body:
On 3/14/07, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
> It is increasingly common that subjects of articles wish to interact
> directly with us and tell us that their article is wrong in some way.
> It is, in my opinion, silly for us to reject even harmless corrections
> on the grounds that they cannot be traced to a reliable source. If

It's also silly for us to object to Joe Smith fixing his birthday on
[[Joe Smith]] while simultaneously complaining that people don't seem
to realise that people can edit the encyclopaedia themselves. See the
other topic, about the history tab and the edit button being
invisible.

> Wikipedia itself becomes a primary source in the process of someone
> commenting on "their" article, what is the problem with that from a
> purely factual point of view? Depending on the nature of the
> statement, such comments could be either incorporated as corrections
> (date of birth) or attributed statements (".. denies that he ever had
> sexual relations with that woman").

You mean, if Joe Smith deletes "was seeing Jane Bloggs" from his
article, we can then add "Joe Smith denies being in a relationship
with Jane Bloggs" with a link to the diff as the citation for the
denial? How pervertedly weirdly plausible.

> ...). No, just like any credentials verification, WMF shouldn't be
> involved directly. But while I generally fully support the need for
> good sourcing in any article, I often find it absurd how people who
> point out simple corrections are treated.

Simple corrections from the source itself should just be accepted.
Anything vaguely controversial we should ask for something on their
website we can link to. Ie, if we have a semi-reliable source saying
someone was in the IRA, and they privately claim they weren't, we
should at least ask to see a public declaration that they weren't.
Then we can publish as "The Camden local paper says that he was in the
IRA<ref.../>, a claim which he denies strongly<ref.../>

Steve


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [WikiEN-l] Corporate Donors - Status?

body:
On 3/13/07, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Would an unpaid editor on the Wikipedia think "gosh, I should lie on
> > Google's wikipedia page because they are one of dozens (hundreds?
> > thousands?) of companies that have donated to the foundation."
>
> No, I wouldn't expect many editors to make a conscious decision to lie
> on a corporate article, but our preferences and likes do manifest in
> our editing.

It could go either way. I remember thinking when looking at the
[[Virgin United]] article last time that I would find it somewhat mean
to be as hard-nosed towards their article as I might normally be. But
I'm sure that other editors would be the opposite, perversely
insisting on sources for *everything*, bringing up any dirt they can
find, to challenge the notion that the company is getting a free ride
on us.

Come to think of it, the second way of thinking is more likely to
prevail. A lot of our editors fiercely defend democracy, independence,
freedom...

Steve


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Oldak Quill

subject: [Wikitech-l] Comprised IP address?

body:
On 13/03/07, Ian Tresman <it at knowledge.co.uk> wrote:
> At 21:33 13/03/2007, you wrote:
> >It's _possible_ to lose your IP to someone else.  I believe this is more
> >likely for DSL than Cable.
>
> Sure, but
> (a) not for a static IP address ?
> (b) for a dynamic IP address, it would be unlikely that if you lose
> an IP address, you'd get it back.
> (c) You wouldn't lose the same IP address on several ocassions to the
> same culprit?

Don't AOL pool their IPs among users?

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


from_name: ben wilber

subject: [Wikitech-l] Voice chat & VoIP systems

body:
On Mar 13, 2007, at 11:10 PM, Kelly Martin wrote:

> I can't spare the
> time right now (I'm already backlogged at work, and we're moving house
> just now), but I can probably give it more focus in a week or so when
> things are bit less insane around here.

Like I said on IRC, I've been working with Asterisk and SER for a few
years now and would be happy to help if this is the route things are
going.

bw.


from_name: Ian Tresman

subject: [Wikitech-l] Comprised IP address?

body:
At 23:25 13/03/2007, you wrote:
>2007/3/13, Ian Tresman <it at knowledge.co.uk>:
>
> > If their User IP was identified with, for example, a college, then
> > several people could indeed be using the same Wikipedia User IP address.
> >
> > But if their IP address is identified with a private residential
> > broadband account, then the only ways it could be compromised is:
> >
> > a. Someone else has access to the same computer
> > b. The home computer has a Trojan giving access to an intruder
> >
>
>c. They have an unprotected wireless network
>
>And of course there is also the possibility that their IP is neither college
>nor private but (for example) an ISP-based cache.

1. That would imply it's shared... and there would probably be a
record of it during a Google search?

2. And if I ping the IP address, it should be active 24-hours a day,
nor when the customer is out at work?

Regards,
Ian

>--
>Andre Engels, andreengels at gmail.com
>ICQ: 6260644  --  Skype: a_engels
>_______________________________________________
>Wikitech-l mailing list
>Wikitech-l at lists.wikimedia.org
>http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


subject: [Wikitech-l] Comprised IP address?

body:
At 01:22 14/03/2007, you wrote:
>On 13/03/07, Ian Tresman <it at knowledge.co.uk> wrote:
> > At 21:33 13/03/2007, you wrote:
> > >It's _possible_ to lose your IP to someone else.  I believe this is more
> > >likely for DSL than Cable.
> >
> > Sure, but
> > (a) not for a static IP address ?
> > (b) for a dynamic IP address, it would be unlikely that if you lose
> > an IP address, you'd get it back.
> > (c) You wouldn't lose the same IP address on several ocassions to the
> > same culprit?
>
>Don't AOL pool their IPs among users?

a. Do you mean a dynamic IP address... in which case a customer could
end up with any one of numerous IP addresses?

b. As it is, I know they are with Comcast, who have identified their
IP address as a residential customer.

Regards,
Ian


list: foundation-l

from_name: Jeffrey V. Merkey

subject: [Foundation-l] BitTorrent Image Downloads enwiki-20070206 Posted

body:
Using BitTorrent Python Package

BitTorrent files:

ftp://www.wikigadugi.org/wiki/torrents/

Tracker URL:

http://www.wikigadugi.org:60292

These torrent files have only been tested against BitTorrent, Azureus,
Ctorrent, and rTorrent.   ctorrent canot read files over 4 GB without
crashing.  Azureus have changed their DHT distributed tracking formats
and have problems with generic BitTorrent .torrent files.

It may take a day or so to fully flush this out, but the torrents are up.

Jeff


list: wikimedia-l


subject: [Wikitech-l] BitTorrent Image Downloads enwiki-20070206 Posted


subject: [WikiEN-l] 10 Things You Did Not Know About Wikipedia

body:
On 3/14/07, Simetrical <Simetrical+wikilist at gmail.com> wrote:
> want to be blocked or desysopped.  I think this was made pretty clear
> by the pedophilia userbox thing, where people who reversed what he did
> were summarily desysopped, and it took a day or two of arguing with
> him to get him to undo a block that seemed to pretty clearly not have
> consensus (as I recall the incident).

I seem to recall the situation as mass confusion over whether the
actions taken were "official" (err, "office"-ial) or not. But yeah,
effectively, people (well, one person) were desysopped for opposing
him. Even if they didn't actually mean to oppose him. And then the
situation was clarified and the Ewoks danced.

All of which served to reinforce the notion that Jimbo's role is
clearly a very special one, and not merely the "voice of the people"
idea suggested earlier.

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia as a primary source

body:
On 3/14/07, Stan Shebs <stanshebs at earthlink.net> wrote:
> Just as we need to be known for not allowing corporations to buy slanted
> coverage, we need it to be known that celebrities can't get the slant
> they want just by asking.

De-slanting is not the same thing as a harmless correction. If we have
no source for a birthdate, and the celebrity says it's wrong, we
should just fix it. If we have no source for a mildly embarrassing
statement, and the celebrity says it's wrong, we should try and find
out one way or another ASAP. Which (iirc) is what we usually do.

So far, I'm comfortable with kowtowing to loudmouthed celebrities who
complain about their articles. I don't see that it does our cause a
great deal of good to stubbornly keep a crappy article in place when
the world's attention has just been brought to it. Better to clean it
up and make it "nice", at the expense of true NPOV, and let it drift
back to a more neutral position in the days afterwards.

Steve


body:
On 3/14/07, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Wikipedia editor happy). IMHO it would be perfectly fine for Wikipedia
> to accept such statements & corrections directly, and to refer to them
> as <ref>correction/statement submitted by XX, ticket ID #123, received
> ...</ref>. The main issue here is verifying identity, but that could
> be handled by trusted people who have access to the respective OTRS
> queue.

It's a bit ugly, and very self-referential. Which is something we
normally try and avoid. Wikipedia tries to document the external
world, not itself...see WP:SELF.

However, it's probably an acceptable, if somewhat last-resort, solution.

Steve


subject: [WikiEN-l] Almeda University paying for positive Wikipedia edits

body:
On 14/03/07, The Cunctator <cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 3/11/07, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> > One problem I have with this kind of paid editing is that those who
> > can afford to pay will have more NPOV, better written articles. Do we
> > want the quality of parts of Wikipedia to be determined by who's
> > paying for what?
>
> Dirty hippy communist.

I prefer to think of myself as an inequality aversionist ;)

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Mechanical turks (was: Re: Almeda University paying
	for positive Wikipedia edits)

body:
On 3/14/07, William Pietri <william at scissor.com> wrote:
> I would, but I'm not sure of the answer. Well, if anybody gets an MTurk
> project going, let me know and I'm in for up to $250 donated to the
> Foundation to help fund it.

You wouldn't be interested in helping set up the project, and putting
some money directly into it? I think we could get an answer to the
basic question of whether this is a worthwhile pursuit with much less
than $250.

Also, do you live in the US? :)

Steve


from_name: Skyring

subject:
[WikiEN-l] Why cutting'n'pasting from Wikipedia is not a good
	idea

body:
On 3/13/07, Ron Ritzman <ritzman at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 3/13/07, Daniel P. B. Smith <wikipedia2006 at dpbsmith.com> wrote:
>
> > People don't _seriously link_ about Wikipedia's reliability any more
> > than they think about the reliability of their newspaper.
>
> At least with the newspaper, there's no chance that, depending when
> you choose to open it, you will see "BLOW ME" in big red letters
> instead of the story you were expecting to read.

You've never read the local free paper in Rockingham, I'll bet.

Some good suggestions so far in the discussion, but I can't say that I like
the idea of new text being wigglelined. It might be something perfectly
fine, in fact it probably is, but it's going to look like a spelling or
grammer error to the casual reader.

I'd like to suggest something which I think should work. Whenever an
administrator edits an article, that version automatically becomes the
"stable" version that an unregistered reader will see. And it won't have
"edit" links all over it. Sure, it might have mistakes and it might have
POV, but the odds are that if an admin has had even a glance at it, it's
probably good.

Readers who have accounts, and are presumably wikisavvy, will see what we
have now: the latest version, able to be edited. Readers without accounts
will have an extra button they have to press before they get to the actual
current version that they can edit.

