User talk:Rodasmith/Archive 6

Possessive forms exclusion WT:VOTE rewritten and restarted

I have rewritten and restarted the vote, having attempted to reword the proposal to address the issues that people have raised. You may want to reread the proposal and reconsider your vote. † Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 20:05, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

template:en-noun and regular possessive forms of modern English nouns

There is currently an active vote at [[1]] regarding whether regular possessive forms of modern English nouns should have their own entries or not. As part of this it has been suggested that the {{en-noun}} template might be modified to show the possessive forms in the inflection line of modern English noun entries (irrespective of the outcome of the vote). Your comments and/or votes are welcome until the end of the vote on 5th August 2007. You are receiving this note as you have edited template:en-noun and/or template talk:en-noun Thryduulf 17:26, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks from ko Wiktionary

Thanks for your emendation of Hanja (詞 -> 辭). You are welcome to the ko. 고맙습니다. 자주 한국어 위키낱말사전에 들리세요. --아흔(A-heun) 08:42, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

re: opposition

Regarding Wiktionary:Votes/2007-07/Layout_of_example_sentences#Oppose, I'd just like to say wow, when you come up with a tough one, it is really difficult! My brain does not like to think in object-subject(modifier)-verb patterns.  :-)   Needless to say, it took me quite a while to grok the basics of it. --Connel MacKenzie 06:34, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, it's not easy to wrap an English brain around verb-final syntax. (Books seem to call it "subject-object-verb", but there really isn't a fixed order to the subject and object—the only really fixed position is that of the verb, which is always last.) If you're not used to it, it can be disorienting. Thanks again for you help, though. Rod (A. Smith) 15:07, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

German in particular can string together a lot of words before the verb. There is a joke about a writer infamous for very long constructions of this sort who published a new work in two volumes; after the first volume was printed, a reviewer was asked his opinion. His reply: "I can't tell you, I'm waiting for the verb!" Robert Ullmann 15:21, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Another day, another vote...

Speaking of votes, time is running out on Wiktionary:Votes/pl-2007-07/Brand names of products - would you like to add your thoughts? Cheers! bd2412 T 03:22, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Hangul's stroke order

Hi, you can view the stroke order for all jamo at: http://langintro.com/kintro/write2.htm Please note you'll need Java, though. Additional notes:

• The jamo ㅈ can be either two strokes or three strokes, depending on the letter shape.
  • If the downward strokes join in the middle of the top stroke, then it's three strokes, right, down left, down right.
  • If the letter looks like Katakana su then it's two strokes, right then down left, down right.

--Kjoonlee 23:56, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

CheckUser

Hi, I was wondering if you'd consider accepting a nomination for CheckUser. It's a fairly technical role, but we need trustworthy people to occasionally accept responsibility with that kind of information, and you are someone who the community can trust. Let me know how you feel about it, and thanks! DAVilla 08:54, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I’d be happy to accept such a nomination. I understand and respect the privacy concerns and am well versed in technical details like proxies and dynamic IPs. Rod (A. Smith) 14:52, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Hey, that's great! You'll be a natural then. I'm going to wait a little before making the nomination, and I'll email you when I do. DAVilla 22:07, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

ELE L4 header sequence

I had to revert/reset the vote because DAVilla could not resist editing.

Please try again. Robert Ullmann 00:09, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Ah. I see. I voted after DAVill improved the vote text. Then that fix was reverted, so my vote fell away with it. It looks to me like it means pretty much the same thing as it did when I voted, so I guess I still support. Rod (A. Smith) 00:17, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

IRC logs

No, I want it to not have to have the blank line between things, but the silly box is annoying too. If I take out the blank line though it just runs a giant block of text and whatnot. I'm sure I could use <br> to do what I want maybe. But the log I was actually referring to is some ten+ pages long and I'm lazy. Neskaya ^talk 21:33, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

edit conflicts

My goodness. Five edit conflicts in a row. And I was trying to kee my last couple WT:GP posts down to one sentence, each! Sigh. --Connel MacKenzie 16:41, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Would it be rude to mention that "writed" is generally not a possible error, when using the long form? --Connel MacKenzie 16:44, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

No, pointing that out wouldn't be rude at all. From my point of view, irregular (strong) verbs should be written out in the spell-it-all-out syntax. For regular (weak) verbs, though I think adopting a global preference for spell-it-all-out would actually increase the number of errors. I have to say, Connel, from my point of view, you have made excellent strides lately in the direction of diplomacy.  :-) Rod (A. Smith) 17:04, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Orthography of mentioned words

Hi, DAVilla. In this comment, you said, “It looks like we'll need different css classes for form-of definitions, which should normally be boldfaced, and other mentions, which should normally be italicized.” My impression is that you said that because you believe that the decision about formatting “form of” definitions differs from existing conventions. Based on that impression (and on my understanding that there really is no convention elsewhere), I was not led to believe that you specifically want the style of mentions to differ based on location.

