Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Contract bridge/Archive 2014

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Bridge Winners
How commonly have we linked to Bridge Winners member profiles --as at Bobby Levin? A template may be useful for that. --P64 (talk) 20:56, 14 June 2013 (UTC)
 * I do not know but guess that links to Bridge Winners member profiles have been very few in number - can't really remember any but have not searched. The question raises a broader issue - should links to websites which have a public membership profile be added? Such as Facebook, BBO etc.?  Does WP have a policy on this?  Newwhist (talk) 02:20, 15 June 2013 (UTC)
 * I have looked at the WP policy page on External links and find three relevant sections:
 * Links normally to be avoided. See item 10.
 * In biographies of living people
 * Sites requiring registration
 * The policy statements contain the weasel words "usually" and "generally". For further discussion.  Newwhist (talk) 12:47, 15 June 2013 (UTC)


 * Now I doubt that a footer template is warranted.
 * But it's clear that the link is appropriate where we don't know any other official web presence for the subject of the article. The preface to WP:EL section 4, Links normally to be avoided clearly qualifies the list of 19 items and does so without weasel words: "Except for a link to an official page of the article's subject", which links WP:ELOFFICIAL.
 * I have added a few such listings to biography footers, or re-located or re-formatted them--recently, all as at Bobby Levin. --P64 (talk) 17:36, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Tom Townsend
Hi, I have created this stub but don't have access to the OEB and wondered if someone who has could add a bit to it, please? The Whispering Wind (talk) 00:16, 16 October 2013 (UTC)

I couldn't resist being flippant
Looking at the project page, I see that under "User userboxes and categories" we have three templates. The first displays a banner saying "This user plays bridge" and the second displays a banner saying "This user enjoys playing bridge". I assume that the former must be intended for those who play bridge but don't enjoy it. :) JH (talk page) 21:56, 12 February 2014 (UTC)

Positioning the TOC
WP:TOC permits positioning the TOC within the lead section rather than after it,
 * (quote) Although usually a heading after the TOC is preferable, can be used to avoid being forced to insert a meaningless heading just to position the TOC correctly, i.e., not too low.

and permits floating the TOC with TOC right,
 * (quote) when it is beneficial to the layout of the article, or when the default TOC gets in the way of other elements.

It doesn't explicitly permit both exceptions. On the contrary,
 * (quote) If floating the TOC, it should be placed at the end of the lead section of the text, before the first section heading.

That restricts what the first quotation grants; conflicts with the permission in the first quotation.

In several articles (all my doing?) we use both exceptions, or perpetrate them. Some instances have recently been undone by script-assisted edits using AWB, as at Camrose Trophy yesterday.

Experiment at Bermuda Bowl shows that floating {TOC right} immediately before section 1 --the second exception alone-- may be useful. There the lead section is not very long and the fixed-width element below the lead is narrow enough.

--P64 (talk) 23:39, 15 February 2014 (UTC)


 * Template TOC right displays the Contents table at far right, beginning at the point where it is located in the code. And displays the following content to its left—permits what follows to flow around it.
 * The template will not survive prior to or anywhere within the lead section except immediately preceding the section 1 heading. That displays the Contents table in the upper right corner of section 1. For some explanation see See recent edit summaries of major championships articles for one explanation.
 * The two alternatives are
 * Vanderbilt Trophy - default
 * Venice Cup - {TOC right} immed. prior to section 1 heading

The alternative may not be viable where section 1 begins, or nearly begins, with content other than flowing text. Such as a table of past results (World IMP Pairs Championship).
 * --P64 (talk) 18:28, 31 May 2014 (UTC)

Albert Dormer
I see that Albert Dormer has recently died. His obituary was in the Daily Telegraph earlier this week. If anyone has the time to spare, he might be worth an article. JH (talk page) 17:58, 4 April 2014 (UTC)
 * Seeing his obituary in the latest edition of the EBU quarterly magazine English Bridge reminded me of this. I've created an article for him, but it's pretty basic and could do with a lot of expansion and refinement. JH (talk page) 18:24, 2 June 2014 (UTC)

Coverage of bridge writers
In several respects I have completely covered all the person articles, a.k.a. biographies, in ; that is now 92 of 95 pages in the category. See Category talk: Bridge writers for details.

