User talk:Ravenpuff/Archives/2020/February

Prep 6 (now Queue 6)

Hi, I appreciate your touch-ups, but we can't assume that international readers will know where Chicago is. Yoninah (talk) 19:12, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

@Yoninah: Feel free to re-link Chicago if you think that it's necessary. MOS:OL is intentionally vague in determining what to link or not to link; I feel that Chicago is sufficiently well-known worldwide to not be regularly linked, like New York City (which is hardly ever linked in DYK). — RAVENPVFF · talk · 15:40, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Well, I can't do anything about it now, as I'm not an administrator. But I do see your point. I'll try to keep it in mind. Thanks, Yoninah (talk) 15:43, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

"per MOS:SOCRATIC"

That's not really a question addressed to the reader, rather by the described interrogator to the person he was interrogating, and I think that's clear from context, but in the interest of comity among editors, stylistic consistency and the article being on DYK tomorrow I'll leave it be. Daniel Case (talk) 19:06, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

Initial caps

Why have you been changing [[predation|predatory]] to [[Predation|predatory]] (and similar) lately? I'm not aware of any support for that. It's happened at least 4 times now. - Dank (push to talk) 17:39, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

@Dank: It's a purely syntactic change; I feel that piped links are made clearer that way to editors. Considering that this has zero impact on the actual output of the wikitext, I don't think that this is a problem per se. — RAVENPVFF · talk · 00:26, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

Okay, if there's no support for the change, I'll revert it. - Dank (push to talk) 00:36, 19 January 2020 (UTC)

I really don't follow what's happening ... your edits used to be fairly consistent. Something's changed; I just had to revert all of your changes at WP:Today's featured article/January 27, 2020. I'll take part of the blame, but please be more careful. - Dank (push to talk) 14:41, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

@Dank: Could you kindly elaborate? Which edits in particular do you find objectionable – for instance, I used both {{TFATOPIC}} and {{TFAFULL}} to mimic the syntax in recent featured-topic TFAs (e.g. Jan 14, Jan 15 and Jan 26), whereas I moved the italic markup to be outside the link in accordance with wikitext convention. While I'll admit that I can occasionally be a little overzealous in my editing and copy-editing, I still work to maintain consistency in my contributions across Wikipedia. — RAVENPVFF · talk · 16:11, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

You participated in the conversation at WT:TFA where we deprecated Template:TFATOPIC. I was on a short wikibreak that started on December 28, and other people were involved with blurbs ... that's fine, but it doesn't override the discussion at WT:TFA. We've been using the '''[[Japanese battleship Hyūga|''Hyūga'']]''' syntax for years ... I don't care at all what syntax we use, but that's the syntax that was least likely to get reverted, and these aren't the kind of decisions that should be made in the last hours before the page gets protected. Decisions about optional commas also shouldn't be made during the last hours. There's a current discussion at WT:TFA that's contemplating an RfC; the current version of the proposal would, roughly speaking, protect all blurbs all the time. When people wait until the last hours to edit blurbs, and the edits aren't in line with existing practice, that's the kind of thing that makes RfC voters want to vote to protect blurbs from editing. I'm not criticizing your work in general, you've generally been careful, but you've been less careful lately. Please be more careful. - Dank (push to talk) 16:37, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

@Dank: Duly noted. I do remember that discussion regarding {{TFATOPIC}}, but I was under the impression that the decision had been (at least implicitly) reversed due to recent usage of the deprecated syntax; I'll be more cautious in my future editing of blurbs. Anyway, on a related note, are you still opposed to the nowrapping of dates in TFA? — RAVENPVFF · talk · 02:53, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. Several things come to mind: 1. I know that some people feel strongly about nbsps, so I've always stayed out of that fight in blurbs. (And it is a fight, because I've never found any two proponents of nbsps who can agree in all cases where they should go.) 2. I usually don't see nbsp's in running text in dates at FAC, but no one minds if you add them ... as long as you add them near the end of the reviewing process. It's more difficult to read long text with tons of gibberish characters inserted. That's probably a good rule of thumb in TFA blurbs, too ... the nbsps should come last. 3. WP:MOSNUM, the fussiest page in all of wiki-space, is repeatedly inconsistent in whether they add a nbsp between the month and day (September 2, say). They consistently don't put an nbsp between the day and year (September 2, 1997). - Dank (push to talk) 03:15, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Feb 12: your edits took it up to 1047 characters, way over the 1025 limit. Some of them were unnecessary, and the numerals-to-numbers edit should have gone the other way. Please don't do that. I'll fix it. - Dank (push to talk)

Re: Wikipedia:Today's featured article/February 17, 2020: Okay, all things considered, I don't think I have any good options here other than to simply start reverting some of your last-day edits and ask you to post at WP:ERRORS if you have questions. (I'll try to revert them quickly so you'll have plenty of time to post at ERRORS, and so that we'll have time to ping the article editors if discussion is needed ... but of course I'm not available 24/7.) I'm not asking you to stop making edits that you think are right; sometimes everyone else misses stuff. But often, the issues are subtle, or consensus hasn't been worked out yet, or we're dealing with matters of taste. These kinds of edits often require consensus; I really don't want to be accused of giving the "win" by default to whoever manages to make the last edit before the page gets protected. If there's some subtle issue, I'll generally indicate that in my edit summary when I revert. - Dank (push to talk) 16:54, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

