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(1) I seek consensus to add the following:
Avoid the use of wordings such as "note that" and "remember that", which change the tenor by directly instructing the readers.
(2) As the invisible comment says, this is probably better in the Abbreviatinos section: " Abbreviations of Latin terms like i.e. and e.g., or use of the Latin terms in full, such as “nota bene”, or “vide infra”, should be left as the original author wrote them. In the main text of articles intended for a general audience, consider spelling out the item in English (“that is”, “for example”).<!-- why is this not in [[#Abbreviations]]?-->
(3) I wonder whether this is better in the Varieties of English section: "Use an unambiguous word or phrase in preference to an ambiguous one. For example, use “other meaning” rather than “alternate meaning” or “alternative meaning”, since alternate means only “alternating” to a British-English speaker, and alternative suggests “nontraditional” or “out-of-the-mainstream” to an American-English speaker. Tony (talk) 01:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
I strongly disagree with your first suggestion. These are rhetorical phrases, and much finely crafted prose uses them freely. I strongly disagree with your third suggestion as well, at least as far as your example goes. "Other meaning" is awkward, and "alternative meaning" will only suggest "nontraditional [sic]" in a slang context. An encyclopedia needs to be written in formal prose. I mildly disagree with your second suggestion. TheScotch 07:44, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Words to avoid covers (1), though that guideline does ramble a bit. I'm not clear what the "Usage" in the "Usage and spelling" section title means. It seems a bit of a mixed bag. I can't see any spelling guidelines in that section either. Colin° Talk 11:33, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
When did not bolding synonyms for a person become the new rule? Or not having it as a standard in MOS? Can I now deBold every synonym in every biography in Wikipedia? See: [ [1]] -- Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 08:50, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
On " Wikipedia:Only make links that are relevant to the context" it says: "As a general rule, do not put links in the bold reiteration of the title in the article's lead sentence or any section title." Following the link given: "from Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Article titles" - I couldn't find an account of this guideline concerning section titles. I found Wikipedia:Lead section#Bold title, which refers only to avoiding links in the bold title words. Does this guideline still apply to section titles, and if so, what's the reasoning behind it? Dan Pelleg 10:43, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
Rich Farmbrough, 12:35 9 October 2007 (GMT).
Hi, I just would like to clarify our usage and capitalization conventions for nobiliary particles. These are the "of" words used in many European languages to denote that the family belongs to the hereditary nobility. Examples might be Charles de Gaulle, Simone de Beauvoir, Max von Laue, Johannes Diderik van der Waals and Lorenzo de' Medici.
My questions are whether we should include the nobiliary particle (de, della, von, van, etc.) whatsoever, and where it should be capitalized. My own preference would be to include it as part of the last name (e.g., "After winning the battle, de Gaulle returned to...") and to capitalize it only when it occurs as the first word in a sentence, e.g., "Van der Waals proposed a modification of the ideal gas law, which von Laue confirmed experimentally..." or (possibly) in a section heading or article title, e.g., ==Della Rovere family==.
I'm sure that this is treated in one or another style manual, but I haven't found it as yet. Any suggestions or clarification would be very welcome — thank you! :) Willow 15:15, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for your help and insights! I never knew all that about the Dutch van. :) Unfortunately, I'm a little unclear on the solution. Do you mean that we should adopt the same custom as the originating country does, e.g., Belgian typography for Belgian names and Dutch typography for Dutch names? It's a minor technical point, I realize; I was just curious whether WP had any consistent policy on such nominal particles. Willow 22:42, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
I didn't know where to post this comment, so please move it to the appropriate page. I noticed that many editors (especially those working on US articles , and obvsiously know intimetly the country) take for granted that the average editor have the same knowledge of the country as them and often omit specifiyng the country in which the article refers to. Examples include:
What Im saying is that editors should be precise when establishing the geographical context of the article in the lead, and indicating the country should be highly recommended.
Note that the same applies for UK-related articles, however when commenting on this issue, editors were strongly opposed to using (for example) Manchester, England, UK or even indicating that it is located in UK. Thank you for your comments. CG 16:29, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
(outdent)A balance is required between the easy, unambiguous identification of a city, and uncluttered brevity for the readers (and even the avoidance of irritants). Where a city is very well-known, let's not go for the formulaic US-address mantra, especially when the country-context is clear. "Chicago", "Los Angeles" and "New York" (when clearly the city), should be well-enough-known to every English speaker in context. Including the state is entirely ephemeral, and the country unnecessary in most cases. Same for "London", unless it's not clearly a UK context and there's a need to disambiguate with "London, Ontario". For less well-known cities/towns, the state would be good, but not the country unless the context gives no help. Triple-bungers might occasionally be necessary (Portland, Maine, US - unless we're already talking about Maine), but they clutter the text.
But please, after the first occurrence in an article, it shouldn't be necessary to tag the name of a city with any state/country ID, should it? Same for links, of course. Tony (talk) 03:37, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
What is the policy or consensus on the structure (alignment) of an article?
I realise that all the articles (that I have visited) are left aligned, but has anyone considered the fact that it may be more encyclopaedia like to have the text 'justified' for some or all of the articles. Anyway, since I am new, I was wondering if someone could tell me there opinion on this matter, as it was just an idea I had. -Jack 04:42, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
Hmmm...For arguments sake, is this your opinion or are u speaking on behalf of everyone? Note: Please don't take my question the wrong way (I do not mean anything by this question, other then the fact that I wish you to expand on what you are saying), I am just wondering how you find it harder to read, when it can make a document (or article) appear more professional (more reliable). -Jack 05:37, 2 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stealth Carbon Eagle ( talk • contribs)
You do realise I am refering to the alignment structure of an article, not some software which helps people build websites for them. Anyway, text justification is done by inserting the following code in the 'edit this page' section (without the brackets) and by appropriately placing the relevant parts where necessary:
(<)div style="text-align: justify;"(>)TEXT(<)/div(>) -Jack 04:28, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
Well, what you have just mentioned leads me to a new question I would like to put forward. Why is it that some articles have a lot of proper references (and citations) and reliable information and yet, some articles (I have also come across) have factual information but few (and sometimes no) citations or references? -Jack 06:29, 2 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stealth Carbon Eagle ( talk • contribs)
Hahaha, well that is a point. But it doesn't really justify the reason for articles being set out like this. Let me give you an example I have come across... Age of Empires III: The War Chiefs - It has factual info, but only 2 references, one of which I added. So, how can you state that it hasen't been referenced yet, when people continue to add stuff to it. Therefore, the information they have obtained will most likely have to have come from a source...however, I do realise that some of the info given is based on gameplay and I will admit that this info cannot be referenced, generally speaking, but besides this how can you justify this? Hahahaha, it should be referenced more like Age of Empires III...I congratulate those who did this and my hat goes off to them, wow, what a lot of effort. Anyway, any comments? - Jack 04:22, 3 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stealth Carbon Eagle ( talk • contribs)
Someone has added this: "It is customary to use we in mathematical derivations; for example: “To normalize the wavefunction, we need to find the value of the arbitrary constant A." In historical fields, it is also customary to use we of the present age as a whole: "The fragments of Menander which have come down to us...".
I do wish that such additions to the text were posted here, even for a day or two, so that they could be improved. Why, for example, wouldn't you just write "The surviving fragments of Menander"? Is there a need for the ellipsis dots? If so, insert a space before them. Why not use the customary formatting for examples in MOS: parentheses, pure and simple?
There's also a faint possibility that some folk might object to the addition. I don't, at first look, but it would be practical and, dare I says it, courteous, to use the expertise of users on this page. It's a collaborative project. And does the Mathematics submanual sing from the same songsheet? It would be nice to be reassured first. Tony (talk) 13:58, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
"Nevertheless, it is sometimes appropriate to use we when referring to an experience that any reader would be expected to have, such as general perceptual experiences. For example, although it might be best to write “When most people open their eyes, they see something”, it is still legitimate to write “When we open our eyes, we see something”.
I see a contradiction between these two sentences as they stand, the section entitled "No common usage in English":
Surely the foreign term should be consistently italicised throughout? BrainyBabe 08:10, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
There seems to be a 'double standard' applied to these articles. For example - British Isles is forbidden at Ireland and Lough Neagh & yet Irish Sea is allowed at Ireland, Great Britain. Why is this so? GoodDay 17:30, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
Why? It might be important, but it's not central to the specific purpose of the MOS. Now it interrupts the flow of sections on style. I think this should go back to where it was. Tony (talk) 02:30, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
Wiki grammar gurus! If you're talking about a band, do you use "is" or "are"? "Iron Maiden is a band", or "Iron Maiden are a band"? Band = noun = is, surely? The members "are", the band "is"... Cardinal Wurzel 08:29, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
I've never heard anyone say anything but "data is", but there you go. You're right about the police. Anyone else? Cardinal Wurzel 09:47, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
I think it's the more the fact that it's the British English way of saying it. Iron Maiden are [sic] an English band. If it reads okay as "are" then it should stay. Cradle of Filth are an English band. It reads fine with "are" and there shouldn't be a problem with that. "Is" and "are" are both correct grammar, but "are" should take precedence being the predominantly British grammatical way of saying it. But that's just my opinion. Scarian Talk 12:06, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
An academic buddy of mine at Bristol University comments "a collective noun is properly given in the singular. Write 'is'. The other usage is commonplace but ghastly." Scarian, this is not a matter of British English versus American English. Anon, there's no question of saying "They was a band". The question is do you say "It was a band" or "They were a band"? Cardinal Wurzel 17:49, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm doing nothing of the sort - I'm saying that the gramatically correct answer is the same in both! Cardinal Wurzel 18:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
Both constructions are very frequent; as others have noted, American English tends toward is and British English tends toward are. I assume the guidelines concerning US vs. UK English in an article still apply. Strad 01:47, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
Thanks, Rich - that's exactly what I needed. Cardinal Wurzel 16:50, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
I'd say scrap the whole debate, and recommend "are" across the board, since it will be correct in American English as well, even if it is somewhat more common to use "is" in A.E. when the band's name sounds somehow more singular. No big opposition to the "leave to to a US/UK distinction" tactic, but why bother? I'm hard pressed to imagine an American editor getting genuinely upset with "ZZ Top are a band from Texas". If anything I have a suspicion that the majority of WP's American editors would prefer "are" to "is" there, that the vast majority of the readership would not mind "are", and that of the probably over-50% of the American readers who if pressed on the matter would prefer "is", only a tiny handful would even notice the difference if it weren't pointed out to them. Meanwhile, use of "is" probably rankles more British/Commonwealth speakers than "are" does Americans and Western Canadians. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:26, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
After a lengthy disagreement today I would like to see a definitive example in the manual of style for the following problem:
IMO the comma is a part of the sentence and not a part ot the program's title. For this reason, the comma should be after the quote. Comments anyone? TinyMark 09:42, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
Correct: | Martha asked, “Are you coming?” |
| |
Correct: | Did Martha say, “Come with me”? |
|
I see this is back, much sooner than I predicted. Can we, this time, deal with the matter soberly, and admit that there are two systems; both are used; and the important thing is to be consistent within an article? Then we can stop discussing this every month. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:42, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
- At one point during Tool's set, Keenan acknowledged his debt to the long-running art rockers: "For me, being on stage with King Crimson is like Lenny Kravitz playing with Led Zeppelin, or Britney Spears onstage with Debbie Gibson."
Hello. I'm new here, but I am not going to abandon everything I learned in school and college on where to put the period and other punctuation marks when quotation marks are involved. You want umpteen students to learn one way in school and another here. That ain't gonna fly. Students do not get it correct all the time in school; now they will see examples of what is taught as incorrect and think it is correct. I will put a period inside the quotation marks if it is an American-related topic. British people, I assume, will put in on the outside. Don't take one argument and turn it into something else. — Bobopaedia 20:43, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
According to CMOS (Chicago), APA, MLA, Merriam-Webster, Associated Press Stylebook, OWL (Purdue U.) and every other style guide I could find, in North America (not just US) periods and commas always (without exception) go inside the closing quotation marks. A Survey of Modern English By Stephan Gramley, Kurt-Michael Pätzold. Routledge, 2004. ISBN 0415300355, explains:
No educator on either side of the Atlantic should ever have to tell a student: "This is the way it is except in Wikipedia." Wikipedia has never been about changing the generally-accepted standards of anything. Where there are two generally-accepted ways to do something, the Wiki rule of thumb is to allow either method, so long as it is consistent within an article. We should show respect for both traditions and ask only for within-article consistency. Highly recommend amending MoS to this effect. Afaprof01 03:17, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm very new to editing, but I find that this sentence should settle the argument: "scientific and technical publications, even in the U.S., almost universally use logical quotation (punctuation outside unless part of the source material), due to its precision". I find that the goal of Wikipedia should be the same to that of scientific and technical publications in regards to precision, eventhough I was taught the typesetter rule in school. My question though, is what system most encyclopedias use? Resu ecrof 21:07, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
It has been a long standing feature of the MoS that it promotes U.S. over US. How long standing can be seen by this proposal to delete the then wording [for those who don't want to follow the link - dated 2004]... "When referring to the United States, please use "U.S."; that is the more common style in that country, is easier to search for automatically, and we want one uniform style on this. When referring to the United States in a long abbreviation (USA, USN, USAF), periods should not be used."
While I have no strong view either way, it has always seemed to me a good thing that the MoS has one, and in this case a long-standing one.
Imagine my surprise when on the 6th of September I was unable to find something I was sure was in the MoS! Perhaps it was in a subpage, but diligent searching revealed nothing. Nor was there recent "talk" of a change, an the history going back yonks did not reveal a likely change. Nonetheless I checked a very old version, and indeed it was there, so I assumed I'd missed the discussion and change. I eventually found the change hidden in the midst of a lot of minor changes here. Clearly this was an error (not mentioned in the comment, but an HTML comeent asks why it's not in the "Abbreviations" section), so I reverted it (with this comment "Acronyms and abbreviations - restoring section that was commented out by Crissov in this ed"), and thought no more of it.
The following day Tony reverted me with "Rv: This needs discussion. At the moment, formatting of "the US" is by consensus for each article; please discuss reasons for imposing this text".
Well I agree such a change needs discussing, which is why I restored the original text! And Tony, I wish you'd told me that you reverted me.
I am restoring once more the status quo, please discuss it here if it needs discussion.
Rich Farmbrough, 09:11 5 October 2007 (GMT).
I'm unsure of the history of whatever MOS used to say about how to format this item, but since I started hanging around MOS, it hasn't prescribed one set of usages and proscribed others. There are a few issues:
Thus, I suggest that MOS continue to remain silent on the issue, so that WPians may dot or not, and abbreviate or spell out regardless of the presence of the names of other countries in the sentence, provided consistency is maintained within each article. Tony (talk) 11:22, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
OK, so you don't mind if MOS says that you can't use US spelling for "kilometre", then. Because that's what it will come to. The suddenly shoved in guideline to use you dot es dot is in conflict with the MOS guidelines on "National varieties". In my variety of English, it's "US", and that's that. This is a blatant attempt to impose some notion of US English on all other varieties, and it's outrageous. I will fight this until the end of the earth. In fact, tomorrow, I'll be changing the guidline for the spelling of "kilometre", to insist on the non-US spelling. Tony (talk) 15:36, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
(Outdent) Sorry, but my variety of English uses "US", except perhaps in all-caps (not all that common in normal text, now that we we've dispensed with typewriters). You can't come along and tell people who speak and write in different varieties of English that they must now use the AmEng term, when in real-life they see and write differently. Otherwise, I'll make a pronouncement that you must use "kilometre", not "kilometer"'. Same deal. WP is already used to both versions, and I hate to say this, but quite a few Americans use the undotted variety, not wanting to fuss with the distinction between the ugly you dot es dot in normal text, and the undotted USA, USAF, UK, and the rest.
The first issue is a reason to retain the delineation of "American English" in the MOS guideline; the second is a reason to soften it from a "you must use" tone. Tony (talk) 01:12, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
I personally prefer "U.S." to "US" as it is more distinct from the pronoun "us." I find it annoying to read "us" every time someone refers to the United States. Also, it is standard in legal writing to punctuate "U.S." Whichever is preferred, there is another issue that is not addressed here that I believe deserves note: when is it appropriate to use U.S./US and when should the country name be spelled out? In legal writing, U.S. can only be used as an adjective. Unites States is used otherwise. For example, "he is from the United States" would be correct while, "he is from the U.S." would not. Is the MoS willing to offer guidance on the matter?
Italicization is restricted to what should properly be affected by italics, and not the surrounding punctuation.
I'm not sure this is wise, especially for semicolons, which look dreadful on default IE settings, especially after y or f; while sentences can be recast, it is a cost to do so to solve a purely typographical problem. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:45, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
My typographer friend reminds me that this is a general problem: italic punctuation has survived because italic text jangles with roman punctuation in general. (There are exceptions, like the period; but is it worth insisting on the roman instead of the italic period? How many pixels do they differ on? Sample follows, with the italic on the left.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:58, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
Thanks to Noetica for his recent copy-edits to MOS. However, they have brought up again a niggling issue that was raised by SMcCandlish only last week on this page, and which received but one response apart from mine ( an extremely negative one for which the reasoning escaped me). Insisting on italics for words as words requires writers and readers to be aware of an all-too-subtle boundary between noun phrases and larger chunks of text. A whole clause clearly does not fit the ambit of words as words, and under the current rule should be marked by quotes, not italics.
Following the current rule, only the last item (Old Man Winter) should be italicised:
Seasons, in almost all instances, are lowercase: “This summer was very hot”; “The winter solstice occurs around December 22”; “I’ve got spring fever”. When personified, season names may function as proper nouns, and they should then be capitalized: “I see that Spring is showing her colors”; Old Man Winter.
But all examples are now italicised. This looks better and avoids the need for readers to wonder about this fussy grammatical distinction, but goes against the current rule.
Above, SMcCandlish called for a compromise proposal: that both styles be allowed, as long as consistency is maintained within each article. This would allow editors to get rid of the need to observe this awkward grammatical distinction it they wish, by using quotations marks for all examples. The quote-marks method is widely used in all varieties of English.
