from_name: Zoe Comnena

subject: [Wikipedia-l] What do I do when my bug report is rejected for an invalid reason?

body:
I wrote the following bug report, and got the accompanying response:
<<Bugs item #584421, was opened at 2002-07-21 01:20
You can respond by visiting:
https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=411192&aid=584421&group_id=34373

Category: Special pages
Group: None
>Status: Closed
>Resolution: Rejected
Priority: 5
Submitted By: Zoe C (zoec)
Assigned to: Lee Daniel Crocker (lcrocker)
Summary: Recent Changes for (x) days

Initial Comment:
When I request Recent Changes for (x) days, I can't
get past "diff) (hist) . . Theophylline; 23:38 . . Kpjas
(more) ", no matter how many days back I ask.

If I ask for 500 Recent Changes, it goes beyond this
point with no problem.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

>Comment By: Lee Daniel Crocker (lcrocker)
Date: 2002-07-23 21:45

Message:
Logged In: YES
user_id=3076

This was a problem only on the test server, after restoring
from an old database dump.>>

But the response isn't true.  I still can't get "view the last (x) days" to work.

Zoe

---------------------------------
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
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from_name: wojtek pobratyn

body:
----- Original Message -----
From: "Lars Aronsson" <lars at aronsson.se>
To: <wikipedia-l at nupedia.com>
Sent: Wednesday, July 24, 2002 11:03 AM
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Auto-save in your browser editor

|
| I'm using my normal web browser to edit Wikipedia articles, and
| it wasn't really designed to be an editor.  Several times I have
| lost my work because either the browser crashed or the website
| wasn't responding when I was done and wanted to save my article.
| Real text editors or word processors have an auto-save function
| that allows me to recover and continue work after a crash, so
| why shouldn't a web browser?  Of course I could write my article
| in a real text editor, and submit it using cut-n-paste to the
| browser, but I'm too lazy to switch back and forth.

Yes I know what you mean. I hate when this happens.
Unfortunately I've got no idea how to get around this except
cut-n-paste from a text editor. What we would need (I'm not
a programmer so excuse any of my mistakes here) is something
like the Blogger API for the 'pedia and a simple stand-alone
piece of software that could retrieve and post articles.

<snip>

regards
WojPob

<wojtek[at]seti23[dot]org>
what burns twice as bright, burns half
as long, and you have burnt so very,
very brightly roy.


from_name: lcrocker at nupedia.com

body:
The answer to the title question is to do exactly what you're doing--
argue your case.  It's quite likely that I've misunderstood a bug or
mistaken it for another.

In this case, the date the bug was entered made me think it was
entered against the test database before transition, but right after
I had restored an old dump, which would have produced symptoms
similar to those you mention.  In the case of the live database,
others have answered you: the time cutoff and result count are
parallel limits. You only get the changes that meet both criteria.
If there's a way you think this might be better documented, feel free
to open a documentation bug or feature request.


from_name: Stephen Gilbert

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Recent changes page

body:
--- "Jan.Hidders" <hidders at uia.ua.ac.be> wrote:
> On Wed, Jul 24, 2002 at 05:06:16AM -0700, Jimmy
> Wales wrote:
> > Stephen Gilbert wrote:
> > > It used to be an option on the user preferences
> page.
> > > That's what I would like to see.
> >
> > Stephen's talking here about the ability to see
> all the edits, or to see them
> > consolidated by article.
> >
> > I, too, prefer to see this as an option on the
> user preferences page.  Both
> > are useful, and I've used both, and I used to
> switch back and forth pretty
> > often depending on what I was trying to do.
>
> I don't think there ever was such an option. Wat we
> did have was an option
> to hide minor edits and that is still there,
> although currently not
> operational but Lee promised to repair it soon. I
> suspect it will alleviate
> most of the pain of seeing all the separate edits.

It was a checkbox labeled something like: "Show all
edits on Recent Changes (not just most recent)" on
UseModWiki. The phase II software had something
similar. Trust me, it was there. I toggled the status
every once and a while.

-- Stephen Gilbert

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Restored history

body:
--- Brion VIBBER <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
> lcrocker at nupedia.com wrote:
> > I think the article histories are restored now.
> Let me know if there
> > are still problems.
>
> Which reminds me: do we still want to restore the
> edit histories from
> the usemod wiki days?
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

Yes, if possible and not absurdly complicated. If we
run the risk of trashing the histories since February,
I'd rather not attempt it.

-- Stephen G.

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sound formats again

body:
A timely announcement: Xiph and Real just announced that they will be
collaborating to make Ogg Vorbis plugins for RealPlayer and other
software.  Since it's now standard in WinAmp as well, I now see no
reason at all to use any other format.

Pierre, if you can give me that RealAudio sound you uploaded in some
other format (any other--wav, aiff, au, or even raw bytes), I'll
recode it into an Ogg so that we'll both be able to hear it.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Auto-save in your browser editor

body:
On Wed, Jul 24, 2002 at 01:42:22PM +0200, wojtek pobratyn wrote:
>
> Yes I know what you mean. I hate when this happens.
> Unfortunately I've got no idea how to get around this except
> cut-n-paste from a text editor.

Sorry if I sound critical but is it really such a problem to save your
intermediate work as a minor edit every now and then?

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Recent changes page

body:
On Wed, Jul 24, 2002 at 05:06:16AM -0700, Jimmy Wales wrote:
> Stephen Gilbert wrote:
> > It used to be an option on the user preferences page.
> > That's what I would like to see.
>
> Stephen's talking here about the ability to see all the edits, or to see them
> consolidated by article.
>
> I, too, prefer to see this as an option on the user preferences page.  Both
> are useful, and I've used both, and I used to switch back and forth pretty
> often depending on what I was trying to do.

I don't think there ever was such an option. Wat we did have was an option
to hide minor edits and that is still there, although currently not
operational but Lee promised to repair it soon. I suspect it will alleviate
most of the pain of seeing all the separate edits.

-- Jan Hidders


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sound formats again

in_reply_to: <200207242244.g6OMiUC27902@ross.bomis.com>; from lcrocker@nupedia.com on Wed, Jul 24, 2002 at 03:44:30PM -0700

body:
I am now convinced that .ogg should be our preferred format, with .mp3 accepted
but discouraged.

What's our policy with .gif?  I know I'm supposed to be the ultimate
"buck stops here" on policy issues, but I honestly forgot what we
decided.

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sound formats again

body:
>> Pierre, if you can give me that RealAudio sound you uploaded in
>> some other format (any other--wav, aiff, au, or even raw bytes),
>> I'll recode it into an Ogg so that we'll both be able to hear it.

> I have it in no other format. Do you know of a program that
> converts Real Audio into something else?

I believe WinAmp will do it if the .ra is not encrypted.  But it
would be better to go to the source of the file and ask if they
have an original.  They probably created the .ra from a .wav, and
that .wav will be the highest quality.  (And if you don't know
where the file came from, it shouldn't be here anyway :-).


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sound formats again

body:
> What's our policy with .gif?  I know I'm supposed to be the
> ultimate "buck stops here" on policy issues, but I honestly forgot
> what we decided.

I don't remember that anybody had any strong feelings about it.
I'd see it the same as OGG/MP3--we'd rather have PNGs, but a GIF
is OK.  I'd be likely to convert them if they were posted anyway
(although I would /not/ automatically convert MP3->OGG, because
that's a lossy transform).


from_name: Neil Harris

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Links to sound

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:

>Brion VIBBER wrote:
>
>
>>I don't think it's appropriate to put Realaudio on Wikipedia.
>>The only sound format that is readily usable by freely-available
>>software on multiple platforms and that is compressed for Web
>>transfer is Ogg Vorbis.  Especially now that they've released
>>1.0, I see no reason to use anything else.
>>
>>
>
>Can ordinary Windows users, i.e. users who aren't into music and file
>sharing and the like, use Ogg Vorbis with relative ease?
>
>For example, could my mom, running Windows 2000 or Windows XP, click
>on an Ogg Vorbis sound and end up happy?
>
>I'm totally in agreement with pushing free software and open standards
>wherever we can.  But I think we at least have to use stuff that Windows
>people can use.
>
>--Jimbo
>[Wikipedia-l]
>To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
>http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>
>
>
>
>
Yes, if you have the right plug-ins. There's a Vorbis plug-in for
Winamp, and I use that.

Neil


from_name: The Cunctator

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] [Fwd: [ wikipedia-Bugs-584804 ] URL followed by
	punctuation->broken link]

body:
On 7/24/02 5:06 PM, "Brion VIBBER" <brion at pobox.com> wrote:

> Brion VIBBER wrote:
>> The old software knew that 99.9% of the time humans don't _really_ mean
>> it when they put a comma, period, or other such item of punctuation
>> immediately after a URL, but that these are rather intended as, well,
>> punctuation.
>>
>> The new phase III software trusts us more; URLs that are followed
>> immediately by punctuation (period, comma, paren, semicolon, etc) now
>> include this punctuation in the hyperlink, which leads to a lot of
>> broken external links where URLs are put casually into text,
>> particularly on talk pages.
>>
>> Bug or feature? You decide!
> [...]
>> You can respond by visiting:
>> http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=411192&aid=584804&group_id=3
>> 4373
>
> So far the votes are tied 2-2:
>
> Crop final punctuation from links: Brion, Tony
> Include final punctuation in links: Lee, Jan
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
>
Crop.


from_name: Pierre Abbat

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sound formats again

body:
On Wednesday 24 July 2002 18:44, lcrocker at nupedia.com wrote:
> A timely announcement: Xiph and Real just announced that they will be
> collaborating to make Ogg Vorbis plugins for RealPlayer and other
> software.  Since it's now standard in WinAmp as well, I now see no
> reason at all to use any other format.
>
> Pierre, if you can give me that RealAudio sound you uploaded in some
> other format (any other--wav, aiff, au, or even raw bytes), I'll
> recode it into an Ogg so that we'll both be able to hear it.

I have it in no other format. Do you know of a program that converts Real
Audio into something else?

phma


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Image link to larger image

body:
jansson at gmx.net wrote:

>>'align="right"' makes tables and images float, but not other things like
>>paragraphs and div tags; it just changes the text alignment inside that
>>section. This will do the job you want:
>>
>>   <div style="float: right">
>>
>
>Can't we make this default for [[image:...]]?
>
Please don't! I've got a lot of inline images in [[Shavian alphabet]]
that need to flow in with the text, and automatic floating would be hurtful.

