subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Plea for help

in_reply_to: <001001c1bafa$08e4b080$ad37a8c0@laptop>; from juleskemp@yahoo.com on Thu, Feb 21, 2002 at 09:05:59AM -0800

body:
Julie Hofmann Kemp wrote:
>(partially
> because I seem to have offended some delicate programmer sensibilities
> by saying that they were acting exactly like programmers -- good at what
> they do, but less interested in making it clear to the user through
> documentation).

Oh, I'm not offended by that -- it's accurate.  :-)

> Whether or not people want to hear it, the new site is not all that
> user-friendly as far as explaining subpages and namespaces goes (or how
> to report bugs, for that matter -- why isn't there a bug report link?).
> People are still trying to create /Talk pages and /whatever subpages.
> All we need is a carefully placed announcement or two -- I suggest
> adding a special page (changes to the system) and links on the home
> page, on how to edit a page, and on recent changes.  I know that Lars
> added some stuff on namespaces under the article, but what is needed is
> a primer -- something that says...where one did  x in the old version,
> please do y in the new.    I'd do this myself, but am pretty sure I
> can't create a special page (guessing it's an admin thing) and I'm still
> not clear on it.  It appears that, instead of subpages, we should be
> creating link pages (maybe) and that each page is generated with an
> associated talk page.

I think this is a great idea.  In fact, I think that we should link to a
"changes to the system" page directly from the edit page.  "Need help with
the new system?  Click here for a few short tips."

--Jimbo


list: wikitech-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] New case conversion functions

body:
On ?a?, 2002-02-21 at 09:59, Jan Hidders wrote:
> Right now there is a localization problem wrt. indexing. The fulltext index
> indexes single words and defines these as series of letters, numbers, and
> the odd "'" and "_". Since the standard character set of MySQL is ISO 8859-1
> I assume that it knows what are letters in that character set. I really
> don't know how this behaves when the character set of MySQL is changed.
> Available, by the way, are big5, cp1251, cp1257, czech, danish, dec8, dos,
> euc_kr, gb2312, gbk, german1, hebrew, hp8, hungarian, koi8_ru, koi8_ukr,
> latin1, latin2, sjis, swe7, tis620, ujis, usa7, and win1251ukr. But I don't
> think we want to go that way because then (if I understand the documentation
> correctly) we need a separate MySQL server for every character set. Anyway,
> in all cases the indexing breaks down for entities because it doesn't index
> words with '&' and ';' in them, so it sees "Gödel" as "G" and "del"
> with some funny symbols inbetween that it doesn't index. The indexing also
> has no idea that this has something to do with "Godel".
>
> Admittedly unaware of any previous discussion on this before, I would
> suggest the following:
> 1. Internally, i.e., in the database fields and URLs we use for bodies and
> titles only standard ASCII plus HTML entities. However, to allow indexing we
> encode e as something like '_101_' in the database fields.
> 2. Externally in search and edit boxes the user can type any character the
> browser allows, but we always translate internally the non-ASCII ones to
> entities.
> 3. When a request for a page is made we always translate the entities as
> much as possible to the character set specified in the request, including
> the contents edit boxes.

Ugh. Doable, though. Presumably the point of this is so that someone can
type either:
  ?  (actual o-with-umlaut in the display character encoding)
  ö
  Ö
  Ö
  Ö
or any number of other alternatives in the edit box and put the same
actual sequence of bytes into the data?

Also remember that we'll still have to escape entities that _aren't_ in
the display character set in all edit boxes, so that they won't be
disappeared or converted into "?"s when the user hits submit. (I'm
assuming that you don't want to put the raw HTML entities for _every_
non-ASCII character into the edit box appearing as the entity codes? See
my previous message on this subject for why that's a Very Bad Idea.)

> The main thing is to define the translation functions:
>
> - string encodeEntities ( mb-string external-string, string character-set )
> - mb-string decodeEntities ( string internal-string, string character-set )
>
> (With mb-string I mean a multi-byte character string.)

cf $wikiRecodeInput(), $wikiRecodeOutput() if you want a ready place to
do this.

(Keep in mind that ASCII-with-HTML-entities is for all intents and
purposes a multibyte character encoding. It switches from single-byte to
double-byte mode when encountering a "&", and self-recovers if it is not
followed by a correct multibyte code string ending in ";".)

> For localization we define the following functions:
>
> - string canonicalTitle ( string internal-string ) translates an internal
> title to it's canonical form. It deals with capitalization, for example. If
> two strings are translated to the same canonical form they are formally the
> same title. If a string is translated to an empty string it is not a valid
> title. If you don't want entities in your titles, you can define that here.
> - string urlTitle ( string  internal-string ) translates an internal
> canonized title to its URL form. It probably only replaces space characters
> with "+" and escapes ASCII characters that need to be escaped in an URL.

cf. wikiTitle->makeSecureTitle()

> For these functions we also need to define arrays that associate entities
> with their uppercase equivalents, and vice versa, for the relevant character
> sets.

Easy enough, I can generate that from the Unicode data tables.

> Having said all this I also want to emphasize that we first need to have a
> document that describes exactly how we are going to do this, before we code
> another line for localization. We have to realize that we are a real project
> now.

Yes, a real project that's already running and has thousands of pages
that don't conform to the as-yet-nonexistant document. Hopefully we can
munge them together!

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


list: wikipedia-l

from_name: Mark Christensen

subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Plea for help

body:
In addition to the addition of more explanatory text, and -- most
importantly -- making that information far more prominent. I'd really like
to see a light background, of whatever color,  added to each of the
different subspaces.

This will make it possible to see at a glance which subspace you are in.  I
am very confident that this UI improvement will be of tremendous value in
making the namespaces issue clear to new users, without the requiring them
to read a complex explanation of the concept of namespaces to them in a FAQ.

Yours
Mark

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jimmy Wales [mailto:jwales at bomis.com]
> Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2002 1:17 PM
> To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Plea for help
>
>
> Julie Hofmann Kemp wrote:
> >(partially
> > because I seem to have offended some delicate programmer
> sensibilities
> > by saying that they were acting exactly like programmers --
> good at what
> > they do, but less interested in making it clear to the user through
> > documentation).
>
> Oh, I'm not offended by that -- it's accurate.  :-)
>
> > Whether or not people want to hear it, the new site is not all that
> > user-friendly as far as explaining subpages and namespaces
> goes (or how
> > to report bugs, for that matter -- why isn't there a bug
> report link?).
> > People are still trying to create /Talk pages and /whatever
> subpages.
> > All we need is a carefully placed announcement or two -- I suggest
> > adding a special page (changes to the system) and links on the home
> > page, on how to edit a page, and on recent changes.  I know
> that Lars
> > added some stuff on namespaces under the article, but what
> is needed is
> > a primer -- something that says...where one did  x in the
> old version,
> > please do y in the new.    I'd do this myself, but am pretty sure I
> > can't create a special page (guessing it's an admin thing)
> and I'm still
> > not clear on it.  It appears that, instead of subpages, we should be
> > creating link pages (maybe) and that each page is generated with an
> > associated talk page.
>
> I think this is a great idea.  In fact, I think that we
> should link to a
> "changes to the system" page directly from the edit page.
> "Need help with
> the new system?  Click here for a few short tips."
>
> --Jimbo
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Plea for help

body:
I agree it is important to make clear what has changed. But, I must say I'm
not exactly clear about what's _not_ clear.  I take it from your message
that the concept of namespaces is not clear, as is the concept of not using
subpages.

Basically I'd explain the namespace issue as follows:

Talk and user articles are now in separate "namespaces" though I'm not at
all certain we should try to explain namespaces.  So, I'd say talk and user
articles are now in separate parts of the wikipedia, in order to make it
less likely to confuse these items with real encyclopedia articles.  On the
link bar, at the bottom is a talk link, this takes you over to the portion
of the wikipedia devoted to the discussion of that particular wikipedia
article.  When you are looking at the talk page, in the same space is a link
back to the article which that talk page discusses.  There's no need to
create /talk pages any more, as this new system allows for a cleaner
separation of wikipedia articles and the other pages which we need to have,
but don't count as encyclopedia articles.

And I'd explain the subpages issue as follows:

The new wikipedia software allows us to use parentheses markers to
distinguish between different kinds of article.  Before we had this for
example, we'd have had an article "Poker/stud," but now the same article is
"Stud (poker)."  This means that we are now expecting "Stud (poker)" to be
an entire article, not just a simple addition to the main poker article.
Right now you can use /'s in article names, but we recommend against it
because it isn't as clear as the (poker) notation (there are a number of
different ways to understand the / in a title).  On the other hand, on pages
like TCP/IP, where the / is part of the name of the article, you can and
should still use the /.

Another use people had for the "XXX/yyy" style page names was to break up
longer articles into chunks.  This can still be done by creating articles
with titles like "World War II battles," rather than making a page "World
War II" with a subpage "World War II/Battles."

************************

However, the above text simply explains the things I've guessed are not
clear, and it intentionally ignores both the complexities of the argument
against subpages, and the complexities involved in explaining namespaces to
a newbie as well as the particular implementation of namespaces in the
wikipedia software.

If we need a summary of the argument against subpages, I can try to boil
down some points from the extensive debate on the subject.  If we need a
technical explanation of namespaces and how they work in the wikipedia, I
think we can provide that as well.  But the keys to getting adequate
documentation in the hands of users who need it are 1) to understand where
people need additional help, and 2) to make available clear links to that
documentation at precisely the places where this confusion will be
experienced.