If you actually would prefer the style of mentions to differ based on location, or if you think somebody else specifically would prefer such distinction, please let me know. Thanks for your help so far and thank you in advance for any additional feedback you might provide. Rod (A. Smith) 18:33, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

If you look at Wiktionary:Etymology you will see italicized Roman text. While it's unclear what style should apply to English words in the etymology, and while usage notes are even less clear, in practice italics is used almost universally for at least foreign words in Roman script in the etymology. As you know, Roman roots in definitions should be boldfaced by default. Therefore there are already at least two conventions for mention. DAVilla 01:41, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Interesting. Thanks for the pointer. I had been applying italics to roman script terms mentioned in etymologies, but as this edit shows, not all editors appear to agree with that draft, perhaps because it was written before the “form of” style vote. Do you personally prefer to keep the style for mentions in the etymology different from that in definitions? Rod (A. Smith) 01:49, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Personally? Yes. But I say that believing I'm not the only one. In fact it could already be a strong majority with that opinion. I'm not interested in the debate, but I'm worried there may even be a distinction between mentions in definitions (e.g. used with “the”) and mentions of roots in definitions (as form-of). DAVilla 02:50, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

OK. That's excellent information. It would do us very little good for me to propose the wrong approach. Thank you, DAVilla. Rod (A. Smith) 03:05, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

missing something

Yes, there was a large amount that went on some months ago, you may have been fortunate enough to miss it. Does -polis mean anything to you? ;-) Robert Ullmann 07:04, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

I do remember some garbage with "etymologically correct" plurals, but I thought that was well in the past. Are you on IRC? Rod (A. Smith) 07:08, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

IRC doesn't work out-of-the-box on the network I am on. I could probably hack it, but haven't. Robert Ullmann 07:10, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

OK. Was hoping to chat about the situation off wiki.  :-( Rod (A. Smith) 07:15, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

{{term}} without parameters

The version you generated for non-linked mention with {{term||word}} still insert an undesirable   after it. Can you see how to remove that? Circeus 21:09, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Done. Thanks for pointing that out. Rod (A. Smith) 21:17, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

== Compliment for Rodasmith ==

Sory abt tht mstake I md on RFV#Antarctican.I tried2rv it bt mesd up cos U gt in b4 m.I endd up doin'a half-rv 20mins aftr m orig post.I jst wntd 2 sy U'r fast&I lk wt I'v seen o'U so far.I tried2kp ths shrt&kinda1337'd it2avoid wstn yr space.If it dsn't mk sns or's anoyin,pls tel m. Thecurran 07:10, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

wintard

Conversation moved to WT:BP#WT:CFI, WT:RFV, and "durably archived". Rod (A. Smith) 17:36, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Good! That is better than on someone's talk page, whatever we think of the content of the conversation. Eclecticology 18:48, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Referenced words

Hi Rod,

I like your suggestion - it makes sense. Sorry for not getting back to you sooner; I've not been on Wiktionary for a while.

My preference is for emboldening English terms; italicising those in other languages that use the Latin alphabet, and to leave words in other scripts unchanged. This is the practice used in several print dictionaries. Looking into this a little more closely:

• Emboldening referenced headwords distinguishes them from surrounding text, which wikification alone does not do, as other words in an etymology (such as language names) might also be wikified. It also indicates that the words are defined elsewhere in the dictionary.
• Some dictionaries (eg, the OED) use small caps for cross-references. This is not really convenient for Wiktionary and I've never seen it used here.
• Italicising referenced non-English words also distinguishes them from both surrounding text and from English words; a possible case against the need to make the latter distinction is that Wiktionary defines non-English words too.
• It is important that terms in scripts other than the Latin alphabet are not emboldened or italicised as fine detail can be obscured by doing this. In any case, the fact that the terms are in another script is sufficient to distinguish them from any surrounding text.
• Hypothetical etymons (such as those in Proto-Indo-European) should be are treated like other non-English terms, but not italicised, as Wiktionary does not define them (they are non-words). [SEE FOOTNOTE]

Hopefully this answers your question about my own preferences.

Note that this means that a mix of styles should be permissible; will your proposed template be able to cope with this?