>There are far too many html tags in Wikipedia, and these could be really
>automated.
>
Now, if you want to propose some way to make it float only optionally,
and only on one side or the other, we'll see.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Oops...

body:
Yes, I'm the one who screwed up the "changed by" field on a lot of
records that makes recent changes and history lists look weird.  The
data is reconstructable, and I'm working on it.  I even tried the
update on my own server before trying it on the live one, but it
failed anyway.  Live and learn.  And keep good backups.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Image question

body:
Pierre Abbat wrote:

>On Wednesday 24 July 2002 22:14, Karen AKA Kajikit wrote:
>
>>Does the Image: namespace still contain ALL the images used in ALL the
>>differerent language versions of the wikipedia?
>>
Not by a long shot. A lot of stuff used on the other wikis (and some
used on the English) is on http://meta.wikipedia.com/.

Incidentally; _should_ we have a convenient procedure for sharing images
between language wikis using a variation of the [[image:foo]] syntax?
Most images are photographs or don't contain (or don't need) any
language-specific text, and it doesn't make a lot of sense to have
25-odd copies of every one.

>> I'm looking at orphaned
>>images and wondering what to do about the large number of orphans with
>>labels/captions/titles in languages other than English. Do I just
>>pretend they're not there?
>>
>>eg. 'auge.gif' - a German diagram of the human eye, with labels. Looks
>>like it comes from a textbook.
>>
As noted in the image page, that's used in [[de:Auge]]. It's exactly the
same as the image in the English article [[Eye]], with the text
rewritten in German.

>>'angulorecto.png' - a Right Angle, labelled in a language I can't
>>identify.
>>
Spanish. A local copy of the same image is used on enciclopedia.us.es.
(I note that there's no text *in* the image; feel free to use it to
illustrate a new English article [[Right angle]].)

>Brion Vibber left this link on my talk page:
>http://leuksman.com/misc/wikisearch.php
>angulorecto.png does not appear to be used anywhere, though the word occurs
>on the Esperanto Wiki.
>
Yes; note that a bunch of images are indirectly linked to from
[[eo:Brion VIBBER/Dezirataj]], where I have a list of images on www. and
meta.wikipedia.com that could be used in articles on that wiki, but
mostly aren't yet.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sound formats again

body:
On Wednesday 24 July 2002 20:54, lcrocker at nupedia.com wrote:
> I believe WinAmp will do it if the .ra is not encrypted.  But it
> would be better to go to the source of the file and ask if they
> have an original.  They probably created the .ra from a .wav, and
> that .wav will be the highest quality.  (And if you don't know
> where the file came from, it shouldn't be here anyway :-).

I don't know where I got it from (it was over two years ago, and I just
wanted to show fellow Fictionary players who thought that it was a Creole
expression indicating objection what a morepork sounds like), but I did a
search for Judy Voullaire (the recorder; if you don't have realplay, type
"strings Morepork.ra|head") and I'm sending her a message asking her.

phma


from_name: Daniel Mayer

subject: [Wikipedia-l] [Fwd: [ wikipedia-Bugs-584804 ] URL followed by  punctuation->broken link]

body:
On Wednesday 24 July 2002 05:56 pm, you wrote:
> So far the votes are tied 2-2:
>
> Crop final punctuation from links: Brion, Tony
> Include final punctuation in links: Lee, Jan
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

I say crop the final punctuation /if/ we decide to let the software recognize
URLs minus the http:// as weblinks (which I think would be the user friendly
thing to do anyway).

There are /far/ more valid reasons why somebody would naturally want to write
"blah, blah, blah www.napster.com." than there are webpages with punctuation
marks at the end of their URLs.

--mav


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Ogg as standard + some thoughts on going completely free (GNU flag waving alert)

body:
On Wednesday 24 July 2002 05:56 pm, LDC wrote:
> A timely announcement: Xiph and Real just announced that they will be
> collaborating to make Ogg Vorbis plugins for RealPlayer and other
> software. ?Since it's now standard in WinAmp as well, I now see no
> reason at all to use any other format.

I enthusiastically 100% agree. <emphasis>We should do ///everything///
reasonable in our power to promote free (libre) file formats.</emphasis>
This is especially true nowadays when the companies that control the
predominant proprietary file formats are trying to wrest even more control
over media files. We have established a fairly significant web presense and I
do believe our choice to go completely free would not go unfelt or unnoticed.

We could even decide to do the same for png/jpg and other cases where there
are totally valid and functional free (libre) alternatives to proprietary
file formats. We could even draft a press release for this and get some well
deserved publicity. Of course, we would have to systematically convert all
that we currently have (at least plan to do so eventually).

On Wednesday 24 July 2002 05:56 pm, Pierre Abbat wrote:
> I have it in no other format. Do you know of a program that converts Real
> Audio into something else?
>
> phma

If we do go this route, we must provide pointers to people where and how they
can convert their audio files (I'm pretty sure conversion of jpegs to pngs
could be done on the fly by the server using a GIMP script -- doing the same
for sound files would be too CPU intensive). This will probably have a side
effect of reducing the number of sound files uploaded to wikipedia but I say
so be it for the greater good.

--mav


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Image width

body:
On Wednesday 24 July 2002 05:56 pm, Karen wrote:
> I don't even try to get the text to wrap because I think the page often
> looks neater if it doesn't wrap when you're putting a fairly large pic
> in. I standardise my image size to about 300 or 400 pixels across
> because again I think it looks neater if all the images match up in a
> row.

In the case of images that size I would simply center them inline to the text
so they look nice in browsers that are 1000+ pixels wide. Having images that
wide though should be reserved for special cases -- like in the [[Yosemite
Valley]] article for example. If the image is just of somebodies portrait or
of an organism, then please downsize the image to between 150-250 pixels and
then wrap the text around it (perhaps placing the larger version on the
thumb's image page). This is pretty standard practice on other webpages and
has analogues in the print media (If you need quick access to a very simple,
right or left aligned table, just place one on your user page).

Anything wider than 250 pixels begins to crowd-out wrapped text for people
with screen resolutions of 800 by 600 pixels -- which is the largest single
group of web-surfers BTW (MS Windows default).

--mav


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Kaji: Please undelete bobine120.jpg

body:
> It seems to me that the 'orpan' list as it stands is useless
> because it doesn't track references to the image by direct url
> in the english wikipedia, and it doesn't track ANY reference to
> the image in any other wikipedia either...

I agree; the "orphaned image" list is useless, and in any case I
don't see that much of a problem with a useful image that isn't
currently linked to an article, especially if it is known that it
is in fact free--and image is, in a sense, an article in its own
right.

I'll make a note on the orphaned image page to that effect.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Is Wikipedia broken?

body:
>Warning: Can't connect to MySQL server on '127.0.0.1' (111) in
>/usr/local/apache/htdocs/w/DatabaseFunctions.php on line 15

That was me too.  Took it down for about 2 minutes to restart
it with different MySQL logging options.  It's fine now.


from_name: Jens Frank

body:
On Wed, Jul 24, 2002 at 01:40:41PM -0700, Zoe Comnena wrote:
>
> I wrote the following bug report, and got the accompanying response:
> <<Bugs item #584421, was opened at 2002-07-21 01:20
> You can respond by visiting:
> https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=411192&aid=584421&group_id=34373
>
[...]
> Summary: Recent Changes for (x) days
>
> Initial Comment:
> When I request Recent Changes for (x) days, I can't
> get past "diff) (hist) . . Theophylline; 23:38 . . Kpjas
> (more) ", no matter how many days back I ask.
>
> If I ask for 500 Recent Changes, it goes beyond this
> point with no problem.
>
>
[...]
>
> But the response isn't true.  I still can't get "view the last (x) days" to work.

Hi Zoe,

There are two limits active: First the number of changes to be displayed
(150 by default), second the number of days (3 by default).

If you click on "7 days", the limit of 150 still applies. You have to click
on "500", to get the last 500 changes, up to 7 days ago.

However, you probably won't get 7 days that way two, since there are more than 500
changes in 7 days. You will have to change the URL to include e.g. 1000 or 2000
changes.

	Best regards,

		   jens


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Image question

body:
On Wednesday 24 July 2002 22:14, Karen AKA Kajikit wrote:
> Does the Image: namespace still contain ALL the images used in ALL the
> differerent language versions of the wikipedia? I'm looking at orphaned
> images and wondering what to do about the large number of orphans with
> labels/captions/titles in languages other than English. Do I just
> pretend they're not there?
>
> eg. 'auge.gif' - a German diagram of the human eye, with labels. Looks
> like it comes from a textbook.
> 'angulorecto.png' - a Right Angle, labelled in a language I can't
> identify.

Brion Vibber left this link on my talk page:
http://leuksman.com/misc/wikisearch.php
angulorecto.png does not appear to be used anywhere, though the word occurs
on the Esperanto Wiki.

phma


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bad format username

body:
Someone created a username 209.105.200.28. I don't think that should be
allowed. Can the username creation code check for usernames that look like IP
addresses?

phma


body:
You deleted bobine120.jpg with the comment "wierd diagram in french, unused".
It is used in the French Wikipedia at
http://fr.wikipedia.com/wiki.cgi?Le_Choix_De_La_Pellicule_En_Argentique .
Please undelete it. In the future, if an old orphan image is not blatantly
junk but you think it should be deleted, mark it as a delenda and let someone
else check. Also, when you delete something that has been nominated for
deletion by someone else, please note that fact.

phma


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Recent changes page

body:
--- "Jan.Hidders" <hidders at uia.ua.ac.be> wrote:
> > The phase II software had something
> > similar. Trust me, it was there. I toggled the
> status
> > every once and a while.
>
> Are you really sure? I implemented the SQL behind
> the Recent Changes page
> for the phase II script, so I should have noticed.
> :-) (Or perhaps it's my
> fault the option was removed.) Anyway, I believe
> reintroducing the option is
> considered at the moment.

*Very* sure. Someone should back me up here, before I
feel the need to add more astericks. :)

-- Stephen G.