Yours
Mark Christensen

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Julie Hofmann Kemp [mailto:juleskemp at yahoo.com]
> Sent: Thursday, February 21, 2002 12:06 PM
> To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Plea for help
>
>
> Larry, I have to apologize --
>
> I've been so wrapped up trying to keep my course on track
> that I didn't
> respond at all to your letter.  I was frankly just glad you were still
> going to be around!  I'll help any way I can.
>
> Also, (since I'm hoping lots of people are still reading
> this) we still
> have NO ACCEPTABLE INFORMATION  on how some of the programming changes
> affect day to day use.  I've offered to write something up -- given an
> explanation, but have been repeatedly ignored or blown off (partially
> because I seem to have offended some delicate programmer sensibilities
> by saying that they were acting exactly like programmers --
> good at what
> they do, but less interested in making it clear to the user through
> documentation).
>
> Whether or not people want to hear it, the new site is not all that
> user-friendly as far as explaining subpages and namespaces
> goes (or how
> to report bugs, for that matter -- why isn't there a bug
> report link?).
> People are still trying to create /Talk pages and /whatever subpages.
> All we need is a carefully placed announcement or two -- I suggest
> adding a special page (changes to the system) and links on the home
> page, on how to edit a page, and on recent changes.  I know that Lars
> added some stuff on namespaces under the article, but what is
> needed is
> a primer -- something that says...where one did  x in the old version,
> please do y in the new.    I'd do this myself, but am pretty sure I
> can't create a special page (guessing it's an admin thing)
> and I'm still
> not clear on it.  It appears that, instead of subpages, we should be
> creating link pages (maybe) and that each page is generated with an
> associated talk page.
>
> JHK -- feeling very resentful that no one actually seems to think this
> is worth their time.
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Wed, 20 Feb 2002 09:45:37 -0800 (PST)
> From: Larry Sanger <lsanger at nupedia.com>
> To: <wikipedia-l at nupedia.com>
> cc: <intlwiki-l at nupedia.com>
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] Plea for help
> Reply-To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
>
> This is an unusual plea for help.  It's possible I'm going out of my
> mind--I mean, I guess I don't think so, but sometimes it
> seems like it.
> :-)
>
> Occasionally in the past, controversy has erupted that has occupied
> unfortunately large amounts of my time.  Sometimes the controversy is
> definitely worth the time, but just as often it seems it isn't, not at
> all.  Most recently, in the wake of my announcement that I am
> no longer
> a paid employee, that I will still be working though as a
> volunteer, and
> that we might (if we can) start selling ads and soliciting
> donations to
> help pay for me once again, apparently some people reacted not by
> saying, very kindly, "Oh, poor Larry, whatever will we do
> without him?"
> but instead, "Huh?  There was a paid employee?  And they might sell
> ads?! Someone was making money?!  This must be a greedy capitalist
> exploitative project.  This shouldn't be!  We've got to do something
> about it!"
>
> Well, I and sometimes Jimbo then spend a lot of time putting
> out fires.
> In the present case, we inform the newcomers that, yes, I did do a few
> useful things for the projects oh maybe occasionally; yes, the idea of
> fees for viewing content is absolutely ludicrous and has never been
> considered; yes, we *really, really are* committed to making
> and keeping
> the content always completely free forever; and yes, we have been
> considering making a nonprofit foundation for Wikipedia and
> Nupedia for
> a long time now; it's mainly a matter of getting enough time
> to actually
> start us formally down the road.  (We can start with a "OK now, we're
> really going to do it, it's official, we're asking for pro bono legal
> help to set it up" kind of announcement, but we don't want to do that
> until we have the time to follow through properly.  "We" in this case
> mainly means
> Jimbo.)
>
> I think some people just sit back and enjoy the show, and
> figure that I
> can hold my own well enough.
>
> Well, er, not exactly.  I can, usually, if I spend the time.  But I
> don't have the time anymore.  I literally *don't have the
> time* for this
> kind of nonsense.  I've spent, I don't know, three hours so far today
> working on various Wikipedia stuff, and it's not even 1 PM yet.  I
> should instead have been, er, looking for a job, or a lot of other
> things my wife wants me to do.  :-)
>
> So, please, critics, have mercy--be gentle--and, non-critics, if you
> support my cause and think you can supply the correct response to an
> e-mail that, you can predict, I will want to have answered, please do
> that.  Don't hold back waiting for me to do it.  I'll be very
> grateful.
>
> Larry
>
>
>
> --__--__--
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikipedia-l mailing list
> Wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>
>
> End of Wikipedia-l Digest
>
>
> _________________________________________________________
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> Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com
>
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


from_name: Julie Kemp

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Suggestions from Magnus, Mark, and Jimbo

body:
Magnus -- I don't mean to offend, but you don't speak
customer -- and I don't expect you to.  But to
demonstrate my point, you just suggested I start a
page (article?) with wikipedia: -- as if I know what
that means!  Are you saying that, if I do that, it
will create a special page and show up in the bar at
the side?  I know you went to the FAQs and added
stuff, but I really think you and the others are so
closely involved in the programming side that you
assume that we all get what you're talking about.

There are lots of people out there who have
programming backgrounds -- but lots more who don't.
You also seem to think users are intelligent beings.
Sorry, but years in customer service and training
(including training in DSL, telco processes and an
online SQL-based transaction coordination package)
have taught me that you have to teach to the lowest
common denominator.  Even people who are really bright
about most things have trouble getting their heads
round computer stuff.  SO honestly, suggesting I go do
something that I've offered to do isn't helpful -- I
can't do it until someone takes the time to explain it
to me.  Also, I am still unaware of what constitues
admin-only creation and all-user creation rights.
Fortunately, Mark has answered some of those
questions.

So, my questions to you all are:

1)How do I create a special page (New system
features?) that will show up on the sidebar?

2)Can we place a link at least on the recent changes
page and the homepage (could it be in a different
color and blink?) and how does inserting a link to a
special page differ from inserting a link to a regular
page?

3)Is a namespace the same as an article and/or a page?

4) Mark mentioned using parentheses rather than a
slash in an article title to indicate what used to be
a subpage (I think).  Does this mean that the article
is independent, or that the parentheses associate it
with a main article in a similar manner? How does this
relate to the talk page generated with each article?
(and for my own sanity, are they related at the same
level or do sublevels even exist?)

5)If the system still functions in a way that says
"subpage" to the users, is there any reason to even
dicuss functionality?  It seems to be that the UI may
still look like a duck and walk like a duck -- even if
it doesn't talk like a duck behind the scenes -- so
why not let the users think it is in fact a duck?

And by the way -- I do realize that the corollary to
programmers don't speak user and don't like to
document things is that users haven't got a clue about
how much work has gone into any particular piece of
software -- and don't care, as long as it works!  All
I'm asking is for some help and understanding so that
I can do what I do well -- be the middleman.  OR, I
can butt out completely.  I just figure I should try
to become part of the process and help make things
better, rather than just whinge about not liking the
things I (and many others) clearly don't get! [[JHK]]

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Sports - Coverage of the 2002 Olympic Games
http://sports.yahoo.com


from_name: Larry Sanger

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page

body:
I would be delighted to draft something suitable if someone else doesn't
do it first.

It sure would be great to be able to edit the homepage so I could link to
it.  But I can't because I'm no longer a sysop!  (A software bug, it
seems.  ;-) )

Larry


from_name: Jimmy Wales

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page

body:
mysql> select user_name,user_rights from user where user_rights='is_sysop';
+--------------+-------------+
| user_name    | user_rights |
+--------------+-------------+
| Jimbo Wales  | is_sysop    |
| Larry Sanger | is_sysop    |
+--------------+-------------+
2 rows in set (0.01 sec)

It works for me.  I just tried logging in as you, and that works fine, too.

What account are you logging into?

--Jimbo


body:
I have recently run my head up against the limitations of the conversion
script several times.

It can be very helpful to see if the talk comments refer to the current
version of an article, or to a previous version.  Sometimes, this is
difficult to determine unless one can see the article history.

So, I'd like to see if we couldn't get old.wikipedia.com up and running, as
it does not seem like we are making much progress on importing the old
history into the new mySQL database.

Yours
Mark Christensen

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jimmy Wales [mailto:jwales at bomis.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, January 29, 2002 12:43 PM
> To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] History of pages, author issues.
>
>
> Magnus Manske wrote:
> > * As Wikipedia articles have no author, there's no authorship.
>
> Well, there was a good bit of useful data there.  There is
> authorship in some
> sense, and we do like to keep the history.
>
> > * AFAIK, the UseModWiki only stored the changes of the last
> two weeks (or
> > something like that).
>
> It was previously two weeks, but I extended it, I forget how
> long, but our
> intention is to keep the history more or less permanently,
> subject to disk
> space constraints.  (But disk space is cheap.)
>
> > * AFAIK, there will be "old.wikipedia.com", with a patched
> UseModWiki that
> > doesn't allow to edit/save articles, only view them, with
> the contents from
> > before the switch.
>
> That's right.  But we should still see about getting the old
> history into the new
> database if it isn't impossible.
>
> > * The reason why I didn't convert the article history as well as the
> > "current" versions is simply that I didn't figure out how
> to read the
> > UseModWiki history format. I asked several times, even on
> the 'pedia, for
> > help, but...
>
> *nod*  I don't know the answer to this.  I've tried it myself
> and did not succeed.
>
> Maybe Clifford Adams could help us?
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


from_name: Dan Keshet

subject: [Wikitech-l] recent changes linked

body:
Hi Wikitechers,

I've had this itch for a while, and I've finally scratched it: being
able to display the recent changes of all pages that are linked to
from a particular page.  You can see the function I wrote at work
here:

http://www.projectmosaic.org/pwiki/wiki.phtml?title=Main_Page&action=recentChangesLinked

You could use this feature to get an overview of the activity in a
given section (say, "Mathematics") without having to load/unload the
entire section into your watch list.  Alternately, you could use this
to build group or public watch lists, the wiki way.

Would you like this feature in the php script?  Should I send someone
the diff?