Existing text in MOS:
Words as words
- Italics are used when citing a word or letter (see use–mention distinction). For example, “The term panning is derived from panorama, a word coined in 1787.” “The most commonly used letter in English is e.” Here, word includes noun phrases (e.g., the brown dog).
Proposed text:
Words as words
- Words discussed as words are indicated by either quotation marks (The term "panning" is derived from “panorama”) or by italics (The term panning is derived from panorama). Be consistent within an article.
Tony (talk) 02:17, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
A good example of where quotes instead of italics would be better, from WP:MOSNUM:
Converted values should use a level of precision similar to that of the source value; for example, the Moon is 380,000 kilometres (240,000 mi) from Earth, not ... (236,121 mi).
It's basically impossible to tell that the elipsis is part of the example without quotation marks; in fact, the lack of them makes the passage look completely weird. There are many, many more examples like this I could come up with (I see about 10 per day), but the point ought to already be clear: By using quotation marks as the delimiter of examples and words-as-mentioned rather than -as-used, we actually delimit the passage in question, while italics often do not (except in the source code, which is of no relevance to the general readership). — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 16:26, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
In an edit summary somewhere, Gene Nygard hit upon another issue. When we mention rather than use units we are italicizing them, and this runs at least some risk of confusing users, on two levels. Gene's point was that they could be confused with variables, which are often italicized in mathematical contexts. I think a bigger risk is that some editors may well believe that they are to be italicized in articles, e.g. "43 cm". Using quotes for mention of units would solve this problem. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 16:43, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
A classic case of the confusion italics cause when used this way: Editor did a revert based on the mistaken impression that the italics in the case in question were being used to delimit words-as-mentioned, when they were in fact being used for their main purpose, emphasis: diff — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 16:52, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
Where known, use terminology that subjects use for themselves (self-identification). This can mean using the term an individual uses for himself or herself, or using the term a group most widely uses for itself.
A completely different idea is that this could be handled the same way that non-transgender-related alternate names are. Typically (there's no rule about this, I just see it), it goes something like this:
I.e., the original name is used up until the new name was assumed, and use of either is avoided in the lead's additional sentences. Works just fine. Pronouns would be adapted in the same way to the extent that they should be used at all; it is quite easy to write around them. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:10, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
The following MOS guideline was added today, in an edit with the associated comment "Merging "Article titles" with 'Sections and headings'—more logical)":
I'm not sure when it would be considered non-helpful, as "helpful" is somewhat vague as a requirement. I think this is a new style guideline, derived from guidance in Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Maintaining a separate "References" section in addition to "Notes", which said only that separate sections can be helpful, not that they must be helpful. Personally, I put non-footnote citations (which I use if they apply to a big part of the article) in a References section, and inline footnoted citations (which I use for a quote, sentence, or other limited part of the article) in a Notes section, even if there is only one entry under the Notes and/or References headings. - Agyle 19:38, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
(Outdent) I've got the loud shouting in edit summaries from Timneu22, which doesn't impress me. S/he is insisting on a sequence of headings in this part of MOS that take you logically through the sequence a reader meets in reading an article. Article titles, First sentences, Section headings. It has some advantages, but one big disadvantage in that the guidelines for the wording of both article titles and section headings are identical, except for one (Avoid restating wording on a higher level in the heading hierarchy). As Timneu has loudly insisted, the guidelines are illogically strewn between the two. Now it's OK to use "You" in an article title, where not part of a proper noun? And "The" and "A" as opening word? And now you can insert links into article titles.
And it's unfortunate to trot out the same points twice in the space of the three opening sections of MOS. I'll have a go at fixing this while retaining the current structure. Tony (talk) 01:25, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
It seems to me that there is an overwhelming trend away from using both, and a strong one away from using a Notes section at all except in article with genuine non-reference footnotes. I think it could be time to delineate more clearly between them: If all of the footnotes are reference citations, even with commentary, use References. If there are both and different footnoting systems are used (e.g. <ref> for refs and one of the footnote templates for notes of a non-ref nature, use both, and use only Notes if both are used and both use the same footnoting system. Agree with keeping notes between See also and References. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I find two things unclear with the ellipses policy:
Tristan Schmelcher 21:15, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
This page is again causing Firefox/WinXP to crash due to its bulk, on systems that don't have gobs and gobs of RAM (100%-repeatable crash on my system). — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:14, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
This page is archived by subject (as well as?) not just date, so a bot might not be the best soln. Rich Farmbrough, 13:57 9 October 2007 (GMT).
What standard is followed in issues of term usage between British and American English? For example, the use of 'paraffin' in Tractor_vaporising_oil. Britain uses 'paraffin' for both kerosene and paraffin wax, while all other English-speaking countries, as far as I know, call it kerosene nearly exclusively. I know that in matters of spelling, articles are left in the style in which they were written, but terms seem to have a much larger impact. What should be done in this case? Phasmatisnox 01:58, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
Can we have a guideline that states that one does not have to put the US in front of $ for articles that are clearly talking about American things? I find the US$ wording to be an eyesore and usually unnecessary. Alternatively, perhaps have a template that goes towards the end of the article (such as in "Notes" or "References") that reads something like "All $s in this article refer to United States dollars." Other countries' dollars could have similar templates. It seems that the need to specify which dollars is only needed for articles that talk of things of a global nature.-- SeizureDog 05:50, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
There's been some confusion here on what to do with parentheticals that end in terminal punctuation and also end their enclosing sentence. As we already know from quotations, which when used inline in a sentence are basically a form of parenthetical, terminal punctuation that must be inside a parenthetical that agrees with the terminal punctuation required by the enclosing sentence, ends the sentence there, with the terminal punctuation not duplicated outside the parenthetical. This is so obvious that few style guides address it directly. Because they don't need to. A rule already given long before parentheticals are even mentioned will already address it. Examples:
I'm sure others go into it as well, but I have better things to do that look up a multitude of references that all says the same thing.
The principle here is reiterated, even in the rather too concise Fowler's Modern English Usage, as well as a other style guides, when addressing quotation handling and other issues, such as titles of works, usage of commas, and so on.
By way of further comparison: If I wrote a song that was literally called "Foo," with the comma part of the song name, we would not write about the song with redundant commas: "SMcCandlish's song 'Foo,' released in 2007...", not "SMcCandlish's song 'Foo,', released in 2007...".
Any read through Wikipedia articles will show that the principle here is being applied consistently, and there's evidently no widespread confusion about it, but someone keeps insisting on adding redundant punctuation to MOS itself, thus this long message to address it before it starts inspiring editors at large to add redundant punctuation all over the place.
The problem probably stems from failure to recognize that the "except when the parenthetical is separate or self-contained" exception in various style guides that applies to "always put terminal punctuation outside a parenthetical at the end of a sentence" is satisfied by abbreviations that terminate with a period (again, as long as the period agrees with the sentence), because the period is indivisible from the acronym. Abbreviations that end with periods are "detached" or self-contained by virtue of their format, as they cannot be altered to move their punctuation away. The mistake is in assuming that the only things that satisfy the exception are sentences (CMS even appears to say this, until one remembers that they've already countermanded double-perioding elsewhere. Twice.)
Some examples:
Another way of looking at this is, "Why on earth would we advise doing one thing with parenthetically-constructed quotations (and titles of works, etc.), and something completely different with all other parentheticals?" (Please note that a period does not follow the end of that pseudo-quotation. :-)
— SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 13:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
Q. Hi—I seem to remember in an earlier edition of the CMOS that, if parenthetical material ended in a period, the final period of the sentence should be omitted, even if the rules would otherwise require it. Here’s an example:
She prepared all the Thanksgiving dishes (turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, etc.)
She prepared all the Thanksgiving dishes (turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, etc.).
A co-worker has insisted that the second example is correct and has scoffed at me for suggesting that the first example is preferred. Did I deserve the scoffing? Please do not tell me to omit the “etc.” whenever possible, because this will not be an option in most cases.
A. The scoffer is right. A sentence needs punctuation at the end, and it can’t appear within the parentheses unless the entire sentence is contained in the parentheses. Version 2 is correct.</bockquote>
An expression containing an expression in parentheses is punctuated, outside of the marks of parenthesis, exactly as if the expression in parenthesis were absent.
The conference was held in Portland (Me., not Ore.).
When you enclose material in brackets, punctuation within the sentence remains the same:[...]
When parenthetical matter is not punctuated as a complete sentence, the closing parenthesis precedes any punctuation marks in the enclosing sentence:[...]
As punctuation within parenthetical matter does not affect matter outside it,[...]
With other punctuation
An opening parenthesis should be preceded by a comma or a semicolon only in an enumeration (see 6.126); a closing parenthesis should never be preceded by a comma or a semicolon. A question mark, an exclamation point, and closing quotation marks precede a closing parenthesis if they belong to the parenthetical matter; they follow it if they belong to the surrounding sentence. A period precedes the closing parenthesis if the entire sentence is in parentheses; otherwise it follows. (A parenthetical enclosure of more than one sentence should not be included within another sentence. If a final period is needed at the end of such an enclosure, rewording may be necessary to keep the enclosure independent of the surrounding text, as is this one.) Parentheses should rarely appear back to back. Different kinds of material may, if necessary, be enclosed in a single set of parentheses, usually separated by a semicolon. For parentheses in documentation, see chapters 16 and 17.
As with no doubling of commas and no redundant punctuation after quotations, the no-double-periods rule trumps parenthetical handling. The CMS editors have simply goofed in my opinion, forgetting their own underlying reasoning, and I have to note that CMS's blog or message forum is not CMS, and is not subject to peer review and other external editorial review, so citing it does not "clinch the matter" at all. The fact that CMS, Fowler's, Guardian and other style guides differ on numerous points means that they are all subjective and fallible, so even if CMS itself disagreed with me and removed its no-double-period rule, it would still have to contend with other style guides that insist upon it. Handling of parentheticals does not exist in a vacuum, but interacts with more basic rules, such as against double-dotting. I've offered a logical deduction that so far is countermanded by a blog post and by a Merriam-Webster publication, so I'm outgunned by one reliable source for now. Oh well. In response to your question about Fowler's, as I clearly wrote: It and other style guides address parallel constructions that illustrate the same principles (don't double end-punctuation after a quote, etc.) I did not say that Fowler's or any other actually directly addresses dotted acronyms at the end of paratheticals that close a sentence. The very fact that they don't is why any deduction has to be done at all. The argument that "the expression does itself end the sentence: it is followed by a closing parenthesis that is not a part of the expression itself" is simply impenetrable (I realized you've borrowed it from M.-W.); it either does or it doesn't end the sentence, and can't do both at the same time. To argue that the closing parenthesis somehow makes it not the end of the sentence, thus requiring a second period, is the same as arguing that a closing quotation mark has the same effect, and we know from all style guides that this is not the case. The analogy between the two situations is so perfect that style guides simply never bother to mention the parenthetical case, with the sole case so far as either of us have found being the M.-W. item you cite. Strunk and White doesn't address the matter other than to indicate that we do not double-punctuate outside of quotes, and that we punctuate outside of brackets; it seems unlikely to me that if they'd thought to include whether or not to double-punctuate outside of brackets that they would have contradicted their previous advice with regard to the same situation in quotations (then again, if Merriam-Webster is doing it...). So, I certainly do not concede the argument, only that it remains unsettled pending my finding counter-citations. In another window, I'm actually composing a letter to CMS about this, because I do not think that their position is logically defensible, and I want to see if they can come up with some rationale for it. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:26, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I suspect I'll be a "star pupil" on that stuff since I've already aborbed much of those areas (though I never pretend I have nothing to learn.)
Is this is just my personal opinion? It seems to me that starting off an article with "In <whatever subject domain>, a <subject of this article> is ..." is not really nice. Maybe it is still encyclopedic, but seems just a little bit, not meaning to be pejorative, well, sort of childish.
For example: "In mathematics, a parallelogram is a four sided figure whose opposites sides are parallel to each other". I would rather it read just straight: "A parallelogram is a ...". Any ideas on this? Peashy 13:42, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I have added the caveat that it is good to number lists where the number itself is of some importance, for example track listings. Rich Farmbrough, 14:04 9 October 2007 (GMT).
Someone disputed my prescriptive edits to the section on acronyms and abbreviations, and made the entire thing descriptive on the assertion that there isn't any consensus to be descriptive about it. I've now rewritten that to at least be accurately descriptive, based on reliable sources (Chicago Manual of Style, etc.) I argue against the descriptivist position here, on the following basis:
I could add more, but these are probably enough points against dropping periods from abbreviations (other than units of measure, where the science crowd won out). The points for it seem to be "we're used to it because of British newspapers" (which is no stronger an argument than "get rid of logical quotation because American newspapers don't use it"), and ... well, that seems to be it.
My proposal: Eschew the colloquial British no-dots practice for the formal use-dots practice, which is even preferred by British sources like Fowler: "Dr. Smith of 42 St. Joseph St." I could probably live with some carefully enumerated exceptions in articles on British topics (or begun in British English on dialect-neutral topics) for the most common British usage, no-dotting forms of address such as "Dr Smith" and "St Joseph", so long as it remains clear that otherwise, periods are used, thus deprecating "op cit", "etc", "approx", "123 Second Ave", and other period omissions.
This is the mirror image of my urging deprecation of "U.S.", because there isn't a rationale other than "I'm used to it and it's traditional in my neck of the woods" for the dialectal exception.
— SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 14:09, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
-- ROGER DAVIES TALK 09:47, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Can we reduce
"By convention, the names of railroads and railways do not employ the serial comma (for example,
Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad). This is also the standard for
law firms and similar corporate entities (for example,
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom)."
to
The names of corporate entities do not usually use the serial comma (for example, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad).
Rich Farmbrough, 14:12 9 October 2007 (GMT).
I can find nothing about the treatment of individual letters of the alphabet in linguistic contexts. The MoS should recommend lower case italics as follows: c sounds either like k or like s. Rothorpe 18:00, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
Also, regarding the names of languages in infoboxes, it would seem more educational not to use capitals when the language does not always require them: español, not Español. Present practice is inconsistent. Rothorpe 18:00, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
Have a look at the infoboxes for Spanish language & Portuguese language, and you'll see the inconsistency: español has a capital but português does not. Capitalizing the Occitan one would be awkward (how much? for a start), and that suggested to me that the the Romance languages should all be lower case in the boxes, just as they are normally in italiano, en français, etc. - in contrast, for example, to German, Deutsch. Simply educational. Rothorpe 21:19, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I've edited Words as words after its recent editing to introduce the new policy. But my changes don't alter the fact that users will have to work hard to get it. In particular, I'm unsure myself how mentioning a whole sentence differs from quoting it.
I hated the God save the King example—not only the ideological implications of the title, but the label "subjunctive", which I need to be persuaded is correct (in any case, it would have made most WPians knit their brow, and why the internal italics, just to make things harder?). The example didn't clarify the distinction between quoting and mentioning. I simply removed the example.
Here it is:
Italics are used when mentioning a word or letter (see use–mention distinction) or a string of words up to and including a full sentence: "The term panning is derived from panorama, a word coined in 1787"; "The most commonly used letter in English is e". For a whole sentence, quotes may be used instead, as they are in this manual of style where this helps to make things clear. But distinguish mentioning (to discuss such features as grammar, wording and punctuation) from quoting, for which only quote marks should be used (or appropriate indenting for large quotations). (See Quotations, below.)
Tony (talk) 12:41, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
And this one is a problem:
however, alif and ayin should normally have their standard transliterations, and rough and smooth breathings in Ancient Greek should be marked where necessary; but note that there are browser compatibility issues with them also.
Now sorry to be a party pooper, but why are such arcane matters as breathings in Ancient Greek being introduced into MOS? Hello? Isn't there a WikiProject where this kind of thing could be discussed? Or a talk page? It's covered, anyway, by saying that only apostrophes when used as apostrophes should be "straight". I haven't checked, but is this PManderson's doing? (Sorry if I've leapt to a wrong conclusion.) Tony (talk) 12:58, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Please read and comment at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (exit lists)#Proposals for clarifications. -- NE2 05:16, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
The sentence sentence with a McDonald's example of glyph style was changed by one character, and I don't understand the distinction.
Old: For example, searching in an article for McDonald's (typewriter quote) will fail to find McDonald’s (typographic quote), and vice versa
New: For example, searching in an article for McDonald's (typewriter quote) will fail to find McDonald's (typographic quote), and vice versa.
For me, the old sentence's second occurrence of McDonald's wouldn't be found by Firefox or Internet Explorer (U.S. English browser settings, on U.S. Windows XP) searching for "McDonald's," while in the second example, the two examples are rendered the same way, and both are found by either browser. Do they appear different with other language or country settings? Note that I copied and pasted the "New" sentence, and it's possible my browser lost something in that process, so you might want to check the MOS itself. - Agyle 05:36, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
Any reason we need to list all of the daughter manuals in a section towards the end as well as in the infobox at the top? I see that the two lists aren't quite the same, too.
I'd rather just keep the box at the top. Tony (talk) 11:00, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
Featured Articles are supposed to meet our MOS guidelines. Well apparently not, as an ongoing discussion shows. violet/riga (t) 20:17, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
MOS currently says:
When was the this discussed here? I think we should have instead:
The square brackets are standard in most scholarly practice. And after all, what do you do if you want to show elision from a quote that already includes its own ellipses? An appended note would be cumbersome; and the meaning of the square brackets is immediately obvious.
– Noetica♬♩ Talk 00:31, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
Response: This is a distinction I hadn't thought of; but what if the original source had square brackets as well? Where will it end?
Enclosing every set of ellipsis dots with big square brackets partly negates the reason for using the ellipsis dots in the first place, which is to remove text that is not strictly relevant to the sense, and to save clutter and make the passage easier to read (while preserving the meaning). Square brackets are visually disruptive.