We can make it so that the version a casual reader sees is likely to be a
good one, and they can cut and paste it into their grade school homework or
professional journalistic article as they please. But they can also get into
the "work in progress" version just by clicking an extra button and
Wikipedia remains the encyclopaedia anyone may edit.

--
Peter in Canberra


list: commons-l

from_name: Eugene Zelenko

subject: [Commons-l] Deletion Bot

body:
Hi!

We have problem in Belarusian Wikipedia: bot creates articles copied
from copyrighted source. Bot operates from open proxy and we can't
block proxy itself due configuration issue.

As for now we need to delete already created articles. Any help with
deletion automation are appreciated.

Thank you,
Eugene.


from_name: John Lee

body:
On 3/14/07, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> On 3/13/07, Simetrical <Simetrical+wikilist at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Jimbo's role is ambiguous, but it seems pretty clear that for
> > day-to-day purposes, he can ignore consensus-gathering, which no one
> > else on the project can do
>
> "Day-to-day" seems like an exaggeration. Jimmy steps into disputes
> relatively rarely, and they are not usually what I would call serious
> long term issues (with all due respect to friends of Mr. Peppers or
> owners of shiny userboxes). Ideally, I see Jimmy's role as that of the
> respected founder who heals divisions in the community by cautiously
> proposing compromises in difficult, heated situations. I think it's
> also fine for him to focus the attention of the community on an
> important issue for the purpose of brainstorming and consensus
> finding.
>
> His role, if you want to give it a name, is that of a representative
> "head of state" for the English Wikipedia, but without any legal
> basis. There are controls in place above & below him, and he has acted
> with remarkable restraint even before this was the case. Of course I
> don't agree with everything Jimmy says or does, but I don't think it's
> reasonable to characterize him a "dictator" of anything, certainly not
> now that his legal status is equal to mine, Kat's or Oscar's.

De jure, Jimbo is indeed no more special than most others, but de facto,
let's face it - he can get away with a lot more than anyone else. This is
mainly because, like the constitutional monarch, he has accumulated
sufficient amounts of respect over time to exercise substantial authority.
But this fact doesn't diminish the fact that he does have substantial de
facto authority.

Johnleemk


from_name: Julian Fleischer

subject: [Wikitech-l] TOC Extension - does this exist?

body:
Am Mittwoch, 14. M?rz 2007 schrieb Chris Marmo:
> For my current project CSS positioning isn't an option because I need
> to position the TOC in another column relative to the actions bar
> (which I'm displaying vertically). Because both the TOC and Actions
> bars increase/decrease in size absolute positioning wont cut it,
> unfortunately.
>
> Again, any suggestions from developers would be received with great
> appreciation :)

Well, I'm not a developer myself, but I think XSL-Transformations would be a
neat way to achieve the appreciated behaviour. I think some basic XSLT which
is needed for what you want to do is supported along with MSIE 6 and recent
Gecko Versions, so there shouldn't be a problem with it.

Julian

--
Public Key at http://keys.warhog.net/mediazilla_warhog_net.asc
md5sum: b2bc5b96358bb5f0ab499f7720b999c1
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from_name: Sharon, Lois Bram

subject: [WikiEN-l] Requesting assistance re user:Bastique

body:
I thought that there was a confirmation email or something, so when it
didn't arrive, I tried again.

I didn't do anything about the other account, didn't even log into it. I
think it's blocked anyways.

And "the edits themselves"? I was trying to ensure that things were done
fairly. Look at my contributions, I'm a good editor. Or I was, even though
I'm probably not coming back after seeing this is how you administrators
behave.

[[user:One Elephant went out to play...]]

On 3/14/07, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 13/03/07, Sharon, Lois Bram <oneelephant at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Please, if anyone can help, it would be greatly appreciated.
> > User: One Elephant Went Out to Play...
>
>
> Hint: having also created User:Two Elephants Went Out to Play... two
> minutes later gives a strong impression of bad faith on your part. Not
> to mention the edits themselves.
>
>
> - d.
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Samuel L Bronkowitz

subject: [WikiEN-l] Fine, be that way.

body:
Liar.

On 3/14/07, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 14/03/07, Oskar Sigvardsson <oskarsigvardsson at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 3/14/07, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > On 14/03/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > > Does anyone know where I can find the checkuser request that led to
> the
> > > > blocking of CountPointercount?
>
> > > No idea if there was an on-wiki request, but the check was around
> > > 16-20 Feb. Two checkers did the search.
>
> >
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/RunedChozo
>
>
> Ah, Enviroknot/Parker again. (Unsurprisingly from the invective style.)
>
>
> - d.
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] An observation about Wikipedia

body:
On 14/03/07, Steve Bennett <stevagewp at gmail.com> wrote:

> Just a personal anecdote. I'm currently preparing a trivia quiz in a
> very similar format to one I did 2 years ago. Then, I don't recall
> using Wikipedia much - I just got on the web and searched for the
> answers to questions I came up with. This time, I'm using it almost
> exclusively - it just seems to have become that much more useful.

Just make sure there's no wifi and there's social pressure not to use
a phone at the quiz ...

- d.


body:
On 14/03/07, stevertigo <stvrtg at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 3/13/07, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:

> > I'm not concerned about a slippery slope here. Wikipedians tend to be
> > pretty paranoid the moment anyone vaguely connected to an article says
> > anything (and rightly so).

> This general claim about how Wikipedias tend to act needs a citation.
> A "reliable" source,
> preferably.

There's a primary source on foundation-l most of last December.
Certainly enough to create the effect described.

- d.


from_name: Rob Church

subject:
[Wikitech-l] [MediaWiki-CVS] SVN: [20439]
	trunk/phase3/includes/SpecialIpblocklist.php

body:
On 14/03/07, aaron at svn.wikimedia.org <aaron at svn.wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Revision: 20439
> Author:   aaron
> Date:     2007-03-13 21:38:52 -0800 (Tue, 13 Mar 2007)
>
> Log Message:
> -----------
> *Hide blocks from regular users if ipb_deleted is set

Er, isn't this taking it too far? There's no need to add a bunch of
levels of hiding blocks; blocks ought to be open and transparent to
all users. I also don't believe there's a need to be able to mark a
block as deleted and restore it - just unblock and reblock as
required.

Rob Church


from_name: Ken Arromdee

body:
On Wed, 14 Mar 2007, Anthony wrote:
> > > The policy on sources, WP:ATT, allows self-published sources to be
> > > used in biographies of living persons. This means we can use the
> > > subject's personal website or blog, so if someone wants to address an
> > > issue in their Wikipedia article, they only have to publish it
> > > themselves on their blog first, which anyone can set up at no cost.
> >
> > Setting up a blog can be quite a hassle, especially for a non-techie, even
> > if he doesn't have to pay to get it.  Basically, "if you want this fixed,
> > set up a blog" is a big hoop you're making people jump through in order to
> > fix something that they probably didn't even want in the first place.
> >
> We could always set up the blog for them.

That's another form of "you can't fix your article unless you jump through
these ridiculous hoops".  Finding someone in an all-volunteer Wikipedia
willing to set up a blog for a random complainer is at least as difficult
as setting up the blog himself.

> Or we could set up a wiki
> which allows original research, and which can be referenced from
> Wikipedia.

This won't work, because the attribution FAQ says that Wikis are not
legitimate sources.  I tried to change it to allow wikis when self-published
sources are allowed.  It didn't get in.


from_name: Jeff V. Merkey

subject: [Wikitech-l] MediaWiki 1.9.3 ImageMap Extension Errors and bugs

references:
<45F5A30E.6040602@wolfmountaingroup.com>	<45F5CC25.2070303@pobox.com>	<45F5C28E.6050906@wolfmountaingroup.com>	<45F5CE79.7010709@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<45F6B122.4080805@pobox.com>

body:
Brion Vibber wrote:

>-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>Hash: SHA1
>
>Jeff V. Merkey wrote:
>
>
>>You may want to look at this page. I do have tidylib installed and running.
>>
>>http://en.wikigadugi.org/wiki/Sun
>>
>>
>
>There's an unclosed <div>.
>
>Confirm that tidy is working correctly; check also the UI portions?
>
>

I had to change the path to tidy and add a '/' character to the front of
the absolute
path to the program, then it worked with 1.9.3. I noticed that the path
parsing has subtle
differences between MediaWiki versions.

i.e. one example was the path rendering of $wgLogo when I first installed
1.9.3. Someone might want to check over all of the path parsing and make
certain
it is consistent throughout in the event someone fat fingers the strings
(like I did).

Some paths which worked under 1.8 stopped working under 1.9.3. (I have
used the same
syntax on 1.6 through 1.8, but on 1.9.3, it stopped working unless the
path specifications
were precise).

Jeff

>
>- -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com / brion @ wikimedia.org)
>-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
>Version: GnuPG v1.4.2.2 (Darwin)
>Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org
>
>iD8DBQFF9rEiwRnhpk1wk44RAi6KAJ9H2/XUU2hMK4LA3SyV7cFidzgcnACgveF9
>Rg6PAV5K2tmQFC2xyt8/t6w=
>=DQLV
>-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
>
>_______________________________________________
>Wikitech-l mailing list
>Wikitech-l at lists.wikimedia.org
>http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>
>
>


subject:
[Wikitech-l] [MediaWiki-CVS] SVN:
	[20439]trunk/phase3/includes/SpecialIpblocklist.php

body:
On 14/03/07, Andrew Garrett <andrew at epstone.net> wrote:
> I presume the intent is to hide block messages that inadvertantly
> reveal personal information. Or, if my estimations of policy
> creep are accurate, ones that offend people (a la Giano)... Or
> ones that offend people. Or ones that are uncivil. And so the list
> of probable new missions goes on...

Ahhhh...that would make more sense. Excuse me; lack of sleep, no caffeine, etc.

Rob Church


from_name: Florian Straub

subject:
[Commons-l] Please do not delete images used on
 [[Wikimedia	logo mosaic]]

body:
"David Gerard" <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote on Tue, 13 Mar 2007:

> On 13/03/07, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > If the mosaic is going to get in the way of our fundimental mission
> > then we might need to reconsider if we should be keeping it at all.
> > ... Although I agree with Erik's view that a few broken images in the
> > mosaic are not a bad thing.
> > In any case, a copy vio image should never be undeleted simbly because
> > it has not yet been replaced.
>
>
> Well, how was the mosaic constructed? How did we go through the images
> finding ones of the right average colour? Presumably someone could do
> a checking run again looking for verified-status images of the right
> average colour for use as copyvio replacements on an ongoing basis.
> The mosaic can cope with temporary holes while a violation is being
> replaced if there's a pile of known-good replacements to hand.