-- Dan Keshet

PS: (Please to: or cc: me; I'm not on the list.)

PPS: Great job everybody who's worked on the script.  Wikipedia's
looking really great. :)


from_name: Jan Hidders

body:
Right now there is a localization problem wrt. indexing. The fulltext index
indexes single words and defines these as series of letters, numbers, and
the odd "'" and "_". Since the standard character set of MySQL is ISO 8859-1
I assume that it knows what are letters in that character set. I really
don't know how this behaves when the character set of MySQL is changed.
Available, by the way, are big5, cp1251, cp1257, czech, danish, dec8, dos,
euc_kr, gb2312, gbk, german1, hebrew, hp8, hungarian, koi8_ru, koi8_ukr,
latin1, latin2, sjis, swe7, tis620, ujis, usa7, and win1251ukr. But I don't
think we want to go that way because then (if I understand the documentation
correctly) we need a separate MySQL server for every character set. Anyway,
in all cases the indexing breaks down for entities because it doesn't index
words with '&' and ';' in them, so it sees "Gödel" as "G" and "del"
with some funny symbols inbetween that it doesn't index. The indexing also
has no idea that this has something to do with "Godel".

Admittedly unaware of any previous discussion on this before, I would
suggest the following:
1. Internally, i.e., in the database fields and URLs we use for bodies and
titles only standard ASCII plus HTML entities. However, to allow indexing we
encode e as something like '_101_' in the database fields.
2. Externally in search and edit boxes the user can type any character the
browser allows, but we always translate internally the non-ASCII ones to
entities.
3. When a request for a page is made we always translate the entities as
much as possible to the character set specified in the request, including
the contents edit boxes.

The main thing is to define the translation functions:

- string encodeEntities ( mb-string external-string, string character-set )
- mb-string decodeEntities ( string internal-string, string character-set )

(With mb-string I mean a multi-byte character string.)

For localization we define the following functions:

- string canonicalTitle ( string internal-string ) translates an internal
title to it's canonical form. It deals with capitalization, for example. If
two strings are translated to the same canonical form they are formally the
same title. If a string is translated to an empty string it is not a valid
title. If you don't want entities in your titles, you can define that here.
- string urlTitle ( string  internal-string ) translates an internal
canonized title to its URL form. It probably only replaces space characters
with "+" and escapes ASCII characters that need to be escaped in an URL.

For these functions we also need to define arrays that associate entities
with their uppercase equivalents, and vice versa, for the relevant character
sets.

Having said all this I also want to emphasize that we first need to have a
document that describes exactly how we are going to do this, before we code
another line for localization. We have to realize that we are a real project
now.

-- Jan Hidders


from_name: Magnus Manske

subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Plea for help

body:
> Also, (since I'm hoping lots of people are still reading this) we still
> have NO ACCEPTABLE INFORMATION  on how some of the programming changes
> affect day to day use.  I've offered to write something up -- given an
> explanation, but have been repeatedly ignored or blown off (partially
> because I seem to have offended some delicate programmer sensibilities
> by saying that they were acting exactly like programmers -- good at what
> they do, but less interested in making it clear to the user through
> documentation).

Yeah, we were so hurt that we immediately started a FAQ page, based on the
questions you raised. I lost track of it, though, as I thought you'd expand
it as promised.

> Whether or not people want to hear it, the new site is not all that
> user-friendly as far as explaining subpages and namespaces goes (or how
> to report bugs, for that matter -- why isn't there a bug report link?).
> People are still trying to create /Talk pages and /whatever subpages.
> All we need is a carefully placed announcement or two -- I suggest
> adding a special page (changes to the system) and links on the home
> page, on how to edit a page, and on recent changes.  I know that Lars
> added some stuff on namespaces under the article, but what is needed is
> a primer -- something that says...where one did  x in the old version,
> please do y in the new.    I'd do this myself, but am pretty sure I
> can't create a special page (guessing it's an admin thing) and I'm still
> not clear on it.  It appears that, instead of subpages, we should be
> creating link pages (maybe) and that each page is generated with an
> associated talk page.

This is explained on the Nwe Functions page, as well as on the FAQ page, and
probably at a few other places as well.

> JHK -- feeling very resentful that no one actually seems to think this
> is worth their time.

If the (very real) existing FAQs/manuals are not extensive enough for you
(and others), let's try this:
* You create a page (best starting with "wikipedia:") where you put all the
questions you have, or the questions you think people might have.
* You let all of us know where to find it.
* The Sensitive Ego Club of Programmers will go there and answer them.

Magnus


from_name: Vicki Rosenzweig

body:
At 03:16 PM 2/21/02 -0800, Julie Kemp wrote:

>Magnus -- I don't mean to offend, but you don't speak
>customer -- and I don't expect you to.  But to
>demonstrate my point, you just suggested I start a
>page (article?) with wikipedia: -- as if I know what
>that means!

I'm not sure I speak customer, but one of the things I've done as an
editor is translate, including between techies and non-techies, so I'll
try.

>Are you saying that, if I do that, it
>will create a special page and show up in the bar at
>the side?  I know you went to the FAQs and added
>stuff, but I really think you and the others are so
>closely involved in the programming side that you
>assume that we all get what you're talking about.

I don't know the answer to this.

>There are lots of people out there who have
>programming backgrounds -- but lots more who don't.
>You also seem to think users are intelligent beings.

Users are intelligent beings. That they don't speak tech
doesn't change this, any more than my not speaking Chinese
makes me stupid.

>Sorry, but years in customer service and training
>(including training in DSL, telco processes and an
>online SQL-based transaction coordination package)
>have taught me that you have to teach to the lowest
>common denominator.  Even people who are really bright
>about most things have trouble getting their heads
>round computer stuff.

Okay, but I don't think it helps to suggest that we're creating an encyclopedia
written and edited primarily by the unintelligent.
<snip>
>3)Is a namespace the same as an article and/or a page?

No. A namespace is a set of articles. "Talk:" is a namespace.
So is "User:" Like the main wikipedia, they can have unlimited numbers
of articles within them.

>4) Mark mentioned using parentheses rather than a
>slash in an article title to indicate what used to be
>a subpage (I think).  Does this mean that the article
>is independent, or that the parentheses associate it
>with a main article in a similar manner? How does this
>relate to the talk page generated with each article?
>(and for my own sanity, are they related at the same
>level or do sublevels even exist?)

The parentheses are to distinguish between two or more things of the
same name. Rather than have subpages, the wikipedia now uses a
"flat" namespace--everything is on the same level. (The following examples
are invented, probably not reflecting current actual wikipedia content.)
"Niger (river)" and "Niger (country)" distinguish between two entities of the
same name. Sometimes we can avoid parentheses by careful naming: the
former article could be named "River Niger," for example. But neither is
part of the other.

I don't think we have subpages anymore; if I'm wrong, please, would one of
the programmers correct me?

>5)If the system still functions in a way that says
>"subpage" to the users, is there any reason to even
>dicuss functionality?  It seems to be that the UI may
>still look like a duck and walk like a duck -- even if
>it doesn't talk like a duck behind the scenes -- so
>why not let the users think it is in fact a duck?

Does it function that way, though?

We allow the specific existence of "Talk" pages--but we don't want other
subpages. If we make it look and talk like a duck, and call it a duck, people
will start creating a whole flock of other waterfowl.

I hope some of this helps.

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


body:
> 1)How do I create a special page (New
> system features?) that will show up on the
> sidebar?

Right now this can only be done by changing the PHP code that runs the
wikipedia.

>2)Can we place a link at least on the recent
> changes page and the homepage (could it be in a
> different color and blink?) and how does inserting a
> link to a special page differ from inserting a link
> to a regular page?

Editing the special pages is something which can only be done
programatically, or by a sysop.  I think we can and should make
the link a different color, but I'm sure a blinking link will
become distracting very quickly.

> 3)Is a namespace the same as an article and/or a page?

A namespace is a separate section of the site, which can have
any number of articles.  The part before the colon is
the namespace, and the part after is the name of a page.

We call them namespaces because they allow you to use
the same page names in multiple places.  For example
there is a page called "main page," and also a page in
the talk namespace called "main page."  So people know
which namespace they are in, all namespaces other than
the main article namespace are prefaced by Talk: or
User: or whatever the title of their namespace happens
to be.  This means that what used to be "Main Page/Talk"
should now be "Talk:Main Page."  This is not a subpage
of "Main Page" but a page in a separate section of the
wikipedia site devoted to talking about the main page.

The conversion script automatically changed all of
the zzz/talk pages into Talk:zzz for us.

> 4) Mark mentioned using parentheses rather than a
> slash in an article title to indicate what used
> to be a subpage (I think).  Does this mean that
> the article is independent, or that the parentheses
> associate it with a main article in a similar manner?
> How does this relate to the talk page generated
> with each article?

> (and for my own sanity, are they related at the same
> level or do sublevels even exist?)

Subpages automatically linked back to their root page
(the page before the /) and the software does not do
this anymore.  Subpages are no longer a part of
wikipedia.

> 5)If the system still functions in a way that says
> "subpage" to the users, is there any reason to even
> dicuss functionality?  It seems to be that the UI may
> still look like a duck and walk like a duck -- even if
> it doesn't talk like a duck behind the scenes -- so
> why not let the users think it is in fact a duck?

Because Larry, and others have argue strongly that
subpages are a bad idea.  Perhaps we need to post
a summary of why they believe this to be true.

We want people to stop thinking that they can
use the software to create a fixed hierarchy of
ideas in the wikipedia, or else we might end up
not being able to find an article on George
Washington because it is actually:

"Presidents/Washington,"
"Famous Generals/George Washington,"
"George Washington/Biography"

We can still set up hierarchies by using regular pages
with links, but we shouldn't be allowed to force the
use of a particular hierarchy on everybody...

