from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] new dumps ?

body:
Nick Jenkins wrote:
>> Erik Zachte wrote:
>>> Sometimes the jump job reports all is well when it is not (Brion knows this)
>> This part's now fixed; .bz2 failures will not report .7z success on the next run
>> around (but could on the current run while the program's still running).
>>
>> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
>
> If I can possibly please make a suggestion / request, one thing I would quite like from the download.wikipedia.org site is an index
> file somewhere (could be plain text or XML) that indicates what the latest valid individual dump files are for a given Wikipedia
> site.

That's what the latest directory is for.

> The "latest" directory is not useful for this purpose (e.g. http://download.wikipedia.org/enwiki/latest/ points to files from approx
> Aug-17, which looks to be the latest dump where everything reported as succeeded;

Right, for consistency.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


list: wikien-l

source: pipermail-mbox

from_name: Zephram Stark

subject: [WikiEN-l] How to deal with direct requests for articles?

body:
On 9/28/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> My phone number and email are publicly available for media contact
> purposes. This means, of course, I get emails and calls about
> *everything*.
>
> A common call is "How do I get an article about me/my book/my
achievement?"
>
> Now. What's a helpful answer to this? Better than "You don't, someone
> else has to write one," because you *know* they'll just write a
really
> bad one themselves and it'll all end in a tearful AFD entry and
> someone hating or fearing Wikipedia henceforth.
>
> Assume that referring them to a web page or policy page is less good
> than being able to answer on the phone right there.
>
> Ideas please?
>
>
> - d.

  In this regard, one-time editors at Wikipedia have the same problem as single-use sellers at eBay: they have no established reputation. Yet, building a reputation at Wikipedia can take months once you understand the system, and years to grok the politics of the Wiki world. A person who wants to contribute something noteworthy about themselves, or make a one-time contribution on another subject, does not have the time or resources to learn the procedures or establish their reputation. There is also the problem of maintenance on a good article to make sure that it isn't vandalized or dumbed down. For these needs, increasingly more people are turning to established third-party sellers and editors for their eBay and Wikipedia service requests. For a low one-time fee, companies like ZS Wikiplacement guarantee a top quality Wikipedia article and two years of 99.9% uptime maintenance. Reputation has its rewards. Next time someone calls or writes to you about positioning
 themselves in Wikipedia, simply refer them to ZS WikiPlacement at 1.432.224.6991 (email: info at collectiveresource.com). We will determine if their desired information has a good enough chance of being considered noteworthy and verifiable. Plus, we will format the article in such a way that it is useful to the greatest amount of people (through Wiki formatting, writing the article from a neutral point of view and by placing the most noteworthy data at the top).

  I hope this provides a win-win-win solution for our company, mutual customers and service personnel at Wikipedia (by reducing your workload.)

  Thank you,
  --Zephram


from_name: Zoney

subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
On 28/09/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 9/27/06, Zoney <zoney.ie at gmail.com> wrote:
> > As a mergist - how do you get around the difficulties of preserving the
> > history of the content (wrt. attribution under GFDL)?
>
> Repeated detetions and undeletions. You delete the page you are moving
> the text to be merged to. Move the text to that page then undelete.
> Full process is described in how to fix copy and paste moves.
>
> --
> geni
>
>

Yes - as you say, specifically for fixing copy and paste moves - I'm
familiar with executing this process (oh what fun!). In my experience,
merging content usually means combining two disparate articles (e.g. one
major article and one stub article). Maybe history merge is still
appropriate (it'd sure be confusing to look through though) but it certainly
isn't the approach usually taken. Usually the content from the smaller stub
article is just copy-pasted into the main one.

Zoney

--
~()____) This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds...


from_name: Gregory Kohs

body:
>> From: "David Gerard" <dgerard at gmail.com>
>> Subject: [WikiEN-l] How to deal with direct requests for articles?

My phone number and email are publicly available for media contact
purposes. This means, of course, I get emails and calls about
*everything*.

A common call is "How do I get an article about me/my book/my achievement?"

Now. What's a helpful answer to this? Better than "You don't, someone
else has to write one," because you *know* they'll just write a really
bad one themselves and it'll all end in a tearful AFD entry and
someone hating or fearing Wikipedia henceforth.

Assume that referring them to a web page or policy page is less good
than being able to answer on the phone right there.

Ideas please?

++++++++++++++

David, I know that this will sound like it's self-serving promotion, but in
all honesty, MyWikiBiz.com could potentially be another alternative to
consider if your caller is asking about a notable, verifiable company or
non-profit organization that currently lacks an article in the mainspace.
We do our best to research the entity, evaluate both the "good" and the
"bad" news associated with it, and write a NPOV article.  Then, according to
Jimmy Wales' request, we see if an independent, non-paid, non-employee
editor thinks it's up to Wikipedia's standards for inclusion, and we see if
it gets posted.

I think our examples at [[The Family & Workplace Connection]] and [[Arch
Coal]] demonstrate fairly well that we are not here to spam Wikipedia, but
rather, to fill in the gaps.  Also, I know you have no way of knowing or
verifying this, but we turn away the potential business of about 20%-25% of
our contacts, usually on the grounds that they fail [[WP:CORP]].  One final
note -- we are currently running a promotion where, if the client is a
non-profit entity with a humanitarian mission, we complete the work on a pro
bono basis (no charge).

Kindly,

   Gregory Kohs
   MyWikiBiz.com


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
On 28/09/06, Stephen Bain <stephen.bain at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> Otherwise, a manual merge can be performed leaving the merged page as
> a redirect. A clear edit summary on both articles, clearly indicating
> where the content was merged from/to, is sufficient. If necessary a
> message on the respective talk pages can document the merge.
>
>
Sufficient for satisfying people on Wikipedia perhaps! But what about
sufficient for the licence we are using? I don't see how it even comes close
to providing copyright/attribution information on the content. Having such
information available by viewing the page history is one thing - it's
another entirely to suggest that it's acceptable to have to go hunting for
the old page history on what is now a redirect.

Zoney

--
~()____) This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds...


list: foundation-l

from_name: Birgitte SB

subject: [Foundation-l] Proposal re: sep11.wikipedia.org

body:
--- David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:

> > I am suggesting that I and some others have a
> contrary viewpoint here,
> > and it shouldn't be assumed that this is an
> unanimous decision to shut
> > down this project in this manner.  I admit that
> sometimes decisions like
> > this need to be made, but please be honest about
> why they are being made
> > rather than trying to sugar coat them to be for
> reasons that really
> > don't exist.
>
>
> No, no. You don't understand. The Foundation is
> relentlessly
> Americocentric and dedicated to the pursuit of en:wp
> running roughshod
> over all other languages!
>
>
> - d.
>

This is at least the third time you have you replied
in this manner to someone's concerns.  I can't
articulate what is exactly wrong with your reply, but
I know that I personally dislike it.  Please stop.  It
does nothing to further disscusion or help find
solutions.

Birgitte SB

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com


list: wikimedia-l


from_name: Erik Moeller

subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?

body:
On 9/28/06, oscar <oscar.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
> the more i think about it, the explanations offered afterwards i find highly
> disappointing too, but maybe i was expecting too much here. "purely for
> technical reasons" and "yay for self-mutilation" sound like someone having
> no notion of the responsibility that should go with his position, to be
> honest.

Yay for pointless accusations and flamewars about database flags.

--
Peace & Love,
Erik

Member, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees

DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.


subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?


subject: [Foundation-l] A Wikimedia sidebar box for wikipedia.org

body:
Robert Scott Horning wrote:
> Out of curiosity, how much information on the WMF site is confidential
> in nature and shouldn't get out to anybody else?

None; wikimediafoundation.org exists for the sole purpose of listing official
public information.

It basically consists of:
* A description of the corporation
* Contact information
* Donation information
* Press releases
* Public text of passed board resolutions

Both public and private discussion occurs elsewhere; it is neither a discussion
site nor a planning site.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


from_name: Stephen Bain

body:
On 9/27/06, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> Should we have a sidebar with the heading "Wikimedia" containing links
> to wikimediafoundation.org for things like:
> - About Wikimedia
> - Projects
> - Volunteer (info about committees, mailing lists, etc.)
> - Jobs (those we chooose to publicly advertise)
> - Chapter information

I think a single link to either the About page or the main page would
be a good start. Jobs and chapter information is far too specific
information to be in the sidebar of every project, similarly
volunteering. There is occasionally some information in these areas
which needs broad attention, but the sitenotice is a better approach
for temporary notices.

A link to a list of projects, or a page describing the various
projects, might also be a good idea.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com


body:
Tim 'avatar' Bartel wrote:
> It seems crystal clear to me, that their is a big difference between
> sep11 and any other WM project,

It's not a "WM project"; it's an archive of pages that were removed from Wikipedia.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


from_name: Robert Scott Horning

body:
Anthony wrote:

>On 9/26/06, James Hare <messedrocker at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>>I recognize that, but I didn't work it properly. In order to comply, AND
>>delete extremely old edits, we have to copy the older edit history over to
>>the talk page. But space is not a pressing issue, so why don't we do what we
>>have been doing, which has not been a problem? Hard disk drives are cheap.
>>
>>
>>
>If the wiki is truly not within the scope of the mission of the
>foundation, which *many* people feel is true, then having it on
>Wikimedia's servers and domain names confuses people as to what is the
>mission of the foundation.
>

This, to me, is an ex-post facto redefinition of the scope and mission
of the Wikimedia Foundation, or something akin to backronyms.  This is
only outside of the scope of the WMF because those involved with the day
to day affairs of the WMF just don't want to be bothered with this.  It
isn't part of some more noble and legalistic attitude that seems to be
presented here.

I am suggesting that I and some others have a contrary viewpoint here,
and it shouldn't be assumed that this is an unanimous decision to shut
down this project in this manner.  I admit that sometimes decisions like
this need to be made, but please be honest about why they are being made
rather than trying to sugar coat them to be for reasons that really
don't exist.