What about getting a CommonsTicker for Commons .... --~~~~
--
Der GMX SmartSurfer hilft bis zu 70% Ihrer Onlinekosten zu sparen!
Ideal f?r Modem und ISDN: http://www.gmx.net/de/go/smartsurfer


from_name: Rich Holton

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> On 13/03/07, Sharon, Lois Bram <oneelephant at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Please, if anyone can help, it would be greatly appreciated.
>> User: One Elephant Went Out to Play...
>
>
> Hint: having also created User:Two Elephants Went Out to Play... two
> minutes later gives a strong impression of bad faith on your part. Not
> to mention the edits themselves.
>
>
> - d.
>

I'm troubled by the course of the conversation that took place about
this on WP:ANI. At least two people were asserting that one should not
revert Danny because he's a foundation employee, or Kat Walsh, because
of board membership.

There have been many, many assertions of late that we on Wikipedia do
not (should not) give credit to credentials, but to the content of
contributions. So it's disturbing to see these arguments used. Using
these sorts of arguments does Wikipedia no favors, and contributes to
the notion that there is a cabal that one should not cross lest one
suffer the penalty.

Note that I have no comment (and have developed no opinion) on the
content of the contributions of any of the parties involved in the
original dispute.

-Rich Holton


from_name: Andrew Dunbar

body:
On 13/03/07, Chris Marmo <wiki at prosimian.com.au> wrote:
> Thanks for the replies everyone.
>
> > Having recently played with this code I can say it sounds like a good
> > idea to me. The TOC code is tied to the parser and the output more
> > strongly than it need be. It should be free to be output as part of
> > the
> > skin or part of the article. It should be quite easy to implement.
>
> Andrew - I agree completely. I think hacking up the parser class
> would be easy, however I don't want to mess with the core code. I'd
> rather build this as an extension on top of what already exists. I've
> tried extending the class and overriding the Parser::formatHeadings()
> function but I don't know enough about hooks, etc at the moment to
> make an informed decision about the best way to go about this.
>
> For my current project CSS positioning isn't an option because I need
> to position the TOC in another column relative to the actions bar
> (which I'm displaying vertically). Because both the TOC and Actions
> bars increase/decrease in size absolute positioning wont cut it,
> unfortunately.
>
> Again, any suggestions from developers would be received with great
> appreciation :)

Oftentimes when you're doing something new there is not yet any hook
in the right place. Adding a new hook is trivial and typically only adds
one line to the core code. In the work I mentioned above I added two
hooks. One to allow extra stuff where the [edit] links are added and one
to allow an alternative algorithm for generating the TOC and the
headings since this code is glommed together now.

Because you're typically only adding one line, svn updates usually
cause no problem. And if you want others to benefit from your new
hook you can post it to Bugzilla as a feature request with your patch.
If the devs see a better way to do it they will usually say so or even
implement an improved version right away.

Good luck.

Andrew Dunbar (hippietrail)

> Best Regards,
> Chris
>
>
> On Mar 13, 2007, at 11:20 PM, Andrew Dunbar wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > Andrew Dunbar (hippietrail)
> >
> > --
> > http://wiktionarydev.leuksman.com http://linguaphile.sf.net
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > Wikitech-l mailing list
> > Wikitech-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> > http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
>

--
http://wiktionarydev.leuksman.com http://linguaphile.sf.net


from_name: Anthony

body:
On 3/13/07, Ken Arromdee <arromdee at rahul.net> wrote:
> On Tue, 13 Mar 2007, Slim Virgin wrote:
> > The policy on sources, WP:ATT, allows self-published sources to be
> > used in biographies of living persons. This means we can use the
> > subject's personal website or blog, so if someone wants to address an
> > issue in their Wikipedia article, they only have to publish it
> > themselves on their blog first, which anyone can set up at no cost.
>
> Setting up a blog can be quite a hassle, especially for a non-techie, even
> if he doesn't have to pay to get it.  Basically, "if you want this fixed,
> set up a blog" is a big hoop you're making people jump through in order to
> fix something that they probably didn't even want in the first place.
>
We could always set up the blog for them.  Or we could set up a wiki
which allows original research, and which can be referenced from
Wikipedia.

Anthony


from_name: Neil Harris

subject: [Wikitech-l] Comprised IP address?

body:
Thomas Dalton wrote:
>> Sure, but
>> (a) not for a static IP address ?
>> (b) for a dynamic IP address, it would be unlikely that if you lose
>> an IP address, you'd get it back.
>> (c) You wouldn't lose the same IP address on several ocassions to the
>> same culprit?
>>
>
> a) Definitely right
> b,c) Probably right
>
>
a) Don't forget about BGP prefix hijacking attacks, or (less likely)
direct attacks on your ISP's routing architecture, either of which would
have the same effect without a site compromise; or the use of insecure
wireless networks, which would allow an external attacker to use the
same IP address without authorization...
>
>
>


from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [WikiEN-l] Google Trends

body:
On 3/14/07, Jossi Fresco <jossifresco at mac.com> wrote:
>
> On Mar 13, 2007, at 11:18 AM, Ray Saintonge wrote:
>
> > The places where Jesus is more popular than Wikipedia are Spanish
> > speaking
> >
> > These are also the places where Jesus is more popular than porn.
>  Fascinating...

Well, J?sus is a Spanish first name.

Steve


from_name: Jim Hu

subject: [Wikitech-l] bot to append email to wiki page?

body:
Does anyone know if a bot exists to allow a wiki page to serve as an
archive for a listserv?  Preferably this would run on the mail
server, not on the server that has the wiki.

Thanks?

Jim
=====================================
Jim Hu
Associate Professor
Dept. of Biochemistry and Biophysics
2128 TAMU
Texas A&M Univ.
College Station, TX 77843-2128
979-862-4054


from_name: Chris Marmo

body:
Thanks for the replies everyone.

> Having recently played with this code I can say it sounds like a good
> idea to me. The TOC code is tied to the parser and the output more
> strongly than it need be. It should be free to be output as part of
> the
> skin or part of the article. It should be quite easy to implement.

Andrew - I agree completely. I think hacking up the parser class
would be easy, however I don't want to mess with the core code. I'd
rather build this as an extension on top of what already exists. I've
tried extending the class and overriding the Parser::formatHeadings()
function but I don't know enough about hooks, etc at the moment to
make an informed decision about the best way to go about this.

For my current project CSS positioning isn't an option because I need
to position the TOC in another column relative to the actions bar
(which I'm displaying vertically). Because both the TOC and Actions
bars increase/decrease in size absolute positioning wont cut it,
unfortunately.

Again, any suggestions from developers would be received with great
appreciation :)

Best Regards,
Chris

On Mar 13, 2007, at 11:20 PM, Andrew Dunbar wrote:

>
>
> Andrew Dunbar (hippietrail)
>
> --
> http://wiktionarydev.leuksman.com http://linguaphile.sf.net
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l


body:
On 3/14/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> talk-page was that I'd turned up a letter to a newspaper from a
> relative of the subject which mentioned, in passing, the correct
> deathdate - it seemed fair to accept that where sources differed,
> going to a source as close as possible to the subject seemed the most
> accurate.

If you've got two sources saying different things, NPOV generally
encourages you to cite both. I did something like this in [[Kate
McTell]] where half the sources I used claimed that Ruby Glaze was a
pseudonym, and half said they were two distinct people. IMHO it's much
easier to convince the reader that you're right if you cite both
versions and explain why one is more likely.

> I really don't see anything wrong with me footnoting a) as "was born
> in Such-and-Such<ref>Personal correspondence with the Wikimedia
> Foundation, June 17th, reference ABC1234567</ref>. Yes, we could ask
> them to issue a rather dull press release, or write a blog post, or
> (in one case I recall) update the details on their myspace page. But
> no reasonable academic or reporter objects to incorporating
> corrections of trivial, non-contentious details from those who know
> about the article; why should we?

Well, the obvious problem is that a future editor is not going to know
the background to the problem, and, following policy, will probably
reinstate the "public record" version. That's why "private
correspondance" just isn't good enough in most cases. It's just not
durable enough.

Steve


body:
On 3/14/07, Anthony <wikilegal at inbox.org> wrote:
> Because we want to be better?  If the detail is so trivial as to not
> matter if it's correct or not, why include it in the first place?

We always include birthdates. All publications do. But on a scale of
importance, there are much bigger mistakes we could make.

Steve


body:
On 3/14/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> 2) Does it have to be easily accessed by a random passer-by if the
> Foundation can verify it? That is really the point of this
> discussion... stating it won't work because of this is kind of
> circular.

Erm, yeah, that's sort of what verif^H^H^H^H^Hattributability is all
about. What would stop a reader putting down any random fact about
anyone and claiming 'personal correspondance with WMF'?

Steve


body:
On 3/14/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> Right now, what's to stop anyone uploading any image they choose and
> claiming permission to GFDL it has been filed with WMF? Nothing,
> except the fact we come down on them like a ton of bricks when we
> catch them...

Copyright is a completely different kettle of fish. We have never
demanded verifiability for licensing. I guess we assume a bit of good
faith, and for extraordinary claims ("This professional quality photo
of Tom Cruise was taken by me!") we ask for a bit more proof.

In general, very little harm can occur if we inadvertently use a
copyrighted image inappropriately. Compared to the amount of harm if
we inadvertently state something false and defamatory about someone.

Steve


body:
On 3/14/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> Which is why any correspondence we use is footnoted as such, and filed
> with the Foundation. You don't have to know the background to be able

Ok, I missed that, sorry.

Steve


body:
Mr. Holton,

when I started out, I thought that I had to get a confirmation email for my
account, because so many places do that. When I figured out how to get in, I
didn't need the second one, so I let it sit. Feel free to delete the second
account, I was just confused about the signup process because I had never
used it.

As far as the policies, I took the time to read them once I finally got in.
I may have missed the WP:OFFICE policy, but it does not say which accounts
are listed. The mere name of "Danny" did not mean anything to me. Nor did it
get listed with anything pointing to the WP:OFFICE policy to show me if that
was the case. I still really think it isn't the case.

Nor did I revert Danny at all. Nor does any policy specifically give a list
of editors that it is a "bad idea" to revert. I did revert user:Evrik, but
that was because he was edit warring, and I made a note on the talk page
that edit warring was bad and things should have been discussed first.

The organization that the page covers is controversial, but that wasn't why
I did what I did. I didn't even know about the page when Danny made his
revert, nor when Mindspillage protected it. Apparently the protection
expired, because someone named DumbBOT removed the tag later, and someone
else reverted it yet again. I did what I did because policy says edit
warring is bad and using admin powers to win a dispute is worse.

