This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Numeral systems template. |
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Archives: 1 |
Numbers | ||||
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1) Someone seems to be using brackets to put 'Hindu' next to the Western Arabic family. This makes no sense so please stop unless you have good evidence and reason for doing so.
2) Someone has put brackets around Tamil. Again not sure why. Tamil like Thai, Burmese, has a system based on the Hindu-Arabic system, but also has its own system (see article). It is standalone, and there is no reason to put brackets around it because the same would apply to all systems (Thai, Burmese) under the Hindu-Arabic family. -- 90.215.129.236 ( talk) 13:58, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
Eequor has, in the process of moving this around and changing the table syntax, also added the fictional D'ni numerals. Is it really a good idea to include such a fictional numeral system with all the others? Lupo 09:37, 23 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I recently removed the D'ni as SF cruft, but I was reverted and pointed to this talk. Obviously we all agree that it doesn't belong in the same list as others. More importantly, it simply is not a part of the same series of articles, which this box is supposed to be about. I'm removing it again. There are other ways to link to D'ni - there is Numeral system, category:Numeration, we can even have a list of numeral systems. Zocky 15:30, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
I've contributed to many articles about works of fiction and components thereof, and even created templates linking such articles together. But I think that including the D'ni numerals article in what is presumably supposed to be a serious series of articles about numeral systems isn't a very good idea. This series of articles should cover important and influential systems of numerals throughout history, helping to link the articles to show their evolution and use of these systems. I am also against creating a separate section in the template for fictional numeral systems—they don't add to the value of these articles as a series. Not only are they artifical constructions, but they are essentially unused, except for the fiction they were created for. Having them in the template is equivalent to someone adding articles about speculative "future histories" to a series of history articles. I agree with Zocky, just make an all-inclusive List of numeral systems with all the real ones, and a separate section for fictional ones. While I'm completely fine with the article D'ni numerals existing in Wikipedia as a whole, leave it out of this template. — siro χ o 22:45, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
The usefulness of spelling out all those long words like "quadrosexagesimal" is questionable. If someone wants to know the fancy word for "Base 64" he can look at the article, right? It should be shortened with a table, like Template:Cyrillic alphabet navbox, and links to "2" "3" "4" "10" etc. Any thoughts? Ashibaka tock 03:38, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
I've just made it a bit worse, adding two more non-standard systems. Perhaps we should instead remove all the non-standard systems from the template, except for the link to Non-standard positional numeral systems? But I think at least Unary would still deserve a link of its own. Perhaps it a bit too much that we have: Three categories:
Four articles, including a list:
And a template:
Here's a suggestion: The categories are fine, the List of numeral system topics is redundant at can be deleted, the template should be divided into three (all of which should include links to the other two):
E.g., Babylonian numerals and Tally marks would be listed on template 1, Sexagesimal on template 2, and Unary on template 3. If no objections appear here - or suggestions of better names for the templates - I'll probably split the template as indicated one of these days.-- Niels Ø 06:55, 27 April 2006 (UTC) Having checked List of numeral system topics and Computer numbering formats, here's some links that might be added: Computer numbering formats; Gray code; Binary-coded decimal; Signed number representations; Two's complement; Radix; Radix point; Pentimal system; Bi-quinary coded decimal; Algorism; Goodstein's theorem; Myriad. I haven't figured out how to include all those.-- Niels Ø 09:24, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
The template was far too long anf too wide, I had to remove it elsewhere. And then (I hope) fixed, it's now in a "works for me" (non-CSS) state. Add CSS as you like, but please leave legacy align/width/colspan/etc. alone unless you can test the effect without CSS. For the suggestion above maybe adding a link to the relevant category is good enough, but on the other hands all affected pages should already be in this category, and there's a link to the list with more related topics. I've removed some esoteric stuff like base 11, anybody interested in such oddities will find them without this template. -- Omniplex 14:04, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm very happy with the quite radical changes made to this template. One thing bothers me, though: The headings for the two parts are misleading. It says Numeral systems on top, which is fine, but then it says Positional systems at the bottom. Most of the systems mentioned in the first half are in fact positional systems. The divide is not between positional and non-positional; it is (or should be, in my opinion) between articles with focus on the cultural history of numeral systems (e.g. Babylonian numerals) and articles with focus on mathematics and computer science aspects (e.g. Sexagesimal). How do we fix this? I'm not so sure that I'll change it right away, but how about just changing the heading Positional systems into Positional systems by base? What I do not like 100% about this solution is that "by base" seems to suggest it's really the same links sorted in a different way, which is not quite the case, but I think it would be OK anyway.-- Niels Ø 07:57, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
