from_name: Adam Raizen

body:
Geoff Burling wrote:
> On Sun, 14 Sep 2003, Daniel Ehrenberg wrote:
>
>
>>--- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:
>>
>>>I would like to use a bot to upload articles on
>>>cities in Israel based
>>>on information from Israel's Central Bureau of
>>>Statistics
>>>(http://www.cbs.gov.il), a la Rambot. You can see an
>>>example article at
>>>[[User:AdamRaizen/Ramla]]. Any objections or
>>>comments?
>>>
>>
>>I wouldn't object, but the following part is a bit
>>unclear:
>>
>>The ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish and
>>other, and 20.0% Arab (15.4% Muslim and 4.0%
>>Christian). There are 450 new immigrants.
>
>
> Are these catagories legally defined in Israeli law? (Or
> at least, the same terms from the Israeli census materials?)
> If so, I would like to see those terms hyperlinked to
> an article explaining the legal definitions, much as
> was done for the U.S. cities.

Kind of. For Jews, the Interior Ministry (whose data is the source of
the data used here) basically accepts as Jewish whoever the Rabbinate
says is Jewish (with some complications), and this is a hotly debated
political issue. I'm not sure of the situation for Muslims and
Christians, but I assume it's similar (i.e. whatever the local religious
authority says). There probably should be an article explaining all this
somewhere anyway.

>>Also, I would like to know how this bot handles it
>>when articles are already there but it wants to put
>>this data there.
>>LDan
>>
>
> Good point.

Since there aren't many already existing articles, I will just merge
these in with the previous text manually.

 > I would also add some kind of referent that
> helps a user to locate where in Israel these municipalities
> are. Both the US & France listings include the name of
> the local government, which offer useful information
> for locating the habitation in question.

The local government is the subject of the article, and there aren't any
other divisions of local government. The article mentions the Interior
Ministry's District or Region, which will tell you whether the city is a
suburb of Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, or Haifa, or otherwise whether it's in
the North, South, or Center, or in the West Bank or Gaza Strip. If I
could find geographic coordinates, I would add a lot more detailed
information.

A user on he.wikipedia suggested that tables are easier to read than
paragraphs. Am I correct that this has already been debated with regards
to Rambot's articles and settled that short paragraphs are okay, at
least for the English wikipedia?

--Adam Raizen


list: wikipedia-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Gutza

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:

>On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 03:51:46PM +0200, Magnus Manske wrote:
>
>
>>OK, anyone opposed to
>>- wiki table markup *in general*
>>- the *markup style* I use at test.wikipedia.org
>>- my *implementation* of that style
>>
>>please speak up now! Otherwise, I'll commit it to the stable branch of
>>the software, which means it will go online with the next update.
>>
>>
>
>I'm not a great fan of it.
>Can you provide complete specification of how is it supposed to behave ?
>It seems to be stealing whole 3 characters - {, }, and |,
>and to be much more ambiguous than it should.
>
>
>
It only steals one character--"{"--and at that, only at the beginning of
a paragraph. Not bad if you ask me (not that you did), 'cause I don't
think there are so many paragraphs in Wikipedia starting with a curly
bracket. It does "steal" the other characters you mention, plus the
exclamation mark I suggested, at the beginning of a paragraph *within* a
table. But one you open a table, you're aware those are mandatory, so no
worries there.

Gutza


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Ulrich Fuchs wrote:

>Am Montag, 15. September 2003 15:51 schrieb Magnus Manske:
>
>
>>OK, anyone opposed to
>>- wiki table markup *in general*
>>- the *markup style* I use at test.wikipedia.org
>>- my *implementation* of that style
>>
>>please speak up now! Otherwise, I'll commit it to the stable branch of
>>the software, which means it will go online with the next update.
>>
>>
>>
>
>Ok, just speaking up a little bit, but just repeating what has been said
>before.
>
>I doubt that a new markup for tables will make things a lot more easier for
>newbies. Tables *are* a complex thing, and they are difficult to read in any
>markup language, because cells rendered *beside* the other are coded *below*
>each other in the source (at least if there is som more content requireing
>line breaks). So I doubt that a newbie will be able to edit a table like it's
>used in the country or element articles, no matter what markup we are using.
>
>Therefore I really liked the idea of having a "table"-namespace, and a way of
>importing the tables in that namespace as easiliy as we do with images right
>now. The article source would be cleared of the table, and the table might be
>as complex as needed without scaring away the newbies.
>
>However, I can imagine that the new markup is a fine way for rendering
>*simple* tables within the article, giving newbies a chance to do simple
>table layouts the easy way (there are a lot of issues that can be aligned in
>simple tables, so the feature *is* useful). It's somewhat more readable,
>easier to understand and therefore easier to write than html.
>
>But, as I said, for large and complex tables that new markup will not solve
>our problems.
>
>Uli
>
Agreed, for large tables it probably wouldn't as it stands. But if your
worries are the newbies, a table creation tool could be added in
Wikipedia, which would make things easier with newbies. I do however
think the new table markup could be useful for newbies because it
wouldn't require strict stack-like (FIFO) open/close tags which I guess
are the main drawback of HTML tables; also, with the advent of proper
table header wiki tags, newbies could easily properly format relatively
simple tables, without having to go through freakish "<TD
BGCOLOR='#DDDDDD'>" tags. And finally, being a newbie doesn't equate
being an idiot, people can learn even if the cells rendered beside one
another must be coded under one another, that's relatively easy to
understand, given that people generally read
left-to-right/top-to-bottom, so it's no change of order, although
admittedly there is a considerable change in format (I expect there will
be some support for right-to-left languages as well).

Gutza


from_name: Tomasz Wegrzanowski

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 11:47:27PM +0300, Gutza wrote:
> Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
> >On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 03:51:46PM +0200, Magnus Manske wrote:
> >I'm not a great fan of it.
> >Can you provide complete specification of how is it supposed to behave ?
> >It seems to be stealing whole 3 characters - {, }, and |,
> >and to be much more ambiguous than it should.
> >
> It only steals one character--"{"--and at that, only at the beginning of
> a paragraph. Not bad if you ask me (not that you did), 'cause I don't
> think there are so many paragraphs in Wikipedia starting with a curly
> bracket. It does "steal" the other characters you mention, plus the
> exclamation mark I suggested, at the beginning of a paragraph *within* a
> table. But one you open a table, you're aware those are mandatory, so no
> worries there.

Table is not like the math mode, which is completely separate
from normal wiki syntax, but something inside what all the wiki syntax
is supposed to be usable. And for something like that, it steals a bit
too many characters.

And what about precise description of this markup ?


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:

>On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 11:47:27PM +0300, Gutza wrote:
>
>
>>Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
>>
>>
>>>On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 03:51:46PM +0200, Magnus Manske wrote:
>>>I'm not a great fan of it.
>>>Can you provide complete specification of how is it supposed to behave ?
>>>It seems to be stealing whole 3 characters - {, }, and |,
>>>and to be much more ambiguous than it should.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>It only steals one character--"{"--and at that, only at the beginning of
>>a paragraph. Not bad if you ask me (not that you did), 'cause I don't
>>think there are so many paragraphs in Wikipedia starting with a curly
>>bracket. It does "steal" the other characters you mention, plus the
>>exclamation mark I suggested, at the beginning of a paragraph *within* a
>>table. But one you open a table, you're aware those are mandatory, so no
>>worries there.
>>
>>
>
>Table is not like the math mode, which is completely separate
>from normal wiki syntax, but something inside what all the wiki syntax
>is supposed to be usable. And for something like that, it steals a bit
>too many characters.
>
>
How should I put it? It's *ONE* character *COMBINATION*! If one
character combination is too many, well, I don't know, maybe you're
right. I don't think it is too many though. Do you understand what I
mean about it only stealing one character combination? If you don't
start a table by using "{|" at the beginning of a line, "{" or "|" at
the beginning of a line would be rendered as-is. Using "{", "|" or even
"{|" anywhere else but the beginning of a line would be rendered as-is
as well. Maybe I'm missing something though, please clarify your
position if I overlooked something.

>And what about precise description of this markup ?
>
>
Given the fact that, if you read the rest of this thread, this
implementation is currently under discussion, I wouldn't expect the
developer to start typing a description just yet.

Gutza


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
On Tue, Sep 16, 2003 at 02:29:55AM +0300, Gutza wrote:
> Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
> >Table is not like the math mode, which is completely separate
> >from normal wiki syntax, but something inside what all the wiki syntax
> >is supposed to be usable. And for something like that, it steals a bit
> >too many characters.
>
> How should I put it? It's *ONE* character *COMBINATION*! If one
> character combination is too many, well, I don't know, maybe you're
> right. I don't think it is too many though. Do you understand what I
> mean about it only stealing one character combination? If you don't
> start a table by using "{|" at the beginning of a line, "{" or "|" at
> the beginning of a line would be rendered as-is. Using "{", "|" or even
> "{|" anywhere else but the beginning of a line would be rendered as-is
> as well. Maybe I'm missing something though, please clarify your
> position if I overlooked something.

It's not only that - `|' becomes magical not only at the begining of line (what
would be relatively harmless), but also inside it. We already had a bug
where ;/: and : for namespaces conflicted (and btw., is it fixed ?).

> >And what about precise description of this markup ?
>
> Given the fact that, if you read the rest of this thread, this
> implementation is currently under discussion, I wouldn't expect the
> developer to start typing a description just yet.

Magnus said he's going to put it live on all pedias.
That's definitely the time for giving exact description.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 07:32:58PM -0700, Brion Vibber wrote:
> On Mon, 2003-09-15 at 18:49, Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
> > .... We already had a bug
> > where ;/: and : for namespaces conflicted (and btw., is it fixed ?).
>
> Which bug is that?

This one - http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_bug (still there)


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 07:58:19PM -0700, Brion Vibber wrote:
> On Mon, 2003-09-15 at 19:43, Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
> > On Mon, Sep 15, 2003 at 07:32:58PM -0700, Brion Vibber wrote:
> > > On Mon, 2003-09-15 at 18:49, Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
> > > > .... We already had a bug
> > > > where ;/: and : for namespaces conflicted (and btw., is it fixed ?).
> > >
> > > Which bug is that?
> >
> > This one - http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_bug (still there)
>
> Blecch! Is there any reason not to remove the single-line ;: directory
> list syntax?
>
> For the uninitiated: a line like this:
>
> ; foo : bar
>
> would produce code something like:
>
>

>
foo

>
bar

>

>
> (but uglier, because our parser produces ugly code) which renders
> something like:
>
> foo
>       bar
>
> Currently this triggers on :s in URLs and wikilinks as well as plain
> text, which is unexpected.
>
> Requiring the : portion to be a second line would prevent this from
> being an issue.