I still don't have a preferred version, I think the truth is somewhere
between the two versions, but it's obvious that there's not going to be
movement when Bastique is using his powers to control the page like that.

But what happened to me was ridiculous. I complained to the WP:ANI because
Bastique was going nuts attacking and threatening me. Instead of help, what
I got was more attacks, and Bastique apparently started going around back
channels trying to "prove" I'm someone I'm not, and what am I supposed to do
about that? The behavior of Bastique has shown me that there really is some
group on here that if you cross them, no matter how well intentioned you
are, they will destroy you just out of spite.

Merzbow has asked me to return. "MiddleEastern", a user with a big problem
axe to grind who's been leaving rants about "Zionists", says I should stay
gone for "censoring."

And what do I get from you people? I get threats from Bastique and Jersey
Devil. I get attacked out of nowhere by someone called slimvirgin, and I
have no idea what his/her major malfunction is, he/she seems obsessed with
finding whoever it is he/she's accusing me of being everywhere from looking
back on his/her conversations and all the stuff he/she provides.

I've been accused of being someone I'm not for "turning up" on [[Allegations
of Israeli Apartheid<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_Israeli_Apartheid>]],
the same article that is listed two spots down from my original complaint on
WP:ANI, and I only commented on that because I saw the report and
MiddleEastern was just being a jerk.

If there isn't a cabal, if there isn't some group someone "should not cross
lest one suffer the penalty", then there sure as heck is SOMETHING like that
going on, because there's no way in anything resembling a fair system that
someone brings a minor concern and it turns into something like this where
bringing an honest complaint gets you attacked over and over again.

[[user:One Elephant went out to play...]]

On 3/14/07, Rich Holton <richholton at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> David Gerard wrote:
> > On 13/03/07, Sharon, Lois Bram <oneelephant at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Please, if anyone can help, it would be greatly appreciated.
> >> User: One Elephant Went Out to Play...
> >
> >
> > Hint: having also created User:Two Elephants Went Out to Play... two
> > minutes later gives a strong impression of bad faith on your part. Not
> > to mention the edits themselves.
> >
> >
> > - d.
> >
>
> I'm troubled by the course of the conversation that took place about
> this on WP:ANI. At least two people were asserting that one should not
> revert Danny because he's a foundation employee, or Kat Walsh, because
> of board membership.
>
> There have been many, many assertions of late that we on Wikipedia do
> not (should not) give credit to credentials, but to the content of
> contributions. So it's disturbing to see these arguments used. Using
> these sorts of arguments does Wikipedia no favors, and contributes to
> the notion that there is a cabal that one should not cross lest one
> suffer the penalty.
>
> Note that I have no comment (and have developed no opinion) on the
> content of the contributions of any of the parties involved in the
> original dispute.
>
> -Rich Holton
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


subject: [Wikitech-l] New Special:Contributions form in SVN

body:
On 14/03/07, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:

> I'm fine with showing this form on Special:Contributions itself, but
> do we really need to show it when a user has been specified? It seems
> that a simple link to the form - "choose a different user" - should be
> sufficient.

Is a box a major nuisance? If not, there's no reason to make people
click twice when they could click once.

- d.


from_name: Brianna Laugher

subject:
[Commons-l] Please do not delete images used on [[Wikimedia
	logo mosaic]]

body:
On 14/03/07, Guillaume Paumier <guillom.pom at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 3/13/07, Pedro Sanchez <pdsanchez at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Yes, mosaic pretty. Finding replacements for it
> > nice thing to do. But again, it's not a top priority, we shouldn't
> > stop doing what we're doing just to attend the mosaic. Onc eagain,
> > doing so it's a nice thing however.
>
> This page is linked from an official press release from the foundation. It
> is linked from the first frame of [[Commons:Welcome]] which is the first
> link on Commons Main page. So yes, I think keeping it without red links is
> important. It is sad if I am the only one.

Hear hear. Look, Guillom is not forcing you to replace the images. But
there already exists a gallery you can use to replace images (
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_logo_mosaic/Colours_gallery
) so it's not an onerous amount of work. How about everyone just keeps
it in mind and takes a little bit more care with deletion.

cheers,
Brianna
user:pfctdayelise


from_name: Erik Moeller

body:
I'm fine with showing this form on Special:Contributions itself, but
do we really need to show it when a user has been specified? It seems
that a simple link to the form - "choose a different user" - should be
sufficient.
--
Peace & Love,
Erik

DISCLAIMER: This message does not represent an official position of
the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.

"An old, rigid civilization is reluctantly dying. Something new, open,
free and exciting is waking up." -- Ming the Mechanic


body:
On 3/14/07, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> Is a box a major nuisance? If not, there's no reason to make people
> click twice when they could click once.

Think most common use case: checking your own contributions, or
following a link in RC, histories, etc. The case of typing a username
into the box seems to be uncommon enough to justify a mere link.
--
Peace & Love,
Erik

DISCLAIMER: This message does not represent an official position of
the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.

"An old, rigid civilization is reluctantly dying. Something new, open,
free and exciting is waking up." -- Ming the Mechanic


body:
On 13/03/07, Skyring <skyring at gmail.com> wrote:

> I'd like to suggest something which I think should work. Whenever an
> administrator edits an article, that version automatically becomes the
> "stable" version that an unregistered reader will see. And it won't have
> "edit" links all over it. Sure, it might have mistakes and it might have
> POV, but the odds are that if an admin has had even a glance at it, it's
> probably good.

A 'stable versions' feature is at last being written. w00t!

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Fine, be that way.

body:
On 14/03/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:

> Does anyone know where I can find the checkuser request that led to the
> blocking of CountPointercount?

No idea if there was an on-wiki request, but the check was around
16-20 Feb. Two checkers did the search.

- d.


body:
On 14/03/07, Platonides <Platonides at gmail.com> wrote:
> Erik Moeller wrote:
> > On 3/14/07, David Gerard wrote:

> >> Is a box a major nuisance? If not, there's no reason to make people
> >> click twice when they could click once.

> > Think most common use case: checking your own contributions, or
> > following a link in RC, histories, etc. The case of typing a username
> > into the box seems to be uncommon enough to justify a mere link.

> My 2 cents:
> I almost never write the user names to see the contributions, they are
> too complicated :P And if i did, i already have a nice box to change it,
> called address bar. :-)

A text entry box right there would be useful for admins.

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Fine, be that way.

body:
On 14/03/07, Oskar Sigvardsson <oskarsigvardsson at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 3/14/07, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 14/03/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:

> > > Does anyone know where I can find the checkuser request that led to the
> > > blocking of CountPointercount?

> > No idea if there was an on-wiki request, but the check was around
> > 16-20 Feb. Two checkers did the search.

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/RunedChozo

Ah, Enviroknot/Parker again. (Unsurprisingly from the invective style.)

- d.


body:
On 13/03/07, Sharon, Lois Bram <oneelephant at gmail.com> wrote:

> Please, if anyone can help, it would be greatly appreciated.
> User: One Elephant Went Out to Play...

Hint: having also created User:Two Elephants Went Out to Play... two
minutes later gives a strong impression of bad faith on your part. Not
to mention the edits themselves.

- d.


body:
On 3/14/07, Ken Arromdee <arromdee at rahul.net> wrote:
> On Wed, 14 Mar 2007, Anthony wrote:
> > > > The policy on sources, WP:ATT, allows self-published sources to be
> > > > used in biographies of living persons. This means we can use the
> > > > subject's personal website or blog, so if someone wants to address an
> > > > issue in their Wikipedia article, they only have to publish it
> > > > themselves on their blog first, which anyone can set up at no cost.
> > >
> > > Setting up a blog can be quite a hassle, especially for a non-techie, even
> > > if he doesn't have to pay to get it.  Basically, "if you want this fixed,
> > > set up a blog" is a big hoop you're making people jump through in order to
> > > fix something that they probably didn't even want in the first place.
> > >
> > We could always set up the blog for them.
>
> That's another form of "you can't fix your article unless you jump through
> these ridiculous hoops".  Finding someone in an all-volunteer Wikipedia
> willing to set up a blog for a random complainer is at least as difficult
> as setting up the blog himself.
>
Well, I certainly disagree.  Finding one person out of the thousands
of volunteers who are capable of doing this seems much easier than
teaching a random complainer how to do it himself.

It also seems easier than rewriting all the rules and standards of
Wikipedia which rely upon not allowing original research, though this
is more arguable, I guess.

> > Or we could set up a wiki
> > which allows original research, and which can be referenced from
> > Wikipedia.
>
> This won't work, because the attribution FAQ says that Wikis are not
> legitimate sources.  I tried to change it to allow wikis when self-published
> sources are allowed.  It didn't get in.
>
So, do you actually have a suggestion which doesn't involve changing anything?

Otherwise, allowing a wiki set up by the foundation to be used as a
source in Wikipedia articles seems much less drastic than dropping the
rules against original research altogether.  It also seems to me to
provide much better accountability.

Anthony


body:
On 14/03/07, Platonides <Platonides at gmail.com> wrote:
> David Gerard wrote:

> > A text entry box right there would be useful for admins.

> Sorry? I still don't see the need. Can you explain?

Convenience in the interface - one click is more convenient than two,
and vastly more convenient than URL-twiddling.

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Google Trends

body:
On 3/13/07, Steve Bennett <stevagewp at gmail.com> wrote:
> http://www.google.com/trends?q=wikipedia%2C+wiki%2C+open+source%2C++free+software%2C+linux+&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all
>
http://www.google.com/trends?q=%22brian+peppers%22%2C%22jimmy+wales%22%2Cbrittanica&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all


from_name: Platonides

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> On 3/14/07, David Gerard wrote:
>> Is a box a major nuisance? If not, there's no reason to make people
>> click twice when they could click once.
>
> Think most common use case: checking your own contributions, or
> following a link in RC, histories, etc. The case of typing a username
> into the box seems to be uncommon enough to justify a mere link.

My 2 cents:
I almost never write the user names to see the contributions, they are
too complicated :P And if i did, i already have a nice box to change it,
called address bar. :-)


body:
On Wed, 14 Mar 2007, Anthony wrote:
> > > We could always set up the blog for them.
> > That's another form of "you can't fix your article unless you jump through
> > these ridiculous hoops".  Finding someone in an all-volunteer Wikipedia
> > willing to set up a blog for a random complainer is at least as difficult
> > as setting up the blog himself.
> >
> Well, I certainly disagree.  Finding one person out of the thousands
> of volunteers who are capable of doing this seems much easier than
> teaching a random complainer how to do it himself.

Even if this is true, isn't a line on a Wikipedia talk page saying "so-
and-so told Wikipedia that... and it was verified to come from him by ..."
basically a one line blog hosted by Wikipedia anyway?  (At least if we link
to the diff, which nobody can edit.)