I wonder whether, in the rare cases in which ellipsis dots are part of the original source, this could be explicated after the quoted material, analogous to the requirement that editors explicate their own highlighting of words within quoted text with italic:
Italics are used within quotations if they are already in the source material, or added to give emphasis to some words. If the latter, an editorial note "[emphasis added]" appears at the end of the quotation ("Now cracks a noble heart. Good night sweet prince: And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest" [emphasis added]).
If the source uses italics for emphasis, and it is desirable to stress that Wikipedia has not added the italics, the editorial note "[emphasis in original]" appears after the quote.
By converse analogy:
Where Wikipedia uses an ellipsis to indicate that material has been elided from a direct quotation, they should not be square-bracketed. Where ellipses appear in the original source, their original form should be retained and an editorial note added at the end of the quotation ("Blah blah oink oink ... gabba gabba diddley squat" [ellipsis in original]').
How's that? Default is that WP has inserted the ellipsis, which is almost always the case. (Can you point to examples where ellipses are themselves quoted?) BTW, singular or plural for ellipsis/es here? Tony (talk) 01:57, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
An original sentence or fragment may include an ellipsis, for example as points of suspension, that should not be deleted. For clarity, any later ellipsis inserted in such a passage must be set in square brackets. This passage from The Importance of Being Earnest, for example, contains two ellipses:
The fact is, lady Bracknell, I said I had lost my parents. It would be nearer the truth to say that my parents seem to have lost me...I don't actually know who I am by birth. I was...well, I was found.
In the following extract, the square brackets make clear which are in the original and which have been added subsequently:
The fact is, lady Bracknell, [...]my parents seem to have lost me...I don't actually know who I am [...]. I was...well, I was found.
Privileging a chosen few other style guides (and along with them the two varieties of English in which they are located), with uncertain relationship to this one, is very awkward right at the top. Why is it necessary to interrupt the flow of the lead, which contains critical information such as overarching principles, with this kow-towing to other, hard-copy-oriented tomes? It's just muddy and confusing. There's already a clear statement to raise issues on the talk page where they're not covered by WP's MOS. This parade of people's pet favourites has no place at the top, and could even be regarded as POV. Is Wikipedia endorsing these select few? Bad idea.
I suggest that if people are still keen to list their favourites, it be done at the end under its own section (perhaps "Other style guides"). Tony (talk) 02:52, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
If this page does not specify a preferred usage, discuss your issues on the talk page of this manual. When either of two styles is acceptable, it is inappropriate for an editor to change an article from one style to another unless there is a substantial reason to do so (for example, it is acceptable to change from Canadian to British spelling if the article concerns a British topic). Edit warring over optional styles is unacceptable. If an article has been stable in a given style, it should not be converted without a reason that goes beyond mere choice of style. When it is unclear whether an article has been stable, defer to the style used by the first major contributor.
Happily there are no revert wars going on. Sometimes hypothetical situations are not the best. The instance(s) User:Roger Davies is referring to is actually a series of nine articles, all of which are featured (they are all about Mary Wollstonecraft and her works). As the near-sole editor and maintainer of these pages ( User:Kaldari helps me maintain Mary Wollstonecraft), I find it much easier to keep the pages vandalism-free and updated if I can edit in AE, my native dialect. Since the MOS is a guideline (not a policy) and there is no real reason to write about any topic in any particular dialect (certainly real scholars don't alter their writing depending on the subject matter), this did not seem like a big issue to me. Tony and others are welcome to look at the long and tedious debate at Talk:A Vindication of the Rights of Men. I am currently ill and do not really feel like rehashing it here. Thanks. Awadewit | talk 11:46, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
This has been proposed (under the working title Wikipedia:Use of flags in articles and some others) since April 2007 (and was "officially proposed" at WP:VPP more recently, with plenty of helpful feedback and virtually no opposition). I was about to go put {{ Guideline}} on it, but thought I'd let folks here know before hand in case anyone here hasn't seen it yet. The only bone of contention I know of at present is that WP:ELG conflicts with WP:MOSFLAG in a few ways. Discussion about that is ongoing, and I don't think has any bearing on whether the general material in WP:MOSFLAG has consensus. It's a dispute over whether the most general language in WP:MOSFLAG would also cover roadsign icons (I think it does; it was certainly intended to cover any such usage of symbols and seals especially their abuse as image cruft – and especially especially in the main prose of articles rather than in tables and lists – though much of the detailed material is flag-specific). Anyway, that aside, WP:FLAG is ready to roll as far as I can determine. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:56, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
The more I look into it, the more of a problem I have with WP:ELG. Curious if this is shared by others. It was written by one person and designated a guideline after only three weeks, with not a single other person editing it. Since then it has has a very small editorship who have seemingly been developing it in a vacuum, without any regard to or awareness of how it would integrate with other guidelines. I believe its conflicts with WP:MOSFLAG, which has been building genuine consensus, including a WP:VPP proposal, for 6 months, are more serious than I initially thought. Its principal editors seem to believe that the template atop ELG vs. the template atop MOSFLAG actually means something important and that ELG automatically trumpts MOSFLAG (they don't seem to understand that consensus is consensus and random stuff without consensus except among members of a single wikiproject isn't consensus, and that a template doesn't change this). I'm not sure whether to MfD this (for merge into MOSNUM, to the extent useful to the general editing population, which is very little, with the how-to minutiae moved to a Wikipedia:WikiProject U.S. Highways subpage as an {{ essay}} for the benefit of highway article specialist editors; the bulk of it simply isn't MOS-suitable material, but it says it is part of the MOS); just move it to said subpage and make it an essay, and not bother importing any of it into MOSNUM; simply slap it with {{ disputedtag}}; or change it to {{ proposal}} (though it has never been proposed), or just {{ essay}}. I'm about equally concerned with the content of this specific page and with the process/precedent issue here, in which any random person can cobble something together out of left field and call it part of the MOS without anyone challenging that. However, I am now engaged in a dispute on ELG's talk page, so I don't really consider myself in a position to do any of the above, since it will look like a punitive measure. Also, I believe everyone at ELG is editing in good faith and they have put a lot of work into it rather recently, ergo I wouldn't advocate MfD'ing it for outright deletion. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 03:47, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
(Outdent)I take SMcCandlish's summary comments about this subpage as entirely in good faith. I've always looked in wonderment upon the title in the list of subpages at the top of MOS, but never investigated it to learn why such an eccentricly narrow field was appropriate as a Manual of Style. I agree that it is an inducement to others to bring to prominence their pet topic through MOS status (and I mean nothing personal by saying this—I appreciate that effort has gone into the highway page). In addition, the subpage is not well written and shows problems of uneven and inappropriate tone.
I found the specific discussion that led to it being moved: [2], User talk:Northenglish/Archive 5#WP:USRD/ELG, User talk:Matt Yeager#WP:USRD/ELG . -- NE2 11:19, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
This looks to be nothing more than a project guideline and should not be considered as part of the MOS. older ≠ wiser 11:56, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
(ec) Look, we just want a standard for exit lists so we don't get a bunch of totally inconsistent tables and even bulleted lists on all sorts of pages. I personally don't care what it's called. So move it back to the project, to Wikipedia:Exit list guide or whatever, all we want is to have a consistent set of rules that can be applied to exit lists in highway articles. I thought that the Manual of Style was to provide a home for such standards. I'm sure whoever moved it here thought the same thing. Also, with all the hand-wringing over how it's not globalised, I don't see anyone from outside the U.S. stepping up and actually fixing it. We'd be happy to help normalise it to have global terms that don't clash with the U.S. usage (that is prevent the globalisation changes from altering the intended meaning). I live in Missouri and I've never been to the UK; I haven't a bloody clue what needs to be done. Also, calling this an essay is horribly inaccurate, because as I understand it essays express one person's opinion and are most prose. This has full support of just about everyone at WP:USRD, so don't say there's not a consensus for it. The reason there's no discussion involving the "greater community" is because the greater community won't use it most of the time. I will devote time (taken away from bringing an article up to GA) to develop a glossary of terms used in the document to assist editors who would like to globalise this document. — Scott5114 ↗ 21:44, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
I have edited throughout MOS to get rid of "spell out", which was over-used and imprecise. There was always a clearer way to express things, so I did just that. I looked at this, along the way:
General rule
*In the body of an article, single-digit whole numbers (from zero to nine) are given as words; numbers of more than one digit are generally rendered as figures, or as words if they are expressed in one or two words (sixteen, eighty-four, two hundred, but 3.75, 544, 21 million).
Now, I must have missed something. Forgive me: I was out of action at Wikipedia for several weeks. Was there really a consensus that the 9–10 boundary was so important? (Why?) But what I really have difficulty with is this part:
numbers of more than one digit are generally rendered as figures, or as words if they are expressed in one or two words (sixteen, eighty-four, two hundred...
Where, pray tell, does that come from? Interpreting strictly, both 10 and ten are right in text, right? (And 20 and twenty, ninety-nine and 99, and so on). By the rule as it stands, sentences like these would be permissible:
From nine to 11 she learned flute, and from 10 to fifteen she learned Latin.
Between eight hundred and 1450 satellites pose a risk to manned flight; or some estimates between 1540 and three thousand.
Really? Rethink! – Noetica♬♩ Talk 07:19, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
There doesn't seem to be any surviving rationale for that subpage to exist. Every topic covered in it is covered in MOS proper, and all that needs to be done is for some specifics to be merged in from the subpage. As a separate document, it is falling out-of-synch with the main MOS, and its talk page is simply a magnet for FAQs to be re-asked and for debates to fragment into "different parents to ask" to use the metaphor explored in detail at WP:CONSENSUS. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:20, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
No, No, No! Not just no, but hell no! I've already opposed it above, but didn't know then what I know now.
I am fuming, livid, totally pissed off.
I just figured out how the guidelines for non-breaking spaces got changed without discussion. In this edit on Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers) subpage, User:Tony1 implemented a major rewrite, including a total rewrite of non-breaking spaces guidance.
Then, less than two days later, before anybody had a chance to digest his changes and see if they were worthwhile, and discuss them, he moved his rewrite about non-breaking spaces here, to the main page.
Anybody looking at that move sees, at least in regard to non-breaking spaces, that he merely copied exactly what was at MOSNUM. So he sneaked it in here, craftily avoiding any discussion on the (dates and numbers) subpage, and avoiding any discussion here on this page. Gene Nygaard 07:53, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
There is already a rather silly number of (seemingly) region-specific subguidelines. Some of them are not even what they purport to be. For example, the one that is allegedly about China-related topics is not about that at all but about the Chinese language. I propose refactoring this entire mess into two instead of a dozen+ subpages (before that turns into 4 dozen), each with short sections pertaining to the region/language in question, with cross-references between them. The two proposed are: one on foreign languages, and one on political disputes. The former would discuss handling of Chinese, Korean, Russian and other non-Latinate character set material, and the latter on issues to be congnizant of that have POV-inflaming potential (Londonderry vs. Derry, etc.) I think that each of the two could begin with generic/overall sections that elaborate on what MOS already says about that subject, and then have sections for specific countries and other areas. So the language one would have a bit about English vs. Irish Gaelic placenames under ==Irish== and conclude with a cross-ref to the ==Ireland== section in the politics guideline, about avoiding PoV disputes like the Derry issue (and that in turn would xref to the language one). — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:31, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
(Outdent) So you're saying that you'd resist scrutiny of your page, then? That is what an audit would amount to. Hmmm ... the first one I visited for a look-see— Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Thailand-related articles)—has, guess what, an "inactive" tag. Why, then, is it listed at MOS? The prose is faulty, there are digressions from MOS guidelines, and the tone is uneven.
The one on Ethiopia is quite well-written, but is not long and is very narrow in its audience. I wonder whether MOSes on Sudan- and Kenya-related articles will pop up, and if they do, whether a merger would be productive.
The Japan-related article opens with a delicious morsel: "The English Wikipedia is an English-language encyclopedia." Later, "English grammar rules", which is in the same self-ironic vein as "pronounciation". It could do with scrutiny, but I must say that it's substantial, contains good information, and is apparently regularly edited.
My first impression is that the quality and maintenance of these subpages varies considerably. That is why the MOS project needs to keep tabs on its daughters, irrespective of defensive reactions by their owners. Tony (talk) 15:45, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
I think this can basically be closed as "no consensus" for now. I'd like to see what comes out of WT:COUNCIL, then after that settles out in a few months, revisit this issue. Some of us are convinced that the profusion of micro-topical guidelines about languages/regions is a Bad Thing. Those who disagree are unconvinced, but clearly cannot counter-convince either, so we have an impasse for now. Maybe the eventual solution to he WikiProject guidelines overall issue will change the nature of the situation. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:23, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
As a road editor, I invite "scrutiny" on WP:ELG. Please look it over and make sure that it complies with the MOS, after I finish applying the changes discussed on the talk page in a day or two. -- NE2 12:22, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
Back on 28 September I posted a merge tag on MOSHEAD, but neglected to post a corresponding tag here; I've now done this. The Headings subpage contained little extra information to what was already here, and the recent overhaul of the first two sections (Now "Article titles, headings and sections") has made this redundancy clearer. All that remains is MOSHEAD's little point about floating the table of contents, which in any case links to Help:Section#Floating the TOC. I've suggested that MOSHEAD be deleted in about a week's time. Tony (talk) 11:36, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
Back onto the MOSHEAD issue (presuming that PMA was referring to another page, not MOSHEAD)—it's about time the merger was acknowledged in the deletion of MOSHEAD. How is this done? Tony (talk) 04:00, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
See merge and rename proposals at end of Wikipedia talk:Trivia sections. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:46, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
The Images section doesn't say anything about panoramas, which are possible using template:wide image (see Denver, Colorado for two examples). Do we want to make a definitive statement in MOS about use of full width panoramas? I've started a thread at talk:Denver, Colorado#Panoramas? about the ones that are there, but it seems like a broader issue. -- Rick Block ( talk) 00:57, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
I set out to made a small change to the section on ellipses. But then I discovered that an important part of it needs radical surgery. Rather than cite how it goes right now, I present how it would look if we were simply to clarify the recommendations and give examples that reflect them:
*A space is inserted either side of the ellipsis, except where the ellipsis follows a period, in which case no spaces are inserted. To prevent an ellipsis from wrapping to the beginning of a line, use a non-breaking space (
...) before it instead of a normal space.Examples: "in the middle of a sentence where punctuation does not occur ... "; "after a comma, ... "; "a semicolon; ... "; "a colon: ... "; "or at the end of a sentence ... ."; "or after a sentence that ends with a period...."; "or after an abbreviation ending in a period, e.g...."; "rarely, in a question ... ?"; "and even more rarely, before an exclamation mark ... !".
Where did such arbitrary recommendations come from? They are bizarre. I will be happy to rewrite all this, but I would like to see others' comments first.
– Noetica♬♩ Talk 23:11, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
... .
formatting of elipsis + period? I read a lot and I don't think I've ever seen that in my life. Only ...
and ....
, with the latter seeming to be chiefly American. Also be aware that the usual spaced style raises some of the same issues as end punctuation and quotations; if this style were used it would need to be Content1.& ... Content2
in cases of a quoted sentence ending, material being skipped, and more material following that, and so forth. Using 4 dots with no space just avoids that issue entirely. —
SMcCandlish [
talk] [
cont] ‹(-¿-)›
05:05, 19 October 2007 (UTC)Concerned that triple periods representing pauses in speech ellide nothing, and are confusing if integrated into the "Elipses" section solely because they have in common with real ellipsis punctuation just the triple dots (not the spaces, and not the square brackets). That is why I put the guideline about pause dots (or whatever they should be called) almost as an aside at the end, untitled. I find it confusing under a title now, interceding information about ellipses proper.
Also concerned at the example: Her long rant continued: "How do I feel? How do you think I... look, this has gone far enough! [...] I want to go home!". I find the roman "think" confusing—is it coincidental, or does it have something to do with the point being made? If not, let's smooth it out so readers are presented just with the point of this guideline. Tony (talk) 07:30, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Coming back to this Ellipses section after a couple weeks, we see that it still has structural flaws, at least one example that is not in accord with the recommendations given, incomplete advice about retaining original punctuation from quoted material (retain original spacing, or just all original punctuation marks?), and more problems. When these elementary matters of housekeeping are fixed, preferably by those who introduced the relevant changes, perhaps those interested can rationally address the question of ellipses again.
– Noetica♬♩ Talk 22:50, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes I know they both show the Union Jack, (and I figured no one would object to my changes, as a result). Yet I'm being disputed and reverted, the flagicon link should be flagicon|UK (respecting a British boxers full nationality), not flagicon|GBR which does not. The last time I checked, Northern Ireland was included in the UK. GoodDay 14:10, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
Very occasionally, when I have made a change to an article to bring it into line with WP:MOS, I have been challenged by another editor who claims that a certain project does things differently. I am not sure how best to reply to such situations.
It seems to me that Wikipedia should be cohesive and local guidelines should only resolve matters not already covered by top-level guides. If separate projects are to have their own special-case exceptions to guidelines should they not first get a consensus for such an inconsistency here?
Thoughts? Gaius Cornelius 21:43, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
After extended discussion, to be effective, the consensus decision making process must close. [I.e., after a guideline is proposed and accepted by the community, it is designated as a guideline and considered accepted by the community; it's designation as a guideline is not open to random or piecemeal dispute, but would need to be taken to a policy re-examination process like RFC or more likely VPP to be considered suddenly not a Wikipedia consensus-reflecting document. The applicability of its particular recommendations could also be challenged that way, or more commonly by gaining a more local consensus to modify it. Simply ignoring it doesn't work.] In many Wikipedia decision making processes, such as Wikipedia:Articles for deletion or Wikipedia:Requests for adminship, an administrator or bureaucrat "closes" the discussion by evaluating the arguments, considering which alternatives have more support and announces a decision, which may be "no consensus", an outcome which, depending on the context, usually has definite consequences. In other, less structured, situations, as in the case of how to structure the titles of television episodes, there is no formal closer. [I.e. the lack of an official closer doesn't mean that the decision hasn't been arrived at.] Nevertheless, considering the alternatives proposed, the extended discussion engaged in, expressions of preference, there is a result which should be respected. [I.e., a Wikipedia-wide guideline was in fact formulated and accepted by consensus, and it doesn't just go away because someone has a bone to pick.] Absent formal closing, it is the responsibility of users to evaluate the process and draw appropriate conclusions. [I.e., if there wasn't anything procedurally wrong with the process, conclude that consensus was reached and that it would have to be changed, which is different from alleging that consensus was not reached.]"