I'm for.
And similar problems may occur with | and that table markup.


from_name: Karl Eichwalder

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Table markup

body:
Magnus Manske <magnus.manske at web.de> writes:

> please speak up now! Otherwise, I'll commit it to the stable branch of
> the software, which means it will go online with the next update.

Nice, it is as obscure as SGML's shortref feature, modulo you cannot
validate it ;)

--
                                                         |      ,__o
                                                         |    _-\_<,
http://www.gnu.franken.de/ke/                            |   (*)/'(*)


from_name: Thomas Corell

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Brion Vibber schrieb:

> Blecch! Is there any reason not to remove the single-line ;: directory
> list syntax?
>
> For the uninitiated: a line like this:
>
> ; foo : bar
> Requiring the : portion to be a second line would prevent this from
> being an issue.

Well, you can write
; foo
: bar
currently, and it is the same result as you get with ; foo : bar - I
like this parser :)

I think it can be changed, if we support the conversion.

Smurf
--
Smurf

smurf at AdamAnt.mud.de
-------------------------  Anthill inside! ---------------------------


list: wikien-l

from_name: Anthere

subject: [WikiEN-l] BuddhaInside's behaviour

body:
> Message: 2
> Date: Mon, 15 Sep 2003 14:36:58 +0200
> From: "Mike" <Mike at cybermaus.com>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] BuddhaInside's behaviour
> To: "Discussion list for English-language Wikipedia"
> 	<wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Message-ID: <007801c37b86$0f081d50$2101a8c0 at maus1>
> Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="iso-8859-1"
>
> > He then tried to edit the [[Consensus]] page to
> redefine what a consensus
> > is, forcing the comment Angela,
> >
> > Changing the definition on the [[consensus]] page
> won't help Buddha . . .
> > [[User:Angela|Angela]] 18:04, Sep 14, 2003 (UTC)
>
> In spite of all the irritation he has caused, I
> would still have been
> inclined to give him the benefit of doubt, but the
> above cited act brands
> him as a troll in my opinion.
>
> Mike AKA CyberMaus

Have you look at the page in question ([[consensus]]),
its history, and the talk page ?

Anthere

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


list: textbook-l

from_name: Karl Wick

subject: [Textbook-l] NYT article on textbook prices

body:
This was on the front page of my local paper this morning:

"When Books Break the Bank"

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/16/nyregion/16BOOK.html?pagewanted=all&position=

An article about outrageous textbook prices and the things
that students are doing to avoid paying them. (No mention
of our site unfortunately).

I saw old NYT articles on Sept 11 archived on the main
wikipedia .. could we do that with this one, put the text
on Wikibooks ?

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


subject: [Textbook-l] slashdotting the NYT story and us

body:
Oh yeah, would it be a good idea to submit the NYT story to
Slashdot with a link to our site and describing what we are
doing to improve the situation ?

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


from_name: Magnus Manske

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
> It's not only that - `|' becomes magical not only at the begining of line (what
> would be relatively harmless), but also inside it.

It will be only magical if
* it is used inside a table and
* if a '|' is the first char at the beginning of the line
Or a "!", as of latest (yes, <th> has finally arrived!)

The only use of '|' I can think of in text (not counting links, they
won't be affected) is for ASCII drawings, and for these, the line always
starts with a blank anyway.

> Magnus said he's going to put it live on all pedias.
> That's definitely the time for giving exact description.

I put one up at
http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki_table_markup

Magnus


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Gutza wrote:

> Magnus Manske wrote:
> On a side note, this should probably also be supported in a
> fully-flexible implementation:
>
> {|
> ! Header1 || Cell1
> |-
> ! Header2 || Cell2
> |}

IMHO most use of headers occurs in the very first line, so a line with
multiple cells that starts with "!" will only have headers.

Your above example would have to be done like
{|
! Header1
| Cell1
|-
! Header2
| Cell2
|}

Also: Currently, I do "||" parsing via "explode" (with prior replacing
"!!" with "||" if line starts with "!"). Parsing the different tags
would thus result in more code, and if you ever read my code, you don't
want more of it than absolutely necessary ;-)

Magnus


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Magnus Manske wrote:

> Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
>
>> It's not only that - `|' becomes magical not only at the begining of
>> line (what
>> would be relatively harmless), but also inside it.
>
>
> It will be only magical if
> * it is used inside a table and
> * if a '|' is the first char at the beginning of the line
> Or a "!", as of latest (yes, <th> has finally arrived!)
>
> The only use of '|' I can think of in text (not counting links, they
> won't be affected) is for ASCII drawings, and for these, the line
> always starts with a blank anyway.
>
>> Magnus said he's going to put it live on all pedias.
>> That's definitely the time for giving exact description.
>
>
> I put one up at
> http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki_table_markup

Beautiful! I think this will make the life of newbies a lot easier when
having to use tables. And I'm also happy with the <th> tags, it's way
better than using classes; we just need to implement proper visual
support for headers in CSS for everyone to use it (<th> should have a
different background than <td> in all skins except printer-friendly IMHO).

Gutza


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Magnus Manske wrote:

> Tomasz Wegrzanowski wrote:
>
>> It's not only that - `|' becomes magical not only at the begining of
>> line (what
>> would be relatively harmless), but also inside it.
>
>
> It will be only magical if
> * it is used inside a table and
> * if a '|' is the first char at the beginning of the line
> Or a "!", as of latest (yes, <th> has finally arrived!)
>
> The only use of '|' I can think of in text (not counting links, they
> won't be affected) is for ASCII drawings, and for these, the line
> always starts with a blank anyway.
>
>> Magnus said he's going to put it live on all pedias.
>> That's definitely the time for giving exact description.
>
>
> I put one up at
> http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki_table_markup

On a side note, this should probably also be supported in a
fully-flexible implementation:

{|
! Header1 || Cell1
|-
! Header2 || Cell2
|}

Gutza


list: wikitech-l

from_name: Erik Zachte

subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
> "No parameters can be added to |- tags;
> not that I ever saw a table on wikipedia which uses that!"

If you search the en: cur sql dump file for '<tr ' you will find
hundreds of examples;

Most are in these categories:

Secondly, I suggest using another character for captions.

|_ is too similar to |- and therefore hard to detect when editing the
source, easy to confuse and mistype.

Erik Zachte


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup


subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
Oops, I responded to wrong list, please do not comment here, discussion
is on wikipedia-l. Erik Zachte


subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
Erik Zachte wrote:
>>"No parameters can be added to |- tags;
>>not that I ever saw a table on wikipedia which uses that!"
>
> If you search the en: cur sql dump file for '<tr ' you will find
> hundreds of examples;

Yes, but now substract those that are used in "standard" tables like the
elements tables; we want to cover these by CSS anyway, right?

Now, substract those that are applied wrongly (e.g., Alexander I of
Russia: <tr align="center"> in a table with only one row...)

Now, substract those that can be easily done just as well by <td ...>

Of the remaining ones (if any), which are absolutely necessary (meaning,
don't serve some doubtful decorative purpose;-) ?

> Secondly, I suggest using another character for captions.
>
> |_ is too similar to |- and therefore hard to detect when editing the
> source, easy to confuse and mistype.

I am open to suggestions!

Magnus


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Magnus wrote:
>>>"No parameters can be added to |- tags;
>>>not that I ever saw a table on wikipedia which uses that!"

Erik Zachte wrote:
>> If you search the en: cur sql dump file for '
> hundreds of examples;

Magnus wrote:
>Yes, but now substract those that are used in "standard" tables like
the
>elements tables; we want to cover these by CSS anyway, right?
>Now, substract those that can be easily done just as well by

>Of the remaining ones (if any), which are absolutely necessary
(meaning,
>don't serve some doubtful decorative purpose;-) ?

I rather specify any option only once than on each cell.

As for doubtful decorative purpose: not quite NPOV ;)
Colour helps to bring order to complex tables, CSS classes might do the
trick, but will that be easier to apply than a
 ? (one
needs to look up css definitions somewhere)

----

Erik Zachte wrote:
>> |_ is too similar to |- and therefore hard to detect when editing the
>> source, easy to confuse and mistype.

Magnus wrote:
>I am open to suggestions! Magnus

anything goes that is not confusing
|= may be mistaken by unitiated as meaning
what about |+, |@ or |# ?

Erik Zachte


from_name: Daniel Ehrenberg

body:
--- Karl Wick <karlwick at yahoo.com> wrote:
> This was on the front page of my local paper this
> morning:
>
> "When Books Break the Bank"
>
>
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/16/nyregion/16BOOK.html?pagewanted=all&position=
>
> An article about outrageous textbook prices and the
> things
> that students are doing to avoid paying them. (No
> mention
> of our site unfortunately).
>
> I saw old NYT articles on Sept 11 archived on the
> main
> wikipedia .. could we do that with this one, put the
> text
> on Wikibooks ?

I'm sorry to say this, but no Wikibooks book is
anywhere near usable quality, especially in a college
environment.
LDan

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Erik Zachte wrote:

>>Of the remaining ones (if any), which are absolutely necessary
> (meaning,
>>don't serve some doubtful decorative purpose;-) ?
>
> I rather specify any option only once than on each cell.
>
> As for doubtful decorative purpose: not quite NPOV ;)
> Colour helps to bring order to complex tables, CSS classes might do the
> trick, but will that be easier to apply than a
 ? (one
> needs to look up css definitions somewhere)

OK, so is there an example for
* a row with several cells (say, more than 2)
* that has some properties in common (e.g., background)
* which can't be defined in the
 / {| statement
* in a table that is not one of a default type (countries, elements etc.)
?

I don't want CSS for *all* tables, just for the ones that occur over and
again. Advantage: less to type, easier for newbies, settings can be
changed with a central "switch" if desired.

Also, we were about to give  sone nice default background via CSS,
right? That'll take care of many "colored row" problems, IMHO.

Don't get me wrong, it'll take ~5-10min to implement the
 thingy
(probably less than writing all these mails;-) but what's the point?