Most likely to be both new this fortnight and useful in expanding, eventually updating: footer links to Library of Congress Authorities, a point of convenient entry to LC Catalog(ue) records, and to WorldCat, with less consistent records from participating libraries everywhere.

Both these sources are available even for the barely-writer Hamman (Bob Hamman) but they are absent for some barelies and for several writers in other languages such as Westra (Berry Westra). --for whom I linked the WorldCat search report; not done if it's empty as for Marx (Jack Marx (bridge)).

--P64 (talk) 20:18, 10 June 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks. That was a major undertaking! JH (talk page) 21:02, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Old bridge and whist books
Unfortunately the Library of Congress Catalogue (LCCat) uses the subject heading LCSH "bridge whist" for many mid- and late-19th century books. And the sort by date does not work for me now. Nevertheless Bridge whist (72 records + 91 "from old catalog" + a few more) is interesting and maybe fruitful to skim. (There are 277 and 1026 records in Auction bridge and Contract bridge, so-called narrower terms.)

The heading Whist may be used with integrity in a useful sense; 145 of the 160 records have pre-1900 dates. (Sort by date, which doesn't work for me now at Bridge whist.)

--P64 (talk) 16:38, 24 June 2014 (UTC)

Smolen question
I just started playing Smolen a week ago. Tonight partner opened 1NT and I had 5-5 in the majors. I bid 2C and partner bid 2D. What do you do if you play Stayman, Jacoby transfers, and Smolen? Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 03:27, 9 July 2014 (UTC)

List of national/supranational bridge organisations
New page needed imo.

Not to mention that several national bridge organisations are missing from WP and really deserve their own articles. Like e.g. CBAI, IBU, NIBU, SBU, WBU. Creating a list page might encourage editors to get their fingers out.

Narky Blert (talk) 02:06, 11 August 2014 (UTC)
 * The foregoing acronyms have been added to the table listing new article nominations.
 * Newwhist (talk) 17:07, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

WBF championships official coverage
Our articles on WBF championships include numerous references to official sources with dead links --dead for more than a year if i recall correctly. Many of them, perhaps a vast number, are broken in the same fashion. These two are previous and current eddresses for the "[final] Results & Participants" of one particular event rendition, the 2012 World Mixed Teams Championship -- at the main WBF website, where it is integrated to the players database.
 * http://www.worldbridge.org/competitions/worldchampionships/TeamChampRP.asp?qmenudetid=546 (old)
 * http://www.worldbridge.org/TeamChampRP.aspx?qmenudetid=546 (new)

Contrast the contemporary coverage, session-by-session and in Daily Bulletins, at microsites devoted to one meet such as the 14th World Bridge Games (microsite). But I see that session detail down in that 2012 WMSG microsite is linked to the player database too.

--P64 (talk) 22:23, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

Comment on the WikiProject X proposal
Hello there! As you may already know, most WikiProjects here on Wikipedia struggle to stay active after they've been founded. I believe there is a lot of potential for WikiProjects to facilitate collaboration across subject areas, so I have submitted a grant proposal with the Wikimedia Foundation for the "WikiProject X" project. WikiProject X will study what makes WikiProjects succeed in retaining editors and then design a prototype WikiProject system that will recruit contributors to WikiProjects and help them run effectively. Please review the proposal here and leave feedback. If you have any questions, you can ask on the proposal page or leave a message on my talk page. Thank you for your time! (Also, sorry about the posting mistake earlier. If someone already moved my message to the talk page, feel free to remove this posting.) Harej (talk) 22:47, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

