User talk:Cloudcuckoolander/Archive 1

Spockian

Can you please clean up this entry? Etymology header always proceeds part of speech header. Please peruse WT:ELE for formatting standards. If you need an example, use dick Jamesjiao → ^{T ◊ C} 05:16, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Brilliant work

Congrats on the new entries - really great work. :) ---> Tooironic 22:45, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! I'm glad to contribute wherever I can. Astral 07:29, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

And, again, on broaden one's horizons :) ---> Tooironic 13:59, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Thank you! Astral 01:31, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Citations

Thanks for digging up all these citations. If you create a new entry, you can link it to an existing citations page by writing ===Citations=== * {{seeCites}} Equinox ◑ 02:11, 18 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip. When I create new entries, I generally post all the quotations I find on the citations page in order to confirm the term meets Wiktionary's inclusion criteria, but only select one or two of these to go under each sense on the actual entry page, because I think it's more helpful to readers looking up words to give them one or two quotes that seem to "best" illustrate usage/meaning than to provide them with a long and possibly overwhelming list of citations in the entry itself. Astral 02:49, 18 January 2012 (UTC)

Wikisaurus

Two things.

"Wikisaurus" is spelled with lowercase "s" rather than "WikiSaurus", in an analogy to "Wiktionary", "Wikipedia", "Wikisource", "Wikinews", etc. "Wikisaurus" is "wiki" + ("thesaurus" - "the"); "Wikipedia" is "wiki" + ("encyclopedia" - "encyclo"); both are blends.

For linking to Wikisaurus, "See also" seems better to me than "See", as it invites people to also add synonyms to the main namespace. Furthermore, using "See also" is the current common practice. --Dan Polansky 09:31, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure how I came to be under the impression that "Wikisaurus" was written with camelcase. Thanks for pointing out this mistake.

Regarding linking to Wikisaurus pages in Wiktionary entries, are you suggesting it's preferable to place said links in a separate "See also" section, or to place them under the "Synonyms" section like I've been doing, but use the format "see also Wikisaurus:example," not "see Wikisaurus:example?" Astral 14:16, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

You could have followed the formatting of one of the mainspace entries that used "WikiSaurus". I have cleaned them, so that they do not mislead.

I usually place links to Wikisaurus to "Synonyms" section, as that is where people come looking for synonyms. Sometimes, "Hyponyms" is a better section, as in mammal. The current practice, which is still mixed a bit, can be seen from looking at http://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=Special%3ASearch&search=Wikisaurus&fulltext=Search. --Dan Polansky 07:27, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Wikisaurus and child

Creating WS:baby, WS:toddler, WS:preteen, and WS:teenager from WS:child was no good idea, IMHO. All the content can be easily hosted at WS:child. Instead of adding new useful content to Wikisaurus, you have just changed the way things are being done. All the hyponyms of "child" can nicely fit into WS:child, separated by {{ws ----}} if required. --Dan Polansky (talk) 15:08, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

I based it on the structure that is in use at WS:man and WS:woman. For example, instead of listing "little lady", "missus", "trouble and strife" in the hyponyms section at WS:woman, there's a single link to the Wikisaurus page for "wife" (WS:wife), on which all those terms are listed as synonyms. So far from aiming to "change the way things are done," I was attempting to correct the apparent inconsistency between WS:child and WS:man and WS:woman.

I also don't think the template you suggested is an alternative in this case. If "newborn" and "neonate" were listed under the sub-heading "baby" in the hyponyms section at WS:child, it would suggest that both words are synonyms of "baby," which isn't strictly accurate, since "baby" can mean an infant of any age, whereas "newborn"/"neonate" only apply to recently-born infants. Thus, "newborn" is a hyponym of "baby," and "baby" should have its own Wikisaurus page, because that nuance can't be reflected in the hyponyms list at WS:child. Astral (talk) 15:38, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

WS:woman is not low-level enough, unlike WS:child: without further subpages, WS:woman would have too many hyponyms if all were listed.

On another note, {{ws ----}} in a hyponyms section does not imply synonymy. It merely implies some unspecific grouping, as can be seen in Wikisaurus:container. There can be an explicit grouping as in Wikisaurus:bird, but even there, the groups in hyponyms section are not ones of synonyms.

All nuances can be reflected in a hyponyms section of WS:child by providing the terms with definitions, such as the definition that "bin" has in Wikisaurus:container: {{ws|bin|A container used for storage.}}

I admit that the thing is nowhere clearcut, and that what you did is sensible from a particular point of view. Nonetheless, I still think that you have not improved Wikisaurus by creating these subpages, as WS:child was not overflowing with hyponyms. --Dan Polansky (talk) 16:01, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

I'm a stickler for consistency and organization, and I always try to keep an eye out for ways that I can improve or help out this site. There were areas of WS:child that, to me, appeared inconsistent with comparable Wikisaurus entries (WS:man and WS:woman), and with the corresponding Wiktionary entry. Also, since there were already age-specific Wikisaurus pages linked to from the hyponym sections of WS:man and WS:woman (WS:old man and WS:old woman, respectively), it made sense to me to create age-specific pages to link to from WS:child. Astral (talk) 16:30, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

I'd also like to request that, in the future, you avoid directing statements of this tone toward me: "Instead of adding new useful content to Wikisaurus, you have just changed the way things are being done." If you think the pages are redundant, fair enough, but examination of them should reveal that my intent was to create useful reference points for readers of Wiktionary. Perhaps I was misguided in my intent, but I don't see any cause to suggest that I was deliberately making unconstructive edits. Astral (talk) 19:10, 6 April 2012 (UTC)

cronehood

thanks for creating this one, great addition. also it made me realize we were missing sagehood, sageing, croning, etc. =) merry part. =0Lucifer (talk) 08:54, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

sure i'll give it a look, and anything else wicca related.Lucifer (talk) 15:22, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Rollbacker.