>>>|_ is too similar to |- and therefore hard to detect when editing the
>>>source, easy to confuse and mistype.
>
>>I am open to suggestions!
>
> anything goes that is not confusing
> |= may be mistaken by unitiated as meaning
> what about |+, |@ or |# ?

|# could be confused with the numbering wiki markup. |@ doesn't strike
me as intuitive.

|+ is something I could well live with! :-)

Magnus


from_name: Richard Grevers

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 19:35:47 +0200, Schneelocke <wikipedia-l at gl00on.net>
gave utterance to the following:

>> >Is there a special function for <th> anyway, or is it just the visual
>> >difference?
>>
>> Please note there are two ways of specifying the table headers: TH cells
>> (in which case you must specify a scope attribute) and the THEAD row
>> group. The THEAD and TBODY groups are mandatory in HTML 4.x strict IIRC
>> [...]
>
> In XHTML 1.1 at least, thead, tfoot and tbody are optional [1]. In HTML
> 4.01, it seems to me that tbody at least is required, while thead and
> tfoot
> are optional [2].
>
> 1.
> http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml-modularization/abstract_modules.html#s_tablemodule
> 2. http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/sgml/dtd.html
>
There is no validation error from absence of TBODY, which is fortunate
given that 99.999% of tables on HTML 4 pages do not include it. I think
its status is IMPLIED.

TFOOT is a dangerous element to use. It must appear in the source before
TBODY, but in non-supporting browsers (of which there are a number in
common use) that means that your footer rows will appear at the top of
your table rather than the bottom (one of the few instances where a new
HTML element does not degrade gracefully).

As for the recomemndation to use the scope and headers attributes, there
isn't one browser which supports them yet. They are a nice theory, but no
practical use.

I would opt for a means of generating TH - which must be available on any
cell (I have tables with headers on the left, or a smaller subsection in
one corner.

--
Richard Grevers
Between two evils always pick the one you haven't tried


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Bot for generating articles on cities in Israel

body:
--- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:
> Geoff Burling wrote:
> > On Sun, 14 Sep 2003, Daniel Ehrenberg wrote:
> >
> >
> >>--- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:
> >>
> >>>I would like to use a bot to upload articles on
> >>>cities in Israel based
> >>>on information from Israel's Central Bureau of
> >>>Statistics
> >>>(http://www.cbs.gov.il), a la Rambot. You can see
> an
> >>>example article at
> >>>[[User:AdamRaizen/Ramla]]. Any objections or
> >>>comments?
> >>>
> >>
> >>I wouldn't object, but the following part is a bit
> >>unclear:
> >>
> >>The ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish and
> >>other, and 20.0% Arab (15.4% Muslim and 4.0%
> >>Christian). There are 450 new immigrants.
> >
> >
> > Are these catagories legally defined in Israeli
> law? (Or
> > at least, the same terms from the Israeli census
> materials?)
> > If so, I would like to see those terms hyperlinked
> to
> > an article explaining the legal definitions, much
> as
> > was done for the U.S. cities.
>
> Kind of. For Jews, the Interior Ministry (whose data
> is the source of
> the data used here) basically accepts as Jewish
> whoever the Rabbinate
> says is Jewish (with some complications), and this
> is a hotly debated
> political issue. I'm not sure of the situation for
> Muslims and
> Christians, but I assume it's similar (i.e. whatever
> the local religious
> authority says). There probably should be an article
> explaining all this
> somewhere anyway.

Are you refering to the fact that Judiasm, according
to the laws therof, is transfered from mother to child
(as written at [[Judaism#Who_is_a_Jew]])? If so, I'd
suggest that you chage

The ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish and
other, and 20.0% Arab (15.4% Muslim and 4.0%
Christian). There are 450 new immigrants.

to

Tje ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish by
ethnicity and 20.0% Arab, consisting of 15.4% Muslim,
and 4.0% Christian. There are 450 new immigrants since
the last time the census was taken.

> A user on he.wikipedia suggested that tables are
> easier to read than
> paragraphs. Am I correct that this has already been
> debated with regards
> to Rambot's articles and settled that short
> paragraphs are okay, at
> least for the English wikipedia?
>
> --Adam Raizen

Yes, I do think a table would be easier to read, but
there should also be some content in paragraph form.
I'll try to find content to put in the articles that
is automated. So far, I've found
http://www.iula.org.il/cities/citind.htm, a list of
links to the websites of all of the big cities in
Israel, but that's it, and it probably would go into
the table.
LDan

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


body:
--- Daniel Ehrenberg <littledanehren at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> --- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:
> > Geoff Burling wrote:
> > > On Sun, 14 Sep 2003, Daniel Ehrenberg wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > >>--- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:
> > >>
> > >>>I would like to use a bot to upload articles on
> > >>>cities in Israel based
> > >>>on information from Israel's Central Bureau of
> > >>>Statistics
> > >>>(http://www.cbs.gov.il), a la Rambot. You can
> see
> > an
> > >>>example article at
> > >>>[[User:AdamRaizen/Ramla]]. Any objections or
> > >>>comments?
> > >>>
> > >>
> > >>I wouldn't object, but the following part is a
> bit
> > >>unclear:
> > >>
> > >>The ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish
> and
> > >>other, and 20.0% Arab (15.4% Muslim and 4.0%
> > >>Christian). There are 450 new immigrants.
> > >
> > >
> > > Are these catagories legally defined in Israeli
> > law? (Or
> > > at least, the same terms from the Israeli census
> > materials?)
> > > If so, I would like to see those terms
> hyperlinked
> > to
> > > an article explaining the legal definitions,
> much
> > as
> > > was done for the U.S. cities.
> >
> > Kind of. For Jews, the Interior Ministry (whose
> data
> > is the source of
> > the data used here) basically accepts as Jewish
> > whoever the Rabbinate
> > says is Jewish (with some complications), and this
> > is a hotly debated
> > political issue. I'm not sure of the situation for
> > Muslims and
> > Christians, but I assume it's similar (i.e.
> whatever
> > the local religious
> > authority says). There probably should be an
> article
> > explaining all this
> > somewhere anyway.
>
> Are you refering to the fact that Judiasm, according
> to the laws therof, is transfered from mother to
> child
> (as written at [[Judaism#Who_is_a_Jew]])? If so, I'd
> suggest that you chage
>
> The ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish and
> other, and 20.0% Arab (15.4% Muslim and 4.0%
> Christian). There are 450 new immigrants.
>
> to
>
> Tje ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish by
> ethnicity and 20.0% Arab, consisting of 15.4%
> Muslim,
> and 4.0% Christian. There are 450 new immigrants
> since
> the last time the census was taken.
>
> > A user on he.wikipedia suggested that tables are
> > easier to read than
> > paragraphs. Am I correct that this has already
> been
> > debated with regards
> > to Rambot's articles and settled that short
> > paragraphs are okay, at
> > least for the English wikipedia?
> >
> > --Adam Raizen
>
> Yes, I do think a table would be easier to read, but
> there should also be some content in paragraph form.
> I'll try to find content to put in the articles that
> is automated. So far, I've found
> http://www.iula.org.il/cities/citind.htm, a list of
> links to the websites of all of the big cities in
> Israel, but that's it, and it probably would go into
> the table.
> LDan

Oh, yeah, and if you make a table, you should wait
until the new table markup is put up (or it is decided
that we don't want it).
LDan

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


from_name: Sanford Forte

body:
Yes. This has been a problem for years. It's like skimming cream off the top
for college textbook publishers. Also, K-12 publishers are just as greedy.
We need to get the K-12 project going. Believe me, once we create a
*quality* K-12 book, based on strict state framework standards (ideally,
California, because that would make, by far, the biggest impact), we could
revolutionize the whole textbook creation and adoption process. University
books are also ripe for reform, but they are really less of a challenge than
the K-12 sector. The K-12 publishers really have a stranglehold on the
books, the pricing, and the process. Millions of kids, parents, and
teachers - and our society - lose in this antiquated process.

Before sending anything to Slashdot, as Karl suggests, I think it would
behoove us to get something substantial underway, or have something
finished. Otherwise, it's just empty promises.

Here are some more links to an excellent series (expose) in K-12 books that
was done about 8 months ago in the San Jose Mercury News. Additionally, an
excellent piece from Forbes.
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/4743883.htm
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/living/education/4749572.htm
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/living/education/4756801.htm

http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2000/1030/6612178a_print.html

Best,
Sanford

----- Original Message -----
From: "Daniel Ehrenberg" <littledanehren at yahoo.com>
To: "Wikimedia textbook discussion" <textbook-l at Wikipedia.org>
Sent: Tuesday, September 16, 2003 12:19 PM
Subject: Re: [Textbook-l] NYT article on textbook prices

>
> --- Karl Wick <karlwick at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > This was on the front page of my local paper this
> > morning:
> >
> > "When Books Break the Bank"
> >
> >
>
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/16/nyregion/16BOOK.html?pagewanted=all&position=
> >
> > An article about outrageous textbook prices and the
> > things
> > that students are doing to avoid paying them. (No
> > mention
> > of our site unfortunately).
> >
> > I saw old NYT articles on Sept 11 archived on the
> > main
> > wikipedia .. could we do that with this one, put the
> > text
> > on Wikibooks ?
>
> I'm sorry to say this, but no Wikibooks book is
> anywhere near usable quality, especially in a college
> environment.
> LDan
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
> http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> Textbook-l mailing list
> Textbook-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/textbook-l


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Richard Grevers wrote:
> Which raises the question of supporting <COL> elements. I don't think
> <COLGROUP> is particularly useful, but <COL> is, and is fairly well
> supported.

Wasn't our original intention to *simplify* table markup? ;-)

Magnus


from_name: Steve Vertigum

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Fair use (Alex, Brion et Tarquin)

body:
--- "Alex T." <alex756 at nyc.rr.com> wrote:

> There may be the _rare_ occasion when an image is so
> publically
> well known (i.e. a famous photo of something that is
> very _news_
> worthy) that practically any informational use may
> be covered
> by fair use, but that will be _very rare_. Most fair
> uses will not
> be 100% compatible with the GNU FDL.

IOW: The crux of the biscuit is the apostrophe (not
Legalese)...Fair use is a ubiquitous legal plugin that
tries to keep molehill issues from become mountains of
suits over nonsense.

Im not sure what Brion was saying about resolution--IF
you understand how printing works, you know that you
generally need twice the dpi for a screen print--
(printing is dots of color right--used to be done with
"dot screens", now done on 'puters).  So to properly
render a magazine photo of a Kalvin Klein
ad--mimicking the quality of the original photo (which
is impossible -- a cameras ultimate resolution is way
higher than print, which is way higher than web.) youd
basically need to copy the thing purty durn well.
(Also not legalese)

Consider an album cover -- the value of which is in
part based on its quality of rendering -- aethethic
qualities that cannot be reproduced from a tiny little
web picture --even a "large" pic at only at 72dpi (ie.
standard)-- roughly a quarter of that necessary to
properly render it as a print, and this doesnt come
close to having something that someone can make a
poster out of and sell.