I would urge against allowing wikification alone as an option, for the reasons I have given above; here is an example to show what I mean: "spaghetti: from Italian spaghetti, plural diminutive of spago, string". Without wikification, this becomes: "spaghetti: from Italian spaghetti, plural diminutive of spago, string". So apparently the word "spaghetti" comes from Italian spaghetti (as opposed to spaghetti manufactured in another country, perhaps), which is a diminutive of "spago" and of "string". Not the best example, perhaps, but you see what I mean - this is liable to misinterpretation. Formatting is available because it makes things clear, so we should use it, in my opinion. — Paul G 15:32, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Thank you very much for elaborating so clearly, Paul. I will be certain to address the special formatting requirements for the situations you explained above. Rod (A. Smith) 16:50, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Footnote: my mistake. I should have said that I think hypothetical etymons should be italicised but not wikified. — Paul G 09:26, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

Template request

Could you add something to {{fr-noun}} that would allow an "uncountable" option? Circeus 23:25, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks

For blocking that vandal, he was a real pain in the neck. I'm really accustomed to doing this kind of stuff because I'm a Wikipedian, "JetLover." 67.150.7.28 00:40, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I just created an account! Cheers, JetLover 02:27, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Also, thanks for helping out my article biatch! Cheers, JetLover 02:49, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

WT:PREFS

I was talking about the option ‘Show “form of” definitions with an “italic qualifier”. (Default is with a “bold lemma”.)’ It is unclear to me what you mean by that. H. (talk) 20:09, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Ah. That option. Yes, that is unclear. I'll fix it. Rod (A. Smith) 20:11, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, I changed it. It now has too many parentheses for my tastes, but is it at least clear? Rod (A. Smith) 20:20, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

At least it is understandable now. Could you maybe also make a pref for ‘Show “form of” definitions with an italic definition (“qualifier”) and bold lemma.’, or am I confused and is this the default now (I think it is supposed to be.) H. (talk) 12:48, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

The default set by Wiktionary:Votes/2006-12/form-of style was for plain definition with a bold lemma. I add your requested option: ‘Show “form of” definitions with an italic definition (“qualifier”) and bold lemma.’

Cheers! Rod (A. Smith) 16:27, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

In Template talk:term, you claim to have implemented the ‘hide parentheses around glosses’ option, but I can’t find that in WT:PREFS, can you add it there? H. (talk) 14:22, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

It does work by editing my monobook.css, but it would be nice if there were an option in WT:PREFS as well, thanks. H. (talk) 14:30, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Now implemented as the last two checkboxes in WT:PREFS. Rod (A. Smith) 07:19, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Removal of gender from Template:es-verb form of

Hi,

Could you explain the rationale behind not supporting inflected forms of Spanish participles?

Thanks,
—Ruakh_TALK 04:41, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

I was responding to a direct request from Dmcdevit. I asked the same question and the reply was that the gender and number information is specified in the inflection line only. The definition line is to be simple. Not my decision. I thought there was consensus. Rod (A. Smith) 04:45, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

newbie and section order

Hm, here you switched the order of Synonyms and Translations, but this vote, which is as good as accepted, and for which you voted support, states that it should be the other way round... H. (talk) 12:48, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Oops. I was thinking of that vote when I switched the order. In my mistaken memory, though, I had ====Translations==== mixed in with ====Conjugation====, etc. Thanks for the note, or I would have kept making the same mistake. Rod (A. Smith) 16:15, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Braille cell

I like the diagram to the left of the ety. But it causes the Symbol header to float off the margin. I'd suggest you put the line <br clear="left" /> in between the ety text and the symbol header? Robert Ullmann 06:04, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Better? Rod (A. Smith) 06:24, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Way too big. The small one to the left about the size of the paragraph was much better. Robert Ullmann 11:46, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Oops. That was a typo. It was supposed to be 50px, but somehow "frame" made its way in there. Rod (A. Smith) 16:32, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

That was my doing, sorry. The frame-less version doesn't work for me, for some reason. Looking at the HTML, it is coming out properly as an <img> with src set to http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3b/Braille_cell.svg/50px-Braille_cell.svg.png; but that URI doesn't work for me: my browser does get an HTTP 200 response with an appropriate content-type, but no data follows the blank line after the headers. Quite strange, and I take it this isn't happening to you? (For me it happens in both Firefox and Internet Explorer.) —Ruakh_TALK 17:31, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I get the same problem. † Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 17:48, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Purge the image on commons to reset resized thumbnails. --Connel MacKenzie 18:04, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, Connel. That worked. Now, does it look better at 50 pixels or 75? Rod (A. Smith) 18:07, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Lose "thumb" and the caption. And it looks fine at 50px, on a very wide/high/hi res screen. Robert Ullmann 23:17, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Done. Rod (A. Smith) 03:56, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Another thing: font size = 5 (or whatever) does radically different things on different browser/OS/screen combinations. Much better is something like "125%". And using HTML tags on the line that lots of s/w (not just AF) expect to be the "inflection line" will cause much trouble ... I'd suggest you create {{Brai}} as a script template with size = 125%, and then just use sc=Brai in the {infl} call? And it had not occurred to me to use "mul" for Translingual, good idea. Robert Ullmann 23:11, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I didn't add the font tags myself but noticed that another editor did, and that they confused AF. Your suggestion for a script template is sensible. I will create it and update the Braille entries this evening or tomorrow. Rod (A. Smith) 23:55, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