--
Robert Scott Horning


body:
Erik Moeller wrote:

>I think the best way forward, as per the discussion, is to first
>launch a larger effort to improve the WMF site. We can then add a
>sidebar to e.g. en.wp and see what the effects are; if we consider it
>useful, we can add it to all wikis by Board resolution or Executive
>decree, or leave it up to the communities to implement it.
>
>
Out of curiosity, how much information on the WMF site is confidential
in nature and shouldn't get out to anybody else?

One of the problems that I see with this site is the near absence of
anybody willing to keep up the content, even though I'm sure there would
be some willing and able participants who are knowledable and trusted
enough to be able to take on the task.  While I don't think it should be
opened completely to anybody and everbody like wikipedia, the process to
allow additional users to gain edit access is quite bureaucratic and
could be updated to encourage more "trusted" and "active" Wikimedia
users to get involved if they want to.  Nothing against the current
people who are working on it, but they tend to be board members and
other people who are very busy with other WMF tasks and don't seem to
have the time necessary to really put the polish on that is needed.

So this is an open question:   How does somebody, anybody, gain access
to be able to help out in developing the WMF site?

Or another general question:  Should the number of people helping out to
develop and add content to the WMF site be increased substantially?

--
Robert Scott Horning


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

references:
<s7lah2pihqs0vqiecpaifbaphj43urt5a5@4ax.com>
	<fbad4e140609230946g1506a024g26e2447a3c584abb@mail.gmail.com>
	<38a7bf7c0609231036g378bf749yc132fbfbb05dc1b2@mail.gmail.com>
	<451B9A01.1020904@wikia.com>

body:
On 28/09/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:

> However, I am very sorry to report that I agree with David Gerard,

Don't worry, it's not terminal. Usually.

> who I
> think was not being critical of anyone at all, when he said that
> spending a lot of time in school deletion wars is probably not a good
> use of any intelligent person's time.  I am very sorry to say it, but
> there it is. :)

Deletion wars in general are a sign people are missing a point. (Well, DUH.)

Lists of the verifiable information and a forest of redirects are
often a highly workable compromise, and indeed more usable to the
interested reader.

- d.


from_name: MacGyverMagic/Mgm

subject: [WikiEN-l] Using social networking sites as sources

body:
Those are just as reliable as forum posts and blogs.
Avoid them if you can help it.

Mgm

On 9/28/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>
> Certainly my date of birth is wrong all over the net because I entered
> it wrong on a social networking site years ago.  Such sources should be
> treated with EXTREME skepticism on ALL details.
>
> Andrew Gray wrote:
> > This may be of interest to some people, given our occasional habit of
> > fleshing out articles by raiding the personal sites of subjects:
> >
> >
> http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003211808_fancher20.html
> >
> > It's a brief report of a discussion at the Seattle Times about the
> > reliability and ethical appropriateness of using (say) the Myspace
> > page of a murder victim in reporting on them. Not much content, but
> > it's good to see people are asking themselves these questions.
> >
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>


from_name: George Herbert

subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

references:
<s7lah2pihqs0vqiecpaifbaphj43urt5a5@4ax.com>
	<fbad4e140609230946g1506a024g26e2447a3c584abb@mail.gmail.com>
	<47683e960609241202h58eebc8fua913fdc8802ae10c@mail.gmail.com>
	<ef754g$jmb$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<fbad4e140609252350s7644b094hff6edc5ab124865f@mail.gmail.com>
	<451B9BCC.5020400@wikia.com>

body:
On 9/28/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:

> So, the current situation is that
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seneca_Falls_%28town%29%2C_New_York
>
> contains the following completely out-of-context and unverified and
> unverifiable paragraph:
>
> "Private education
>
> Finger Lakes Christian School is a private Pre-K-Grade 12 school located
> in Seneca Falls, New York. It shares the building with the 1st Baptist
> Church. The current principal is the Rev. Scott Van Kirk. The school was
> established in 1991.

This is all verifyable with the New York State board of education.  I had
all the links up a few days ago and will go back and find them again
sometime in the next few days, and reference the article.

Linked to The First Baptist Church of Seneca Falls,
> its aims were to offer an alternative for Christian children.

This is only verifyable off the school website and student info
packet/application.

The school
> has about 75 students.
>

 This is verifyable with the New York State board of education.

Its admission policy is that at least one parent
> or guardian must be a born-again Christian. As well as the general
> curriculum, pupils at the school attend Bible classes twice a week, and
> students have devotional meetings with their teachers or a Pastor at
> least weekly and have a weekly Chapel service."

This is only verifyable off the school website and student info
packet/application

I would go in and simply delete it myself and insist that it not be
> added back until someone finds a source better than the school's own
> homemade website, but I don't want to be seen as creating *actual
> policy* in this area by my edits.
>
> I'm just saying.

I think you're applying too high a bar for verifyability.  The basic factual
existence, location, size and management of the school are independently
verifyable.  This will be as a rule easily true for any of the 124,000-ish
schools in the US.

I think that using a school website for additional descriptive information
of the nature of the tidbits above is eminently reasonable.  Once we
establish that an organization such as a school exists, and verify its
general information, then "flavor" details from its website or own published
information should count as reasonably verified.  The fundamental focus of
verifyability needs to be avoiding the publication of untracable false
information.  In this case, we are tracing the information to the
publications of the organization itself, whose existence the NY State Board
of Education vouches for.

One could use a stricter verifyability standard and strip out own-website
sourced school information, but I ask you (and the assembled throngs), to
what end?  If the intent is to both provide accurate information and
verifiable (referenced) information, then the second is met (school's
existence and statistics easily externally confirmed, so it becomes a
credible reference regarding itself).  Schools as a rule would get in huge
amounts of trouble if they started lying in public publications or websites
about themselves, so we should make a reasonable assumption of accuracy for
those websites.

--
-george william herbert
george.herbert at gmail.com


from_name: oscar

subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?

body:
On 9/28/06, Alphax (Wikipedia email) <alphasigmax at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Walter van Kalken wrote:
> > Erik Moeller wrote:
> >
> >> On 9/28/06, oscar <oscar.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>> the more i think about it, the explanations offered afterwards i find
> highly
> >>> disappointing too, but maybe i was expecting too much here. "purely
> for
> >>> technical reasons" and "yay for self-mutilation" sound like someone
> having
> >>> no notion of the responsibility that should go with his position, to
> be
> >>> honest.
> >>>
> >>>
> >> Yay for pointless accusations and flamewars about database flags.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> > That is an extremely impolite answer Erik. I would have expected better.
> >
>
> Perhaps you missed his .sig:
>
> > DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
> > in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
> > position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.
>
> You are all assuming that there was something underhanded going on here.
> The whole thing was an accident. You are making a big deal out of
> nothing. Move along, nothing to see here.

i apologize for overemphasizing my point; let's move along, yes.

oscar


subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?


from_name: Guy Chapman aka JzG

subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
On Thu, 28 Sep 2006 10:54:01 +0100, "David Gerard" <dgerard at gmail.com>
wrote:

>Lists of the verifiable information and a forest of redirects are
>often a highly workable compromise, and indeed more usable to the
>interested reader.

I absolutely agree.  Unfortunately this was rejected out of hand by
the obdurate schools inclusionists.

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

references:
<s7lah2pihqs0vqiecpaifbaphj43urt5a5@4ax.com>
	<fbad4e140609230946g1506a024g26e2447a3c584abb@mail.gmail.com>
	<38a7bf7c0609231036g378bf749yc132fbfbb05dc1b2@mail.gmail.com>
	<451B9A01.1020904@wikia.com>
	<fbad4e140609280254t3b9ea640pb51397958e6eaeca@mail.gmail.com>
	<rjanh25gtkgg1huc9l1arocubhkmtbqc93@4ax.com>

body:
On 28/09/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
> On Thu, 28 Sep 2006 10:54:01 +0100, "David Gerard" <dgerard at gmail.com>
> wrote:

> >Lists of the verifiable information and a forest of redirects are
> >often a highly workable compromise, and indeed more usable to the
> >interested reader.

> I absolutely agree.  Unfortunately this was rejected out of hand by
> the obdurate schools inclusionists.

That's the trouble with entrenched positions in process wars - the
people act in a manner indistinguishable from bloody idiots. I suggest
persisting on the verifiability and making the list article anyway.

- d.


subject: [Foundation-l] Taipei chosen to host Wikimania 2007

body:
On 28/09/06, effe iets anders <effeietsanders at gmail.com> wrote:

> If you mean here that we should now already pick Turin to "do"
> wikimania 2008, I think that would be inappropriate. There are a lot
> of other cities working on a bid right now, and it would be extremely
> unfair to change the rules now and don't give others the chance to
> make their bid up, which might be better, as you don't know what you
> can expect. Please let's just follow the procedure as stated by the "
> picking committee"  (how should I call them? ;-) ) before and let
> people prepare their bid, and pick one about november, december.
> If you meant otherwise, please forgive my lack of english :-)

The procedure as it is evidently needs work, since other bidders (e.g.
London) are disappointed at their hard work being pretty much wasted.

The current system seems to ensure a lot of volunteer time and effort
being futile. This is damaging to the project.

- d.


body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> On 9/28/06, Robert Scott Horning <robert_horning at netzero.net> wrote:
>> One of the problems that I see with this site is the near absence of
>> anybody willing to keep up the content, even though I'm sure there would
>> be some willing and able participants who are knowledable and trusted
>> enough to be able to take on the task.
>
> The WMF site doesn't work, period. That is something that seems to be
> generally acknowledged.

What doesn't work about it?

What *should* it contain, other than a few pages of official contact information?

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [Foundation-l] Wikimedia Foundation logo policy

body:
Can I just add we really need a logo policy. My personal press email
address seems to have made its way onto people's lists of 'how to
contact Wikipedia', and so I get these questions. I *should* be able
to give them a simple answer quickly. I can't. That's bad - it wastes
my time and theirs.

I hardly care what the policy is as long as there is one.

- d.


body:
On 28/09/06, effe iets anders <effeietsanders at gmail.com> wrote:

> But if you want another procedure, make one,
> and don't skip the procedure and just choose one. Because next year
> you will then have an even huger problem, as there will be no bidding
> candidates which are somehow experienced, and you will have a lot of
> cities bidding which don't have to be good.