So, it seems that the image use policy is generally
made null by the mere fact that these images are
web-based, and therefore low resolution.  Granted the
web is well-used, and print reproduceability is no
longer a standard (was it ever?) but where uniqueness
of images is protected, it seems that its impossible
to sincerely fault a diminished-quality rendering for
the crime of imposing itself as a substitute for the
original.

> This is a good point. Even if you don't keep a copy,
> it is still being
> copied
> automatically when it is being displayed on the
> Wikipedia page. Someone
> does not have to click on it to go to another web
> page. Therefore some
> jury or judge can easily make a legal finding that
> the deep link is a copy
> on Wikipedia (never know what judges or juries will
> do until the law
> becomes well settled).

But its reasonable that display issues may simply
break down as "fair use" standards do-- a case-by-case
look at the pertinent factors -whats it for? was there
credit to the source? is it high-quality? was it used
in print? profit? etc...

What is clear in all of this is that there needs to be
a better, more centralized cross-languages way of
handling images, perhaps an images domain -- so that
highband users can attempt to manage these
better--copyright issues can be dealt with more
swiftly and therefore the intelligencia doesnt have to
trip too much about the potential possibility of
things they only suspect.  Having separate imagelists
for each seem silly.

~S~
IANAL, but not a very good one.

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


from_name: Geoffrey Thomas

subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
JavaScript needs to be disabled in parameters.

 http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/JavaScript_table_security_hole

Try to click on the link to Main Page. The JS there is harmless but
there are so many possible things one can do with it....

For that matter, parameters need to be checked for sanity. If you look
at the wikisource and the HTML source of that page, the table has the
meaningless attributes "foo 15". Not foo=15, foo and 15 separately. A
check needs to be made for approved attributes, just like the check for
approved HTML tags.

=====
-Geoffrey Thomas
geoffreyerffoeg at yahoo.com

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 14:39, Geoffrey Thomas wrote:
> JavaScript needs to be disabled in parameters.
>
>  http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/JavaScript_table_security_hole

That page doesn't exist...?

JavaScript is stripped from HTML, or it's supposed to be. Of course,
there's an Internet Explorer-related CSS hole that needs to be plugged,
and right now you can put anything you want in an uploaded HTML file...
*ahem*

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
--- Brion Vibber <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 14:39, Geoffrey Thomas wrote:
> > JavaScript needs to be disabled in parameters.
> >
> >  http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/JavaScript_table_security_hole
>
> That page doesn't exist...?
>
> JavaScript is stripped from HTML, or it's supposed to be. Of course,
> there's an Internet Explorer-related CSS hole that needs to be plugged,
> and right now you can put anything you want in an uploaded HTML file...
> *ahem*
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

Ah, sorry. Forgot to click save. ;-) Server was a bit slow so I got
distracted....

=====

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
--- Brion Vibber <brion at pobox.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 14:39, Geoffrey Thomas wrote:
> > JavaScript needs to be disabled in parameters.
> >
> >  http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/JavaScript_table_security_hole
>
> That page doesn't exist...?
>
> JavaScript is stripped from HTML, or it's supposed to be. Of course,
> there's an Internet Explorer-related CSS hole that needs to be plugged,
> and right now you can put anything you want in an uploaded HTML file...
> *ahem*
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l

Whoops, sorry again. The page is on test wikipedia:
http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/JavaScript_table_security_hole

=====

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikitech-l] Re: site down? and Re: server mostly dead?

body:
On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 11:26, E23 wrote:
> That is bad enough for a regular web site, but catastrophic for a wiki.
> The rate of new articles has dwindled and thereby broken a previously
> strong upwards trend.

The sad truth is that we *know* the Wikipedia's too slow. It's been too
slow for most of its existence, yet it's still growing -- of course,
that's why it's always slow! ;)

There have been occasional /extra/ slow spots that have slowed the
growth curve temporarily, and have been generally solved through
hardware upgrades. Unfortunately that takes money, so we can't do it as
readily as installing a program or tweaking a configuration file.

A minor upgrade to the database server and a complete overhaul of the
web server should be coming in a few days; once that's done we can
finish moving all the web work off the database server, and then we can
think about adding more web servers to split the load.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


body:
I think the point of the argument against is that
statistics from an apartheid state (regardless of how
much the US happens to sanction it currently) must be
treated as suspect.  UN statistics should be
better--ie, more NPOV--even if they are not as
"complete."

The same could in many ways be said for the US as
well-- the US until very recently was more or less an
apartheid state, and still has lingering aspects of
this left over, in terms of its sociological/financial
barriers. Etc.  If this was the case today in the
US--as it was 1950--there would be every justification
for Wikipedians to look upon statistics coming out of
such a country's official machinery as smelly.
We should trust more open neutral statistics than
those of any state agency.  The CIA factbook for
example is only usable is because its extremely short
descriptions belie any attempt at pov.

To deal with the basic concept--what people forget is
that "racism" and the apartheid that was synonymous
with it, (which came first?) in the US was, (as it is
everywhere) simply a way to keep people
separated--firstly for imperialist/corporate control
reasons.  The US began as an English corporate venture
into tobacco, youll remember.
Whatever the reason, ''[[the hand that rocks the
cradle]] is the hand that rules the world'', and we
would be remiss to not challenge such statistics, that
ask us to overlook some glaring inconsistencies.

Apply these fundamental metaphors for understanding
humanity as you like.
~S~
Between any two disparate points of view is a buffer
zone, which makes for a nice way for tricksters to get
around. --??????

=
=
=
=

- Daniel Ehrenberg <littledanehren at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> --- Daniel Ehrenberg <littledanehren at yahoo.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > --- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:
> > > Geoff Burling wrote:
> > > > On Sun, 14 Sep 2003, Daniel Ehrenberg wrote:
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >>--- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:
> > > >>
> > > >>>I would like to use a bot to upload articles
> on
> > > >>>cities in Israel based
> > > >>>on information from Israel's Central Bureau
> of
> > > >>>Statistics
> > > >>>(http://www.cbs.gov.il), a la Rambot. You can
> > see
> > > an
> > > >>>example article at
> > > >>>[[User:AdamRaizen/Ramla]]. Any objections or
> > > >>>comments?
> > > >>>
> > > >>
> > > >>I wouldn't object, but the following part is a
> > bit
> > > >>unclear:
> > > >>
> > > >>The ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish
> > and
> > > >>other, and 20.0% Arab (15.4% Muslim and 4.0%
> > > >>Christian). There are 450 new immigrants.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Are these catagories legally defined in
> Israeli
> > > law? (Or
> > > > at least, the same terms from the Israeli
> census
> > > materials?)
> > > > If so, I would like to see those terms
> > hyperlinked
> > > to
> > > > an article explaining the legal definitions,
> > much
> > > as
> > > > was done for the U.S. cities.
> > >
> > > Kind of. For Jews, the Interior Ministry (whose
> > data
> > > is the source of
> > > the data used here) basically accepts as Jewish
> > > whoever the Rabbinate
> > > says is Jewish (with some complications), and
> this
> > > is a hotly debated
> > > political issue. I'm not sure of the situation
> for
> > > Muslims and
> > > Christians, but I assume it's similar (i.e.
> > whatever
> > > the local religious
> > > authority says). There probably should be an
> > article
> > > explaining all this
> > > somewhere anyway.
> >
> > Are you refering to the fact that Judiasm,
> according
> > to the laws therof, is transfered from mother to
> > child
> > (as written at [[Judaism#Who_is_a_Jew]])? If so,
> I'd
> > suggest that you chage
> >
> > The ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish and
> > other, and 20.0% Arab (15.4% Muslim and 4.0%
> > Christian). There are 450 new immigrants.
> >
> > to
> >
> > Tje ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish by
> > ethnicity and 20.0% Arab, consisting of 15.4%
> > Muslim,
> > and 4.0% Christian. There are 450 new immigrants
> > since
> > the last time the census was taken.
> >
> > > A user on he.wikipedia suggested that tables are
> > > easier to read than
> > > paragraphs. Am I correct that this has already
> > been
> > > debated with regards
> > > to Rambot's articles and settled that short
> > > paragraphs are okay, at
> > > least for the English wikipedia?
> > >
> > > --Adam Raizen
> >
> > Yes, I do think a table would be easier to read,
> but
> > there should also be some content in paragraph
> form.
> > I'll try to find content to put in the articles
> that
> > is automated. So far, I've found
> > http://www.iula.org.il/cities/citind.htm, a list
> of
> > links to the websites of all of the big cities in
> > Israel, but that's it, and it probably would go
> into
> > the table.
> > LDan
>
> Oh, yeah, and if you make a table, you should wait
> until the new table markup is put up (or it is
> decided
> that we don't want it).
> LDan
>
> __________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site
> design software
> http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


from_name: Luc Van Oostenryck

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Magnus Manske wrote:
>
> OK, anyone opposed to
> - wiki table markup *in general*
> - the *markup style* I use at test.wikipedia.org
> - my *implementation* of that style
>
> please speak up now! Otherwise, I'll commit it to the stable branch of
> the software, which means it will go online with the next update.
>
> Magnus

I have looked at the details, but at first sight I like it a lot.

-- Looxix


subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 14:48, Geoffrey Thomas wrote:
> Whoops, sorry again. The page is on test wikipedia:
> http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/JavaScript_table_security_hole

Oh, in Magnus's magic table code. Sigh...

{| onMouseOver="alert('hey');" foo 15
|[[Main Page]]
|}

I'm deleting the page.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 15:00, Brion Vibber wrote:
> On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 14:48, Geoffrey Thomas wrote:
> > Whoops, sorry again. The page is on test wikipedia:
> > http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/JavaScript_table_security_hole
>
> Oh, in Magnus's magic table code. Sigh...
>
> {| onMouseOver="alert('hey');" foo 15
> |[[Main Page]]
> |}
>
> I'm deleting the page.

Or rather, I'm not, since it's on the test wiki. Urgh, brain not running
on full today.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 15:05, Chris Seaton wrote:
> Instead of stripping JavaScript from the input, why not strip it from
> the output (of the body, not the whole page)?
>
> That would solve this problem and anything similar.