I've done this. Cheers! Robert Ullmann 12:45, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Yakuza ranks

hey thanks for tidying up :) since you know a little japanese, do you know what gashira means? Mallerd 08:16, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

頭 kashira; head, chief, boss ... but I don't know if it should be がしら (gashira) instead. Robert Ullmann 11:43, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I suggest がしら (gashira), but you know more Japanese than I do, so I'll leave it to you. Mallerd 21:15, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

It seems that 頭 is pronounced as がしら (gashira) in some compounds, e.g. 銛打ち頭 (“lead harpooner”), apparently pronounced as もりうちがしら (moriuchigashira), but the term in isolation is pronounced かしら (kashira), or at least that's so in modern Japanese. We'll need someone who speaks Japanese better than myself (e.g. Tohru) to verify this, though. Rod (A. Smith) 21:33, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, since waka gashira (がしら (gashira)) for example is a compound it seems to me that in isolation it is indeed かしら (kashira). I'll post this on Tohru's page as well :). Mallerd 12:21, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Hey, I've asked Tohru as you adviced. He said that gashira is only used in compounds, so not an isolate word. Oh btw, are you in any way related to User:Rdsmith4? Mallerd 12:44, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

2L

I take it this edit was just because the anon's edits caused some of the quotes to be attached to the wrong sense? (I ask because it seems to me like we should split it into two sense lines, but before doing that, I want to make sure that the splitting out itself isn't what you objected to.) Thanks! —Ruakh_TALK 19:42, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, no. No objection to splitting the senses. They should be split. The problem was that the anon edit deleted several quotations without explanation. Rod (A. Smith) 19:46, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, heh, yes, duh. (How did I miss that?) Thanks again. :-) —Ruakh_TALK 19:57, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Template:es-adj

I'm having some trouble with this template, and maybe you can help. When I enter a masculine form of an adjective, like at atómico, I put {{es-adj|f=atómica}}, and it gives me the correct inflection line, with the feminine and plural forms: atómico m. (feminine atómica, masculine plural atómicos, feminine plural atómicas)".

However, when I mirror this for feminine nouns, typing "{{es-adj|m=atómico}}, for atómica, I expect the same sort of output, an inflection line with the correct gender, and masculine and plural forms: "atómica f. (masculine atómico, feminine plural atómicas, masculine plural atómicos)". Instead, what I get is the incorrect output you can see at atómica now, where it gives the masculine form I entered for the headword, instead of as an inflection. Can you figure out what the problem is? Dmcdevit·t 02:44, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, feminine adjective forms are not the lemma entries, so I'm not sure we should be using {{es-adj}} for those entries. Notice that for English non-lemma adjective forms (e.g. easier), we don't show any other forms on the headword line. Should we discuss this at Wiktionary talk:About Spanish? Rod (A. Smith) 06:41, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

As far as I'm aware, we don't list feminine forms in Spanish like we do alternate forms or other inflections (No "feminine form of," or at least not consistently, and certainly no {{feminine form of}}). It may simply be motly uncharted territory though. I wanted a way to link back to the masculine form, and the inflection template exists, and makes good sense, since, even if this is an inflection (though I think it's in a different category from most inflections; it's almost inevitably as common, and frequently more common than the lemma form), it has it's own inflection, the plural, which would go in the headword. Englih words aren't a good parallel in that respect, especially since the derived forms don't have essentially the same meaning, but get used for different nouns usually arbitrarily, like gendered Spanish adjectives. Dmcdevit·t 00:30, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

I see. You just haven't seen {{feminine of}}, which is used by several thousands of non-lemma feminine forms (Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:feminine of). If we change our practice and start creating full entries for feminine forms of Spanish adjectives, that would water down our notion of lemma entries for Spanish. I don't want to come off as stubborn, but I don't see the benefit in doing so, particularly because that would unnecessarily duplicate etymologies, usage notes, etc. outside of the lemma entries. Maybe I should add something to Wiktionary:About Spanish to indicate that the masculine form is the lemma for Spanish adjectives. Does that make sense? Rod (A. Smith) 01:05, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

There are problems with that template, though it's not terrible. It gives no category, and it can't know whether we are talking about nouns or adjectives (or feminie plurals thereof) in order to create the right category. Also, if we decide against the inflection template, then we can't list the plural. Should we remove the inflection line at profesora. In any case, I'm increasingly unconvinced about the arguments for the lemma/inflection division on Wiktionary. Giving the template the option to do something informational in the event it is needed or desired is a far cry from making something time-consuming policy. Lemma entries make sense in paper dictionaries, and most other online dictionaries that simply copy them, where it lists all the inflections in the same entry, frequently without any information other than the POS or form. We, however, have a wiki, give them all their own article, and are at an advantage in that we can use as much space as we want without running out of paper. We shouldn't be afraid of duplication, when it helps the reader, who is trying to actually piece out a meaning from these things, especially, when, as I say, there are words (a quick example, and probably there are more extreme ones, but enfermera gets well over twice as many Google hits as enfermero) where feminine forms are more common, and readers will be entering these, not some canonical form, into the search box. Duplication is bad only when it actually is burdensome, not when we begin to restrict ourselves form including useful information for the fear of duplication. Dmcdevit·t 01:25, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