ACBLhof tag
The ACBLhof tag no longer works. ACBL seems to have changed their HOF references on the web site. The numerical ID no longer works. This means that someone needs to go through all of the ACBLhof and change to using an name, not an ID. Example. See Kit Woolsey. His HOF ID is 88, but the link on his page does not work any more. ACBL changed their web site in early 2014. Someone needs to update all of these templates.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 02:26, 22 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Likewise for the WBF people links. I am not a website guru so have no idea how these two links can be salvaged without tedious one-by-one effort. Editor P64 was involved in their initial creation and may be of assistance. Newwhist (talk) 12:13, 23 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't know that WBFpeople links have been permanently broken, ever. I do know that WBF people database service is sporadic (awful, awesome, awespirational, ...). Newwhist, I guess you noticed broken footer links during a timespan when service was down, but valid eddresses have been stable.


 * With template sfhof, which has the same function for the Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame, the citations/biographies of all inductees/members were in the Internet Archive. When the organization unpublished them a couple years ago (at least at their known eddresses, which is the crucial point here), I was actively working on FSF coverage, noticed the broken links soon, and revised the template almost trivially to formulate an Internet Archive eddress using the same template parameter. . To revise the template once is to revise every one of the biography footer links,
 * When I created template and added it to several biographies this spring, ACBL still served the citations/biographies at their old eddresses. Its history shows that I revised this template in similar fashion, presumably during the transition. Perhaps I checked Internet Archive, altho I don't recall that, sorry about the oversight. Checking now I see that Internet Archive does have copies from numerous about/hall-of-fame eddresses, but mainly from last fortnight, copies of the Page not found notice perhaps prompted by activity here. Only a few with genuine old content, not enough citations to be valuable here now.
 * This is a complete list if i clerk correctly. From 2008, only the alphabetical list members.php, 2008-03-08 (first of 20 dated page copies) and the citation of Eddie Kantar (id=35). From 2009, the top page, 2009-02-15 and HBaron 1; 2010, an index by induction date, 2010-01-07 and CGoren 24; 2011, EKempFreilich 17 and LStansby 76; 2012, none; 2013, DTruscott 81 and RFreeman 16.
 * After general use of any external link template here, many a rearrangement of material published out there is innocuous, including relocation to a new domain. But ACBL changed the HOF member ID. And the material had not been archived out there--at least, not by the Internet Archive.
 * --P64 (talk) 19:12, 2 November 2014 (UTC)


 * The 'correct' way to solve this problem, and all other similar problems, is to have a file, somewhere, that correlates player names to WBF IDs. Keeping this file separate from player profiles, means when we add a new player, we just add a symbol/tag pointing to this file and we automatically get their profile.
 * For the ACBL HOF, one step is to modify the macro, then go through all players that have an ACBLhof tag, then manually edit that tag. That's painful. Better is to use the approach I recommend, but this means that someone needs to create the macro/symbol/tag. I have no desire to become a tag programmer. Are there others out there? I can describe what is needed, but someone else would need to do the work. The WBF player links have been working for me, not sure about the WBF HOF links. Nicolas.hammond (talk) 13:49, 23 October 2014 (UTC)
 * I'm willing to revise both template ACBLhof and all of its uses, which doesn't amount to "pain" for me. And willing to check something else along the way.
 * I hope to wait two days for the conclusions of our annual American baseball championship :-)
 * --P64 (talk) 19:23, 28 October 2014 (UTC)
 * The WBF user ID is also useful. Some players have the link, some don't. I added about 50 the other day. Manually editing all of these files seems to be very painful. Is there any way that someone can reference an external or Wikipedia utility to do that?Nicolas.hammond (talk) 20:36, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

List of Winners
I have created an automatically generated list, with references, of Bridge achievements. It is on https://github.com/njhammond/generate_bridge_wikipedia_entries/tree/master/results Then look in the directory that contains their first name. For example, for Zia, go to the Z directory.