I hope this helps.


body:
At 09:51 PM 2/21/02 -0500, Mark wrote:
> > 1)How do I create a special page (New
> > system features?) that will show up on the
> > sidebar?
>
>Right now this can only be done by changing the PHP code that runs the
>wikipedia.
>
> >2)Can we place a link at least on the recent
> > changes page and the homepage (could it be in a
> > different color and blink?) and how does inserting a
> > link to a special page differ from inserting a link
> > to a regular page?
>
>Editing the special pages is something which can only be done
>programatically, or by a sysop.  I think we can and should make
>the link a different color, but I'm sure a blinking link will
>become distracting very quickly.

Distracting is putting it mildly. For me, it would literally make the
Wikipedia unusable, because I would be unable to look at the pages
comfortable. I may not be the only contributor who has difficulties
with blinking objects, including Web links.

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


subject: [Wikitech-l] Background colors for namespaces

body:
I just committed some changes so each namespace can get its own background
color. The colors are stored in wikiTextEn.php as an array.

For the sake of our eyesight, please, help me change the colors to something
nice but distinguishable!

Magnus


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page

body:
OK, well, Magnus already knows about this, but since you ask!  :-)

I am logging into my Larry_Sanger account.  Rather, I am automatically
logged into that account, and even when I log out, and then log in using
"Larry Sanger" instead of "Larry_Sanger", when I go to any other page
other than the login page, I am shown logged in as Larry_Sanger and when
I'm logged in that way I don't have sysop rights.

So the point is, when I try to log in one way, I have rights, and when I
try to log in another way, I don't.

Maybe what you could do is just change the user_name with
user_rights=is_sysop to 'Larry_Sanger' from 'Larry Sanger'.

Larry

On Thu, 21 Feb 2002, Jimmy Wales wrote:

> mysql> select user_name,user_rights from user where user_rights='is_sysop';
> +--------------+-------------+
> | user_name    | user_rights |
> +--------------+-------------+
> | Jimbo Wales  | is_sysop    |
> | Larry Sanger | is_sysop    |
> +--------------+-------------+
> 2 rows in set (0.01 sec)
>
> It works for me.  I just tried logging in as you, and that works fine, too.
>
> What account are you logging into?
>
> --Jimbo
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page

body:
On Fri, 22 Feb 2002, Larry Sanger wrote:

> So the point is, when I try to log in one way, I have rights, and when I
> try to log in another way, I don't.

Oops, I've got to get back into the habit of proofreading what I write!
:-)

I meant to say: when I try to log in one way (as Larry_Sanger), I succeed
but don't have rights, and when I try to log in the other way (as Larry
Sanger), I don't succeed and don't have rights.

Larry


from_name: Julie Hofmann Kemp

subject: [Wikipedia-l] RE: Some answers and more questions for the gang

body:
Julie's comments preceded by ------

Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2002 19:56:49 -0500
To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
From: Vicki Rosenzweig <vr at redbird.org>
Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Re: Suggestions from Magnus, Mark, and Jimbo
Reply-To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com

At 03:16 PM 2/21/02 -0800, Julie Kemp wrote:

>Magnus -- I don't mean to offend, but you don't speak
>customer -- and I don't expect you to.  But to
>demonstrate my point, you just suggested I start a
>page (article?) with wikipedia: -- as if I know what
>that means!

I'm not sure I speak customer, but one of the things I've done as an
editor is translate, including between techies and non-techies, so I'll
try.

----That used to be my job, too...which is why I find this frustrating.
But not as much as about a week ago! ;-)

>Are you saying that, if I do that, it
>will create a special page and show up in the bar at
>the side?  I know you went to the FAQs and added
>stuff, but I really think you and the others are so
>closely involved in the programming side that you
>assume that we all get what you're talking about.

I don't know the answer to this.

>There are lots of people out there who have
>programming backgrounds -- but lots more who don't.
>You also seem to think users are intelligent beings.

Users are intelligent beings. That they don't speak tech doesn't change
this, any more than my not speaking Chinese makes me stupid.

-----Um....I was speaking from a training perspective.  One has to
assume absolutely no knowledge as well as a desire to know only what
immediately affects the user, in order to make sure that the info can be
assimilated by everybody.  Perhaps intelligent wasn't the best word
choice -- but having dealt with users a lot, my experience has been that
some of the smartest people I've met (except the techs) turn glassy-eyed
when faced with technical details.  The information should be there for
people who actually have an interest in software design, etc., but my
experience in training has taught me that too much information (without
understanding it fully) leads to a lot more frustration and a LOT of
requests for changes that drive programmers up the wall.  Plus, most
users (of any software) really do   have a profound lack of interest in
how the program works -- they just want it up and running.  Kind of like
car owners -- most folks just want the car to run, and do the least they
can themselves to keep it up and running.   (oil? Water? Huh? ;-) )

>Sorry, but years in customer service and training
>(including training in DSL, telco processes and an
>online SQL-based transaction coordination package)
>have taught me that you have to teach to the lowest
>common denominator.  Even people who are really bright
>about most things have trouble getting their heads
>round computer stuff.

Okay, but I don't think it helps to suggest that we're creating an
encyclopedia written and edited primarily by the unintelligent. <snip>
>3)Is a namespace the same as an article and/or a page?

No. A namespace is a set of articles. "Talk:" is a namespace. So is
"User:" Like the main wikipedia, they can have unlimited numbers of
articles within them.

-----That helps immensely -- now, when an article is created in the main
wikipedia namespace, does it not automatically create a related talk
page in the "talk:"  namespace?   I'd like to be able to explain this in
a way that keeps people from adding /Talk at the bottom of all "their"
articles.

>4) Mark mentioned using parentheses rather than a
>slash in an article title to indicate what used to be
>a subpage (I think).  Does this mean that the article
>is independent, or that the parentheses associate it
>with a main article in a similar manner? How does this
>relate to the talk page generated with each article?
>(and for my own sanity, are they related at the same
>level or do sublevels even exist?)

The parentheses are to distinguish between two or more things of the
same name. Rather than have subpages, the wikipedia now uses a "flat"
namespace--everything is on the same level. (The following examples are
invented, probably not reflecting current actual wikipedia content.)
"Niger (river)" and "Niger (country)" distinguish between two entities
of the same name. Sometimes we can avoid parentheses by careful naming:
the former article could be named "River Niger," for example. But
neither is part of the other.

I don't think we have subpages anymore; if I'm wrong, please, would one
of the programmers correct me?
----we don't

>5)If the system still functions in a way that says
>"subpage" to the users, is there any reason to even
>dicuss functionality?  It seems to be that the UI may
>still look like a duck and walk like a duck -- even if
>it doesn't talk like a duck behind the scenes -- so
>why not let the users think it is in fact a duck?

Does it function that way, though?

We allow the specific existence of "Talk" pages--but we don't want other
subpages. If we make it look and talk like a duck, and call it a duck,
people will start creating a whole flock of other waterfowl.

I hope some of this helps.
-----It does.  And I think that it just needs to be more accessible.
--
Vicki Rosenzweig
vr at redbird.org
http://www.redbird.org

-----And from Magnus:

I expanded the http://www.wikipedia.com/wiki/Wikipedia:PHP_script_FAQ
page a little. Please check if this is sufficient (for the questions
asked, of course). Feel free to write a manual (or something) in your
own words, based on your experiences and this page. If you do so, it
would be nice to put it into the wikipedia namespace. To do this, just
call it [[wikipedia:My little manual]] instead of [[My little manual]]
;)

----Read what you've written, and I think it still needs to be less
techie.  What if I just wrote out a bunch of text (a user translation,
so to speak) and sent it to one of you guys/gals to proof, and then you
could create a "Changes to the System" or "New System features" special
page.  I say this because that way it would be really obvious.  The
problem is that, unless people know where to look, they don't know how
to search... ;-)  For example, PHP script FAQ assumes that users know
what PHP script is -- and that it has something to do with posting
articles.  I would also take what you and Vicki and Mark have explained
about namespaces, weed it a bit, and then NOT use the word namespace so
often.  Even if not accurate, I think there are probably non-tech words
that are more easily understood -- analogies can be our friends!

----Also, would it be possible to have a link on every page (at least
for now) to the Bug reports?  When I hit an error, it would be so much
nicer to be able to describe it immediately, rather than finding
"utilities", "bugs", go back and forth several times to make sure I
documented everything... Or maybe just put a "utilities" link on
everypage (or in the side bar.

Or add more questions to the FAQ page; we'll try to answer them as
customer as we can...

----Actually, I think it would be good to duplicate the info in several
places...people approach things in different ways.  There are still
people who don't know what FAQs are!

Thanks to all of you guys (in the both-genders-inclusive sense) for your
help!!

Julie

_________________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com


from_name: David Jones

subject: [Wikipedia-l] History of pages, author issues.

body:
In message <2100F5D84712D411A00E00B0D0221D1A972B19 at kodiak.htec.com>, Mark Chris
tensen writes:
>
> So, I'd like to see if we couldn't get old.wikipedia.com up and running, as
> it does not seem like we are making much progress on importing the old
> history into the new mySQL database.

I documented the format of the UseModWiki keep files (as that was one
claimed barrier).  I did offer to write a script to convert keep files,
but I need a reasonable sized UseModWiki repository to test.  Anyone got
one?  Less than 2 MB would make my download bearable.  I don't think the
script would be very hard to write.