I don't have to have a replacement to be able to notice that the
current one is clearly damaging. Sending some of the Foundation's
hardest-working volunteers on a futile task is utterly demotivating.

- d.


body:
My phone number and email are publicly available for media contact
purposes. This means, of course, I get emails and calls about
*everything*.

A common call is "How do I get an article about me/my book/my achievement?"

Now. What's a helpful answer to this? Better than "You don't, someone
else has to write one," because you *know* they'll just write a really
bad one themselves and it'll all end in a tearful AFD entry and
someone hating or fearing Wikipedia henceforth.

Assume that referring them to a web page or policy page is less good
than being able to answer on the phone right there.

Ideas please?

- d.


body:
On 28/09/06, effe iets anders <effeietsanders at gmail.com> wrote:

> And forbidding someone to do work that (s)he wants to do is even more
> demotivating :(

That's why we're talking about it now rather than next July or September :-)

- d.


subject:
[Foundation-l] [Wikimediauk-l] [Fwd: Royal Society Digital
	Journal Archive]

body:
On 9/27/06, phoebe ayers <phoebe.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
> So I can understand the publisher being upset if there is systematic
> downloading occuring; they've put a great deal of time, energy and money
> into producing this archive which they hope to market to libraries and thus
> keep their publishing business alive.

It was probably a bit silly to make it all freely available then.

On 9/28/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/27/06, phoebe ayers <phoebe.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
> > but bear in mind that the
> > archives, which were just completed and released, are only freely available
> > to the community until November 2006. After that, they will be included with
> > the Royal Society's journal packages, which are not cheap (though more
> > reasonable than many equivalent publishers):
>
> We have enough uni students that we could likely still get our hands
> on them if we needed to.

There was a discussion on a similar issue on the OTRS list recently.
Even if there is no copyright in the material from the archives, the
Society may have contractual rights against people who access the
material from subscription services.

I would want to read the terms of use for the subscription very
closely before I started uploading things accessed through a
subscription.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com


from_name: Nick Boalch

body:
David Gerard wrote:

> A common call is "How do I get an article about me/my book/my achievement?"
[...]
> Ideas please?

Explain why we discourage autobiography (i.e. explain it as part of high
encyclopaedic standards) and point them to [[WP:RA]]?

(I know you didn't want to simply quote a webpage at them, but if you
can encourage them to go to [[WP:RA]] and add a simple explanation of
why their achievement/book/whatever is encyclopaedic and verifiable
enough for us to be interested in it, that gets them off your back and
into contributing.)

Cheers,

N.

--
Nicholas Boalch
School of Modern Languages & Cultures       Tel: +44 (0) 191 334 3456
University of Durham                        Fax: +44 (0) 191 334 3421
New Elvet, Durham DH1 3JT, UK               WWW: http://nick.frejol.org/


subject: [Foundation-l] Call for volunteers: clean up sep11.wikipedia.org

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:
> Dear community,
>
> after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, Wikipedia was
> overwhelmed by people expressing their sympathy for the victims,
> adding material about affected organizations, and generally flooding
> us with content that was inappropriate. Rather than turning these
> people away, the decision was made to set up a separate wiki,
> sep11.wikipedia.org, which still exists today.

At the time these pages were very much a part of Wikipedia; the separate wiki
was created a year later as a place where they could be archived after a number
of people started deleting them from English Wikipedia.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


body:
On 28/09/06, Nick Boalch <n.g.boalch at durham.ac.uk> wrote:

> Explain why we discourage autobiography (i.e. explain it as part of high
> encyclopaedic standards) and point them to [[WP:RA]]?
> (I know you didn't want to simply quote a webpage at them, but if you
> can encourage them to go to [[WP:RA]] and add a simple explanation of
> why their achievement/book/whatever is encyclopaedic and verifiable
> enough for us to be interested in it, that gets them off your back and
> into contributing.)

Hmm, possibly. The last real case of this was yesterday morning. The
example is probably notable, but I had to somehow explain this to
their publicity person.

(Suggesting an amateur PR person do something is to be approached with
*great* care, because you know they'll do it 10000x really badly and
everyone they know will also do it 10000x really badly.)

WP:RA might be the go. Does anyone actually look at it and create the
articles? I thought it had devolved into a dump for unloved really bad
ideas.

- d.


body:
On 28/09/06, Oskar Sigvardsson <oskarsigvardsson at gmail.com> wrote:

> Fist off all, this should really be in our FAQ (I've just skimmed over
> it, man it's big, and I couldn't find it). Someone should put that in.

Yep. "Put a note on [[WP:RA]] with a few good third-party references"
should cover it, if a note on WP:RA will actually lead to an article.

(I'm sure the brilliantly concise writers who hang around Wikipedia
policy pages will work out a way to expand that simple sentence into a
four-sentence paragraph consisting almost entirely of modifier
clauses.)

- d.


body:
David Gerard wrote:
> WP:RA might be the go. Does anyone actually look at it and create the
> articles? I thought it had devolved into a dump for unloved really bad
> ideas.

Well, I just had a look at it and it certainly has several dump-like
qualities. There are far too many entires that are just names or topics
without any explanation of why they'd be a useful article. I might give
it some TLC over the next few days.

Cheers,

N.

--
Nicholas Boalch
School of Modern Languages & Cultures       Tel: +44 (0) 191 334 3456
University of Durham                        Fax: +44 (0) 191 334 3421
New Elvet, Durham DH1 3JT, UK               WWW: http://nick.frejol.org/


body:
On 28/09/06, Nick Boalch <n.g.boalch at durham.ac.uk> wrote:
> David Gerard wrote:

> > WP:RA might be the go. Does anyone actually look at it and create the
> > articles? I thought it had devolved into a dump for unloved really bad
> > ideas.

> Well, I just had a look at it and it certainly has several dump-like
> qualities. There are far too many entires that are just names or topics
> without any explanation of why they'd be a useful article. I might give
> it some TLC over the next few days.

If you think it's saveable, that'd solve my problems nicely.

- d.


list: wikitech-l

subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing database dumps

body:
Mike O wrote:
> I'm having a bit of trouble figuring out database dump XML. Looking at the
> articles dump I see page content is wrapped in <page> and </page> elements.

First, look at the documentation:

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Data_dumps
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Help:Export
http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/MWDumper

> What I don't see is how to determine what namespace an article correlates to.
> I see the namespace elements at the top of the file, but how do I match
> articles to the right namespace?

The namespace prefix appears at the beginning of the page title, which appears
as the text contents of the /mediawiki/page/title element, separated by a colon
from the remaining title part.

The correspondence between namespace prefixes and internal numeric IDs is given
in the /mediawiki/siteinfo/namespaces/namespace elements, so you can automate
your processing to work properly with wikis in different languages or with
different custom namespaces.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
On 9/28/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>
>
> I would go in and simply delete it myself and insist that it not be
> added back until someone finds a source better than the school's own
> homemade website, but I don't want to be seen as creating *actual
> policy* in this area by my edits.
>
> I'm just saying.
>
> --Jimbo

You'd be enforcing verifiability policy, not creating anything new.

Mgm


from_name: effe iets anders

body:
If you mean here that we should now already pick Turin to "do"
wikimania 2008, I think that would be inappropriate. There are a lot
of other cities working on a bid right now, and it would be extremely
unfair to change the rules now and don't give others the chance to
make their bid up, which might be better, as you don't know what you
can expect. Please let's just follow the procedure as stated by the "
picking committee"  (how should I call them? ;-) ) before and let
people prepare their bid, and pick one about november, december.
If you meant otherwise, please forgive my lack of english :-)

Lodewijk

2006/9/28, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com>:
> Not that it is up to me, nor should it be, but I intend to be a strong
> personal supporter of Turin for 2008, and encourage the concept that we
> should settle this fairly soon.
>
> Gianluigi Gamba wrote:
> > I congratulate with Taipei team and I'm sure they'll organize a memorable
> > event.
> >
> > As a member of the Turin bidding team, let me voice a choral "too bad".
> > We had a sort of incredible "astral conjunction" of sponsors *really eager*
> > to have the Wikimania event, the enthusiasm of the whole community, the
> > honeymoon with the media and the commitment of many people from national
> > (and not only) institutions.
> > I wonder if such combination will return in a future. I hope so.
> >
> > A prayer to the future jury: that's not been this year's case, but should
> > geographic and linguistic criteria be essential in choosing the future
> > locations, please say it in advance, before people start making contacts,
> > put their faces off and spend words.
> >
> > Good luck Taipei, and good job.
> >
> > G. (aka Paginazero)
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > foundation-l mailing list
> > foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> > http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
> >
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


subject: [Foundation-l] Metapub

body:
i started [[Metapub]] at http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Metapub

hoping to have some more to-the-point on-topic discussions, as well as
having a more or less central page on meta for focussing attention.
it hopefully will also take some load of the lists, as there are so many to
which not all are subscribed.

if it helps to make meta more intellegible or accessable it already served
its purpose imho.

oscar


subject: [Foundation-l] Metapub


body:
2006/9/27, Anthere <Anthere9 at yahoo.com>:
<snip>
> There is infortunately no resolution cooking as of today. We listed the
> issue as one of the topic to discuss at the board retreat.
> If you have ideas or a "draft" of concept to provide to help us proceed,
> it will be welcome.
</snip>

Unfortunately indeed. I know there is a draft on
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Logo_and_trademark_policy , and it
might be a nice concept, but I think it would be best if it would be
discussed by those who have studied for this, the lawyers among us,
and maybe also others who are interested. I am for sure interested,
but i think the legal work should be done first. In principle the idea
of thecurrent draft looks OK to me (use of logo on small scale and NC
is allowed, commercial needs permission from WMF or authorized agent
etc), but the language might have to change (unless "stuff"  is
legally a clear definition ;-)) Maybe the Chief legal officer and/or
brad could take a look at it?