> > > Or we could set up a wiki
> > > which allows original research, and which can be referenced from
> > > Wikipedia.

For that matter, what's the difference between this, and putting some lines
on a Wikipedia talk page, saying "this type of talk page is to be treated
as a wiki which allows OR and can be referenced from Wikipedia"?


from_name: Christof Sperl

subject: [WikiEN-l] Requesting assistance re user:Bastique PLEASE HELP

body:
You should wait some time. It takes time for the mailing list to get
updated, and not everyone gets the same mails at the same time. Take a day
off or two, and there probably will be messages waiting for you from other,
helpful, administrators.

Regards,
Christof Sperl aka Aetherfukz

On 13/03/07, Sharon, Lois Bram <oneelephant at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Fine.
>
> I'm leaving.
>
> Jersey Devil outright threatened me, Slimvirgin posted the lies to the
> administrators noticeboard, I am no longer interested in contributing to
> Wikipedia if this is how you treat people.
>
> Goodbye.
> [[User: One Elephant Went Out to Play...]]
>
> On 3/13/07, Sharon, Lois Bram <oneelephant at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > This has gotten progressively worse, now someone named Slimvirgin is
> > accusing me of being someone I have no clue who they are, please, PLEASE
> > will someone help?
> >
> > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > From: Sharon, Lois Bram <oneelephant at gmail.com>
> > Date: Mar 13, 2007 12:37 PM
> > Subject: Requesting assistance re user:Bastique
> > To: wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> >
> > Hello,
> >
> > I need to request assistance with an issue I am having with an
> > administrator who, for whatever reason, feels the need to be abusive and
> > problematic towards me. This is the first time I'm encountering
> something
> > like this, the rest of the time people have been extremely helpful,
> > especially when I didn't know how to fix something on the page for
> pixar's
> > Cars film and they helped troubleshoot a problem I saw with one of the
> > images going over text.
> >
> > What is going on is at the [[National Council of La Raza]] page. I saw
> > that there was an editing dispute there, editors disagreeing over the
> > content of the page and the nature of the group. I've been reading the
> > sources supplied by the various sides and it seems the truth lies
> somewhere
> > in the middle.
> >
> > However, user:Bastique saw fit to revert to a version he preferred, and
> > then semiprotected the page. This seems to be at odds with the
> protection
> > policy and admin policies which state that admin powers should not be
> used
> > to win a content dispute.
> >
> > I reverted the page, and left a note on the talk page, the admins
> > noticeboard, and then Bastique's page as a friendly reminder of what
> policy
> > states:
> >
> > Page history:
> >
> >
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=National_Council_of_La_Raza&action=history
> > Edit on talk page:
> >
> >
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk%3ANational_Council_of_La_Raza&diff=114801400&oldid=114394497
> > Edit made to Bastique:
> >
> >
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk%3ABastique&diff=114803985&oldid=114197204
> >
> > Bastique's response was to threaten me by saying "Don't revert me
> again":
> > he also reverted the page back and fully protected it this time, to
> "win"
> > his argument by preventing me from doing so. (see page history above).
> >
> > He has since continued to attack me, violating WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA. He
> > directly called me a liar, and has been lying about the fact that he
> > threatened me, as well as accusing me of "gaming the system" which I am
> not
> > doing, and it seems obvious despite his claims to the contrary that he
> has
> > some stake in the content of the page, otherwise he would not have
> > reverted/locked it TWICE nor would he be spending this much time
> attacking
> > me for pointing out that his doing so is against policy.
> >
> > It has gotten so bad that I had to create a new section regarding this:
> >
> http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=114838915&oldid=114838462Thissection fully explains my problem as well as containing the additional
> > difference links.
> >
> > I do not know what else to do, this is scary to be treated in this
> manner
> > by an administrator, so I am posting here in hopes that someone can
> help.
> >
> > Please, if anyone can help, it would be greatly appreciated.
> > User: One Elephant Went Out to Play...
> >
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Jossi Fresco

body:
On Mar 13, 2007, at 7:35 AM, Ken Arromdee wrote:

> Setting up a blog can be quite a hassle, especially for a non-
> techie, even
> if he doesn't have to pay to get it

That is somewhat incorrect, Ken. There are tools that anyone can use
to start blogging without being a techie.

See http://www.vox.com/

-- Jossi


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Why cutting'n'pasting from Wikipedia is not a good
 idea

body:
Steve Bennett wrote:
> On 3/14/07, Skyring <skyring at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Some good suggestions so far in the discussion, but I can't say that I like
>> the idea of new text being wigglelined. It might be something perfectly
>> fine, in fact it probably is, but it's going to look like a spelling or
>> grammer error to the casual reader.
>>
>
> Yeah, "wigglelining" may not be the way to go. How about a yellow star
> placed next to the paragraph, perhaps with the word "new!" or "fresh!"
> or something.
>
> Steve
>
>
>
Or possibly a sidebar stripe in the margin?

The idea of the paragraph as the semantic unit for changes is excellent.

We'd also need to do something to show the removal of paragraphs.

-- Neil


from_name: charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Fine, be that way.

body:
"Samuel L Bronkowitz" wrote

> They all refuse to acknowledge my right to demand that the results of the
> lying, bullshit "checkuser" be made open, too.

Your 'right to demand' is naturally matched by a right to ignore demands. There are very obvious reasons why CheckUser is kept under wraps.

> Fine.
>
> You've made an enemy. Wikipedia can rot and I'll help to ensure it does.

I don't think Wikipedia has ever been afraid of fair comment.

Charles

-----------------------------------------
Email sent from www.virginmedia.com/email
Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software and scanned for spam


from_name: David Gerard

body:
On 14/03/07, Steve Bennett <stevagewp at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 3/14/07, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:

> > Just make sure there's no wifi and there's social pressure not to use
> > a phone at the quiz ...

> Definitely no wi-fi. Not even any mobile broadband coverage. Social
> pressure likely. Time pressure also helps - if you barely have time to
> answer all the questions yourself, you definitely don't have time to
> call someone at home and get them to look it up for you.

Yeah. I'm quite sure Wikipedia has done horrible things to the world
of pub quizzes.

- d.


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

subject: [WikiEN-l] Fine, be that way.

body:
Does anyone know where I can find the checkuser request that led to the
blocking of CountPointercount?

Mgm

On 3/13/07, Samuel L Bronkowitz <countpointercount at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> All of your supposed "arbitrators" refuse to respond to emails asking for
> a
> sincere and honest review of my case.
>
> They all refuse to acknowledge my right to demand that the results of the
> lying, bullshit "checkuser" be made open, too.
>
> Fine.
>
> You've made an enemy. Wikipedia can rot and I'll help to ensure it does.
>
> CountPointercount
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: Oskar Sigvardsson

subject: [WikiEN-l] Fine, be that way.

body:
On 3/14/07, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 14/03/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm <macgyvermagic at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Does anyone know where I can find the checkuser request that led to the
> > blocking of CountPointercount?
>
>
> No idea if there was an on-wiki request, but the check was around
> 16-20 Feb. Two checkers did the search.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_checkuser/Case/RunedChozo


body:
David Gerard wrote:
>> My 2 cents:
>> I almost never write the user names to see the contributions, they are
>> too complicated :P And if i did, i already have a nice box to change it,
>> called address bar. :-)
>
>
> A text entry box right there would be useful for admins.

Sorry? I still don't see the need. Can you explain?


from_name: Brion Vibber

references:
<45F5A30E.6040602@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<45F5CC25.2070303@pobox.com>	<45F5C28E.6050906@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<45F5CE79.7010709@wolfmountaingroup.com>
	<45F6B122.4080805@pobox.com>
	<45F80B36.8070801@wolfmountaingroup.com>

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Jeff V. Merkey wrote:
>> I had to change the path to tidy and add a '/' character to the front of
>> the absolute
>> path to the program, then it worked with 1.9.3. I noticed that the path
>> parsing has subtle
>> differences between MediaWiki versions.

$wgTidyBin points to the tidy executable and must be *either*:

* a full path (from filesystem root, meaning with initial '/')

or

* an executable name, which will be searched in the system PATH
environment variable

Any other value will lead to undefined behavior.

This has not changed since it was introduced, so far as I know.

>> i.e. one example was the path rendering of $wgLogo when I first installed
>> 1.9.3. Someone might want to check over all of the path parsing and make
>> certain
>> it is consistent throughout in the event someone fat fingers the strings
>> (like I did).
>
>> Some paths which worked under 1.8 stopped working under 1.9.3. (I have
>> used the same
>> syntax on 1.6 through 1.8, but on 1.9.3, it stopped working unless the
>> path specifications
>> were precise).

Give specific examples if possible.

Note that the default LocalSettings.php as of 1.9 doesn't set as many of
the path variables as previous versions did; you can either set them
explicitly in LocalSettings.php or let them be interpolated against the
default parents.

- -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com / brion @ wikimedia.org)
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2.2 (Darwin)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFF+DFIwRnhpk1wk44RAoAFAJwP9rsNedSnnZ0evmCtEl0nqOpdbQCfVA9x
qneJMTCNTu2UnNotABJn3cU=
=6yp8
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


subject: [Wikitech-l] preload method of class Article

body:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Uwe Baumbach wrote:
> Hi core developers...,
>
> Looking at method preload (Article.php) you can see that
> <includeonly> tags will be swept.

There is no "preload" method in Article.php.

Do you mean getPreloadedText() in EditPage?

> Is it by mischance or by consciously decision that
> <noinclude>...</noinclude> parts remain?

Sounds normal to me; you either keep the parts for includes or the parts
that aren't for includes.

<includeonly> -> when not including, remove this
<onlyinclude> -> when including, remove anything outside this
<noinclude> -> when including, remove this

However the code that's there doesn't make sense to me; it appears to be
removing only the actual <includeonly> and </includeonly> start and end
tags, not their content.

> Would it be reasonable to add this $text = preg_replace(
> '/<noinclude>.*?<\/noinclude>/s', '', $text ); into the main source
> code branch?

Wouldn't that lead to a confusing mix of both?

- -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com / brion @ wikimedia.org)
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.2.2 (Darwin)
Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org

iD8DBQFF+DLDwRnhpk1wk44RAlSCAJ42o5vQX3VWiL5zHM00jDI3P4GFhACfWUgA
TTJa0B57uUjAPeTm5frJNWQ=
=7whp
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----


from_name: Guettarda

body:
On 3/14/07, Sharon, Lois Bram <oneelephant at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 3/14/07, Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Rich Holton <richholton at gmail.com> writes:
> >
> > > I'm troubled by the course of the conversation that took place
> >   about
> > > this on WP:ANI. At least two people were asserting that one
> >   should not
> > > revert Danny because he's a foundation employee, or Kat Walsh,
> >   because
> > > of board membership.
> > ...
> >
> > This should surprise no-one. The last person I remember reverting
> > Danny's work was de-adminned and indefinitely banned.
> >
> > > -Rich Holton
> >
> > --
> > Gwern
> > Inquiring minds want to know.
>
>
> Are they really that bad?
>
> This is really scary, I didn't think Wikipedia was like that at all. It
> seems like I'm very correct to just quit if that is how you act!