You might have a good argument to start formatting certain non-lemma entries the way we currently format lemma entries. A challenge with similar efforts has been to synchronize info like etymologies/usage notes, etc., but maybe someone can come up with a new approach. As I'm sure you know, the place to begin discussion about such a change would be in BP. As for profesora, I do understand your point of view, because it's a noun with a human referent whose sex must match the grammatical gender. I think the de facto standard is to create only a simple non-lemma-style entry (i.e. with only brief gender/number/case information and a link to the lemma) for such entries, and to use {{es-noun-mf}} only in the lemma (masculine singular) entry. I doubt there is a formal decision recorded anywhere, though, so this is a great topic for public discussion. Feel free to copy this conversation into BP or just to post a summary. Rod (A. Smith) 01:41, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

A stupid question: is profesora not considered a lemma? I mean, nouns aren't really inflected for gender in Spanish; to say of a man, "That person is a professor", you'd say "Esa persona es un profesor", not *"Esa persona es una profesora", right? I do see the argument for considering profesora an inflected form of profesor, but I think it makes more sense to consider it a derived term. (Especially for purposes of translation to English: English also often has separate male and female words for the same idea, as with actor and actress, waiter and waitress, and so on, and in English I think it's more clear that these are separate words and not inflected forms of a single term.) —Ruakh_TALK 02:21, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, http://www.lingref.com/cpp/hls/9/paper1373.pdf and similar articles treat pairs like profesor/profesora as different forms of a single noun whose lemma is the masculine singular form. Nevertheless, I am partially swayed by the argument that since English lacks grammatical gender, readers might expect fuller entries for feminine versions of non-English animate nouns that are otherwise in lemma form. To do so, we would probably need to distinguish between lemma entries, non-lemma entries, and these new pseudo-lemma entries. I have some reservations about doing so, but perhaps we should take this to WT:BP. Should I or would somebody else prefer to do so? Rod (A. Smith) 03:05, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Er, on second reading, it's not clear whether the article linked above considers the feminine forms to be lemmata. Rod (A. Smith) 03:14, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

In any case, I may be distracting from my point by giving the noun as an example, but my point is simply that there are feminine adjectives that are as common or more common (in fact, if I'm searching Spanish-only on Google right, atómica beats atómico by a wide margin), and this is in contrast to other inflected forms I can think of, like comparative and superlative forms, verb forms, etc. As well, they have the same meaning, so appear "basic," unlike other inflections that are clearly derived from their lemma. And part of my point earlier was that fixing the template so that we can make it display more information, even duplication, when the user decides to enter it (inflections for the feminine) can never be harmful, really. Dmcdevit·t 04:23, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, there are plenty of words in every inflected language whose non-lemma forms are more common than the lemma forms. An important component to making a large wiki project successful is to guide editors in the right direction. With that in mind, it is more productive to encourage editors to put additional inflections into lemma entries than it is to encourage them to waste time providing additional inflections within non-lemma entries. (If we encourage that contribution pattern with Spanish adjective entries, it will inevitably spread into other languages and parts of speech.) For Spanish adjectives, I'm quite certain we should limit the lemma to the masculine singular forms, even for adjectives whose feminine or plural forms are much more common. Again, if you feel strongly otherwise, please take this into WT:BP. Rod (A. Smith) 04:41, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Script

Thanks for the script to put a searchbox on my blog. It was just what I needed. Aafje

Be more careful!

Your last edit to custom.js really messed things up.

1. Do not ever rename those pseudo-variables.
2. Do not ever renumber those pseudo-variables. Retire, perhaps, but never renumber.
3. Those cookies are used elsewhere. Do not rename those pseudo-variables.
4. Do not mark absolutely essential features as "deprecated." Say what? Do you have a method of finding who uses those? I never, ever, ever wish to see parenthesis - they are wrong, always. you may recall, that issue, in particular, is why we have WT:PREFS now.

I haven't figured out why your edit killed most of my settings yet, still checking.

--Connel MacKenzie 03:55, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm terribly sorry if my change caused any problems. I thought I was being very careful. What problem are you experiencing? Rod (A. Smith) 04:15, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

When I re-wrote that section, I put "stop-gap" code in, to convert the old-style cookies to the single cookie style (with a couple exceptions.) When you renamed them, the stop-gap code was re-invoked, deleting my cookies.