Lodewijk


from_name: Aerik Sylvan

subject: [Wikitech-l] Category Intersections - some early testing

body:
Sorry - here are the queries I was playing with - I had intended to
send a rather more detailed and thought out analysis, but haven't had
time in the last couple of days to play with it much more.  These
times are from running the queries on phpMyAdmin on my home computer
that wasn't doing anything else strenuous at the time.  As you can
see, I used count... group by instead of join.  They could be the
same, inside MySQL, but it doesn't seem like it.  I tried doing some
large joins last night, and they never returned any results, but that
could be an instability in my computer - I need to try it again.

Just to get this out of the way:  These number are of course, only
relevant to themselves, but I was thinking of comparing the times to
return intersections against the time it takes to do something that is
known on Wikipedia (say, get the first 200 results of the
"Living_People" category?) and try to extrapolate a meaningful
estimate.

Showing rows 0 - 15 (16 total, Query took 0.3316 sec)
SQL query: SELECT cl_sortkey, count( * ) AS catcount
FROM `categorylinks`
WHERE `cl_to` = 'Fantasy_films'
OR `cl_to` = 'Disney_films '
GROUP BY cl_sortkey
HAVING catcount =2
LIMIT 0 , 30

Showing rows 0 - 9 (10 total, Query took 0.4407 sec)
SQL query: SELECT cl_sortkey, count( * ) AS catcount
FROM `categorylinks`
WHERE `cl_to` = 'United_States_Army_soldiers'
OR `cl_to` = 'German-Americans '
GROUP BY cl_sortkey
HAVING catcount =2
LIMIT 0 , 30

Showing rows 0 - 19 (20 total, Query took 0.8908 sec)
SQL query: SELECT cl_sortkey, count( * ) AS catcount
FROM `categorylinks`
WHERE `cl_to` = 'Drama_films'
OR `cl_to` = 'World_War_II_films '
GROUP BY cl_sortkey
HAVING catcount =2
LIMIT 0 , 30

Showing rows 0 - 29 (2,169 total, Query took 36.3109 sec)
SQL query: SELECT cl_sortkey, count( * ) AS catcount
FROM `categorylinks`
WHERE `cl_to` = 'Prisoners_of_war'
OR `cl_to` = 'Living_people'
GROUP BY cl_sortkey
HAVING catcount =2
LIMIT 0 , 30

Showing rows 0 - 1 (2 total, Query took 8.6470 sec)
SQL query: SELECT cl_sortkey, count( * ) AS catcount
FROM `categorylinks`
WHERE `cl_to` = 'Articles_with_unsourced_statements'
OR `cl_to` = 'American_World_War_II_veterans '
GROUP BY cl_sortkey
HAVING catcount =2
LIMIT 0 , 30


body:
it costs a lot of time yes. That's for sure. but on the other hand you
can select the best city this way. You can not prospect how good the
other bids will be when you don't give them the chance to proof
themselves.

But you can go in between. you can do the selection on an earlier
point in the selection procedure, and make the demands smaller. Them
you can make a selection earlier in the process of preperation, and
less time will be "lost". But if you want another procedure, make one,
and don't skip the procedure and just choose one. Because next year
you will then have an even huger problem, as there will be no bidding
candidates which are somehow experienced, and you will have a lot of
cities bidding which don't have to be good.

lodewijk

2006/9/28, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com>:
> On 28/09/06, effe iets anders <effeietsanders at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > If you mean here that we should now already pick Turin to "do"
> > wikimania 2008, I think that would be inappropriate. There are a lot
> > of other cities working on a bid right now, and it would be extremely
> > unfair to change the rules now and don't give others the chance to
> > make their bid up, which might be better, as you don't know what you
> > can expect. Please let's just follow the procedure as stated by the "
> > picking committee"  (how should I call them? ;-) ) before and let
> > people prepare their bid, and pick one about november, december.
> > If you meant otherwise, please forgive my lack of english :-)
>
>
> The procedure as it is evidently needs work, since other bidders (e.g.
> London) are disappointed at their hard work being pretty much wasted.
>
> The current system seems to ensure a lot of volunteer time and effort
> being futile. This is damaging to the project.
>
>
> - d.
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


body:
And forbidding someone to do work that (s)he wants to do is even more
demotivating :(

2006/9/28, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com>:
> On 28/09/06, effe iets anders <effeietsanders at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > But if you want another procedure, make one,
> > and don't skip the procedure and just choose one. Because next year
> > you will then have an even huger problem, as there will be no bidding
> > candidates which are somehow experienced, and you will have a lot of
> > cities bidding which don't have to be good.
>
>
> I don't have to have a replacement to be able to notice that the
> current one is clearly damaging. Sending some of the Foundation's
> hardest-working volunteers on a futile task is utterly demotivating.
>
>
> - d.
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


from_name: Oskar Sigvardsson

body:
On 9/28/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> My phone number and email are publicly available for media contact
> purposes. This means, of course, I get emails and calls about
> *everything*.
>
> A common call is "How do I get an article about me/my book/my achievement?"
>
> Now. What's a helpful answer to this? Better than "You don't, someone
> else has to write one," because you *know* they'll just write a really
> bad one themselves and it'll all end in a tearful AFD entry and
> someone hating or fearing Wikipedia henceforth.
>
> Assume that referring them to a web page or policy page is less good
> than being able to answer on the phone right there.
>
> Ideas please?
>
>
> - d.

Fist off all, this should really be in our FAQ (I've just skimmed over
it, man it's big, and I couldn't find it). Someone should put that in.

To answer your question, if I were to get those calls I would calmly
explain that we have fairly high standards on what people can be
subjects of articles. Tell them that if they deserve to have an
article in wikipedia, they will. Just not written on request or by
themselves. Point out that if they do write an article on themselves,
it is very likely it will be deleted and it is not always a nice
discussion to read. You might also want to point out that you yourself
doesn't have an article, I can imagine that would convince some people
;)

But hey, it's not me who gets the calls, what do I know. That's how I
would handle it anyway.

--Oskar


from_name: Brion Vibber

subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing database dumps

body:
Mike O wrote:
>> The namespace prefix appears at the beginning of the page title, which appears
>> as the text contents of the /mediawiki/page/title element,
>> separated by a colon from the remaining title part.
>
> That's what I gathered from reading the Wiki docs before I started trying to
parse the XML. But look at this snippet of XML from
enwiki-latest-pages-articles.xml.bz2 taken from late August. I don't see any
namespace in the <title> elements, any ideas why, or am I looking in the wrong
spot?

Those particular page titles are in the main (article) namespace, which has no
prefix:

>       <namespace key="0" />
[snip]
>     <title>AaA</title>
[snip]
>     <title>AlgeriA</title>

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


body:
On 28/09/06, Hsiang-Tai Chien <htchien1225 at yahoo.com.tw> wrote:

> Taipei, as other bidding team, also pad their volunteer time and effort on
> this bid. And, we do not know if the jury will choice us or not before the
> final result comes out.
> We, just like all of you, are only volunteers who are willing to devote
> ourselves to the WM projects and share the knowledge to benefit all human
> beings.

Are you saying you consider there's no problem?

- d.


from_name: Stephen Streater

body:
On 28 Sep 2006, at 12:36, Oskar Sigvardsson wrote:

> On 9/28/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>> My phone number and email are publicly available for media contact
>> purposes. This means, of course, I get emails and calls about
>> *everything*.
>>
>> A common call is "How do I get an article about me/my book/my
>> achievement?"
>>
>> Now. What's a helpful answer to this? Better than "You don't, someone
>> else has to write one," because you *know* they'll just write a
>> really
>> bad one themselves and it'll all end in a tearful AFD entry and
>> someone hating or fearing Wikipedia henceforth.
>>
>> Assume that referring them to a web page or policy page is less good
>> than being able to answer on the phone right there.
>>
>> Ideas please?
>>
>>
>> - d.
>
> Fist off all, this should really be in our FAQ (I've just skimmed over
> it, man it's big, and I couldn't find it). Someone should put that in.
>
> To answer your question, if I were to get those calls I would calmly
> explain that we have fairly high standards on what people can be
> subjects of articles. Tell them that if they deserve to have an
> article in wikipedia, they will. Just not written on request or by
> themselves. Point out that if they do write an article on themselves,
> it is very likely it will be deleted and it is not always a nice
> discussion to read. You might also want to point out that you yourself
> doesn't have an article, I can imagine that would convince some people
> ;)

I would suggest that they start contributing to Wikipedia.
After a period, their name will be recognised by other
passing editors who will be surprised that they don't have
an article yet, and they will write one.


from_name: Jimmy Wales

body:
Certainly my date of birth is wrong all over the net because I entered
it wrong on a social networking site years ago.  Such sources should be
treated with EXTREME skepticism on ALL details.

Andrew Gray wrote:
> This may be of interest to some people, given our occasional habit of
> fleshing out articles by raiding the personal sites of subjects:
>
> http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003211808_fancher20.html
>
> It's a brief report of a discussion at the Seattle Times about the
> reliability and ethical appropriateness of using (say) the Myspace
> page of a murder victim in reporting on them. Not much content, but
> it's good to see people are asking themselves these questions.
>


body:
Not that it is up to me, nor should it be, but I intend to be a strong
personal supporter of Turin for 2008, and encourage the concept that we
should settle this fairly soon.

Gianluigi Gamba wrote:
> I congratulate with Taipei team and I'm sure they'll organize a memorable
> event.
>
> As a member of the Turin bidding team, let me voice a choral "too bad".
> We had a sort of incredible "astral conjunction" of sponsors *really eager*
> to have the Wikimania event, the enthusiasm of the whole community, the
> honeymoon with the media and the commitment of many people from national
> (and not only) institutions.
> I wonder if such combination will return in a future. I hope so.
>
> A prayer to the future jury: that's not been this year's case, but should
> geographic and linguistic criteria be essential in choosing the future
> locations, please say it in advance, before people start making contacts,
> put their faces off and spend words.
>
> Good luck Taipei, and good job.
>
> G. (aka Paginazero)
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
On 9/28/06, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/27/06, Zoney <zoney.ie at gmail.com> wrote:
> > As a mergist - how do you get around the difficulties of preserving the
> > history of the content (wrt. attribution under GFDL)?
>
> Repeated detetions and undeletions. You delete the page you are moving
> the text to be merged to. Move the text to that page then undelete.
> Full process is described in how to fix copy and paste moves.