OK, so we seem to have gone full circle on a question that I think is of central importance. Thank you to all the contributors, but I am still confused. I hope all will excuse me if I try putting the question again in a slightly different way:
And, if that question cannot be definitively answered, I must hesitantly ask:
Thanks. Gaius Cornelius 13:04, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
Should names of books be italicised? What about Bible, Talmud etc? Chesdovi 13:45, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
We have some problems at both
Stanislavski's 'system' (beginning with its name) and
Method acting. In both cases,
use-mention distinction is pretty confused, and editors at the former insist on always writing 'system'
because that's how S. preferred to write it. My contention is that this article must be at
Stanislavsky System, and be referred to as the Stanislavsky System
as a proper noun, and as Stanislavski's system
, the system
, his system
as a non-proper noun. S. can be quoted directly as calling it "my 'system'", with the scare-quotes and lower case he preferred, but despite the fact that theatre publications prefer to also use that scare-quoting, WP is under no such obligation and should do what it always does. WP should not use the Stanislavski 'system'
or Stanislavski's 'system'
. Scare-quoting like this implies a leading "so-called" or "alleged", and using the scare-quoted version in this manner strongly implies a Wikipedia point-of-view about the system, which we
can't do. Similarly, the
Method acting article uses a capitalized Method
or the Method
all over the place, even when it is not being used a proper noun, and editors there are highly resistant to fixing this, because they are used to the (grammatically incorrect) usage in the theatrical press and are simply failing to see the distinction. There are usages in that article where the capitalization is appropriate, but the Method
is an informal colloquialism just like the 'system'
, not a formal proper noun, so all cases of the Method
in that article (other than its mention as an alt. term in the lead) should be Method acting
(assuming that phrase is always a proper noun; I'm not personally certain that it is) or the Strasberg Method
. I think the MOS should directly address this kind of thing in the section on philosophies and theories. We need better examples in there. Also, it's not getting across to people at the S. article that even where it is approproriate to use S.'s scare-quoting, in WP we do this as "system"
, not 'system'
(S. used single quotes because he was European, and at least one editor insists that we have to keep doing it that way; same editor also seems not to understand that we don't use single-quotes for mention cases generally, but either italics, double-quotes, or single-quotes-inside-double-quotes, but I'm trying to explain that to him.) I saw a very similar case somewhere in a religious context, in which an "in-universe" term was used in place of the formal one, in a way not appropriate for an encyclopedia. (My reference to "in-universe" is also a hint that this problem has occurred before in articles on fiction series, and been resolved there; I don't see any rationale for not applying the encyclopedic language principle behind that precedent to articles outside of fiction.) —
SMcCandlish [
talk] [
cont] ‹(-¿-)›
02:12, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
The Stanislavski System: The Professional Training of an Actor] (a standard text) and Encyclopedia Britannica. older ≠ wiser 12:46, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Biblical or biblical? Should Wikipedia adopt a style guideline favoring one over the other when used as an adjective referring to the Bible (e.g., Biblical scholar, biblical exegesis, Biblical foundation, biblical support, etc.)?
Please comment on the RFC at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Bible#RFC: "biblical" or "Biblical". Thanks — DIEGO talk 22:20, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
*Scriptures are capitalized but not italicized (for example, the names of the Qurʾan, the Talmud, the Granth Sahib, and the Bible). When the is used, it is not capitalized. Some derived adjectives are capitalized by convention, some are not (biblical, but normally Koranic); for others, check a dictionary appropriate to the topic, and be consistent in an article.
The link "How Users Read on the Web" contains lots of interesting data, but hello, no reference to the study (there is a link to an eye-movement study at the bottom, but who knows what that is). I'd like to be presented with a few details of the study on that page.
Then we're confronted with a link to an invitation to buy, clothed in an academic reference to a "conference": "Full-day tutorial on content usability and writing for the Web at the User Experience 2007 conference in Las Vegas and Barcelona".
It's a pity, but I don't think this link should be on MOS. Any thoughts? Tony (talk) 01:34, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
I've removed it. Tony (talk) 03:59, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I have been bold and changed:
to
I think this gives editors a clearer idea of how to solve disputes, i.e. by looking at the literature. Tim Vickers 18:50, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
[Comment and my reply shifted to the end:]
I agree with Tim Vickers's proposed rule. I think it is more important to show how the units are used in the real world rather than obsessing over BIPM or NIST recommendations (basically, be descriptive rather than prescriptive). In general, whatever value is being quoted in an article has to come from a source. I suggest that, by default, we should use the same units that were used by the source, except when there is a compelling reason to do otherwise (for example, if it is a historic source with really archaic units, or for consistency when quoting values from different sources.) -- Itub 13:28, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
The new guidline will have consequences for theoretical physics articles on wikipedia. Most of the wiki articles use SI units to make them better accesible to the lay public even though almost no one in this field uses SI units. But I don't think we need to worry about this, as people who do not understand units won't understand much of physics anyway. Count Iblis 20:36, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Most editors feel the revised wording reflects what we already do and provides a simpler way of resolving disputes than the previous version. With the exception of Gene Nygaard, who has now been blocked for incivility and disruptive editing, I think there is a broad consensus to adopt this wording. Thanks to everybody who commented on this. Tim Vickers 17:05, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
There aren't any rules on bolding. We should reach a consensus on these rules. LuisGomez111 20:31, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm working through both gradually, because the texts have changed in the months since the more commonly used guidelines in MOSNUM were duplicated here. This has entailed changes to both. I hope that I've made no substantive changes to either.
There's an unresolved issue: the last two points in MOSNUM on "Dates", which I've numbered for convenience, are:
Both points are absent from MOS and require deliberation here. I'm in favour of the first, but I suspect that there may be objections: it need consensus. The second I've always found problematic, since the 1700s will mean the 18th century to many of our readers. I'd prefer to remove this point.
Your opinions will be appreciated. Tony (talk) 02:43, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
The exception is ordinals for centuries, which are always expressed in figures (the 5th century CE).
I rather think the Oxford manual of style favours using words for centuries. Rich Farmbrough, 10:28 22 October 2007 (GMT).
(Outdent) Amateur? Noetica, FAs are required to be written and formatted to a professional standard, and they set the goal (even if not achieved) for all articles. WP won't survive on a highly competitive Internet unless it does aspire to professional standards. WP is heaving with academics and ex-academics: promising material.
My reasons that the guidelines should be changed to accept either nine/10 or ten/11 as the boundary, provided consistent are as follow.
*Within a context or a list, style should be consistent (either There were 5 cats and 32 dogs or There were five cats and thirty-two dogs, not There were five cats and 32 dogs).
We also need to think through whether to do something about the "or as words if they are expressed in one or two words" bit. Tony (talk) 02:23, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Hello. User:Caroig's {{ Geobox}} template shows up technical categories in all articles which use it, see e.g. Warta Bolesławiecka and Category:Geobox Settlement, Poland which shows up. Caroig said he didn't find any official policy saying that such technical categories in the article namespace are prohibited. I asked him to alter the Geobox code but he didn't do that. Can you point me to proper policy, please? - Darwinek 22:14, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
Nominated to WP:CFD --> here. Please vote and express your opinion. - Darwinek 20:28, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Charon's status as a satellite of Pluto is rather uncertain. I do not mind the example much as it stands now, but perhaps it would be better if it could be changed to one which might produce fewer disputes in the future? Waltham, The Duke of 15:42, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
I've skimmed the archives, but this seems not to have come up before; please correct me if I'm wrong.
The MOS lists only usage for non-breaking spaces: between numerical and non-numerical elements (though implicitly also lists the space in "sq ft"). What do you think about using it in "St. John"? In my opinion, this is valid (and indeed, the MOS doesn't forbid it). However, in an article like Johannes Passion the source will become very cluttered if one were to replace all instances of "St. John" with "St. John". What are your opinions?
Regardless of this specific example, I think the MOS would benefit from expanding the section on usage of the non-breaking space. Regards, Phaunt 21:25, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
As for the hard space (an easier name than non-breaking space), it is often essential in HTML documents because of the unpredictable ways such documents get displayed (affected by browser, viewing settings, size of window, and style and size of font). This problem is compounded at Wikipedia, since our editors are uneven in skill and diligence. Dynamic pages indeed!
We should, I think, educate editors about hard spaces and similar resources, pressing home the general theory behind them. Merely prescribing specific occasions for their use both looks mindlessly legalistic, and works against acceptance and recall. The theory of hard spaces is not rocket science: let's have a better section showing the techniques and motivations for their use – at WP:MOS where it belongs. We should press for an improved way of inputting hard spaces in Wikipedia editing, too.
All that said, we can sometimes reduce the need for hard spaces, making life easier for everyone. Why, for example, must there be a space after c. (for "circa") before a date? Not only does it need to be hard itself, it often calls into being other hard spaces – before an en dash, for example (see discussion above). Oxford Guide Style (OGS) wants c. to be set close the number that follows it, presumably for a reason of this sort.
Assign a normal qwerty-keyboard character (or better, a pair of them) to stand for a hard space. One suggestion is the underused and almost useless backtick, or for perfect clarity two of them ( `` ). Everyone has ready access to these from a standard keyboard, rather than having to hunt around under the edit box every time the hard space is needed. Typing, recognising, and searching for `` is easy, and this makes compliance highly likely. The change is not extravagant. It is a proper response to a serious defect that experienced editors have diagnosed, which impedes sound and efficient editing, and therefore compromises the quality of articles. Such a unique innovation is justified in the case of the hard space, because this is the single most beneficial improvement we could suggest, when we consider the many ways we have called for the hard space to be used – in ordinary writing and editing, along with standard punctuation.
The whole non-breaking spaces with numbers is nonsense now. It slaps them in where they aren't needed in any case. It doesn't mention the cases where they are needed. It has also expanded in scope from what it used to be. Was that discussed? And, as Phaunt points out, it also includes an example which does not comport with the stated rule.
Noetica is also pushing a national varieties of English button with her "St John" recommendation. Gene Nygaard 07:05, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Comment: No, it is not a good idea. This project page is getting too long as it is. The edit section even warns people: "This page is 108 kilobytes long". If we merge other articles into it, it might collapse, and all of the information on fixing articles to meet Wikipedia's quality standards would be lost. Wilhelmina Will 00:28, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I figured someone would notice my comment sooner down here. Wilhelmina Will 00:33, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
On page 278 of "The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage" in the section "PUNCTUATION WITH QUOTATION MARKS," it states: "Periods and commas, in American usage, always go inside the closing quotation marks, regardless of grammatical logic." Now if Wikipedia states that the opposite is true and disregards this common usage, it leads me to understand why teachers and professors refuse to let students reference Wikipedia; it promotes illiteracy.
- 69.231.5.43 02:32, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
With national spellings, it is easy to tell the difference at a glance, one either knows that "centre" is a spelling mistake or Commonwealth English. The trouble with punctuation and quotes is that it can be difficult to tell which style is being used. Indeed as Wikipedia is optimised for readers, the chances are that many will get it wrong even if there is an in house style, unless they take the trouble to read the MOS, which is unlikely unless they are Wikipedia editors. -- Philip Baird Shearer 07:58, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
See WP:CONSENSUS#"Asking the other parent": "It is very easy to create the appearance of a changing consensus simply by asking again and hoping that a different and more sympathetic group of people will discuss the issue. This, however, is a poor example of changing consensus, and is antithetical to the way that Wikipedia works. Wikipedia's decisions are not based on the number of people who showed up and voted a particular way on a particular day. It is based on a system of good reasons." PS: MOS does not deny that two systems "exist", it simply prefers one over the other for precisely the same reasons that technical, scientific and other publications do so: logical punctuation is more precise. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:48, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
The current situation regarding which delimiting marks to use in the Genres sections of Template:Infobox Musical artist has led to edit warring and breaking of the three-revert rule by various editors. I would like a wider opinion of this to see if some improvement to the situation can be made. A discussion about this took place on the WikiProject Albums talkpage in June, which concluded that commas were preferable. A question about which to use was raised in April, starting the Genres section on the talkpage of Infobox Musical artist, which started to lean towards both line breaks and commas being acceptable, or line breaks being better. The current discussion on the talkpage of Infobox Musical artists started in July and has been continuing since. As yet no resolution has been made and meanwhile, editors are reverting each other over the preferences. As this is a style issue, I would like some input from this neck of the woods to see if the situation can be resolved. Thanks.-- Alf melmac 11:11, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
As a couple people have already noted...this debate is not taking place here. The real debate has been on for the longest time here: Template_talk:Infobox_Musical_artist#Standardizing_genre_delimiters. Please take your opinions to that page. Thanks. Navnløs 21:49, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
I believe one of the example pages in our project article needs disambiguating.
The current text is *Generally, right-alignment is preferred to left- or center-alignment. (Example: Race).
I believe this possibly should be disambiguated to: *Generally, right-alignment is preferred to left- or center-alignment. (Example: Race (classification of human beings)). Alice.S 08:36, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
I was looking at an article tonight that seemed to be sacrificing readability in order to adhere to the 'subject bolded/nearest the beginning of the sentence' structure. Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy is the article.
"The Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy concerns the publication of a series of diaries..."
is the start of the lede, which is awkward.
Now, I know if the title is descriptive, it doesn't need to be placed/bolded, but I'm also wondering if it might be acceptable to improve the language of the sentence by saying something like:
"Scott Thomas Beauchamp caused controversy after the publication of a series of diaries..."
That is less strained linguistically, but splitting the subject even by one word might not be the best option, either (the whole article needs a rewrite, it just reminded me that I'd hit a similar article a few days ago, and also thought that the language sounted awkward, for the same reason; often the subject, even while a noun, just doesn't fit nicely into the format. Unlike a couple days ago, I had time to ask this today ;-) )-- Thespian 08:51, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
Can I get some consensus that scrollbars for every section of an article is not acceptable, despite its not being explicitly discussed? See [3] and User_talk:Cohesion#Article_page_Scroll_Boxes. Thanks. - cohesion 12:51, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
The idea that certain things taken from an original source should not be edited for (at least some aspects of) style is a fairly basic principle, but it's one that possibly not everyone is aware of; see this discussion about dashes in the titles references being altered (things like case are also relevant). It might be a good idea to include something mentioning that there are certain things which should not be changed to meet our style guidelines, like the titles of references, and direct quotations for another example. Any suggestions on language? -- bainer ( talk) 00:33, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Generally, a direct quotation should not be altered (although there are exceptions, including the modernizing of archaic text and using only one space after the end of a sentence regardless of the original spacing). However, citing a reference is not a direct quotation of the reference's title, nor is it intended to be. All style guides and guides to bibliographic citation prescribe how a reference is to be cited, generally without regard to the title's original published format, and Wikipedia's MOS should not be the lone exception. Like most style guides, we render English language titles in title case, even though the original may be in all caps or large and small caps, and even if titles or subtitles are lower case. We render titles of certain types types of works in italic type (e.g., books, feature films, albums of recorded music), regardless of the original title's format. We render titles of other types of works in roman type between quotation marks (e.g., articles, poems, songs), again regardless of the original title's format. (The Library of Congress capitalizes only the first word and proper nouns in a title—do you really want to tell these experts that they are not justified in "altering" the original title?) We use these conventions (when we actually follow them) to give our text a consistent appearance and also to convey meaning: the reader knows that David Berlinski's A Tour of the Calculus is a book because the title is in italic, and that his "The Deniable Darwin" is an article (or essay) because it is in roman. And we use our punctuation conventions, which are matters of typography rather than faithful reproduction of the original. It really is not so complicated, and should not be so controversial. Finell (Talk) 10:42, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
IMO, the changes Noetica is talking about are closer to typesetting than to punctuation and shouldn't cause any trouble. You wouldn't worry about quoting in Verdana a text that you read in Times, would you? ;-) -- Itub 21:39, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
Is MOS a little strict in its disapproval of its usage? A user has rightly replaced "BC/BCE" in MOS, unfortunately with a hyphen rather than "or". Are there not instances where either of two items is used, habitually, which are neatly coupled with a slash? Tony (talk) 21:39, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
Do we have a guideline about what types of templates can be used as headers? - Peregrine Fisher 01:33, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
Please archive this page's old threads and include this and similar comments in the archiving (at least the last two times, the "please archive" topics have remained, which is kind of silly, wasting bandwidth/RAM in the very name of saving it.)
This page is getting so long that it is somewhat (about 50/50 so far for me) causing Firefox/WinXP to crash (totally, taking all windows/tabs with it) when this page is edited or even diffed as a whole unit (this happens automatically any time there is an edit confict, so "just edit one topic" is not an adequate answer). I'd do it myself, but I've already had 4 crashes here when I try to do anything other than edit/create one specific topic and get lucky enough to not have an edit conflict. If this is hitting me, with a 1yo snazzy Dell laptop, it must be wreaking untold carnage among people running old, piecemeal machines with 1MB of RAM or worse. Please archive with extreme prejudice or we'll just be back in crash city in a few days. I.e., if there are no new comments of substance, then file the entire thread. This probably means auto-archive with some software on the first run then human judgement to archive even more. WT:MOS is high-traffic and then some. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:22, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
So does archiving now involve sorting out all of the themes, or can material be dumped into a chronological archive pending allocation by some good person into the themed archival sections? Tony (talk) 01:48, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
Done. Strad ( talk) 23:20, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
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(1) I seek consensus to add the following:
Avoid the use of wordings such as "note that" and "remember that", which change the tenor by directly instructing the readers.
