Wiktionary:Information desk/Archive 2007/January-June

January

New page, initialism

I tried to create a new page for the initialism "OSE", but it got captured by the French word "ose". How do I force a new page with the precise title/language I want?

An experiment ended up with a page entitled "'OSE'". OSE with single quotes. Any way to change the title of a page?

Doug Hockin 17:49, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

No easy shortcuts exist for pages that already exist. I'll set a substub for you to replace. --Connel MacKenzie 21:23, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I've corrected the {{see}} links that were supposed to be on line one of all three entries. Look good now? --Connel MacKenzie 21:27, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

My original question still stands. How do I force a new page with the precise title/language I want? If an easy way doesn't exist, one is needed.

Doug Hockin 00:27, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

If you get redirected, the page you end up on will have a line at the top: (redirected from OSE) click on that link, and you will be back at the redirect page. Now click on the edit tab, and you'll have an entry area that starts with #REDIRECT, change that to the new entry text.

If you just get automatically sent to the other page, either plant a link somewhere (e.g. edit the sandbox, add [[OSE]]) and then follow the link (you don't need to save the sandbox, just preview, so you can use any page, say ose itself). Or add the {{see}} template to the top of ose (which will be wanted anyway) save it and follow the link.

If nothing else, go to explicit URL http://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=OSE&action=edit but that isn't easy ;-) Robert Ullmann 01:09, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Moving pages

I would like to move a page. While I am familiar with Wikipedia, I do not see a similar Move option for Wikitionary. How do I make a move request? Specifically, I would like to move Transwiki:Gou to Transwiki:Gō. See the discussion page as well as the updated Wikipedia entry for more details. Bendono 16:12, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

The [move] tab should appear above the article title, same as on Wikipedia. Alternately, you can type ALT-M as the "hotkey shortcut" on pages that are not move-protected. If your account is very new, you won't be able to move pages (as a standard anti-vandalism measure, same as Wikipedia.) It seems a sysop has moved the page for you. --Connel MacKenzie 17:32, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Thank for the response and move. I am a regular editor of Wikipedia, but I just created my Wiktionary account. That must be why the [move] tab is not visible yet. Again, thanks for the assistance. Bendono 17:43, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Is it okay to use this quote?

See consular; I used a rather well-known movie quote. Is this allowable? If not as a quote, then as a reference? I noticed that while Wikipedia has cite video, Wiktionary does not. Is that a hint? Grendelkhan 07:01, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

It could be if the movie is likely to be accessible. Some movies have disappeared into vaults, and so would definitely not be good quote choices. I know that we've used occasional TV quotes for modern phrases, and some Min Nan quotes are taken from television. In any event, the source must be fully identified: Title, Author, and Date as a minimum. In the case of your selected quote (which I recognize), you'd need to specify an edition, since they do vary. That said, the big problem with using a movie quote on Wiktionary is that it's hard to document the spelling used in the quote. You might check a library to see whether the novelisation uses the word. A print citation is prefereed because it will show the spelling. --EncycloPetey 07:06, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Proper nouns and business names

Are proper nouns and business names appropriate for Wiktionary?

For example, I wanted to lookup BitTorrent and there was no entry. There's an entry for Bach and a bare-bones entry for IBM (acronym definition only) but no entry for Cingular or emachines.

What's the guideline to follow?

--Caswick 17:21, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Attribution. Corporate names are always highly suspect, occasionally deleted even if initially passed. Music can be written in Bach style, IBM pc's are not made by IBM but are compatible (in the 70s, 80s and maybe 90s terminology) with PCs made by IBM. --Connel MacKenzie 19:37, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

So we should wait before entering something that resembles the first sentence of this Wikipedia entry for Bittorrent, until it enters the language like the word xerox. Does that sound right? --Caswick 01:40, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Precisely. --Connel MacKenzie 02:39, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

requesting deleted information

I am very interested in a subject that was recently deleted. Your web site gives links to others and I don't have any of this information that was deleted. Could I request some information from that deleted page? Thanks,

T. Covais

• What subject are you talking about? Kappa 04:18, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

• No. The WMF board has a postal mail address you can send a request (letter) to. --Connel MacKenzie 04:41, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

German "er"

Hello, I'm a n00b looking for a way to prounce [eːɐ̯], found here. The IPA chart doesn't seem to have anything for the upside down a and the symbol before it. Please help! --JDitto 04:43, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

The vowel occurs in "cut" [kɐt], "sofa" [ˈsəʊfɐ] in some Brittish dialect, "manual" [mɐˈnwal], in Portuguese, it's not quite fully open, central unrounded vowel. ―Gliorszio 04:51, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

No, that's incorrect. The sound [ɐ] does not occur in English. You're thinking of [ʌ] in "cut" and [ə] in "sofa". Neither of these sounds is quite the same as [ɐ], though they're close. --EncycloPetey 05:54, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Anyone know what happened to the audio links we had (on one of the IPA pages) last year? I do remember seeing at least one IPA table that had audio for all the symbols, but I can't find it now. --Connel MacKenzie 05:47, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

The Swedish one does - Wiktionary:About Swedish/Pronunciation. Remember, we do have a page entitled Wiktionary:Pronunciation that has lots of useful links. --EncycloPetey 05:54, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Thank you, EncycloPetey, for the final answer, but back to the question: once I've found the page, how do I pronounce it? All the examples are already in German. Wow, this getting to be quite difficult for a two letter German word... --JDitto 04:37, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

If you can play .ogg sound files (such as with QuickTime), there is a

recording

(file)

available on the Wikipedia page for the w:Near-open_central_vowel (technical description of this sound). I have linked the file here as well for your convenience. Note that in German it's an r that thinks it's a vowel, and that should help you understand what you're hearing. It's pronounced lower in the mouth and a bit further back than the u in "up" or the a in sofa. For the whole word, there is a sound file on the German Wiktionary; the file is

here

(file)

. --EncycloPetey 04:57, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Thank you so much!! Have a great day! --JDitto 01:57, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

D.T help

What is Inline mass production?

thnx — This comment was unsigned.

This is not the information desk, but even if it were, what do you mean? "inline mass production" sounds like a sum-of-parts description for manufacturing inline skates. I have no idea what you mean by "D.T help". --Connel MacKenzie 16:07, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Preloading template?

Is there any page creating preload template I can use when writing new pages? For example:

<inputbox>
type=create
preload=Template:ExampleWordPreload
default=Insert word here
</inputbox>

Do you get what I mean? Smiddle / TC@ 15:35, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

You can use that code on your userpage, to test it, then ask for a review of the template you come up with here, e.g. {{new en test}}/{{new en test info}}. If you are uncomfortable experimenting in the template namespace, you could do something like this:

<inputbox>
type=create
preload=User:Smiddle/new_en_test
editintro=User:Smiddle/new_en_test_intro
default=$1
</inputbox>

to use User:Smiddle/new en test / User:Smiddle/new en test intro during your eperimentation. When you are happy with it, request a review of it here. If it is not controversial (rare) then when I and other sysops are happy with it, it may get added to MediaWiki:Noexactmatch. --Connel MacKenzie 16:05, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Nouns with two plural forms

Should I really be using the "irregular" noun template, as I've done at albino, for such cases? I don't think the noun is "irregular" in the sense intended by that template. It's more that English has a pattern of using -s rather than -es on singular nouns ending in -o if they are loanwords (e.g. in "patios" vs. "potatoes"); yet "albino" has been a word in English for long enough that it is being reanalyzed as a "native" English word by many speakers, and treated as such, so some people use "albinoes" (including in medical literature) instead of the more common "albinos". Anyway, I don't want to be misusing a template here. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:47, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

No. All English nouns (except proper nouns) should get a form of the {{en-noun}} template, which is equipped to handle multiple plural forms. We are trying to phase out all of the other previous noun templates. --EncycloPetey 00:01, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Fixed. Didn't realize the basic "noun" template was so well-documented on its talk page. As an aside, I'm curious why it and so many others are documented on their talk pages, instead of with <noinclude>Documentation here.</noinclude>. It seems counter-intuitive to me (being more of a Wikipedian than a Witionarian thus far; we don't do it this way on 'Pedia), since the documentation isn't a discussion, it's a set of usage instructions which themselves are likely to be subjects of discussion, like any other content in the non-talk page that the talk page is attached to. <fzzt spark pop> Does not compute! Does not compute! — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 01:38, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Some significant percentage of our templates are "preload" templates that also need documenting. (AFAIK, Wikipedia only uses two or three preload templates; only for very special cases.) For consistency, (since the noinclude doesn't work in a preload) and template performance (e.g. yesterday's downtime caused by a rogue template on es.wiki) we're aiming for the talk pages for template documentation. This has the side benefit of keeping the conversations (the "why") with the documentation. It also encourages (in theory) those documenting a template to be more verbose. That's why {{temp}} points to the talk page of the template, instead of the template itself. --Connel MacKenzie 07:04, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Shortcut for cross-wikilinking from Wikipedia to Wiktionary

I could have sworn that wikilinks like [[WT:albino]] would link from a Wikipedia page to a Wiktionary definition, much the way [[W:Albinism]] will link from here to that Wikipedia article, or [[M:Deletionism]] will link from either site to the Meta page by that name. But it doesn't work. I have looked for about two hours for the page that documents these little shortcuts, but it eludes me. I know I saw it once, about 6 months ago, so I imagine it is still around somewhere. TIA for a pointer to it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:47, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

'wikt:' is the prefix, from wikipedia to here. 'w:' is the prefix from here to wikipedia. --Connel MacKenzie 07:40, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

WT:WT#Rogue shortcuts (cross project redirects). --Connel MacKenzie 07:51, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Gracias. I've found that "WT:" does not consistently work from Wikipedia. For example, [[WT:chocolate]] is a redlink, while [[Wikt:chocolate]] is not. Go figure. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:25, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

When on Wikipedia, to use a Wiktionary shortcut, you'd have to say [[wikt:WT:WT]]. Wikipedia wasn't exactly thinking forward, when it decided that "WT:" should mean "Wikipedia talk:" namespace. --Connel MacKenzie 23:28, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm surprised, though, that "WK:" or something hasn't been set up, Wiki*-wide, to work like "W:" and "M:" do. I guess "Wikt:" is short enough that my fingers won't fall off from overuse or anything. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 06:32, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia was originally a single project. As they branched out, lots of things got done "wrong." Two and three letter codes are used EXCLUSIVELY for language codes (i.e. ISO 639 codes) here. Ooops, except for "WT:", that is. (Originally, the WT shortcuts were named "WS" for 'Wiktionary Shortcut' which conflicted with WikiSource/WikiSpecies; so I guess Wikipedia wasn't alone in bad namespace choices.) --Connel MacKenzie 07:09, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Topical Dictionary / Topical and Synonymic Lexicon

Hello Wiktionarians, I would like to be a part of (or start) wiktionary pages that divide all words in the English language into topical categories (feelings, airplane parts, action words (divide into sub-topics like skiing)). This is not a thesaurus. The only book in the English language I have found that attempts this is John Williams' "Readable Dictionary, or, Topical and Synonymic Lexicon, The: Containing Several Thousands of the More Useful Terms of the English Language, Classified by Subjects, Imprint: Columbus, Ohio, Follett, Foster and Co., 1860, Edition: 1st, Binding: Hardback." But, as you can see, it is from 1860. In addition it is far from complete, only 360 pages. Can anyone point me in the right direction? Thanks

I think our category scheme is well on its way towards that end. For example, Category:Emotions exists in a primative state. It could use lots of cleanup help, if you are so inclined. Likewise Category:Skiing. --Connel MacKenzie 18:29, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

If you find the category system too restrictive (for example, you can't make notes or format them) you might want to consider making an appendix for a topic as well. For example, Appendix:Animals Kappa 20:31, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Review of "albino"

I'd appreciate a constructive review of the "albino" entry. This is my first foray into using a number of the templates and sections and so forth now being used there. Am I doing it all correctly? — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 01:40, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

The primary point I notice is that you've included plural forms in the translations table. In general, we don't do that. Policy is to include only the primary form (usually the masculine singular nominative), though some editors with include the feminine and/or neuter, but we never include the plural unless the word being translated is plural. Also, the translations section should follow all other subsections (e.g. Syn, Ant) --EncycloPetey 06:54, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

What EP said, plus: the so-called POS level-three headings are arranged alphabetically, so Adjective needs to come before Noun. Synonyms, Antonyms, Related terms and Usage notes should come before the Translations headings. External links is not needed if only Wikipedia is being called out (which is typically the case); instead use {{wikipedia}} on the immediate line after the first level three heading (i.e. the very next line after ===Etymology===.) There are only a couple other very minor cosmetic things that pertain only to wikitext, that I won't bother you with (but that my Javascript will automatically do, if I edit that entry.) For the Translations, there is a recent move towards {{trans-top}}/ {{trans-mid}}/ {{trans-bottom}} (see WT:VOTE,) instead of top/mid/bottom. Also for translations, the gloss of your definition (e.g. "one lacking pigmentation") should be there, in case another definition is added later. Additionally, it helps to add an example sentence, to show how the word is used. (Even better is to include an actual citation of the word in use.) The example sentences help enormously, for translators trying to discern which definition is which. Lastly, I've never heard "Albino" being a pejorative, or even remotely offensive, for that matter. Because of the statical rarity, calling someone an Albino I thought was usually a compliment...so I guess I learned something new today. Could you add a reference for that usage note, please? --Connel MacKenzie 07:28, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Please note: this was not meant as a slam, rather, feedback (as requested) to help you make it a "perfect" Wiktionary entry. Double checking entry layout explained, it seems I may have been in error regarding the ordering of Related terms (but I think there may have been some contributory 'instruction creep' there.) Also, the second Usage notes note for the adjective probably isn't needed. --Connel MacKenzie 07:40, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks folks, this was precisely what I was after. BTW, is there a "perfect" entry anywhere, one that is so well-developed it uses all of the sections, every relevant template, etc., etc.? I'd just like to see what a "completely finished" one looks like, esp. if it is using reference citations galore (which albino does not yet). — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 20:16, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll let someone else provide one (or more) such example(s). --Connel MacKenzie 21:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Clarification questions:

1. Adj. should come before Noun, even if the Adj. usage is derived from the Noun usage?

Yes. Changing that would require a discussion in WT:BP and a subsequent WT:VOTE. My personal view on it is somewhat different than it was two years ago. My main concern now, is that whatever the ordering is, it should be unambiguous. --Connel MacKenzie 21:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Right. It's now in Adj-N order, throughout. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:47, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

2. What are the "other very minor cosmetic things that pertain only to wikitext"? I'd just as soon get up to speed on that stuff too.