...which is not always practical, but is more likely to be when
dealing with short stubs (most of which have brief histories).

Otherwise, a manual merge can be performed leaving the merged page as
a redirect. A clear edit summary on both articles, clearly indicating
where the content was merged from/to, is sufficient. If necessary a
message on the respective talk pages can document the merge.

--
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com


from_name: charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com

body:
"David Gerard" wrote

> Ideas please?

It's now a little while, and I have other concerns, but I thought _last_ year that a 'how to edit Wikipedia' book would be an excellent idea. (I went as far as getting a proposal turned down by a publisher.)

Still relevant in 2006? Scenario is non-Webbish person (middle aged, middle class) wants a book on how to interact with Wikipedia, with a specific end in view. About as interesting as 'spreadsheets for dummies' type literature, but actually comprehensive as a reference, and _not_ just a bunch of hypertext looking like overgrown rhododendrons.

This at least is one type of answer to DG's phone call issue (I can't tell you it all in five minutes but I can recommend a book); and an admission that however simple the theory, the practice has become demanding.

Charles
Charles

-----------------------------------------
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from_name: Walter van Kalken

subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?

body:
Erik Moeller wrote:

>On 9/28/06, oscar <oscar.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>>the more i think about it, the explanations offered afterwards i find highly
>>disappointing too, but maybe i was expecting too much here. "purely for
>>technical reasons" and "yay for self-mutilation" sound like someone having
>>no notion of the responsibility that should go with his position, to be
>>honest.
>>
>>
>
>Yay for pointless accusations and flamewars about database flags.
>
>
>
That is an extremely impolite answer Erik. I would have expected better.

Walter/Waerth


subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
George Herbert wrote:
> I understand those that disagree, but I think the categorical include
> pseudopolicy for schools makes sense.  They're of immense interest to
> most parents, the school system has 72 million odd Americans in it,
> and categorical inclusionism here is not in any way throwing Wikipedia
> into disrepute or threatening our server load or diskspace.

That "immense interest" does not in any way mean that there is actual
verifiable information, nor does it keep us from having a steady stream
of Oh So Very Funny Young Men editing these little gems of nonsense into
still further useless nonsense that good people then have to clean up.

However, I am very sorry to report that I agree with David Gerard, who I
think was not being critical of anyone at all, when he said that
spending a lot of time in school deletion wars is probably not a good
use of any intelligent person's time.  I am very sorry to say it, but
there it is. :)

--Jimbo


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
David Gerard wrote:
> On 24/09/06, Constantine Evans <constantine at evanslabs.org> wrote:
>
>> Note that notability is not the policy. Verifiability is. Even if a
>> school is notable "by default", as some claim, if there is no verifiable
>> information about it, there should be no article.
>
>
> Correct.
>
> "I can prove, by breathtaking querulousness, that the school in my
> front room fit that rule."
> "Well done. Cookie for you! Third-party verifiability? No? So sad."

So, the current situation is that
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seneca_Falls_%28town%29%2C_New_York

contains the following completely out-of-context and unverified and
unverifiable paragraph:

"Private education

Finger Lakes Christian School is a private Pre-K-Grade 12 school located
in Seneca Falls, New York. It shares the building with the 1st Baptist
Church. The current principal is the Rev. Scott Van Kirk. The school was
established in 1991. Linked to The First Baptist Church of Seneca Falls,
its aims were to offer an alternative for Christian children. The school
has about 75 students. Its admission policy is that at least one parent
or guardian must be a born-again Christian. As well as the general
curriculum, pupils at the school attend Bible classes twice a week, and
students have devotional meetings with their teachers or a Pastor at
least weekly and have a weekly Chapel service."

I would go in and simply delete it myself and insist that it not be
added back until someone finds a source better than the school's own
homemade website, but I don't want to be seen as creating *actual
policy* in this area by my edits.

I'm just saying.

--Jimbo


from_name: Nick Jenkins

subject: [Wikitech-l] new dumps ?

body:
> Erik Zachte wrote:
> > Sometimes the jump job reports all is well when it is not (Brion knows this)
>
> This part's now fixed; .bz2 failures will not report .7z success on the next run
> around (but could on the current run while the program's still running).
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

If I can possibly please make a suggestion / request, one thing I would quite like from the download.wikipedia.org site is an index
file somewhere (could be plain text or XML) that indicates what the latest valid individual dump files are for a given Wikipedia
site.

The "latest" directory is not useful for this purpose (e.g. http://download.wikipedia.org/enwiki/latest/ points to files from approx
Aug-17, which looks to be the latest dump where everything reported as succeeded; but the later dumps are still useful for most of
the files, just not the really large ones). An index file of this type would supersede the
http://download.wikipedia.org/enwiki/latest/ directory, and would probably live in  http://download.wikipedia.org/enwiki/ .

Given that sometimes some dumps fail, it could be good to make automating the downloading and processing of dump files easier. That
way dump consumers could have a cron job that say once a day would get the latest index file, and download the latest dump files
they wanted, if they had been updated.

It might help here to show a rough mock-up example of the type of file I'm thinking of:

===================================================================
<mediawiki xsi:schemaLocation="http://download.wikipedia.org/xml/export-0.1/" version="0.1" xml:lang="en">
  <siteinfo>
     <sitename>English Wikipedia</sitename>
  </siteinfo>
  <dump type="site_stats.sql.gz">
      <desc>A few statistics such as the page count.</desc>
      <url>http://download.wikipedia.org/enwiki/20060925/enwiki-20060925-site_stats.sql.gz</url>
      <size_in_bytes>451</size_in_bytes>
      <timestamp>2006-09-24T16:29:01Z</timestamp>
      <md5sum>e4defa79c36823c67ed4d937f8f7013c</md5sum>
  </dump>
	<dump type="pages-articles.xml.bz2">
      <desc>Articles, templates, image descriptions, and primary meta-pages.</desc>
      <timestamp>2006-09-24T22:12:24Z</timestamp>
      <url>http://download.wikipedia.org/enwiki/20060925/enwiki-20060925-pages-articles.xml.bz2</url>
      <md5sum>2742b1b4b131d9a28887823da91cf2a5</md5sum>
      <size_in_bytes>1710328527</size_in_bytes>
  </dump>

.... snip various dump entries ....

   <dump type="pages-meta-history.xml.7z">
      <desc>All pages with complete edit history (.7z)</desc>
      <timestamp>2006-08-16T12:55:00Z</timestamp>
      <url>http://download.wikipedia.org/enwiki/20060816/enwiki-20060816-pages-meta-history.xml.7z</url>
      <md5sum>24160a71229bee02bb813825bf7413db</md5sum>
      <size_in_bytes>5132097632</size_in_bytes>
  </dump>
</mediawiki>
===================================================================

... the above file is probably invalid XML and needs to tweaked and so forth, but hopefully it illustrates the idea (e.g. the
pages-articles.xml.bz2 entry is recent, whereas the pages-meta-history.xml.7z file is a month older, but both represent the latest
valid dump for that type of file). Someone who for example only wants the "All pages with complete edit history (.7z)" file can
download this file once a day, then when the entry changes have it download the file, verify the size in bytes matches, verify the
Md5sum matches, and if everything is good, extract the file, maybe then locally verify it's a valid XML file, and if it's all still
good process the file in an automated way. Also after every individual dump file was successfully created, the index file would
probably have to be updated (to ensure it was always current). At the moment the above information is I think currently on the
download.wikipedia.org site, but it's just scattered out over a number of different places; this would basically unify all that
information into a nice useful data format.

All the best,
Nick.


subject: [Wikitech-l] Wikipedia mirror

body:
>   I have already built a  mirror of en.wikipedia at http://freeknowledge.dyndns.org/ however some of the pages are not
> rendered properly. For e.g. http://freeknowledge.dyndns.org/index.php/India
>   Any suggestions/advice on how to fix this

Looks like you haven't installed Parser Functions ( http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/ParserFunctions ) or any of the other extensions
used on the Wikipedia.
Compare: http://freeknowledge.dyndns.org/index.php/Special:Version
To     : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Version
... you want everything under "Parser hooks" to be the same on your wiki as per the Wikipedia, in order to have the best chance of
Wikipedia content displaying correctly on your wiki. You can download the extensions you need from
http://svn.wikimedia.org/viewvc/mediawiki/trunk/extensions , and get documentation for most of the extensions from
meta.wikimedia.org (e.g. http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Cite/Cite.php#How_to_install )

All the best,
Nick.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
Guettarda wrote:
> Quite frankly I am anything but a deletionist, but I think that a school
> with 75 students and no other claim to notability doesn't deserve a
> Wikipedia article

I think the danger here is that "doesn't deserve" (though I agree) is a
value judgment about which it is quite hard to get consensus.  I would
put it this way:

"An article with no independent sources of any kind about a school (or
anything else) about which there is only a clearly homemade website
presents insurmountable editorial difficulties for us.  As a general
rule, there is no good way to be sure that we are not being hoaxed, nor
that the information on the website is in any way true."

>  There is a long-established tradition of notability for Wikipedia
> articles.  We delete things that are non-notable.  People who say "all
> schools are notable" aren't discussing an issue, they are espousing an
> ideology.  Some people who home-school their children register a school.  By
> that token, anyone home-schooling their children is notable enough for
> inclusion, so the only barrier then is verifiability

So, yeah, while I agree, I still think it is almost always better to
find some *other* point of argument than "notability" which is the sort
of value judgment that is pretty hard to get consensus on.

--Jimbo


from_name: Steve Summit

subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing database dumps

body:
Mike wrote:
> ...What I don't see is how to determine what namespace an article
> correlates to. I see the namespace elements at the top of the file,
> but how do I match articles to the right namespace?

As Brion already explained, they're sitting there right in each
entry's title, using the same colon-separated syntax as they do
through the normal wiki UIF.