I went through all my preferences then, resetting them to what I was, before realizing that I just made it worse (i.e. I could no longer see what my cookies had been set to, before they were eaten.)

Hmm, I probably shouldn't use cutsie-wording on such a serious topic. Couldn't resist though. Nevertheless, my statements above are quite sincere, despite the humorous wording.

Perhaps the JS should express that renaming and renumbering is prohibited, more explicitly? Anything used in MediaWiki:Monobook.js / MediaWiki:Common.js only, needs an "apparent-orphan" name+number in custom.js. I haven't yet verified if those are still intact.

Since I use several different computers, on several different platforms, at several different physical locations, I will soon run into these problems again.

Right now, I am undecided about demanding a rollback. But I would not mind at all, if you took it upon yourself to rollback, then re-add the new items. --Connel MacKenzie 16:55, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Done. Sorry. Rod (A. Smith) 16:59, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you.

---

Next item: Why is my pet preference now marked as "deprecated"? --Connel MacKenzie 17:01, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I'm glad you asked. There is a new preference called, "Hide the parenthesis around list item qualifiers." Given recent conversations with Hippietrail, I'm pretty sure you actually intended just to hide all of the parentheses that appear around "qualifiers", e.g. at the beginning of definitions, before any synonyms, etc. A type of parenthesis that you probably do not want to hide is the following:

From the Italian word (deprecated template usage) graffiti (see below), which was used...

The vast majority of the uses of {{italbrac}} are for qualifiers, but a slim minority are for other types of parenthetical notes. I am seeking to allow readers to hide parentheses just around qualifiers, which I believe is your actual intent. Please see Template talk:italbrac. Editors who already have the italbrac preference checked should automatically inherit the replacement qualifier parentheses preference the next time they visit WT:PREFS. Eventually, most uses of {{italbrac}} will be converted to {{qualifier}}. Does that make sense? Rod (A. Smith) 17:13, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for explaining that. No, my preference is to follow the convention of every American dictionary: NO parenthesis for qualifiers, nor for other note-types (such as disambiguations in "Synonyms" sections.) ASCII-parenthesis in the actual definition (AKA "parenthetical notes") text can't be helped, but usually are incorrect, IMHO. --Connel MacKenzie 17:25, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Absolutely. I think the "qualifier" parentheses setting applies to all of those things you want to hide. It applies to {{context}}, {{sense}}, and {{qualifier}}. I.e., it does apply to synonym disambiguations. Rod (A. Smith) 17:31, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Overdue thanks

I should really have said this to you long before now — thanks for your comments in my defence on my talk page, at RFV, and elsewhere. It is appreciated. † Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 23:22, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Don’t mention it. Seriously, don’t mention it. The wrong parties might read this and take me off the white list.  ;-) I mean, you’re welcome.  :-) Rod (A. Smith) 23:26, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

;-) I should send these kinds of message by e-mail, methinks! BTW, concerning the “master template” which is to replace {{italbrac}}, may I pedantically suggest a name which uses “parenthesⁱ/_es”, instead of “bracket(s)”, being that the former term is the correct one for “(” and “)” (whereas the latter is the term for “[” and “]” –both unwikifiable)? † Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 19:45, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for that suggestion. Speaking of pedantry, “[” and “]”. Rod (A. Smith) 20:09, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

de

Hello Rod, good te see someone else takes and interest in Northeast dialect. I've been struggling for some time to decide on what inflections to show for the verb de. I'm curious of where you got the info as your source may be of some use to me when populating the Geordie and Northumbrian entries.

Regards.--Williamsayers79 18:06, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

A Dictionary of North East Dialect →ISBN would be a great source, but unfortunately, I don't have that in my possession. Instead, I found those forms of (deprecated template usage) do in several different mutually corroborating web pages, including [2], [3], [4], and [5]. Rod (A. Smith) 21:18, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Rod, I've got a copy of A Dictionary of North East Dialect and it is propa raker! It's worth the £10 it costs if you have an interest in Northeast dialect--Williamsayers79 21:49, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks

I think I was a little spaced out this morning when I made the apă potabilă article :) I probably wouldn't have caught that for a long time — [ ric | opiaterein ] — 23:36, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

label

layman/linguist etc. Please don't do this; you will break everything in sight. The "initialism" et al templates are bad enough, and need to be gotten rid of. There are many hundreds, if not thousands of programs that need the POS headers to stay the same, and not become magic templates. Robert Ullmann 19:08, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

How about if it's used only outside of POS headers? Rod (A. Smith) 19:11, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Emotion

Thanks, that's the one I would have deleted, but I'm too new to delete anything other than obvious gross error. I'm more likely to be adding "technical" psych (and philo) senses than to be deleting much. DCDuring 01:34, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Logo conversation

It's great you contacted the person who has created the Wikimedia logo. Could you also leave him a link to the conversation on Wiktionary please? Best regards Rhanyeia♥♫ 16:58, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

I added one more header there to make linking easier. Best regards Rhanyeia♥♫ 17:04, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, Rhanyeia. I added your link to that editor's talk page. Rod (A. Smith) 17:49, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Thank you very much. :) Best regards Rhanyeia♥♫ 18:47, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Template:a

Hello there Rod, I'm a bit ropey with templates sometimes and tried to add a 3rd parameter to {{a}}, it did not work so was hopeing you may be able to lend a hand here since you did the last edit to the template to add the 2nd parameter. Regards, --Williamsayers79 11:56, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Done. Rod (A. Smith) 20:31, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

template:back-form

Thanks for your help.—msh210℠ 20:29, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

gerrymander portmanteau?