Spaces don't belong in heading levels (immediately before or after the equal signs)...to make it (ever so slightly) easier on bot tasks/writers. --Connel MacKenzie 21:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Really? Didn't know that would make any difference to them. I've preferred the spaced style for human editor readability, but I'll try to remember to quit doing that henceforth. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:47, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

3. What does {{temp|...}} do? I haven't seen that before...

The Wikipedia equivalent is w:Template:Tl, which we can't use here, as that is a language code: {{tl}}. --Connel MacKenzie 21:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Right; I figured it out after I mistakenly used {{temp|wikipedia|Albinism}} on the actual definition page. D'oh. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:47, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

4. When copying the definition gloss to the translations, should I keep the (presumptively redundant) wikilinking to terms like pigment and melanin, or strip it out?

Within {{trans-top|one lacking pigmentation}} no terms should be wikified. When essentially repeating the definition for noun/adj., yes, repeat the wikification (no server load, as the lookup has already been performed for one.) --Connel MacKenzie 21:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Done. NB: I really like that version of the translations thing better, since it reduced the space used on the page. Also done for the Danish, German, etc., entries, which I believe was what was advised. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Please remember to include the gloss in trans-top as parameter one. --Connel MacKenzie 21:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Does it need to be precisely the same as the definition, or can it be shorter, e.g. "congenitally lacking melanin"? — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:47, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

It should be shorter, but unambiguous. So "congenitally lacking melanin" is great. --Connel MacKenzie 00:36, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Done. SMcCandlish 01:32, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Another note: I mean the redundance between the English noun definition and the English adjective definition. All other languages should have just "# albino" or "# albino". --Connel MacKenzie 11:01, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

5. Should I really combine the usage notes, even though one only applies to the adjective? Or have a usage not under Adj. for that one, and then a usage note a level higher for the entire entry that covers the issue that applies to both the N. and the Adj.?

Up to you - yes, you can have one level-three Usage notes and one level-four Usage notes but it might be easier to understand if they are all kept together at level three (with the usage note's note noting its note notation applies only to the adjective.) --Connel MacKenzie 21:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Note: Notably noted. I lean toward thinking that for undestandability purposes it's better to have two level-4 notes sections, even if one of the notes appears in both and is a little redundant. But I could be swayed toward a single level-3 if people are certain that would be better. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:47, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Notes:

A. I've started implementing these ideas (and a few others suggested by edits already made to the article by others).

B. Will look for sourced examples and stuff to add today.

C. The "derogatory" issue seems to be comparatively recent, but I can source it, and will try to do that today or otherwise soon, after I figure out how to properly do ref. citations here (as opposed to at WP; I imagine there are differences). The issue seems to be that the word is often used like any other "you're different" epithet, e.g. "albino freak" or "ugly albino" (cf. "lazy ]any random racial slur]", "stupid retard", "inbred hick", etc.) I've limited this concern to the English definition, since I don't have any source-able evidence that goes beyond English. A few years ago I would have said that this is just like "dumb blonde" - the noun itself not conveying anything negative, but there's source-able, organized concern that "albino" in English is becoming a discriminatory epithet unto itself in both noun and adjective forms. I think this is already sourced at W:Albinism; will check. Anyway, it's definitely not universal, which was why the usage note's language is so qualified. Anecdotally, I have two albinistic friends; one hates the term "albino", vehemently, while the other could care less and calls herself an albino. <shrug>.

On this one you may be lucky. While we are very particular about Quotation formats, I don't think anyone has pressed the "References" formatting issues - by default, the only ones that usually add such references are Wikipedians. (Wiktionarians know to add quotations instead, to back something up.) Since it is the usage note and not the usage being sourced, I think the Wikipedia style is preferred (but I expect I'll very quickly be corrected on that point, if wrong.) --Connel MacKenzie 21:57, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Do ,<ref name="foo">[http://bar.baz/quux Snorkel Weasels]</ref> <ref name="foo" />, and <references /> work here, or does it have to be done the "old-fashioned" manual way? And, I'll go look for the quotations Wiktionary:-space docs before adding one of those. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 23:47, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

D. Re: Related Terms ordering — Someone already moved the Trans. stuff to the end, so I'll just leave it that way.

— SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 21:04, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Can you please reduce you sig? --Connel MacKenzie 00:36, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

I think that should do it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] 01:57, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Hehe. You removed the cute part, but kept the long redundant part? Oh well.  :-)   By the way, you can use popups here, customized a little for Wiktionary, at WT:PREFS. (That's why I say the talk/contrib links are redundant.) --Connel MacKenzie 03:14, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

I'll try "antiverting" to this one then. — SMcCandlish ツ 10:03, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Pending question

Do ,<ref name="foo">[http://bar.baz/quux Snorkel Weasels]</ref> <ref name="foo" />, and <references /> work here, or does it have to be done the "old-fashioned" manual way? And, I'll go look for the quotations Wiktionary:-space docs before adding one of those. — SMcCandlish ツ 10:03, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

The REF/REFERENCES tags work; they just aren't generally used (but probably should be, much more.) Remember to use a level three heading for ===References===, not level two. --Connel MacKenzie 10:09, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Is there a copy of a retention table available in here?

Hi I'm new to the site & find it a bit complicated... I'm looking for a basic retention table that tells you how long to keep records, Paid bills, Tax returns, ect,ect,ect. I found one on line that was excellent, but it said Utah... Appreciate any help you can provide.

Thank you, — This unsigned comment was added by Anitalenor (talk • contribs).

That's not something you'd usually find in a dictionary - Retention periods vary depending on jurisdiction, so it might be best to find one for the state/country where you live. I've removed your email address from this post to prevent spambots from picking it up.. it's a bad idea to post your email address in a forum like this. --Versageek 08:25, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

Please note that the appearance of an e-mail address indicates the post was only a troll, hoping to flood someone else's inbox with irate responses. We probably should enact a more official policy of simply removing such trolls, regardless of content, if they contain an e-mail address. --Connel MacKenzie 17:01, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Troll: You deleted my school from Wikipedia

Admin note: spam/troll, with e-mail addresses, has been removed. --Connel MacKenzie 16:57, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

This is not Wikipedia. This is Wiktionary. --EncycloPetey 08:08, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

licencing help

Why is it that unlike the main commons, wiktionaries do not require -- and at any rate don't display -- licencing information for picture/media uploads? Is this intentional? (Actually noticed in he TR wiktionary but the EN one seems the same). Thanks. (no username here Bm in TR).

All the uploads are housed at Commons, so that's where the licensing information is kept. We discourage local files, and prefer that everything (audio and graphic) be uploaded at Commons. Clicking on the image will pull up the Commons page with the licensing info. --EncycloPetey 09:29, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. I'll badger the TR admins about this, because commons uploads are not even mentioned in the TR wiktionary. The link there goes to local.

No template for "self-contradictory"?

Looked at Category:Request_templates but didn't find a template for "this article or section appears to contradict itself" (cf. W:Template:Contradict). Seems it would be useful, as dag#Noun defn. 2 and the "Synonyms" subsection immediately below it make dag self-contradictory. — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] 09:08, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

That looks intentional (but I guess we'll have to ask someone from Australia or NZ) as it says commonly in the definition, but then lists them as loose synonyms. For subtle questions like this, I usually tag it with {{rft}}. --Connel MacKenzie 10:04, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

animal mates

Is there a heading where pairs such as 'goose and gander', 'pen and cob' etc are located?

Yes. Appendix:Animals. With lots of red links waiting for some keen and enthusiastic contributor. Jonathan Webley 16:18, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

Help requested for new pages

I just made 3 new pages for the adjective hypomorphic. hypomorph, hypomorphic, and hypomorphs. I have a list of related terms to add but I'd like to have someone double-check the format. The most common use of the term is as an adjective: "er-2 is a hypomorphic allele". Hypomorph is the mutation itself: "er-a is a stronger hypomorph than er-2". I don't think I've ever read the plural "hypomorphs" but the link was automatic so I filled it in. I'm watching the pages so you can just edit them and/or leave a message here or in my talk. Thanks Dr d12 00:09, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

I've made a slight change to hypomorphic, so that it uses the more elegant {{context}} template, which allows you to combine the two sets of parentheses. I've made formatting changes to hypomorphs that you might want to look at; specifically, I've added the "inflection line" after the part of speech header; utilized the {{plural of}} template; and added Category:English plurals to the entry. Otherwise, the formatting looks fine. --EncycloPetey 00:14, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks that was fast Dr d12 03:33, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Help with English spelling variants

How do you deal with spelling variants? Do both pages paralog and paralogue (french?) get the same definition or should one forward to the other as a spelling variant? In the US, the chiefly British spelling variants like "characterise" are treated as errors (in Canada we can't make up our minds and use both). Thanks Dr d12 03:33, 21 January 2007 (UTC) And is there a category template "spelling variant"? Dr d12 03:36, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

As long as both variants are considered equally valid, or each is the preferred form for a particular geographic region, then both spellings get full and (mostly) parallel entries. If one form is a rare spelling variant, then we usually use the {{alternative spelling of}} template in place of a definition, thereby guiding the user to the main entry. Be warned, however, that this issue is a contentious one with a long history of vigorous argument, which continues even now. --EncycloPetey 03:54, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

wot is coleaic?

does any one know what coleaic is? if so please email me at [removed]. — This comment was unsigned.

E-mail address removed. — Beobach972 21:37, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Do you mean coeliac or celiac (both relating to the abdomen)? Jonathan Webley 19:33, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Based on the only 26 Google hits I came across (apparently all related), it seems to be a protologism. I would guess that it is intended to be an adjectival form derived from Escherichia coli (E. coli). --EncycloPetey 19:46, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Volapük in Wiktionary main page?

In the English language homepage, the Volapük dictionary project is mentioned among the 1000+ languages, which is OK. In the main page to all wiktionaries (here), however, it is mentioned in the lowest rank, among the 100+ languages. Does anyone know where I can ask for it to be plaed in the 1000+ category? Smeira 14:06, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that is meta:Www.wiktionary.org portal. We should be able to scare up a meta admin lurking here somewhere. --Connel MacKenzie 02:05, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Okey-dokey, I've basically overhauled that page using data from the master list of Wiktionary editions. In addition to bumping Volapük up, I've added a whopping 11 languages that should've been listed long ago, and eschewed the inflexible <br /> line wrapping with a little CSS. Sorry it took so long; I should've done all that long ago. – Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 04:25, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Font

Could you provide the option of font size for us older people? fjwun@yahoo.com

• If you are using Internet Explorer - select View ==> Text Size ==> Larger (that's what this aged person does). SemperBlotto 13:44, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
• If you are using Firefox, type Ctrl-+ (hold the Ctrl key down and press the plus sign to make text larger - minus sign to make text smaller.) --Connel MacKenzie 06:50, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Wiktionary - change of appearance

Is it just me - the appearance of Wiktionary (and Wikipedia etc) has changed. I had Preferences - Skin set to Monobook (Default) - it was OK yesterday, but this morning the logo has gone and the side menu moved to the bottom (ie it follows all other text on a page) - and no tabs at the top. I have changed the skin to 'Simple' and the side menu has reappeared.

I am using Firefox - thought I would try MS-IE - and that does have a sidebar and logo. Is it me, or has something changed on Wiki? —Saltmarsh 06:16, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Who knows! It appears to have returned to normal. —Saltmarsh 06:30, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

I use Firefox most of the time, now. I did not notice any abberations. Image loading problems usually indicate a problem on commons:. Layout funkiness that I've seen, has invariably been due to my erroneous Javascript, which I clear (in Firefox) by typing Ctrl-Shift-R. --Connel MacKenzie 06:47, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps image loading is the problem. Wiktionary is now behaving with me and has an image. OTOH Wikipedia is still wrong - and has no image.
—Saltmarsh 09:48, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Help with searching

I would like to know if anyone can recommend a good way of searching for an idiom by its meaning rather than simply browsing for it. I've tried a google search restricting the search to the idioms page, like this:

distance site:http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_idioms

only to discover, after a few tests, that this only points to the very first page of the idioms! Another try, using just the phrase "Category:English idioms" like this:

mythical "Category:English idioms" site:http://en.wiktionary.org

didn't work, either (the word mythical appears in the definition of the idiom "Midas touch").

Thanks for any suggestions!

Enovickas 00:47, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Entering "mythical idiom" in the search box here, and pressing [search] seems to work. Likewise "distance idiom". Is that what you meant? --Connel MacKenzie 01:56, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

I still get no results when I type "mythical idiom" in the seach box. When I went to report this, I saw in the edit page that your search was actually directed through a "special search" page, which I found after poking around for a bit. I'm not quite sure why this function is so well hidden (I didn't see anything about it in the help pages), but thanks! Enovickas 15:53, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

That is curious. Did you press return (which activates the [Go] button) or click on [Search]? --Connel MacKenzie 20:31, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

I beg your pardon; I was hitting return, which was selecting "go" instead of search. Mea culpa!

-Enovickas 02:34, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Vietnamese

Perhaps this has been answered somewhere else, sorry didn't really search very well and it's a bit OT but how the heck did the Vietnamese wikitionary get so large? I presume there was some sort of contribution of an existing source perhaps from the Vietnamese government? Don't mean this to offend anyone, just surprised it's so large even more so since it was 600 so entries in Jan 2006 Nil Einne 15:43, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

The answer is simple: imports from a number of free sources. Lmaltier 19:17, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

notably the English and French wiktionaries ;-) Robert Ullmann 23:41, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

For the record, nothing was ever imported from another Wiktionary. The Vietnamese Wiktionary – specifically, Laurent Bouvier's PiedBot – used the Free Vietnamese Dictionary Project, which the author licensed under the GFDL. – Minh Nguyễn (talk, contribs) 23:53, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

A list of easily misspelled names

Guess which spelling is correct:

I.

• Rosemarie Waldrop
• Rosemarie Waldorp
• Rosemary Waldrop
• Rosemary Waldorp
• Rosmary Waldrop
• Rosmary Waldorp
• Rosmarie Waldrop
• Rosmarie Waldorp

II.

• Edgar Alan Poe
• Edgar Alen Poe
• Edgar Allan Poe
• Edgar Allen Poe

III. And what's the surname in the Vietnamese-American poet Linh Dinh's name?

The correct answers are the second from the last in each list and "Dinh", and following custom and his preference, it comes before "Linh" if he's in Vietnam but afterward when he's back home in the United States.