@Dank: I've made a post at ERRORS relating to the cyclone image issue. I recognise that my edits often come at an inopportune time just before the templates get protected; while my intention in this regard was originally to perform some tidying-up after all of the substantive edits have been done, some of my tweaks have obviously veered into less uncontroversial territory. To mitigate this a little, I'll try to make such alterations, if needed, at least a few days before (e.g. here). Regarding the wind speed change, I'm aware that such conversions in the context of tropical cyclones aren't as precise as the templates give by default; I did in fact take that into account by tweaking the number of significant figures in the output, but I can understand it if it's preferred to state the conversions explicitly. Thanks. — RAVENPVFF · talk · 17:43, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. - Dank (push to talk) 17:46, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm uncomfortable with this edit. Please hear this message: I'm not willing to continue treating your TFA edits as some kind of ongoing relationship or negotation between you and me, which is what it winds up being if you revert my reversion, since no one else (these days) is interested in these kinds of edits. This is starting to feel wrong, and a little creepy. You're welcome to insert nbsps since I agree that they should be inserted last (if at all) and I'm not interested in doing that. I'm fine with corrections that broadly correspond to Wikipedian expectations. Anything else needs to use and respect the established consensus-building processes ... discussion generally, but in particular, blurb reviews and WP:ERRORS. Regarding this edit in particular: it's only "uncontroversial" in the sense that hyphens that are added are rarely reverted because people don't care. But people do care, broadly, about large numbers of unnecessary edits, especially ones outside the established consensus-building processes. Few people hyphenate "black and white" these days ... do a Google search and see for yourself. I don't usually see the phrase hyphenated at FAC. You're welcome to discuss the matter at ERRORS ... I wouldn't be shocked, or bothered, if the decision is made there to hyphenate. I hope you hear me this time; we're running out of good options here. - Dank (push to talk) 17:11, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

@Dank: I believe that we're both unwilling to continue this "negotiation" concerning TFA blurbs. My edits have always been in good faith, of course, and so have yours. I agree with your sentiments above, but I think most of the grey area regarding what I choose to edit (which has, by and large, been stylistic emendations) and to which you've been opposed lies within what "broadly correspond[s] to Wikipedian expectations". Normally, I interpret this to include fixes in accordance with the MOS, which I would certainly consider uncontroversial – for example, the "black-and-white" hyphenation is covered by MOS:HYPHEN (specifically, point 3b). Perhaps I haven't been that clear with my edit summaries, but I'd argue that the majority of my edits brings blurbs more closely in line with standard English style and syntax, as well as maintaining consistency across the Main Page (e.g. the "U.S." edit, to which you didn't object when we discussed this very issue in September). Also, some of my corrections may seem trivial, but most of them have never been completely unnecessary – if it were so, I wouldn't have made them myself. Now, I'll concede that I haven't been very careful in my execution of WP:BOLD, as well as not making enough use of ERRORS; I apologise. Please be assured that I have indeed read and considered your messages here. Additionally, I'll try to limit my editing at TFA for now to nbsps and related refinements, which should help de-escalate tensions a little. Thanks. — RAVENPVFF · talk · 17:39, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

I just realized I don't know what pronouns you prefer ... he/she/they/something else? - Dank (push to talk) 19:44, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

@Dank: I prefer "he"/"him". — RAVENPVFF · talk · 10:26, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

I regret some of what I just said. I don't want to lessen your enthusiasm or enjoyment of Wikipedia. If you're content to take issues to ERRORS in the cases where I revert you, that might work for both of us ... or maybe not. I think this conflict that we're having sits inside a much larger set of misunderstandings and conflicts between people who put their faith in various article-review forums and people who don't. If it turns out our conflict isn't resolved, then I might have to talk about the bigger conflicts ... not something I'm looking forward to. - Dank (push to talk) 04:09, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

@Dank: I'm entirely open to the discussion of potentially contentious changes in Main Page content over at ERRORS; I've in fact just posted a note there about the single-year link that you had previously reverted, as well as another suggestion for the day-after-tomorrow's. For my part, I've always understood the value of Wikipedia's forums as the main ways in which consensus is developed. Conversely, there's the exhortation for editors to be bold when making changes. It isn't that I don't have faith in Wikipedia's discussion spaces, protracted as they may be at times, but that it may often be valuable for editors to step in and make improvements when they think that it's necessary. Of course, what we've ended up doing through our TFA interactions is basically the BOLD, revert, discuss cycle. Anyway, I agree that this isn't worth escalating, for reasons I've already elucidated above.

Note that we've got a tricky one coming up on March 5 ... "the Hawaiʻi-born Colonel Samuel Armstrong" needs "Colonel" not "colonel", because "Hawaiʻi-born" isn't a type of colonel ... it modifies the whole name. - Dank (push to talk) 03:57, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Old love

Do you know of Olf Love used as a title of this particlular book? That - vs. just a ttranslation - would need a reference. --(forgot to sign)

@Gerda Arendt: The rule of thumb that I follow is that translations of italicised works are likewise placed in italics. I'm unsure if "Old Love" was ever used as a translation of Alte Liebe, but that wasn't my intention when I edited the article and DYK template. — RAVENPVFF · talk · 10:17, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Where is that rule? My rule is that if we suggest that something is a title, by italics and title case, it better IS a title, or we would be misleading. Example: Jesus nahm zu sich die Zwölfe, BWV 22. There's a translation to help understanding the foreign title, but it is not a title: sentence case. Reviewed quality. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 10:29, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

DYK nomination of Querida Amazonia

Hello! Your submission of Querida Amazonia at the Did You Know nominations page has been reviewed, and some issues with it may need to be clarified. Please review the comment(s) underneath your nomination's entry and respond there as soon as possible. Thank you for contributing to Did You Know! Daniel Case (talk) 05:24, 29 February 2020 (UTC)