anybody, then do what you like, as Jayron suggests. Alansplodge (talk) 23:42, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Good point. You need to take into account the quality of the drink - you probably don't want to pour a fine cognac into a coffee, if only out of respect. I once was at a very nice Italian restaurant in Tuscany (while cycling from Florence to Sienna), and a bigshot in his bigshot cabrio with the bigshot blonde bombshell ordered the five course menu, got the best (or rather most expensive) bottle of red wine from the cellar, and then proceeded to smoke a bigshot cigar with his meal and wine. He was not popular with the owner or the staff of the place, regardless of tip. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 11:06, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
 * See "The Man Who Lit His Cigar Before the Royal Toast" by H. M. Bateman. Similar outrage can be caused in Scotland by buying a 12 year-old single malt whisky, and then adding Coca-cola. Quelle horreur! Alansplodge (talk) 15:36, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
 * A friend of mine has a very fine collection of old single malts. And a magnum bottle of Jim Beam for certain people and their unholy mixers... --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:16, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Or Tesco Everyday Value Whisky would fit the bill - "as rough as a badger's arse" allegedly ;-) Alansplodge (talk) 23:23, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I take it the bigshot in question caused disapproval by lighting his cigar first by drowning the taste of his five-course meal and wine in his cigar smoke, and second by forcing others to inhale his cigar smoke when they had preferred the aroma of their own meals? It's a good thing that smoking inside public restaurants in Finland has been forbidden for the past seven years. J I P  &#124; Talk̃
 * According to Smoking in Italy, it was banned there in 2005. Alansplodge (talk) 23:26, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Checking the conference I was cycling to, it was IJCAR 2001 in Siena. More to the point, it was a lovely summer day, and everybody was sitting outside on the patio. I think it was more the "fine wine and food will be wasted" kind of disapproval. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:16, 3 May 2013 (UTC)
 * It depends on the event. If you expect there to be speeches and toasts, hang on to the cognac to drink the toasts. If you're at a restaurant or a private dinner, just drink them separately. I'd advise against mixing them; a brandy that is good for drinking neat should not be wasted making liqueur coffee. AlexTiefling (talk) 13:47, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

I'd just mix them and enjoy! But then, I am Canadian. ..

99.250.103.117 (talk) 03:32, 3 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Probably why I suggested it, too. InedibleHulk (talk) 16:17, 3 May 2013 (UTC)
 * TOGETHER, QUICKLY. THEN, RECKLESS ABANDON. Shadowjams (talk) 07:40, 4 May 2013 (UTC)