No, it was a misunderstanding/overreaction, and Erik is a board member now.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Corporate Donors - Status?

body:
On 3/14/07, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> You're probably right - but what about the 20% who aren't committed
> enough to Wikipedia's policy to reason in this way?

I don't think that those who reject corporate influence do it due to
policy. They just don't like feeling "bought".

But anyway, predicting how groups of people will behave in new,
untried situations is notoriously difficult.

Steve


from_name: Pedro Sanchez

subject: [WikiEN-l] Speedy deletion criterion G5

body:
On 3/14/07, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> Redirect was deleted by User:Kusma from [[Schachter]] to
> [[Schechter]]. A valid redirect: the latter article is about a German
> surname which may be spelt Schachter (the in-text title of the article
> is, in fact, Schachter).
>
> After a little digging I found out the only reason he had deleted this
> important redirect is because "[p]ages created by banned users while
> they were banned" is a reason to speedily delete.
>
> Am I wrong to think that deleting valid articles and redirects based
> on who the creator was is nonsensical and against what we're trying to
> achieve?
>
> --
> Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

If it's an occasional mistake, cut some slack (check history to see if
he was doing cleanup) . If it wasn't, then it's
process-for-the-process-sake-wonkery-wonkery-willy-wonka kinda guy and
should be sent to room 101


body:
Just to clarify: I'm not thinking along the lines of the thread from
last month.

	http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/wiki/wikitech/84265

I don't want to edit what's already there by email. I want to add
emails as if they are new comments.  The use case is for developers
to post change items to a documentation wiki for a software project.
The idea is that they would email each other and cc the wiki.

Jim

On Mar 14, 2007, at 10:31 AM, Jim Hu wrote:

> Does anyone know if a bot exists to allow a wiki page to serve as an
> archive for a listserv?  Preferably this would run on the mail
> server, not on the server that has the wiki.
>
> Thanks?
>
> Jim
> =====================================
> Jim Hu
> Associate Professor
> Dept. of Biochemistry and Biophysics
> 2128 TAMU
> Texas A&M Univ.
> College Station, TX 77843-2128
> 979-862-4054
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l

=====================================
Jim Hu
Associate Professor
Dept. of Biochemistry and Biophysics
2128 TAMU
Texas A&M Univ.
College Station, TX 77843-2128
979-862-4054


from_name: Oldak Quill

body:
On 14/03/07, Steve Bennett <stevagewp at gmail.com> wrote:
> Definitely no wi-fi. Not even any mobile broadband coverage. Social
> pressure likely. Time pressure also helps - if you barely have time to
> answer all the questions yourself, you definitely don't have time to
> call someone at home and get them to look it up for you.

Unless, of course, you send an SMS to a few friends asking for the
answer and, when you get the reply, change your answer for that
question.

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


from_name: Jay R. Ashworth

subject: [Wikitech-l] RSS feeds for watchlists

body:
On Mon, Mar 12, 2007 at 01:15:54PM +0000, Rob Church wrote:
> Watchlist data isn't "private" in the sense that we need to protect it
> at all costs; if it *does* leak out, no-one's going to care that
> much...you're not really gaining access to anything hideously
> confidential, are you?

Well, if you're the Wikipedia editor who is in the closet but has a
watchlist that's disproportionately loaded with with MOTSS'y pages,
then yeah, you might care.

Cheers,
-- jr 'sorry, g{ua}ys; that's just the canonical example' a
--
Jay R. Ashworth                                                jra at baylink.com
Designer                          Baylink                             RFC 2100
Ashworth & Associates        The Things I Think                        '87 e24
St Petersburg FL USA      http://baylink.pitas.com             +1 727 647 1274


from_name: Sharon, Lois Bram

body:
On 3/14/07, Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Rich Holton <richholton at gmail.com> writes:
>
> > I'm troubled by the course of the conversation that took place
>   about
> > this on WP:ANI. At least two people were asserting that one
>   should not
> > revert Danny because he's a foundation employee, or Kat Walsh,
>   because
> > of board membership.
> ...
>
> This should surprise no-one. The last person I remember reverting
> Danny's work was de-adminned and indefinitely banned.
>
> > -Rich Holton
>
> --
> Gwern
> Inquiring minds want to know.

Are they really that bad?

This is really scary, I didn't think Wikipedia was like that at all. It
seems like I'm very correct to just quit if that is how you act!


from_name: Gwern Branwen

body:
Rich Holton <richholton at gmail.com> writes:

> I'm troubled by the course of the conversation that took place
  about
> this on WP:ANI. At least two people were asserting that one
  should not
> revert Danny because he's a foundation employee, or Kat Walsh,
  because
> of board membership.
...

This should surprise no-one. The last person I remember reverting
Danny's work was de-adminned and indefinitely banned.

> -Rich Holton

--
Gwern
Inquiring minds want to know.


from_name: stevertigo

subject: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia as a primary source

body:
On 3/14/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> We're not saying "we should institute a method for any random person
> to make unqualified, unassailable, assertions". We're talking about
> letting *the subject* point factual errors out to us. If we're
> automatically assuming that subjects are untrustworthy, I look forward
> to banning the use of autobiographies and corporate histories as
> sources.

I can see what Eloquence was getting at now, in the sense that there
needs to be something
inbetween the Office and the Mob - using an open version of the OTRS model.

I think the OTRS part is a great idea, but making the leap from "edit
this wiki" to "primary source" is an enormous and presumptive
interpretation -- perhaps overstated, but nevertheless something best
left to people to judge after a new system is set up.

I suggested something like a ticket-based model just as a way to
organize workflow.
I never would have come up with the idea that subjects would want to
register themselves.
This "registrationalism" might infringe on NPOV. We aren't qualified
to take people's affidavits after all, nor to investigate particular
claims.  And because its tacky to edit your own articles after all,
ultimately they would want to make their changes anonymously, which
sort of contradicts your idea, doesnt it. Foundation bureaucracy 2.0?

Maybe Im not reading it right.
-Stevertigo


from_name: Steve Bennett

subject: [WikiEN-l] Almeda University paying for positive Wikipedia edits

body:
On 3/14/07, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 14/03/07, The Cunctator <cunctator at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 3/11/07, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > One problem I have with this kind of paid editing is that those who
> > > can afford to pay will have more NPOV, better written articles. Do we
> > > want the quality of parts of Wikipedia to be determined by who's
> > > paying for what?
> >
> > Dirty hippy communist.
>
> I prefer to think of myself as an inequality aversionist ;)

If it helps, most of our articles on corporations are pretty crappy.
Paid edits fixing up those crappy articles would, in the short term,
be reducing that inequality.

Steve


from_name: Anthony

body:
On 3/14/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> a) No, the foundation is *not* the source. It is simply somewhere
> which happens to archive the source for the purposes of using it to
> write an encyclopedia. The source is the, well, the source; the person
> who wrote to us with the correction.

Would it be possible to publish the email sent to OTRS?  I'd be much
more comfortable treating the email itself as the source, rather than
extending the [[telephone game]] by that extra link.  There's just too
much room for error, unintentional or intentional, when we say "Andrew
Gray said that John Doe said (in an email to OTRS) that his mom told
him he was born in Brooklyn."

I'd still be somewhat uncomfortable with using an email to OTRS as a
source, though.  How would one be able to confirm that the email is
actually from the person in question?

Anthony


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Mark Williamson

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] Campaign by linguists to improve English/Russian
	coverage of linguistics

body:
Wikipedia certainly made it easier, but I was interested in
linguistics well before I found Wikipedia. One of my first non-IP
edits (I must've been 12 at the time) was to the article [[Ainu
language]].

Mark

On 14/03/07, Brianna Laugher <brianna.laugher at gmail.com> wrote:
> Language Log is a widely read blog covering linguistic issues that
> goes back to July 2003. (It's even licensed under CC-BY-SA! how
> progressive :))
>
> http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/004301.html
> A recent post about [[en:User:Koryakov Yuri]]'s campaign to improve
> linguistics biography and general coverage in Russian Wikipedia.
> Probably more to come.
>
> Also a nice anecdote from an assistant professor at the University of
> Massachusetts:
>
> --
>     In my large intro course yesterday, there was an unfamiliar hand
> in the air a lot of the time, and the student's questions and insights
> were the best I've had all semester. It was puzzling, because I didn't
> recognize him, and he seemed to know much more about syntax than one
> would expect. (It was our first official day on the topic.)
>
>     After class, he came to the front and introduced himself as a
> prospective student, just out of high school. He said linguistics was
> his passion in high school. I said, "What? How?" And he replied,
> "Wikipedia".
> --
>
> regards,
> Brianna
> user:pfctdayelise
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at lists.wikimedia.org
> http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>

--
Refije dirije lanm? yo paske nou posede pw?p bato.


from_name: Christian Vo

subject:
[Wikitech-l] help needed with LDAP Authentication setup and group
	restriction

body:
Hi,

I'm trying to add LDAP Authentication to my MediaWiki 1.6.5 server and
downloaded LdapAuthentication.php v1.0h.