You said in the comments that gerrymander isn't a portmanteau because it contains the full word "gerry" - I'm not sure that's enough reason to reject it as a portmanteau, as the definition of portmanteau seems to leave open words that haven't had both of their roots chopped ("usually, but not always").

Looking through Category:Portmanteaus, I found these:

lavacicle, adultescent, backronym, hacktivist. Are these words also not portmanteaus? Scott Ritchie 22:38, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

I cannot locate the discussion about this issue, but I do recall that some editor or editors were insistent that we reserve "portmanteau" and "blend" for situations where part of each etymon is dropped. Please continue this conversation at WT:BP#Category:Portmanteaus. Rod (A. Smith) 23:08, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Accidentally auto-catting pages

Hi Rod. Note this revision of mine to WT:RFV. Your inclusion of {{rfv-sense}}s and a number of context tags in the emo section of RFV autocategorised WT:RFV into those categories; please be careful to avoid this in future. Thanks. † ﴾^(u):Raifʻhār ^(t):Doremítzwr﴿ 00:33, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for that edit. The general opinion, though, is that such templates should not categorize the any calling page outside of NS 0. I think I've seen some template changes in that direction, so hopefully you won't have to make such corrections much longer.  :-) Rod (A. Smith) 01:16, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Too true. The present situation is a pain in the arse. † ﴾^(u):Raifʻhār ^(t):Doremítzwr﴿ 01:45, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

The context tags are fixed. {rfv-sense} and so on not so much. Fixed it at least. Robert Ullmann 01:54, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Can you estimate how long it’ll take to sort them all out? † ﴾^(u):Raifʻhār ^(t):Doremítzwr﴿ 02:07, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Logo

All kind of comments on Wiktionary:Beer parlour#More logo conversation would be helpful. :) Best regards Rhanyeia♥♫ 19:55, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

After all the conversations I had I have a feeling it's too early to vote about the tile logo. Best regards Rhanyeia♥♫ 13:16, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Misuse of term

I notice in this edit that you've decided to apply the {{term}} template to the Descendants section. Why? This section should be formatted like the Related terms and Derived terms. It does not mention words in-line, but lists them the way the Translation section does. What is the point of adding all that extra template, coding, and formatting? The current vote specifically excludes list items from the use of {{term}}. --EncycloPetey 22:31, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes. That edit of mine is clearly in error. I think it was a reformat from inline text of some entry, and I neglected to remove {{term}}. Not sure how that happened. Thanks for fixing it. Rod (A. Smith) 00:58, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Misuse of {{onym}}

What gives? The proposal for this template specifically says it is for "non-Latin scripts", not for Latin ones. In any case, its formatting is incompatible with current ELE standards for -onyms sections. Why are you adding it to dozens of articles using Latin script? --EncycloPetey 13:09, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Please indicate one specific entry where you think my application of {{onym}} is in error so I can be sure we're talking about the same thing. Assuming you're talking about an entry with a Latin script -onym that is followed by an English sense gloss, please understand that I'm not aware of any prohibition of English sense glosses in -onyms sections. Do we really prohibit such glosses? If so, I've run across many nonconformant entries, and a broad cleanup effort may be in order. Rod (A. Smith) 16:55, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Look at the ELE format specifications for the Synonyms and Antonyms sections. It specifes that Synonyms and Antonyms are presented as a serial list separated by commas, not a bulleted list. The sense is given at the head of the list, not among the synonyms.

You are using the {{onym}} template, but you're using in sections for "Derived terms", "See also", etc. You're not even using it in -onyms sections, so the template is a misnomer at best.