As it now stands, without direct links to non-standard positional numeral systems, should we remove the template from those articles (e.g., Bijective numeration, Balanced ternary, etc.)? They will still be connected to the other articles through their categories.-- Niels Ø 07:40, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
Why aren't the various numerical systems placed into alphabetical order? Has there been a consensus against that? ktr ( talk) 18:30, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
Do we include articles on numbers as part of a language in this template? if we do, we need to add Names of numbers in English. If we don't we need to remove Chinese, Korea, and Japanese articles as they do not cover numeral systems, but simple how numbers written/spoken in those languages/culture. -- Voidvector ( talk) 14:51, 31 August 2008 (UTC)
In these edits, the links to the mathematical articles in the section on positional numeral system are reordered in a way I do not understand, and the link to Unary is moved to a section on cultural numeral systems. As Unary is a mathematical article rather than a cultural one, and as unary arguably belongs with the positional systems (see here), I think it should be moved back. So, unless the IP user behind these edits explains herself, I'll revert both edits.-- Noe ( talk) 18:47, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
Please see Category talk:Positional numeral systems#List of positional systems by base.-- Nø ( talk) 10:56, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
For those who don't understand that the unary numeral system is NOT a positional notation: please stop adding or moving it to respective block of template! -- StanContributor ( talk) 22:24, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
Currently, the top of the box says "Numeral systems by culture" in large font. Near the bottom there is a header in smaller font saying "Numeral systems by base". Clearly this is inappropriate: "by culture" and "by base" should be headers at the same level. Can someone fix this?-- Nø ( talk) 16:35, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
Double sharp, what is it that makes unary a "non-standard" positional system? I personally don't see anything that would make it different from other standard systems. Mvpo666 ( talk) 18:25, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
Can anybody explain how to get an image into an article so that it somehow overrides the image from the navbox in the popup tooltip preview of the article. An alternative question is how to mark the navbox image so it is discouraged from being used (this could possibly be true for every navbox, not just this one).
The problem I am trying to fix is the misleading result for hovering over arabic numerals. Due to cropping the image actually does not show them, and contributes to the continuous misconception that this term means "base 10" (rather than the correct meaning of the 10 glyphs that are very popular for writing numbers). There is an image on that page (shown here) that I would like it to choose instead.
Spitzak ( talk) 17:10, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
This template should be a navbar at the bottom of articles, not a sidebar. Reasons:
In fact, the time and energy spent creating, maintaining, and inserting a navigation sidebar like this one is worse than wasted. That effort should be better spent on writing or improving the
number system article.
All the best, --
Jorge Stolfi (
talk) 09:20, 2 May 2019 (UTC)
Back in 2014 (with this edit), "Other historical systems" was changed to "Former", and I feel this should be changed back to simply "Historical systems". I came to notice this due to the inclusion of Kaktovik Inupiaq numerals (Inuit) in this list. While the Inupiat have used base 20 for ages, the written numeral system was invented in 1994 (and since refined) and has entered wide use within the community. — Huntster ( t @ c) 11:51, 23 June 2020 (UTC)
Done-- Akrasia25 ( talk) 13:18, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
This template is a complete mess; an odd, inconsistent mix of geographical (continental), chronological (historical), cultural, and typological organisation. Even ignoring the messy inconsistent organisation, the lists are questionable:
Surely there's a better way of organising these links - something more accurate, and consistent? – Scyrme ( talk) 18:43, 8 July 2022 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Numeral systems template. |
|
Archives: 1 |
Numbers | ||||
|
1) Someone seems to be using brackets to put 'Hindu' next to the Western Arabic family. This makes no sense so please stop unless you have good evidence and reason for doing so.