The body may contain legitimate javascript, such as the table of
contents show/hide code.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


from_name: Stan Shebs

body:
Steve Vertigum wrote:

>I think the point of the argument against is that
>statistics from an apartheid state (regardless of how
>much the US happens to sanction it currently) must be
>treated as suspect.  UN statistics should be
>better--ie, more NPOV--even if they are not as
>"complete."
>
>The same could in many ways be said for the US as
>well-- the US until very recently was more or less an
>apartheid state, and still has lingering aspects of
>this left over, in terms of its sociological/financial
>barriers. Etc.  If this was the case today in the
>US--as it was 1950--there would be every justification
>for Wikipedians to look upon statistics coming out of
>such a country's official machinery as smelly.
>
Oh geez... If you have some proof, let's see it.  Otherwise you're
just spreading FUD. Almost every official statistic in Wikipedia
has a political opponent or conspiracy theorist ready to challenge
its validity; that's why we say "according to the Census Bureau"
or whatever, so if somebody has some differing numbers, they
can add those, citing the alternate source, rather than having an
edit war.  In the case of Israel, there are plenty of reasons to
challenge any UN numbers - and plenty of books doing just that, in
great detail - so it's not neutral to simply declare that UN
numbers must be better than Israeli numbers.

Stan


subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Pronunciations and IPA/SAMPA

body:
--- David Friedland <david at nohat.net> wrote:
> The reasoning behind morphophones is that even
> though people speak with
> different regional dialects, how the pronunciations
> are stored in each
> person's internal lexicon in their brain is the
> same, or can be
> representented symbolically in ways that are
> equivalent. The
> morphophonic system taps into this internal
> consistency between
> different dialects and thus a single symbolic form
> can represent the
> different (but equivalent) pronunciations for
> speakers of different
> dialects.
>
> For example, in such system we would have a single
> symbol for the sound
> represented by the final "er" in the word "runner".
> A speaker of a
> non-rhotic Boston dialect, for example, would then
> always produce this
> sound as a plain schwa, and a speaker of, say,
> standard American would
> produce it as a rhoticized schwa. In the
> morphophonic system, only a
> single pronunciation would be needeed to specify the
> two different
> pronunciations in result.
>
> The problem with this system is that the fundamental
> assumption that
> internal representations of pronunciations are
> equivalent is false. This
> is what I meant by "mildly divergent" dialects.
> Besides regular sound
> change, dialects also differ in some cases in how
> pronunciations are
> represented in the lexicon. It is simply the case
> that some dialects
> have fundamentally different internal
> representations for the
> pronunciations of some words.
>
> If you don't agree, then how would you specify a
> single pronunciation
> using a morphophonic system for the words "almond",
> "apricot", "aunt",
> "controversy", "clerk", "creek", "florida",
> "garage", "greasy",
> "lieutenant", "mayonnaise", "mischievous", "pecan",
> and "tour", just for
> starters? I just don't see how a simple system could
> capture all these
> variants with a single representation. You're not
> advocating a system
> that has a symbol that corresponds to /u/ in AmE and
> /Ef/ in BrE so that
> "lieutenant" is represented with one set of symbols,
> are you?
> - David [[User:Nohat]]

I'd advocate for such a system. I created a system
that can do just that by writing (oo|ayf). If you
wanted to do almond, you'd write a-|lmi|und. This can
be made slightly less verbose by using accent marks.
The other accents besides US and UK English can just
infer what sound it will make. I think such a system
(although not mine) would work well. I would like to
know what linguists use, though.
LDan

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


subject: [WikiEN-l] Pronunciations and IPA/SAMPA

body:
BTW, a google search on morphophone yielded 63
results, and morphophonic yielded 2 wikipedia mail
posts. However, morphophonemic had 3120 results, and
apparently is very similar to what we're talking
about.
LDan

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
Luc Van Oostenryck wrote:
>
> Magnus Manske wrote:
>
>>
>> OK, anyone opposed to
>> - wiki table markup *in general*
>> - the *markup style* I use at test.wikipedia.org
>> - my *implementation* of that style
>>
>> please speak up now! Otherwise, I'll commit it to the stable branch of
>> the software, which means it will go online with the next update.
>>
>> Magnus

I have not looked at the details, but at first sight I like it a lot.


body:
--- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:
> > The ethnic makeup of the city is 80.5% Jewish and
> > other, and 20.0% Arab (15.4% Muslim and 4.0%
> > Christian). There are 450 new immigrants.
>
> What's unclear about it? Also, do you think that
> there are too many
> statistics, or too few? There are a lot more
> statistics available, but I
> don't want to clutter up the pages with a bunch of
> useless statistics.
> --Adam Raizen

What do you mean "Jewish and other"? Are all
christians there arab? are there no arab jews? Are you
treating Jewish as an ethnicity or a religion? It
looks like ethnicity from the context.
LDan

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


body:
--- Daniel Ehrenberg <littledanehren at yahoo.com> wrote:
> What do you mean "Jewish and other"? Are all
> christians there arab? are there no arab jews? Are
> you
> treating Jewish as an ethnicity or a religion? It
> looks like ethnicity from the context.
> LDan

LD is correct to point out this distinciton. As I
understand tit, an Jewish Arab, living in Israel, is
virtually a contradiction in terms.  An Arab in
"disputed land" is not considered a citizen. An Arab
cannot live for long in Israel without attempting to
gain citizenship. Because the state wishes to
artificially keep its proportions predominantly
Jewish, there is an extreme hardship. On the other,
(as I understand it) a Jew on "disputed land"
considered an Israeli, because even "disputed land" is
still Israeli land.

All of these are apartheid distinctions and it is
right to point out that Jewishness is more of a
context, than it is anything to generate statistics
by.  If there was a clear definition by the Rabbinate
as to ultimately who is qualified for "Israeli
citizenship" --and were there any accurate statistics
dealing with Palestinian refugees, then there could be
a way to establish the merits of such a system's
statistics.
As it stands, they are about as useful as those from
South Africa in the 1980s or the US in the 30's.

~S~

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


body:
--- Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:

> Oh geez... If you have some proof, let's see it.
> Otherwise you're
> just spreading FUD.

Proof of what?

>Almost every official statistic
> in Wikipedia
> has a political opponent or conspiracy theorist
> ready to challenge
> its validity;

Can you "prove" this?

> that's why we say "according to the
> Census Bureau"
> or whatever, so if somebody has some differing
> numbers, they
> can add those, citing the alternate source, rather
> than having an
> edit war.

This is valid.

> In the case of Israel, there are plenty
> of reasons to
> challenge any UN numbers - and plenty of books doing
> just that, in
> great detail - so it's not neutral to simply declare
> that UN
> numbers must be better than Israeli numbers.

What reasons are those?

~S~

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


subject: [WikiEN-l] Consensus

body:
> > From: "Mike" <Mike at cybermaus.com>

> > > He then tried to edit the [[Consensus]] page to
> > redefine what a consensus
> > > is, forcing the comment Angela,
> > >
> > > Changing the definition on the [[consensus]]
page
> > won't help Buddha . . .
> > > [[User:Angela|Angela]] 18:04, Sep 14, 2003 (UTC)
> >
> > In spite of all the irritation he has caused, I
> > would still have been
> > inclined to give him the benefit of doubt, but the
> > above cited act brands
> > him as a troll in my opinion.
> >
> > Mike AKA CyberMaus
>
> Have you look at the page in question
([[consensus]]),
> its history, and the talk page ?
>
> Anthere
>

>Yes. I've just gone through it again and I hold to my
>opinion. What he wrote on the [[consensus]] page is
>not wrong.  What bothers me is that he did it to
>justify his previous actions in spite of what is
>written in the rest of the article. See the second
>paragraph in the "consensus as collective thought"
>section, in particular the last sentence.

So, you mean that in spite the fact he is not wrong,
in spite the fact Angela has agreed he was not wrong,
"the above cited act brands him as a troll" anyway.

And you further justify it by the fact what he put
down (not wrong) is perhaps not consistant with other
things written down in the article.

Do you mean he should also have edited what was below
to make it more fit ?

>As I said, what he wrote is not wrong, but in my
>experience I have never heard or seen the word
>consensus used to mean unanimous. In Meriam-Webster,
>it is also mentioned that this usage is "slightly
>older". In my opinion, it is obsolete.

I did. Several times.

Such as "C'est un processus dans lequel aucune
d?cision ne peut ?tre prise tant que tous les
participants ne l'acceptent."

Which means "it is a processus in which no decision
may be taken as long as all participants do not agree"

Or " Lors d'une d?cision consensuelle, il peut y avoir
diff?rents degr?s d'accord et de nombreuses nuances au
regard des engagements que les diff?rents membres
assument par rapport ? une d?cision d?termin?e,
cependant le tout a lieu de fa?on explicite et
globalement accept?. "

Which means "When there is consensus, there may be
different degree of agreement, and many nuances as
regards acceptance of a decision by the different
participants. However, the whole must be globally
accepted"

But right, this is an ideal, and agreement by all is
hard to achieve. We seek the ideal.

>Here's another possible meaning: A minority holds an
>opinion to which the majority have no objection or
>differing opinion, thus the minority opinion
>is presented as consensus.

Of course, since it is globally accepted

Anthere

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


body:
--- Steve Vertigum <utilitymuffinresearch2 at yahoo.com>
wrote:
> I think the point of the argument against is that
> statistics from an apartheid state (regardless of
> how
> much the US happens to sanction it currently) must
> be
> treated as suspect.  UN statistics should be
> better--ie, more NPOV--even if they are not as
> "complete."
>
> The same could in many ways be said for the US as
> well-- the US until very recently was more or less
> an
> apartheid state, and still has lingering aspects of
> this left over, in terms of its
> sociological/financial
> barriers. Etc.  If this was the case today in the
> US--as it was 1950--there would be every
> justification
> for Wikipedians to look upon statistics coming out
> of
> such a country's official machinery as smelly.
> We should trust more open neutral statistics than
> those of any state agency.  The CIA factbook for
> example is only usable is because its extremely
> short
> descriptions belie any attempt at pov.
>
> To deal with the basic concept--what people forget
> is
> that "racism" and the apartheid that was synonymous
> with it, (which came first?) in the US was, (as it
> is
> everywhere) simply a way to keep people
> separated--firstly for imperialist/corporate control
> reasons.  The US began as an English corporate
> venture
> into tobacco, youll remember.
> Whatever the reason, ''[[the hand that rocks the
> cradle]] is the hand that rules the world'', and we
> would be remiss to not challenge such statistics,
> that
> ask us to overlook some glaring inconsistencies.
>
> Apply these fundamental metaphors for understanding
> humanity as you like.
> ~S~
> Between any two disparate points of view is a buffer
> zone, which makes for a nice way for tricksters to
> get
> around. --??????