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Sound formats again

body:
--- Jimmy Wales <jwales at bomis.com> wrote:
> I am now convinced that .ogg should be our preferred
> format, with .mp3 accepted
> but discouraged.
>
> What's our policy with .gif?  I know I'm supposed to
> be the ultimate
> "buck stops here" on policy issues, but I honestly
> forgot what we
> decided.
>
> --Jimbo

I think we should go with png over gif in all cases. I
don't think any current browser has problems with png;
is this the case?

-- Stephen G.

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Image question

body:
--- Karen AKA Kajikit <kaji at labyrinth.net.au> wrote:
> Does the Image: namespace still contain ALL the
> images used in ALL the
> differerent language versions of the wikipedia? I'm
> looking at orphaned
> images and wondering what to do about the large
> number of orphans with
> labels/captions/titles in languages other than
> English. Do I just
> pretend they're not there?

I think pretending they're not there is exactly what
we should do. Until the other language encyclopedias
get software upgrades, they have to use the English
Wikipedia's file uploader.

-- Stephen G.

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Recent changes page

body:
On Wed, Jul 24, 2002 at 03:27:37PM -0700, Stephen Gilbert wrote:
>
> It was a checkbox labeled something like: "Show all
> edits on Recent Changes (not just most recent)" on
> UseModWiki.

Ah, that could be, I wasn't around then.

> The phase II software had something
> similar. Trust me, it was there. I toggled the status
> every once and a while.

Are you really sure? I implemented the SQL behind the Recent Changes page
for the phase II script, so I should have noticed. :-) (Or perhaps it's my
fault the option was removed.) Anyway, I believe reintroducing the option is
considered at the moment.

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikipedia-l] [Fwd: [ wikipedia-Bugs-584804 ] URL followed by

body:
> I vote for punctuation cropping, too.

That seems to be a growing consensus.  The remaining questions,
then, are the exact details.  Exactly which characters do we want
to consider "punctuation", and under what circumstances?  My
suggestion is this: After parsing URLs the way it does now, if the
URL ends with one, and exactly one, of the characters period, comma,
question mark, or exclamation; then remove that character and
assume it punctuates the sentence. Otherwise, leave the URL alone.


body:
--- Daniel Mayer <maveric149 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> (I'm pretty sure
> conversion of jpegs to pngs
> could be done on the fly by the server using a GIMP
> script -- doing the same
> for sound files would be too CPU intensive).

JPEG is a lossy compresion format; converting to PNG
from JPEG is as bad as converting from MP3 to OOG.

(I'm listening, Lee!)

-- Stephen Gilbert

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


body:
On Thursday 25 July 2002 01:13, Karen AKA Kajikit wrote:
> oh F###. I just ASKED if the images on the english database were used in
> other wikipedias so that I could know if it was safe to delete them and
> I was told that no they're not - they have their own storage space.

No, you asked whether for all image such that it is used in a wikipedia, that
image is in the English wikipedia image namespace. The answer to that is no.
But there exists an image in the English wikipedia such that it is used in
another wikipedia.

Anyway, bobine120 appears to be still in www.wikipedia.com/upload, without
the subdirectories. Once all the trash is picked through, and the people
working on foreign wikis notified, the images in /upload ought to be deleted.

phma


from_name: jansson at gmx.net

body:
> 'align="right"' makes tables and images float, but not other things like
> paragraphs and div tags; it just changes the text alignment inside that
> section. This will do the job you want:
>
>    <div style="float: right">

Can't we make this default for [[image:...]]?
There are far too many html tags in Wikipedia, and these could be really
automated.

Kurt

--
GMX - Die Kommunikationsplattform im Internet.
http://www.gmx.net


body:
>| I agree, but I'd also add semicolon and colon characters
>| to that list.

>...and single, double quotation marks, parentheses, and dashes.

Double quotes aren't legal in URLs, so they're not an issue.
But single quotes and hyphens are very common and I think it
would be a very bad idea not to treat those as URL chars in all
cases.  I'm even bothered a little bit by question marks and
exclamation points, but there is a workaround
([http://x.com/y? http://x.com/y?]), so I think it will be OK.
I think colon and semicolon would be OK as well.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] non-logged in users using upload utility

body:
I have mixed feelings about this -- what does everyone else think?

--mav


from_name: Brion VIBBER

body:
lcrocker at nupedia.com wrote:
 >Karen AKA Kajikit <kaji at labyrinth.net.au> wrote:
>>It seems to me that the 'orpan' list as it stands is useless
>>because it doesn't track references to the image by direct url
>>in the english wikipedia, and it doesn't track ANY reference to
>>the image in any other wikipedia either...
>
> I agree; the "orphaned image" list is useless, and in any case I
> don't see that much of a problem with a useful image that isn't
> currently linked to an article, especially if it is known that it
> is in fact free--and image is, in a sense, an article in its own
> right.

I disagree; it's not "useless", it's just of certain limited use -- like
everything else.

An image's being on the list doesn't guarantee that it isn't used
somewhere (on the English wiki via a click-link to the URL, or on other
language wikis), nor does it guarantee that it shouldn't be used in the
future. What it _does_ do is to narrow down a 'short list' of things
that _might_ be not being used.

Like the article orphans page it lists things that _might_ be junk to be
deleted, or _might_ be useful stuff that should be further linked to.
It's a starting point for further investigation, not a deletion list.

> I'll make a note on the orphaned image page to that effect.

Here I agree wholeheartedly.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


body:
On Wednesday 24 July 2002 10:34 pm, Karen wrote:
> It seems to me that the 'orpan' list as it stands is useless because it
> doesn't track references to the image by direct url in the english
> wikipedia, and it doesn't track ANY reference to the image in any other
> wikipedia either... there should be something to tell you if it's linked
> to from outside to at least give you an idea that you need to look.
>
> Either all the wikpedias are unified, or they're not. It's too confusing
> as it stands.

Yet another reason why all 'pedias should be run with the same program
(unless that would adversely affect performance, then having all the 'pedias
on the same highly integrated version wold be second best).

--mav


list: wikitech-l

subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing

body:
> This made me think: Would it make sense to make a formal BNF
> grammar for the Wikipedia text format, so a LALR(1) parser could
> be made for it?  Would that make any sense at all with PHP, or
> just be too hard to code and inflexible?

I'd love to have a formal grammar of some kind (I think regexps
would be fine), and I agree with Jan that a totally wiki-specific
syntax would be far better than out current mish-mash of HTML and
wiki markup.  But I'm not sure if it's not already too late to
revisit those decisions.

But if it isn't, I'll be happy to discuss what a syntax might
look like.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Image width

body:
On Thursday 25 July 2002 02:13 am, Karen wrote:
> 150 pixels is FAR too small for any details to be visible. If you're
> going to do that then you've got to do the 'two image' thing and put a
> larger version on the image description page. Once upon a time I would
> have said that 100 pixels was ample but most people are using large
> screen monitors and working on at least 1000 pixels across the screen.

Where did you read that "most people are using large screen monitors and
working on at least 1000 pixels across the screen"? My experience is that the
vast majority of desktop users, even those with 21 inch monitors go with
Windows defaults. Maybe XP detects this now and gives a larger default based
on screen size, but previous versions of Windows use 800 by 600 pixels by
default.

I haven't seen the research myself, but the IT department where I work always
state that market research indicates that by far the largest single group of
websurfers use Windows default resolutions. My coworkers and I are therefore
constrained by lowest common denominator of 800 by 600 pixels and have to
size everything appropriately -- which is annoying since my 21 inch monitor
at work is at 1600 by 1200.

The 150 figure was a bare minimum figure and not really meant to be
equivalent to the upper bound of 250 (which can be stretched to 300 in most
cases without too much text squishing at lower res).

Just something for you to consider, I'm not proposing we make this policy or
anything.

--mav


from_name: koyaanisqatsi at nupedia.com

body:
That sounds like a good idea.  If I had a link that had its own punctuation in it already, I would try to avoid confusing the matter by putting any more punctuation around it.

kq

Lee wrote:
>The remaining questions,
>then, are the exact details.  Exactly which characters do we want
>to consider "punctuation", and under what circumstances?  My
>suggestion is this: After parsing URLs the way it does now, if the
>URL ends with one, and exactly one, of the characters period, comma,
>question mark, or exclamation; then remove that character and
>assume it punctuates the sentence. Otherwise, leave the URL alone.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Image question

body:
The other wikipedias haven't been upgraded?  They must feel left out in the cold.

kq

Stephen G. wrote:
>I think pretending they're not there is exactly what
>we should do. Until the other language encyclopedias
>get software upgrades, they have to use the English
>Wikipedia's file uploader.
>
>-- Stephen G.


body:
I like it just fine, since we've lost that function where I could for instance hover over [[Koyaanis Qatsi]] in the Recent Changes page and see what his IP was.  So if someone has to log in to upload, that prevents us from blocking the person if s/he decides to start uploading copyrighted, irrelevant, or otherwise objectionable stuff.

kq

You Wrote:
>I have mixed feelings about this -- what does everyone else think?
>
>--mav


body:
On Thu, Jul 25, 2002 at 01:40:02AM +0200, jansson at gmx.net wrote:
>
> There are far too many html tags in Wikipedia, [...]

Ah! Finally somebody who agrees with me! :-) Thank you, thank you.

-- Jan Hidders


from_name: Anthere

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Please undelete bobine120.jpg

body:
Karen,

Regardless of the issue of images being used in other
wikis and of having an indication of where to look at
(seems to be a very important issue no ?), maybe it
would be wise not to delete any images with a title in
an obvious foreign language. Especially if this
language is used in one of the international wiki.
I understand it's really tough if it's in javanese
language though.

But in this case, I must say I'm puzzled : you
recognised a french title, with a french diagram, so
probably it's related to french wiki. You assume it's
unused. Why not ask to french wiki or on the
international list ? Just in case, for safety, even if
somebody told you maybe our image space was not common
?

As somebody stated it, if our stuff is in common, the
link must be seen, otherwise just pretend it's not
there, until we are able to check ourselves.
If really the image is bothering you (if you fear it's
copyrighted for example), I highly recommand you ask
on the international list or directly on the specific
wiki (you can write to us in english :-)). Please.

By the way, I take the opportunity to indicate
something that is getting a problem to my point of
view. Do you guys are not troubled by the increasing
numbers of messages that gets everyday ?
I was away for a week, when I came back, I had over
250 messages in the mail box. I guess that these last
few days, the number of messages is over 40 per day.
I'll be away most of august, I'm afraid I'll have to
disconnect from the list otherwise it will overflow.
Say...arenot they some issues that might be treated on
another list ? I appreciated the effort that were made
to direct people to the cvs bugbase for bug report...