Really? The front cover of the Paul Celan collection spells it "Rosemarie Waldrop" ... Wikipedia points that spelling to Rosmarie Waldrop, the LoC agrees; but Amazon uses Rosemarie, and they do have an image of that cover ;-) ;-) Robert Ullmann 21:39, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh wow, you're right! Amazing! There must be a heck of a story there (i.e., did the first "e" jump of the owner's accord, or was it pushed by mistake?) A Google search, however, confirms the counter-intuitive, correct spelling.Noroton 22:27, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

This is all leading up to my question, which is: Is there an appropriate place in Wictionary for a list of often-misspelled/easily misspelled names? I think redirect pages are useful in Wikipedia and here as well and that solves many individual problems, but it seems to me it would be useful to have a unified list somewhere that editors or, really, anybody who's dealing with a lot of names at once could refer to because it would save the reader time and effort. I'm not sure such a list would survive in Wikipedia. Could it be set up in Wictionary? I realize the list might become enormous, but by focusing on names that are tricky, like "Rosmarie" and on specific categories of people, say authors in one list, other famous people or places or things in other lists, it could be broken down into workable chunks. Noroton 21:13, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Seems much easier to google for authoritative sources. Especially because there can be a serious issue of which person you are looking for. And they will do the fuzzy matches: all of the Rosmarie Waldrop variants above will lead you to the right answer, as long as you are aware that others may be making the same mistake. Robert Ullmann 21:39, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

For anyone dealing with only one spelling question, googling is quicker and it's easier to find the Google search page than some page on Wictionary or Wikipedia. But for anyone going over multiple names (I'll admit, a small minority), getting to one Web page with a list is easier. If we're talking about notable people with tricky spelling, there should be a minimal amount of confusion (birth and death years should resolve nearly all confusion). The real problem comes when the spelling problem comes out of nowhere and hits you. There are 1,200 "Rosemarie Waldrop" ghits for a reason — none of these people thought of the possibility that they could be mistaken when they typed in that extra "e". Is there a name for that? They call it "false friends" in language translation. It's a kind of "spelling false friend".Noroton 22:34, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Impetigo

I wish to know the treatment of Impetigo — This comment was unsigned.

February 2007

Caretaker of the earth

hopefully you cna help, i am currently trying toi recall a word; that begins with the letter S which can be used in the context of, and god left mankind as the_____________of the world any answers would be greatly appreciated, as far as i can recall the word is similar to caretaker in meaning, thankyou — This unsigned comment was added by 88.105.184.43 (talk).

Well it says here that he left mankind as subduer of the earth, but that's not too similar to caretaker. Are you thinking of steward? --Enginear 19:51, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

yes thats the word im thinking of thankyou

pronunciation guide

Would someone please provide the link to the dictionary pronunciation guide/page for words listed on this site. I have never seen an "omega" sign used to help pronounce something...

An inverted Ω: [ʊ] is used in the IPA to represent the “u” sound in “book” (/bʊk/). An IPA chart for English can be found here. † Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 17:10, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

All the various pronunciation links are located at Wiktionary:Pronunciation. You can also follow the link from the word IPA which precedes pronunciations given in IPA. --EncycloPetey 15:52, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Major backlog at WT:OP

Could an administrator please clear out the backlog at Wiktionary:WikiProject on open proxies? I went there to report a zombie proven on Wikipedia, and noticed the large backlog. Thanks. Jesse Viviano 15:28, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for the reminder. The WT:OP list went inactive for several reasons: User:Pathoschild has indicated a centralized approach from meta, which may still be in development, and VCN died. Perhaps this should move to WT:BP where more sysops are likely to see it and chisel away at the backlog? --Connel MacKenzie 15:37, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

glovolium

This is aproduct sold by Rawlings to put on baseball gloves. I need help finding the ingredients.

adding words to dictionary

I am new here.

I just made my first contribution: I added "Spanish: paleta" under "Translations" under English "pallet" in the Wiktionary. (How I got there and why is a whole other story.)

I copied the templates from the other translations, so my "paleta" fit the template and came up clickable. But there was, of course, no entry behind it.

So then I wanted to fill in that link and define "paleta" in Spanish, but I don't feel I have the moral authority to do so; I would want to copy the definition from a Spanish dictionary. But there is that big warning about copyright. I notice the English wictionary cites the OED and others. Of course one must use other dictionaries to make a dictionary. All dictionaries borrow from each other. So what is the procedure here? Can I quote from, and cite, any dictionary? Or must I personally obtain approval from the publisher?

Thanks, Elaine Harvey

— This unsigned comment was added by Elaine.harvey (talk • contribs).

• First - are you sure that your translation is correct? I would have thought that plataforma was better (but what do I know?).
• Second - foreign words just get a translation, not a definition (unless it it untranslatable) so your spanish entry would look something like . . .

==Spanish==
===Noun===
paleta f (plural: paletas)
# pallet

• Good luck. SemperBlotto 22:27, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Plataforma-platform. Paleta-pallet. In both English and Spanish, a pallet is a subspecies of platform, one specifically used to hold or move cargo. I thought there were dictionaries of many languages on here! I haven't looked yet. I thought if you clicked on a foreign word you would get to a dictionary of that language. Is that not the case? If it is not, it should be. Thanks. How do I learn what brackets and marks to put on words as in your example above?

— This unsigned comment was added by Elaine.harvey (talk • contribs).

I tried to undo the tangling of quotes above to achieve a somewhat more readable result, my apologies if I messed up the layout of your posts, I'll revert if asked to. Anyway, Elaine, as you can see this is en.wiktionary.org - that means that this is an English dictionary; entries in other languages give a translation to English. There are many sister-sites in other languages, such as fr.wiktionary.org or zh.wiktionary.org or whatever. The first two letters always indicate the language. See the Main Page for links to those. You may also see links to the sister-dictionaries in specific articles, on the lower left (below the Toolbox). As for the brackets and marks, there are conventions for those which you just will have to remember, but mostly we make use of the symbols =, ', { and [. Remember that you can always discover how a certain lay-out is obtained, by clicking on the "Edit" button and then scrolling to the relevant section. For testing purposes, please use the Wiktionary:Sandbox. Paul Willocx 23:15, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Thank you Paul. I deleted the question about "budget" because it was not mine. I do not know how it got there.

Keeping the languages separate makes sense as an organizing principle. I think I get how it works. When I translate between two languages, I like to have bilingual dictionaries and separate monolingual dictionaries with definitions in both languages, and as I now understand it, you have all of that here. Thank you.

Elaine Harvey

Oceans of palindromes

A very long list of palindromes (actually three lists: English, words in multiple languages, and phrases in multiple languages) is up for deletion at Wikipedia. It seems that the lists are not really encyclopedic but they are an extraordinary collection.

I'm hoping that the list can be saved somewhere on a related Wiki site, perhaps this one. Someone in that discussion suggested that the list might be put into Wiktionary as a "an appendix in Wiktionary". I don't know what this even means, and I don't want to violate Wictionary rules (for one thing because that would just create another move to delete and defeat the purpose).

Wikisource is for whole books, which this list is not. Wikibooks is for how-to manuals and free textbooks, which this list is not.

The deletion debate is here: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of palindromic phrases in English

The three palindrome articles are here:

• Wikipedia:List of palindromic phrases in English
• Wikipedia:Palindromic words
• Wikipedia:Palindromic phrases

I'm not particularly interested in palindromes, but I don't see how anyone can look at the vast amount of work that's gone into this and the ingenuity of what's been collected here and not want to save it so others can enjoy it too.

Is there a way to save it on Wiktionary? Noroton 02:49, 16 February 2007 (UTC) edited out a mistake in the first paragraph Noroton 02:59, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Simply tag them on Wikipedia with {{dicdef}} or {{Move to Wiktionary}} (or similar,) and they usually will be here within 24 hours. If you nag me (or any sysop) directly, pointing to WT:MTW, it may get done sooner. I'll be starting today's import in a little while...only one out of the three is currently tagged. --Connel MacKenzie 06:21, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

Looking up words

I have visited this site hoping to look words up. like "employ," "employed' which you might think is simple, but not when it comes to legal issues, but yet so far there is not one page where I can simply, just enter the words I want to use in my legal dispute with my present employer. This site surely does offer lots but how is it used? how do I get to the page where the self-promotion stops and the self-service begins? how is it you will be able to find me to tell me the answer? even this is useless I see cause then I would never be able to find the answer, how about a site that offers too much and thus offers nothing at all, how sad....There is no way to send this? are you too smart or too stupid what the use of doing this if it cannot be send anywhere??? — This unsigned comment was added by 204.110.228.254 (talk).

Are you not getting a Search box on every page? Just type the word in and press return. Having said that, this is not an appropriate site to confirm the exact legal meaning of a word, for which you would need to study, and understand, all relevant legislation and case law, or ask a lawyer. --Enginear 12:03, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

"SAMOAN GIRL NAMES AND DEFINITIONS"

HI MY NAME IS VENUS I HAVE RECENTLY FOUND OUT I AM PREGNANT BY THE MIGHTY MOVEMENT WITHIN MY BELLY SHE WILL BE PART SAMOAN SO I WOULD LIKE TO READ THROUGH SOME GIRL NAMES WITH THE DEFINITIONS AND CORRECT PRONUNCIATION OF EACH NAME IS THERE ANY WAY POSSIBLE OR AN EXACT SITE THAT YOU KNOW OF THAT I CAN LOOK AT???? IT IS REALLY IMPORTANT TO ME BECAUSE I WANT MY CHILD TO HAVE A PART OF EACH RACE WITHIN HER NAME AS WELL IN HER LIFE EXPERIENCE CULTURE FROM EACH BACKGROUND.I AM DUE IN MAY,SO THAT IS NOT TOO FAR FROM NOW IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN SO IF POSSIBLE OF AN E-MAIL MY EMAIL IS ///Removed/// THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR TIME.

Here are a few. I don’t have time to give details of each one, but you might be able to search the Internet for additional info on ones you like. —Stephen 08:01, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

• Aveolela ("rays of the sun")
• Pogisa ("dark")
• Solosolo ("dry")
• Asoese, *Eseta, *Iloai, *Kirita, *Kisa, *Lalago, *Lelani, *Leleialofa, *Loto, *Masepa, *Masina, *Ne’emia, *Nu’u, *Ruta, *Silei, *Silei, *Sina, *Solomona, *Taulau, *Taumaloto, *Tealoha, *Telesia, *Tiresa, *Upumao

imperative as noun and adjective

"becomes imperative".IS imperative here a noun or an adjective?

• becomes imperative - adjective
• becomes an imperative - noun

SemperBlotto 09:10, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Hoosier

What is the definition of Hoosier? I thought I read somewhere a few years ago it meant "bigger than life". People here in FL ask me and I can't tell them and certainly won't give them the St Louis version. — This comment was unsigned.

Hoosier? Well, several copyvio word histories are repeated on w:Hoosier; you might find what you want there. --Connel MacKenzie 02:56, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

I live in Indian and the reason I've always been given is that someone would knock on another's door and the person inside would respond "Hoosier" or said slowly, Who is there? It's probably fake, but we can't discount every theory for the origins of words. — This unsigned comment was added by Ianhrrngtn (talk • contribs).

Polish adjectives - should I include all genders in translation?

Hi All! We have different adjective form for every grammatical gender in Polish language. In almost all cases only the last letter in the word differ so when you know one of the gender forms two other ones are usually obvious. Bearing that in mind, how should be Polish translation for nice inserted:

• Polish: miły

or

• Polish: miły m (dictionaries usually list only masculine form...)

or maybe

• Polish: miły m, miła f, miłe n

Thanks in advance. Kubakd 15:04, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

The place to check would be Wiktionary:About Polish, to see if there are any special concerns; since there don't seem to be, the default convention is to include all three gender forms. --Connel MacKenzie 03:27, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

"Paltry"?

Anybody know when this word first appeared in the English language? Cause I need to know. =/— This unsigned comment was added by 216.8.145.127 (talk).

As a noun, 1556; as an adjective (from the noun), which is probably what you want: earliest cite is 1570. So in each case some time prior to that. Robert Ullmann 01:19, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Transwiki:Gynecocracy

Transwiki:Gynecocracy seems to contain most of the necessary information to be moved into main dictionary space, but I'm not sure how to do it, and the exact formatting to be used etc. w:User:AnonMoos 13:37, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Well, you'd start with the move button of that page, moving it to gynecocracy. It will then need an ==English== level-two language heading on line one, a ===Noun=== third-level heading line followed immediately by an {{en-noun|gynecocracies}} inflection line, followed by the definition. The definition needs to start with "#" (on its own line) and should not repeat the Wikipedia intro style (i.e. remove "Gynecocracy is a word for "). Be bold, and someone will correct you...and then let the "piranha effect" take over for further enhancements. The etymological information goes in an ===Etymology=== section (which should precede the part-of-speech heading.) Remember to correct wikified terms to point to their lower-cased Wiktionary equivalents. List ===Alternative forms=== before the etymology. A ===Usage notes=== and/or a ===Synonyms=== section should come after the definition. (Remember that the only lines that begin with "#" anywhere, are definition lines...so lines in synonym sections need to start with "*" for an unnumbered, alphabetized list.) Hope this helps. You can have other walk throughs on irc://irc.freenode.net/wiktionary if you have the inclination. --Connel MacKenzie 03:41, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

March

fantasy interpretation

i want to know perfect meaning for the fantasy and fantasy interpretation pleas aware me — This comment was unsigned.

Starting a new subject

I was looking for work on 'Terracotta Temples of Bengal'.Finding that there is none at the moment in Wikipedia,I thought of starting a page on the same.

I have visited National Library , Calcutta,India for preparing notes on the historical, architectural and religious/social angle of the beautiful terracotta temples we have in Bengal,India.I have collected a good nos of photographs myself and plan a few trips to develop a suitable album.

Posting the work will take quite a few days' time; subsequent editing to make it concise and to the point and addition of text and photos can be quite a few weeks' job.I have just downloaded the "Manual of Style".Shall study the same.

However, advices as to how to progress .....specially regd. editing..... is required.Do I write a good part in MSWord and then upload it and edit/add subsequently or keep on addition/editing on a regular basis ?