It's worth noting, though, that the colon syntax isn't
unambiguous.  If you're looking for namespace prefixes, you have
to look for only the ones that are known to exist in the project.
You can't just look for colons, because there are plenty of
articles with colons in their names, such as [[Boston Red Sox:
Managers and Ownership]] and [[Star Trek: The Next Generation]],
but obviously "Boston Red Sox" and "Star Trek" aren't namespaces.


from_name: Carl Peterson

subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

references:
<s7lah2pihqs0vqiecpaifbaphj43urt5a5@4ax.com>
	<fbad4e140609230946g1506a024g26e2447a3c584abb@mail.gmail.com>
	<47683e960609241202h58eebc8fua913fdc8802ae10c@mail.gmail.com>
	<ef754g$jmb$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<fbad4e140609252350s7644b094hff6edc5ab124865f@mail.gmail.com>
	<451B9BCC.5020400@wikia.com>
	<fb7fdd9c0609280359p34dbcbc8s23dca1adb00e814@mail.gmail.com>
	<451BC6B8.8040201@wikia.com> <efh9sc$c7h$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<fbad4e140609281317u1ec7257en6117a1ceff2c64bc@mail.gmail.com>

body:
On 9/28/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 28/09/06, David Alexander Russell <webmaster at davidarussell.co.uk>
> wrote:
> > Jimmy Wales wrote:
>
> > > Yeah, but when I do something, unless I am very very very careful, it
> > > ends up getting used as a stick to beat innocents to death with. :)
>
> > Couldn't you do what Danny does for WP:OFFICE actions, i.e. have a 'this
> > is me just editing' account and a 'this is me as a policy-creating
> > godking' account? And then anyone who tries to use your ordinary edits
> > to beat innocents with can just be laughed at.
>
>
> You haven't experienced the amazing feats of Jimbomancy some
> wikilawyers and obsessives will stretch to. "This edit is ABSOLUTELY
> IMPERATIVE because Jimbo suggested on a mailing list in 1989 that
> something like it would be a good idea."

That's when Jimbomancy is invoked in directly stating that "edits made by
this account are to be regarded no differently than those made by any other
editor." Also, if the account remained anonymous with regards to its
owner...

Carl


from_name: David Mestel

body:
My only concern with the book idea is that it really has to go one of
two ways - either a guide to doing shiny stuff in WML, or a guide to
Wikipedia policy and process.  Now, if it is just a guide to WML, it's
obviously not going to help a caller wondering why they haven't got a
Wikipedia article on them.  On the other hand, if it's a guide to
policy and process, my concern is that it'll go out of date very
quickly - for example, if it directs the reader to WP:RA, and we
decide to scrap that page, said reader may be just a leetle bit
annoyed.  Having said which, it seems a pretty good idea overall.

On 28/09/06, charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com
<charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
> "David Gerard" wrote
>
> > Ideas please?
>
> It's now a little while, and I have other concerns, but I thought _last_ year that a 'how to edit Wikipedia' book would be an excellent idea. (I went as far as getting a proposal turned down by a publisher.)
>
> Still relevant in 2006? Scenario is non-Webbish person (middle aged, middle class) wants a book on how to interact with Wikipedia, with a specific end in view. About as interesting as 'spreadsheets for dummies' type literature, but actually comprehensive as a reference, and _not_ just a bunch of hypertext looking like overgrown rhododendrons.
>
> This at least is one type of answer to DG's phone call issue (I can't tell you it all in five minutes but I can recommend a book); and an admission that however simple the theory, the practice has become demanding.
>
> Charles
> Charles
>
> -----------------------------------------
> Email sent from www.ntlworld.com
> Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software
> Visit www.ntlworld.com/security for more information
>
> _______________________________________________
> WikiEN-l mailing list
> WikiEN-l at Wikipedia.org
> To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
>

--
David


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

references:
<s7lah2pihqs0vqiecpaifbaphj43urt5a5@4ax.com>
	<fbad4e140609230946g1506a024g26e2447a3c584abb@mail.gmail.com>
	<38a7bf7c0609231036g378bf749yc132fbfbb05dc1b2@mail.gmail.com>
	<451B9A01.1020904@wikia.com>
	<fbad4e140609280254t3b9ea640pb51397958e6eaeca@mail.gmail.com>
	<rjanh25gtkgg1huc9l1arocubhkmtbqc93@4ax.com>
	<fbad4e140609280359v49e80a53sdc2aeed3ef9430c8@mail.gmail.com>

body:
On Thu, 28 Sep 2006 11:59:51 +0100, "David Gerard" <dgerard at gmail.com>
wrote:

>That's the trouble with entrenched positions in process wars - the
>people act in a manner indistinguishable from bloody idiots. I suggest
>persisting on the verifiability and making the list article anyway.

In a rare outbreak of Clue (rare for this issue, not the closer of the
DRV), the article was (last time I saw it) redirected to the
community, which has a short sentence on it.  We shall see.

Guy (JzG)
--
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG


from_name: David Gerard

subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

references:
<s7lah2pihqs0vqiecpaifbaphj43urt5a5@4ax.com>
	<fbad4e140609230946g1506a024g26e2447a3c584abb@mail.gmail.com>
	<38a7bf7c0609231036g378bf749yc132fbfbb05dc1b2@mail.gmail.com>
	<451B9A01.1020904@wikia.com>
	<fbad4e140609280254t3b9ea640pb51397958e6eaeca@mail.gmail.com>
	<rjanh25gtkgg1huc9l1arocubhkmtbqc93@4ax.com>
	<fbad4e140609280359v49e80a53sdc2aeed3ef9430c8@mail.gmail.com>
	<uhrnh29kjhku737rne69oh2u3f7vk299fn@4ax.com>

body:
On 28/09/06, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman at spamcop.net> wrote:
> On Thu, 28 Sep 2006 11:59:51 +0100, "David Gerard" <dgerard at gmail.com>
> wrote:

> >That's the trouble with entrenched positions in process wars - the
> >people act in a manner indistinguishable from bloody idiots. I suggest
> >persisting on the verifiability and making the list article anyway.

> In a rare outbreak of Clue (rare for this issue, not the closer of the
> DRV), the article was (last time I saw it) redirected to the
> community, which has a short sentence on it.  We shall see.

w00t!

- d.


subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing database dumps

body:
Mike wrote:
> ...look at this snippet of XML from enwiki-latest-pages-articles.xml.bz2
> taken from late August. I don't see any namespace in the <title> elements,
>...
>     <title>AaA</title>
>...
>     <title>AlgeriA</title>

Those are main namespace (namespace 0) articles, so they don't
have a prefix.  But all the non-main-namespace pages do.
The first is <id>724</id><title>Wikipedia:Adding Wikipedia
articles to Nupedia</title>.)


subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing database dumps

body:
Mike wrote:
> So are you saying that if there's no colon in the title it's safe the
> assume that they go in namespace 0. And if there is a colon then I need
> to parse to see if text before a colon matches a namespace, and
> if it doesn't then the colon is just part of the article title ?

I'm not Brion, but that's more or less exactly what I'd do.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

references:
<s7lah2pihqs0vqiecpaifbaphj43urt5a5@4ax.com>
	<ef754g$jmb$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<fbad4e140609252350s7644b094hff6edc5ab124865f@mail.gmail.com>
	<451B9BCC.5020400@wikia.com>
	<fb7fdd9c0609280359p34dbcbc8s23dca1adb00e814@mail.gmail.com>
	<451BC6B8.8040201@wikia.com> <efh9sc$c7h$1@sea.gmane.org>
	<fbad4e140609281317u1ec7257en6117a1ceff2c64bc@mail.gmail.com>
	<6ac0ff0e0609281323w5688280x3ef7360782f0e7eb@mail.gmail.com>
	<fbad4e140609281335h5e429bf5j2a8df068e7e4e879@mail.gmail.com>

body:
On 9/28/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 28/09/06, Carl Peterson <carlopeterson at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > That's when Jimbomancy is invoked in directly stating that "edits made
> by
> > this account are to be regarded no differently than those made by any
> other
> > editor." Also, if the account remained anonymous with regards to its
> > owner...
>
>
> Those two contradict somewhere ...

I didn't mean that the two approaches should be used at the same. That's
self-defeating, as an otherwise anonymous user saying they should be treated
"no differently than any other editor" would raise a few eyebrows as to the
editor's real identity.

There are a few admins who have multiple accounts, purely so they can
> edit articles without upset people stalking their every step. There
> are users who have had real-life stalkers and so quietly fade out one
> account while using a second. This is fine as long as it's for good
> reason and one is very careful not to cross the streams. Per
> [[WP:SOCK]], "... some have suggested that Jimbo should get, and edit
> from, a sock puppet account. Perhaps he does."
>
>
Carl


subject: [WikiEN-l] NYT obituaries editor answers reader's questions

body:
>From Danny:

  http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/25/business/media/25asktheeditors.html

You should all read this (you need to log in, but these things
happen). It answers a pile of relevant questions for Wikipedia:
notability, how to write a good bio (our best bio articles would a
well-written obituary, whether the person is alive or not), research
... fantastic stuff.

- d.


body:
On 28/09/06, Robert Scott Horning <robert_horning at netzero.net> wrote:

> This, to me, is an ex-post facto redefinition of the scope and mission
> of the Wikimedia Foundation, or something akin to backronyms.  This is
> only outside of the scope of the WMF because those involved with the day
> to day affairs of the WMF just don't want to be bothered with this.  It
> isn't part of some more noble and legalistic attitude that seems to be
> presented here.

Uh, not really. It was put on a separate wiki to get it the heck out
of Wikipedia.

> I am suggesting that I and some others have a contrary viewpoint here,
> and it shouldn't be assumed that this is an unanimous decision to shut
> down this project in this manner.  I admit that sometimes decisions like
> this need to be made, but please be honest about why they are being made
> rather than trying to sugar coat them to be for reasons that really
> don't exist.

No, no. You don't understand. The Foundation is relentlessly
Americocentric and dedicated to the pursuit of en:wp running roughshod
over all other languages!

- d.


list: wikipedia-l

subject:
[Wikipedia-l] [WikiJA-l] Korean servers to be shuffled: ja, ko,
 ms, th Wikipedias moving

body:
Brion Vibber wrote:
> Just a heads-up; we're planning to move the backend hosting for
> Japanese, Korean, Malay, and Thai Wikipedias from our Korean server
> cluster (yaseo) back to the main servers in Florida (pmtpa) later this
> week.