Cheers,
 drj


body:
On ven, 2002-02-22 at 02:33, Jan Hidders wrote:
> From: "Brion Vibber" <brion at pobox.com>
> >
> > Ugh. Doable, though. Presumably the point of this is so that someone can
> > type either:
> >   ?  (actual o-with-umlaut in the display character encoding)
> >   ö
> >   Ö
> >   Ö
> >   Ö
> > or any number of other alternatives in the edit box and put the same
> > actual sequence of bytes into the data?
>
> Exactly.
>
> > Also remember that we'll still have to escape entities that _aren't_ in
> > the display character set in all edit boxes, so that they won't be
> > disappeared or converted into "?"s when the user hits submit. (I'm
> > assuming that you don't want to put the raw HTML entities for _every_
> > non-ASCII character into the edit box appearing as the entity codes? See
> > my previous message on this subject for why that's a Very Bad Idea.)
>
> No, no, of course not.  What I meant was that we check what the display
> character encoding (I said character set, but that is probably not the right
> word) is that is given with the request. Suppose someone asks for an edit
> page and the browser tells us that it uses ISO-8859-5 (which supports
> Cyrillic) then we present the contents of the edit box such that all
> entities that have a direct encoding in  ISO-8859-5 are translated and all
> the other entities simply stay themselves. I think we need
> multibyte-character support for this.

(Not necessarily, just lots of transliteration tables. Or perhaps
compile in iconv support... does iconv allow partial transliteration
between HTML entities and other character sets? ie, HTML entities that
are not in the destination charset are left intact?)

> The nice thing about this would be that you can cut'n paste anything from
> any other Wikipedia by cutting it from the edit box.

If I understand correctly, you're suggesting that the default character
encoding should *not* be based on the language used, but on some ability
of the browser to specify a preferred encoding (for instance, the HTTP
Accept-Charset header), such that the same user would see wikipedias in
different languages come up with the same character encoding?

I'm not convinced that the default value of that would always (or even
often) be acceptable, and most users won't know how to change it.
Simple, obvious at first sight manual switching between UTF-8 and a
standard transliteration format is a non-negotiable requirement for the
Esperanto 'pedia, so retaining the manual override is necessary.

> > > The main thing is to define the translation functions:
> > >
> > > - string encodeEntities ( mb-string external-string, string
> character-set )
> > > - mb-string decodeEntities ( string internal-string, string
> character-set )
> > >
> > > (With mb-string I mean a multi-byte character string.)
> >
> > cf $wikiRecodeInput(), $wikiRecodeOutput() if you want a ready place to
> > do this.
>
> It doesn't have the right arguments. But these are implementation details.
> We first should agree on the architecture.

There's no character set argument because that's a global variable. At
present $wikiCharset specifies the default encoding (that used in the
database), and optional alternate external encodings are in
$wikiCharsetEncodings[] with the user-selected index in
$user->options["encoding"].

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


body:
From: "Brion Vibber" <brion at pobox.com>
>
> Ugh. Doable, though. Presumably the point of this is so that someone can
> type either:
>   ?  (actual o-with-umlaut in the display character encoding)
>   ö
>   Ö
>   Ö
>   Ö
> or any number of other alternatives in the edit box and put the same
> actual sequence of bytes into the data?

Exactly.

> Also remember that we'll still have to escape entities that _aren't_ in
> the display character set in all edit boxes, so that they won't be
> disappeared or converted into "?"s when the user hits submit. (I'm
> assuming that you don't want to put the raw HTML entities for _every_
> non-ASCII character into the edit box appearing as the entity codes? See
> my previous message on this subject for why that's a Very Bad Idea.)

No, no, of course not.  What I meant was that we check what the display
character encoding (I said character set, but that is probably not the right
word) is that is given with the request. Suppose someone asks for an edit
page and the browser tells us that it uses ISO-8859-5 (which supports
Cyrillic) then we present the contents of the edit box such that all
entities that have a direct encoding in  ISO-8859-5 are translated and all
the other entities simply stay themselves. I think we need
multibyte-character support for this.

The nice thing about this would be that you can cut'n paste anything from
any other Wikipedia by cutting it from the edit box.

> > The main thing is to define the translation functions:
> >
> > - string encodeEntities ( mb-string external-string, string
character-set )
> > - mb-string decodeEntities ( string internal-string, string
character-set )
> >
> > (With mb-string I mean a multi-byte character string.)
>
> cf $wikiRecodeInput(), $wikiRecodeOutput() if you want a ready place to
> do this.

It doesn't have the right arguments. But these are implementation details.
We first should agree on the architecture.

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page

body:
I'll just give all the Larry Sangers sysop.  :-)

Larry Sanger wrote:

> OK, well, Magnus already knows about this, but since you ask!  :-)
>
> I am logging into my Larry_Sanger account.  Rather, I am automatically
> logged into that account, and even when I log out, and then log in using
> "Larry Sanger" instead of "Larry_Sanger", when I go to any other page
> other than the login page, I am shown logged in as Larry_Sanger and when
> I'm logged in that way I don't have sysop rights.
>
> So the point is, when I try to log in one way, I have rights, and when I
> try to log in another way, I don't.
>
> Maybe what you could do is just change the user_name with
> user_rights=is_sysop to 'Larry_Sanger' from 'Larry Sanger'.
>
> Larry
>
> On Thu, 21 Feb 2002, Jimmy Wales wrote:
>
> > mysql> select user_name,user_rights from user where user_rights='is_sysop';
> > +--------------+-------------+
> > | user_name    | user_rights |
> > +--------------+-------------+
> > | Jimbo Wales  | is_sysop    |
> > | Larry Sanger | is_sysop    |
> > +--------------+-------------+
> > 2 rows in set (0.01 sec)
> >
> > It works for me.  I just tried logging in as you, and that works fine, too.
> >
> > What account are you logging into?
> >
> > --Jimbo
> > [Wikipedia-l]
> > To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> > http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
> >
>
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page

body:
Larry Sanger wrote:
> I meant to say: when I try to log in one way (as Larry_Sanger), I succeed
> but don't have rights, and when I try to log in the other way (as Larry
> Sanger), I don't succeed and don't have rights.

O.k., I will give both of them rights, then.

But this is still odd -- I can log in as either Larry_Sanger or Larry Sanger, and
both work fine, as far as I can tell.  So whatever problem you are having with
Larry Sanger is still a mystery.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

in_reply_to: <ILENJBCFHGHELEBFPPBGAEJKCFAA.Magnus.Manske@epost.de>; from Magnus.Manske@epost.de on Fri, Feb 22, 2002 at 10:45:50PM +0100

body:
Magnus Manske wrote:
> - Should we introduce some users with a "trusted" status? So some "old
> hands" could do some maintnance, like permanently deleting obsolete pages,
> without access to the really crucial functions like direct database access.

One idea I had seems very doable and very useful.

One of the main reasons we want to delete some pages is so that
underlined links go back to being questionmark links, tempting the
reader to write something.  (And also making the link show up on most
requested, and so on.)

For that purpose, the side-effect of deletion, which is to delete the
history as well, is just that: a side-effect.  We don't really need it.

Since any user can delete all the text anyway, it would not hurt for
them to be able to delete the page, too.... that is, IF they don't
also automatically delete the history.

There can be reasons to delete the history, of course!  Sometimes the
history will just be so very wrong that we must delete it.  Maybe it
will be a copyright violation, or maybe it will be just really
mean-spirited or something.

But in most cases where we want to delete pages, they're just silly,
and there's not much harm done in leaving the history.

--Jimbo


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page

body:
This looks exactly as it should to me.

Jimbo, try to look for other "versions" like "Larry_Sanger",
"Larry_Sanger1", "Larry Sanger1" etc., as these might interfere with the
"real Larry" ;)

Otherwise, I don't see a reason why it shouldn't work.

Magnus

> -----Original Message-----
> From: wikipedia-l-admin at nupedia.com
> [mailto:wikipedia-l-admin at nupedia.com]On Behalf Of Jimmy Wales
> Sent: Friday, February 22, 2002 12:44 AM
> To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page
>
>
> mysql> select user_name,user_rights from user where
> user_rights='is_sysop';
> +--------------+-------------+
> | user_name    | user_rights |
> +--------------+-------------+
> | Jimbo Wales  | is_sysop    |
> | Larry Sanger | is_sysop    |
> +--------------+-------------+
> 2 rows in set (0.01 sec)
>
> It works for me.  I just tried logging in as you, and that works
> fine, too.
>
> What account are you logging into?
>
> --Jimbo
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


body:
Dear Julie,

I am not offended by you (though I might get a little annoyed if you keep
claiming that I am;)

I expanded the http://www.wikipedia.com/wiki/Wikipedia:PHP_script_FAQ page a
little. Please check if this is sufficient (for the questions asked, of
course). Feel free to write a manual (or something) in your own words, based
on your experiences and this page. If you do so, it would be nice to put it
into the wikipedia namespace. To do this, just call it [[wikipedia:My little
manual]] instead of [[My little manual]] ;)

Or add more questions to the FAQ page; we'll try to answer them as customer
as we can...

Magnus


subject: [Wikitech-l] recent changes linked

body:
From: "Dan Keshet" <dkesh at channel1.com>
>
> I've had this itch for a while, and I've finally scratched it: being
> able to display the recent changes of all pages that are linked to
> from a particular page.

I certainly like the idea, but Magnus is the boss. I hope you are using the
new linked table and not the local variable $linked_link, because the latter
is depreciated and I am trying very hard to make them obsolete.

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikitech-l] recent changes linked

body:
----- Original Message -----
From: "Magnus Manske" <Magnus.Manske at epost.de>
To: "Jan Hidders" <hidders at uia.ua.ac.be>
Sent: Friday, February 22, 2002 3:48 PM
Subject: RE: [Wikitech-l] recent changes linked

> I checked the online example, and it would be great to have such a thing
in
> the sidebar!
>
> Jan, as you are working on the link table, could you get the code and try
to
> integrate it, if you have time?

But of course. Send me the code and I'll adapt it and add it to the sidebar.