(2) As the invisible comment says, this is probably better in the Abbreviatinos section: " Abbreviations of Latin terms like i.e. and e.g., or use of the Latin terms in full, such as “nota bene”, or “vide infra”, should be left as the original author wrote them. In the main text of articles intended for a general audience, consider spelling out the item in English (“that is”, “for example”).<!-- why is this not in [[#Abbreviations]]?-->
(3) I wonder whether this is better in the Varieties of English section: "Use an unambiguous word or phrase in preference to an ambiguous one. For example, use “other meaning” rather than “alternate meaning” or “alternative meaning”, since alternate means only “alternating” to a British-English speaker, and alternative suggests “nontraditional” or “out-of-the-mainstream” to an American-English speaker. Tony (talk) 01:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
I strongly disagree with your first suggestion. These are rhetorical phrases, and much finely crafted prose uses them freely. I strongly disagree with your third suggestion as well, at least as far as your example goes. "Other meaning" is awkward, and "alternative meaning" will only suggest "nontraditional [sic]" in a slang context. An encyclopedia needs to be written in formal prose. I mildly disagree with your second suggestion. TheScotch 07:44, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Words to avoid covers (1), though that guideline does ramble a bit. I'm not clear what the "Usage" in the "Usage and spelling" section title means. It seems a bit of a mixed bag. I can't see any spelling guidelines in that section either. Colin° Talk 11:33, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
When did not bolding synonyms for a person become the new rule? Or not having it as a standard in MOS? Can I now deBold every synonym in every biography in Wikipedia? See: [ [1]] -- Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 08:50, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
On " Wikipedia:Only make links that are relevant to the context" it says: "As a general rule, do not put links in the bold reiteration of the title in the article's lead sentence or any section title." Following the link given: "from Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Article titles" - I couldn't find an account of this guideline concerning section titles. I found Wikipedia:Lead section#Bold title, which refers only to avoiding links in the bold title words. Does this guideline still apply to section titles, and if so, what's the reasoning behind it? Dan Pelleg 10:43, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
Rich Farmbrough, 12:35 9 October 2007 (GMT).
Hi, I just would like to clarify our usage and capitalization conventions for nobiliary particles. These are the "of" words used in many European languages to denote that the family belongs to the hereditary nobility. Examples might be Charles de Gaulle, Simone de Beauvoir, Max von Laue, Johannes Diderik van der Waals and Lorenzo de' Medici.
My questions are whether we should include the nobiliary particle (de, della, von, van, etc.) whatsoever, and where it should be capitalized. My own preference would be to include it as part of the last name (e.g., "After winning the battle, de Gaulle returned to...") and to capitalize it only when it occurs as the first word in a sentence, e.g., "Van der Waals proposed a modification of the ideal gas law, which von Laue confirmed experimentally..." or (possibly) in a section heading or article title, e.g., ==Della Rovere family==.
I'm sure that this is treated in one or another style manual, but I haven't found it as yet. Any suggestions or clarification would be very welcome — thank you! :) Willow 15:15, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for your help and insights! I never knew all that about the Dutch van. :) Unfortunately, I'm a little unclear on the solution. Do you mean that we should adopt the same custom as the originating country does, e.g., Belgian typography for Belgian names and Dutch typography for Dutch names? It's a minor technical point, I realize; I was just curious whether WP had any consistent policy on such nominal particles. Willow 22:42, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
I didn't know where to post this comment, so please move it to the appropriate page. I noticed that many editors (especially those working on US articles , and obvsiously know intimetly the country) take for granted that the average editor have the same knowledge of the country as them and often omit specifiyng the country in which the article refers to. Examples include:
What Im saying is that editors should be precise when establishing the geographical context of the article in the lead, and indicating the country should be highly recommended.
Note that the same applies for UK-related articles, however when commenting on this issue, editors were strongly opposed to using (for example) Manchester, England, UK or even indicating that it is located in UK. Thank you for your comments. CG 16:29, 29 September 2007 (UTC)
(outdent)A balance is required between the easy, unambiguous identification of a city, and uncluttered brevity for the readers (and even the avoidance of irritants). Where a city is very well-known, let's not go for the formulaic US-address mantra, especially when the country-context is clear. "Chicago", "Los Angeles" and "New York" (when clearly the city), should be well-enough-known to every English speaker in context. Including the state is entirely ephemeral, and the country unnecessary in most cases. Same for "London", unless it's not clearly a UK context and there's a need to disambiguate with "London, Ontario". For less well-known cities/towns, the state would be good, but not the country unless the context gives no help. Triple-bungers might occasionally be necessary (Portland, Maine, US - unless we're already talking about Maine), but they clutter the text.
But please, after the first occurrence in an article, it shouldn't be necessary to tag the name of a city with any state/country ID, should it? Same for links, of course. Tony (talk) 03:37, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
What is the policy or consensus on the structure (alignment) of an article?
I realise that all the articles (that I have visited) are left aligned, but has anyone considered the fact that it may be more encyclopaedia like to have the text 'justified' for some or all of the articles. Anyway, since I am new, I was wondering if someone could tell me there opinion on this matter, as it was just an idea I had. -Jack 04:42, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
Hmmm...For arguments sake, is this your opinion or are u speaking on behalf of everyone? Note: Please don't take my question the wrong way (I do not mean anything by this question, other then the fact that I wish you to expand on what you are saying), I am just wondering how you find it harder to read, when it can make a document (or article) appear more professional (more reliable). -Jack 05:37, 2 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stealth Carbon Eagle ( talk • contribs)
You do realise I am refering to the alignment structure of an article, not some software which helps people build websites for them. Anyway, text justification is done by inserting the following code in the 'edit this page' section (without the brackets) and by appropriately placing the relevant parts where necessary:
(<)div style="text-align: justify;"(>)TEXT(<)/div(>) -Jack 04:28, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
Well, what you have just mentioned leads me to a new question I would like to put forward. Why is it that some articles have a lot of proper references (and citations) and reliable information and yet, some articles (I have also come across) have factual information but few (and sometimes no) citations or references? -Jack 06:29, 2 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stealth Carbon Eagle ( talk • contribs)
Hahaha, well that is a point. But it doesn't really justify the reason for articles being set out like this. Let me give you an example I have come across... Age of Empires III: The War Chiefs - It has factual info, but only 2 references, one of which I added. So, how can you state that it hasen't been referenced yet, when people continue to add stuff to it. Therefore, the information they have obtained will most likely have to have come from a source...however, I do realise that some of the info given is based on gameplay and I will admit that this info cannot be referenced, generally speaking, but besides this how can you justify this? Hahahaha, it should be referenced more like Age of Empires III...I congratulate those who did this and my hat goes off to them, wow, what a lot of effort. Anyway, any comments? - Jack 04:22, 3 October 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Stealth Carbon Eagle ( talk • contribs)
Someone has added this: "It is customary to use we in mathematical derivations; for example: “To normalize the wavefunction, we need to find the value of the arbitrary constant A." In historical fields, it is also customary to use we of the present age as a whole: "The fragments of Menander which have come down to us...".
I do wish that such additions to the text were posted here, even for a day or two, so that they could be improved. Why, for example, wouldn't you just write "The surviving fragments of Menander"? Is there a need for the ellipsis dots? If so, insert a space before them. Why not use the customary formatting for examples in MOS: parentheses, pure and simple?
There's also a faint possibility that some folk might object to the addition. I don't, at first look, but it would be practical and, dare I says it, courteous, to use the expertise of users on this page. It's a collaborative project. And does the Mathematics submanual sing from the same songsheet? It would be nice to be reassured first. Tony (talk) 13:58, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
"Nevertheless, it is sometimes appropriate to use we when referring to an experience that any reader would be expected to have, such as general perceptual experiences. For example, although it might be best to write “When most people open their eyes, they see something”, it is still legitimate to write “When we open our eyes, we see something”.
I see a contradiction between these two sentences as they stand, the section entitled "No common usage in English":
Surely the foreign term should be consistently italicised throughout? BrainyBabe 08:10, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
There seems to be a 'double standard' applied to these articles. For example - British Isles is forbidden at Ireland and Lough Neagh & yet Irish Sea is allowed at Ireland, Great Britain. Why is this so? GoodDay 17:30, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
Why? It might be important, but it's not central to the specific purpose of the MOS. Now it interrupts the flow of sections on style. I think this should go back to where it was. Tony (talk) 02:30, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
Wiki grammar gurus! If you're talking about a band, do you use "is" or "are"? "Iron Maiden is a band", or "Iron Maiden are a band"? Band = noun = is, surely? The members "are", the band "is"... Cardinal Wurzel 08:29, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
I've never heard anyone say anything but "data is", but there you go. You're right about the police. Anyone else? Cardinal Wurzel 09:47, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
I think it's the more the fact that it's the British English way of saying it. Iron Maiden are [sic] an English band. If it reads okay as "are" then it should stay. Cradle of Filth are an English band. It reads fine with "are" and there shouldn't be a problem with that. "Is" and "are" are both correct grammar, but "are" should take precedence being the predominantly British grammatical way of saying it. But that's just my opinion. Scarian Talk 12:06, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
An academic buddy of mine at Bristol University comments "a collective noun is properly given in the singular. Write 'is'. The other usage is commonplace but ghastly." Scarian, this is not a matter of British English versus American English. Anon, there's no question of saying "They was a band". The question is do you say "It was a band" or "They were a band"? Cardinal Wurzel 17:49, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm doing nothing of the sort - I'm saying that the gramatically correct answer is the same in both! Cardinal Wurzel 18:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
Both constructions are very frequent; as others have noted, American English tends toward is and British English tends toward are. I assume the guidelines concerning US vs. UK English in an article still apply. Strad 01:47, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
Thanks, Rich - that's exactly what I needed. Cardinal Wurzel 16:50, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
I'd say scrap the whole debate, and recommend "are" across the board, since it will be correct in American English as well, even if it is somewhat more common to use "is" in A.E. when the band's name sounds somehow more singular. No big opposition to the "leave to to a US/UK distinction" tactic, but why bother? I'm hard pressed to imagine an American editor getting genuinely upset with "ZZ Top are a band from Texas". If anything I have a suspicion that the majority of WP's American editors would prefer "are" to "is" there, that the vast majority of the readership would not mind "are", and that of the probably over-50% of the American readers who if pressed on the matter would prefer "is", only a tiny handful would even notice the difference if it weren't pointed out to them. Meanwhile, use of "is" probably rankles more British/Commonwealth speakers than "are" does Americans and Western Canadians. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:26, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
After a lengthy disagreement today I would like to see a definitive example in the manual of style for the following problem:
IMO the comma is a part of the sentence and not a part ot the program's title. For this reason, the comma should be after the quote. Comments anyone? TinyMark 09:42, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
Correct: | Martha asked, “Are you coming?” |
| |
Correct: | Did Martha say, “Come with me”? |
|
I see this is back, much sooner than I predicted. Can we, this time, deal with the matter soberly, and admit that there are two systems; both are used; and the important thing is to be consistent within an article? Then we can stop discussing this every month. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:42, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
- At one point during Tool's set, Keenan acknowledged his debt to the long-running art rockers: "For me, being on stage with King Crimson is like Lenny Kravitz playing with Led Zeppelin, or Britney Spears onstage with Debbie Gibson."
Hello. I'm new here, but I am not going to abandon everything I learned in school and college on where to put the period and other punctuation marks when quotation marks are involved. You want umpteen students to learn one way in school and another here. That ain't gonna fly. Students do not get it correct all the time in school; now they will see examples of what is taught as incorrect and think it is correct. I will put a period inside the quotation marks if it is an American-related topic. British people, I assume, will put in on the outside. Don't take one argument and turn it into something else. — Bobopaedia 20:43, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
According to CMOS (Chicago), APA, MLA, Merriam-Webster, Associated Press Stylebook, OWL (Purdue U.) and every other style guide I could find, in North America (not just US) periods and commas always (without exception) go inside the closing quotation marks. A Survey of Modern English By Stephan Gramley, Kurt-Michael Pätzold. Routledge, 2004. ISBN 0415300355, explains:
No educator on either side of the Atlantic should ever have to tell a student: "This is the way it is except in Wikipedia." Wikipedia has never been about changing the generally-accepted standards of anything. Where there are two generally-accepted ways to do something, the Wiki rule of thumb is to allow either method, so long as it is consistent within an article. We should show respect for both traditions and ask only for within-article consistency. Highly recommend amending MoS to this effect. Afaprof01 03:17, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm very new to editing, but I find that this sentence should settle the argument: "scientific and technical publications, even in the U.S., almost universally use logical quotation (punctuation outside unless part of the source material), due to its precision". I find that the goal of Wikipedia should be the same to that of scientific and technical publications in regards to precision, eventhough I was taught the typesetter rule in school. My question though, is what system most encyclopedias use? Resu ecrof 21:07, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
It has been a long standing feature of the MoS that it promotes U.S. over US. How long standing can be seen by this proposal to delete the then wording [for those who don't want to follow the link - dated 2004]... "When referring to the United States, please use "U.S."; that is the more common style in that country, is easier to search for automatically, and we want one uniform style on this. When referring to the United States in a long abbreviation (USA, USN, USAF), periods should not be used."
While I have no strong view either way, it has always seemed to me a good thing that the MoS has one, and in this case a long-standing one.
Imagine my surprise when on the 6th of September I was unable to find something I was sure was in the MoS! Perhaps it was in a subpage, but diligent searching revealed nothing. Nor was there recent "talk" of a change, an the history going back yonks did not reveal a likely change. Nonetheless I checked a very old version, and indeed it was there, so I assumed I'd missed the discussion and change. I eventually found the change hidden in the midst of a lot of minor changes here. Clearly this was an error (not mentioned in the comment, but an HTML comeent asks why it's not in the "Abbreviations" section), so I reverted it (with this comment "Acronyms and abbreviations - restoring section that was commented out by Crissov in this ed"), and thought no more of it.
The following day Tony reverted me with "Rv: This needs discussion. At the moment, formatting of "the US" is by consensus for each article; please discuss reasons for imposing this text".
Well I agree such a change needs discussing, which is why I restored the original text! And Tony, I wish you'd told me that you reverted me.
I am restoring once more the status quo, please discuss it here if it needs discussion.
Rich Farmbrough, 09:11 5 October 2007 (GMT).
I'm unsure of the history of whatever MOS used to say about how to format this item, but since I started hanging around MOS, it hasn't prescribed one set of usages and proscribed others. There are a few issues:
Thus, I suggest that MOS continue to remain silent on the issue, so that WPians may dot or not, and abbreviate or spell out regardless of the presence of the names of other countries in the sentence, provided consistency is maintained within each article. Tony (talk) 11:22, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
OK, so you don't mind if MOS says that you can't use US spelling for "kilometre", then. Because that's what it will come to. The suddenly shoved in guideline to use you dot es dot is in conflict with the MOS guidelines on "National varieties". In my variety of English, it's "US", and that's that. This is a blatant attempt to impose some notion of US English on all other varieties, and it's outrageous. I will fight this until the end of the earth. In fact, tomorrow, I'll be changing the guidline for the spelling of "kilometre", to insist on the non-US spelling. Tony (talk) 15:36, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
(Outdent) Sorry, but my variety of English uses "US", except perhaps in all-caps (not all that common in normal text, now that we we've dispensed with typewriters). You can't come along and tell people who speak and write in different varieties of English that they must now use the AmEng term, when in real-life they see and write differently. Otherwise, I'll make a pronouncement that you must use "kilometre", not "kilometer"'. Same deal. WP is already used to both versions, and I hate to say this, but quite a few Americans use the undotted variety, not wanting to fuss with the distinction between the ugly you dot es dot in normal text, and the undotted USA, USAF, UK, and the rest.
The first issue is a reason to retain the delineation of "American English" in the MOS guideline; the second is a reason to soften it from a "you must use" tone. Tony (talk) 01:12, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
I personally prefer "U.S." to "US" as it is more distinct from the pronoun "us." I find it annoying to read "us" every time someone refers to the United States. Also, it is standard in legal writing to punctuate "U.S." Whichever is preferred, there is another issue that is not addressed here that I believe deserves note: when is it appropriate to use U.S./US and when should the country name be spelled out? In legal writing, U.S. can only be used as an adjective. Unites States is used otherwise. For example, "he is from the United States" would be correct while, "he is from the U.S." would not. Is the MoS willing to offer guidance on the matter?
Italicization is restricted to what should properly be affected by italics, and not the surrounding punctuation.
I'm not sure this is wise, especially for semicolons, which look dreadful on default IE settings, especially after y or f; while sentences can be recast, it is a cost to do so to solve a purely typographical problem. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:45, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
My typographer friend reminds me that this is a general problem: italic punctuation has survived because italic text jangles with roman punctuation in general. (There are exceptions, like the period; but is it worth insisting on the roman instead of the italic period? How many pixels do they differ on? Sample follows, with the italic on the left.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:58, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
Thanks to Noetica for his recent copy-edits to MOS. However, they have brought up again a niggling issue that was raised by SMcCandlish only last week on this page, and which received but one response apart from mine ( an extremely negative one for which the reasoning escaped me). Insisting on italics for words as words requires writers and readers to be aware of an all-too-subtle boundary between noun phrases and larger chunks of text. A whole clause clearly does not fit the ambit of words as words, and under the current rule should be marked by quotes, not italics.
Following the current rule, only the last item (Old Man Winter) should be italicised:
Seasons, in almost all instances, are lowercase: “This summer was very hot”; “The winter solstice occurs around December 22”; “I’ve got spring fever”. When personified, season names may function as proper nouns, and they should then be capitalized: “I see that Spring is showing her colors”; Old Man Winter.
But all examples are now italicised. This looks better and avoids the need for readers to wonder about this fussy grammatical distinction, but goes against the current rule.
Above, SMcCandlish called for a compromise proposal: that both styles be allowed, as long as consistency is maintained within each article. This would allow editors to get rid of the need to observe this awkward grammatical distinction it they wish, by using quotations marks for all examples. The quote-marks method is widely used in all varieties of English.