If you edit any players, please see this list and c/p as necessary. Nicolas.hammond (talk) 23:00, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Nicolas, can you provide some documentation? What should I find somewhere there, which is appropriate for copy and paste somewhere? Do we have a biography (sub)section that is literally created by copy-paste from that utility? (I'll try to remember to visit from my public library as I get the message "Please note that GitHub no longer supports old versions of Firefox.") --P64 (talk) 19:34, 28 October 2014 (UTC)


 * I don't know which browser you have, so can't comment on access to Github for you.


 * For documentation on this tool, see the README file in the home directory of the project. Basically, if you have a player, say Zia Mahmood, go to the directory of the first letter of the first name, in this case the Z directory. You will see several players. Click on the Zia Mahmood link and it contains the generic information that would be cut/paste into their "Bridge achievements". As I find more achievements, I will add them time permitted. Each time I do this I re-run the tool, and update the entries. There are about 2,500 player entries. But this is for everyone that has won an NABC+ event. The file https://github.com/njhammond/generate_bridge_wikipedia_entries/tree/master/10winners.txt contains those that have won 10 or more NABC titles.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 11:49, 30 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Thanks. Welcome to the WikiProject. JH (talk page) 08:18, 23 October 2014 (UTC)


 * You're welcome. I actually did Dickie Freeman several years ago so not exactly new. For the Bridge accomplishments, we need someone to write a fairly complicated macro/tag (not sure the right world). We should have all of the winner data in separate files. When there is a new championship, e.g. current world event in China, we just update the file of winners. This should then automatically update the Bridge accomplishments of all players on the Wikipedia without having to manually edit each/every one. I have the necessary files for ACBL events, ACBL HOF, King/Queen of Bridge, most World events. See the Github page. Rather than having this on Github, it should be on the Wiki somewhere. This type of data - winners - should not have to be updated on all players pages, we should be able to put somewhere centrally.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 13:52, 23 October 2014 (UTC)


 * FYI: Editing dozens of bridge biographies several months ago, I frequently ignored and never systematically checked the tournament accomplishments subsections/lists. In the Bridge accomplishments section, I gave systematic attention only to the ACBL Hall of Fame listing (add listings; revise listings to use the template ACBLhof) in the first subsection.


 * I support semi-automation of winners and runners-up listings in principle. I don't understand how much Nicolas.hammond's suggestion would automate, how much work that design would require, or how robust it would be to the retirement of particular editors.


 * It would need a template. You include the template, "Bridge accomplishments". That template would look in databases/flat files, however it is designed, and generate their accomplishments. As someone decides more accomplishments are useful, e.g. European championships, they can easily be added. Right now, if you wanted to add European Championships in Wikipedia you would need to manually edit every Bridge player that won one. That's absurd given the power of computers.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 11:49, 30 October 2014 (UTC)


 * I consider other shortcomings to be severe in practice. We don't clearly distinguish world/WBF championships (nor european/EBL ch'ips). We list world, euro-, and other zonal ch'ips irregularly and incompletely, relative to the American-NABC/ACBL ones. These lengthy and relatively flat lists obscure as much as they reveal (eg, some NABC championships really are secondary, some tertiary). We don't systematically do all that we should to remedy that in prose (where I believe that the original-research proscription permits us to do more, in practice, than we may do in lists).
 * --P64 (talk) 19:23, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

New biography pages Oct 2014
We have a batch of new biography pages created by User:Nicolas.hammond--at least 21 created 16–24 October, which I added to the list of "Newest Articles ... People" on the main page (section 5.2).

These pages probably incorporate one or more copy-paste of that "automatically generated list, with references, of Bridge achievements" Nicolas announced in the preceding section. Regarding those references:
 * 1. Section heading should be "References".
 * 2. Some generate red error notices. See Ron Andersen, Manfield, Meyers, Weichsel, at least.
 * 3. "Hall of Fame" references are broken. Evidently we have bad pathnames regardless whether the correct ACBLhof alphabetic ID is used:
 * http://web5.acbl.org/about-acbl/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (correct)
 * http://www.acbl.org/about/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (now in Betty Ann Kennedy)
 * 1. interject stable link to that version -P64
 * http://www.acbl.org/about/hall-of-fame/members/94 (now in Kerri Sanborn)

Most of these points should be addressed by revision of the utility.
 * 4. Some need expansion. See the several "List of previous winners" at B. Jay Becker.
 * 5. Some need abbreviation --at least "ACBL" for "American Contract Bridge League" (but that is publisher, not title, at least for particular issues of the NABC Daily Bulletin).
 * 6. Repeat use of identical references needs attention.