-- Jan Hidders


from_name: Gareth Owen

subject: [Wikipedia-l] A feature request

body:
The colour coding of the "diffs" don't serve much of a purpose.
How I'd like them to work (and IIRC, how they used to work), is for the
colours to highlight much smaller
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Original text:
Gareth Owen is a short fat Welshman
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Revised
Gareth Owen is a short thin Welshman
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
only the words "fat" and "thin" would be highlighted (making it much easier to
locate altered text in long paragraphs.)

Anyone who's used 'M-x ediff' in emacs will know what I'm talking about.
--
Gareth Owen
"Wikipedia does rock.  By the count on the "brilliant prose" page, there
 are 14 not-bad articles so far" -- Larry Sanger (12 Jan 2001)


subject: [Wikipedia-l] A feature request

in_reply_to: Gareth Owen's message of "22 Feb 2002 16:07:16 +0000"

body:
Oh another thing.  I also believe it'd be easier to read if laid out like
this...

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is the first paragraph.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is the modified first paragraph
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is the second paragraph
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is the second paragraph, as modified
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

And so on...

--
Gareth Owen
"Wikipedia does rock.  By the count on the "brilliant prose" page, there
 are 14 not-bad articles so far" -- Larry Sanger (12 Jan 2001)


subject: [Wikitech-l] update: lonley pages

body:
Highly esteemed colleagues, :-)

I've optimzed the database access of the lonely-pages-page and committed it
to CVS. You can now actually wait for the result to appear. :-)

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page

body:
On Fri, 22 Feb 2002, Jimmy Wales wrote:

> I'll just give all the Larry Sangers sysop.  :-)

Yessss!  That worked!

We are very grateful.  ;-)

Larry

>
> Larry Sanger wrote:
>
> > OK, well, Magnus already knows about this, but since you ask!  :-)
> >
> > I am logging into my Larry_Sanger account.  Rather, I am automatically
> > logged into that account, and even when I log out, and then log in using
> > "Larry Sanger" instead of "Larry_Sanger", when I go to any other page
> > other than the login page, I am shown logged in as Larry_Sanger and when
> > I'm logged in that way I don't have sysop rights.
> >
> > So the point is, when I try to log in one way, I have rights, and when I
> > try to log in another way, I don't.
> >
> > Maybe what you could do is just change the user_name with
> > user_rights=is_sysop to 'Larry_Sanger' from 'Larry Sanger'.
> >
> > Larry
> >
> > On Thu, 21 Feb 2002, Jimmy Wales wrote:
> >
> > > mysql> select user_name,user_rights from user where user_rights='is_sysop';
> > > +--------------+-------------+
> > > | user_name    | user_rights |
> > > +--------------+-------------+
> > > | Jimbo Wales  | is_sysop    |
> > > | Larry Sanger | is_sysop    |
> > > +--------------+-------------+
> > > 2 rows in set (0.01 sec)
> > >
> > > It works for me.  I just tried logging in as you, and that works fine, too.
> > >
> > > What account are you logging into?
> > >
> > > --Jimbo
> > > [Wikipedia-l]
> > > To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> > > http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
> > >
> >
> > [Wikipedia-l]
> > To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> > http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

body:
On Fri, 22 Feb 2002, Magnus Manske wrote:

> Some things we should consider:
>
> - Should we re-integrate the meta.wikipedia as a "meta:" namespace?

If we can have a separate "Recent Changes" page, sounds good to me.

> - Should we then (or anyway;) enable each user to select the namespaces he
> wants to see on the Recent Changes?

That would be one way to accomplish the above!  Interesting!

> - Should we then turn the meta namespace on or off by default?

Off; on the other hand, as soon as the majority of the people who are
interested in Meta-W. turn it on, all the changes will be intruding
side-by-side with other changes, which is a bad thing, I think.

> - Should we introduce some users with a "trusted" status? So some "old
> hands" could do some maintnance, like permanently deleting obsolete pages,
> without access to the really crucial functions like direct database access.

Generally, I'm opposed to this, for reasons we've rehearsed (regarding
that cabal thing, y'know :-) ).  Unless there really is a need for this
that I'm not seeing right now.

Larry


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

body:
On Fri, 22 Feb 2002, Jo?o M?rio Miranda wrote:

> Magnus Manske wrote:
> >
> > Some things we should consider:
> >
> > - Should we re-integrate the meta.wikipedia as a "meta:" namespace?
>
> What's going on at the spanish wikipedia is a result of lack of
> comunication betwen the english wikipedia and the international
> projects. We need to improve communication betwen projects.

Actually, that was the whole point of intlwiki-l.  It was the precise
stated aim of that list, in fact, to improve communication between
projects.

> There
> are two possible solutions:
>
> keep a neutral place for discussion: meta.wikipedia.com

This is a pretty solid argument for keeping it where it is.  Hadn't
thought of that.

> integrate all the international projects in the same wiki:
> es.wikipedia.com would become: "es:" namespace.

That would be bad for people on non-English Wikipedias whose links
currently do not begin with "es:" or "fr:" etc.

Larry


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

body:
On Fri, 22 Feb 2002, Jimmy Wales wrote:

> Magnus Manske wrote:
> > - Should we introduce some users with a "trusted" status? So some "old
> > hands" could do some maintnance, like permanently deleting obsolete pages,
> > without access to the really crucial functions like direct database access.
>
> One idea I had seems very doable and very useful.
>
> One of the main reasons we want to delete some pages is so that
> underlined links go back to being questionmark links, tempting the
> reader to write something.  (And also making the link show up on most
> requested, and so on.)
>
> For that purpose, the side-effect of deletion, which is to delete the
> history as well, is just that: a side-effect.  We don't really need it.

I totally agree, by the way!  There's no reason we shouldn't do this!

Larry


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

body:
On Fri, 22 Feb 2002, Magnus Manske wrote:

> But:
> * There's a good, extensive article in the 'pedia
> * Some troll deletes it (leaving the history intact)
> * To everyone, it seems that there is no article
> * Someone writes a two-line stub, not realizing that there's a much better
> article in the history
> This would not be good, right?

The only difference between this and the current situation is what,
*exactly*?

> I was thinking about the "page titles to be deleted" list, and some of the
> empty or silly orphans. No need to accumulate that stuff in the database.

So, yes--retain the ability to permanently delete pages.

Larry


body:
> Okay, but I don't think it helps to suggest that we're creating an
> encyclopedia written and edited primarily by the unintelligent. <snip>
> >3)Is a namespace the same as an article and/or a page?
>
> No. A namespace is a set of articles. "Talk:" is a namespace. So is
> "User:" Like the main wikipedia, they can have unlimited numbers of
> articles within them.
>
> -----That helps immensely -- now, when an article is created in the main
> wikipedia namespace, does it not automatically create a related talk
> page in the "talk:"  namespace?   I'd like to be able to explain this in
> a way that keeps people from adding /Talk at the bottom of all "their"
> articles.

Yes, every article gets a matching talk namespace. For the "blank" (main)
namespace, this is "talk:". For the "wikipedia:" namespace, it is "wikipedia
talk:"; and for "user:", it is "user talk:".
In other words, all namespaces get their own talk namespace, except for
"talk:", "special:", and "log:".
See the FAQ page for more details on the namespaces and what they mean.

> ----Read what you've written, and I think it still needs to be less
> techie.  What if I just wrote out a bunch of text (a user translation,
> so to speak) and sent it to one of you guys/gals to proof, and then you
> could create a "Changes to the System" or "New System features" special
> page.  I say this because that way it would be really obvious.  The
> problem is that, unless people know where to look, they don't know how
> to search... ;-)  For example, PHP script FAQ assumes that users know
> what PHP script is -- and that it has something to do with posting
> articles.  I would also take what you and Vicki and Mark have explained
> about namespaces, weed it a bit, and then NOT use the word namespace so
> often.  Even if not accurate, I think there are probably non-tech words
> that are more easily understood -- analogies can be our friends!

Sure. Mail it to me (or to wikitech-l), and tell me where to put it, or just
put it up yourself and tell us where it is so we can "proofread" it. This
*is* a wiki system we're using ;)

> ----Also, would it be possible to have a link on every page (at least
> for now) to the Bug reports?  When I hit an error, it would be so much
> nicer to be able to describe it immediately, rather than finding
> "utilities", "bugs", go back and forth several times to make sure I
> documented everything... Or maybe just put a "utilities" link on
> everypage (or in the side bar.

I'll do that; it might take some time before it goes online, though.

> Or add more questions to the FAQ page; we'll try to answer them as
> customer as we can...
>
> ----Actually, I think it would be good to duplicate the info in several
> places...people approach things in different ways.  There are still
> people who don't know what FAQs are!

Just set up some redirects!

> Thanks to all of you guys (in the both-genders-inclusive sense) for your
> help!!

while(++support);    (Techie for "we help where we can";)


from_name: Lars Aronsson

subject: [Wikitech-l] recent changes linked

body:
When I saw Dan's prototype for "Recent Changes of Linked Pages", I was
thinking: What if this could be a personal setting, that doesn't have
to be available for everybody (if they don't want it).  And what if
each user (who is a programmer) could program their own website based
on the Wikipedia contents, or based on any Wiki site for that matter.
This could be done if a website, such as Dan's projectmosaic.org, only
contained the framework and made on-the-fly "web services" calls to
wikipedia.com for the contents of each page.  Web services is a sort
of RPC (remote procedure calls) using XML over HTTP.  One problem
might be that the suggested ads would have to be part of the contents
served by Wikipedia, or else Wikipedia would have to serve contents
without any exposure of ads.  Perhaps this would be solved by only
allowing web services calls from logged-in users.

Has anybody tried a multi-level wiki based on web services?  Is it a
good or bad idea?

If these general thoughts have too little to do with Wikipedia, where
should I rather post them?

