Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 17:09, 2 June 2007

Welcome!

Hello, Lightmouse, and welcome to Misplaced Pages! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are some pages that you might find helpful:

• The five pillars of Misplaced Pages
• How to edit a page
• Help pages
• Tutorial
• How to write a great article
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I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Misplaced Pages:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question and then place {{helpme}} before the question on your talk page. Again, welcome! 

--Jtir 16:32, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

wikilinking

I noticed someone just got stung on a Featured Article Candidacy for meaningless wikilinks, on American Goldfinch you linked generic years and months. I guess the issue is we could end up with an all-blue article, so the suggestion was made to keep them reasonably specific. Thanks for helping though. cheers, Cas Liber | talk | contribs 12:27, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you that meaningless links are bad. I did not link anything, I *unlinked*. Your revert relinked them all again. Please check again. Lightmouse 14:37, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

I noticed you delinked those also. I agree that it is a little silly to link generic years, but the style guidelines to suggest this be done. I am not agreeing with the policy, just noting why it seems to happen.--Mitamarine 22:16, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Where does it say to link them? Lightmouse 22:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

About bot-status

Yeah, you should really apply for it ;-) . Anyway, you could also go into your preferences and check the box for "Mark all edits minor by default". I think I would say they are. This box are found at "My preferences"- and then "Editing". I'm getting used to your comment "minor edit" now, but it could perhaps have been better with something like "adjusting number of links to sane level" instead? Just thinking here...Greswik 19:35, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the tips. On your advice, I have changed the preference to 'minor edits'. The reason that I previously did not was that I thought that I did not want to debate whether it was major or minor. I don't care either way. As for the edit summary, I like to keep it very short. Long summaries about trivia are distracting and it is worse if they are frequent. But I will think of something more explicit.

I am surprised that the number of links is so 'insane' as you put it. To be honest, I would rather not do this and would prefer it if somebody else did it. Perhaps there is somebody that can do it better than me. Lightmouse 19:56, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Of course, then you will have to remove the "m" when you make non-trivial edits. The numbers of links are high, sometimes too high: but thats why you use your common sense and remove some of them, isn't it? It's allways a question what's too much, and what's just right. You seems to be doing fine, but of course, if you get to zealous, I'm sure people will start to let you know;-) I guess it's an idea to not become too eager! But again, it seems like you are doing good here. Greswik 20:05, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Ah yes, I see now that I can remove the 'm' at any time. Thanks for the praise, it feels good. Lightmouse 20:10, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Please stop!

(Restored from User talk:Petri Krohn after deletion.)

You have been delinking dates in a number of articles. I do not see a concensus for this.

In your edit summary you claim the edits are minor fixes. Instead yo ushould say you hav "delinked dates". Even worse, you have marked the edits as minir (m), these edits are not minor and possibly destroy hours of work by other editors. Please stop! -- Petri Krohn 22:59, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I will change the edit summary. I did not mark them as minor but then Greswik asked me to do that (see above). Links are used for context and there is no need to link plain english terms or partial dates. Full dates can be linked so that date preferences work. If you look at all the dates to Sunday and November and 2006, you will see that excessive links are a big problem on Misplaced Pages. Lightmouse 11:52, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Years should be linked, when they first appear in the text. -- Petri Krohn 01:37, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I understand that you think that, many editors do. But it is a misunderstanding of the two reasons for 'links':

• Full dates should be linked for preferences. That is the reason why Misplaced Pages treats dates in a special way.
• Other links are there in case the reader needs to look them up to understand the article content. There is no requirement to link the first instance of bits of dates.

Hope that helps. Lightmouse 10:13, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Please do not remove critical comments from your talk page as you did here. I is considered an indication of bad faith. I still consider your edits unconstructive. As you are a new user, I am giving you a template warning:

Welcome to Misplaced Pages. We invite everyone to contribute constructively to our encyclopedia. Take a look at the welcome page if you would like to learn more about contributing. However, unconstructive edits, such as those you made to Blade Runner, are considered vandalism and are immediately reverted. If you continue in this manner you may be blocked from editing without further warning. Please stop, and consider improving rather than damaging the work of others. Thank you.

-- Petri Krohn 14:00, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Good faith editing is NOT vandalism - do not give out templates for vandalism for content disputes. --Fredrick day 14:06, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Final Warning

Your "minor fixes" are major damage. If you continue to remove content from articles, remove links to associated articles throughout text, and making incorrect formatting changes, then you will be blocked without further warning.

Chrisch 05:54, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Two of your complaints are:

• Removal of content.
• Incorrect formatting changes.