Regards. Shyamal Chatterji [email removed]

It is fine to edit on the wiki, use preview to look at the results, then when you are done (with a draft) save it. But do note that you want to contribute this to the Wikipedia, not Wiktionary! We are a dictionary, not the encyclopedia. Robert Ullmann 11:27, 2 March 2007 (UTC)

Word Of The Day

I'm not sure if it's my computer or if someones being lazy, but it's March 6th, and my Word of the days still on the third. Anyone that can help out with that would be...helpful. Also I'm not sure once again if it's my computer or not, but whenever I copy and paste words I think I might use (writer) into "Word" it says I'm misspelling it. Ianhrrngtn 02:05, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

It could be many, many things; but it is not toolserver. The RSS feed currently being reported is for March 6th (dissemble.) Please identify the exact URI where the WOTD is being reported wrong. Instead of "writer" you mean, "more correctly"? Many words on en.wiktionary.org will be identified by numerous spell-checking programs as likely errors; it seems to be a past-time of many people, to enter ridiculous words that barely squeak past our inadequate criteria. --Connel MacKenzie 03:18, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Well that may be a part of it, but most of it is probably due to the fact that we're an international dictionary. In MS Word (from Word98 and probably earlier), if you set Tools/Language/Set Language to "UK English", it will tell you that color is an error. If you set it to "US English" it will tell you that colour is an error (unless you've added the spellings in a supplementary dictionary file). (And if you set to "UK English", write color, then without moving the cursor, set to "US English" and write colour, it will show them both as incorrect, which amuses me.) --Enginear 14:15, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

That is amusing. Gah! My copy of "word" is infected with UK spellings now! --Connel MacKenzie 12:57, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Nick-name for "Richard"

How did "Dick" ever become the almost univerally accepted nick-name for "Rickard"?? — This unsigned comment was added by 68.46.189.71 (talk).

Much like any other nickname -- not as strange to my ears as Peggy for ElizabethMargaretedited 19:37, 9 March 2007 (UTC). According to OED, it's been around at least since 1553, centuries before any of the modern uses of dick were thought of. But what interests me more, is why some of the other uses developed -- were any (rude or otherwise) from the name, or did they all have alternative etymologies? --Enginear 15:21, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

According to Cecil ([1]), the nickname Dick does predate the other uses. Here’s how it became the nickname: Richard was shortened to Rick. Rhyming nicknames were all the rage back then (800-900 years ago), so Dick was created to rhyme with Rick. -- Beobach972 17:51, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

To answer --Enginear, then: the name Dick (again, according to Cecil) came to be used, as John Doe is today, to mean ‘anybody’. Hence it acquired other meanings: first it meant a common type of cheese, then to mean ‘a riding whip, an apron, the mound around a ditch, and an abbreviation for "dictionary" around 1860. Dick also meant a declaration, in which sense the OED cites someone writing in 1878 "I'd take my dying dick" to mean "I'd swear a dying declaration." The term "dick" came to mean policeman around 1908, and then detective. And we finally get to where you started. The use of "dick" as coarse slang for penis first arises around 1890. Tracking the history of uncouth words is not easy, since such expressions were not generally written down. How "dick" came to be associated with penis is not known, although the riding whip may have pointed the way.’ The AHD says that the ‘detective, policeman’ sense is a ‘shortening and alteration’ of the word detective, and attributes the other meanings to the nickname. Etymonline traces the ‘penis’ sense to British army slang a century old. -- Beobach972 17:51, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

The ‘declaration’ sense of the word seems to me as though it could be a shortening of dec(laration), though, unrelated to the nickname. -- Beobach972 18:16, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Are you sure Peggy is the nickname for Elisabeth? The information I've found indicates hat it is a rhyming form of Meggy, a form of Maggie, itself a form of Margaret. It would indeed be strange if it were a nickname for Elisabeth. -- Beobach972 17:59, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Of course you're right. My brainfade. Another rhyming nickname (and thanks for the explanation -- I hadn't realised there was a fad for them back then) --Enginear 19:37, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

moisture wicking fabric construction

I wish to know how the moisture wicking fabric works on my shirt, and what kind of fabric it is make of and how the fabric is constructed. I would appreciate if it can be explain to me, thank you.

andrew

I recommend you try the wikipedia reference desk. This is the wiktionary, a collaborative dictionary, RJFJR 17:35, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Page Deleted

Could someone tell me why the entry for "Cooch" was deleted? Pseudonymius 18:47, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

• cooch was deleted because it was a copyvio. SemperBlotto 18:55, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Paraphrasing is an infringement? Pseudonymius 21:26, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Paraphrasing does not often include the practice of cut-n-pasting definition numbers. This is not Wikipedia: copying from other secondary sources is not the goal here. --Connel MacKenzie 12:50, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Nothing in the entry was cut or pasted. The cited source was published in 1960. You could buy a copy of the cited book through online sellers of used books, but as far as I know the book itself does not exist in electronic form. I typed the entry. I didn't copy it. I put it in my own words and provided the citation so that anyone who cares to check it could do so. What's the problem? Pseudonymius 16:28, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

The version available seems to be →ISBN. The problems, Primetime, are far too numerous. --Connel MacKenzie 16:58, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I can see this discussion is going nowhere. Primetime? What the hell are you talking about? But anyway have a nice project. Pseudonymius 17:58, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

IP

"you are not logged in. Your IP address will be recorded in this page's history if you save."

is that a threat?......or a warning that everyone will see my ip?.....oh no, my ip...what's the harm?.....will i be investigated by the trace of my IP?.......or do some consider it a nuisance?

NEWBIE!

tell me what this means..please

Not a threat, statement of fact. The database needs a method to record who made an edit. If you are logged in it records your user name. If you are not logged in it records your IP address. (Internally it records the IP even if you are logged in, but only a very few people trusted people can get at that data). The IP generally tells very little about you (and if it's dynamic then it may change). RJFJR 13:12, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually, the edit time is recorded also, and that does uniquely identify you, unless you use an anonymizing proxy of some sort. Fortunately this information is only available on court order. Unless you live in the US or China, but in that case you've got bigger worries. 82.139.85.100 04:46, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Is it appropriate to include some Usage History in Wiktionary entries?

I've edited Wikipedia for a while, but am a newcomer to Wiktionary, so I don't know my way around here particularly well yet. One feature of the Oxford English Dictionary which I've long found useful is the inclusion of a summary of a term's usage history. So, for example, under "doomsday" the OED cites milestone usages of that term by notable English writers like Shakespeare and Carlyle (providing a brief quotation, to show the word's usage in context, and a date for each). And under the relatively new term "doomsday machine" the OED will even cite the term's first usages (again with brief quotations and dates) in periodicals like The New Scientist or the Observer. Is there any provision for doing this sort of thing in Wiktionary? I honestly think it would be a helpful addition to some entries, since it would provide authoritative external sources and some validation. -- WikiPedant 17:17, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes (within reason). See the quotations section of hyperbole as a good example to follow. SemperBlotto 17:24, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Hello SemperBlotto -- Ah, yes, that's very much the sort of thing I had in mind. Many thanks. -- WikiPedant (occasionally blotto) 17:58, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Hello SemperBlotto At a tangent... Why is the Spanish link on hyperbole directed to the Portuguese page ?? Algrif 13:18, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Wikiproject

Do you all have an equivalent for Wikiprojects over here? My proposed project ended up being in violation of WP:WINAD. — atchius (msg) 23:56, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Not per se. Someone was talking about starting something up for Spanish, but I don't think that ever progressed far. I doubt there are enough Wiktionarians to support that scheme effectively (unlike Wikipedia, where such a scheme is absolutely necessary.) Out of curiosity, what was your proposed project? --Connel MacKenzie 05:37, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Given Names: I wanted all given names to look like w:Michael did before it got WINADed (old) — atchius (msg) 06:03, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, I know that Appendix:Names is active still. (I haven't taken an active part there in quite a while.) Specific entries such as Michael should have etymology sections, but the "baby names" popularity statistics have not found a home here (very little, if any, lexical relevance.) Out entry should also list diminutives (either on the definition lines, or in a ===Related terms=== section, or some mix of both.) --Connel MacKenzie 05:53, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Deleting a new entry as it's being written?

Hi there,

I've just created two new entries, and found the first of these had been deleted almost immediately (probably also the second one by now?) It seemed that everything met the guidelines, and they didn't previously exist. "Warrior Librarian" brings up over half a million hits on Google - did I maybe miss something in the guidelines about why the term is not wanted here?

Thanks heaps for any information.

Amanda Credaro

Your entry was an encyclopedic entry, and should be placed on Wikipedia, not here on Wiktionary. --EncycloPetey 04:27, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

spam removed --Connel MacKenzie 05:32, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Editing

In this example, I can't figure out how to edit the spelling ... can you please advise?

"fishing (countable and uncountable; plural fishings)"

(Obviously it's the "fishings" bit I'm trying to edit!) — This comment was unsigned.

I'm sorry, but I don't see the problem with fishing. It seems to be using {{en-noun}} correctly for that situation. (Or are you suggesting the couuntable sense is invalid, and should have {{rfv-sense}} applied?) --Connel MacKenzie 05:29, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

If the latter, then it's not in OED2+, but there are >>100 b.g.c. 21st cent cites of fishings, most of which seem to be for that use, apart from ~500 pre-2000 cites. --Enginear 18:48, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Question about Japanese quasi-adjectives

Should the POS header for quasi-adjectives be quasi-adjective or should it be adjective ?--Balloonguy 21:53, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Should have thought we answered this in WT:AJ? Always Adjective Robert Ullmann 23:25, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

How Do you type in full paragraphs to be translated or pronounced: 翻訳されるか、または発音される完全なパラグラフをタイプインするためにいかにしなさいか

This one is pronounced: Hon’yaku sareru ka, mata wa hatsuon sareru kanzen na paragurafu o taipu in suru tameni ikanishi nasai ka. —Stephen 00:42, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

i have a paragraph that i want to have pronounced so i put it in the search bar but it wont go: 私は従って私が調査棒にそれを発音したいと思う行かない置くが、ことを私がことパラグラフを有する。

It won’t do any good to put it in the search bar because that article does not exist. I would pronounce this: Washi wa shitagatte washi ga chōsa bō ni sore o hatsuon shita ito omou ikanai oku ga, koto o washi ga koto paragurafu o yūsuru. —Stephen 00:24, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

@washi: personally I'd go with watashi - but then again, I'm still young :-) 82.139.85.100 04:36, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

You are right, watashi is better. Washi shows my age. —Stephen 15:55, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

English Wiktionary entries in various languages

The question I'd like to answer is approximately how many words in the English Wiktionary Wikipedia are words from each language. Do we have that data compiled anywhere? I reallize an estimate of the ratio could be made by counting the entries in categories, but there are various problems with that such as circular and overlapping categories. - Taxman 20:22, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

I haven't downloaded en.wikipedia.org lately - it is getting to be kindof huge. I'll have to clear off quite a bit of old stuff, to fit the uncompressed XML dump for analysis. Using Wiktionary as a possible language identification seems perilous. Wikipedia (quite naturally) has many, many single words from foreign languages, which become quite tricky to pick out (from the middle of an English sentence!) I'm not particularly interested in trying that approach, as the results are not likely to be very clean.

The toolserver has an elaborate catscan tool somewhere, for tricky category intersection analysis. Have you tried that approach yet? --Connel MacKenzie 06:48, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Shoot, I meant Wiktionary. I was wondering about this project. I'm not familiar with the catscan tool, do you have a link? - Taxman 18:54, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Regarding the number of foreign language words, see Wiktionary:Statistics. — Beobach972 18:59, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Re: Toolserver, http://tools.wikimedia.de/~interiot/cgi-bin/tstoc?sortby=hits&tag=categories --Connel MacKenzie 20:00, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

• P.S. The last time I checked, en.wikt: had ZERO circular categories. Topical grouping are only appropriate here, if there is sufficient jargon in a field to support it - and that seriously discourages categories crossing willy-nilly (unlike Wikipedia, where the topics themselves - not the words about the topics - are inter-related.) There are not very many overlapping categories either; the abbreviations, acronyms and initialisms proof-of-concept never got copied much, as a technique. --Connel MacKenzie 20:07, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Why cant you give antonyms as well

In wiktionary, I find Synonyms only, why cant you give Antonyms and Thesaurus as well... — This comment was unsigned.

While the ===Antonyms=== sections are much less common than the ===Synonyms=== sections, they are equally welcome. Links to Wikisaurus: are normally entered in the Synonyms section. If you see some that are missing, please Be Bold in adding them. But please, no blank sections. --Connel MacKenzie 06:43, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Question

Couldn't find a reference desk so I'll ask here. Is there a specific name for adjectives that mean "of or pertaining to..." ? Is there a list of such words? 172.200.98.233 09:58, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

The shortcut to the Information desk is WT:ID. I'll move this there for you. --Enginear 13:44, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

a question for German speakers

Could anybody give me a better German translation of the phrase "balancing act" (in the sense of trying to hold a balance between two opposing concepts) - I came up with Spiel des Gleichgewichts, Spiel des Ausgleichens or Gleichgewichtsspiel as possibilities, but I'm not sure which of these would be best, and can't help thinking that there must be a more elegant way of putting it.

In a metaphorical sense like you put it (balance between two opposing concepts, not balancing a plate on a stick) you can say "Balanceakt" or "Spagat". --212.46.127.232 12:48, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

norm and normal

I am asking for help. The ethymology of 'normal' given here as well as in other dictionaries refers this adjective to Latin. Does this mean that there were 2 different borrowings in English - 'norm' and 'normal'? Would that be right to assume that there was no derivation in English from 'norm' to 'normal' (by adding suffix '-al' to the N root)? thank you, NS

scottish/english lineage

I am a new comer here. And I am of the above descent. Learned when one has olive skin tones w/freckles, you are of either irish/scottish or scottish/english descent. Wish to learn so much more!

The word "Place"

Can anyone tell me what the word "place" means according to the Catoring service?

It depends on the case. You can place food in box, you can put a dish in its place, you can place an order, you can deliver an order to a place, and I’m sure there are several other possibilities as well. —Stephen 12:50, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Or, if catoring is a misspelling of catering, place might be a misspelling of plaice. --Enginear 12:57, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

wiktionary access via python

I have been using wiktionary manually to look up words their usage as parts of speech. I've reached the point where I want to automate that step. I am using python and tried using the basic

response = urllib2.urlopen('<url>')

approach.

But I get "HTTP Error 403: Forbidden"

So obviously that approach is proscribed.

I presume given various wikibots that there is wiki acceptable way to do this.

I did download media wiki source for some ideas. But it's quite a code pile.

Pointers comments anyone? thanks, --Makearney 21:27, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

A 403 forbidden is either the wrong URL, or a block due to running a live mirror of the complete site. (I seriously doubt it is the latter.) For the word the, what URL are you passing in? --Connel MacKenzie 13:57, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

For "the" I use url = 'http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/the'. Makearney 14:50, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Try setting the "User-agent" http heading to "Makearneys-usage-extractor" or the name of your program. --Connel MacKenzie 06:19, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, that worked, once I raised my http-iq from 0 to 1. Should anyone care, the pertinent python code is:

                     import urllib2
                     theurl = 'http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/the'
                     req = urllib2.Request(theurl)
                     req.add_header( 'user-agent', 'client-name')
                     handle = urllib2.urlopen(req)
                     html = handle.read()

where html is a string of the html comprising the page that one can process as one wishes.

urllib2 is an atypical python module, that indeed feels ready for prime time except the supporting docs and comments are marginal.