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


from_name: João Mário Miranda

subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

body:
Magnus Manske wrote:
>
> Some things we should consider:
>
> - Should we re-integrate the meta.wikipedia as a "meta:" namespace?

What's going on at the spanish wikipedia is a result of lack of
comunication betwen the english wikipedia and the international
projects. We need to improve communication betwen projects. There
are two possible solutions:

keep a neutral place for discussion: meta.wikipedia.com

or

integrate all the international projects in the same wiki:
es.wikipedia.com would become: "es:" namespace.

Joao
http://www.nonio.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

body:
Some things we should consider:

- Should we re-integrate the meta.wikipedia as a "meta:" namespace?
- Should we then (or anyway;) enable each user to select the namespaces he
wants to see on the Recent Changes?
- Should we then turn the meta namespace on or off by default?

and

- Should we introduce some users with a "trusted" status? So some "old
hands" could do some maintnance, like permanently deleting obsolete pages,
without access to the really crucial functions like direct database access.

Thoughts? Comments? Bribes? ;)

Magnus


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page

body:
I guess the problem comes from the fact that there *are* two or them, with
"Larry_Sanger" being the internal, "secure" form of "Larry Sanger". My
advice would be to manually remove "Larry_Sanger" from the database. That
should not affect the user page or other user-related functions.

Magnus

> -----Original Message-----
> From: wikipedia-l-admin at nupedia.com
> [mailto:wikipedia-l-admin at nupedia.com]On Behalf Of Jimmy Wales
> Sent: Friday, February 22, 2002 9:27 PM
> To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Changes page
>
>
> Larry Sanger wrote:
> > I meant to say: when I try to log in one way (as Larry_Sanger),
> I succeed
> > but don't have rights, and when I try to log in the other way (as Larry
> > Sanger), I don't succeed and don't have rights.
>
> O.k., I will give both of them rights, then.
>
> But this is still odd -- I can log in as either Larry_Sanger or
> Larry Sanger, and
> both work fine, as far as I can tell.  So whatever problem you
> are having with
> Larry Sanger is still a mystery.
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

body:
But:
* There's a good, extensive article in the 'pedia
* Some troll deletes it (leaving the history intact)
* To everyone, it seems that there is no article
* Someone writes a two-line stub, not realizing that there's a much better
article in the history
This would not be good, right?

I was thinking about the "page titles to be deleted" list, and some of the
empty or silly orphans. No need to accumulate that stuff in the database.

Magnus

> -----Original Message-----
> From: wikipedia-l-admin at nupedia.com
> [mailto:wikipedia-l-admin at nupedia.com]On Behalf Of Jimmy Wales
> Sent: Friday, February 22, 2002 10:48 PM
> To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?
>
>
> Magnus Manske wrote:
> > - Should we introduce some users with a "trusted" status? So some "old
> > hands" could do some maintnance, like permanently deleting
> obsolete pages,
> > without access to the really crucial functions like direct
> database access.
>
> One idea I had seems very doable and very useful.
>
> One of the main reasons we want to delete some pages is so that
> underlined links go back to being questionmark links, tempting the
> reader to write something.  (And also making the link show up on most
> requested, and so on.)
>
> For that purpose, the side-effect of deletion, which is to delete the
> history as well, is just that: a side-effect.  We don't really need it.
>
> Since any user can delete all the text anyway, it would not hurt for
> them to be able to delete the page, too.... that is, IF they don't
> also automatically delete the history.
>
> There can be reasons to delete the history, of course!  Sometimes the
> history will just be so very wrong that we must delete it.  Maybe it
> will be a copyright violation, or maybe it will be just really
> mean-spirited or something.
>
> But in most cases where we want to delete pages, they're just silly,
> and there's not much harm done in leaving the history.
>
> --Jimbo
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l


subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

body:
> > - Should we re-integrate the meta.wikipedia as a "meta:" namespace?
> If we can have a separate "Recent Changes" page, sounds good to me.

Will this mean that within any meta page, a link to another meta page
will have to be written using [[meta: ...]] ?  Cause this is how it
works for the talk: and user: namespaces today, isn't it?  Or would
normal [[links]] stay within that namespace, and you would write
[[unmeta: ...]] to get back to the English Wikipedia?  Or how would it
work?

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


from_name: koyaanisqatsi at nupedia.com

subject: [Wikipedia-l] subpages

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subject: [Wikipedia-l] subpages

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subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

body:
> > But:
> > * There's a good, extensive article in the 'pedia
> > * Some troll deletes it (leaving the history intact)
> > * To everyone, it seems that there is no article
> > * Someone writes a two-line stub, not realizing that there's a
> much better
> > article in the history
> > This would not be good, right?
>
> The only difference between this and the current situation is what,
> *exactly*?

Currently, you see that an article exists, and if it is blank, you will
probably have a look at the history. If the article is deleted, you might
miss the history even though it is still stored.

>
> > I was thinking about the "page titles to be deleted" list, and
> some of the
> > empty or silly orphans. No need to accumulate that stuff in the
> database.
>
> So, yes--retain the ability to permanently delete pages.

Sure we do. But currently, you and Jimbo are the only ones who *can*
permanently delete pages. Jimbo is too busy to do that, and AFAIK, you are
currently as well (job, wife,...;)
That's the reason I suggested the "trusted" status, to get some work off
your shoulders (and actually done, look at the "page titles to be deleted"!)
without compromising security.
I don't think we'll get the "cabal" discussion again about this one, as we
are not reducing user rights, merely expanding them for some. And, we could
still give The Cunctator trusted status - noone could complain about the
cabal THEN! :)

Magnus


subject: [Wikipedia-l] country subpages

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from_name: Chuck Smith

subject: [Wikipedia-l] country subpages

body:
> * History of Afghanistan
> * Geography of Afghanistan
> * People of Afghanistan
> * Government of Afghanistan
> * Economy of Afghanistan
> * Communications in Afghanistan
> * Transportation in Afghanistan
> * Military of Afghanistan
> * Foreign relations of Afghanistan
>
Why not simply:

* Afghanistan history
* Afghanistan geography
* Afghanistan people
* ...
* Afghanistan transportation
* Afghanistan military
* Afghanistan foreign relations

Chuck

=====
Come to my homepage!  Venu al mia hejmpagxo!
http://amuzulo.babil.komputilo.org/
====
Venu al la senpaga, libera enciklopedio
esperanta reta! http://eo.wikipedia.com/

_________________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Informaci?n de Estados Unidos y Am?rica Latina, en Yahoo! Noticias.
Vis?tanos en http://noticias.espanol.yahoo.com


subject: [Wikipedia-l] country subpages

body:
At 02:02 PM 2/23/02 -0600, Chuck wrote:
> > * History of Afghanistan
> > * Geography of Afghanistan
> > * People of Afghanistan
> > * Government of Afghanistan
> > * Economy of Afghanistan
> > * Communications in Afghanistan
> > * Transportation in Afghanistan
> > * Military of Afghanistan
> > * Foreign relations of Afghanistan
> >
>Why not simply:
>
>* Afghanistan history
>* Afghanistan geography
>* Afghanistan people
>* ...
>* Afghanistan transportation
>* Afghanistan military
>* Afghanistan foreign relations

I prefer Koyanisqaatsi's approach to naming. "Afghanistan history" looks odd
to me because it should be "Afghan history"; when we get to the F's, I'll want
"French geography," not "France geography." This doesn't apply for every
possibility: "United States government" is correct, for example.

The other, broader question to consider is whether we want a stack of small
pages for history, geography, etc. of each country: "history" probably,
geography
might well go better as a paragraph or two in the article on "Afghanistan." At
least if we're still working with CIA World Factbook data--a good, long,
detailed
article could be written (by someone more up on the area than I) about the
geography of Afghanistan, and how that has affected its history, politics,
and culture.

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


body:
From: "Brion Vibber" <brion at pobox.com>
> On ven, 2002-02-22 at 02:33, Jan Hidders wrote:
> >
> > No, no, of course not.  What I meant was that we check what the display
> > character encoding (I said character set, but that is probably not the
right
> > word) is that is given with the request. [....]
>
> (Not necessarily, just lots of transliteration tables. Or perhaps
> compile in iconv support... does iconv allow partial transliteration
> between HTML entities and other character sets? ie, HTML entities that
> are not in the destination charset are left intact?)

Ah, I didn't know iconv. My guess would be that it doesn't know about
entities because the default behaviour should be that it doesn't and I don't
see any flags to indicate that it should.

> > The nice thing about this would be that you can cut'n paste anything
from
> > any other Wikipedia by cutting it from the edit box.
>
> If I understand correctly, you're suggesting that the default character
> encoding should *not* be based on the language used, but on some ability
> of the browser to specify a preferred encoding (for instance, the HTTP
> Accept-Charset header), such that the same user would see wikipedias in
> different languages come up with the same character encoding?

Yes, and the accept-charset header is indeed the meta-tag I was thinking of.

> I'm not convinced that the default value of that would always (or even
> often) be acceptable, and most users won't know how to change it.

Can you give an example? What is at the moment the behaviour of the
Esperanto Wikipedia?

> Simple, obvious at first sight manual switching between UTF-8 and a
> standard transliteration format is a non-negotiable requirement for the
> Esperanto 'pedia, so retaining the manual override is necessary.

Of course, users will still be able to choose their encoding (provided they
log in). Note that I was only talking about the editable boxes such as the
edit box and the search box. It makes sense to me to ask people to log in if
 they want special behavior there. The encoding for presentation of pages is
another matter that can be decided separately.

> > > cf $wikiRecodeInput(), $wikiRecodeOutput() if you want a ready place
to
> > > do this.
> >
> > It doesn't have the right arguments. But these are implementation
details.
> > We first should agree on the architecture.
>
> There's no character set argument because that's a global variable. At
> present $wikiCharset specifies the default encoding (that used in the
> database),

Ok, then it would be the right place. But note that for indexing reasons the
meaning of the variable that you gave can no longer be correct. The encoding
in the database *has*  to be different from the representation in the edit
box and there may even be another encoding used for representing the page.