Maybe I am only bothered because I can't read as
quickly as you do...but do not expect non-english to
necessarily see a message that might concern them
(such as an image deletion issue...)

cheers

anthere

and btw2 : I like the new en.wiki software and
interface (though I definitly had to give up using
Netscape, it overlaps text, logo and tool bar real bad
;-)). Welcome Opera !

--- Karen AKA Kajikit <kaji at labyrinth.net.au> wrote:
> Pierre Abbat wrote:
> >
> > You deleted bobine120.jpg with the comment "wierd
> diagram in french, unused".
> > It is used in the French Wikipedia at
> >
>
http://fr.wikipedia.com/wiki.cgi?Le_Choix_De_La_Pellicule_En_Argentique
> .
> > Please undelete it. In the future, if an old
> orphan image is not blatantly
> > junk but you think it should be deleted, mark it
> as a delenda and let someone
> > else check. Also, when you delete something that
> has been nominated for
> > deletion by someone else, please note that fact.
>
> oh F###. I just ASKED if the images on the english
> database were used in
> other wikipedias so that I could know if it was safe
> to delete them and
> I was told that no they're not - they have their own
> storage space.
>
> I give up. I don't know how to undelete it - I don't
> think you CAN. But
> I won't be removing anything else so I won't screw
> up again.
>
> It seems to me that the 'orpan' list as it stands is
> useless because it
> doesn't track references to the image by direct url
> in the english
> wikipedia, and it doesn't track ANY reference to the
> image in any other
> wikipedia either... there should be something to
> tell you if it's linked
> to from outside to at least give you an idea that
> you need to look.
>
> Either all the wikpedias are unified, or they're
> not. It's too confusing
> as it stands.
>
> --
>
> Karen AKA Kajikit
>
> You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can
> never take Alfandra
> out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...
>
> Come and visit my part of the web:
> Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
> Aussie Support Mailing List:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
> Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
> and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/
>
> Love and huggles to all!
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go
> here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


from_name: Steve Callaway

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Is Wikipedia broken?

body:
I am getting the following message on trying to connect to www.Wikipedia.com

Warning: Can't connect to MySQL server on '127.0.0.1' (111) in
/usr/local/apache/htdocs/w/DatabaseFunctions.php on line 15

Could not connect to DB on 127.0.0.1

Does this mean it's broken?


from_name: Lars Aronsson

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Excellent performance

body:
Since Monday, my script is seeing *average* response times ranging
from 0.8 to 1.5 seconds from all Wikipedia pages that I sample, with 99%
of calls served in less than 5 seconds.  The only exception is the Recent
Changes pages on the non-English Wikipedias, which take up to 4 seconds on
average.  (The ping roundtrip time alone from Sweden to San Diego is .2
secs, so the theoretical "room for improvement" is only 0.6 - 1.3 secs.)

--
  Lars Aronsson (lars at aronsson.se)
  tel +46-70-7891609
  http://aronsson.se/  http://elektrosmog.nu/  http://susning.nu/


body:
On Thursday 25 July 2002 04:55, Daniel Mayer wrote:
> I have mixed feelings about this -- what does everyone else think?

Anyone who has no user name must not be allowed to upload an image. Anyone
who has not created an article should not be allowed to upload, but as long
as the English Wiki can't tell that the French Wiki is pointing to an image,
there is no way to do this.

phma


subject: [Wikipedia-l] [Fwd: [ wikipedia-Bugs-584804 ] URL followed bypunctuation->broken link]

body:
The Cunctator wrote thusly:
<snip>
|| > Crop final punctuation from links: Brion, Tony
| > Include final punctuation in links: Lee, Jan
| >
| > -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
| >
| Crop.

Count me in: Crop

regards,
WojPob

<snip>


subject:
[Wikipedia-l] [Fwd: [ wikipedia-Bugs-584804 ] URL followed by
 punctuation->broken link]

body:
The Cunctator wrote:

>On 7/24/02 5:06 PM, "Brion VIBBER" <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>>Brion VIBBER wrote:
>>
>>
>>>The old software knew that 99.9% of the time humans don't _really_ mean
>>>it when they put a comma, period, or other such item of punctuation
>>>immediately after a URL, but that these are rather intended as, well,
>>>punctuation.
>>>
>>>The new phase III software trusts us more; URLs that are followed
>>>immediately by punctuation (period, comma, paren, semicolon, etc) now
>>>include this punctuation in the hyperlink, which leads to a lot of
>>>broken external links where URLs are put casually into text,
>>>particularly on talk pages.
>>>
>>>Bug or feature? You decide!
>>>
>>>
>>[...]
>>
>>
>>>You can respond by visiting:
>>>http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=411192&aid=584804&group_id=3
>>>4373
>>>
>>>
>>So far the votes are tied 2-2:
>>
>>Crop final punctuation from links: Brion, Tony
>>Include final punctuation in links: Lee, Jan
>>
>>-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
>>
>>
>>
>Crop.
>
>[Wikipedia-l]
>To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
>http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>
>
>
I vote for punctuation cropping, too.

Neil


from_name: Vicki Rosenzweig

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bad format username

body:
At 11:37 PM 7/24/02 -0400, you wrote:
>Someone created a username 209.105.200.28. I don't think that should be
>allowed.

Personally, I'm just glad I'll be able to leave this person messages now.
My userid happens to be my real name; many people's aren't. We cheerfully
allow koyanisqatsi (sp?) and ansible as usernames, why not the person's
IP address?

>Can the username creation code check for usernames that look like IP
>addresses?
>phma
>[Wikipedia-l]
>To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
>http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l

--
Vicki Rosenzweig
vr at redbird.org
http://www.redbird.org


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Image question

body:
koyaanisqatsi at nupedia.com wrote:
> The other wikipedias haven't been upgraded?  They must feel left out in the cold.

No shit.

We're working on adapting those with interface translations originally
made for the Phase II software now... At some point there should also be
a mass convert of the empty wikis, which should go smoother. ;)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Bad format username

body:
On Thursday 25 July 2002 08:50, Vicki Rosenzweig wrote:
> Personally, I'm just glad I'll be able to leave this person messages now.
> My userid happens to be my real name; many people's aren't. We cheerfully
> allow koyanisqatsi (sp?) and ansible as usernames, why not the person's
> IP address?

If you ask for the user's contributions, and the username is someone else's
IP address, do you get the contributions of that user, that IP address, or
both?

phma


body:
lcrocker at nupedia.com wrote:

>>I vote for punctuation cropping, too.
>>
>>
>
>That seems to be a growing consensus.  The remaining questions,
>then, are the exact details.  Exactly which characters do we want
>to consider "punctuation", and under what circumstances?  My
>suggestion is this: After parsing URLs the way it does now, if the
>URL ends with one, and exactly one, of the characters period, comma,
>question mark, or exclamation; then remove that character and
>assume it punctuates the sentence. Otherwise, leave the URL alone.
>
>
>
I agree, but I'd also add semicolon and colon characters to that list.

Neil

.


from_name: Karen AKA Kajikit

body:
Pierre Abbat wrote:
>
> I just added the picture to [[Cornish Rex]] but it's not behaving right. The
> code I used is
> <div align="right">
> [[Image:CornishRexRopey-small.jpg|Image:CornishRexRopey.jpg]]
> </div>
> which should show one image, and link to the other. Instead it shows one
> image, and links to the image page of the same one. How is it done? There's
> no explanation on editing help on how to do this. Also the text should flow
> around the image, and it doesn't.

Since the image automatically links to its own page I simply put the
larger version of it there - when someone clicks on the image they'll
see it.

I don't even try to get the text to wrap because I think the page often
looks neater if it doesn't wrap when you're putting a fairly large pic
in. I standardise my image size to about 300 or 400 pixels across
because again I think it looks neater if all the images match up in a
row.

--

Karen AKA Kajikit

You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can never take Alfandra
out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...

Come and visit my part of the web:
Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
Aussie Support Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/

Love and huggles to all!


from_name: wojtek pobratyn

body:
----- Original Message -----
From: "Neil Harris" <usenet at tonal.clara.co.uk>
To: <wikipedia-l at nupedia.com>
Sent: Thursday, July 25, 2002 10:21 AM
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] [Fwd: [ wikipedia-Bugs-584804 ] URL followed by

| lcrocker at nupedia.com wrote:
|
| >>I vote for punctuation cropping, too.
| >>
| >>
| >
| >That seems to be a growing consensus.  The remaining questions,
| >then, are the exact details.  Exactly which characters do we want
| >to consider "punctuation", and under what circumstances?  My
| >suggestion is this: After parsing URLs the way it does now, if the
| >URL ends with one, and exactly one, of the characters period, comma,
| >question mark, or exclamation; then remove that character and
| >assume it punctuates the sentence. Otherwise, leave the URL alone.
| >
| >
| >
| I agree, but I'd also add semicolon and colon characters to that list.
|
| Neil

...and single, double quotation marks, parentheses, and dashes.

WojPob


subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing

body:
There's a discussion on wikipedia-l about the exact syntax of an URL and
whether a punctuation mark at the end of the URL should be considered part
of the URL or not.

This made me think: Would it make sense to make a formal BNF grammar for
the Wikipedia text format, so a LALR(1) parser could be made for it?
Would that make any sense at all with PHP, or just be too hard to code
and inflexible?

Only ten years ago, people would use C programming and YACC to solve
problems like this, and reg.exp based parsing was considered just too
inefficient.

--
  Lars Aronsson (lars at aronsson.se)
  tel +46-70-7891609
  http://aronsson.se/  http://elektrosmog.nu/  http://susning.nu/


from_name: lcrocker at nupedia.com

body:
> I have unmixed fellings about this: people who are not logged
> in should not be able to upload. People are spending very valuable
> time on removing illegitimate uploads so we should be very strict
> on this. I would even suggest the rule that unused pictures are
> fair game. Being able to check this is not a nice-to-have but a
> must-have. If we cannot integrate the different Wikipedias enough
> to do this easily, then we should decide that each gets its own
> upload space. Disk space is cheap, the time of contributers is
> certainly not.