--P64 (talk) 21:56, 28 October 2014 (UTC)


 * Page creations by Nicolas.hammond lists more than 150 created this fortnight, all or nearly of which are biography pages for bridge players (more than 95% American).
 * 2. Pages created (from Richard Freeman, 2011) is slightly more useful. In reverse chron order (as usual), it begins at the bottom with the earliest bridge biography pages that Nicolas created this month, plus the one created previously. -P64


 * At least a dozen page names were inappropriate, including several that other editors have converted to redirects to our previous pages for those people. I expect (but haven't checked) that some of those other editors have simply deleted Nicolas.hammond's content rather than integrate it with our biographies, and have sometimes done that without notice on our biography talk pages. That is, there may be no trail except edit summaries in the redirect page histories.


 * After a closer look I think no content by Nicolas.hammond was lost when other editors converted his new pages Kehela, Murray, Lightner, and Stayman pages to redirects. Said to be merged. --P64 (talk) 01:56, 1 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately I don't know that those four are the only ones that were converted to redirects as redundant coverage of one person. I quickly visited the histories of all the new pages and skimmed for the large bright numbers that indicate massive deletions (eg, see   history Samuel M. Stayman) rather than moves to preferred pagenames that are not in use. Unfortunately I used a composition window rather than paper to list them, along with other notes, as I worked, and I lost the session. Those four are the ones in this class that I remembered after visiting all.
 * --P64 (talk) 16:11, 1 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Nicolas, please please take a moment to check whether we have a page for someone. If not, please take a moment to check how we name the player in tournament articles. (Bluelinks in tournament articles imply that we have a page for the player, of course. Both redlinks and unlinked names commonly, albeit unreliably, show appropriate page names; sometimes preferred page names.)
 * The list of contract bridge people commonly but unreliably shows preferred page names.


 * A few particular points. We don't generally use middle initials and disambiguators such as ", Jr."; we never use them simply because ACBL uses that name-form somewhere. By design we always use appropriate diacritic marks.
 * --P64 (talk) 22:10, 28 October 2014 (UTC)


 * "Bluelinks in tournament articles imply that we have a page for the player, of course." Not necessarily. In a few cases it's possible that the link is incorrectly to someone else with the same name who has a Wikipedia article, so it's worth checking. JH (talk page) 09:59, 29 October 2014 (UTC)


 * It was not always clear if there was a link for someone. I used the tournament winners as a reference assuming that if someone had added a name, then they would have created the link to their name in the winners lists. As I have found previous entries, either I have linked them, or deleted my original post and did a #REDIRECT. It is hard for me to tell with people that have multiple names (married/divorced etc.). If I messed up some with Jr. etc, let me know, I'll tweak the code that generates the entries. I have used middle initials where appropriate because I see this all the time on Wikipedia. Larry Cohen is the example. There is a Larry T. Cohen and a Larry N. Cohen. I think it is correct to use when there may be ambiguation later. For players with "common" names, I would suggest that we create player_name_bridge, this seems to be the style. My criteria for inclusion was 10 NABC+ wins, so the majority I added were ACBL players, though I have added a few that are not. The ACBL HOF was broken before I did anything. ACBL redid their web site. Someone needs to go through ALL the HOF entries and update. My suggestion remains that we use an external file to cross-reference this data. Much easier.
 * 3. Template ACBLhof was broken by a major revision of the ACBL website recently (actually, by ACBL's more recent unpublication of the old website). The template is commonly if not exclusively used in the footer section "External links". But the utility generates broken references with target-title "Hall of Fame". Commonly those are now the first reference(s) in new biog pages for ACBL HOF members, as for Betty Ann Kennedy. See the illustrations in point #4 above (where I have now numbered my six yesterday items). The utility evidently uses a bad pathname stem(?), . -P64