I'm having a lot of trouble when trying to restrict the wiki to a specific
LDAP group...
here's the block I've added to LocalSettings.php:

# begin LDAP authentication part
require_once( 'includes/LdapAuthentication.php' );
$wgAuth = new LdapAuthenticationPlugin();

$wgLDAPDomainNames = array( "NVIDIA.COM" );
$wgLDAPServerNames = array( "NVIDIA.COM"=>"ldap.nvidia.com"  );

//$wgLDAPUseSSL = true;
$wgLDAPUseSSL = false;
$wgLDAPUseLocal = false;
$wgMinimalPasswordLength = 1;

$wgLDAPAddLDAPUsers = false;
$wgLDAPUpdateLDAP = false;
$wgLDAPMailPassword = false;
$wgLDAPRetrievePrefs = true;
$wgLDAPDebug = 99;

//$wgLDAPSearchAttributes = array( "NVIDIA.COM"=>"sAMAccountName" );

$wgLDAPSearchStrings = array( "NVIDIA.COM"=>"NVIDIA.COM\\USER-NAME" );

# testing group restriction below

$wgLDAPRequiredGroups = array(
"NVIDIA.COM"=>array("cn=neteng-contractors,ou=departments,ou=distribution
lists,ou=groups,dc=nvidia,dc=com") );
$wgLDAPGroupUseFullDN = array( "NVIDIA.COM"=>true );
$wgLDAPGroupObjectclass = array( "NVIDIA.COM"=>"group" );
$wgLDAPGroupAttribute = array( "NVIDIA.COM"=>"member" );
$wgLDAPGroupSearchNestedGroups = array( "NVIDIA.COM"=>false );
$wgLDAPBaseDNs = array( "NVIDIA.COM"=>"ou=groups,dc=nvidia,dc=com" );

Here is the error output that I'm getting:

{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0\deflang1033{\fonttbl{\f0\fswiss\fcharset0
Arial;}} {\*\generator Msftedit 5.41.15.1507;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\f0\fs20
Entering validDomain
User is using a valid domain
Entering getCanonicalName
Munged username: Cvo
Entering Connect
Entering Connect
Not Using SSL
Using servers: ldap://ldap.nvidia.com
Connected successfully
Entering getSearchString
Doing a straight bind
userdn is: NVIDIA.COM\\Cvo
Binding as the user
Binded successfully
Checking for (new style) group membership
Entering isMemberOfRequiredLdapGroup
Required groups:cn=neteng-contractors,ou=departments,ou=distribution
lists,ou=groups,dc=nvidia,dc=com
Entering getGroups
Search string: (&(member=NVIDIA.COM\\Cvo)(objectclass=group))

\par *Warning*: ldap_get_entries(): supplied argument is not a valid ldap
result resource in */srv/www/htdocs/wiki/includes/LdapAuthentication.php* on
line *857*
\par
\par *Warning*: array_shift() [function.array-shift]: The argument should be
an array in */srv/www/htdocs/wiki/includes/LdapAuthentication.php* on line *
860*
\par
\par *Warning*: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in *
/srv/www/htdocs/wiki/includes/LdapAuthentication.php* on line *863*
\par Returned groups:
Couldn't find the user in any groups (1).
\par \par }

If I uncomment the $wgLDAPSearchAttributes line and comment out
$wgLDAPSearchStrings, I get the following:

{\rtf1\ansi\ansicpg1252\deff0\deflang1033{\fonttbl{\f0\fswiss\fcharset0
Arial;}} {\*\generator Msftedit 5.41.15.1507;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\f0\fs20
Entering validDomain
User is using a valid domain
Entering getCanonicalName
Munged username: Cvo
Entering Connect
Entering Connect
Not Using SSL
Using servers: ldap://ldap.nvidia.com
Connected successfully
Entering getSearchString
Doing a proxy or anonymous bind
Entering getUserDN
Doing an anonymous bind
Created a regular filter: (sAMAccountName=Cvo)
Using base: ou=groups,dc=nvidia,dc=com
Couldn't find an entry
userdn is:
User DN is blank
\par \par }

Can someone please help out?  I can run dsquery on a Win2k3 server against
my accountname (cvo) and it returns fine...


body:
On 3/14/07, Ken Arromdee <arromdee at rahul.net> wrote:
> On Wed, 14 Mar 2007, Anthony wrote:
> > > > We could always set up the blog for them.
> > > That's another form of "you can't fix your article unless you jump through
> > > these ridiculous hoops".  Finding someone in an all-volunteer Wikipedia
> > > willing to set up a blog for a random complainer is at least as difficult
> > > as setting up the blog himself.
> > >
> > Well, I certainly disagree.  Finding one person out of the thousands
> > of volunteers who are capable of doing this seems much easier than
> > teaching a random complainer how to do it himself.
>
> Even if this is true, isn't a line on a Wikipedia talk page saying "so-
> and-so told Wikipedia that... and it was verified to come from him by ..."
> basically a one line blog hosted by Wikipedia anyway?  (At least if we link
> to the diff, which nobody can edit.)
>
I dunno.  Why don't you ask on the talk page for WP:ATT?  I certainly
wouldn't call a line written on a talk page a blog, but I'm not
familiar enough with WP:ATT to say whether or not it falls under the
term as used there.

> > > > Or we could set up a wiki
> > > > which allows original research, and which can be referenced from
> > > > Wikipedia.
>
> For that matter, what's the difference between this, and putting some lines
> on a Wikipedia talk page, saying "this type of talk page is to be treated
> as a wiki which allows OR and can be referenced from Wikipedia"?
>
Not much except for precedent (and correspondingly a set of rules and
guidelines governing the use of talk pages in such a way).  It also
seems like an awfully poor way to organize things.  If you're going to
borrow a namespace, the meta namespace would probably be better, as
it'd have much less overlap.

Anthony


from_name: Rich Holton

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> On 14/03/07, Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Rich Holton <richholton at gmail.com> writes:
>
>>> this on WP:ANI. At least two people were asserting that one
>>   should not
>>> revert Danny because he's a foundation employee, or Kat Walsh,
>>   because
>>> of board membership.
>> ...
>
>> This should surprise no-one. The last person I remember reverting
>> Danny's work was de-adminned and indefinitely banned.
>
>
> Yes, but Erik recovered quite well from it, I think ;-)
>
>
> - d.

Two points:

1. There is a substantial difference between someone like Erik (who knew
who Danny was and what his role was) reverting Danny and some random
user reverting Danny, who for all intents and purposes appears to be
just another random user.

2. I thought part of the aftermath of the whole Erik/Danny thing was to
make insist that Danny make it clear when he is performing an Office
action versus just editing like anyone else. Am I misinformed?

I am truly puzzled that there is no further reaction to the issue that I
brought up with my earlier post. Have we really come to the point where
where have a de-facto class of editors who are un-revertable, where
reverting them is seen to be an offense, regardless of the merits of the
case?

-Rich


from_name: gjzilla at gmail.com

subject: [WikiEN-l] Speedy deletion criterion G5

body:
On 3/14/07, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > If it's an occasional mistake, cut some slack (check history to see if
> > he was doing cleanup) . If it wasn't, then it's
> > process-for-the-process-sake-wonkery-wonkery-willy-wonka kinda guy and
> > should be sent to room 101
>
> I think this is an example of where process should be followed even
> when it seems pointless. If we don't follow it then the banning policy
> is actually "Banned users are not allowed to make useless edits.",
> rather than "Banned users are not allowed to edit." The former is not
> a useful policy (it basically makes bans a form of probation).
>
> All edits by banned users should be deleted, if they're useful, they
> can be remade by someone else who can take responsibility for them.

Fair enough, but we should give credit where credit is due; i.e. in the edit
summary put "Originally created by banned user MegaTroll."  --~~~~


from_name: Uwe Baumbach

body:
Hi core developers...,

Looking at method preload (Article.php) you can see that <includeonly> tags will be swept.

Is it by mischance or by consciously decision that <noinclude>...</noinclude> parts remain?

Since we do not want to hack the original source code and hooks are not provided her - so:

Would it be reasonable to add this
		$text = preg_replace( '/<noinclude>.*?<\/noinclude>/s', '', $text );
into the main source code branch?

Greetings.

--

Uwe (Baumbach)
U.Baumbach at web.de

_____________________________________________________________________
Der WEB.DE SmartSurfer hilft bis zu 70% Ihrer Onlinekosten zu sparen!
http://smartsurfer.web.de/?mc=100071&distributionid=000000000066


from_name: Bryan Derksen

body:
Steve Bennett wrote:
> The self-ref rule in this case basically should be interpreted as
> "don't give that diff special authority just because it was made on
> Wikipedia".[1] Would you have accepted a diff made on pokemonwiki.com
> by a user who seriously appeared to be her? (a serious question)

If I was as sure of the authenticity of the user as I am of Angela's
Meta account, then sure.

> [1] Though I guess since she's a Wikipedia user, perhaps there is a
> special authority due to it being her "home ground" so to speak.

It also helps that since I and most of the other editors are already
familiar with the workings of Wikipedia and its prominent members we're
much more easily able to judge the likelihood that it's really her and
not someone spoofing her or hacking her account or something. If it were
pokemonwiki.com I'd have to spend a lot longer sleuthing around to be
sure things were on the level.


body:
Just a personal anecdote. I'm currently preparing a trivia quiz in a
very similar format to one I did 2 years ago. Then, I don't recall
using Wikipedia much - I just got on the web and searched for the
answers to questions I came up with. This time, I'm using it almost
exclusively - it just seems to have become that much more useful.

It's brilliant on:
- Storylines of popular soap operas
- Train stations
- Winners of major sporting events
- Participants on reality TV shows

It's somewhat less good on:
- Ranking Australian cities by size (the formats of the articles are
too inconsistent)
- Finding people who had died of certain unpleasant diseases. (There's
a rough list of survivors/victims of testicular cancer, but couldn't
find the same for anal cancer. Don't ask...)

It's (understandably) no help at all on:
- Lyrics of popular songs

I guess we malign Wikipedia a lot for its coverage of popular culture,
but on the rare occasions you actually want that, it's pretty damn
useful :) And it's just astonishing how the whole method for preparing
something like a quiz has just totally changed due to this one
fantastic resource.

Steve


body:
On 3/14/07, Bryan Derksen <bryan.derksen at shaw.ca> wrote:
> The reference to Meta was being rejected on account of it being
> unreliable and on account of it being a "self-reference" (which IMO is
> not a correct interpretation of the manual of style guideline against
> self-reference, it's intended simply to keep Wikipedia's contents
> location-neutral in case someone else hosts it). Even the old [[WP:RS]]
> guideline explicitly allows this sort of thing; "Self-published
> material, whether published online or as a book or pamphlet, may be used
> as a primary source of information about the author or the material
> itself, so long as there is no reasonable doubt who wrote the material"

The self-ref rule in this case basically should be interpreted as
"don't give that diff special authority just because it was made on
Wikipedia".[1] Would you have accepted a diff made on pokemonwiki.com
by a user who seriously appeared to be her? (a serious question)

Steve
[1] Though I guess since she's a Wikipedia user, perhaps there is a
special authority due to it being her "home ground" so to speak.


from_name: Platonides

subject: [Commons-l] Deletion Bot

body:
Eugene Zelenko wrote:
> Hi!
>
> We have problem in Belarusian Wikipedia: bot creates articles copied
> from copyrighted source. Bot operates from open proxy and we can't
> block proxy itself due configuration issue.
>
> As for now we need to delete already created articles. Any help with
> deletion automation are appreciated.
>
> Thank you,
> Eugene.

Request (anonymous) users to pass a captcha to edit/create a page (code
for captcha on page creation is on bug 9099). This should stop any bot.


from_name: Ken Arromdee

body:
On Wed, 14 Mar 2007, Anthony wrote:
> > Even if this is true, isn't a line on a Wikipedia talk page saying "so-
> > and-so told Wikipedia that... and it was verified to come from him by ..."
> > basically a one line blog hosted by Wikipedia anyway?  (At least if we link
> > to the diff, which nobody can edit.)
> >
> I dunno.  Why don't you ask on the talk page for WP:ATT?  I certainly
> wouldn't call a line written on a talk page a blog, but I'm not
> familiar enough with WP:ATT to say whether or not it falls under the
> term as used there.