There's two issues there: as for upload privileges, those in favor
of restricting them to logged in users make a good case, so I'll make
that happen soon.

The second issue is should the Wikis share uploads.  I'm of the
opinion that each Wiki should be an island unto itself, both
conceptually and physically.  Images are conceptually "inline"
content, even though they are implemented as external links for
technical reasons. Isolating them for each wiki and making all links
internal makes it possible to encapsulate them, say, for a CD, or for
backup.  The combination of database + upload directory should be
able to reproduce a Wiki in its entirety.  I would even go so far as
to say that eventually, inline-rendered external image links
shouldn't be allowed--they should be treated like all other external
links rather than being rendered.

If that means having to upload flags 20 times, sobeit.  There might
be good reasons for some Wiki to want to use different flag images
anyway.


body:
Jan Wrote:
>> I have unmixed fellings about this: people who are not logged
>> in should not be able to upload. People are spending very valuable

then LDC wrote:
>There's two issues there: as for upload privileges, those in favor
>of restricting them to logged in users make a good case, so I'll make
>that happen soon.
>
>The second issue is should the Wikis share uploads.  I'm of the
There is a third issue, which we saw in spades on the Phase II software: once someone is logged in, we will no longer see that person's IP and therefore will have no way to block that person--and there will most certainly be people who log in solely to upload files that should not be uploaded, and who will deserve to be blocked.

This problem could be solved by reinstating the UseModWiki feature of revealing the IP of someone who is logged in simply by hovering the mouse over the username.  It worked quite well, even on my dynamic IP--each time I logged out and back in whatever I did on Recent Changes would reflect the IP I had assigned me when I did it.  I would love to see the feature returned.

cheers,

kq


body:
----- Original Message -----
From: "Daniel Mayer" <maveric149 at yahoo.com>
To: <wikipedia-l at nupedia.com>
Sent: Thursday, July 25, 2002 10:55 AM
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] non-logged in users using upload utility

| I have mixed feelings about this -- what does everyone else think?
|

I rather tend to be against anonymous users uploading 'stuff'.
Signing up or logging in is not a very big hassle, plus it could
be used as an incentive to persuade new users to do so.

WojPob


body:
> There is a third issue, which we saw in spades on the Phase II
> software: once someone is logged in, we will no longer see that
> person's IP and therefore will have no way to block that
> person--and there will most certainly be people who log in
> solely to upload files that should not be uploaded, and who
> will deserve to be blocked.

The new software is capable of blocking by IP or by login name.
There just aren't yet any features in the software to add to the
block list by name, or to discover the IP of a logged in user.
Those will need to be added at some point; I'll add that to the
tracker at high priority.


from_name: Larry Sanger

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Copyright Question - Catholic encyclopedia

body:
FYI, I did ask the Catholic Encyclopedia web editor for permission when
the same issue came up probably about a year ago.  I didn't get a reply,
if I recall correctly.  It's worth trying again, but I doubt they have a
nice view the prospect of the encyclopedia's content being included in
Wikipedia.

If we feel we don't have one, it would be good to get a definitive view on
such issues, when they arise, from a lawyer, and then just proceed
regardless of what New Advent says (or fail to say).

Larry


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Image question

body:
Does the Image: namespace still contain ALL the images used in ALL the
differerent language versions of the wikipedia? I'm looking at orphaned
images and wondering what to do about the large number of orphans with
labels/captions/titles in languages other than English. Do I just
pretend they're not there?

eg. 'auge.gif' - a German diagram of the human eye, with labels. Looks
like it comes from a textbook.
'angulorecto.png' - a Right Angle, labelled in a language I can't
identify.

--

Karen AKA Kajikit

You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can never take Alfandra
out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...

Come and visit my part of the web:
Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
Aussie Support Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/

Love and huggles to all!


subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing

body:
On Thu, 25 Jul 2002 lcrocker at nupedia.com wrote:

> > This made me think: Would it make sense to make a formal BNF
> > grammar for the Wikipedia text format, so a LALR(1) parser could
> > be made for it?  Would that make any sense at all with PHP, or
> > just be too hard to code and inflexible?
>
> I'd love to have a formal grammar of some kind (I think regexps
> would be fine), and I agree with Jan that a totally wiki-specific
> syntax would be far better than out current mish-mash of HTML and
> wiki markup.  But I'm not sure if it's not already too late to
> revisit those decisions.
>
> But if it isn't, I'll be happy to discuss what a syntax might
> look like.

Wiki is still a new concept.  Think how HTML was based on SGML, then
evolved into HTML 2, 3, 4, 5, and then XML came along, because people
understood from the HTML experience that SGML was overly complex.

There is a big world of PhpWikis out there with [single bracket] link
syntax.  There are other wiki implementations with different ideas about
syntax.  But no wiki is as big as Wikipedia, so this is the most
concentrated amount of experience.  This is where a format standard should
or at least could start to form.

--
  Lars Aronsson (lars at aronsson.se)
  tel +46-70-7891609
  http://aronsson.se/  http://elektrosmog.nu/  http://susning.nu/


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Contoversy flag on articles.

body:
> Can we add a "contested flag" or something? That alerts the
> reader to the opinion (of any given author) that the content
> of the article is or might be tainted? A lot of the middle east
> articles popping up all over could then be tagged as not entirely
> reliable until everyone have had their say.

> If not as a specific feature, then at least as a convention on how
> to mark an article as controversial, for instance with an agreed
> upon keyword early in the article.

> I love Wikipedia, but this problem always gives me a bad feeling,
> and makes we feel like giving up. Something like this would help
> to civilize disagreements, and thereby divert a lot of energy away
> from them, and over to other articles.

I would consider just marking an article as "likely to be
controversial" or something along those lines as tantamount to
giving up on the goal of making it a good article, so I wouldn't
want that.  On the other hand, it is not only acceptable, but
highly recommended, that the first paragraph if not the first
sentence of such an article simply tell the reader in plain
English that the topic is controversial and likely to contain
contradictory opinions. That's just part of describing the topic.

We could make a clearer statement of policy to that effect if
it would help.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Image policy

body:
Guys, I started working on an "Image use policy" for wikipedia.  I'd
appreciate it if you could take a look and flesh it out and start
some discussion--I'm a techie, so I put in lots of techie details,
but I'm sure many of you have many other things you'd like to say
there.  It's linked from the policy page.


from_name: Imran Ghory

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Image width

body:
On 25 Jul 2002, at 15:40, Karen AKA Kajikit wrote:

> 150 pixels is FAR too small for any details to be visible. If you're
> going to do that then you've got to do the 'two image' thing and put a
> larger version on the image description page. Once upon a time I would
> have said that 100 pixels was ample but most people are using large
> screen monitors and working on at least 1000 pixels across the screen.

According to thecounter.com (who statistics come from 1 million
web sites, ~400 million hits/month) 51% of people still use
800x600.

(See http://www.thecounter.com/stats/2002/May/res.php)

Imran
--
TheOpenCD Project
Promoting Open Source on Windows
http://www.theopencd.org


from_name: tarquin

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Image width

body:
Imran Ghory wrote:

>According to thecounter.com (who statistics come from 1 million
>web sites, ~400 million hits/month) 51% of people still use
>800x600.
>
>(See http://www.thecounter.com/stats/2002/May/res.php)
>
Yes, but the width of the browser window itself should be much less:
http://c2.com/cgi/wiki?TenWordLine


body:
That would be an easy way to do it, but it doesn't take into account the wasted download time (a big consideration for people on dialup, which is probably still most people on wikipedia).  It would be faster to have the two files separate so the thumb can display quickly, and people have the option to see the larger pic but are not forced to.

cheers,

kq

Magnus wrote:
>A mode that might work:
>* Default is "browser loads large image, then downsizes it"
>* The exceprion for this is server-side, when the article contains
>[[thumb:xyz.jpg]] *and* there is a "t_xyz.jpg" file.
>
>That would guarantee the thumb: thing works, and enable fast loading
>/if/ there's a thumbnail file available.


body:
excellent.  Sorry for mentioning a problem you had already considered, and mostly solved.  :-)

kq

LDC wrote:
>The new software is capable of blocking by IP or by login name.
>There just aren't yet any features in the software to add to the
>block list by name, or to discover the IP of a logged in user.
>Those will need to be added at some point; I'll add that to the
>tracker at high priority.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Trusted status

body:
>then LDC wrote:
>>There's two issues there: as for upload privileges,
those in favor
>>of restricting them to logged in users make a good
case, so I'll make
>>that happen soon.
>>
>>The second issue is should the Wikis share uploads.
I'm of the
>There is a third issue, which we saw in spades on the
Phase II
>software: once someone is logged in, we will no
longer see that person's IP and
>therefore will have no way to block that person--and
there will most
>certainly be people who log in solely to upload files
that should not be
>uploaded, and who will deserve to be blocked.
>
>This problem could be solved by reinstating the
UseModWiki feature of
>revealing the IP of someone who is logged in simply
by hovering the
>mouse over the username.  It worked quite well, even
on my dynamic IP--each
>time I logged out and back in whatever I did on
Recent Changes would
>reflect the IP I had assigned me when I did it.  I
would love to see the
>feature returned.
>
>cheers,
>
>kq

Better idea; Reinstate a type of ?trusted hand? status
and name it something like ?old hand?. Old hands would
be users that have been around for at least 30 days
and have made at least 30 edits (status would be
automatically granted by the software when those two
requirements are met ? there could be more than a 30
edit requirement if that is deemed necessary). Then
have the software only allow old hands, sysops and
developers the ability to use the upload utility. This
would be grandfathered in for current users.

I would further suggest that old hands would also have
the ability to edit protected pages and use the
administrative move feature (I don?t know if we should
restrict the possible ?vote for? feature to old hands
though). Then the only special privileges sysops would
have would be pure meta functions; blocking IPs,
manually setting user status, deleting pages and
protecting/unprotecting pages.

Having a 30 day/30 edit requirement ensures that users
are exposed to wikipedia long enough to become
familiar with our naming conventions, policies and
guidelines. Whether they actually do pay attention is
up to them. If needed their status could be reset back
to just ?user? by a sysop. Alternatively, sysops
should be encouraged to upgrade the user status of any
user that ?gets it? early.