I am not aware of either of those. Please give examples. Lightmouse 11:09, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Akira Toriyama

Why did you perform this edit? If you fail to respond to this message in the next 2-3 days, I'll undo all of your edits to the page. Lord Sesshomaru

Links should be relevant to the context. Dates can be linked to support date preferences.

• In that article, there are 55 solitary years. There were links to only 5 of them and they were arbitary.
• 'Saturday' is a plain english word and linking it is silly.
• I see that there is a date formatted as April 5, 1955. The article defect there was not the link to the year, it was the presentation to the reader of '5 April' ,1955'.

If you don't understand what I mean by that last point, you may with to investigate further how date preferences work.

Regards Lightmouse 11:28, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

The article is (was) written in chronological order, and years were linked when they first appeared; just as it should! -- Petri Krohn 01:41, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Where does it say years should be linked on first appearance? Lightmouse 12:14, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Delinking dates

Greetings, I see you are delinking most dates on seemingly random articles. While some of them may be redundant, I wouldn't say that delinking all dates in an article is necessary. I've reverted a few as I saw you had been reported at a vandalism in progress noticeboard, but rather than go through all of that, I thought I'd drop a line to you instead as they seem to be a good faith attempt to help out. --Fire Star 火星 06:22, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. The edits were not random. If you had looked at 'what links here' for solitary days and solitary months (such as Wednesday and November) articles, you will see an astonishing number of excessive links. There is no good reason for such links. The same applies to solitary years. Such partial dates are just like plain english terms. The edits were certainly not vandalism. By removing excessive links to 'plain english' terms, I am making the good links more visible. All done to make Misplaced Pages a better encyclopedia for readers. Lightmouse 11:47, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Hello, again, as you know I am of the ones who agree with you there tend to be many links just making the articles blue here. You just have to use your common sense to what is redundant. If someone thinks you take out to much, you will have to ask them for wich articles that is- however, with your speed, you may get many examples. And, of coruse, you will probably sometimes remove one that shouldn't go- just as everybody has an error percentage. Perhaps you should ask at the village pump for comments, or even Misplaced Pages:Peer_review -allthough I have never tried out this precedures. Of course, as you have started to write the "minor fixes" in the M field, you should change the text of the edit summary to something more precise. I proposed "adjusting number of links to sane level", "delinking excess links" may be an alternative. Greswik 11:39, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Indeed, the 'error percentage' point is good and I have to say that I think that no real error has been demonstrated yet. I will change the edit summary. Look above at the 'Akira Toriyama' example. Lightmouse 11:47, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

And, I am sure you have read Misplaced Pages:Build the web, with it's useful links at the bottom. I don't think the other users get anything out of reporting you as a vandal- even if you become to eager. But, it's the common sense thing: It is difficult. Linking to someeones birth year, however, is typically a thing we do, I think. :-) Greswik 11:51, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I looked at Misplaced Pages:Build the web and followed the links at the bottom. I could not find anything about linking a a birth year. I think 'typically a thing we do' applies to all these silly excessive links to partial dates. Lightmouse 12:04, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

The term of art is overlinking. The guideline is: Only make links that are relevant to the context. --Jtir 14:20, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Excellent reference. I see it contains the following:

• On the other hand, do not make too many links. An article may be considered overlinked if any of the following is true:
  
• Low added-value items are linked without reason — such as, 1995, 1980s, and 20th century (this excludes special date formatting,
  
• A link for any single term is excessively repeated in the same article
  
• If an editor finds themselves "reflexively" linking a term without having a good look around the entire article, it is often time to stop and reconsider.

Thanks. Lightmouse 14:28, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

NP. As you are discovering, when doing a mass edit, a good edit summary is very important. I would suggest adding "per WP:CONTEXT".

BTW, one of the welcome headers on your talk page seems to be causing the wrong section to be selected for editing when I click on the "" link. --Jtir 16:07, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I just saw a bot edit that consisted of nothing more than linking all mentions of years in the article... isnt that bot against guidelines?--Alexia Death 13:01, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Which bot or edit? BTW, User:SmackBot does year delinking. --Jtir 13:28, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I was hoping that unlink non-full dates/minor fixes would do the trick. I try to keep summaries as short as possible because repeated long ones can be irritating. I might consider adding 'per WP:CONTEXT' as you suggest, thanks.