You are answering the wrong question.  I'm not asking if it's a blog by our
definition; I'm asking there's any *practical difference* between it and a
blog.  What characteristics does the line on the talk page have, that the blog
does not, that would justify why we'd *want* the rules to prohibit one but
not the other?


subject: [Wikitech-l] BitTorrent Image Downloads enwiki-20070206 Posted

body:
Jeffrey V. Merkey wrote:
> It may take a day or so to fully flush this out, but the torrents are up.

Huzzah! I've added links to
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Database_download#Images_and_uploaded_files
so hopefully a few brave souls with far more bandwidth and storage than
I will become seeders.


from_name: Andrew Gray

body:
On 13/03/07, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Which is why any correspondence we use is footnoted as such, and filed
> > with the Foundation. You don't have to know the background to be able
> > to tell that when we have a footnote saying "correction from subject,
> > filed at X", there is probably a reason why it doesn't correspond to
> > the public record...
>
> But then, the source the actually WMF, and WMF is not a reliable
> source. Why should anyone trust some random person on OTRS to have
> correctly interpreted the email and copied the information across
> without making any typos, etc?

a) No, the foundation is *not* the source. It is simply somewhere
which happens to archive the source for the purposes of using it to
write an encyclopedia. The source is the, well, the source; the person
who wrote to us with the correction. (I write articles and give the
book I worked from as the source. I don't give the library I read the
book in, which seems to be the appropriate analogy here...)

b) Right now we trust thousands of those random people to write the
entire encyclopedia, interpreting and synthesising like crazy without
even requiring the minimum sanity checks we'd impose on the "handlers"
here. I don't see how entrusting them with turning "good article,
thanks, but I got divorced two years ago" into a correction is
dangerous.

If it's complex, ask them to clarify.

> The whole point of citing sources is so
> readers can go and check for themselves to confirm it's right - citing
> a private source is pretty much useless because it's really just
> saying "I know I'm right, just trust me on it." Just because I'm the
> foundation doesn't make me trustworthy.

*One* reason to provide sources is so that people can go and
double-check, but it's a minor one. By far the most common reason is
to indicate the reliability of the information, what kind of accuracy
and currency you can expect from it. In this case, we'd be attributing

We're not saying "we should institute a method for any random person
to make unqualified, unassailable, assertions". We're talking about
letting *the subject* point factual errors out to us. If we're
automatically assuming that subjects are untrustworthy, I look forward
to banning the use of autobiographies and corporate histories as
sources.

--
- Andrew Gray
  andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk


from_name: David Hanson

subject: [WikiEN-l] Restricting the GFDL license to the namespace

body:
 At present GFDL includes not only wikipedia articles but talk pages, user
pages and WP pages. This is entirely necessary and accentuates the risk of
libelous or defamatory (or just nasty) comments being duplicated on various
mirrors throughout the web, beyond the reach of editors to delete them.

Since the product of wikipedia, the actual content, are articles and not
talk pages, administrative pages, user pages etc can we do something to
limit the GFDL to these pages specifically?


from_name: Andrew Garrett

body:
Rob Church wrote:

> Er, isn't this taking it too far? There's no need to add a bunch of
> levels of hiding blocks; blocks ought to be open and transparent to
> all users. I also don't believe there's a need to be able to mark a
> block as deleted and restore it - just unblock and reblock as
> required.

I presume the intent is to hide block messages that inadvertantly
reveal personal information. Or, if my estimations of policy
creep are accurate, ones that offend people (a la Giano)... Or
ones that offend people. Or ones that are uncivil. And so the list
of probable new missions goes on...

Andrew Garrett
(Werdna)


from_name: Ben Yates

subject:
[Wikitech-l] Does anyone want to help me build a digg/reddit style
	wikipedia filter?

body:
I can code a bit, but I'm not a programmer by any means, and I kind of
need some help (ruby on rails is hard) or just answers to questions
about how to do stuff.

I posted a blog entry on why I think the filter would be so cool; I'll
copy it here:

- - - - -

Here's why I think wikimouse would be incredibly cool:

1. There are more great, quirky, insightful wikipedia articles than
any individual could blog in a lifetime.

2. We won't need to worry at all about spam prevention,
self-promotion, etc., which cuts down the workload a lot -- if users
are only allowed to link to wikipedia, all that stuff is taken care of
already inside the wikipedia project. Basically, there's a floor on
how bad the user-submitted content can be, and no ceiling (or is that
the other way around?).

3. It could be an open-source, non-profit project on donated server
space, but if it's for-profit, it would be cool to programatically
generate merchandise based on the wikipedia article text (I've already
written a program that does this). That means we don't have to bog
down the site with banner and text ads (which wouldn't work too well
anyway, since the content is very diverse).


from_name: Gregory Szorc

subject: [Wikitech-l] RSS feeds for watchlists

body:
On 3/14/07, Bryan Tong Minh <bryan.tongminh at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Am I totally missing something, or are we talking about this?
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/w/api.php?action=feedwatchlist

The problem with the API feeds is that they require a cookie or a
non-constant token to access.  It would be nice to be able to import these
feeds into 3rd party feed aggregators.  This currently cannot be done, as
credentials have to be supplied with each request.

As far as implementing watchlist feeds on Wikipedia goes, the easy solution
is to implement a "private" token as part of the API watchlist feed.  This
makes much more sense than deploying my WikiFeeds extension for simply
watchlist feeds.  If you want all the extra feed types WikiFeeds provides
(per-category, per-user, etc), then it is a different story.

Greg


from_name: Oldak Quill

subject: [WikiEN-l] Speedy deletion criterion G5

body:
Redirect was deleted by User:Kusma from [[Schachter]] to
[[Schechter]]. A valid redirect: the latter article is about a German
surname which may be spelt Schachter (the in-text title of the article
is, in fact, Schachter).

After a little digging I found out the only reason he had deleted this
important redirect is because "[p]ages created by banned users while
they were banned" is a reason to speedily delete.

Am I wrong to think that deleting valid articles and redirects based
on who the creator was is nonsensical and against what we're trying to
achieve?

--
Oldak Quill (oldakquill at gmail.com)


from_name: phoebe ayers

subject: [WikiEN-l] Jimbo's letter to the New Yorker

body:
A coda: A letter from Jimbo has been published in the New Yorker this week.
Regretfully, it seems not to be online, so I'm copying it out below.
Hopefully the New Yorker will cut me a little slack for this :)
----------
It's titled "Making Amends."

I am writing to apologize to "The New Yorker" and Stacy Schiff, and to give
some follow-up concerning Ryan Jordan (Editors' Note, March 5). When I last
spoke to "The New Yorker" about the fact that a prominent Wikipedia
community member had lied about his credentials, I misjudged the issue. It
was not O.K. for Mr. Jordan, or Essjay, to lie to a reporter, even to
protect his identity. I later learned more about the deceptions involved and
asked Mr. Jordan to resign from his positions of responsibility at
Wikipedia. He has since resigned from his position at Wikia as well. Mr.
Jordan is a wonderful and thoughtful young man who made a series of very bad
judgments. I consider him a friend, and I hope that the world will allow to
move forward in peace and dignity to regain his honor through a life well
lived. Wikipedia is built on trust and love. Our trust has been broken, and
only love can rebuild it. The community has begun discussing a proposal of
mine that we adopt some verification measures for claimed credentials, so
that Wikipedia may further improve from this painful experience.

Jimmy Wales
President of Wikia, Inc.; board member and chairman emeritus of the
Wikimedia Foundation, St. Petersburg, Fla.
----------

My editorializing: though perhaps obvious, it's worth remembering that each
one of us -- each editor, each administrator, each board member, each critic
-- acts both as an integral part of this community and as a representative
of it to the outside world. Our collaborative, non-hierarchical, often
tenuous and always multifaceted community is thus only as strong, as
trustworthy, and as kind as each one of us. Let's remember what Essjay did
right, as an excellent Wikipedian; and let's learn from his mistakes how to
behave better ourselves. To me, Jimbo's key words in the above are "further
improve" -- the exact mechanism doesn't matter as much as the good faith
that this project can, and will, improve.
-- phoebe


body:
I should note this was published on p. 24 of the March 19, 2007 issue of the
"New Yorker".

On 3/14/07, phoebe ayers <phoebe.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> A coda: A letter from Jimbo has been published in the New Yorker this
> week. Regretfully, it seems not to be online, so I'm copying it out below.
> Hopefully the New Yorker will cut me a little slack for this :)
> ----------
> It's titled "Making Amends."
>
> I am writing to apologize to "The New Yorker" and Stacy Schiff, and to
> give some follow-up

....


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] Speedy deletion criterion G5

body:
On 14/03/07, Oldak Quill <oldakquill at gmail.com> wrote:

> Am I wrong to think that deleting valid articles and redirects based
> on who the creator was is nonsensical and against what we're trying to
> achieve?

Who the creator was can make a difference - when clearing the work of
vandals, often admins just zap the lot - it means someone coming
through later after the same vandal won't spot them. Usually someone
(hopefully the deleting admin) should remake the link so it carries
the endorsement of a good editor.

Speedy deletion errors should be correctable by speedy deletion
cleanup patrol with no rancor on either side - first admin through to
clean up the firehose of crap, second to correct the inevitable human
error.

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Requesting assistance re user:Bastique

body:
On 14/03/07, Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Rich Holton <richholton at gmail.com> writes:

> > this on WP:ANI. At least two people were asserting that one
>   should not
> > revert Danny because he's a foundation employee, or Kat Walsh,
>   because
> > of board membership.
> ...

> This should surprise no-one. The last person I remember reverting
> Danny's work was de-adminned and indefinitely banned.

Yes, but Erik recovered quite well from it, I think ;-)

- d.


from_name: Thomas Dalton

subject: [WikiEN-l] Speedy deletion criterion G5

body:
> If it's an occasional mistake, cut some slack (check history to see if
> he was doing cleanup) . If it wasn't, then it's
> process-for-the-process-sake-wonkery-wonkery-willy-wonka kinda guy and
> should be sent to room 101

I think this is an example of where process should be followed even
when it seems pointless. If we don't follow it then the banning policy
is actually "Banned users are not allowed to make useless edits.",
rather than "Banned users are not allowed to edit." The former is not
a useful policy (it basically makes bans a form of probation).

All edits by banned users should be deleted, if they're useful, they
can be remade by someone else who can take responsibility for them.