I see no reason why we should prevent long time users
from editing protected pages and moving pages and
their history. I also don?t see any need to /ever/
have to block the IP of a long-time logged-in user.
Why then would this information be displayed, even to
a select few? Furthermore, how is it going to be
possible to associate a user with an IP on the blocked
page? Even though I trust this won?t be abused, the
existence of the possibility of abuse could be
chilling to some.

Allowing sysops the ability to block anyone, anytime
might be viewed by some as strengthening the perceived
quasi-cabal we have now into a real one. I have mixed
feelings on whether to allow the display of IPs of
non-?old hand? users though?This might still be a good
idea, but then to see the IP of an ?old hand? all a
sysop would have to do is reset the user status of the
?old hand? to just ?user?. To prevent this type of
activity from going unnoticed logs should be made.

Besides, there are only about a dozen active sysops
and the protected pages need to have more maintainers
(It?s tiring to constantly to have to review and take
requests on what to put on or edit on protected pages
by well trusted long-time users ? I would prefer to
just edit their edits in the wiki way). Having an ?old
hand? status would also help a great deal with the
upload issue ? those that want to use wikipedia as
just a server are going to have to ; 1) create an
account, 2) log-in, 3) make 30 valid edits and 4) wait
30 days.

--mav

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Wiki tables

body:
>But I still don't like tables
>--
>Karen AKA Kajikit

Believe it or not, I really don?t care much for them
either --- I can see how tables could be downright
frightening to newbies hitting edit. However, tables
are often necessary, sometimes vital, to presenting
data in a logical and easy to follow manor. This is
especially true for the elements articles and for
presenting taxonomic data in organism articles. So I
view tables as being a necessary evil to get things
done.

With that said?.

I have recently submitted a feature request for a
<wiki table> syntax that would greatly simplify table
markup and not be intimidating to newbies.

Please add additional ideas to the sourceforge
tracker.

http://sourceforge.net/tracker/index.php?func=detail&aid=584459&group_id=34373&atid=411195

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Wiki image justification

body:
>How about [*[image:...]] and [[image:...]*] ? But I'm
open to any suggestion
>that reduces the html tags and keeps the syntax
intuitive.
>
>Kurt

Hum, I like the concept. How about something like
^[[image:...]], [[image:...]]^ and ^[[image:...]]^ for
respectively, left, right and center. The asterisk is
already used for something else in wiki markup.

--mav

__________________________________________________
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Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


body:
> >>   <div style="float: right">
> >>
> >
> >Can't we make this default for [[image:...]]?
> >
> Please don't! I've got a lot of inline images in [[Shavian alphabet]]
> that need to flow in with the text, and automatic floating would be
> hurtful.
>
> >There are far too many html tags in Wikipedia, and these could be really
> >automated.
> >
> Now, if you want to propose some way to make it float only optionally,
> and only on one side or the other, we'll see.

How about [*[image:...]] and [[image:...]*] ? But I'm open to any suggestion
that reduces the html tags and keeps the syntax intuitive.

Kurt

--
GMX - Die Kommunikationsplattform im Internet.
http://www.gmx.net


subject: [Wikipedia-l] thumb:namespace

body:
>To re-use an earlier idea of mine: There could be a
namespace "thumb:"
>(or thumbnail or preview or ...), which refers to the
same files as
>"image:" does, but:
>* It has a fixed width (say, 150 pixel, or "15%" or
something)
>* It could have "special effects", like aligning it
to the right, with
>the text floating around it
>* [[thumb:xyz.png|text]] would display the
thumbnailed image, with
>"text" below it
>* It would link to the large image, maybe with the
description from the
>image: namespace

Oh please no! Forcing images to downsize like that
often results in hideous thumbnails and if I read you
right, will also force browsers to download the
full-sized image just the see the thumbnail. This
might work if the server automatically created a new
image at a certain pixel width and then linked that to
the larger one (in standard 'thumbnail', ?click image
for larger version? format. But forcing a 400 pixel
wide image into a thumbnail that is 150 pixels wide is
a bad idea (again, if I read you right).

--mav

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


from_name: Magnus Manske

body:
To re-use an earlier idea of mine: There could be a namespace "thumb:"
(or thumbnail or preview or ...), which refers to the same files as
"image:" does, but:
* It has a fixed width (say, 150 pixel, or "15%" or something)
* It could have "special effects", like aligning it to the right, with
the text floating around it
* [[thumb:xyz.png|text]] would display the thumbnailed image, with
"text" below it
* It would link to the large image, maybe with the description from the
image: namespace

Advantages:
* no new HTML, just another namespace
* no need to upload small and large image, the large one will do
* no ugly "click here to see the larger image" link (but, if you like
that, it could be created on-the-fly)

Magnus


from_name: Tomasz Wegrzanowski

subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing

body:
On Thu, Jul 25, 2002 at 12:17:26PM +0200, Lars Aronsson wrote:
> On Thu, 25 Jul 2002 lcrocker at nupedia.com wrote:
> > > This made me think: Would it make sense to make a formal BNF
> > > grammar for the Wikipedia text format, so a LALR(1) parser could
> > > be made for it?  Would that make any sense at all with PHP, or
> > > just be too hard to code and inflexible?
> >
> > I'd love to have a formal grammar of some kind (I think regexps
> > would be fine), and I agree with Jan that a totally wiki-specific
> > syntax would be far better than out current mish-mash of HTML and
> > wiki markup.  But I'm not sure if it's not already too late to
> > revisit those decisions.
> >
> > But if it isn't, I'll be happy to discuss what a syntax might
> > look like.
>
> Wiki is still a new concept.  Think how HTML was based on SGML, then
> evolved into HTML 2, 3, 4, 5, and then XML came along, because people
> understood from the HTML experience that SGML was overly complex.
>
> There is a big world of PhpWikis out there with [single bracket] link
> syntax.  There are other wiki implementations with different ideas about
> syntax.  But no wiki is as big as Wikipedia, so this is the most
> concentrated amount of experience.  This is where a format standard should
> or at least could start to form.

I tried to make formal grammar of Wikipedia, LALR, regexps of
whatever, and I can tell you that it's next to impossible if almost
arbitrary HTML markup is allowed.

Especially HTML tables syntax is difficult to parse,
so maybe we should make our own ?

Without HTML tables I think that we could limit what kind of HTML is
allowed and make some sane formal syntax.

It's not easy to design simple table markup that:
* allows multicolumn and multirow cells
* allows cell attributes
* can nest tables
* allows all constructs that HTML allows inside cells, i.e. multiple
  paragraphs, lists etc.
* is readable
* is easy to write

So I suggest that you check http://sf.net/projects/freetable
I made this a while ago to allow simpler HTML tables.
It seems to be working and is used by WebMake and WebsiteMetaLanguage.

Syntax looks something like this:

<wwwtable border=1>
(1,1)
column 1, row 1
(+,)
the same column, next row
(*,2)
column 2 in any row
(*,3) align=center
columns 3 should be centered
(1,3)
Some centered text
(3,3)
Other centered text
</wwwtable>

What is converted to:

    column 1, row 1
    column 2 in any row
    columns 3 should be centered Some centered text

    the same column, next row
    column 2 in any row
    columns 3 should be centered

    column 2 in any row
    columns 3 should be centered Other centered text

I'd say it's much better than what wikipedia currently uses.


body:
> On Thu, Jul 25, 2002 at 01:40:02AM +0200, jansson at gmx.net wrote:
> >
> > There are far too many html tags in Wikipedia, [...]
>
> Ah! Finally somebody who agrees with me! :-) Thank you, thank you.

:-)
Other tags that seem to be used often are tables. I think there already is a
wiki standard for this, so why not use it? (Sorry, can't find a source for
this at the moment.)

<br> is used very often, too. It doesn't really annoy me, but something in
wiki style whould be nicer.

Kurt

--
GMX - Die Kommunikationsplattform im Internet.
http://www.gmx.net


body:
Pierre Abbat wrote:
>
> You deleted bobine120.jpg with the comment "wierd diagram in french, unused".
> It is used in the French Wikipedia at
> http://fr.wikipedia.com/wiki.cgi?Le_Choix_De_La_Pellicule_En_Argentique .
> Please undelete it. In the future, if an old orphan image is not blatantly
> junk but you think it should be deleted, mark it as a delenda and let someone
> else check. Also, when you delete something that has been nominated for
> deletion by someone else, please note that fact.

oh F###. I just ASKED if the images on the english database were used in
other wikipedias so that I could know if it was safe to delete them and
I was told that no they're not - they have their own storage space.

I give up. I don't know how to undelete it - I don't think you CAN. But
I won't be removing anything else so I won't screw up again.

It seems to me that the 'orpan' list as it stands is useless because it
doesn't track references to the image by direct url in the english
wikipedia, and it doesn't track ANY reference to the image in any other
wikipedia either... there should be something to tell you if it's linked
to from outside to at least give you an idea that you need to look.

Either all the wikpedias are unified, or they're not. It's too confusing
as it stands.

--

Karen AKA Kajikit

You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can never take Alfandra
out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...

Come and visit my part of the web:
Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
Aussie Support Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/

Love and huggles to all!


body:
The stupid things' back again... I found it in my cache and saved it as
a jpg and reuploaded it. I still think that this indicates a fundamental
flaw in the 'orphan images' list, and I won't be using it again.

--

Karen AKA Kajikit

You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can never take Alfandra
out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...

Come and visit my part of the web:
Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
Aussie Support Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/

Love and huggles to all!


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Image width

body:
Daniel Mayer wrote:
>
> On Wednesday 24 July 2002 05:56 pm, Karen wrote:
> > I don't even try to get the text to wrap because I think the page often
> > looks neater if it doesn't wrap when you're putting a fairly large pic
> > in. I standardise my image size to about 300 or 400 pixels across
> > because again I think it looks neater if all the images match up in a
> > row.
>
> In the case of images that size I would simply center them inline to the text
> so they look nice in browsers that are 1000+ pixels wide. Having images that
> wide though should be reserved for special cases -- like in the [[Yosemite
> Valley]] article for example. If the image is just of somebodies portrait or
> of an organism, then please downsize the image to between 150-250 pixels and
> then wrap the text around it (perhaps placing the larger version on the
> thumb's image page). This is pretty standard practice on other webpages and
> has analogues in the print media (If you need quick access to a very simple,
> right or left aligned table, just place one on your user page).
>
> Anything wider than 250 pixels begins to crowd-out wrapped text for people
> with screen resolutions of 800 by 600 pixels -- which is the largest single
> group of web-surfers BTW (MS Windows default).