I deleted the welcome message. I was encountering problems too but did not know why. Thanks for the explanation. Lightmouse 16:19, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Both would be even better. Citing a guideline provides a rationale for which there is some consensus. I gave you a new {{welcome}} message that doesn't seem to be as obtrusive. --Jtir 16:41, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Regarding edits to Johnny Rodz

Thank you for contributing to Misplaced Pages, Lightmouse! However, your edit here was reverted by an automated bot that attempts to remove spam from Misplaced Pages. If you were trying to insert a good link, please accept my creator's apologies, but note that the link you added, matching rule \bangelfire\.com\/, is on my list of links to remove and probably shouldn't be included in Misplaced Pages. Please read Misplaced Pages's external links guidelines for more information, and consult my list of frequently-reverted sites. For more information about me, see my FAQ page. Thanks! Shadowbot 19:03, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Piped years

Is there a good reason why you delink piped links to years in (some topic)? You apparently decided here that 1982 in film is a bad page to link to from Blade Runner. It does seem a decent link, though; perhaps you should cite something other than WP:CONTEXT if you want to remove links like this one. Kusma (talk) 12:46, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes there is a good reason. Hiding links behind routine terms does not help the reader at all. I do not think anyone believes that readers hover over or click all mundane year links to reveal what is hidden. As far as the reader is concerned, it is just another out of context link to a year.

That is why the people over at the music project say:

Do not use piped links to "years in music" e.g. ], instead add (see 1991 in music) where you feel it is appropriate.

That suggestion makes sense more generally than just for music. Perhaps it would be worth raising it in the film project.

I hope that explains it. Lightmouse 13:04, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

That would make more sense than removing the link, then. Kusma (talk) 18:53, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

See Wikiproject Films. I discovered that they discussed this very issue before, so I took the liberty of quoting it. Feel free to join the debate there. Regards Lightmouse 19:08, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

All I can say is please stop!¨. -- Petri Krohn 13:38, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

AN/I

Hi - you may wish to check this --Fredrick day 13:36, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Question on dates

It appears you are consistently delinking years when they are linked in the cite templates so ''...accessdaymonth=] | accessyear=]...'' becomes ''...accessdaymonth=] | accessyear=2007...'' which looks odd when displayed as we end up with "Retrieved on 30 May 2007". Is this because you are doing some automated checking for standalone years and this appears to be one? Or is there some strange MoS reason that I haven't heard about? I last noticed it a couple of days ago, so apologies if you've fixed it. Yomangani 17:07, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

That is a mistake, sorry. I did see 'accessyear=2007 and thought that these were standalone. I will do something about it. Thanks for bringing it to my attention. Lightmouse 17:48, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Fixed now. It should not happen again. Lightmouse 18:48, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Minor edits

I'm not certain if I'm the first to address this, but you may want to turn off the option that lists all of your edits as minor by default. I am guessing that you have this feature on because of a quick glance at your history, but correct me if I'm wrong. You recently posted to the WP:FILM talk page with an edit of +6,331 bytes, which is, to put it lightly, the opposite of minor. :) I personally like having the feature turned off so that I can review my edit for size as well as for possible consensus issues and make the choice myself whether or not it's minor, without having to remember to uncheck the "This is a minor edit" box. If you aren't aware of how to turn off the automatic minor mark-up, just go into My Preferences (next to My Watchlist), click on the Editing tab, and then uncheck the box next to "Mark all edits minor by default." I don't intend to sound pushy or rude, but I know it would greatly help the rest of us out in picking out the minor from the non-minor, especially since you are seemingly making quite a few changes. Thanks for the consideration. María (habla conmigo) 19:38, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

To put it succinctly: Help:Minor edit. --Jtir 20:02, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

You aren't the first to address it. And I don't think you are pushy or rude at all. Your comment sounds very polite. I left the option off because I did not want to offend anyone. To be honest, I think all my edits are minor but others claim that even small edits are major. I assumed that if I left it off I was safe. But user:Greswik asked me to turn it on (see above). So I did as he asked, but told him I was worried about complaints. Lo and behold, people are complaining. Off, On, Off, I really don't care. Will turning it off allow me to stop thinking about it? Will it stop people accusing me of using the setting for bad faith reasons? Sorry for the rant but I wish this option did not exist and I am somewhat frustrated with it.. Read what user:Greswik says above plus the complaints about the setting by Chrisch and Petri Krohn. Then let me know if you still think I should turn it off. I will do whatever you decide and no doubt somebody else will tell me that is wrong. Which is the 'Does not care' option? Begins to lose sense of fun... Sigh.... Lightmouse 20:17, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

FYI, SmackBot, which does year delinking, flags its edits as minor. Personally, I almost never use the minor flag and don't find it particularly helpful.

When to mark an edit as minor has more and citing it might spare you some whipsawing.