Existing text in MOS:
Words as words
- Italics are used when citing a word or letter (see use–mention distinction). For example, “The term panning is derived from panorama, a word coined in 1787.” “The most commonly used letter in English is e.” Here, word includes noun phrases (e.g., the brown dog).
Proposed text:
Words as words
- Words discussed as words are indicated by either quotation marks (The term "panning" is derived from “panorama”) or by italics (The term panning is derived from panorama). Be consistent within an article.
Tony (talk) 02:17, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
A good example of where quotes instead of italics would be better, from WP:MOSNUM:
Converted values should use a level of precision similar to that of the source value; for example, the Moon is 380,000 kilometres (240,000 mi) from Earth, not ... (236,121 mi).
It's basically impossible to tell that the elipsis is part of the example without quotation marks; in fact, the lack of them makes the passage look completely weird. There are many, many more examples like this I could come up with (I see about 10 per day), but the point ought to already be clear: By using quotation marks as the delimiter of examples and words-as-mentioned rather than -as-used, we actually delimit the passage in question, while italics often do not (except in the source code, which is of no relevance to the general readership). — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 16:26, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
In an edit summary somewhere, Gene Nygard hit upon another issue. When we mention rather than use units we are italicizing them, and this runs at least some risk of confusing users, on two levels. Gene's point was that they could be confused with variables, which are often italicized in mathematical contexts. I think a bigger risk is that some editors may well believe that they are to be italicized in articles, e.g. "43 cm". Using quotes for mention of units would solve this problem. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 16:43, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
A classic case of the confusion italics cause when used this way: Editor did a revert based on the mistaken impression that the italics in the case in question were being used to delimit words-as-mentioned, when they were in fact being used for their main purpose, emphasis: diff — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 16:52, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
Where known, use terminology that subjects use for themselves (self-identification). This can mean using the term an individual uses for himself or herself, or using the term a group most widely uses for itself.
A completely different idea is that this could be handled the same way that non-transgender-related alternate names are. Typically (there's no rule about this, I just see it), it goes something like this:
I.e., the original name is used up until the new name was assumed, and use of either is avoided in the lead's additional sentences. Works just fine. Pronouns would be adapted in the same way to the extent that they should be used at all; it is quite easy to write around them. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:10, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
The following MOS guideline was added today, in an edit with the associated comment "Merging "Article titles" with 'Sections and headings'—more logical)":
I'm not sure when it would be considered non-helpful, as "helpful" is somewhat vague as a requirement. I think this is a new style guideline, derived from guidance in Wikipedia:Citing_sources#Maintaining a separate "References" section in addition to "Notes", which said only that separate sections can be helpful, not that they must be helpful. Personally, I put non-footnote citations (which I use if they apply to a big part of the article) in a References section, and inline footnoted citations (which I use for a quote, sentence, or other limited part of the article) in a Notes section, even if there is only one entry under the Notes and/or References headings. - Agyle 19:38, 6 October 2007 (UTC)
(Outdent) I've got the loud shouting in edit summaries from Timneu22, which doesn't impress me. S/he is insisting on a sequence of headings in this part of MOS that take you logically through the sequence a reader meets in reading an article. Article titles, First sentences, Section headings. It has some advantages, but one big disadvantage in that the guidelines for the wording of both article titles and section headings are identical, except for one (Avoid restating wording on a higher level in the heading hierarchy). As Timneu has loudly insisted, the guidelines are illogically strewn between the two. Now it's OK to use "You" in an article title, where not part of a proper noun? And "The" and "A" as opening word? And now you can insert links into article titles.
And it's unfortunate to trot out the same points twice in the space of the three opening sections of MOS. I'll have a go at fixing this while retaining the current structure. Tony (talk) 01:25, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
It seems to me that there is an overwhelming trend away from using both, and a strong one away from using a Notes section at all except in article with genuine non-reference footnotes. I think it could be time to delineate more clearly between them: If all of the footnotes are reference citations, even with commentary, use References. If there are both and different footnoting systems are used (e.g. <ref> for refs and one of the footnote templates for notes of a non-ref nature, use both, and use only Notes if both are used and both use the same footnoting system. Agree with keeping notes between See also and References. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I find two things unclear with the ellipses policy:
Tristan Schmelcher 21:15, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
This page is again causing Firefox/WinXP to crash due to its bulk, on systems that don't have gobs and gobs of RAM (100%-repeatable crash on my system). — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:14, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
This page is archived by subject (as well as?) not just date, so a bot might not be the best soln. Rich Farmbrough, 13:57 9 October 2007 (GMT).
What standard is followed in issues of term usage between British and American English? For example, the use of 'paraffin' in Tractor_vaporising_oil. Britain uses 'paraffin' for both kerosene and paraffin wax, while all other English-speaking countries, as far as I know, call it kerosene nearly exclusively. I know that in matters of spelling, articles are left in the style in which they were written, but terms seem to have a much larger impact. What should be done in this case? Phasmatisnox 01:58, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
Can we have a guideline that states that one does not have to put the US in front of $ for articles that are clearly talking about American things? I find the US$ wording to be an eyesore and usually unnecessary. Alternatively, perhaps have a template that goes towards the end of the article (such as in "Notes" or "References") that reads something like "All $s in this article refer to United States dollars." Other countries' dollars could have similar templates. It seems that the need to specify which dollars is only needed for articles that talk of things of a global nature.-- SeizureDog 05:50, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
There's been some confusion here on what to do with parentheticals that end in terminal punctuation and also end their enclosing sentence. As we already know from quotations, which when used inline in a sentence are basically a form of parenthetical, terminal punctuation that must be inside a parenthetical that agrees with the terminal punctuation required by the enclosing sentence, ends the sentence there, with the terminal punctuation not duplicated outside the parenthetical. This is so obvious that few style guides address it directly. Because they don't need to. A rule already given long before parentheticals are even mentioned will already address it. Examples:
I'm sure others go into it as well, but I have better things to do that look up a multitude of references that all says the same thing.
The principle here is reiterated, even in the rather too concise Fowler's Modern English Usage, as well as a other style guides, when addressing quotation handling and other issues, such as titles of works, usage of commas, and so on.
By way of further comparison: If I wrote a song that was literally called "Foo," with the comma part of the song name, we would not write about the song with redundant commas: "SMcCandlish's song 'Foo,' released in 2007...", not "SMcCandlish's song 'Foo,', released in 2007...".
Any read through Wikipedia articles will show that the principle here is being applied consistently, and there's evidently no widespread confusion about it, but someone keeps insisting on adding redundant punctuation to MOS itself, thus this long message to address it before it starts inspiring editors at large to add redundant punctuation all over the place.
The problem probably stems from failure to recognize that the "except when the parenthetical is separate or self-contained" exception in various style guides that applies to "always put terminal punctuation outside a parenthetical at the end of a sentence" is satisfied by abbreviations that terminate with a period (again, as long as the period agrees with the sentence), because the period is indivisible from the acronym. Abbreviations that end with periods are "detached" or self-contained by virtue of their format, as they cannot be altered to move their punctuation away. The mistake is in assuming that the only things that satisfy the exception are sentences (CMS even appears to say this, until one remembers that they've already countermanded double-perioding elsewhere. Twice.)
Some examples:
Another way of looking at this is, "Why on earth would we advise doing one thing with parenthetically-constructed quotations (and titles of works, etc.), and something completely different with all other parentheticals?" (Please note that a period does not follow the end of that pseudo-quotation. :-)
— SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 13:15, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
Q. Hi—I seem to remember in an earlier edition of the CMOS that, if parenthetical material ended in a period, the final period of the sentence should be omitted, even if the rules would otherwise require it. Here’s an example:
She prepared all the Thanksgiving dishes (turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, etc.)
She prepared all the Thanksgiving dishes (turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, etc.).
A co-worker has insisted that the second example is correct and has scoffed at me for suggesting that the first example is preferred. Did I deserve the scoffing? Please do not tell me to omit the “etc.” whenever possible, because this will not be an option in most cases.
A. The scoffer is right. A sentence needs punctuation at the end, and it can’t appear within the parentheses unless the entire sentence is contained in the parentheses. Version 2 is correct.</bockquote>
An expression containing an expression in parentheses is punctuated, outside of the marks of parenthesis, exactly as if the expression in parenthesis were absent.
The conference was held in Portland (Me., not Ore.).
When you enclose material in brackets, punctuation within the sentence remains the same:[...]
When parenthetical matter is not punctuated as a complete sentence, the closing parenthesis precedes any punctuation marks in the enclosing sentence:[...]
As punctuation within parenthetical matter does not affect matter outside it,[...]
With other punctuation
An opening parenthesis should be preceded by a comma or a semicolon only in an enumeration (see 6.126); a closing parenthesis should never be preceded by a comma or a semicolon. A question mark, an exclamation point, and closing quotation marks precede a closing parenthesis if they belong to the parenthetical matter; they follow it if they belong to the surrounding sentence. A period precedes the closing parenthesis if the entire sentence is in parentheses; otherwise it follows. (A parenthetical enclosure of more than one sentence should not be included within another sentence. If a final period is needed at the end of such an enclosure, rewording may be necessary to keep the enclosure independent of the surrounding text, as is this one.) Parentheses should rarely appear back to back. Different kinds of material may, if necessary, be enclosed in a single set of parentheses, usually separated by a semicolon. For parentheses in documentation, see chapters 16 and 17.
As with no doubling of commas and no redundant punctuation after quotations, the no-double-periods rule trumps parenthetical handling. The CMS editors have simply goofed in my opinion, forgetting their own underlying reasoning, and I have to note that CMS's blog or message forum is not CMS, and is not subject to peer review and other external editorial review, so citing it does not "clinch the matter" at all. The fact that CMS, Fowler's, Guardian and other style guides differ on numerous points means that they are all subjective and fallible, so even if CMS itself disagreed with me and removed its no-double-period rule, it would still have to contend with other style guides that insist upon it. Handling of parentheticals does not exist in a vacuum, but interacts with more basic rules, such as against double-dotting. I've offered a logical deduction that so far is countermanded by a blog post and by a Merriam-Webster publication, so I'm outgunned by one reliable source for now. Oh well. In response to your question about Fowler's, as I clearly wrote: It and other style guides address parallel constructions that illustrate the same principles (don't double end-punctuation after a quote, etc.) I did not say that Fowler's or any other actually directly addresses dotted acronyms at the end of paratheticals that close a sentence. The very fact that they don't is why any deduction has to be done at all. The argument that "the expression does itself end the sentence: it is followed by a closing parenthesis that is not a part of the expression itself" is simply impenetrable (I realized you've borrowed it from M.-W.); it either does or it doesn't end the sentence, and can't do both at the same time. To argue that the closing parenthesis somehow makes it not the end of the sentence, thus requiring a second period, is the same as arguing that a closing quotation mark has the same effect, and we know from all style guides that this is not the case. The analogy between the two situations is so perfect that style guides simply never bother to mention the parenthetical case, with the sole case so far as either of us have found being the M.-W. item you cite. Strunk and White doesn't address the matter other than to indicate that we do not double-punctuate outside of quotes, and that we punctuate outside of brackets; it seems unlikely to me that if they'd thought to include whether or not to double-punctuate outside of brackets that they would have contradicted their previous advice with regard to the same situation in quotations (then again, if Merriam-Webster is doing it...). So, I certainly do not concede the argument, only that it remains unsettled pending my finding counter-citations. In another window, I'm actually composing a letter to CMS about this, because I do not think that their position is logically defensible, and I want to see if they can come up with some rationale for it. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:26, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I suspect I'll be a "star pupil" on that stuff since I've already aborbed much of those areas (though I never pretend I have nothing to learn.)
Is this is just my personal opinion? It seems to me that starting off an article with "In <whatever subject domain>, a <subject of this article> is ..." is not really nice. Maybe it is still encyclopedic, but seems just a little bit, not meaning to be pejorative, well, sort of childish.
For example: "In mathematics, a parallelogram is a four sided figure whose opposites sides are parallel to each other". I would rather it read just straight: "A parallelogram is a ...". Any ideas on this? Peashy 13:42, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I have added the caveat that it is good to number lists where the number itself is of some importance, for example track listings. Rich Farmbrough, 14:04 9 October 2007 (GMT).
Someone disputed my prescriptive edits to the section on acronyms and abbreviations, and made the entire thing descriptive on the assertion that there isn't any consensus to be descriptive about it. I've now rewritten that to at least be accurately descriptive, based on reliable sources (Chicago Manual of Style, etc.) I argue against the descriptivist position here, on the following basis:
I could add more, but these are probably enough points against dropping periods from abbreviations (other than units of measure, where the science crowd won out). The points for it seem to be "we're used to it because of British newspapers" (which is no stronger an argument than "get rid of logical quotation because American newspapers don't use it"), and ... well, that seems to be it.
My proposal: Eschew the colloquial British no-dots practice for the formal use-dots practice, which is even preferred by British sources like Fowler: "Dr. Smith of 42 St. Joseph St." I could probably live with some carefully enumerated exceptions in articles on British topics (or begun in British English on dialect-neutral topics) for the most common British usage, no-dotting forms of address such as "Dr Smith" and "St Joseph", so long as it remains clear that otherwise, periods are used, thus deprecating "op cit", "etc", "approx", "123 Second Ave", and other period omissions.
This is the mirror image of my urging deprecation of "U.S.", because there isn't a rationale other than "I'm used to it and it's traditional in my neck of the woods" for the dialectal exception.
— SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 14:09, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
-- ROGER DAVIES TALK 09:47, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Can we reduce
"By convention, the names of railroads and railways do not employ the serial comma (for example,
Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad). This is also the standard for
law firms and similar corporate entities (for example,
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom)."
to
The names of corporate entities do not usually use the serial comma (for example, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad).
Rich Farmbrough, 14:12 9 October 2007 (GMT).
I can find nothing about the treatment of individual letters of the alphabet in linguistic contexts. The MoS should recommend lower case italics as follows: c sounds either like k or like s. Rothorpe 18:00, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
Also, regarding the names of languages in infoboxes, it would seem more educational not to use capitals when the language does not always require them: español, not Español. Present practice is inconsistent. Rothorpe 18:00, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
Have a look at the infoboxes for Spanish language & Portuguese language, and you'll see the inconsistency: español has a capital but português does not. Capitalizing the Occitan one would be awkward (how much? for a start), and that suggested to me that the the Romance languages should all be lower case in the boxes, just as they are normally in italiano, en français, etc. - in contrast, for example, to German, Deutsch. Simply educational. Rothorpe 21:19, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
I've edited Words as words after its recent editing to introduce the new policy. But my changes don't alter the fact that users will have to work hard to get it. In particular, I'm unsure myself how mentioning a whole sentence differs from quoting it.
I hated the God save the King example—not only the ideological implications of the title, but the label "subjunctive", which I need to be persuaded is correct (in any case, it would have made most WPians knit their brow, and why the internal italics, just to make things harder?). The example didn't clarify the distinction between quoting and mentioning. I simply removed the example.
Here it is:
Italics are used when mentioning a word or letter (see use–mention distinction) or a string of words up to and including a full sentence: "The term panning is derived from panorama, a word coined in 1787"; "The most commonly used letter in English is e". For a whole sentence, quotes may be used instead, as they are in this manual of style where this helps to make things clear. But distinguish mentioning (to discuss such features as grammar, wording and punctuation) from quoting, for which only quote marks should be used (or appropriate indenting for large quotations). (See Quotations, below.)
Tony (talk) 12:41, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
And this one is a problem:
however, alif and ayin should normally have their standard transliterations, and rough and smooth breathings in Ancient Greek should be marked where necessary; but note that there are browser compatibility issues with them also.
Now sorry to be a party pooper, but why are such arcane matters as breathings in Ancient Greek being introduced into MOS? Hello? Isn't there a WikiProject where this kind of thing could be discussed? Or a talk page? It's covered, anyway, by saying that only apostrophes when used as apostrophes should be "straight". I haven't checked, but is this PManderson's doing? (Sorry if I've leapt to a wrong conclusion.) Tony (talk) 12:58, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
Please read and comment at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (exit lists)#Proposals for clarifications. -- NE2 05:16, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
The sentence sentence with a McDonald's example of glyph style was changed by one character, and I don't understand the distinction.
Old: For example, searching in an article for McDonald's (typewriter quote) will fail to find McDonald’s (typographic quote), and vice versa
New: For example, searching in an article for McDonald's (typewriter quote) will fail to find McDonald's (typographic quote), and vice versa.
For me, the old sentence's second occurrence of McDonald's wouldn't be found by Firefox or Internet Explorer (U.S. English browser settings, on U.S. Windows XP) searching for "McDonald's," while in the second example, the two examples are rendered the same way, and both are found by either browser. Do they appear different with other language or country settings? Note that I copied and pasted the "New" sentence, and it's possible my browser lost something in that process, so you might want to check the MOS itself. - Agyle 05:36, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
Any reason we need to list all of the daughter manuals in a section towards the end as well as in the infobox at the top? I see that the two lists aren't quite the same, too.
I'd rather just keep the box at the top. Tony (talk) 11:00, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
Featured Articles are supposed to meet our MOS guidelines. Well apparently not, as an ongoing discussion shows. violet/riga (t) 20:17, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
MOS currently says:
When was the this discussed here? I think we should have instead:
The square brackets are standard in most scholarly practice. And after all, what do you do if you want to show elision from a quote that already includes its own ellipses? An appended note would be cumbersome; and the meaning of the square brackets is immediately obvious.
– Noetica♬♩ Talk 00:31, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
Response: This is a distinction I hadn't thought of; but what if the original source had square brackets as well? Where will it end?
Enclosing every set of ellipsis dots with big square brackets partly negates the reason for using the ellipsis dots in the first place, which is to remove text that is not strictly relevant to the sense, and to save clutter and make the passage easier to read (while preserving the meaning). Square brackets are visually disruptive.