2) Someone has put brackets around Tamil. Again not sure why. Tamil like Thai, Burmese, has a system based on the Hindu-Arabic system, but also has its own system (see article). It is standalone, and there is no reason to put brackets around it because the same would apply to all systems (Thai, Burmese) under the Hindu-Arabic family. -- 90.215.129.236 ( talk) 13:58, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
Eequor has, in the process of moving this around and changing the table syntax, also added the fictional D'ni numerals. Is it really a good idea to include such a fictional numeral system with all the others? Lupo 09:37, 23 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I recently removed the D'ni as SF cruft, but I was reverted and pointed to this talk. Obviously we all agree that it doesn't belong in the same list as others. More importantly, it simply is not a part of the same series of articles, which this box is supposed to be about. I'm removing it again. There are other ways to link to D'ni - there is Numeral system, category:Numeration, we can even have a list of numeral systems. Zocky 15:30, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
I've contributed to many articles about works of fiction and components thereof, and even created templates linking such articles together. But I think that including the D'ni numerals article in what is presumably supposed to be a serious series of articles about numeral systems isn't a very good idea. This series of articles should cover important and influential systems of numerals throughout history, helping to link the articles to show their evolution and use of these systems. I am also against creating a separate section in the template for fictional numeral systems—they don't add to the value of these articles as a series. Not only are they artifical constructions, but they are essentially unused, except for the fiction they were created for. Having them in the template is equivalent to someone adding articles about speculative "future histories" to a series of history articles. I agree with Zocky, just make an all-inclusive List of numeral systems with all the real ones, and a separate section for fictional ones. While I'm completely fine with the article D'ni numerals existing in Wikipedia as a whole, leave it out of this template. — siro χ o 22:45, 28 February 2006 (UTC)
The usefulness of spelling out all those long words like "quadrosexagesimal" is questionable. If someone wants to know the fancy word for "Base 64" he can look at the article, right? It should be shortened with a table, like Template:Cyrillic alphabet navbox, and links to "2" "3" "4" "10" etc. Any thoughts? Ashibaka tock 03:38, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
I've just made it a bit worse, adding two more non-standard systems. Perhaps we should instead remove all the non-standard systems from the template, except for the link to Non-standard positional numeral systems? But I think at least Unary would still deserve a link of its own. Perhaps it a bit too much that we have: Three categories:
Four articles, including a list:
And a template:
Here's a suggestion: The categories are fine, the List of numeral system topics is redundant at can be deleted, the template should be divided into three (all of which should include links to the other two):
E.g., Babylonian numerals and Tally marks would be listed on template 1, Sexagesimal on template 2, and Unary on template 3. If no objections appear here - or suggestions of better names for the templates - I'll probably split the template as indicated one of these days.-- Niels Ø 06:55, 27 April 2006 (UTC) Having checked List of numeral system topics and Computer numbering formats, here's some links that might be added: Computer numbering formats; Gray code; Binary-coded decimal; Signed number representations; Two's complement; Radix; Radix point; Pentimal system; Bi-quinary coded decimal; Algorism; Goodstein's theorem; Myriad. I haven't figured out how to include all those.-- Niels Ø 09:24, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
The template was far too long anf too wide, I had to remove it elsewhere. And then (I hope) fixed, it's now in a "works for me" (non-CSS) state. Add CSS as you like, but please leave legacy align/width/colspan/etc. alone unless you can test the effect without CSS. For the suggestion above maybe adding a link to the relevant category is good enough, but on the other hands all affected pages should already be in this category, and there's a link to the list with more related topics. I've removed some esoteric stuff like base 11, anybody interested in such oddities will find them without this template. -- Omniplex 14:04, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