interject 2014-11-03 Serious problem, further report. As I write, ACBL serves the path fragments  and   indifferently but does not serve   and (some? all?) recent new pages use the latter.
 * http://web5.acbl.org/about-acbl/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (ok)
 * http://www.acbl.org/about/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (now in Betty Ann Kennedy)
 * — stable link to that version of the biography
 * http://www.acbl.org/about-acbl/hall-of-fame/members/kennedy-betty (ok)

--P64 (talk) 01:04, 3 November 2014 (UTC)


 * "I have used middle initials where appropriate because I see this all the time on Wikipedia." I think the Wikipedia guidelines say that one should use the version of their name by which the person is most commonly known (though of course sometimes it's appropriate to have redirects from plausible alternatives). I think in the bridge world Larry Cohen is commonly known as simply that, so I'd favour using that unless there is already another Larry Cohen on Wikipedia, when I'd choose "Larry Cohen (bridge player)". But that's just my opinion, and I've noticed that Americans seem to use middle initials a lot more than we tend to over here in Britain, so it may be a cultural mindset. If there's no ambiguity currently, I don't think we should worry too much about ambiguity possibly arising at some future date. JH (talk page) 16:34, 29 October 2014 (UTC)


 * There are 2 Larry Cohens that play bridge in the ACBL. Both have won 10+ NABC events.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 20:45, 31 October 2014 (UTC)


 * My apologies. I hadn't realised that there was more than one. JH (talk page) 09:44, 1 November 2014 (UTC)


 * NP. I live in the US, so more familiar with the US players. One is famous for a cheating scandal (Cohen-Katz (Richard)), the other more famous as an author. And the latter more famous as a bridge player. The former has won enough titles to justify his own Wikipedia article.


 * See User talk:Nicolas.hammond. --P64 (talk) 01:56, 1 November 2014 (UTC)


 * 4. The Manual of Style WP:MOS covers page names among other things.


 * I never heard of "the tournament winners" list until after I posted here 24 hours ago (and haven't yet visited). I suppose the other methods I mentioned then are more likely to be reliable guides.


 * Do you know Wikipedia's "What links here" tool? It works for redlinks, which is valuable in this context. Many of the most important bridge players and some who are not so important, such as Björn Fallenius, are linked red in the lists and tables of winners and runners-up that most tournament articles contain.
 * Visit a tournament article; select a redlink player; select "What links here". Or visit any other article with a redlink player name, such as Namyats for Victor Mitchell. The tool returns a list of pages that currently include the same redlink (current example for Mitchell).
 * In particular, if another editor adds the orphan template to one of your new pages --as User:BattyBot did Bjorn Fallenius (under that name without diacritic mark) last week
 * --P64 (talk) 22:40, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

Serious problems yet unnoticed by other editors, evidently.
 * Lorenza Lauria = Lorenzo Lauria
 * Talk:Chuck Said, article does not exist

Sorry, I am out of time, and I may not have used it wisely. To be continued. --P64 (talk) 22:42, 29 October 2014 (UTC)
 * Nor was Chuck Said created and deleted, if i understand the tools correctly. Perhaps it shouldn't exist. Stray talk page isn't really "serious".


 * During the last two days I revised the list WikiProject Contract bridge/NABC multiple winners heavily as I worked. See its [[Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Contract bridge/NABC multiple winners NABC winners talk] for the key, now slightly out of date. I'll revisit soon.
 * Primarily I worked long and hard on the women who played under multiple surnames. Generally I didn't touch their pages, merely fix unify or fix/unify (in my edit summaries) our linkage to them, from competitions articles mainly. Eg, create redirects such as  and piped links such as Kitty Munson.