A helpful web page is:

http://www.voidspace.org.uk/python/articles/authentication.shtml

Referencing a specific sense of a word with multiple etymologies?

I'd like to create the entry for batlike but am stumped by two things. One is the surprising commonness of the term batlike soul, in which I can't figure out what the word means. The other, is that I want to reference the animal, but the way the bat artical is set up, there's no clear canonical way to do this. Maybe "like a bat (1, etymology 1)"? Language Lover 21:30, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

It's better to use a gloss, eg "Like a bat (flying mammal)" in case someone changes the order of the definitions later. Thereagain, there's no theoretical limitation of usage to that definition -- I could imagine someone saying that early hockey sticks were batlike implements. So unless you are fairly sure that there is/was no other usage, you could say "Like a bat" and follow it with representative cites showing that the usage you have found is for the mammalian sense. --Enginear 10:40, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

April

short ogg files won't play properly using VLC

Hi,

Whenever I attempt to play a short .ogg audio file (under 5 seconds), the beginning and ending of the file is not played. A new page opens, completely black with the words "No Video" in white letters.

This is a huge problem when looking at pronunciations on the Wikipedia Dictionary site, Wiktionary, which uses Ogg as the audio format.

On this page for example: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Zeitgeist

There is a link to this ogg file: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/28/En-uk-zeitgeist.ogg

If I download the file and play it directly in VLC it works better, but still misses the beginnings and endings of short files.

Also, the firefox plugin does not appear in the firefox Download Actions window, so I can't easily replace it with an alternative player to workaround the problem.

I'm using: windowsXP SP2 VLC v0.8.6a Firefox v2.0.0.3 Dell Latitude D600 laptop with the SigmaTel audio hardware as shipped with the laptop.

Many thanks,

--Tomhannen 11:10, 2 April 2007 (UTC)Tom

Hmmm. w:Wikipedia:Media help (Ogg). Have you tried Control Panel: Add or Remove Programs yet? --Connel MacKenzie 13:54, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Help!

Hello All,

I am trying to remember a word and am having great difficulty.

The definition is: "Unable to express oneself without swearing"

If anyone knows what I am talking about you will save me from two days worth of annoyance.

Thanks,

Amy — This comment was unsigned.

"Vulgar-tongued"? "Crass"? "Crude"? --Connel MacKenzie 08:31, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

What do you call?

what do you call words that sound like they are spelled, eg, WOW, ZOOM, BAM, KAPOW ?

onomatopoeia. --EncycloPetey 00:20, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Round / Around in an idiomatic expression

Hi all

I have just added the idiomatic expression 'to work around the clock' to Wiktionary.

My question is, how best to indicate and link 'to work round the clock' There must be a standard way to treat these around/round expressions. Can anyone help please?

Thx Algrif 12:52, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

Link to work around the clock (that is: [[work around the clock]]). You just link to the page you created. RJFJR 13:36, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. All sorted now. Algrif 16:01, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Same word in different languages

Comparing the negotiate page with the eigenvector page. I wondered how links to the words in different languages should be handled. The dutch translation onderhandelen links (of course) to the dutch meaning. However the word eigenvector in dutch is written the same as the english word and therefore links back to the english page. I understand that you can add a link in the tag but then there is a risk that someone else would create a page with a different name (so in the end multiple pages might exist for the same word). Is there some kind of convention for this? For instance adding the ISO country code in front of it like nl_eigenvector or something?

RonAFGreve 20:56, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

You put all the information on words spelled the same on the same page but under different Language headings. The language is a level 2 heading (it is surrounded on either side by two equal signs, ==; I call it a level 2 but I'm not sure that is the official name). Things like part of speech within a language are level 3 (or even level 4 for somethings) headings. So each page has a hierarchy; everything is divided by langauge then by other other divisions. RJFJR 13:33, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply and explanation. I saw connel also added some reading material to my talk page and believe the answers are there also. So I guess I have some reading to do this weekend :-). RonAFGreve 20:57, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

the word "empreinte"

Hi folks, What is the correct pronunciation of the French word "empreinte"? Thx for any help! hotpink 15:12, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

If you want to find the pronunciation of empreinte as a modern French word, the best place to look is here in Wiktionnaire. --Enginear 17:22, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Which is to say, the French pronunciations present on Commons: have not been synchronized into entries here yet. I don't know that anyone is actively pursuing that as an automated project at this time. (I've done plenty of stuff for automating Dvortygirl's audio links, but it is not ready for general use yet. I am not even close to navigating the uncharted territory of other languages.) --Connel MacKenzie 17:45, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

the French word "Empreinte"

Thx for the help...

although because the "e" comes before the "i" it can't be pronounced as in "bien" (or bee en) so I'm assuming it's pronounced as "empren" (in French). I heard someone pronounce it as "empree ent ay" and I'm pretty sure that's wrong (sounds Italian that way). So I'll assume that I'm right unless anyone corrects me.

Thx again hotpink 13:02, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

No, the pronunciation of the 2nd vowel is as shown in the link I gave to the French Wiktionnaire, similar to the ein in French frein, somewhat similar to the sound of the English an. --Enginear 13:56, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Idiomatic expressions: How to indicate country of usage

Hi all

I have just added the idiomatic expression give the elbow to Wiktionary.

How can I indicate country of usage. I believe it is only UK, and not US English

Thx Algrif 17:09, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Type {{UK}} at the beginning of the definition. --Enginear 14:01, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Hyer's Hotel

My name is Meredith Hyer, and I am researching my family history and am having a difficult time finding any ancestors. I came acroos the Hyer's Hotel, and would like as much information as possible on this place. Thank you

Turkmen Entries

I spent the last couple of years putting together a Turkmen-English, English-Turkmen dictionary. I have it in MS-Word as well as in Shoebox, a lexicography software package. Is there a way, other than keying in one entry at at time, to get that into Wiktionary?

Thanks, Ben

That does sound like something that would fit in very well around here, the first step would be for you to register a username here, which will make it possible for us to communicate with you more easily. After that there are a few methods of possible batch entry, which any of several bot owners could probably do for you if you were to host the data somewhere online and make it available. As I said, the first step is probably creating a username. Welcome, and thanks for your interest! - [The]DaveRoss 23:03, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

saltpye

Does anyone have a definition of a saltpye.Can't find one anywhere. Thanks Sue — This unsigned comment was added by Suetel (talk • contribs).

The OED2 reckons that salt-pie is dialect for salt-box. A look at b.g.c. suggests it was used in North England, and maybe somewhere in US. I have no more details, but pye is an obsolete alternative spelling of pie, and words are sometimes run together, so saltpye might have been a variant.

Or it might possibly be a type of bird, eg sea-pye was another name for the oyster-catcher.

Or maybe something else entirely. I've no other info. --Enginear 13:47, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

A saltpye is a salt box or shaker; thing to keep salt in; prob. variant spelling of salt-pie. Part of an inventory of Watkinson Hall, Halifax (UK) 1683:

Two spice cupboardes 4 0
One Range, a saltpye, and iron and brass
Thinges about the fire 10 0
One Wood Clock 10 0
27 Bookes 13 4

Part of the inventory of John Hartley's estate, Yorkshire, 1713:

two little tables five chaires stooles
& quishens, 6d; one bread fleake one saltpye one hourglass & shelves & one
other table with all other huslemt, 6s 8d.

Good? Robert Ullmann 17:10, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Idiomatic Verbs (Phrasal Verbs)

This is an area of interest for me. Could s/o (an administrator?) tell me if these entries should be entered as sub heading Idiomatic Transitive/Intransitive Verb, for example, or just plain Transitive/Intransitive Verb In other words, I believe there might well be a need to distinguish phrasal verbs from simple verbs. If so, what is the preferred method.

Thx in advance Algrif 16:06, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Firstly, the Transitive/Intransitive verb headings are now deprecated. The present technique is just to use Verb and tag each definition (transitive) or (intransitive) as appropriate. It is obvious whether an entry is a single word or a phrase, so I believe that the consensus is that we do not mark them as such. However, I don't think there would be any objection to a further tag saying (idiom). --Enginear 17:32, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Enginear. I'll take that suggestion on board.

A further question. Is it OK to include the grammar point of whether the particle is mobile or not in a phrasal verb definition. If so, what is the recommended manner. Example:- 'take (s/t) off' = remove. But 'take off (s/o)' = imitate someone, usually for fun. Indicating that 'take (s/o) off' is not possible with this meaning.

Thanks in advance for another speedy reply !!

This would generally be by Usage notes [header is always plural]. --Enginear 16:58, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Transwiki:Hawaiian name

moved from my talk page, anyone who can help?--Williamsayers79 12:15, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

Could you give me technical help with this article? I'm a complete idiot with computers. I'd like to split this article (that I've written) into two parts,as explained on the discussion page of wikipedia:Hawaiian name. Could you please

1.change the okina template so that all those red letters turn into these nice dots as in the Wikipedia version.(Gilgamesh claims that he's done it but I don't see the difference)

2.change the name of the Wiktionary article into Appendix:Hawaiian given names.

Don't try to teach me how to do it - I'd just mess up everything. I'm targeting you because you say that you clean up Transwiki articles. Yours with eternal gratitude--Makaokalani 12:31, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Yahoo China Dictionary uses Wiktionary

Does everyone know that Yahoo China's English-English dictionary is copied from Wiktionary?

In the BETA they were referencing Wiktionary, as can be seen through Google cache [2].

The reference to their source was later removed:

http://zidian.cn.yahoo.com/result_en2en.html?p=orange

It might be common knowledge, anyway, it's quite interesting. Pistachio 04:55, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia reference resets list numbering

On the knockout page I inserted a wikipedia reference before one of the definitions. It caused the list numbering to reset. Is there any way to prevent that? dougher 02:02, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

According to the template documentation page, no. It has to go at the top or bottom of the list. However, where Wikipedia actually has several articles, and a disambiguation page, as in this case, there is a special template to deal with it. I have modified our knockout entry to demonstrate. --Enginear 14:32, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Back log reports as it relates to accounting

Specifically the project admininstration in the engineering field.

Does any one have an example? for review purpose and how to go about creating a back log report.--209.214.230.142 20:33, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Why are Persian words not included in search results?

Could anybody tell me why when I search for انگشت there are no results, which leads you to believe there is no entry for that word, when in fact there is? If I search for a word in French, for example "laide", it does show in the results. Pistachio 19:28, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

I searched for it using "Search" and found it without any problem. I also tried using "Go" and that worked as well. —Stephen 01:31, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

I see that the page isn't listed below, when you [search] it, but is blue-linked above. I've never noticed that RTL scripts do that before - is it perhaps something weird with the character with pointing? --Connel MacKenzie 01:34, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Category:Persian

Can I add the tag Category:Persian to all Persian language words so they can be browsed more easily? Pistachio 19:51, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

All Persian entries already contain the word Persian. If you search for Persian, you will find them all. Also, all Persian words should be in at least one category, such as nouns, verbs, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, etc. Every Persian category should appear in Category:Persian language. —Stephen 01:34, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

I was just was thinking perhaps we could copy the idea from Wiktionnaire and their Catégorie:persan which means it is possible to see all the Persian entries in order, like an index. Pistachio 03:00, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

If such thing is what you're looking for, it would probably be best to actually write an index. It's a lot of tedious work, to be sure, but it certainly is a useful tool. Atelaes 07:41, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

May

Australia translations section

Many of the entries in the to be checked section exist in the "already checked" sections. Have people not been deleting words that they have checked? - seems unlikely since there are so many of them. Would it be correct to delete all those in the "checked" sections, which still exist under "to be checked"? —Saltmarsh 06:15, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

RFC added —Saltmarsh 05:02, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, delete them from the TTBC section if they are in one (or more) correct sections. --Connel MacKenzie 05:33, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Done —Saltmarsh 13:24, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Editing the ar-4 template

Hello, I have selected ar-4 language skill in the Wiktionary Babel. The template is empty so the table on my User page is not showing the Arabic language. I tried creating the template but I'm afraid I did more harm than good. I undid everything, but if anyone can copy and paste this text with a right-to-left direction then I would appreciate it:
هذا المستخدم قابل على المحادثة بالعربية بطلاقة.
or if you use the {{ARchar|}}: Template:ARchar

Gbeebani 00:57, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Template has been fixed. I used the text from Wikipedia. --Dijan 04:42, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

Request for Name Change

Unlike Wikipedia, there doesn't appear to be a page specifically for requesting name changes. Therefore, I appear to have no choice but to ask here. I request for my name to be changed to simply: Takamatsu. Thanks in advance. --Takanatsu the Frippant 09:57, 6 May 2007 (UTC)

WT:MV --Connel MacKenzie 05:56, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Which template to use for translations

I'm a bit confused, I'm putting in Kurdish translations and I noticed some translations have the collapsable format {{trans-top|}}, and some translations are simply a list {{top}}. I thought the collapsable verion was cleaner looking especially when there is more than one definition for the word. Now I change the format to the collapsable one as I progress. Is there a preferred format for translation? I just wanted to now that before I change more pages.Gbeebani 00:48, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

The WT:VOTE confirmed that the {{trans-top}} is to be preferred. AFAIK, no one has run a bot conversion yet. --Connel MacKenzie 05:55, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

so does that mean I don't need to actually change the format manually since someone will eventually run an automated conversion? Gbeebani 06:17, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

If the table has a gloss, either in triple quotes or starting with ; on the line preceeding {{top}}, or if top has the parameter {{top|(gloss)}} then AutoFormat will fix it sooner or later. Tables without glosses are left for now, to avoid flooding the gloss-needed category, but eventually they will be caught/converted by something. You can tell AF to format an entry with {{rfc-auto}} when you edit something. Robert Ullmann 14:01, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

http://el.wiktionary.org

Greek wiktionary has got over 100.000 entries (for some time now); why hasn't it been moved to the 100.000+ category? 216.224.124.124 15:16, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

We have "Ελληνικά (Greek)" listed in the 100,000+ section. Do you mean http://www.wiktionary.org/? Those are maintained on meta:, I think at meta:Www.wiktionary.org portal. --Connel MacKenzie 13:58, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Help adding "Category:Persian derivations" to "Category:Iran"

I'd like to add the category "Persian derivations" to the category "Iran" but I am being blocked by the spam filter because there is an external link on the page, could an administrator help please? Thanks. Pistachio 12:10, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

When I try to, I get this message:

Spam protection filter

The page you wanted to save was blocked by the spam filter. This is probably caused by a link to an external site.