The Israel is an apartheid state? Hardly. And even if
it were true, it shouldn't be on this list. Israel's
statistics are perfectly valid, as are pre-1950 US
statistics. Even at the beginning of the US's history,
African American slaves were counted in the US Census
for purposes of the size of the electoral college,
albeit only as 2/3 of a person. If you have actual
proof that Israel is messing up its statistics, please
post it here.

Where do you think the UN gets its statistics from?
They don't conduct their own census. In New York
State, there was a small controversey over Census and
old people going to florida while they recieved the
Census in the mail in their official New York
residence and missed the deadline. But there were no
UN statistics to back this up. The UN could care less
about this obscure data.
<rant>
The only data I could find from the UN on Israel
(aside from useless rural vs. urban data) was that
there were about 6 million inhabitants in 2000. But
Israel, evil apartheid Israel, said that there were
6.5 million in 2002! Oh no! We can't use their data
because the obviously fabricated an other half a
million Jews for their evil plan.
</rant>
LDan

Note: If you want to respond to my out-of-place
political statements, do it offlist.

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


subject:
[WikiEN-l] Three-fifths compromise (was: Bot for generating
	articles on cities in Israel)

body:
--- Daniel Ehrenberg <littledanehren at yahoo.com> wrote:
> ...Even at the beginning of the US's history,
> African American slaves were counted in the US Census
> for purposes of the size of the electoral college,
> albeit only as 2/3 of a person. ...

Slaves (of any race) were counted as 3/5 of a free preson,
not 2/3, for the number of seats in the House of Representatives.
The seats of the Electoral College are the total seats in
Congress - that is, 2 (senators) + the number of representatives.
So, yes, the 3/5 did effect electoral college representation,
but not directly.

Sorry for being picky, but our Civics test on that was last week.
(Hmm...WikiBooks module on the Constitution?)

Geoffrey

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


body:
Steve Vertigum wrote:

>--- Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
>
>
>>Oh geez... If you have some proof, let's see it.
>>Otherwise you're
>>just spreading FUD.
>>
>
>Proof of what?
>
You asserted that official statistics of an "apartheid state"
are "smelly".  To me that means you're suggesting that the
numbers have been fabricated or falsified in some way.

>>Almost every official statistic
>>in Wikipedia
>>has a political opponent or conspiracy theorist
>>ready to challenge
>>its validity;
>>
>
>Can you "prove" this?
>
It would be a pretty long list, but one can "sample"; for
instance, the statistics on US Jews and Muslims are being
fought over, because by some measures the Muslim population
of the US just passed the Jewish population.  Some Jewish
groups have been casting doubt on the numbers, ditto for
some Muslim groups (don't remember the names, but easy
enough to look up).  Even in small towns in the US, not
hard to turn up the crank in the city council meetings who
is upset that the town is being "taken over" by racial group
X, and claiming that the statistics have been falsified.
There is/was a political fight over sampling by the US Census,
where homeless/minority/immigrant groups have claimed that
various schemes will systematically undercount their respective
constituencies, thus casting doubts on all of the Census'
results.

As with any other kind of scholarly activity, we need to
maintain at least a little skeptical wariness, both of
numbers purporting to be authoritative, as well as the
persons questioning then.

>
>>In the case of Israel, there are plenty
>>of reasons to
>>challenge any UN numbers - and plenty of books doing
>>just that, in
>>great detail - so it's not neutral to simply declare
>>that UN
>>numbers must be better than Israeli numbers.
>>
>
>What reasons are those?
>
UN organizations often include individuals and states with explicit
anti-Israel biases. Not surprising, since there are 22-odd Arab states
only a few of which have normalized relations with Israel, with the
rest declaring "Barbie dolls are Jewish" and so forth.  So before
placing much credence in a UN statistic, I'll want to know more
about the specific organization that published it, whether it's
non-partisan, or subject to influence by member states with their
own agendas.

Stan


from_name: Geoff Burling

body:
On Tue, 16 Sep 2003, Stan Shebs wrote:

> Steve Vertigum wrote:
>
> >I think the point of the argument against is that
> >statistics from an apartheid state (regardless of how
> >much the US happens to sanction it currently) must be
> >treated as suspect.  UN statistics should be
> >better--ie, more NPOV--even if they are not as
> >"complete."

That may be the point you want to make, Steve, but it was not
the reason I asked the original poster to include the definitions
that the Israeli equivalent of a Census Bureau uses to define
"Jew", "Arab", "Christian", & other catagories.

Ethnicity (if I may use the term to apply to the process of
subdividing populations) is a messy business. And I'm not making
a snide reference to Neo-Nazis who hide the fact that they have
ancestors who were Jews or African-Americans; any time one
attempts to make a formal catagorization of subgroups in a
population, one will find exceptions. For example, there is a
group in Oklahoma known as "Black Cherokees", who are the
decendants of slaves owned by Cherokee Indians before the American
Civil War: they consider themselves Cherokees; Cherokees whose
ancestors were in America before 1492 consider them African-Americans.

I'll use myself as another example. My great-grandmother is said
to have been part American Indian. That part of my family were
New England whalers, & every time I look at her photograph, I have
to wonder if she had lied to her husband & children & she was
actually Polynesian. However my full name makes it appear that
I am as much of a WASP as anyone in the Bush family. (Even though
I prefer the term "Anglo-American", since my father's ancestors
were dirt farmers from the East Midlands.)

What I want in the article is an explanation how the Israeli
government determines these groups, & how people fall into them.
Do they self-report? Are they labelled at the time of birth or
nationalization? And what groups exist that an Israeli
citizen could be catagorized under?

Frankly, I'm coming from a US point of view that finds grouping
people by their belief offensive. I don't see the sense of declaring
someone a "Jew" a "Moslem" or a "Christian" if it's based on a
moment's response, when the responder could believably engage
immediately afterwards cruel sacrifices of kittens & puppies to
Cthulhu or similar inappropriate activites. However, knowing
something about the history of the state of Israel, I can
understand the reason behind these catagories, but I still wonder
at the legal definitions. (e.g., is one considered a Jew in
Israel on one's say-so, or do they have to present evidence
that one or more of their ancestors also prefessed this faith?
Is one allowed to state she/he is a Christian even if the rest of
her/his family is Jewish?)

The reasons for these catagories, how one is determined to fall
into them, etc. all belong to a NPOV article that discusses
ethnic groups in Israel. Just provide the facts, & the intelligent
reader will draw her/his own conclusions.
> >
> >The same could in many ways be said for the US as
> >well-- the US until very recently was more or less an
> >apartheid state, and still has lingering aspects of
> >this left over, in terms of its sociological/financial
> >barriers. Etc.  If this was the case today in the
> >US--as it was 1950--there would be every justification
> >for Wikipedians to look upon statistics coming out of
> >such a country's official machinery as smelly.
> >
> Oh geez... If you have some proof, let's see it.  Otherwise you're
> just spreading FUD. Almost every official statistic in Wikipedia
> has a political opponent or conspiracy theorist ready to challenge
> its validity; that's why we say "according to the Census Bureau"
> or whatever, so if somebody has some differing numbers, they
> can add those, citing the alternate source, rather than having an
> edit war.  In the case of Israel, there are plenty of reasons to
> challenge any UN numbers - and plenty of books doing just that, in
> great detail - so it's not neutral to simply declare that UN
> numbers must be better than Israeli numbers.
>
There are just as many politicians in the UN as there are in
Israel or the US; that is suitable grounds to treat any information
any of them critically. However, it has been shown time & again that
there are individuals in all 3 organizations who try to present data
in a fair & objective manner; that is suitable grounds not to
impeach their materials out of hand.

One point that is decisive for me in this matter is that one person
is doing the work to provide the material; he ought to be allowed
to choose the source of his material, as long as it is properly
attributed & explained. My request is about the ''explanation''.
If after all of that work, the contributors to Wikipedia find
that the source is unsatisfactory, then we have a basis to judge
a better source from.

I'm not interested in passing judgement until I see the evidence --
nor am I interested in seeing a judgement passed until the evidence
is presented completely.

Geoff


body:
--- Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:

> UN organizations often include individuals and
> states with explicit
> anti-Israel biases.

And what is wrong with having an anti-apartheid bias?

~S~

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


body:
--- Geoff Burling <llywrch at agora.rdrop.com> wrote:

> That may be the point you want to make, Steve, but
> it was not
> the reason I asked the original poster to include
> the definitions
> that the Israeli equivalent of a Census Bureau uses
> to define
> "Jew", "Arab", "Christian", & other catagories.
>
> Ethnicity (if I may use the term to apply to the
> process of
> subdividing populations) is a messy business.

This is valid. And I was simply localizing the
complexities of this ethnic debate to the area. Albeit
summat simplistically, Ill admit.

> I'm not making
> a snide reference to Neo-Nazis who hide the fact
> that they have
> ancestors who were Jews or African-Americans; any
> time one
> attempts to make a formal catagorization of
> subgroups in a
> population, one will find exceptions. For example,
> there is a
> group in Oklahoma known as "Black Cherokees", who
> are the
> decendants of slaves owned by Cherokee Indians
> before the American
> Civil War: they consider themselves Cherokees;
> Cherokees whose
> ancestors were in America before 1492 consider them
> African-Americans.

The point of all this specificity is that its
nitpicking -- it overruns secular (meaning
'disregarding religion') humanism (meaning 'of human
causes') and other fads like "democracy" to
reinterpret conflicts from an strictly ethnic POV, and
not a human one.

> I'll use myself as another example. My
> great-grandmother is said
> to have been part American Indian. That part of my
> family were
> New England whalers, & every time I look at her
> photograph, I have
> to wonder if she had lied to her husband & children
> & she was
> actually Polynesian.

Do you? What a burden. Indeed you should go with the
fact that we all come from roughly 5-10K people (in
Africa) back to a population bottleneck 75K years ago.
The rest is details.

> However my full name makes it
> appear that
> I am as much of a WASP as anyone in the Bush family.
> (Even though
> I prefer the term "Anglo-American", since my
> father's ancestors
> were dirt farmers from the East Midlands.)

> What I want in the article is an explanation how the
> Israeli
> government determines these groups, & how people
> fall into them.