 * For the two most important NABC multiple winners overlooked by Nicolas last fortnight I yesterday (overnight 1031/1101)
 * - created Sally Young, a brand-new stub underconstruction without the NABC section;
 * - determined that James Jacoby is an appropriate pagename (consistently used as book author and columnist) and fixed false links to Jim Jacoby thruout EN.wiki
 * I expect to create James Jacoby today. My work will not include any listing of NABC "accomplishments". --P64 (talk) 16:11, 1 November 2014 (UTC)
 * ✅ James Jacoby, as well as Sally Young, is a Start underconstruction.


 * I added accomplishments for Sally Young. See Sally Young accomplishments for details. Same with all other players. Nicolas.hammond (talk) 00:04, 4 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Serious problems ... . Fred Stewart (bridge) gives "World Team Championship Winners" (inadequate anyway), linked to the WBF directory of Bermuda/Venice/Senior winners, as the formal reference for Cavendish Invitational Pairs (twice separately, as usual, for Winners and Runners-up). That is original to the page as created by Nicolas. --P64 (talk) 00:34, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

Task force
Perhaps we should have a Players task force (or Players, People, Persons, Biography, or Biographies). Among other things, User:Nicolas.hammond might recruit people to register as editors and join that task force, rather than simply to edit player pages. (Nicolas recently mentioned bringing new editors to EN.wiki by creating new player pages.)

Creating a task force, even without any members, would stimulate creating a top subpage of WPCB project space that is devoted to bridge Players/People/Biogs. Good. We now have at least two subpages devoted to the matter
 * WikiProject Contract bridge/Manual of Style/Appendix 5: Notable people criteria --with talk page to which many sections of this top talk page were moved a few years ago, a practice that seems useful to me
 * WikiProject Contract bridge/NABC multiple winners --with talk page by me last week

We also have other non-article pages (eg, Categories), and the quasi-Project article List of contract bridge people.

Of course weI might create a useful top subpage without a task force to justify it.

--P64 (talk) 19:27, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

References templates, etc
0. We have one references template for citing the The Official Encyclopedia of Bridge by edition and page, namely OEB. An alternative or an option with a shorter display would be useful.

1. Source lists of past winners.

Nicolas.hammond now/recently generates automatically for biographies a set of longish yet incomplete references to the official lists of previous winners for all of the NABC results on a player's resume. I suggest instead that we use one template for each event, such as template spingold [now empty] for uniform adequate reference to an official list of past Spingold results/winners/whatever. The Nicolas.hammond utility, and commonly manual work as well, would use the template --essentially -- and we would maintain our Spingold-winnerslist-references at once. Eg, maintain by updating to a new issue and page of the NABC Daily Bulletin if we do use that occasional periodical (such as Bulletin'' 80.4, pp. 10–11, with scope 1934–2007). Or maintain by updating occasionally the URL of some ACBL.org webpage or database view (presumably now display Spingold; All Years, with scope 1938–2014).

2. Formal Citations under number references.

Regardless whether we do that, we should fully cite the NABC Daily Bulletin occasional periodical once in every article where we use it as a source --something we might in turn do by template NABCbull-- rather than never, per the current Nicolas utility, or once for every Daily Bulletin article that we use as a source.

Suppose we cite the online NABC Winners database as our source for past winners of Spingold, et al. That, too, we should do once in a formal citation below the numbered references rather than do never or do once for every competition on a player's resume.

3. Insofar as differing Retrieved date formats a stumbling block for use of simple reference or citation template, we might (or might initially, before complicating the template) leave Retrieved dates out of the template display and append them manually. On this point I have other ideas that pertain to publication dates also, and as we do or don't pursue the {spingold} and/or the {NABCbull} lines that I have indicated here.

(Concerning retrieval dates as a stumbling block, I prefer that WPCB agree to use Retrieved YYYY-MM-DD in all page creations, and wherever there is no competing claim.)

4. My previous related thoughts, not shared, concern our formal references to WBF bulletins, webpages, databases. As far as I know, the discussion may as well be specific to ACBL.