The following text is what triggered our spam filter: http //www.cais-soas.com

The site certainly seems valid, but for some reason (usually significant spamming elsewhere on Wiki Media Foundation sites) it is listed on the meta:Spam Filter.

For now, I've broken the link, leaving the text of the link for future reference, should it somehow be removed from the meta: list. --Connel MacKenzie 13:52, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. It seems a bit strange, but who knows, perhaps the Circle of Ancient Iranian Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies have started a sideline in viagra? Pistachio 14:08, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

<nod> I have no idea why it was added to the spam filter. But to request its removal, you need to make that request on meta:. --Connel MacKenzie 14:10, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Was added by our own Dmcdevit just a few days ago; I've asked why. Often it is someone pushing POV on the 'pedia. Robert Ullmann 14:14, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Actually, content issues should never be solved with the spam blacklist, only through local community consensus and enforcement. This is a good example of why, since it's a global blacklist. Dmcdevit·t 07:33, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

In this case, the site was blacklisted after the revelation that it is composed of almost all copyright violations, and the person that runs the site was using Wikipedia to promote it with external links to copyright infringements. [3] was the most recent report that led to the blacklisting. Linking to copyright violations is itself a copyright violation (see w:WP:C#Linking to copyrighted works; I would have linked to Wiktionary's page, but it looks like it's out of sync, though that seems like a good policy to have WMF-wide). By the way, all blacklist additions are logged: meta:Spam blacklist/Log#May 2007. Cheers. Dmcdevit·t 07:33, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I will remove the link (which was added by someone else) then.

turn to face the wall

Somewhere i have read 'turn to face the wall' as meaning someone has realised they are going to die, and turns to face the wall literally. Does anyone have corroboration of this?

Amount of quotations from a single work

How many quotations are allowed from a single work? I mean, if there are too many quotations in all of Wiktionary out of a single work, at some point it would cross the boundary of not being fair use anymore. How should one go about quoting things in practice? I'm thinking of adding quotations from fairly recent Japanese books, which certainly won't be licensed under GFDL-compatible licenses. -- Coffee2theorems 20:28, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

I do not know. IANAL. If you personally add them, then the publisher would want to go after you personally, not WMF. Perhaps you should ask the question on meta:, or see if you can contact WMF's legal counsel? --Connel MacKenzie 20:13, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I thought there might be some sort of guidelines on such things because for popular works the amount of quotations might rise high even if nobody quotes them excessively alone. I see that this is not the case. Maybe two or three per work is fine. -- Coffee2theorems 03:31, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Copyright

Can I get a copyright set up here on Wiki?Dickcarter 05:40, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

No. See w:GFDL. --EncycloPetey 05:43, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Indoor sports in the US

I just added "indoor sports" (or activity) to 실내운동, but I would be grateful if someone could let me know what Americans call "indoor sports" as the Google hits seem to come from the UK. Thanks. Pistachio 20:11, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Note that you linked Indoor sports, not indoor sports. While the term indoor sports is possibly uncommon in the US, it is used to refer to any sport played in a gymnasium. --Connel MacKenzie 12:54, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Verifyability

How do we know that the information on Wiktionary is correct? How can we check? Is there a policy about this? 82.139.85.100 04:42, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Wiktionary:General disclaimer: WIKTIONARY MAKES NO GUARANTEE OF VALIDITY. (This link is titled "Disclaimers" at the very bottom of every page on this site.) --Connel MacKenzie 12:32, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

You can estimate the degree of correctness of any work by taking a random sample from it and verifying everything in that sample. Once you've done that, the rest is an exercise in statistics. I recommend the Bayesian approach, as probabilities are more intuitive than frequentist confidence intervals. For a less rigorous analysis, just look at some random things you know and see if you agree with what Wiktionary says about them. -- Coffee2theorems 13:23, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

I know enough about statistics to know that those approaches don't work for something like a dictionary. All in all, this makes Wiktionary a pretty useless project. At least Wikipedia cites sources (most of the time). 82.139.85.120 16:51, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Them you must not trust Wester's Dictionary either, since it doesn't cite sources. --EncycloPetey 01:25, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

space

Information desk dahmane what is the meaning of "social space"? — This comment was unsigned.

In context it might mean 1) a particular social circle, 2) a meeting place designated for socializing, 3) any informal situation (as opposed to a formal situation,) 4) one's personal space, or 5) some other psychology-related technical definition. But those are simply off the top of my head - some clue as to where you heard that, would help enormously. --Connel MacKenzie 12:21, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

PLURR

okay i may not be cool or whatever but what in the hell does "plurr" mean in the raver world

• peace, love, unity, respect, responsibility. --EncycloPetey 01:24, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Parts of speech in an entry - order of sequence?

Is there a policy or guideline specifying how to organize the entry for a word which comes under multiple parts of speech? I'm baffled by the problem of how to decide what the write-up sequence should be for, say, "home" which can be a noun, verb, adjective, and adverb. Specifically, I just got tripped up over the entry for White Russian; I ordered it one way and another editor flipped the parts of speech around. -- WikiPedant 16:42, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Alphabetical order. Robert Ullmann 16:48, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Please see Wiktionary:Beer_parlour#Parts of speech in an entry - order of sequence? for my response. I have moved this discussion there. -- WikiPedant 03:51, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Why are the "tags" for what you have to fill in in parts of speech templates inconsistent?

Why do the various templates on:

http://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Search/aljfla%3Bsjfdk&go=Go

Use different forms to designate the part you have to fill in?

For example plural of, third-person singular of, present participle of, past of are not consistent.

dougher 22:07, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

The "preload" templates have not been thoroughly worked-over. The "Noun" template has the most complete "introduction" text; the rest are in place to assist newcomers in entering terms in a format closer to what the community here has (gradually) agreed upon, for each of the various forms. --Connel MacKenzie 04:35, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

licensing

I'd like to submit a word & definition to the wiktionary. This word & definition was coined by a small group of people (including me). Which licensing option should I select?

thanks 65.126.53.2 04:18, 21 May 2007 (UTC) 20 May

Underneath the edit box, on every page edited here, is the notice that ALL contributions here are licensed under the GFDL. Additionally, on all page views, at the very bottom of the page, you can see additional links repeating that. That said, inventions are not generally in line with our criteria for inclusion and therefore are generally restricted to out list of made-up terms. --Connel MacKenzie 04:31, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Wiktionary poster

Hi, does english wiktionary have a poster?? — This comment was unsigned.

Not that I know of. The closest I've come across was at cafepress, but I don't know what sort of agreement they have with WMF for use of the logo. --Connel MacKenzie 20:29, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

UserPages

I was wondering if Wiktionary allows users to create userpages like in Wikipedia. --DC52795 04:30, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

Um, that is a pretty open-ended question. Yes, sub-pages of your user (and user talk) pages are allowed. --Connel MacKenzie 07:18, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

The problem with getting Maya Languages into Wiktionary

[Note that I have created both Wiktionary and Meta accounts "MissLena" and logged in "successfully", but that my login is somehow lost when I go to any other page.]

[FWIW, it seems very difficult for someone with language expertise but no Wiki contribution experience to offer their services. I has taken me hours to get to this point, and I think most would have given up before now. This may be limiting your ability to get the best contributors, who are interested but busy. Please contact me if you are interested in the details of my hours of frustration.].

My interest is in Maya Languages ISO 639-2:MYN, specifically Mopan Maya ISO 639-3:MOP.

Getting primarily spoken but mostly unwritten languages into Wiktionary may be near-impossible under your current methods.

I have read your rejection of the Quiché [4] ( K'iche' ISO 639-3:QUC and others) language. If K'iche' -- the most-studied living Mayan language with the largest base of active speakers and possibly the only living Mayan language with historical written texts (e.g., Popol Wuj) -- cannot "make it" here, then what hope is there for any other primarily spoken language? Are there any here at all?

We are losing these languages, and our only hope is to promote milk-tongue literacy, which is essentially zero right now. For this to happen we need publicly accessible resources, and your Wiktionary medium seems ideal (internet connectivity is reaching more and more indigenous communities here).

It is extremely unlikely that you will find native speakers who can write in their Maya language. They just don't exist. So your "native speaker contributor" requirement makes these languages into non-starters.

We need this resource first and then we can create the literacy needed to perpetuate it.

I have been working on a Mopan-Spanish-English dictionary for the past several years and I am up to a few thousand words I would like to contribute. I am willing to do all the work. I do not care that it is under the "officially supported" Wiktionary umbrella, so long as it is accessible to the Maya here and academics and other interested parties.

Please guide me.

Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Sincerely, Galena Alyson Canada [email address redacted]

http://galenaalysoncanada.blogspot.com

Please do not post e-mail addresses on this discussion page.

Given the recent vote on a similar topic, it seems that Appendix:Mopan Maya would be the appropriate place for you to add that information. --Connel MacKenzie 08:13, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

The vote Connel refers to is entirely irrelevent, it is for fictional languages!!.

By all means add entries, language header ==Mopán==. The strict rules in WT:CFI must apply to languages that are written, but as you note, cannot be applied to languages that are mostly or entirely spoken at this time (or ever.)

The meta rejection you refer to was in reference to creating an entire Wikipedia in K'iche, which would require a base of native speakers working on it!

Adding words to the English wikt, with their definition and usage described in English, is what we do! Robert Ullmann 08:25, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

...

(Hmmm...two entries are unsigned, so I can't ask questions directly...two seem irrelevant...two argue...none guide me to the creation of a Mopan Maya Wiktionary. >sigh< Chaos reigns...  ;-)

OK, on http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Multilingual_coordination is a list that claims to be "Wiktionary:Multilingual coordination...Dictionary projects". Down that list you will see "134. Mayan" which is kinda silly because (1) that's like listing "Germanic" as a language, and (2) it's just a link to a stub def'n of the word "Mayan", not to a Wiktionary project.

From what it says on the Multilingual Coordination page, it seems that what I need in order to contribute is mop.wiktionary.org -- not so?

How do I get this started, please? Galena Alyson Canada

You can't start a mop.wikt. You have no user base. A mop.wikt is/would be for users who natively read and write Mopan, to define Mopan words in written Mopan (and words in other languages in Mopan).

You can add words here, in addition to the 239 languages we represent (more or less ;-) already. If you can't define Mopan words in English and add them here so people will have access to them, what are you thinking? The Mopan/English part of your translation dictionary goes here.

I'm sorry if this is confusing, and it is. You are just starting in entirely the wrong place. Robert Ullmann 23:35, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Look, please see the translation table at butterfly, which gives the Engish->Mopán translation, and the entry at pempem. This is where the Mopán/English entries go. The Spanish ones go in the es.wikt, in a similar form. Robert Ullmann 23:44, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

• Said another way: it will take you a year or two to attract enough contributors to start mop.wiktionary.org. In the meantime, you can enter those definitions here on en.wiktionary.org to more clearly show that mop.wiktionary is 1) needed, 2) attracting more than one contributor. It seems unlikely that meta will create a new mop.wiktionary.org if there is only one person (you) who is willing to act as sysop there. The vandalism that hits smaller projects is often overwhelming. In one day, you might enter 5 new good definitions and delete 100 vandalism entries. --Connel MacKenzie 15:43, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, I do think that the requirement of having native speakers is not a wise one for small languages (and how many native speakers of Latin do we have?) because under the circumstances they learn and use their language being a native speaker does not necessarily mean competence.

Link to a specific meaning

How can I cross-reference a specific meaning of a word? I'd like to say one meaning of "stint" is a synonym for one meaning of "spell". If I say "meaning 3 of spell", then that will become obsolete if someone alters that entry. Thanks, LachlanA 20:40, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

On Wiktionary, we "disambiguate" by sense, especially for translations sections. The synonyms sections are broken apart in a similar manner (when needed.) WT:ELE (Entry layout explained) goes into some detail on the topic of "glosses" used as headings for each translation table with the translations section. So, in stint, you could say "... A spell (short period of time of indeterminate length.)" --Connel MacKenzie 08:07, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Newcomer's questions

Hi all. A few questions:

1. Are there any mechanisms for marking words, like templates or categories, that are direct opposites (i.e. sectarianism and nonsectarianism)?
2. Do we create entries for plurals? For example, would there be separate entries for opposite and opposites?
3. For adjectives, is the standard definition "Of or pertaining to noun"? Is nonsectarian, an entry I just created, ok

Thanks! ~MDD4696 20:35, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

1. Yes. Create an ====Antonyms==== section after the definitions. See listen as a model page for synonyms/antonyms.
2. Yes. See visits for an example.
3. It works, but we prefer each word to be defined on its own. Dictionaries have traditionally defined adjectives and adverbs as you have done, but this was to save space and reduce printing costs. Wiktionary is not paper.

--EncycloPetey 20:39, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Linkin pages

While creating page links is there any option where we can have the link when ever we click the link instead of going to that page , it will go to directly edit mode of that particular page. — This unsigned comment was added by 203.200.212.33 (talk) at 06:11, 31 May 2007 (UTC).

There is a bookmarklet you can use, I think at WT:BOOK. I use "Lupin's navigation popups" which you can turn on at WT:PREFS instead. --Connel MacKenzie 07:22, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

June

I am in problem

I reads wikiprdia page about radiation.before one year I took the ct scan of brain because of head ache, from a neuro surgeon.Two months before I took 3-types of xray of face 3-times.Now I am very unhappy because I saw your page about radiation defects.How I overcome my future problems of radiation defects.pleasse give an anser. — This unsigned comment was added by 59.93.20.154 (talk) at 05:06, 2 June 2007.

Please consult a doctor. For legal and ethical reasons, Wiktionarians (even ones with medical qualifications) can't dispense medical advice in this kind of forum. —Ruakh_TALK 06:56, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Pronunciations

I hope Wiktionary support has as a priority common pronunciations for those words lacking phonetics. This sometimes drives me crazy. Can the phonetics be cut and pasted from another source? I know this is against the "law" but common phonetic symbols and accepted pronunciations technically don't belong to anyone and so a source isn't necessarily proprietary. I may be way offbase but food for thought.