We'll start at about 18:00 UTC Friday evening (1am Thailand, 2am Malaysia, 3am
Japan and Korea). It will take a few hours to dump the databases, copy them, and
re-import them, but if everything goes smoothly we hope to have these wikis back
to read-write sometime late Saturday morning local time.

There will also be a brief read-only period for most of our other wikis when we
switch database servers during the import. That should last only a few minutes,
and will not affect en.wikipedia.org (which is on a different database server).
It should be some time in late evening or night European time.

-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)


subject:
[Wikitech-l] [WikiJA-l] Korean servers to be shuffled: ja, ko,
 ms, th Wikipedias moving


from_name: Alphax (Wikipedia email)

subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?

body:
Walter van Kalken wrote:
> Erik Moeller wrote:
>
>> On 9/28/06, oscar <oscar.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> the more i think about it, the explanations offered afterwards i find highly
>>> disappointing too, but maybe i was expecting too much here. "purely for
>>> technical reasons" and "yay for self-mutilation" sound like someone having
>>> no notion of the responsibility that should go with his position, to be
>>> honest.
>>>
>>>
>> Yay for pointless accusations and flamewars about database flags.
>>
>>
>>
> That is an extremely impolite answer Erik. I would have expected better.
>

Perhaps you missed his .sig:

> DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
> in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
> position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.

You are all assuming that there was something underhanded going on here.
The whole thing was an accident. You are making a big deal out of
nothing. Move along, nothing to see here.

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?

body:
Walter van Kalken wrote:
> Erik Moeller wrote:
>
>> On 9/28/06, oscar <oscar.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> the more i think about it, the explanations offered afterwards i find highly
>>> disappointing too, but maybe i was expecting too much here. "purely for
>>> technical reasons" and "yay for self-mutilation" sound like someone having
>>> no notion of the responsibility that should go with his position, to be
>>> honest.
>>>
>>>
>> Yay for pointless accusations and flamewars about database flags.
>>
>>
>>
> That is an extremely impolite answer Erik. I would have expected better.
>

Perhaps you missed his .sig:

> DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
> in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
> position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.

You are all assuming that there was something underhanded going on here.
The whole thing was an accident. You are making a big deal out of
nothing. Move along, nothing to see here.

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?

body:
Walter van Kalken wrote:
> Erik Moeller wrote:
>
>> On 9/28/06, oscar <oscar.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> the more i think about it, the explanations offered afterwards i find highly
>>> disappointing too, but maybe i was expecting too much here. "purely for
>>> technical reasons" and "yay for self-mutilation" sound like someone having
>>> no notion of the responsibility that should go with his position, to be
>>> honest.
>>>
>>>
>> Yay for pointless accusations and flamewars about database flags.
>>
>>
>>
> That is an extremely impolite answer Erik. I would have expected better.
>

Perhaps you missed his .sig:

> DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
> in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
> position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.

You are all assuming that there was something underhanded going on here.
The whole thing was an accident. You are making a big deal out of
nothing. Move along, nothing to see here.

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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subject: [Foundation-l] did i miss something?

body:
Walter van Kalken wrote:
> Erik Moeller wrote:
>
>> On 9/28/06, oscar <oscar.wiki at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> the more i think about it, the explanations offered afterwards i find highly
>>> disappointing too, but maybe i was expecting too much here. "purely for
>>> technical reasons" and "yay for self-mutilation" sound like someone having
>>> no notion of the responsibility that should go with his position, to be
>>> honest.
>>>
>>>
>> Yay for pointless accusations and flamewars about database flags.
>>
>>
>>
> That is an extremely impolite answer Erik. I would have expected better.
>

Perhaps you missed his .sig:

> DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
> in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
> position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.

You are all assuming that there was something underhanded going on here.
The whole thing was an accident. You are making a big deal out of
nothing. Move along, nothing to see here.

--
Alphax - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax
Contributor to Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia
"We make the internet not suck" - Jimbo Wales
Public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Alphax/OpenPGP

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from_name: valdelli at bluemail.ch

body:
For Turin, IMHO, could be interesting also to have a defined rule to
choose the bids.

I have followed three years of candidatures and each year different
rules.

My question is... in this choice what is the role of the
communities?

Last year the final bidders (Toronto e Boston) have been choosed
after a poll (IMHO unnecessary because the two towns are in the same
continent with a little bit difference of proposal)... and this
year?

Who has a limited knowledge of marketing knows that a poll is
important to investigate the crowd of wikipedians. It's not a must,
but it's important because the board of examiners could take a choice
with impartial data without taking in charge the weight of an
important choice.

Without a poll *seems* that the choice has been already taken
previously.

I ask for more importance of Wikipedians.

Regards

Ilario

----Messaggio originale----
Da: jwales at wikia.com
Data: 28.09.06 10.57
A: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List"<foundation-l at wikimedia.org>
Oggetto: Re: [Foundation-l] Taipei chosen to host Wikimania 2007

Not that it is up to me, nor should it be, but I intend to be a
strong
personal supporter of Turin for 2008, and encourage the concept
that we
should settle this fairly soon.

Gianluigi Gamba wrote:
> I congratulate with Taipei team and I'm sure they'll organize a
memorable
> event.
>
> As a member of the Turin bidding team, let me voice a choral "too
bad".
> We had a sort of incredible "astral conjunction" of sponsors
*really eager*
> to have the Wikimania event, the enthusiasm of the whole
community, the
> honeymoon with the media and the commitment of many people from
national
> (and not only) institutions.
> I wonder if such combination will return in a future. I hope so.
>


body:
On 28/09/06, Birgitte SB <birgitte_sb at yahoo.com> wrote:
> --- David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:

> > No, no. You don't understand. The Foundation is
> > relentlessly
> > Americocentric and dedicated to the pursuit of en:wp
> > running roughshod
> > over all other languages!

> This is at least the third time you have you replied
> in this manner to someone's concerns.  I can't
> articulate what is exactly wrong with your reply, but
> I know that I personally dislike it.  Please stop.  It
> does nothing to further disscusion or help find
> solutions.

I mean that this appears to be a belief held by many non-Americans
around this list, so I found it strange that someone then accused the
Foundation of doing the opposite. My apologies if I offended.

- d.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
MacGyverMagic/Mgm wrote:
> On 9/28/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
>>
>> I would go in and simply delete it myself and insist that it not be
>> added back until someone finds a source better than the school's own
>> homemade website, but I don't want to be seen as creating *actual
>> policy* in this area by my edits.
>>
>> I'm just saying.
>>
>> --Jimbo
>
>
> You'd be enforcing verifiability policy, not creating anything new.

Yeah, but when I do something, unless I am very very very careful, it
ends up getting used as a stick to beat innocents to death with. :)

--Jimbo


from_name: Andrew Gray

body:
On 28/09/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:

> The procedure as it is evidently needs work, since other bidders (e.g.
> London) are disappointed at their hard work being pretty much wasted.
>
> The current system seems to ensure a lot of volunteer time and effort
> being futile. This is damaging to the project.

The problem is that either we make a choice based on three or four
groups who've invested a lot of effort - which guarantees wasting a
fair lump of effort - or we make a choice before the detailed work has
been done, which would mean we save the legwork of the other teams
*but* we make a decision based on very little evidence. And if it then
turns out that the really really really optomistic bid for Gothab
isn't going to work once we start scaring up sponsorship etc, it's a
bit late to select an alternative...

It strikes me that any competitive bidding process, where the actual
work is devolved to a largely unknown local community, is going to
require a degree of wasted effort as all communities bidding try to
demonstrate they can achieve the required level. It's not ideal, but
neither is it simple ineptitude... it's necessary.

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


subject: [WikiEN-l] [[Wikipedia:Practical process]]

body:
[[:en:WP:PRO]]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Practical_process

I consign this essay to the fiery depths of the project space.

/me dives for cover

Does this look useful? Is it something of practical use to you? (Not
"is it something you wish other people would read?" Though that's
useful too, I suppose. But half the point is that telling people stuff
doesn't work.)

- d.


subject: [Wikipedia-l] [[Wikipedia:Practical process]]


from_name: Tim 'avatar' Bartel

body:
Hi Wikipedians,

Robert Scott Horning schrieb am 28.09.2006 18:26:
> Anthony wrote:
>>
>>If the wiki is truly not within the scope of the mission of the
>>foundation, which *many* people feel is true, then having it on
>>Wikimedia's servers and domain names confuses people as to what is the
>>mission of the foundation.
>
> This, to me, is an ex-post facto redefinition of the scope and mission
> of the Wikimedia Foundation, or something akin to backronyms.  This is
> only outside of the scope of the WMF because those involved with the day
> to day affairs of the WMF just don't want to be bothered with this.  It
> isn't part of some more noble and legalistic attitude that seems to be
> presented here.

It seems crystal clear to me, that their is a big difference between
sep11 and any other WM project, take the NPOV for an example. It also
seems to irritate people from the outside. We had supporters in germany
- mainly two big universities - who stated that they are very unhappy in
helping us out with projects or mirroring the wikipedia dvd/books/mobile
files (yeah, I know, theese are project from third parties) in the
future, because they disagree that sep11 suits into the WM project
portfolio and the "scope & mission" and that they are unable to support
us further.

Well, not to be misunderstood: This concrete occurence is more than a
year old and I don't argue, that we should do what outsiders demands
from us only to get their support. This should only be an example that
many people think, that sep11 don't fit to our mission and that they are
confused indeed.

Bye and sorry for my bad English, Tim.

--
http://wikipedistik.de


from_name: Rory Stolzenberg

body:
On 9/25/06, Luiz Augusto <lugusto at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 9/25/06, Robert Scott Horning <robert_horning at netzero.net> wrote:
> >
> > Erik Moeller wrote:
>
>
> (...)
>
> I'm not exactly sure where to go
> > with it, but closing it down completely just doesn't seem right to me.
> >
>
> But for at least 104 editors [1], sep11wiki isn't welcome on Wikimedia
> servers.
>
> [1]
>
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_closing_projects/Archive#Closure_of_September_11_Wiki
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>
That is absolutely not true, those users voted only to close the wiki, as
keeping it unlocked just invited spam and nonsense. Many said nothing about
moving it off Wikimedia servers.


from_name: Brad Patrick

body:
We can do a better job with this procedurally, but honestly, there is
only one winner in such a situation.  It is ultimately a
winner-take-all competition.  To the extent this runs counter to the
community culture of wikilove, I don't there is an alternative.