--P64 (talk) 20:15, 3 November 2014 (UTC)


 * Having done all this work, my recommendation is that we have a {bridge accomplishments} tag that automatically displays what "we" consider to be their accomplishments. 1st/2nd in ACBL events, 1/2/3 in WBF events, etc.


 * It is silly that we are manually trying to edit all this data when this is what computers are for.


 * There are >100 people in ACBL HOF. ACBL changes their web site, "we" have 106 pages to update instead of 1.


 * Same with all the WBF tags.


 * We need a centralized DB that can provide all this information.


 * My utility can easily add additional sources (I added World Youth Pairs/Teams today), but it is still not the answer. In a few minutes I changed all the ACBL HOF in my generated files, but someone manually has to edit everyone's profile. This is silly given the power of computers.


 * We really need someone to create proper tools for data that should be auto-generated or in a single place.Nicolas.hammond (talk) 03:08, 4 November 2014 (UTC)
 * Agree 100%. Unfortunately, most of us editors do not have the technical skills to do this programming. From my reading of the foregoing, it seems to me that we have two complementary concepts:
 * (1) Programming that assembles data into a data warehouse somewhere
 * (2) Programming that automatically 'writes' into articles from data that has been assembled into a warehouse
 * The first is easy to imagine, the second less so. Who is this technically skilled programmer? Who can even judge who is competent? How do we go about finding such a person - such a volunteer editor as is the way at Wiki? I look forward to assisting them but my contribution would be from the 'user' perspective not the programming perspective. Prior to such programming effort, there should be discussion on the proposed contents of the proposed warehouse and on 'standard' presentation format of data incorporated into articles. (Had Nicolas been assisted by some of us computer Neanderthals, he might have avoided some of the issues he encountered with his recent work - such as duplicate names - by the way, excellent work nevertheless!) Do we first create a 'tool-making task force' within the contract bridge project to organize this undertaking or simply continue to have each editor do their individual best as is the current practice? Newwhist (talk) 13:07, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

SportAccord Athlete Information
The SportAccord World Mind Games Athlete Information database is likely to be a valuable source. My first visit is thanks to PL.wiki Polish Wikipedia Sylvie Willard.
 * Other-language WikiP. Somewhere I have mentioned the certain value of some bridge player biographies at other-language wikipedia editions. Polish Wikipedia (PL.wiki) provides pages for a great number of players, pl:Kategoria:Brydżyści. (28 of 58 Americans are new or newly categorized during November, perhaps some response to our October creations or November activity.)
 * IT.wiki provides few pages--even for Italian players, it:Categoria:Giocatori di bridge italiani, half the number at PL.wiki-- but they do have Eugenio Chiaradia whom we and PL.wiki and all others lack.
 * --P64 (talk) 22:00, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Athlete Information: Sylvie Willard gives birthdate 7 August 1952, which we/I use here --rather than September per FR.wiki (where i left a talk-page notice) and, ironically for me, PL.wiki. --P64 (talk) 03:11, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

Honor tricks, etc
Glossary of contract bridge terms includes one entry "Honor or honour tricks (also known as quick tricks)" and another "Quick tricks : see honor tricks".

Honor tricks is a redlink while Quick tricks is a redirect to Hand evaluation, whose section 5.1 heading is "Quick Tricks (NOT the same as Honor Tricks in the Culbertson system)".

Offhand I recall reading of defensive and playing tricks, which have no glossary entries, as well as honor and quick tricks. Perhaps some have not been quantified and some have been quantified more than once, differently.

The ACBL NABC Daily Bulletin 57.7 (March 27, 2014), page 5, is our formal source for past winners of the Whitehead Women's Pairs in many player biographies. The page 5 article "Women's Pairs compete for Whitehead Trophy" says that W.C. Whitehead invented among other things "the quick-trick table of card values, the Whitehead system of requirements for original bids and responses". I don't know whether Whitehead related those two.

--P64 (talk) 22:21, 10 December 2014 (UTC)