This is valid. If statistics are used for this purpose
--fine. This thread is concerned with the use of a bot
to mass-import (possibly) POV statistics en masse to
the WP.

> Do they self-report? Are they labelled at the time
> of birth or
> nationalization? And what groups exist that an
> Israeli
> citizen could be catagorized under?

This is all valid again. Agian nothing to do with the
bot, and the source for its stats.

I read the rest, wont comment for length.

~S~

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


body:
--- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:

> Well! Let's save the edit wars for the articles
> themselevs, okay? There
> will be a link to an article which explains the
> demographic groups in
> Israel, which we can fight over all we want.

Well your right about us getting too carried away. On
the other hand, your avoiding the issue --- this
thread was about en masse stats uploaded via a bot.
Unless there is a bot to go around and correct these,
I think we can let my statement stand that we should
pinch our collective nose at the odium of smelly
statistics.

~S~

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


body:
--- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:

> Distinguishing between Jewish ethnicity, Jewish
> religion, and who the
> State of Israel considers as Jewish is not an easy
> task.

But it would be a good start to sort this out *before
coming up with "statistics" wouldnt it?

> This is great. I'll be sure to include those, under
> "External Links".

Ah. Such effortless effort should be noted for its
notability.

;)
~S~

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikitech-l] OpenSSH upgraded to 3.7.1p1

body:
I've installed the just-released OpenSSH 3.7.1p1 onto pliny and
larousse, which includes a fix for a potentially exploitable bug.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


body:
--- Daniel Ehrenberg <littledanehren at yahoo.com> wrote:

> The Israel is an apartheid state? Hardly. And even
> if
> it were true, it shouldn't be on this list.

You can read
http://ps.wikipedia.org/wiki.cgi?Middle_East_Policy_(Chomsky)
on "Sourceberg" and see if you agree or not. Its
short, I transcribed it myself, and Noam gave it an ok
to publish as a "rough."  Afterward you can email him,
and if you dont insult his intelligence, he'll write
you back. Hurry--the old man's gettin' on...

> Israel's
> statistics are perfectly valid, as are pre-1950 US
> statistics.

Well, in a general sense they are what they are-- we
cant be too picky, I agree. But I don't object to the
.il statistics -- I object to them being installed en
masse by a bot. To allow such is to validate those
statistics in a way which they do not deserve.

> Even at the beginning of the US's
> history,
> African American slaves were counted in the US
> Census
> for purposes of the size of the electoral college,
> albeit only as 2/3 of a person. If you have actual
> proof that Israel is messing up its statistics,
> please
> post it here.

Well, someone else corrected you here. As for "proof"
I will use the proof of "no proof" -- there is no
proof that they are valid, and there is every reason
to believe they are suspect.
<rant>
To suggest that an apartheid state can on the one
hand--deny access to healthcare to its non-citizens,
starve them out, bulldoze homes, stifle a population
of millions like it was drowning a puppy in a plastic
grocery bag, not to mention cut electricity and block
access to Wikipedia.org, and the Arabic language
version of the Power Rangers-- and yet 'can still keep
accurate "statistics" on population data,' is calling
on the community to be at best naive.. (look it up).
</rant>

The statistics as they were originally described added
up to 100.5 percent as I recall from the thread.

> Where do you think the UN gets its statistics from?
> They don't conduct their own census.

In New York
> State, there was a small controversey over Census
> and
> old people going to florida while they recieved the
> Census in the mail in their official New York
> residence and missed the deadline.

> But there were no
> UN statistics to back this up. The UN could care
> less
> about this obscure data.

You're right-The UN could care less,  and neither
should the WP.  (But not "care less" in terms of
simply including it with a bot. ;)

> <rant>
> The only data I could find from the UN on Israel
> (aside from useless rural vs. urban data) was that
> there were about 6 million inhabitants in 2000. But
> Israel, evil apartheid Israel, said that there were
> 6.5 million in 2002! Oh no! We can't use their data
> because the obviously fabricated an other half a
> million Jews for their evil plan.
> </rant>
> LDan

I didnt say such a plan was evil-- I simply said that
humans have a history of fabricating stuff.  You may
be too young to believe that, but its true! And thanks
for the <rant> tags -- nice touch.

~S~
"Making it up since 1913."

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


body:
Yes, that is strange. I've been measuring response times for about a week, and I believe it has become progressively worse. Perhaps it differs between the wikis? My measurements are available on the adress below. As you can see, response times of 20-30 seconds are fairly common during the hours people tend to be online.

That is bad enough for a regular web site, but catastrophic for a wiki. The rate of new articles has dwindled and thereby broken a previously strong upwards trend.

http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anv%E4ndare:E23/responstider

Jake Nelson wrote:
> Funny, I've been noticing how much faster and more reliable it's been the
> last few days. (Roughly when mod_throttle was turned on.)
>

--------------------------------------
Protect yourself from spam,
use http://sneakemail.com


from_name: Delirium

body:
Steve Vertigum wrote:

>--- Stan Shebs <shebs at apple.com> wrote:
>
>
>>UN organizations often include individuals and
>>states with explicit
>>anti-Israel biases.
>>
>>
>
>And what is wrong with having an anti-apartheid bias?
>
>
Though I'm generally no fan of Israel's, I'd argue that many
"anti-Israel biases" are not "anti-apartheid biases", but rather
"anti-Jewish biases."  And I think it's pretty obvious what's wrong with
the latter.  And, in addition, I think it's also pretty clear that the
latter is what we're talking about here -- the 22 Arab states in
question are known to be blatantly anti-Jewish almost to neo-Nazi
extents, publishing things like the Protocols of the Elders of Zion as
fact and talking about the "conspiracy of international Jewry".

-Mark


body:
--- Delirium <delirium at rufus.d2g.com> wrote:
> Steve Vertigum wrote:
> >And what is wrong with having an anti-apartheid
> bias?
> >
> Though I'm generally no fan of Israel's, I'd argue
> that many
> "anti-Israel biases" are not "anti-apartheid
> biases", but rather
> "anti-Jewish biases."

I see your point. But is'nt it anti-Israel to even
mention "apartheid" in the context of Israel? So its
ok to be anti-apartheid, but its anti-semitic to say
Israel is an apartheid state? I try to judge the
message rather than the messenger. Judging the
messenger is a *lot more work--which people tend to
give up on anyway, defaulting to the prejudicial
status quo.  Why is it so hard to just stick to the
facts?

> And I think it's pretty
> obvious what's wrong with
> the latter.

Of course.
> And, in addition, I think it's also
> pretty clear that the
> latter is what we're talking about here -- the 22
> Arab states in
> question are known to be blatantly anti-Jewish
> almost to neo-Nazi
> extents, publishing things like the Protocols of the
> Elders of Zion as
> fact and talking about the "conspiracy of
> international Jewry".

Ah yes. But from my point of view, its too hard to
tell (and therefore I simply default to judging the
message, rather than the messenger) -- genuine
persecution from the genuine [[persecution complex]].
Call me ignorant, if you like.

~S~

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


from_name: Rick

body:
Is it necessary to have this discussion on the mailing list?

RickK

Steve Vertigum <utilitymuffinresearch2 at yahoo.com> wrote:

--- Stan Shebs wrote:

> UN organizations often include individuals and
> states with explicit
> anti-Israel biases.

And what is wrong with having an anti-apartheid bias?

~S~

__________________________________

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/attachments/20030916/5fa08215/attachment.htm


from_name: james duffy

subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: WikiEN-l Digest, Vol 2, Issue 26

body:
>75% is not a consensus,

Actually it is. A consensus is generally interpretated as meaning a clear
and unambiguous majority. In democratic systems, a consensus is generally
defined as two-thirds plus one. Three quarters is described as an
'overwhelming consensus'.  Lynch and Jones, ''Political Decision Making in
Divided Societies'' pp.214-215. Whyte and Reynard, ''Consociational
Democracy and Consensus Building: From the Lebanon to Belgium: Case Studies
in Democractic Consensus'' p. 190.

Most deletions on wiki occur because of votes by a small number. Very few
votes attract nearly 30 voters and those with large numbers rarely produce
75% agreement.

>I can understand a user getting angry if it is a page s/he has spent a lot
>of time on. This user seems to rather be in a deep disagreement with the
>majority of Wikipedia users/sysops rather than a genuine troll. In general
>I agree.

The people he has fallen out with are people who that he show the community
the respect of following agreed conventions and methodologies, rather than
act like a spoiled child who throws tantrums because he cannot get things
his way. Many of the people he has fallen out with are sysops. Many are not.
Some agree with his opinions. Some don't. But all find his behaviour well
beyonds the bounds of respect for the community.

JT

_________________________________________________________________
MSN 8 with e-mail virus protection service: 2 months FREE*
http://join.msn.com/?page=features/virus


body:
--- Adam Raizen <araizen at newmail.net> wrote:
> Steve Vertigum wrote:

> The statistics already exist; I don't have the means
> to do my own poll.

Huh?

> Now it's just a question of whether to add them to
> Wikipedia, and if so,
> in what form and with what explanation.

Add what -- the new statistics that "already exist"
but you cant find, or the backup ones from a
controversial POV source?

> So far,
> you're the only one to
> object,

No Im not. I came into this thread after a couple
people raised questions.

> and not on any specific reason to distrust
> the statistics, but
> just on a general distrust of Israel. For the nth
> time, this will be
> explained in detail in an article linked to from the
> bot's articles.

This isnt good enough--you cant simply add statistics
from Hamas and stipulate these with a buried link to
an article which explains that "these stats may not be
NPOV"

> > Ah. Such effortless effort should be noted for its
> > notability.
> What exactly are you objecting to?

The use of a bot to add Israeli government statistics,
which we proved a few letters ago was not NPOV, and
also was an apartheid state, which among decent
thoughful people tends to raise a flag or two.

> I'm not avoiding the issue. I've posted explanations
> of the demographic
> categories in a couple of different messages, and
> I'll expand upon that
> in the article which will be linked to from all the
> bot-generated
> articles. If you can't find the explanations, I'll
> collect them and
> repost them. If you have any specific objections,
> I'd like to hear them.
> If you have any specific questions that I haven't
> answered, ask away.

Im not the kind of guy to get sidetracked with
specifics-- I am the kind to state some obvious
things--that NPOV would be violated if we added
POV-based data en masse.
Add it by hand if you want-- let each stand up to
scrutiny.
As I understand it, in Israel-- even the names of
towns and cities is a often a question of POV.