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikipedia-l] subpages

body:
That could be done, but we (I) would have to know what to convert, and into
what format.

Would that be [[Egypt/History]] => [[Egypt (History)]]? Or rather =>
[[History of Egypt]]? Same for Geography, or different? And so on.

I suggest making this a function that is available only for sysops in the
sidebar. I am certain that Larry will be most eager to deconstruct some
subpages ;)

A similar function is planned for moving/renaming pages, including subpages
(for example, to move them to the wikipedia namespace).

Should we attempt to convert all links to these pages automatically, or
should we use #REDIRECTs? The former would be more elegant, but also more
complicated, while the latter is rather simple but crude.

Magnus

> -----Original Message-----
> From: wikipedia-l-admin at nupedia.com
> [mailto:wikipedia-l-admin at nupedia.com]On Behalf Of
> koyaanisqatsi at nupedia.com
> Sent: Saturday, February 23, 2002 5:10 PM
> To: wikipedia-l at nupedia.com
> Subject: [Wikipedia-l] subpages
>
>
> Hello, I wondered if any of the programmers out there could help
> me.  When I first started contributing to wikipedia, I took it
> upon myself to add all the country info in the CIA World
> Factbook.  This was before Larry hashed out all the consequences
> of subpages, and so I just followed the established model instead
> of creating a new one.  Now all the countries of the world except
> for a few of the A's are in subpage format, and between all the
> individual entries and the [[countries of the world]] page,
> that's a lot of influence towards creating subpages.  I've worked
> on converting the pages, but the process is slow and tedious.  So
> I wanted to know if it would be possible to write a script to
> convert those pages, and if anyone out there has the time and
> inclination to do so.  I'd do it myself except my last
> programming experience was in BASIC.  <g>
>
> thanks,
>
> kq
>
> p.s. I really don't know how long it might take to write this
> script, so if it's some ridiculous amount of time, just forget about it.0


subject: [Wikitech-l] update: new special page "watch page links" is ready

body:
L.S.,

The code donated by Dan Keshet has been integrated. You can find it in the
Quick bar under the name ''watch page links". Not a very good name, but I
couldn't think of a better one that would fit.

I have also optimzed the SQL for the what-links-here page for the new
linked/unlinked tables.

Finally, I added some code to the watchlist page to deal with pages on the
watch-list that no longer exist. A remaining problem is that users cannot
delete such pages from their watch list.

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikipedia-l] subpages

body:
Magnus Manske wrote:
> Would that be [[Egypt/History]] => [[Egypt (History)]]? Or rather =>
> [[History of Egypt]]? Same for Geography, or different? And so on.

The current work, at least for the /History pages, is to use the form
"History of Egypt".

I've started to rename some /History pages in this fashion.  I also
make sure I change all old links to [[Egypt/History]] into links to
[[History of Egypt]], so that the "pages that link here" link will
work as expected.  (It would help if links to redirects were rendered
in a different color.)  I also wikify any years and dates that would
be useful, and add a context at the top of the article, something like
this:

    This is the [[history]] of [[Egypt]].
    See also the [[history of Africa]] and the
    [[history of present-day nations and states]].

See also
http://www.wikipedia.com/wiki/History_of_present-day_nations_and_states
and
http://www.wikipedia.com/wiki/user:LA2

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


subject: [Wikipedia-l] country subpages

body:
Chuck Smith wrote:
> Why not simply:
> * Afghanistan history

One argument against that form of name is that it is harder to use as
a link from another page.  I can easily write:

    Charles Darwin was very interested
    in the [[history of Afghanistan]].

but it doesn't make good English to write:

    Charles Darwin was very interested
    in [[Afghanistan history]].
    in [[Egypt history]].
    in [[Sweden history]].

Afghanistani (?), Egyptian, and Swedish history would work, though.
As would Afghanistan's, Egypt's, and Sweden's history.  Then the
argument is that "History of Afghanistan" is already in majority.

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


from_name: James Jones

subject: [Wikipedia-l] Vandalism report

body:
209.240.222.32 (later 209.240.222.xxx) has vandalized the OS-9
page, starting at 09:29 on February 23, 2002; I ask that the
vandalized versions be excised.

	James Jones


from_name: kband at www.llamacom.com

subject: [Wikipedia-l] meta namespace?

in_reply_to: <ILENJBCFHGHELEBFPPBGAEJNCFAA.Magnus.Manske@epost.de> from "Magnus Manske" at Feb 23, 2002 09:54:44 AM

body:
> > > I was thinking about the "page titles to be deleted" list, and
> > some of the
> > > empty or silly orphans. No need to accumulate that stuff in the
> > database.
> >
> > So, yes--retain the ability to permanently delete pages.
>
> Sure we do. But currently, you and Jimbo are the only ones who *can*
> permanently delete pages. Jimbo is too busy to do that, and AFAIK, you are
> currently as well (job, wife,...;)
> That's the reason I suggested the "trusted" status, to get some work off
> your shoulders (and actually done, look at the "page titles to be deleted"!)
> without compromising security.
> I don't think we'll get the "cabal" discussion again about this one, as we
> are not reducing user rights, merely expanding them for some. And, we could
> still give The Cunctator trusted status - noone could complain about the
> cabal THEN! :)
>
Magnus, just so you're clear, this is *exactly* what a cabal is.
"Expanding rights for some" users == creating a cabal.

Giving me trusted status would have no bearing on whether such a cabal
exists or the ensuing problems. That you assert it would is a
deliberate misinterpretation of the point.

--TC


subject: [Wikipedia-l] subpages

in_reply_to: <200202231609.g1NG9e332384@ross.bomis.com> from "koyaanisqatsi@nupedia.com" at Feb 23, 2002 08:09:40 AM

body:
I think we should have subpage functionality (or modify the namespace
functionality) to help with pages such as the September 11 pages.
The current situation is a step back from the earlier software.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] colons

body:
I just realized we don't need to forbid the use of colons in titles;
unlike the subpage "/", the only time colons are used as a special
character are with the limited number of namespaces.

Thus instead of the ":" being a reserved character anywhere in a
title, only "user:", "talk:", "wikipedia:" etc. need to be
reserved. Any other uses of colons should be fine. This will let us
have entries for books with standard formatting of the subtitle (e.g.,
"The Muggles: A Tale of Woe") or other natural uses of the colon.

-TC


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Vandalism report

body:
From: "James Jones" <jamesjones01 at mchsi.com>

> 209.240.222.32 (later 209.240.222.xxx) has vandalized the OS-9
> page, starting at 09:29 on February 23, 2002; I ask that the
> vandalized versions be excised.

We can't do that, but you can restore a previous version. Go to the history
of the page, choose the version you want to restore, click on edit, and save
it.

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikitech-l] the cur_(un)linked_links columns have officially been dropped

body:
L.S.,

As the subject says these columns have now been removed from the database
schema and all the code that used them has been replaced by code that uses
the new (un)linked tables. This completes a major change in the database
scheme, so I will now wait until Jimbo has installed the latest CVS version,
and see what bugs/problems appear.

There is still a lot I can do in terms of speeding certain pages up, such as
the short-pages page, the long-pages page, the orphans page and the
most-wanted page. But for this I would again have to extend the database
scheme, so I first suggest we freeze the scheme and after the bugs have been
ironed out, I suggest we determine what would be the special page we want to
speed-up first.

-- Jan Hidders


subject: [Wikipedia-l] subpages

body:
It really isn't.  It's a strong step forward, and I'm very glad we've done
it.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2002 kband at www.llamacom.com wrote:

> I think we should have subpage functionality (or modify the namespace
> functionality) to help with pages such as the September 11 pages.
> The current situation is a step back from the earlier software.
>
> [Wikipedia-l]
> To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
> http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>


subject: [Wikitech-l] NuNupedia

body:
Dear fellow programmers,

now that the wikipedia software is running (and quite well), thanks to many
volunteers, and work on that software turns from bug-fixing to fine-tuning,
I would like to open another front ;)

For some time now I've been working on a completely rewritten version of the
Nupedia software (http://www.nupedia.com). For those of you who don't know,
Nupedia was the original, peer-reviewed Bomis encyclopedia project, and
wikipedia was a "spin-off". But, the Nupedia approval process proved to be
too slow and complicated, and the project came to a standstill, with only a
dozen or so articles actually online. Recently, the Nupedia group voted
about a streamlined article review process, and a draft policy is currently
in writing.

Why does this require a new software? Well, it doesn't. But I worked on the
current Nupedia software, and it strikes me as a multi-redundant
HTML-PHP-mix. It is working, and it can be altered, but IMO it will be more
work to change the old software to a revised review process than to write a
new one. Also, some other changes will have to be made, like multi-language
interfaces and databases, which would further complicate a software change.

So, silently, I created a new SourceForge project, using "nunupedia" as a
working title (the encyclopedia title will remain "Nupedia"!). Both Jimbo
and Larry agreed that this can eventually become the official Nupedia
software. You can see a demo at
	http://nunupedia.sourceforge.net
Only some parts of it do currently work. Under "articles in progess", you
can see a demo article with online discussion. You can become a member and
sumbit articles (but, don't use valuable stuff;)

I would have preferred to complete a basically working version before "going
public", like I did with the Wikipedia PHP script, but currently, I bluntly
don't have the time for that :(

So, I ask you, to help me with that. Remember, Nupedia will most likely
become a "stable version" of wikipedia ;)
If you are interested in developing this software, mail me or the list.
Don't forget your SourceForge name, so I can give you CVS write access.

Thanks for listening,
Magnus