And, yes, a major cleanup is needed of synonyms and antonyms section because formatting is often inconsistent. --EncycloPetey 01:54, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Certainly, using {{sense}} before a list of synonyms is preferable, a major -onym cleanup is due, and {{onym}} could benefit from a better name because its name does not make it clear that it is intended for derived terms and other paronyms. See WT:GP#Template:onym and Template:l for the public conversation about its name. You haven't pointed out a specific addition of {{onym}} that you oppose, though, so I can only assume that you don't actually take issue with any specific edits of mine. If you do, please let me know. Otherwise, thanks for your vigilance, EncycloPetey. I enjoy working on this project with you. Rod (A. Smith) 04:23, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

I have opened this issue there, but it wasn't previously part of the discussion. The discussion centered on the merge of two templates, not their use outside their documented purpose. --EncycloPetey 13:04, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

If you still believe I have made any edits that introduce {{onym}} counter to its intended purpose, please indicate just one such edit. Rod (A. Smith) 16:53, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Wiktionary:About sign languages

Do you agree?—msh210℠ 17:04, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Very good. Rod (A. Smith) 17:09, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Now all we need are media.  :-/ —msh210℠ 17:13, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

User:TheDaveBot spanish template

Yes, the entire discussion leading up to the bots run is on the bots talk page, with a vote approving the run and approval of the contents of the run. - [The]DaveRoss 02:25, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. I cannot find any discussion about "Latin American second person" forms, but the direction to go with this seems to depend heavily on Wiktionary:Votes/2007-10/Lemma entries, so I'll wait to pester you further.  ;-) Rod (A. Smith) 17:09, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

WT:GP - Category:English nouns - Nov 2007

Do you have anything handy for WT:GP#Category:English nouns - Nov 2007? --Connel MacKenzie 21:10, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Not really. I'll reply there. Rod (A. Smith) 22:26, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Level 4 section order

I'm confused by this edit. According to the vote we took, Related terms and Derived terms should come before any Translations. --EncycloPetey 04:51, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

That was just a simple case of confusion. Thanks for the correction. Rod (A. Smith) 18:16, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

And thanks for the correctioin to the IPA on hablar; I've been looking around and have found that es:wikt is using a instead of ɑ, which I hadn't previously realized. --EncycloPetey 18:55, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

BP discussion.

Thanks; I let my emotions get the better of me. The nice thing about a wiki is, there's always someone to correct your errors — errors in judgment, in this case. :-) —Ruakh_TALK 20:52, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

my nigger

Please look at this contribs recent history of contribs. Algrif 00:19, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

I did. The only questionable one to me was (deprecated template usage) Peanut Butter Jelly Time, but that phrase does have some currency, so even that deserves some review. Did you see a more obvious act of vandalism? Rod (A. Smith) 00:21, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

Removing redundant Spanish conjugation templates

I just ran across this discussion Wiktionary:Beer parlour archive/2007/August#Redundancy in Category:Spanish conjugation templates. I just finished moving all word entries to using the better of the two duplicate templates. The orphaned ones are listed at User:Bequw/Spanish verbs#Templates to be disposed of. How do we (should we) go about getting rid of those? Should I submit them to WT:RFDO? The names are still listed in two forms (es-conj-* and es:-*), so we could still rename/redirect to keep have just one naming scheme if that's important. Thanks. --Bequw 12:07, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Technically, {{es-conj-arse}} isn't a duplicate, and could be included on pages with a reflexive sense. --EncycloPetey 16:24, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

I've included a reflexive parameter (ref=y) in {{es-conj-ar}} so that it can show reflexive conjugations. I added the same to all other templates which are commonly used for reflexive verbs. That way we don't need two templates for each verb type (there's already ~90 temps, we don't need 180). --Bequw 15:53, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

WT:RFDO is the usual route. If nothing else, listing them there at least serves as a public announcement so editors can adjust any personal tools they use to create Spanish entries. Thanks for cleaning that up, Bequw! Rod (A. Smith) 18:47, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, will do.--Bequw 15:53, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

show only lemma form in translation tables

Was this diff per some community discussion? (I'm curious to read it.)—msh210℠ 18:04, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

That edit reflects the current de facto standard for translations. Conversations that support it include http://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=Wiktionary:Languages_with_more_than_one_grammatical_gender&oldid=1723072 , Wiktionary talk:About Latin#Lemmata for verbs (“In the article for the verb "to see", should we put "video" or "videre" as a translation?”), Wiktionary:About Welsh#Proposed variation to the lemma for certain Welsh words, and Wiktionary:Glossary#L. As you know, I am seeking to codify a much broader treatment of lexemes vs. word forms, but have not made any edits that oppose my understanding of the community consensus. That is, I think edits that normalize adjective translations to the lemma forms already have consensus, but please let me know if you disagree with that. Rod (A. Smith) 18:43, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

I do not. Thanks for the clarification.—msh210℠ 18:47, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

WT:ELE

I was only objecting to being scolded about my practice. Chacun a son gout, within the rules, anyway. DCDuring 22:03, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Ah. I missed that part of the context (and should have read further before butting in).  :-) Rod (A. Smith) 22:32, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

No problem. Really. My fingers do have the habit of capitalizing and putting periods at the end of sense lines (as do some templates sometimes used to make sense lines, like "plural of"). DCDuring 22:43, 25 November 2007 (UTC)