BTW, there are few secrets in the glass house. --Jtir 11:08, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

At your suggestion, I have turned the default off. No secrets, account access denied by forgotten password. Thanks for the 'whipsaw' link, I did not know there was a word for it. Lightmouse 11:52, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

OK. Glad you like the link — it's a great word and a bad feeling. There were clearly unfounded suggestions of sockpuppetry at WP:ANI, so it might help to put something on your user page saying that you used to edit as Editore99 but forgot the password. I have seen other editors do something similar. I must compliment you on your programming style. A link on your user page to User:Lightmouse/monobook.js would inform interested editors of the power of JavaScript and regular expressions and probably quell suspicions about your speedy editing process. (AFAICT, only the owner of the monobook.js page can edit it, all others can "view source".) BTW, I use WP:POPUPS. --Jtir 16:21, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

I have done as you suggest on the user page. Take a look. Thanks for the compliment on my programming. I stole most of it and would be happy for others to steal from me. I looked at popups but they did not do anything for me. Lightmouse 18:08, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Ah, you _had_ been here before. It was what I suspected. About that minor edit thing: you can, as I said, change it in the indiviual edit. When I suggested you should use it as a default, I assumed you would stop for the two seconds to remove it on the bigger edits. But as you forget to do that in the ones you not make a minor edit, you cannot use it as a default- I'm totally with you there, so by all means: leave it as it is for now. Also, I say you have a higher success-rate than 51 %. ;-) And that's good. Cause a success rate that low would have been disastrous for the project: It's not a race you know. Someone should write an essay about that one day :-) Greswik 19:37, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm glad there was no offense taken, and that it all worked out in the end. My suggestion was built upon by my own lesson learned by laziness; I always forget to uncheck the stupid little box, and so it's much easier for me, personally, to have it unchecked. Then, of course, I always forget to check it for real minor edits, but I suppose there's no magic answer after all.  :) Take care! María (habla conmigo) 20:17, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I had just now thought some more about this. I was just writing about it now and you got in first. I think there is something interesting about your (María) complaint.

The impression that I get from Help:Minor edit is that is aimed at protecting the main article space. If I understand it correctly, people want to check non-minor changes and ignore formatting or typo correction. María's complaint was that I made an edit in the talk space and that was not formatting or typos. Firstly the issue of protection of the encyclopedic content does not apply to talk space. Secondly, the talk space is for ... talk... not formatting. So any contribution to the talk space is likely to be non-minor. The setting does not (or should not) matter for edits in the talk space.

So I could claim that is because I have not made any changes to *article* body text. My whole focus is merely formatting/typos/layout and discussion on the talk pages. However, I am just as likely to 'forget' about it because I don't care about it. It seems that the not caring is no longer an option so I will have to watch out. Even if I do care, I am also likely to forget. As I say on my user page, my error rate is indeed between 51% and 100%.

With it off, I am back where I started. I think 'off' is the safest, as you suggest.

The other complaints were not about the byte count. They were more philosophical i.e. "I don't like what you did so it is major to me". I think it is a defect in the guidance that it does not say why the option exists, perhaps that could be addressed. Lightmouse 20:25, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

You can comment at Help talk:Minor edit. Thanks for adding the informative user page. (Editore99 is not linked, and you can give yourself permission to edit User:Editore99.)--Jtir 17:51, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

I see at Help talk:Minor edit that somebody raised the same issue 2 months ago. I said that I would add some text but now I see This is a copy of the master help page at Meta. Do not edit this copy.. I do not want to get involved in meta-wiki so it looks like the end of it for me. I linked the user name. Is there any benefit in reviving old accounts? Lightmouse 09:54, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Notable Alpha Phi Omega members.

Your change note says (dates per WP:CONTEXT/other fixes). What were your other fixes? My compliments on your speed.Naraht 17:22, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

I did not make any other fixes. I put that there because I sometimes do other things. The only way I can maintain the speed is to have a standard summary. Thanks for the compliment. Glad to have been of help. Regards. Lightmouse 18:11, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Delinking dates?! What manner is this?

Sir, if I may humbly ask, why perhaps are you programming thyself to remove the years of all articles in this encyclopedic forum? Have you not thought twice of it? DC&Marvel maniac 19:29, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Thy humility does thee credit sir. Twill undo the erroneous linkitude that was createth in false belief of duty. To do nought would offend the eye of the beholder yet ne'er aid the education. Lightmouse 19:39, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Please do not do this

In Terry Wogan, you unlinked dates like this one: July 1776. Do not do this. There is nothing in the MoS saying you shouldn't have these linked. See here. The talk page has a GA review where the reviewer specifically said that they should be linked. You really should read the talk page before making major edits like that, that have a high chance of making some people angry at you. I will be relinking all of the dates, manually, since, because of recent edits, I can't revert it. --Psychless 17:09, 2 June 2007 (UTC)