150 pixels is FAR too small for any details to be visible. If you're
going to do that then you've got to do the 'two image' thing and put a
larger version on the image description page. Once upon a time I would
have said that 100 pixels was ample but most people are using large
screen monitors and working on at least 1000 pixels across the screen.
Sure, if you're going to wrap, then you want it small but I think it
looks better NOT wrapped, with a caption underneath the pic.

Inserting tables for a single image is unecessarily complicating the
page layout and coding on the edit screen. When I look at an edit screen
with a complicated table in it I'm afraid to touch it for fear of
messing up the entire page. HTML is not everybody's friend.

--

Karen AKA Kajikit

You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can never take Alfandra
out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...

Come and visit my part of the web:
Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
Aussie Support Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/

Love and huggles to all!


body:
----- Original Message -----
From: "Anthere" <anthere5 at yahoo.com>
To: <wikipedia-l at nupedia.com>
Sent: Thursday, July 25, 2002 1:48 PM
Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Please undelete bobine120.jpg

<snip>

| By the way, I take the opportunity to indicate
| something that is getting a problem to my point of
| view. Do you guys are not troubled by the increasing
| numbers of messages that gets everyday ?
| I was away for a week, when I came back, I had over
| 250 messages in the mail box. I guess that these last
| few days, the number of messages is over 40 per day.
| I'll be away most of august, I'm afraid I'll have to
| disconnect from the list otherwise it will overflow.

I wouldn't view this as a problem; as the project grows
it's only natural that the amount of information being
exchanged in and around it is continuing to grow.

If you think your mailbox might overflow you might
consider subscribing only to the daily digest, which is much
clearer to read if you miss messages for a longer period of time.
Or you might want to unsubscribe and read the list archives instead
(http://www.nupedia.com/pipermail/wikipedia-l/ for this list).

<snip>
|cheers
|
| anthere

 regards,
WojPob


from_name: Pierre Abbat

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Blocking junk uploaders

body:
Is it OK to block the IP address of a junk uploader? How does one block a
username?

phma


body:
> Anthere,
>
> The right-justified toolbar doesn't work in Netscape
> and nor does the
> floating one. A left-aligned toolbar works just fine
> in Netscape.

True. But a left tool bar for a right-handed person is
just not efficient. I'm a lazy person. And the tool
bar police is just unreadable (but perfect under
Opera). Time to move on...

> I didn't ask on the French wiki because I do not
> know where that is

a few milimeters from the en.wiki maybe, or are not on
the same serveur ???
seriously, you can access it from the main page, under
the title "Wikipedias in other languages"
also now from the top and the bottom of the main page;
there's a line of links to the big small international
wikis.

and
> I do not speak any other language except English.

Our interface is very similar to the old old one you
used, hum, nearly 6 months ago. Links are basically at
the same place than yours. And I'm sure you remember
enough not to get lost. I go from time to time to the
other wikis, and I promise, I don't know much of
polish !
You may write in english to any of us if necessary.
We'll manage. Or write very simple sentences and then
use a french/english translator on google or
babelfish.altavista.com. That will do it. RobLa proved
it.
That's far from perfect but really good enough to
remove language barriers.

> Unlike the majority of
> the civilised world, Australian adults are
> monolingual. I studied french
> for four years in school and enjoyed it, but I had
> no further
> opportunity to practice it after that, and it was
> more than a decade
> ago.
>
> I thought I asked the important question previously
> but I misunderstood
> the answer so I deleted the image. And then I put it
> back again. The
> mistake won't be repeated because while I might be a
> slow learner I am
> not an imbecile.

no of course :-) But you wouldn't give up just because
you made one mistake, would you ? And you put it
again, so...

> If there are too many posts for you then I'd suggest
> that you go to the
> digest version, and unsubscribe for the time you'll
> be away. A lot of
> the discussion has been to do with the new software
> and I'm sure it will
> settle down soon. But an increasing number of
> contributors and members
> generally equals an increasing level of activity.
>
> Once again, I admire people who speak and contribute
> in a language that
> is not their mother tongue.

hum, thanks
but I contribute very little in english. takes a lot
of time for lots of frustration :-)

Have a good day on the other side of Earth (ain't I
supposed to be in bed ?!?)

> Karen AKA Kajikit
>
> You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can
> never take Alfandra
> out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...
>
> Come and visit my part of the web:
> Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
> Aussie Support Mailing List:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
> Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
> and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/
>
> Love and huggles to all!
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go
> here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l

__________________________________________________
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subject:
[Wikipedia-l] [Fwd: [ wikipedia-Bugs-584804 ] URL followed
 bypunctuation->broken link]

body:
The Cunctator wrote:
>
> On 7/24/02 5:06 PM, "Brion VIBBER" <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
>
> > Brion VIBBER wrote:
> >> The old software knew that 99.9% of the time humans don't _really_ mean
> >> it when they put a comma, period, or other such item of punctuation
> >> immediately after a URL, but that these are rather intended as, well,
> >> punctuation.
> >>
> >> The new phase III software trusts us more; URLs that are followed
> >> immediately by punctuation (period, comma, paren, semicolon, etc) now
> >> include this punctuation in the hyperlink, which leads to a lot of
> >> broken external links where URLs are put casually into text,
> >> particularly on talk pages.
> >>
> >> Bug or feature? You decide!
> > [...]
> >> You can respond by visiting:
> >> http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=411192&aid=584804&group_id=3
> >> 4373
> >
> > So far the votes are tied 2-2:
> >
> > Crop final punctuation from links: Brion, Tony
> > Include final punctuation in links: Lee, Jan

I'd vote for cropping too... urls never end with a punctuation mark
afaik...

--

Karen AKA Kajikit

You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can never take Alfandra
out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...

Come and visit my part of the web:
Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
Aussie Support Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/

Love and huggles to all!


in_reply_to: <20020725090103.XHEK1451.sccrmhc02.attbi.com@there>; from maveric149@yahoo.com on Thu, Jul 25, 2002 at 01:55:30AM -0700

body:
On Thu, Jul 25, 2002 at 01:55:30AM -0700, Daniel Mayer wrote:
> I have mixed feelings about this -- what does everyone else think?

I have unmixed fellings about this: people who are not logged in should not
be able to upload. People are spending very valuable time on removing
illegitimate uploads so we should be very strict on this. I would even
suggest the rule that unused pictures are fair game. Being able to check
this is not a nice-to-have but a must-have. If we cannot integrate the
different Wikipedias enough to do this easily, then we should decide that
each gets its own upload space. Disk space is cheap, the time of
contributers is certainly not.

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Image width

body:
Daniel Mayer wrote:

> Where did you read that "most people are using large screen monitors and
> working on at least 1000 pixels across the screen"? My experience is that the
> vast majority of desktop users, even those with 21 inch monitors go with
> Windows defaults. Maybe XP detects this now and gives a larger default based
> on screen size, but previous versions of Windows use 800 by 600 pixels by
> default.
>
> I haven't seen the research myself, but the IT department where I work always
> state that market research indicates that by far the largest single group of
> websurfers use Windows default resolutions. My coworkers and I are therefore
> constrained by lowest common denominator of 800 by 600 pixels and have to
> size everything appropriately -- which is annoying since my 21 inch monitor
> at work is at 1600 by 1200.
>
> The 150 figure was a bare minimum figure and not really meant to be
> equivalent to the upper bound of 250 (which can be stretched to 300 in most
> cases without too much text squishing at lower res).
>
> Just something for you to consider, I'm not proposing we make this policy or
anything.

Maybe I'm wrong... my brother runs his monitor at the highest resolution
he could push it too, with absolutely microscopic text. He's stretched
his screen acrege to the limits... when I enlarged my monitor I found
that I had to go up a size too.

I guess I just assume that other people are using better equipment than
me because I am NOT an early adopter of new technology... until recently
I was running a pentium 1 with minimum memory etc. I just don't see any
point in having a large screen and running it at such a low resolution!
Forget what I said before...

But I still don't like tables.

--

Karen AKA Kajikit

You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can never take Alfandra
out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...

Come and visit my part of the web:
Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
Aussie Support Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/

Love and huggles to all!


subject: [Wikitech-l] Usemod2SQL feature request

body: Could you make it so that "See also" is added only to non-empty subpages ?


from_name: Hr. Daniel Mikkelsen

body:
Hi.

Suggestion. Some background:

I notice that some articles on Wikipedia, while having an air of NPOV (by using
terse language, and lots of facts (or factoids)) are in fact rather politically
tainted.

This is especially the case in left/right issues, middle east issues and in
regards to nationalities (German/Polish borders, etc.).

This is probably unavoidable, and the way to solve it is of course to include
everyone's viewpoint as _viewpoints_, and only let what everyone agrees on be
"facts" of an article.

However, this is _a lot_ of work, for any given article. You have to rewrite
sections of the article (or spread it out through several articles), you have
to go several rounds with people on both sides of the contested issue, and you
have to keep a close watch on the article for quite a while.

Actual suggestion:

Can we add a "contested flag" or something? That alerts the reader to the
opinion (of any given author) that the content of the article is or might be
tainted? A lot of the middle east articles popping up all over could then be
tagged as not entirely reliable until everyone have had their say.

If not as a specific feature, then at least as a convention on how to mark an
article as controversial, for instance with an agreed upon keyword early in the
article.

I love Wikipedia, but this problem always gives me a bad feeling, and makes we
feel like giving up. Something like this would help to civilize disagreements,
and thereby divert a lot of energy away from them, and over to other articles.

What do you say?

-- Daniel


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Ununbiium

body:
Pierre Abbat wrote:
> I checked "most wanted" and found eight articles linking to "ununbium", which
> as far as I can figure out is a misspelling, but is much more common on the
> Web than "ununbiium".

A ratio of 26,200 to 15 on Google is certainly "much more common". ;)

According to the American Heritage Dictionary, it's definitely ununbium.
(Online edition: http://www.bartleby.com/61/47/U0124765.html )

 > As far as I can tell, the temporary element names are
> formed by stringing together the syllables "nil", "un", "bi", "tri", "quad",
> etc., and adding "ium" to the end. If "ununbium" were correct, then element
> 122 would be unbbium, and element 222 would be bbbium, which can't be
> distinctly pronounced. Does anyone have the definitive document on this?