I'm very happy with the quite radical changes made to this template. One thing bothers me, though: The headings for the two parts are misleading. It says Numeral systems on top, which is fine, but then it says Positional systems at the bottom. Most of the systems mentioned in the first half are in fact positional systems. The divide is not between positional and non-positional; it is (or should be, in my opinion) between articles with focus on the cultural history of numeral systems (e.g. Babylonian numerals) and articles with focus on mathematics and computer science aspects (e.g. Sexagesimal). How do we fix this? I'm not so sure that I'll change it right away, but how about just changing the heading Positional systems into Positional systems by base? What I do not like 100% about this solution is that "by base" seems to suggest it's really the same links sorted in a different way, which is not quite the case, but I think it would be OK anyway.-- Niels Ø 07:57, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
As it now stands, without direct links to non-standard positional numeral systems, should we remove the template from those articles (e.g., Bijective numeration, Balanced ternary, etc.)? They will still be connected to the other articles through their categories.-- Niels Ø 07:40, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
Why aren't the various numerical systems placed into alphabetical order? Has there been a consensus against that? ktr ( talk) 18:30, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
Do we include articles on numbers as part of a language in this template? if we do, we need to add Names of numbers in English. If we don't we need to remove Chinese, Korea, and Japanese articles as they do not cover numeral systems, but simple how numbers written/spoken in those languages/culture. -- Voidvector ( talk) 14:51, 31 August 2008 (UTC)
In these edits, the links to the mathematical articles in the section on positional numeral system are reordered in a way I do not understand, and the link to Unary is moved to a section on cultural numeral systems. As Unary is a mathematical article rather than a cultural one, and as unary arguably belongs with the positional systems (see here), I think it should be moved back. So, unless the IP user behind these edits explains herself, I'll revert both edits.-- Noe ( talk) 18:47, 23 November 2009 (UTC)
Please see Category talk:Positional numeral systems#List of positional systems by base.-- Nø ( talk) 10:56, 24 October 2010 (UTC)
For those who don't understand that the unary numeral system is NOT a positional notation: please stop adding or moving it to respective block of template! -- StanContributor ( talk) 22:24, 13 December 2011 (UTC)
Currently, the top of the box says "Numeral systems by culture" in large font. Near the bottom there is a header in smaller font saying "Numeral systems by base". Clearly this is inappropriate: "by culture" and "by base" should be headers at the same level. Can someone fix this?-- Nø ( talk) 16:35, 29 March 2015 (UTC)
Double sharp, what is it that makes unary a "non-standard" positional system? I personally don't see anything that would make it different from other standard systems. Mvpo666 ( talk) 18:25, 13 April 2015 (UTC)
Can anybody explain how to get an image into an article so that it somehow overrides the image from the navbox in the popup tooltip preview of the article. An alternative question is how to mark the navbox image so it is discouraged from being used (this could possibly be true for every navbox, not just this one).
The problem I am trying to fix is the misleading result for hovering over arabic numerals. Due to cropping the image actually does not show them, and contributes to the continuous misconception that this term means "base 10" (rather than the correct meaning of the 10 glyphs that are very popular for writing numbers). There is an image on that page (shown here) that I would like it to choose instead.
Spitzak ( talk) 17:10, 19 November 2018 (UTC)
This template should be a navbar at the bottom of articles, not a sidebar. Reasons:
In fact, the time and energy spent creating, maintaining, and inserting a navigation sidebar like this one is worse than wasted. That effort should be better spent on writing or improving the
number system article.
All the best, --
Jorge Stolfi (
talk) 09:20, 2 May 2019 (UTC)
Back in 2014 (with this edit), "Other historical systems" was changed to "Former", and I feel this should be changed back to simply "Historical systems". I came to notice this due to the inclusion of Kaktovik Inupiaq numerals (Inuit) in this list. While the Inupiat have used base 20 for ages, the written numeral system was invented in 1994 (and since refined) and has entered wide use within the community. — Huntster ( t @ c) 11:51, 23 June 2020 (UTC)
Done-- Akrasia25 ( talk) 13:18, 19 August 2020 (UTC)
This template is a complete mess; an odd, inconsistent mix of geographical (continental), chronological (historical), cultural, and typological organisation. Even ignoring the messy inconsistent organisation, the lists are questionable:
Surely there's a better way of organising these links - something more accurate, and consistent? – Scyrme ( talk) 18:43, 8 July 2022 (UTC)