> Of course, it will be a very simple matter to have a
> bot go around and
> correct/update these articles, if needed (much
> simpler than creating the
> articles in the first place).

I love how you say "we can take care of it easy and
simple"--just sign on the line--- You sound like a
politician, young man.

 "We're" not pinching
> our collective nose
> at anything. I think that you need a better
> objection than just a
> general dislike for Israel.

Its not a "general dislike" --(dont start that
pottytalk with me--or at least use LD's <rant> tags)--
its an nose for the smell of POV disguised as a field
of "statistics", boosted en mass, up the rear end of
the WP.  The WP does'nt necessarily object to this
course of entry, provided the proper prophylactic
measures have been secured. (We dont want to catch any
POV in other words) You could might as well name it
the POV-BOT,  since were all friends here.

WikiLove be upon you and your progeny,
~S~

__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com


from_name: Sean Barrett

in_reply_to:
<20030917001413.69394.qmail@web11708.mail.yahoo.com> (message
	from Geoffrey Thomas on Tue, 16 Sep 2003 17:14:13 -0700 (PDT))

body:
> Slaves (of any race) were counted as 3/5 of a free preson,
> not 2/3, for the number of seats in the House of Representatives.
> The seats of the Electoral College are the total seats in
> Congress - that is, 2 (senators) + the number of representatives.
> So, yes, the 3/5 did effect electoral college representation,
> but not directly.

And of course it was the North that insisted that slaves were less
than a person.  The slaveholders would have been very happy to have
them counted as full persons for purposes of representation, as long
they remained property.  It was the Northern states that insisted on
reducing the South's number of Congressmen.


from_name: Chris Seaton

subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
Instead of stripping JavaScript from the input, why not strip it from
the output (of the body, not the whole page)?

That would solve this problem and anything similar.

On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 23:02, Brion Vibber wrote:
> On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 15:00, Brion Vibber wrote:
> > On Tue, 2003-09-16 at 14:48, Geoffrey Thomas wrote:
> > > Whoops, sorry again. The page is on test wikipedia:
> > > http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/JavaScript_table_security_hole
> >
> > Oh, in Magnus's magic table code. Sigh...
> >
> > {| onMouseOver="alert('hey');" foo 15
> > |[[Main Page]]
> > |}
> >
> > I'm deleting the page.
>
> Or rather, I'm not, since it's on the test wiki. Urgh, brain not running
> on full today.
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
> _______________________________________________
> Wikitech-l mailing list
> Wikitech-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
--
Chris Seaton <chris at chrisseaton.com>


from_name: Mike

subject: [WikiEN-l] BuddhaInside's behaviour

body:
----- Original Message -----
From: "Anthere" <anthere6 at yahoo.com>
To: <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
Sent: Tuesday, September 16, 2003 4:20 PM
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] BuddhaInside's behaviour

>
> > Message: 2
> > Date: Mon, 15 Sep 2003 14:36:58 +0200
> > From: "Mike" <Mike at cybermaus.com>
> > Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] BuddhaInside's behaviour
> > To: "Discussion list for English-language Wikipedia"
> > <wikien-l at Wikipedia.org>
> > Message-ID: <007801c37b86$0f081d50$2101a8c0 at maus1>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
> >
> > > He then tried to edit the [[Consensus]] page to
> > redefine what a consensus
> > > is, forcing the comment Angela,
> > >
> > > Changing the definition on the [[consensus]] page
> > won't help Buddha . . .
> > > [[User:Angela|Angela]] 18:04, Sep 14, 2003 (UTC)
> >
> > In spite of all the irritation he has caused, I
> > would still have been
> > inclined to give him the benefit of doubt, but the
> > above cited act brands
> > him as a troll in my opinion.
> >
> > Mike AKA CyberMaus
>
> Have you look at the page in question ([[consensus]]),
> its history, and the talk page ?
>
> Anthere
>

Yes. I've just gone through it again and I hold to my opinion. What he wrote
on the [[consensus]] page is not wrong.  What bothers me is that he did it
to justify his previous actions in spite of what is written in the rest of
the article. See the second paragraph in the "consensus as collective
thought" section, in particular the last sentence.

As I said, what he wrote is not wrong, but in my experience I have never
heard or seen the word consensus used to mean unanimous. In Meriam-Webster,
it is also mentioned that this usage is "slightly older". In my opinion, it
is obsolete.

Here's another possible meaning: A minority holds an opinion to which the
majority have no objection or differing opinion, thus the minority opinion
is presented as consensus.

Mike AKA CyberMaus


from_name: Thomas Corell

subject: [Wikitech-l] Bug in the Search

body:
Hello,

after a report on the german bug report age, I checked the reported bug
and the output is realy ''funny'':

Try '+deutscher +Bauernkrieg' as search term in full-text search and get
about ten php error messages. (in de.wiki)

in the en.wiki everything works fine...some hints ?
--
Smurf

smurf at AdamAnt.mud.de
-------------------------  Anthill inside! ---------------------------


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Table markup

body:
On Tue, 16 Sep 2003 12:35:13 +0200, Magnus Manske <magnus.manske at web.de>
gave utterance to the following:

> Erik Zachte wrote:
>
>>> Of the remaining ones (if any), which are absolutely necessary
>> (meaning,
>>> don't serve some doubtful decorative purpose;-) ?
>>
>> I rather specify any option only once than on each cell. As for
>> doubtful decorative purpose: not quite NPOV ;) Colour helps to bring
>> order to complex tables, CSS classes might do the
>> trick, but will that be easier to apply than a <tr bgcolor=blue> ? (one
>> needs to look up css definitions somewhere)
>
> OK, so is there an example for
> * a row with several cells (say, more than 2)
> * that has some properties in common (e.g., background)
> * which can't be defined in the <table> / {| statement
> * in a table that is not one of a default type (countries, elements etc.)
> ?
>
Which raises the question of supporting <COL> elements. I don't think
<COLGROUP> is particularly useful, but <COL> is, and is fairly well
supported.
--
Richard Grevers
Between two evils always pick the one you haven't tried


body:
Teresa,

K-12 in the US ranges from Kindergarden (ages 4-6) through 12th grade (the
last year of high school, before starting university).

The US K-12 system is composed of Elementary School (usually grades K-5, or
6); Middle School (usually grades 5-6, through 8); and high school (usually
grades 9-12). The age and grade-range differences vary slightly, by state.

Finally, some of your science materials would probably be useful for
students in high school curriculum. Once Wiki has chosen a topic for a pilot
textbook, the K-12 project will be on its way.

Best,
Sanford

----- Original Message -----
From: "KNOTT, T" <TKNOTT at qcl.org.uk>
To: "'Wikimedia textbook discussion'" <textbook-l at Wikipedia.org>
Sent: Wednesday, September 17, 2003 12:29 AM
Subject: RE: [Textbook-l] NYT article on textbook prices

> I agree. Although it would be nice to get new contributors, we should wait
> until we get at least one book relatively finished.
>
> A quick question from a brit ? Is K12 high school? I'm currently working
on
> a science textbook based around the UK science syllabus for kids aged
14-16
> I wonder I some of my pages can be adapted by someone for the US and the
> rest of the world.
>
> Theresa
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Sanford Forte [mailto:siforte at ix.netcom.com]
> Sent: 16 September 2003 21:59
> To: Wikimedia textbook discussion
> Subject: Re: [Textbook-l] NYT article on textbook prices
>
> Yes. This has been a problem for years. It's like skimming cream off the
top
> for college textbook publishers. Also, K-12 publishers are just as greedy.
> We need to get the K-12 project going. Believe me, once we create a
> *quality* K-12 book, based on strict state framework standards (ideally,
> California, because that would make, by far, the biggest impact), we could
> revolutionize the whole textbook creation and adoption process. University
> books are also ripe for reform, but they are really less of a challenge
than
> the K-12 sector. The K-12 publishers really have a stranglehold on the
> books, the pricing, and the process. Millions of kids, parents, and
> teachers - and our society - lose in this antiquated process.
>
> Before sending anything to Slashdot, as Karl suggests, I think it would
> behoove us to get something substantial underway, or have something
> finished. Otherwise, it's just empty promises.
>
> Here are some more links to an excellent series (expose) in K-12 books
that
> was done about 8 months ago in the San Jose Mercury News. Additionally, an
> excellent piece from Forbes.
> http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/4743883.htm
> http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/living/education/4749572.htm
> http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/living/education/4756801.htm
>
> http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2000/1030/6612178a_print.html
>
> Best,
> Sanford
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Daniel Ehrenberg" <littledanehren at yahoo.com>
> To: "Wikimedia textbook discussion" <textbook-l at Wikipedia.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, September 16, 2003 12:19 PM
> Subject: Re: [Textbook-l] NYT article on textbook prices
>
>
> >
> > --- Karl Wick <karlwick at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > > This was on the front page of my local paper this
> > > morning:
> > >
> > > "When Books Break the Bank"
> > >
> > >
> >
>
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/16/nyregion/16BOOK.html?pagewanted=all&positi
> on=
> > >
> > > An article about outrageous textbook prices and the
> > > things
> > > that students are doing to avoid paying them. (No
> > > mention
> > > of our site unfortunately).
> > >
> > > I saw old NYT articles on Sept 11 archived on the
> > > main
> > > wikipedia .. could we do that with this one, put the
> > > text
> > > on Wikibooks ?
> >
> > I'm sorry to say this, but no Wikibooks book is
> > anywhere near usable quality, especially in a college
> > environment.
> > LDan
> >
> > __________________________________
> > Do you Yahoo!?
> > Yahoo! SiteBuilder - Free, easy-to-use web site design software
> > http://sitebuilder.yahoo.com
> > _______________________________________________
> > Textbook-l mailing list
> > Textbook-l at Wikipedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/textbook-l
>
> _______________________________________________
> Textbook-l mailing list
> Textbook-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/textbook-l
> _______________________________________________
> Textbook-l mailing list
> Textbook-l at Wikipedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/textbook-l


subject: [Wikitech-l] Table markup

body:
On Wed, 2003-09-17 at 00:41, Magnus Manske wrote:
> OK, I hacked a little filter that will remove all parameters from table,
> td, and th that
> * start with "on" (no JavaScript)
> * have no value and are not "nowrap" ("foo" and "15" above)

In general it's safer to only allow known safe things than to allow
anything but known unsafe things. If a new unsafe attribute or tag comes
into existence, you're not protected against it.

> It is quick'n'dirty, though. Perhaps we should use some code from
> removeHTMLtags instead?

Ahhh, code reuse. :)

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)