Wouldn't it be "bibibium"? *ununbiium > ununbium is simply assimilation
of a double vowel (ii) into a single one (i).

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Wiki tables

body:
On Thu, Jul 25, 2002 at 02:02:55PM -0700, Daniel Mayer wrote:
>
> I have recently submitted a feature request for a
> <wiki table> syntax that would greatly simplify table
> markup and not be intimidating to newbies.

Wouldn't it be better to discuss this at http://meta.wikipedia.com? I was
thinking of
http://meta.wikipedia.com/wiki.phtml?title=WikiShouldOfferSimplifiedUseOfTables

I like your suggestion, btw, but I would even try harder to make it less
look HTML. I think something like the MoinMoin syntax would probably be a
good idea.

-- Jan Hidders


from_name: jansson at gmx.net

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Wiki image justification

body:
> >How about [*[image:...]] and [[image:...]*] ? But I'm
> >open to any suggestion
> >that reduces the html tags and keeps the syntax
> >intuitive.
>
> Hum, I like the concept. How about something like
> ^[[image:...]], [[image:...]]^ and ^[[image:...]]^ for
> respectively, left, right and center. The asterisk is
> already used for something else in wiki markup.

Okay. Don't know if it would be a little bit more intuitive inside the
brackets. Maybe not. Hmm, it doesn't matter much. :-)

Kurt

--
GMX - Die Kommunikationsplattform im Internet.
http://www.gmx.net


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Ununbiium

body:
I checked "most wanted" and found eight articles linking to "ununbium", which
as far as I can figure out is a misspelling, but is much more common on the
Web than "ununbiium". As far as I can tell, the temporary element names are
formed by stringing together the syllables "nil", "un", "bi", "tri", "quad",
etc., and adding "ium" to the end. If "ununbium" were correct, then element
122 would be unbbium, and element 222 would be bbbium, which can't be
distinctly pronounced. Does anyone have the definitive document on this?

phma


from_name: Stephen Gilbert

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Image question

body:
--- koyaanisqatsi at nupedia.com wrote:
> The other wikipedias haven't been upgraded?  They
> must feel left out in the cold.
>
> kq

Yeah, I believe that's that general non-English
consensus.

Stephen G.

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


body:
--- koyaanisqatsi at nupedia.com wrote:
> I like it just fine, since we've lost that function
> where I could for instance hover over [[Koyaanis
> Qatsi]] in the Recent Changes page and see what his
> IP was.  So if someone has to log in to upload, that
> prevents us from blocking the person if s/he decides
> to start uploading copyrighted, irrelevant, or
> otherwise objectionable stuff.
>
> kq

There are also many good contributers who choose not
to obtain a login for one reason or another. I'd
rather let these people upload files. Besides, if we
block non-logged in uploads, our abuser will just get
a login.

Stephen G.

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com


from_name: Fred Bauder

body:
At 02:44 PM 7/26/02 +0200, you wrote:
>On Fri, 26 Jul 2002, Daniel wrote:
>
>Hm. I think the idea of having a page called "controversial issue", and
>describing the problem there is a good idea. I also think that linking to
this
>page early in a controversial article is a good idea.
>
>I _don't_ think listing them up is a good idea. The page should be an
>explanation as to why we chose to flag certain articles as controversial,
>what it implies (that one should be prepared for slanted content, etc.), and
>how to ultimately solve the controversy (npov tactics).
>
>Linking from each article, instead of linking _to_ each article will also
make
>it easier for the random reader (just arrived from Google) to know whether
>these are cold encyclopedic "facts" or contested viewpoints. (Of course, the
>system can be abused, but it is more dangerous for people to have too little
>skepticism, than too much. (And a flame war of people turning on and off the
>"controversial issue"-link is far less intrusive than one where they rewrite
>large sections for every update.))
>
>If you need to track down controversial issues to work on, use the funky
"pages
>that link here" gizmo.

You might be right, but that would not justify removing the page [[List of
controversial issues]]. What you need to do is write a new page, however
titled, like [[editing controversial issues]]. Perhaps the redirect could
be removed from [[controversial issures]] with links to [[editing and [[list

Fred Bauder


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing

body:
Jan.Hidders wrote:
> Was it a conscious decision? I got the impressions the early software didn't
> filter out HTML so people used it and now we are stuck with it.

That's more or less right.  There was a discussion, but really, the code is
the law.

> Apart from the big technical advantages I still feel that having a simple
> HTML-free mark-up language is necessary to keep Wikipedia accessible for
> newcomers. Having lots of complicated HTML that is not very WYSIWIG makes
> editing harder. This inevitably means that you cannot do a lot of fancy
> lay-out things, but I believe that is not a bug but a feature.

My grasp of the consensus (but maybe I am misremembering... perhaps
this is just my grasp of my own opinion!) is that going out of our way
to be HTML-free is not a good thing, but that not allowing the many
html-nightmares is a good thing.

For example, many many many people, not just programmers, understand
how to make html bold and italics.  Those are intuitive
and harmless.  The original Ward Cunningham wiki solution of ' and ''
and ''' for different things, well, that was never very intuitive and
newcomers didn't know about it.

Supporting some html tags, familiar and harmless ones, seems like a
good idea.

Of course, at this point, we do have an established userbase of
writers, some of whom are known to us as regulars, but lots and lots
of whom may only show up once every month to write a little bit.  I
think we have a duty not to change anything in a way that will
astonish them.

--Jimbo


body:
On Friday 26 July 2002 04:52, Stephen Gilbert wrote:
> There are also many good contributers who choose not
> to obtain a login for one reason or another. I'd
> rather let these people upload files. Besides, if we
> block non-logged in uploads, our abuser will just get
> a login.

Google isn't going to get a login, and our upload page is still #2 on Google,
which is how the junk uploaders are finding it. So new abusers won't get
logins - they won't find Wikipedia to begin with.

phma


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Copyright question

in_reply_to: <r5ilm7yjtok.fsf@gill.maths.keele.ac.uk>; from wiki@gwowen.freeserve.co.uk on Fri, Jul 26, 2002 at 06:16:43PM +0100

body:
Gareth Owen wrote:
> Does anyone know the status of photos taken of works in museums/galleries
> (in this case, the Museum of Anthropology at UBC, Vancouver)

I think this is a very good question.

If the work is already in the public domain, then there should be no
copyright problems with taking such a picture, although museum rules
for photography would presumably come into play.  If a museum forbids
photography, and you take a picture anyway, then you've probably
broken the (implicit?) contract for admission to the museum.  But this
is not, strictly speaking, a matter of copyright.

If the work is not in the public domain, then a photograph at
web-resolution probably meets "fair use" as well as anything possibly
could.  I'm assuming here that you mean a photo that YOU take, of a
potentially copyrighted subject.  If a photographer takes a picture of
the Mona Lisa, we can't assume that that *photograph* is in the public
domain, even if the *Mona Lisa* is.

Here's a web essay about this issue -- we should probably find more:
http://is.gseis.ucla.edu/impact/f95/Papers-projects/Papers/taylor.html

Most of the issues that have arisen in this area pertain to access to
high-quality reproductions.  That's not an issue that affects us much,
since for our encyclopedic purposes, any old picture will pretty much
do just fine.

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikipedia-l] More on copyright and photos of art

body:
These two concern cases of photos of art that is still copyrighted.

http://www.dig-mar.com/Commentaries/shellgame.html

http://www.benedict.com/visual/batman/batman.asp


subject: [Wikipedia-l] 4 factor fair use test

body:
http://www.utsystem.edu/ogc/intellectualproperty/copypol2.htm#test

This is a nice summary of the "4 factor" fair use test.

Here's my interpretation of how we would argue for fair use in the
case of a photograph of a still-copyrighted artwork, like a painting
or sculpture in a museum.

1.  What is the character of the use?

Our use is nonprofit and educational.  Because the photo of the artwork would
naturally be accompanied by an article about the artwork, our use is criticism
and commentary.  Notice that even commercial use can be o.k., if the use is
generally educational, commentary, criticism.

2.  What is the nature of the work to be used?

In general, this factor will not help us.  The nature of the work is
'imaginative'.  I'm not sure if a work of art in a museum is
considered 'published' from this perspective or not.

3.  How much of the work will you use?

Here we are in very good shape.  A small web image of a statue or a
painting is a relatively small use.  A recent U.S. Appeals court
decision (Arriba) said that search engines can use thumbnails of web
photos that are copyrighted, for example, in Google's image search.

This is similar.  A small web image is not a full and complete reproduction
of the work.

4. If this kind of use were widespread, what effect would it have on
the market for the original or for permissions?

This seems to lean heavily in our favor.  It seems unlikely that our
use would detract from the market for the original or for permission
for real reproductions (posters and the like), so long as our images
are kept small.  If we offered massive and extremely accurate digital
files which would permit the end user to print a nice poster, this
would weigh against us.

But a small web image is not going to damage the market for posters.

--Jimbo


body:
Anthere,

The right-justified toolbar doesn't work in Netscape and nor does the
floating one. A left-aligned toolbar works just fine in Netscape.

I didn't ask on the French wiki because I do not know where that is and
I do not speak any other language except English. Unlike the majority of
the civilised world, Australian adults are monolingual. I studied french
for four years in school and enjoyed it, but I had no further
opportunity to practice it after that, and it was more than a decade
ago.

I thought I asked the important question previously but I misunderstood
the answer so I deleted the image. And then I put it back again. The
mistake won't be repeated because while I might be a slow learner I am
not an imbecile.

If there are too many posts for you then I'd suggest that you go to the
digest version, and unsubscribe for the time you'll be away. A lot of
the discussion has been to do with the new software and I'm sure it will
settle down soon. But an increasing number of contributors and members
generally equals an increasing level of activity.

Once again, I admire people who speak and contribute in a language that
is not their mother tongue.

--

Karen AKA Kajikit

You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can never take Alfandra
out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...

Come and visit my part of the web:
Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
Aussie Support Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
and now Ample Aussies Mailing List:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ampleaussies/

Love and huggles to all!


from_name: daniwo59 at aol.com

subject: [Wikipedia-l] an idea

body:
Hi,

Is there a way to register the number of words by each article in the search
engine? This would give a quick sense of whether the article is stub or not.

Danny