I continue to be aggravated with the explanations of exactly how to comment or edit in all Wiki media. Sometimes it appears that the object is to be purposely obtuse. Case in point: whoever wrote the section on idioms is an idio... (sorry). A million is 10 to the 6th power. As a scientist, mathematician and engineer....yes I'm all three (but I'm human which is my most important credential so I make mistakes)it complicates the explanation because 2 to the 20th power is not a million. Close---(@ 1048576)---but not accurate. Accuracy should be a hallmark of all Wiki media so such demonstrations of cleverness are really a disservice to those who are not in the know. Especially when it is at the expense of accuracy. Sorry to be critical but the upmost criticism is necessary when the visability of a statement is so universal. moskalski Moskalski 16:08, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Add {{rfp}} to any words whose pronunciations you want to know; those entries will then appear in Category:Requests for pronunciation. Someone will then come along and provide a pronunciatory transcription for entries listed therein. I can personally sort English (RP) and Welsh pronunciations. † Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 16:51, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

It would help to have a little more detail about where you found this problem. You referred to the "section on idioms", but didn't specify a page or location. We have more than 375,000 individual entries, not counting discussion pages, appendices, and categories. It is difficult to correct anything if we don't know where to look. You can help by providing a link from here to that page. Simply enclose the page title within double square brackets like [[this]]. If the page name begins with a capitalized word and colon such as "Category:" or "Appendix:", then include a colon before the page name, as with [[:Category:Mathematics]]. --EncycloPetey 17:40, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Gallery

Are there any specific guidelines for pages in the gallery namespace? I might be interested in fixing up Transwiki:Italian music terminology, but I'm not entirely sure what would be best for the Wiktionary. Should I keep the references and fix their formatting? (Why was the reference info removed in the transwiki process anyway?) Or are the references not necessary? Thanks, 76.100.162.31 02:53, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

We don't have a "Gellery:" namespace that I'm aware of. Ideally, we would want each musical term to be formatted as a separate entry, each on a page named for the entry. I don't believe the references were not removed in the process; we simply don't use the same formatting templates, so many links and formats get broken in the Transwiki process. --EncycloPetey 18:19, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

No, it really does look like some references have been removed; for example, there are three occurrences of <ref name="Musicantica" />, but no <ref name="Musicantica">…</ref> for them to share the content of. (That said, the article had this problem even before it was transwiki'd here, due to some problems that were repaired incorrectly; we'll have to dig in the history to salvage the references we need.) —Ruakh_TALK 21:26, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

P.S. I'm starting further discussion at Transwiki talk:Italian music terminology; feel free to participate. —Ruakh_TALK 21:37, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

P.P.S. Never mind, I misunderstood what had happened. I guess one of our bots has, or used to have, a bug that deleted a lot of the references in that article. —Ruakh_TALK 00:04, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

I didn't actually mean gallery, I don't know why I wrote that. I meant the appendix namespace. 76.100.162.31 02:16, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

There are no format guidelines for the Appendix namespace. Articles there right now are mostly notes on grammar or pronunciation, or are lists of words translated across multiple languages. There probably aren't enough of any one kind of page to make formatting guidelines worth writing. --EncycloPetey 17:05, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Citation subpages

Hi all. I've found some pages (Category:Citations and Template:Citation) which are used in pages that have a unique /Citations subpage. The articles which populate it were mostly created by User:Hippietrail. I haven't found this type of formatting discussed anywhere (notably Wiktionary:Entry layout explained), and I have a feeling that it's somehow redundant. Don't citations go somewhere directly in the articles, or in the References section? ~MDD4696 01:48, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

See Wiktionary:Quotations#Subpages, although I don't think it's very current. Kappa 01:51, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

There is currently a Vote on whether to create a Citations: namespace. If the suggestion is approved, then we'll need to decide on the appropriate format for the new space. In any event, we've been placing sample citations on the entry itself, either directly beneath the definition if there is only one or two, or else in a Quotations section following the definitions. However, for lengthy lists of citations (such as those for listen and dragon) often have been moved to a Citations page. I suspect this issue will be discussed and hopefully resolved once the new namespace vote is concluded. --EncycloPetey 17:09, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Part of "Hippietrail's format" was based on the premise that we shouldn't be telling anyone anything about a word; rather we should be providing citations of use. In a great number of the citations he gleaned, it is not clear what part of speech a term falls under. Furthermore, by arranging them chronologically, different patterns of progression can be observed. But the central concept was that citations for a term should exist for entry writers to pick and choose the "best" from, to use in the various "Quotations" sections. Altogether, it is a decidedly more methodic approach, than we currently have with "RFV." --Connel MacKenzie 18:39, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

There's something to be said for that approach, but once you have, say, 100 citations, then it becomes difficult to use such lists. Each person trying to revise definitions has to redo the mental work of sorting the citations. We'll probably want to discuss this issue once the Citations namespace vote ends, but I would rather see citations grouped by sense (chronologically within each such grouping). It then is relatively easy for someone to browse the citations which purportedly support a given definition and compare. That doesn't mean we couldn't have a group at the end (or beginning) of the page for which the sense isn't clear, but for those which are clear, it's much more useful to an article writer to have them sorted. --EncycloPetey 19:30, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

That's why, in general, I think a combination of the HT approach, and the "senses" approach would work best. Note also, that after 100 citations, it is likely that the word is used in a wider variety of meanings and contexts, making a collection of such citations (perhaps grouped in numerous ways) even more useful. --Connel MacKenzie 22:56, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

New User Request

Hi - is this the right place to ask for help about getting a list of useful links on this newuser's talkpage, and answers to some questions about getting started as an editor? If so, then assistance would be appreciated. Newbyguesses 02:01, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Done -- Thankyou.Newbyguesses 11:39, 7 June 2007 (UTC)

Modifying definiendum

The entry POSET should not be in all caps. The word is an abbreviation for partially ordered set, and its etymology is semi-acronymous: the stem po- coming from partially ordered. Despite the acronym in its origins, as the term is encountered in the mathematical literature, it is never set in all caps, but rather as poset. So, having established that the definiendum needs to be modified, I have the beginner's question, "How does one go about changing the word that is the name and the subject of a Wiktionary page?" PaulTanenbaum 21:53, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Once you've had your account for a few days and have made a certain number of edits (sorry, I'm not sure exactly how long and how many), one of the tabs at the top of each entry — between the "history" and "watch" tabs — will be a "move" link, which you will be able to use to move/rename it. I'll take care of this one; thanks for pointing it out. :-) —Ruakh_TALK 23:32, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

account created, confirmed, nonexistant

I tried the "contact us" links and nothing appeared to happen. Perhaps I've requested help several times by the several clicks I executed?

Anyhow, the account I created and confirmed through my email address won't log in, saying there is no account called by my username. I'm dismayed. What more can I do?

Sorry for the nonwiktionary specific question, but I'm sooo flummoxed. —This unsigned comment was added by 71.146.10.14 (talk • contribs) 2007-06-12T04:08:04.

What was the account name? Rod (A. Smith) 04:21, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

What exactly do you mean when you say, "Sorry for the nonwiktionary specific question"? I ask because usernames are not carried across different projects; for example, I'm "Ruakh" here and at a few other projects where I've created accounts, but there are many other projects where there is no "Ruakh" account, and quite possibly even projects where someone else has created a "Ruakh" account that I don't know about. Heck, maybe they're even pretending to be me. :-)   So if this isn't the project where you created your account, then that account won't work here; you'll have to create a separate account here (though you can certainly use the same username, password, and e-mail address for them, and I'd recommend that you do so). —Ruakh_TALK 04:56, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. My account is called torriblezone. I did create two separate accounts but this one won't let me log in. It's now saying cookies are disabled. Apparently the kiss of death on this computer according to the children. —This unsigned comment was added by 71.146.10.14 (talk • contribs) 2007-06-12T05:05:00.

Well, creation of User:Torriblezone was successful at 2007-06-12 04:43:36. Since that's after your first message above and before your last, you should be back on track as soon as you fix your browser cookie retention problem. Rod (A. Smith) 05:42, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Well, here's me logged in at a different terminal. So far so good. Thanks a mill for the input. Now to check out the word I placed on the list...Thanks again. torriblezone

Use of {{context}}

Should I use

  "{{context|transitive|chemistry}}" 

or

  "{{transitive}}" "{{chemistry}}"

While cleaning up "reduce", I came across "{{context|transitive|chemistry}}" which nicely combines transitive and chemistry to produce (transitive, chemistry) in the output. This is nice, but elsewhere I have seen "{{transitive}}" "{{chemistry}}". In fact, I saw this second style first and made changes based on that model. SO I've got a minor amount of rework to do, if the former style is preferred.

If both words were contexts, then the first style would be fine. In this case, transitive is not a context, though I bet someone could/will argue that it is. —This unsigned comment was added by Makearney (talk • contribs) 2007-06-12T17:28:27.

To me, {{context}} indicates terminology domain and not grammatical features, but others use it more generally and there's no policy either way. In any event, both syntaxes can be unambiguously interpreted by bots, so when an official syntax is eventually determined, bots can migrate from the deprecated syntax to the official one. Rod (A. Smith) 18:18, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

I was under the impression that the {{context}} template was designed to combine templates, so using it in this case would seem appropriate. (That is, I recommend that you use {{context|transitive|chemistry}}, not {{transitive}}" "{{chemistry}}.)— Beobach972 18:44, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification, and thanks for magically attributing my question. Makearney 23:58, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

putting a word in the right category

I'm trying to put a word in the "non-real-word" category--how do I make sure the word gets highlighted in red?

If there is no entry for the word in this dictionary, it will appear in red. If there is an entry, a link is highlighted in blue automatically. You create a link by enclosing a word in double square brackets. --EncycloPetey 00:28, 16 June 2007 (UTC)

Unwelcome Protologism

Someone is not happy with my new word, Christi-insanity, and keeps deleting it. Is there anything I can do to prevent this? —This unsigned comment was added by 209.193.110.38 (talk • contribs) 2007-06-18T04:02:34.

Either wait a few years and see whether your protologism becomes an actual word (i.e. in general public use) or contribute your word to a site like Urban Dictionary instead. :-) Rod (A. Smith) 04:15, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Someone is not happy with my new word (Christi-insanity) and keeps deleting it. Is there anything I can do to prevent this? —This unsigned comment was added by Songsong (talk • contribs) 2007-06-18T04:26:08.

See immediately above. Rod (A. Smith) 04:37, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

I don't see that Christi-insanity, or christi-insanity, or any likely variant has been deleted. Are you sure that you added it here? If so, at what page title? —Ruakh_TALK 04:49, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

It was added to, and deleted from, the WT:LOP. (See [5].) I have restored it, since the anonymous contributor seems to have 'requested' it, and as I see little harm (it's not in the main namespace). Feel free to delete it again if you feel that it is inappropriate, however. — Beobach972 18:41, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:List_of_protologisms

According to the editor who keeps deleting the word "Christi-insanity" from the list of protologisms [6], this word is just a "veiled attempt to engage in a politico-religious debate in the guise of a protologism, probably with an eye toward the approaching elections in the USA. Not NPOV." Elsewhere he or she complains about "Veiled Political Activism:" "Some anonymous editor keeps seeking to make a political statement using the List of Protologisms page. The word in question is "Christi-insanity." The supposed meaning is more of a criticism than a bona fide word proposition." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Help_desk/Archives/2007_May_30)

Setting aside the question of whether a criticism can be a bona fide word, this critique is highly subjective and loaded with assumptions about my motives that have no bearing on the question of inclusion. I don't see any guidelines for political correctness in the rules for inclusion pertaining to protologisms (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Protologisms). Correct me if I'm wrong, but these guidelines are different from those pertaining to words that are more firmly established---those in the main namespace. (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Criteria_for_inclusion).

Even if this editor's assumptions about my motives were correct, there is no basis, that I can see, for excluding political, religious, or critical protologisms---veiled or unveiled. And there are no rules excluding new words that are designed to stimulate debate, and even (God help us) influence elections. And this, I think, is a small, but not insignificant, sign that we are still living in America.

What about Neutral Point of View?" First of all there is the question of whether this Wikipedia article applies to Wiktionary protologisms. Are we not allowed to invent words that express strong opinions? Isn't this the kind of "objectivity" that filters articulate anti-war spokepersons out of the corporate media?

Then there's the question of whether my definition is not, in fact, neutral. I think I've painted a pretty accurate portrait of a certain type of Christian: those who claim to be both pro-life and pro-war. Those who are opposed to abortion under any and all circumstances, except when performed by American soldiers and corporate mercenaries, in the course of a war on dehumanized "ragheads;" in which case the abortions are discounted as "collateral damage."

Would anyone like to provide the world with a more neutral, less critical, non-"politico-religious" definition of Christi-insanity? Is it possible to express the idea of Christi-insanity without listing some of the contradictions that are characteristic of this mindset?

Songsong 22:55, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

I think you're missing the whole point of WT:CFI with regard to protologisms, which is that we don't consider them dictionary material. We have a page where people can propose protologisms, but people are allowed to delete them too. Unless you can provide three attested citations per CFI, you're better off taking your proposed new word to someplace like Urban dictionary. --EncycloPetey 05:21, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Is that the official answer then? The Neutral Point of View guideline does not apply to protolgisms because they are not dictionary material? If that is the case, then I have to wonder why editor Sextiliana (aka Joe Webster) bothered to give any explanation at all, and why he felt that his case would be strengthened by citing NPOV. [7]

Thanks for the Urban Dictionary tip, but the two are not mutually exclusive. Apparently, I also have the option of making it part of my daily routine to add this word back to the list.

By the way: Is it just fine if I delete Sextiliana's protologisms---ecaesthetics, kitbash, picbash, and vertiphile, for example---and invite those who think that Christi-insanity is a word whose time has come, to do the same? http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/User:Sextiliana/Protologisms

Also see: List of Protologisms

• http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:List of protologisms

Wiktionary: Protologisms Definition, guidelines, and criteria for inclusion.

• http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Protologisms

Songsong 2:28, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

If you'd like to add the term "Christ-insanity" with a definition (something like "The combination of Christianity with pro-life and pro-war political opinions; used derisively"), you may do so at Appendix:List of protologisms. If you'd like to add it with a rant, then Wiktionary isn't the place for you; you could try Urban Dictionary, or your own Web site. Also, please log in (via Special:Userlogin) before posting comments, lest it seem that you're impersonating SongSong. —Ruakh_TALK 19:06, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Thank you so much for your suggestions, but I would like to know exactly which statements in my argument constitute a "rant." It seems to me that I am merely defending my protologism---point for point---against the rantings of the editor who has, for a full week now, been playing a daily game of tug of war with me, trying to keep this useful word out of the English language. In other words, if my response sounds like a rant, it is probably because it is a response to a rant. [8] Still I would like to know---so that I can avoid ranting, or appearing to rant, in the future---exactly which statements in my argument resemble a rant.