I wonder whether, in the rare cases in which ellipsis dots are part of the original source, this could be explicated after the quoted material, analogous to the requirement that editors explicate their own highlighting of words within quoted text with italic:
Italics are used within quotations if they are already in the source material, or added to give emphasis to some words. If the latter, an editorial note "[emphasis added]" appears at the end of the quotation ("Now cracks a noble heart. Good night sweet prince: And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest" [emphasis added]).
If the source uses italics for emphasis, and it is desirable to stress that Wikipedia has not added the italics, the editorial note "[emphasis in original]" appears after the quote.
By converse analogy:
Where Wikipedia uses an ellipsis to indicate that material has been elided from a direct quotation, they should not be square-bracketed. Where ellipses appear in the original source, their original form should be retained and an editorial note added at the end of the quotation ("Blah blah oink oink ... gabba gabba diddley squat" [ellipsis in original]').
How's that? Default is that WP has inserted the ellipsis, which is almost always the case. (Can you point to examples where ellipses are themselves quoted?) BTW, singular or plural for ellipsis/es here? Tony (talk) 01:57, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
An original sentence or fragment may include an ellipsis, for example as points of suspension, that should not be deleted. For clarity, any later ellipsis inserted in such a passage must be set in square brackets. This passage from The Importance of Being Earnest, for example, contains two ellipses:
The fact is, lady Bracknell, I said I had lost my parents. It would be nearer the truth to say that my parents seem to have lost me...I don't actually know who I am by birth. I was...well, I was found.
In the following extract, the square brackets make clear which are in the original and which have been added subsequently:
The fact is, lady Bracknell, [...]my parents seem to have lost me...I don't actually know who I am [...]. I was...well, I was found.
Privileging a chosen few other style guides (and along with them the two varieties of English in which they are located), with uncertain relationship to this one, is very awkward right at the top. Why is it necessary to interrupt the flow of the lead, which contains critical information such as overarching principles, with this kow-towing to other, hard-copy-oriented tomes? It's just muddy and confusing. There's already a clear statement to raise issues on the talk page where they're not covered by WP's MOS. This parade of people's pet favourites has no place at the top, and could even be regarded as POV. Is Wikipedia endorsing these select few? Bad idea.
I suggest that if people are still keen to list their favourites, it be done at the end under its own section (perhaps "Other style guides"). Tony (talk) 02:52, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
If this page does not specify a preferred usage, discuss your issues on the talk page of this manual. When either of two styles is acceptable, it is inappropriate for an editor to change an article from one style to another unless there is a substantial reason to do so (for example, it is acceptable to change from Canadian to British spelling if the article concerns a British topic). Edit warring over optional styles is unacceptable. If an article has been stable in a given style, it should not be converted without a reason that goes beyond mere choice of style. When it is unclear whether an article has been stable, defer to the style used by the first major contributor.
Happily there are no revert wars going on. Sometimes hypothetical situations are not the best. The instance(s) User:Roger Davies is referring to is actually a series of nine articles, all of which are featured (they are all about Mary Wollstonecraft and her works). As the near-sole editor and maintainer of these pages ( User:Kaldari helps me maintain Mary Wollstonecraft), I find it much easier to keep the pages vandalism-free and updated if I can edit in AE, my native dialect. Since the MOS is a guideline (not a policy) and there is no real reason to write about any topic in any particular dialect (certainly real scholars don't alter their writing depending on the subject matter), this did not seem like a big issue to me. Tony and others are welcome to look at the long and tedious debate at Talk:A Vindication of the Rights of Men. I am currently ill and do not really feel like rehashing it here. Thanks. Awadewit | talk 11:46, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
This has been proposed (under the working title Wikipedia:Use of flags in articles and some others) since April 2007 (and was "officially proposed" at WP:VPP more recently, with plenty of helpful feedback and virtually no opposition). I was about to go put {{ Guideline}} on it, but thought I'd let folks here know before hand in case anyone here hasn't seen it yet. The only bone of contention I know of at present is that WP:ELG conflicts with WP:MOSFLAG in a few ways. Discussion about that is ongoing, and I don't think has any bearing on whether the general material in WP:MOSFLAG has consensus. It's a dispute over whether the most general language in WP:MOSFLAG would also cover roadsign icons (I think it does; it was certainly intended to cover any such usage of symbols and seals especially their abuse as image cruft – and especially especially in the main prose of articles rather than in tables and lists – though much of the detailed material is flag-specific). Anyway, that aside, WP:FLAG is ready to roll as far as I can determine. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:56, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
The more I look into it, the more of a problem I have with WP:ELG. Curious if this is shared by others. It was written by one person and designated a guideline after only three weeks, with not a single other person editing it. Since then it has has a very small editorship who have seemingly been developing it in a vacuum, without any regard to or awareness of how it would integrate with other guidelines. I believe its conflicts with WP:MOSFLAG, which has been building genuine consensus, including a WP:VPP proposal, for 6 months, are more serious than I initially thought. Its principal editors seem to believe that the template atop ELG vs. the template atop MOSFLAG actually means something important and that ELG automatically trumpts MOSFLAG (they don't seem to understand that consensus is consensus and random stuff without consensus except among members of a single wikiproject isn't consensus, and that a template doesn't change this). I'm not sure whether to MfD this (for merge into MOSNUM, to the extent useful to the general editing population, which is very little, with the how-to minutiae moved to a Wikipedia:WikiProject U.S. Highways subpage as an {{ essay}} for the benefit of highway article specialist editors; the bulk of it simply isn't MOS-suitable material, but it says it is part of the MOS); just move it to said subpage and make it an essay, and not bother importing any of it into MOSNUM; simply slap it with {{ disputedtag}}; or change it to {{ proposal}} (though it has never been proposed), or just {{ essay}}. I'm about equally concerned with the content of this specific page and with the process/precedent issue here, in which any random person can cobble something together out of left field and call it part of the MOS without anyone challenging that. However, I am now engaged in a dispute on ELG's talk page, so I don't really consider myself in a position to do any of the above, since it will look like a punitive measure. Also, I believe everyone at ELG is editing in good faith and they have put a lot of work into it rather recently, ergo I wouldn't advocate MfD'ing it for outright deletion. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 03:47, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
(Outdent)I take SMcCandlish's summary comments about this subpage as entirely in good faith. I've always looked in wonderment upon the title in the list of subpages at the top of MOS, but never investigated it to learn why such an eccentricly narrow field was appropriate as a Manual of Style. I agree that it is an inducement to others to bring to prominence their pet topic through MOS status (and I mean nothing personal by saying this—I appreciate that effort has gone into the highway page). In addition, the subpage is not well written and shows problems of uneven and inappropriate tone.
I found the specific discussion that led to it being moved: [2], User talk:Northenglish/Archive 5#WP:USRD/ELG, User talk:Matt Yeager#WP:USRD/ELG . -- NE2 11:19, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
This looks to be nothing more than a project guideline and should not be considered as part of the MOS. older ≠ wiser 11:56, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
(ec) Look, we just want a standard for exit lists so we don't get a bunch of totally inconsistent tables and even bulleted lists on all sorts of pages. I personally don't care what it's called. So move it back to the project, to Wikipedia:Exit list guide or whatever, all we want is to have a consistent set of rules that can be applied to exit lists in highway articles. I thought that the Manual of Style was to provide a home for such standards. I'm sure whoever moved it here thought the same thing. Also, with all the hand-wringing over how it's not globalised, I don't see anyone from outside the U.S. stepping up and actually fixing it. We'd be happy to help normalise it to have global terms that don't clash with the U.S. usage (that is prevent the globalisation changes from altering the intended meaning). I live in Missouri and I've never been to the UK; I haven't a bloody clue what needs to be done. Also, calling this an essay is horribly inaccurate, because as I understand it essays express one person's opinion and are most prose. This has full support of just about everyone at WP:USRD, so don't say there's not a consensus for it. The reason there's no discussion involving the "greater community" is because the greater community won't use it most of the time. I will devote time (taken away from bringing an article up to GA) to develop a glossary of terms used in the document to assist editors who would like to globalise this document. — Scott5114 ↗ 21:44, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
I have edited throughout MOS to get rid of "spell out", which was over-used and imprecise. There was always a clearer way to express things, so I did just that. I looked at this, along the way:
General rule
*In the body of an article, single-digit whole numbers (from zero to nine) are given as words; numbers of more than one digit are generally rendered as figures, or as words if they are expressed in one or two words (sixteen, eighty-four, two hundred, but 3.75, 544, 21 million).
Now, I must have missed something. Forgive me: I was out of action at Wikipedia for several weeks. Was there really a consensus that the 9–10 boundary was so important? (Why?) But what I really have difficulty with is this part:
numbers of more than one digit are generally rendered as figures, or as words if they are expressed in one or two words (sixteen, eighty-four, two hundred...
Where, pray tell, does that come from? Interpreting strictly, both 10 and ten are right in text, right? (And 20 and twenty, ninety-nine and 99, and so on). By the rule as it stands, sentences like these would be permissible:
From nine to 11 she learned flute, and from 10 to fifteen she learned Latin.
Between eight hundred and 1450 satellites pose a risk to manned flight; or some estimates between 1540 and three thousand.
Really? Rethink! – Noetica♬♩ Talk 07:19, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
There doesn't seem to be any surviving rationale for that subpage to exist. Every topic covered in it is covered in MOS proper, and all that needs to be done is for some specifics to be merged in from the subpage. As a separate document, it is falling out-of-synch with the main MOS, and its talk page is simply a magnet for FAQs to be re-asked and for debates to fragment into "different parents to ask" to use the metaphor explored in detail at WP:CONSENSUS. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:20, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
No, No, No! Not just no, but hell no! I've already opposed it above, but didn't know then what I know now.
I am fuming, livid, totally pissed off.
I just figured out how the guidelines for non-breaking spaces got changed without discussion. In this edit on Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers) subpage, User:Tony1 implemented a major rewrite, including a total rewrite of non-breaking spaces guidance.
Then, less than two days later, before anybody had a chance to digest his changes and see if they were worthwhile, and discuss them, he moved his rewrite about non-breaking spaces here, to the main page.
Anybody looking at that move sees, at least in regard to non-breaking spaces, that he merely copied exactly what was at MOSNUM. So he sneaked it in here, craftily avoiding any discussion on the (dates and numbers) subpage, and avoiding any discussion here on this page. Gene Nygaard 07:53, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
There is already a rather silly number of (seemingly) region-specific subguidelines. Some of them are not even what they purport to be. For example, the one that is allegedly about China-related topics is not about that at all but about the Chinese language. I propose refactoring this entire mess into two instead of a dozen+ subpages (before that turns into 4 dozen), each with short sections pertaining to the region/language in question, with cross-references between them. The two proposed are: one on foreign languages, and one on political disputes. The former would discuss handling of Chinese, Korean, Russian and other non-Latinate character set material, and the latter on issues to be congnizant of that have POV-inflaming potential (Londonderry vs. Derry, etc.) I think that each of the two could begin with generic/overall sections that elaborate on what MOS already says about that subject, and then have sections for specific countries and other areas. So the language one would have a bit about English vs. Irish Gaelic placenames under ==Irish== and conclude with a cross-ref to the ==Ireland== section in the politics guideline, about avoiding PoV disputes like the Derry issue (and that in turn would xref to the language one). — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:31, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
(Outdent) So you're saying that you'd resist scrutiny of your page, then? That is what an audit would amount to. Hmmm ... the first one I visited for a look-see— Wikipedia:Manual of Style (Thailand-related articles)—has, guess what, an "inactive" tag. Why, then, is it listed at MOS? The prose is faulty, there are digressions from MOS guidelines, and the tone is uneven.
The one on Ethiopia is quite well-written, but is not long and is very narrow in its audience. I wonder whether MOSes on Sudan- and Kenya-related articles will pop up, and if they do, whether a merger would be productive.
The Japan-related article opens with a delicious morsel: "The English Wikipedia is an English-language encyclopedia." Later, "English grammar rules", which is in the same self-ironic vein as "pronounciation". It could do with scrutiny, but I must say that it's substantial, contains good information, and is apparently regularly edited.
My first impression is that the quality and maintenance of these subpages varies considerably. That is why the MOS project needs to keep tabs on its daughters, irrespective of defensive reactions by their owners. Tony (talk) 15:45, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
I think this can basically be closed as "no consensus" for now. I'd like to see what comes out of WT:COUNCIL, then after that settles out in a few months, revisit this issue. Some of us are convinced that the profusion of micro-topical guidelines about languages/regions is a Bad Thing. Those who disagree are unconvinced, but clearly cannot counter-convince either, so we have an impasse for now. Maybe the eventual solution to he WikiProject guidelines overall issue will change the nature of the situation. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 18:23, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
As a road editor, I invite "scrutiny" on WP:ELG. Please look it over and make sure that it complies with the MOS, after I finish applying the changes discussed on the talk page in a day or two. -- NE2 12:22, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
Back on 28 September I posted a merge tag on MOSHEAD, but neglected to post a corresponding tag here; I've now done this. The Headings subpage contained little extra information to what was already here, and the recent overhaul of the first two sections (Now "Article titles, headings and sections") has made this redundancy clearer. All that remains is MOSHEAD's little point about floating the table of contents, which in any case links to Help:Section#Floating the TOC. I've suggested that MOSHEAD be deleted in about a week's time. Tony (talk) 11:36, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
Back onto the MOSHEAD issue (presuming that PMA was referring to another page, not MOSHEAD)—it's about time the merger was acknowledged in the deletion of MOSHEAD. How is this done? Tony (talk) 04:00, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
See merge and rename proposals at end of Wikipedia talk:Trivia sections. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:46, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
The Images section doesn't say anything about panoramas, which are possible using template:wide image (see Denver, Colorado for two examples). Do we want to make a definitive statement in MOS about use of full width panoramas? I've started a thread at talk:Denver, Colorado#Panoramas? about the ones that are there, but it seems like a broader issue. -- Rick Block ( talk) 00:57, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
I set out to made a small change to the section on ellipses. But then I discovered that an important part of it needs radical surgery. Rather than cite how it goes right now, I present how it would look if we were simply to clarify the recommendations and give examples that reflect them:
*A space is inserted either side of the ellipsis, except where the ellipsis follows a period, in which case no spaces are inserted. To prevent an ellipsis from wrapping to the beginning of a line, use a non-breaking space (
...) before it instead of a normal space.Examples: "in the middle of a sentence where punctuation does not occur ... "; "after a comma, ... "; "a semicolon; ... "; "a colon: ... "; "or at the end of a sentence ... ."; "or after a sentence that ends with a period...."; "or after an abbreviation ending in a period, e.g...."; "rarely, in a question ... ?"; "and even more rarely, before an exclamation mark ... !".
Where did such arbitrary recommendations come from? They are bizarre. I will be happy to rewrite all this, but I would like to see others' comments first.
– Noetica♬♩ Talk 23:11, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
... .
formatting of elipsis + period? I read a lot and I don't think I've ever seen that in my life. Only ...
and ....
, with the latter seeming to be chiefly American. Also be aware that the usual spaced style raises some of the same issues as end punctuation and quotations; if this style were used it would need to be Content1.& ... Content2
in cases of a quoted sentence ending, material being skipped, and more material following that, and so forth. Using 4 dots with no space just avoids that issue entirely. —
SMcCandlish [
talk] [
cont] ‹(-¿-)›
05:05, 19 October 2007 (UTC)Concerned that triple periods representing pauses in speech ellide nothing, and are confusing if integrated into the "Elipses" section solely because they have in common with real ellipsis punctuation just the triple dots (not the spaces, and not the square brackets). That is why I put the guideline about pause dots (or whatever they should be called) almost as an aside at the end, untitled. I find it confusing under a title now, interceding information about ellipses proper.
Also concerned at the example: Her long rant continued: "How do I feel? How do you think I... look, this has gone far enough! [...] I want to go home!". I find the roman "think" confusing—is it coincidental, or does it have something to do with the point being made? If not, let's smooth it out so readers are presented just with the point of this guideline. Tony (talk) 07:30, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Coming back to this Ellipses section after a couple weeks, we see that it still has structural flaws, at least one example that is not in accord with the recommendations given, incomplete advice about retaining original punctuation from quoted material (retain original spacing, or just all original punctuation marks?), and more problems. When these elementary matters of housekeeping are fixed, preferably by those who introduced the relevant changes, perhaps those interested can rationally address the question of ellipses again.
– Noetica♬♩ Talk 22:50, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes I know they both show the Union Jack, (and I figured no one would object to my changes, as a result). Yet I'm being disputed and reverted, the flagicon link should be flagicon|UK (respecting a British boxers full nationality), not flagicon|GBR which does not. The last time I checked, Northern Ireland was included in the UK. GoodDay 14:10, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
Very occasionally, when I have made a change to an article to bring it into line with WP:MOS, I have been challenged by another editor who claims that a certain project does things differently. I am not sure how best to reply to such situations.
It seems to me that Wikipedia should be cohesive and local guidelines should only resolve matters not already covered by top-level guides. If separate projects are to have their own special-case exceptions to guidelines should they not first get a consensus for such an inconsistency here?
Thoughts? Gaius Cornelius 21:43, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
After extended discussion, to be effective, the consensus decision making process must close. [I.e., after a guideline is proposed and accepted by the community, it is designated as a guideline and considered accepted by the community; it's designation as a guideline is not open to random or piecemeal dispute, but would need to be taken to a policy re-examination process like RFC or more likely VPP to be considered suddenly not a Wikipedia consensus-reflecting document. The applicability of its particular recommendations could also be challenged that way, or more commonly by gaining a more local consensus to modify it. Simply ignoring it doesn't work.] In many Wikipedia decision making processes, such as Wikipedia:Articles for deletion or Wikipedia:Requests for adminship, an administrator or bureaucrat "closes" the discussion by evaluating the arguments, considering which alternatives have more support and announces a decision, which may be "no consensus", an outcome which, depending on the context, usually has definite consequences. In other, less structured, situations, as in the case of how to structure the titles of television episodes, there is no formal closer. [I.e. the lack of an official closer doesn't mean that the decision hasn't been arrived at.] Nevertheless, considering the alternatives proposed, the extended discussion engaged in, expressions of preference, there is a result which should be respected. [I.e., a Wikipedia-wide guideline was in fact formulated and accepted by consensus, and it doesn't just go away because someone has a bone to pick.] Absent formal closing, it is the responsibility of users to evaluate the process and draw appropriate conclusions. [I.e., if there wasn't anything procedurally wrong with the process, conclude that consensus was reached and that it would have to be changed, which is different from alleging that consensus was not reached.]"