On 9/28/06, Andrew Gray <shimgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 28/09/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > The procedure as it is evidently needs work, since other bidders (e.g.
> > London) are disappointed at their hard work being pretty much wasted.
> >
> > The current system seems to ensure a lot of volunteer time and effort
> > being futile. This is damaging to the project.
>
> The problem is that either we make a choice based on three or four
> groups who've invested a lot of effort - which guarantees wasting a
> fair lump of effort - or we make a choice before the detailed work has
> been done, which would mean we save the legwork of the other teams
> *but* we make a decision based on very little evidence. And if it then
> turns out that the really really really optomistic bid for Gothab
> isn't going to work once we start scaring up sponsorship etc, it's a
> bit late to select an alternative...
>
> It strikes me that any competitive bidding process, where the actual
> work is devolved to a largely unknown local community, is going to
> require a degree of wasted effort as all communities bidding try to
> demonstrate they can achieve the required level. It's not ideal, but
> neither is it simple ineptitude... it's necessary.
>
> --
> - Andrew Gray
>   andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>

--
Brad Patrick
General Counsel & Interim Executive Director
Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.
bradp.wmf at gmail.com
727-231-0101


from_name: James Hare

body:
Yes... we have small local meetups, and the international conference.
Something in between would be good.

On 9/28/06, Erik Moeller <erik at wikimedia.org> wrote:
>
> On 9/29/06, Brad Patrick <bradp.wmf at gmail.com> wrote:
> > We can do a better job with this procedurally, but honestly, there is
> > only one winner in such a situation.  It is ultimately a
> > winner-take-all competition.  To the extent this runs counter to the
> > community culture of wikilove, I don't there is an alternative.
>
> I don't think it runs counter to wikilove, but perhaps we need to make
> it clearer to people that, yes, they may spend weeks on preparing a
> bid that will not be accepted. And as has been pointed out time and
> again, Wikimania cannot, should not and will not be the only Wikimedia
> event happening in a single year.
>
> Organizing events is very much within the domain of chapters, and we
> have a UK chapter. Is there a reason some of the lessons from
> preparing the bid could not be used to prepare a more focused wiki
> event in the UK? (*draws wiki youth camp idea  from hat*)
> --
> Peace & Love,
> Erik
>
> Member, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees
>
> DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
> in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
> position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>


from_name: HeinzJ

subject: [WikiEN-l] Encyclopedia of Earth appears to be now online...

body:
David Gerard schrieb:
>
>
> Wikipedia used the same licence as Nupedia, which was started in 2000.
>
Wikipedia GOT the same licence by Jimbo.

HeinzJ


from_name: Mike O

subject: [Wikitech-l] Parsing database dumps

body:
I'm having a bit of trouble figuring out database dump XML. Looking at the articles dump I see page content is wrapped in <page> and </page> elements. What I don't see is how to determine what namespace an article correlates to. I see the namespace elements at the top of the file, but how do I match articles to the right namespace?

Mike O

--
_______________________________________________
Surf the Web in a faster, safer and easier way:
Download Opera 9 at http://www.opera.com

Powered by Outblaze


body:
Hi Wikipedians,

Brion Vibber schrieb am 28.09.2006 19:22:
> Tim 'avatar' Bartel wrote:
>
>>It seems crystal clear to me, that their is a big difference between
>>sep11 and any other WM project,
>
> It's not a "WM project"; it's an archive of pages that were removed from Wikipedia.

But people see it as a Wikimedia project, because it is treated like our
(other) projects in many places. Just for example
http://download.wikimedia.org/ etc.

Perhaps someone can also update [[en:Help:Interwiki linking]] for
removing another example.

Bye, Tim.

--
http://wikipedistik.de


from_name: Erik Moeller

body:
On 9/28/06, Robert Scott Horning <robert_horning at netzero.net> wrote:
> One of the problems that I see with this site is the near absence of
> anybody willing to keep up the content, even though I'm sure there would
> be some willing and able participants who are knowledable and trusted
> enough to be able to take on the task.

The WMF site doesn't work, period. That is something that seems to be
generally acknowledged. The proposals for fixing it are varied, and at
some point, we need to have a strategic discussion or meeting, define
actions, and take them. Personally, I think the functionality
regarding "stable versions" could factor rather heavily here. It's
fine if anyone can "edit" content if only a small number of trusted
people can decide what is the public-facing version of any page.

With that functionality, one question is if we need a separate wiki in
the first place, or if we could just reorganize Meta. With single
login ;-) and other over-arching integration projects, that question
itself may lose some of its significance, so it might be OK to keep it
the way it is.

I think rather than wait for functionality, it might be a good idea to
take an initiative on Meta to improve some public-facing key pages,
and import them to WMF wiki, so that we can build the kind of sidebar
I describe. I need to, for myself, take a good look at the content
that is there before I do so, but that shouldn't stop anyone else.

--
Peace & Love,
Erik

Member, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees

DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.


from_name: Hsiang-Tai Chien

body:
Taipei, as other bidding team, also pad their volunteer time and effort on
this bid. And, we do not know if the jury will choice us or not before the
final result comes out.

We, just like all of you, are only volunteers who are willing to devote
ourselves to the WM projects and share the knowledge to benefit all human
beings.

H.T.

-----Original Message-----
From: foundation-l-bounces at wikimedia.org
[mailto:foundation-l-bounces at wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of David Gerard
Sent: Thursday, September 28, 2006 7:07 PM
To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Taipei chosen to host Wikimania 2007

On 28/09/06, effe iets anders <effeietsanders at gmail.com> wrote:

> If you mean here that we should now already pick Turin to "do"
> wikimania 2008, I think that would be inappropriate. There are a lot
> of other cities working on a bid right now, and it would be extremely
> unfair to change the rules now and don't give others the chance to
> make their bid up, which might be better, as you don't know what you
> can expect. Please let's just follow the procedure as stated by the "
> picking committee"  (how should I call them? ;-) ) before and let
> people prepare their bid, and pick one about november, december.
> If you meant otherwise, please forgive my lack of english :-)

The procedure as it is evidently needs work, since other bidders (e.g.
London) are disappointed at their hard work being pretty much wasted.

The current system seems to ensure a lot of volunteer time and effort being
futile. This is damaging to the project.

- d.
_______________________________________________
foundation-l mailing list
foundation-l at wikimedia.org
http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l

___________________________________________________
 ??????? ? ????????????????
 http://messenger.yahoo.com.tw/


body:
I'm not saying there will be no problems at all, but we will devote
ourselves to solve the issues and problems if there is any.

Thanks and best regards,
H.T.
In Taipei Wikipedian Weekly Meetup

-----Original Message-----
From: foundation-l-bounces at wikimedia.org
[mailto:foundation-l-bounces at wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of David Gerard
Sent: Thursday, September 28, 2006 8:54 PM
To: Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] Taipei chosen to host Wikimania 2007

On 28/09/06, Hsiang-Tai Chien <htchien1225 at yahoo.com.tw> wrote:

> Taipei, as other bidding team, also pad their volunteer time and
> effort on this bid. And, we do not know if the jury will choice us or
> not before the final result comes out.
> We, just like all of you, are only volunteers who are willing to
> devote ourselves to the WM projects and share the knowledge to benefit
> all human beings.

Are you saying you consider there's no problem?

- d.

___________________________________________________
 ??????? ? ????????????????
 http://messenger.yahoo.com.tw/


from_name: David Alexander Russell

subject: [WikiEN-l] Process wonkery

body:
Jimmy Wales wrote:
>
> Yeah, but when I do something, unless I am very very very careful, it
> ends up getting used as a stick to beat innocents to death with. :)
>
> --Jimbo

Couldn't you do what Danny does for WP:OFFICE actions, i.e. have a 'this
is me just editing' account and a 'this is me as a policy-creating
godking' account? And then anyone who tries to use your ordinary edits
to beat innocents with can just be laughed at.

Cynical


body:
Dear community,

after the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, Wikipedia was
overwhelmed by people expressing their sympathy for the victims,
adding material about affected organizations, and generally flooding
us with content that was inappropriate. Rather than turning these
people away, the decision was made to set up a separate wiki,
sep11.wikipedia.org, which still exists today.

A poll on Meta for closing the project showed 104 people in support
and 6 people in opposition. A volunteer, Jeff Merkey, has offered to
host the content under a dedicated domain name, sep11memories.org, in
a read-only state. It will from then onward be completely separate
from the Wikimedia Foundation.

Before we make this move, I would like to call all volunteers to help
review the state of the wiki. Remove comments or pages which are
inappropriate, remove inappropriate references to Wikipedia which
suggest an ongoing association (pointing out the historical
association is fine), and so on. An alternative logo would also be
helpful; otherwise the logo will have to be turned off.

To help, do the following:

1) Create an account on http://sep11.wikipedia.org/
2) Add yourself to the "Cleanup Group" on
http://sep11.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_Portal
3) Start working. :-) If you need admin rights, leave a note on my
talk page (User:Eloquence).

I hope people will help. I believe our own project history is
important and deserves respect and attention, even if we decide that a
project is not within the scope of the Wikimedia Foundation, and
especially when dealing with a subject such as this.

I would suggest a cleanup period of 4 weeks at most. Remember, this is
not a call for reviving the project and adding new information (though
new navigation structure is fine), but to get it into a state where it
can exist as a separate, valuable resource.

--
Peace & Love,
Erik

Member, Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees

DISCLAIMER: Unless otherwise stated, all views or opinions expressed
in this message are solely my own and do not represent an official
position of the Wikimedia Foundation or its Board of Trustees.


subject: [WikiEN-l] Call for volunteers: clean up sep11.wikipedia.org


subject: [Wikipedia-l] Call for volunteers: clean up sep11.wikipedia.org