Songsong 16:39, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

You've misunderstood on two points. (1) It was not your argument here that was being called a rant, but your "definition". Ruakh has offered a more concise alternative. (2) Many submitted entries to Wiktionary are proposed for deletion each week, and are either kept or deleted on the merits laid out in a discussion held by the community. Wiktionary does not regulate the English language. A deletion here has nothing to do with whether or not a word will enter the language; it is merely a reflection of our criteria for inclusion policy and the community decision based on those criteria. --EncycloPetey 00:02, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

(1) My user name or IP address was blocked for several hours by SemperBlotto, as I was editing my argument here---not my definition. The reason given was "exceeded rant limit." (2) I would like to see the discussion held by the community which led to Sextilian's repeated deletions of my definition. I would also like to be invited to any future discussions held by the community regarding the inclusion or exclusion of this protologism.

I think you are seriously underestimating the popularity of Wiktionary, if you think that the inclusion or exclusion of a new word will not significantly hasten or retard its propagation. Songsong 00:47, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

*sigh* We have a dictionary somewhere around here too, not just a list of protologisms for your personal word coinage campaign. So long as your whole purpose here is just to promote that word, instead of getting involved, I don't think you'll find much sympathy from those of us trying to create a great, free dictionary by our own labor. Dmcdevit·t 00:57, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

You folks are doing great work. That's why wiktionary is so popular and increasingly important to word coiners. Especially when the word is non-frivolous. But in this particular case, somebody has dropped the ball, I think. I too have much better things to do with my time than conduct a word coining campaign, and would very much like to be done with it. Unfortunately, I can't be done with it as long as someone keeps removing my definition without providing any reasonable justification. I'm new here, so I haven't had much time to get involved in anything, and I don't see how I can get involved with anything as long as my time and energy are tied up with this unwelcome battle. As for sympathy, I am surprised that from the beginning I've had no advocates who express any sympathy for a newcomer whose first experience of involvement is an unpleasant and time consuming tug-of-war with an editor who has been engaged in a campaign to keep a word out of Wikipedia. From my first email complaint, representatives have given the impression that my best option is to go elsewhere. Everyone defends the deleter's right to delete, and no one encourages me to put it right back in.Songsong 01:32, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

This is not Wikipedia. And Wiktionary is not in the business of coining words. Our goal is to describe the existing words in languages, not to invent new ones. --EncycloPetey 01:45, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Consider this comment to be encouragement to add your protologism with a definition. Also, consider this comment to be a promise that as long as you keep adding your protologism with a rant, it will keep getting removed, and you will eventually get blocked. —Ruakh_TALK 01:45, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/rant 3 An exposition written, or more often oral, where emotionality supersedes rationality. Its purpose is a call to action, often identifying a target for ire and a path to resolution. Due to the pejorative connotation of the term it is a descriptor that is often subjective, most often applied to messages disagreed with. IE: Hitler's speeches were rants, Churchill's were spellbinding.

Songsong 02:10, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

It is certainly written as a critical rant, and not as a neutral dictionary entry (to which format even protologisms must adhære). I suggest you reword your definition thus:

• The coïncidence of Christian religious belief with advocacy of an aggressive foreign policy and vehement opposition to abortion; especially when characterised by support for a laissez-faire socio-economic arrangement, opposition to gay marriage, contraception, and sex education, and criticism of homosexuality and pornography.

This is likely the maximum that you’ll get away with (and even that’s pushing it). Pointing out the self- and Biblical contradiction of such a perspective or making references to the Book of Deuteronomy is beyond the scope of a neutral dictionary definition. (In my opinion, this word fails a protologistic criterion for inclusion in that it simply isn’t catchy. “Christi-insanity”? –That’s a very awkward join; it’ll never catch on. Think of something better.) † Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 09:10, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Sorry to take so long to respond. I got a message stating that I had exceeded my "rant limit," and my access was denied for several days. I still don't understand why my definiton has been characterized as a rant. It may not be written from a Neutral Point of View, but does that make it a rant? And is it really true that protologisms must adhere to a neutral dictionary format? Someone keeps removing my entry from the List of Protologisms, so here again is the definition in question:

Rant removed. --Connel MacKenzie 04:25, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

For the record : this was the much-debated text. — Beobach972 04:34, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Why is this a rant? Most people consider a rant to be speach that is irrational and incoherent? After taking a closer look at Wiktionary's definition, I discovered that it has other connotations, as well. A rant can also be:

An exposition written, or more often oral, where emotionality supersedes rationality. Its purpose is a call to action, often identifying a target for ire and a path to resolution. Due to the pejorative connotation of the term it is a descriptor that is often subjective, most often applied to messages disagreed with. IE: Hitler's speeches were rants, Churchill's were spellbinding.

In other words, the perception of ranting---like the perception of beauty---is in the mind of the beholder. To the "good" Germans, Hitler's speeches were as spellbindingly cogent and convincing as Churchill's were to the British. Given this extreme subjectivity, I think some of my correspondents have not been using the word with much precision.

Another source of misunderstanding is the confusion of protologisms with words in the Wiktionary proper.

According to the Reasons for Protologism Listing: "By consensus it has become policy to not include protologisms in the dictionary proper. The purpose of the Wiktionary is to define and translate "all words in all languages", not to create new ones. Just as Wikipedia strives towards a Neutral Point of View, it is the goal of Wiktionary to describe language as it exists and has existed in the world, not to correct it or make suggestions. But Wiktionary should describe new words as people actually use them."

This paragraph is more than a little confusing. On the one hand, it states that, "The purpose of the Wiktionary is to define and translate 'all words in all languages', not to create new ones; and yet a List of Protologisms is provided for newly created words. If I can rephrase it, for the sake of clarity, this paragraph seems to be saying that Wiktionary, like Wikipedia, strives toward a Neutral Point of View in the dictionary proper; but a separate section has been set aside for protologisms, so that "new words" can be described "as people actually use them." Since, in the real world, people often use words to express emotion or strong opinions, this paragraph gives the impression that the rule regarding Neutral Point of View does not apply to protologisms. And in fact there is no mention of Neutral Point of View, in the main article on Protologisms.

The basic idea seems to be that Wiktionarians should act like reporters and just report the meaning of words as they are used in the real world, without injecting their own value judgements. But does this concern for Neutral Point of View apply to the list of protologisms? These words are contributed by inventors, not reporters. What has this journalistic objectivity got to do with the creative process of inventing a new expression? And how can I not inject my own opinion into my own opinion? In this case, the word alone expresses a non-neutral point of view. Am I, as its inventor, not allowed to craft a definition that expands this non-neutral meaning, strongly advocating non-violence, generosity, and tolerance? Songsong

The point is that the list of protologisms is not a platform or soapbox from which to convince people of your point of view, but only a place to define a new word that others might find useful. If there are other people who already share your point of view, they might find this word useful; if not, then the list of protologisms can't do anything for you. (And yes, many words contain implicit points of view; someone using the word shakra probably believes in Hinduism or yoga, someone using the word Zionazi probably hates Jews, and so on. Defining the word then entails a brief explanation of the point of view, something like "in Hinduism and yoga" or "(pejorative, offensive)", but it does not entail advocating the point of view.) —Ruakh_TALK 16:41, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Participles

At this point I have looked at a fair number of verb entries in their infinitive, participle, and past participle forms. There seem to be several styles for dealing with participles. I find the variety of styles is confusing.

Consider growing. It has headers for verb, noun and adjective. In general, participles can be used as both nouns, adjectives, and verbs but they are derived from verbs. I have seen entries for other words where there is a header(s) for only verb, or verb and noun, or verb and adjective. I have rarely seen a clear reason why a noun or adjective section was included or not.

closing is an interesting example at this moment. It is currently listed as a noun and adjective, and NOT as a verb. Yet close lists the participles including closing.

So I am wondering where wiktionary policy stands regarding this. I bet this has been discussed at some point.

To state my current preference, I would prefer that an entry like growing only have the verb heading with the first definition indicating the flavor of participle. Subsequent definitions could show the word's use as noun or adjective, or not as is often the case now. That is I believe in most cases there is no point in having a whole separate noun or adjective section. I believe there is occasional justification for separate noun/adjective section, and closing is one example. Makearney 22:59, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

For English, we want all the possible parts of speech for a word. For participles, this often means noun, adjective, and verb form. Part of the reasoning behind this is that English participles do not always function as all three parts of speech, and sometimes have unexpected meanings in certain usages. If you have seen an entry missing one of its uses, then it is because no one has yet added that sense. Too often, editors assume a blue link means that a page is complete, when in fact it only means that the page exists. If you would like to help with English participles here, your assistance would be greatly appreciated. --EncycloPetey 01:56, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

This is fine. Having headers for all relevant parts of speech has the obvious virtue of consistent format. My suggestion would have spawned a new place to hide certain type of nouns and adjectives and that would not be good. It was one of those ideas that made seemed to make sense at that moment, but that memoment is over. My rattling around Wiktionary seems draw my attention to issues in of content consistency. Where I see problems I can fix, I'll fix them. Makearney 01:34, 22 June 2007 (UTC)

English verb inflection template nit

I have observed two styles of using the verb inflection templates:

• {{third-person singular of|[[word]]}} which creates:

  Template:third-person singular of

• {{third-person singular of| word}} which creates:

  Template:third-person singular of

So the template can swallow both styles. The only odd bit is the addition of the "to" in the second example, a subtle but significant difference in my opinion.

It seems to me likely that wiktionary probably has chosen one style or the other, and is in the midst of converting. It is not clear to me which is the preferred style. As luck would have it, I encountered the first style initially most often. I generally saw the second style that used the infinitive "to ..." at the end of the definition only in verbs that didn't use the template at all. I have started seeing the second style now where the template is used and that has raised the question of which is the approved style since the second style is the simplest to type, i.e. what I would expect in a template.

If this is documented somewhere, just aim me in the right direction I just haven't stumbled across the definitive answer yet. Makearney 01:38, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

I've been told that the {{third-person singular of|[[word]]}} style is preferable, because of the way our statistics work; if we rely on the template to assemble the link, then the entry is treated as a dead-end page and doesn't count toward our total number of "real" pages. —Ruakh_TALK 02:27, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll stick with the first style unless I hear major noise otherwise. Makearney 22:07, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I've just observed that only inflection template:

{{third-person singular of| word}}

inserts the "to" . The others namely:

{{present participle of| word}}

{{past participle of| word}}

{{past of| word}}

do not. This suggests that the intent is that the "to" is not intended.Makearney 23:05, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

I suspect that it's a hold-over from an earlier version. The other templates were fixed when the current form was decided upon, but that one template wasn't. --EncycloPetey 23:12, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

"to" is now consistently absent from {{third-person singular of}}. Rod (A. Smith) 00:11, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Whilst we’re on this subject, could someone please sort out the inability of the {{present participle of|}} template to link to sections? That is, if I write {{present participle of|word#English|word|lang=English}}, it breaks the template, meaning that I have to write only {{present participle of|word|lang=English}} instead — this error does not occur with the other verb form templates. † Raifʻhār Doremítzwr 12:54, 25 June 2007 (UTC)

Featured entries

I didn't find featured articles in Wiktionary. Please, give me link. Thanks. --AKA MBG 12:53, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

What featured articles? We have "word of the day" and "words in the news" - both linked from the "Selected Entries" section of the front page. SemperBlotto

The Word of the Day is always displayed on the Main Page. --EncycloPetey 19:32, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Elephant family

is an elephant mammal/ manatee within the same family as a platapus? — This unsigned comment was added by Bernard (talk • contribs) at 00:08, 28 June 2007 (UTC).

No, but Wikipedia's Platypus and Manatee articles will be more helpful for your type of question. Rod (A. Smith) 01:48, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

More re: English verb inflection

I first discovered three verb inflection templates below the "save page" line in the edit window. They cover

1. third person singular
2. present participle
3. simple past and past participle.

Notably absent were templates for simple past and past participle alone. Ultimately, I needed both but fortunately needed "past participle" first and hazarded a guess that {{past participle of}} would work. It did. So, when I encountered a case where I needed past tense alone, I finally managed to geuss that the template {{simple past of}} existed and did the job

The questions are:

1. Should I use these two other templates I discovered? Well I have already. So should I not in the future?
2. If they are to be used, then could they be included with the others in the edit window. I am sure others will find themselves in the same predicament at some point. Templates are good. It should be easy to discover and use them. And it almost is. I still have not found a page that describes them. Of course this being a wiki, perhaps one appeared when I wasn't watching.

Makearney 17:37, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

I believe one of the reasons {{simple past of}} and {{past participle of}} aren't included in the Edittools is that we don't want to encourage their use. That's not to say that there aren't perfectly valid times to use them; it's just that for most English verbs, the two forms are indentical and we prefer editors to use the combination template {{past of}} becuase it covers both situations simultaneously. We also want to limit the number of templates listed in the edit window. There are also many, MANY more form templates that are used for inflected languages. Too many templates and it would take forever to load and slow down people's connections. It would also visually swamp out what people are looking for. Since {{simple past of}} and {{past participle of}} aren't used very often, it seems better not to include them in the list. --EncycloPetey 19:46, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Another solution would be to include a list of these templates and perhaps others I don't know about on the {{en-verb}} page. Yes?

What you say all seems reasonable. I guess in my current status as newbie, I am observing how I am screwing up and trying to figure out how to help others do the right thing. After reading your comment, I told myself that {{simple past of}} and {{past participle of}} must be listed somewhere. I had been down various inflection links and never stumbled across them. Today for the first time, at the end of the Index to Templates page, under the heading, Other templates found, but yet to be analysed, I found the link All templates And finally knowing what I was looking for, I found what I was looking for... which I guess is a another statement of the problem. That is a huge list. Does it include deprecated templates as well? Makearney 23:34, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

We do need some better sources of information for newcomers, particularly with regard to advanced formatting and template use. Some things are neglected here while others get done. Perhaps you could have a go at starting a page on Wiktionary:English verbs (covering format and tools, not the general grammar)based on your experience? Usually, once something like that is started, others will help to edit and flesh it out. The difficult part is overcoming the initial inertia. --EncycloPetey 23:38, 29 June 2007 (UTC)

Good idea. I've been fussing with nouns and adjectives as well. Probably pages would be useful for those also. Comparatives and countability superficially seem straight forward, but depending on the word they have confusing aspects that ultimately are reflected in template use or lack of. Makearney 18:53, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Exactly. We already have a few Appendix pages like these for other languages, and I've started working on an Appendix:English proper nouns based on recent conversations. The difficult part is finding the important questions and merginal cases and trying to build a consensus in the community on how to interpret and explain them. --EncycloPetey 21:05, 5 July 2007 (UTC)