OK, so we seem to have gone full circle on a question that I think is of central importance. Thank you to all the contributors, but I am still confused. I hope all will excuse me if I try putting the question again in a slightly different way:
And, if that question cannot be definitively answered, I must hesitantly ask:
Thanks. Gaius Cornelius 13:04, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
Should names of books be italicised? What about Bible, Talmud etc? Chesdovi 13:45, 18 October 2007 (UTC)
We have some problems at both
Stanislavski's 'system' (beginning with its name) and
Method acting. In both cases,
use-mention distinction is pretty confused, and editors at the former insist on always writing 'system'
because that's how S. preferred to write it. My contention is that this article must be at
Stanislavsky System, and be referred to as the Stanislavsky System
as a proper noun, and as Stanislavski's system
, the system
, his system
as a non-proper noun. S. can be quoted directly as calling it "my 'system'", with the scare-quotes and lower case he preferred, but despite the fact that theatre publications prefer to also use that scare-quoting, WP is under no such obligation and should do what it always does. WP should not use the Stanislavski 'system'
or Stanislavski's 'system'
. Scare-quoting like this implies a leading "so-called" or "alleged", and using the scare-quoted version in this manner strongly implies a Wikipedia point-of-view about the system, which we
can't do. Similarly, the
Method acting article uses a capitalized Method
or the Method
all over the place, even when it is not being used a proper noun, and editors there are highly resistant to fixing this, because they are used to the (grammatically incorrect) usage in the theatrical press and are simply failing to see the distinction. There are usages in that article where the capitalization is appropriate, but the Method
is an informal colloquialism just like the 'system'
, not a formal proper noun, so all cases of the Method
in that article (other than its mention as an alt. term in the lead) should be Method acting
(assuming that phrase is always a proper noun; I'm not personally certain that it is) or the Strasberg Method
. I think the MOS should directly address this kind of thing in the section on philosophies and theories. We need better examples in there. Also, it's not getting across to people at the S. article that even where it is approproriate to use S.'s scare-quoting, in WP we do this as "system"
, not 'system'
(S. used single quotes because he was European, and at least one editor insists that we have to keep doing it that way; same editor also seems not to understand that we don't use single-quotes for mention cases generally, but either italics, double-quotes, or single-quotes-inside-double-quotes, but I'm trying to explain that to him.) I saw a very similar case somewhere in a religious context, in which an "in-universe" term was used in place of the formal one, in a way not appropriate for an encyclopedia. (My reference to "in-universe" is also a hint that this problem has occurred before in articles on fiction series, and been resolved there; I don't see any rationale for not applying the encyclopedic language principle behind that precedent to articles outside of fiction.) —
SMcCandlish [
talk] [
cont] ‹(-¿-)›
02:12, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
The Stanislavski System: The Professional Training of an Actor] (a standard text) and Encyclopedia Britannica. older ≠ wiser 12:46, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Biblical or biblical? Should Wikipedia adopt a style guideline favoring one over the other when used as an adjective referring to the Bible (e.g., Biblical scholar, biblical exegesis, Biblical foundation, biblical support, etc.)?
Please comment on the RFC at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Bible#RFC: "biblical" or "Biblical". Thanks — DIEGO talk 22:20, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
*Scriptures are capitalized but not italicized (for example, the names of the Qurʾan, the Talmud, the Granth Sahib, and the Bible). When the is used, it is not capitalized. Some derived adjectives are capitalized by convention, some are not (biblical, but normally Koranic); for others, check a dictionary appropriate to the topic, and be consistent in an article.
The link "How Users Read on the Web" contains lots of interesting data, but hello, no reference to the study (there is a link to an eye-movement study at the bottom, but who knows what that is). I'd like to be presented with a few details of the study on that page.
Then we're confronted with a link to an invitation to buy, clothed in an academic reference to a "conference": "Full-day tutorial on content usability and writing for the Web at the User Experience 2007 conference in Las Vegas and Barcelona".
It's a pity, but I don't think this link should be on MOS. Any thoughts? Tony (talk) 01:34, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
I've removed it. Tony (talk) 03:59, 22 October 2007 (UTC)
I have been bold and changed:
to
I think this gives editors a clearer idea of how to solve disputes, i.e. by looking at the literature. Tim Vickers 18:50, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
[Comment and my reply shifted to the end:]
I agree with Tim Vickers's proposed rule. I think it is more important to show how the units are used in the real world rather than obsessing over BIPM or NIST recommendations (basically, be descriptive rather than prescriptive). In general, whatever value is being quoted in an article has to come from a source. I suggest that, by default, we should use the same units that were used by the source, except when there is a compelling reason to do otherwise (for example, if it is a historic source with really archaic units, or for consistency when quoting values from different sources.) -- Itub 13:28, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
The new guidline will have consequences for theoretical physics articles on wikipedia. Most of the wiki articles use SI units to make them better accesible to the lay public even though almost no one in this field uses SI units. But I don't think we need to worry about this, as people who do not understand units won't understand much of physics anyway. Count Iblis 20:36, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Most editors feel the revised wording reflects what we already do and provides a simpler way of resolving disputes than the previous version. With the exception of Gene Nygaard, who has now been blocked for incivility and disruptive editing, I think there is a broad consensus to adopt this wording. Thanks to everybody who commented on this. Tim Vickers 17:05, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
There aren't any rules on bolding. We should reach a consensus on these rules. LuisGomez111 20:31, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
I'm working through both gradually, because the texts have changed in the months since the more commonly used guidelines in MOSNUM were duplicated here. This has entailed changes to both. I hope that I've made no substantive changes to either.
There's an unresolved issue: the last two points in MOSNUM on "Dates", which I've numbered for convenience, are:
Both points are absent from MOS and require deliberation here. I'm in favour of the first, but I suspect that there may be objections: it need consensus. The second I've always found problematic, since the 1700s will mean the 18th century to many of our readers. I'd prefer to remove this point.
Your opinions will be appreciated. Tony (talk) 02:43, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
The exception is ordinals for centuries, which are always expressed in figures (the 5th century CE).
I rather think the Oxford manual of style favours using words for centuries. Rich Farmbrough, 10:28 22 October 2007 (GMT).
(Outdent) Amateur? Noetica, FAs are required to be written and formatted to a professional standard, and they set the goal (even if not achieved) for all articles. WP won't survive on a highly competitive Internet unless it does aspire to professional standards. WP is heaving with academics and ex-academics: promising material.
My reasons that the guidelines should be changed to accept either nine/10 or ten/11 as the boundary, provided consistent are as follow.
*Within a context or a list, style should be consistent (either There were 5 cats and 32 dogs or There were five cats and thirty-two dogs, not There were five cats and 32 dogs).
We also need to think through whether to do something about the "or as words if they are expressed in one or two words" bit. Tony (talk) 02:23, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Hello. User:Caroig's {{ Geobox}} template shows up technical categories in all articles which use it, see e.g. Warta Bolesławiecka and Category:Geobox Settlement, Poland which shows up. Caroig said he didn't find any official policy saying that such technical categories in the article namespace are prohibited. I asked him to alter the Geobox code but he didn't do that. Can you point me to proper policy, please? - Darwinek 22:14, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
Nominated to WP:CFD --> here. Please vote and express your opinion. - Darwinek 20:28, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Charon's status as a satellite of Pluto is rather uncertain. I do not mind the example much as it stands now, but perhaps it would be better if it could be changed to one which might produce fewer disputes in the future? Waltham, The Duke of 15:42, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
I've skimmed the archives, but this seems not to have come up before; please correct me if I'm wrong.
The MOS lists only usage for non-breaking spaces: between numerical and non-numerical elements (though implicitly also lists the space in "sq ft"). What do you think about using it in "St. John"? In my opinion, this is valid (and indeed, the MOS doesn't forbid it). However, in an article like Johannes Passion the source will become very cluttered if one were to replace all instances of "St. John" with "St. John". What are your opinions?
Regardless of this specific example, I think the MOS would benefit from expanding the section on usage of the non-breaking space. Regards, Phaunt 21:25, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
As for the hard space (an easier name than non-breaking space), it is often essential in HTML documents because of the unpredictable ways such documents get displayed (affected by browser, viewing settings, size of window, and style and size of font). This problem is compounded at Wikipedia, since our editors are uneven in skill and diligence. Dynamic pages indeed!
We should, I think, educate editors about hard spaces and similar resources, pressing home the general theory behind them. Merely prescribing specific occasions for their use both looks mindlessly legalistic, and works against acceptance and recall. The theory of hard spaces is not rocket science: let's have a better section showing the techniques and motivations for their use – at WP:MOS where it belongs. We should press for an improved way of inputting hard spaces in Wikipedia editing, too.
All that said, we can sometimes reduce the need for hard spaces, making life easier for everyone. Why, for example, must there be a space after c. (for "circa") before a date? Not only does it need to be hard itself, it often calls into being other hard spaces – before an en dash, for example (see discussion above). Oxford Guide Style (OGS) wants c. to be set close the number that follows it, presumably for a reason of this sort.
Assign a normal qwerty-keyboard character (or better, a pair of them) to stand for a hard space. One suggestion is the underused and almost useless backtick, or for perfect clarity two of them ( `` ). Everyone has ready access to these from a standard keyboard, rather than having to hunt around under the edit box every time the hard space is needed. Typing, recognising, and searching for `` is easy, and this makes compliance highly likely. The change is not extravagant. It is a proper response to a serious defect that experienced editors have diagnosed, which impedes sound and efficient editing, and therefore compromises the quality of articles. Such a unique innovation is justified in the case of the hard space, because this is the single most beneficial improvement we could suggest, when we consider the many ways we have called for the hard space to be used – in ordinary writing and editing, along with standard punctuation.
The whole non-breaking spaces with numbers is nonsense now. It slaps them in where they aren't needed in any case. It doesn't mention the cases where they are needed. It has also expanded in scope from what it used to be. Was that discussed? And, as Phaunt points out, it also includes an example which does not comport with the stated rule.
Noetica is also pushing a national varieties of English button with her "St John" recommendation. Gene Nygaard 07:05, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
Comment: No, it is not a good idea. This project page is getting too long as it is. The edit section even warns people: "This page is 108 kilobytes long". If we merge other articles into it, it might collapse, and all of the information on fixing articles to meet Wikipedia's quality standards would be lost. Wilhelmina Will 00:28, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
I figured someone would notice my comment sooner down here. Wilhelmina Will 00:33, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
On page 278 of "The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage" in the section "PUNCTUATION WITH QUOTATION MARKS," it states: "Periods and commas, in American usage, always go inside the closing quotation marks, regardless of grammatical logic." Now if Wikipedia states that the opposite is true and disregards this common usage, it leads me to understand why teachers and professors refuse to let students reference Wikipedia; it promotes illiteracy.
- 69.231.5.43 02:32, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
With national spellings, it is easy to tell the difference at a glance, one either knows that "centre" is a spelling mistake or Commonwealth English. The trouble with punctuation and quotes is that it can be difficult to tell which style is being used. Indeed as Wikipedia is optimised for readers, the chances are that many will get it wrong even if there is an in house style, unless they take the trouble to read the MOS, which is unlikely unless they are Wikipedia editors. -- Philip Baird Shearer 07:58, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
See WP:CONSENSUS#"Asking the other parent": "It is very easy to create the appearance of a changing consensus simply by asking again and hoping that a different and more sympathetic group of people will discuss the issue. This, however, is a poor example of changing consensus, and is antithetical to the way that Wikipedia works. Wikipedia's decisions are not based on the number of people who showed up and voted a particular way on a particular day. It is based on a system of good reasons." PS: MOS does not deny that two systems "exist", it simply prefers one over the other for precisely the same reasons that technical, scientific and other publications do so: logical punctuation is more precise. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:48, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
The current situation regarding which delimiting marks to use in the Genres sections of Template:Infobox Musical artist has led to edit warring and breaking of the three-revert rule by various editors. I would like a wider opinion of this to see if some improvement to the situation can be made. A discussion about this took place on the WikiProject Albums talkpage in June, which concluded that commas were preferable. A question about which to use was raised in April, starting the Genres section on the talkpage of Infobox Musical artist, which started to lean towards both line breaks and commas being acceptable, or line breaks being better. The current discussion on the talkpage of Infobox Musical artists started in July and has been continuing since. As yet no resolution has been made and meanwhile, editors are reverting each other over the preferences. As this is a style issue, I would like some input from this neck of the woods to see if the situation can be resolved. Thanks.-- Alf melmac 11:11, 30 October 2007 (UTC)
As a couple people have already noted...this debate is not taking place here. The real debate has been on for the longest time here: Template_talk:Infobox_Musical_artist#Standardizing_genre_delimiters. Please take your opinions to that page. Thanks. Navnløs 21:49, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
I believe one of the example pages in our project article needs disambiguating.
The current text is *Generally, right-alignment is preferred to left- or center-alignment. (Example: Race).
I believe this possibly should be disambiguated to: *Generally, right-alignment is preferred to left- or center-alignment. (Example: Race (classification of human beings)). Alice.S 08:36, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
I was looking at an article tonight that seemed to be sacrificing readability in order to adhere to the 'subject bolded/nearest the beginning of the sentence' structure. Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy is the article.
"The Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy concerns the publication of a series of diaries..."
is the start of the lede, which is awkward.
Now, I know if the title is descriptive, it doesn't need to be placed/bolded, but I'm also wondering if it might be acceptable to improve the language of the sentence by saying something like:
"Scott Thomas Beauchamp caused controversy after the publication of a series of diaries..."
That is less strained linguistically, but splitting the subject even by one word might not be the best option, either (the whole article needs a rewrite, it just reminded me that I'd hit a similar article a few days ago, and also thought that the language sounted awkward, for the same reason; often the subject, even while a noun, just doesn't fit nicely into the format. Unlike a couple days ago, I had time to ask this today ;-) )-- Thespian 08:51, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
Can I get some consensus that scrollbars for every section of an article is not acceptable, despite its not being explicitly discussed? See [3] and User_talk:Cohesion#Article_page_Scroll_Boxes. Thanks. - cohesion 12:51, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
The idea that certain things taken from an original source should not be edited for (at least some aspects of) style is a fairly basic principle, but it's one that possibly not everyone is aware of; see this discussion about dashes in the titles references being altered (things like case are also relevant). It might be a good idea to include something mentioning that there are certain things which should not be changed to meet our style guidelines, like the titles of references, and direct quotations for another example. Any suggestions on language? -- bainer ( talk) 00:33, 3 November 2007 (UTC)
Generally, a direct quotation should not be altered (although there are exceptions, including the modernizing of archaic text and using only one space after the end of a sentence regardless of the original spacing). However, citing a reference is not a direct quotation of the reference's title, nor is it intended to be. All style guides and guides to bibliographic citation prescribe how a reference is to be cited, generally without regard to the title's original published format, and Wikipedia's MOS should not be the lone exception. Like most style guides, we render English language titles in title case, even though the original may be in all caps or large and small caps, and even if titles or subtitles are lower case. We render titles of certain types types of works in italic type (e.g., books, feature films, albums of recorded music), regardless of the original title's format. We render titles of other types of works in roman type between quotation marks (e.g., articles, poems, songs), again regardless of the original title's format. (The Library of Congress capitalizes only the first word and proper nouns in a title—do you really want to tell these experts that they are not justified in "altering" the original title?) We use these conventions (when we actually follow them) to give our text a consistent appearance and also to convey meaning: the reader knows that David Berlinski's A Tour of the Calculus is a book because the title is in italic, and that his "The Deniable Darwin" is an article (or essay) because it is in roman. And we use our punctuation conventions, which are matters of typography rather than faithful reproduction of the original. It really is not so complicated, and should not be so controversial. Finell (Talk) 10:42, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
IMO, the changes Noetica is talking about are closer to typesetting than to punctuation and shouldn't cause any trouble. You wouldn't worry about quoting in Verdana a text that you read in Times, would you? ;-) -- Itub 21:39, 4 November 2007 (UTC)
Is MOS a little strict in its disapproval of its usage? A user has rightly replaced "BC/BCE" in MOS, unfortunately with a hyphen rather than "or". Are there not instances where either of two items is used, habitually, which are neatly coupled with a slash? Tony (talk) 21:39, 6 November 2007 (UTC)
Do we have a guideline about what types of templates can be used as headers? - Peregrine Fisher 01:33, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
Please archive this page's old threads and include this and similar comments in the archiving (at least the last two times, the "please archive" topics have remained, which is kind of silly, wasting bandwidth/RAM in the very name of saving it.)
This page is getting so long that it is somewhat (about 50/50 so far for me) causing Firefox/WinXP to crash (totally, taking all windows/tabs with it) when this page is edited or even diffed as a whole unit (this happens automatically any time there is an edit confict, so "just edit one topic" is not an adequate answer). I'd do it myself, but I've already had 4 crashes here when I try to do anything other than edit/create one specific topic and get lucky enough to not have an edit conflict. If this is hitting me, with a 1yo snazzy Dell laptop, it must be wreaking untold carnage among people running old, piecemeal machines with 1MB of RAM or worse. Please archive with extreme prejudice or we'll just be back in crash city in a few days. I.e., if there are no new comments of substance, then file the entire thread. This probably means auto-archive with some software on the first run then human judgement to archive even more. WT:MOS is high-traffic and then some. — SMcCandlish [ talk] [ cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:22, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
So does archiving now involve sorting out all of the themes, or can material be dumped into a chronological archive pending allocation by some good person into the themed archival sections? Tony (talk) 01:48, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
Done. Strad ( talk) 23:20, 18 November 2007 (UTC)