You should now see "rollback" links in various places. Hopefully they're self-explanatory, but if you have any questions about them, please ask. :-)   —Ruakh_TALK 18:49, 30 May 2012 (UTC)

Well, now you should. Happy antivandalisming! --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 05:36, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! This should definitely come in handy. :) Astral (talk) 01:03, 3 June 2012 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you for creating the page Citations:crotchfruit, much appreciated, -- Cirt (talk) 17:02, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

You're welcome. Always happy to hunt for cites. :) Astral (talk) 17:28, 22 June 2012 (UTC)

bazinga

I hereby award this citation barnstar for a record of outstanding service in creating Citations pages. Robin (talk) 06:05, 24 June 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for attesting those non-Sheldonian usages of bazinga. ~ Robin (talk) 06:05, 24 June 2012 (UTC)

Thank you! :) Astral (talk) 01:13, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Merci

¶ I thank you very much for providing many a Citation for Neologisms, particularly for brony. I appreciate your Labours. --Æ&Œ (talk) 01:53, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Thank you. I'm always glad to help out wherever I'm able. :) Astral (talk) 02:34, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Canadian pronunciations of about

You're Canadian, right? People keep adding joking or mistaken "Canadian" pronunciations to [[about]] (see the talk page). Could you check the audio and see if sounds right to you, and, if you're familiar with IPA, check the IPA transcriptions which were just removed? It'd be nice to figure out which, if any, are actual Canadian pronunciations of the word... - -sche (discuss) 07:38, 7 July 2012 (UTC)

-tard

Hullo. You are doing good work, but I believe that most blends of ‘retard’ should have an etymology that looks like {{suffix|noun|-tard}}, since ‐tard appears to be a productive suffix. I just thought that you may want to consider it. Ciao. --Æ&Œ (talk) 02:24, 19 July 2012 (UTC)

Good idea! I've gone ahead and created an entry for the suffix -tard. Feel free to update the etymologies for any other words featuring this suffix that come to mind. Astral (talk) 02:54, 19 July 2012 (UTC)

HotCat

It seems like you're adding categories manually, so I recommend you use the automated system, HotCat. You can enable it at WT:PREFS; an explanation of how to use it should be available at w:WP:HotCat (if it isn't, let me know and I'll track it down for you). Thanks! --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 00:39, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip. This should save a lot of time. :) Astral (talk) 00:49, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

I also recommend Lupin's popups, if you don't already have it; it's the first checkbox in the Gadgets section of WT:PREFS. That also saves a lot of time. --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 00:55, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Thanks again for the tip. Astral (talk) 01:32, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

The second checkbox and last checkbox in the 'Editing gadgets' section are also immensely helpful. Oh, and Tabbed Languages doesn't save much time, but it does look a lot better. Personally, I think all this stuff should be enabled by default. Sorry to bombard you. --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:36, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

I've avoided enabling any Gadgets so far I because somewhat prefer to do things manually (less chance of making errors that way, IMHO). But some tasks, like categorisation, are just so tedious that it definitely seems preferable to have Gadgets do the heavy lifting for me. I appreciate the pointers on which Gadgets are the handiest. Astral (talk) 01:55, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

Interesting. I respect that position, although I must admit I'm not that virtuous (thereby creating errors, now and then). Cheers! --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:59, 20 July 2012 (UTC)

This page

I did my best to give you back your old "normal" talkpage, but I'm sure I did something wrong. If this isn't what you want, just tell me. --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 05:03, 23 August 2012 (UTC)

Oh yeah — do you want your userpage back too? --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 02:16, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Sure. Thanks again. :) Astral (talk) 02:20, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

 Done (I hope you'll be able to compile a foreign list as well!)--Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:00, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

I'm pretty much monolingual, sadly. As une Canadienne, I know some French, in addition to bits of Japanese, but not enough to contribute comfortably. I suppose I could still nominate foreign words, but I wouldn't feel they were "my" Words of the Day unless I actually created the entries.

The introduction of a Foreign WotD has me wondering if introducing a "salty" WotD might also be a neat idea. Offensive and vulgar terms understandably cannot be nominated for regular WotD, as we want to keep the main page work-safe, but there could be a separate subpage somewhere where a Swear of the Day could be featured. Astral (talk) 03:49, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Hmm. So much for theoretically bilingual education. Pick a language and have fun with it! I enjoy learning about languages with interesting writing systems and grammatical structures, and I don't gain fluency, but at least I sometimes reach the point where I can add correct entries. Then again, we all have different backgrounds and reasons for endlessly continuously editing here. What would the feature be called, Bloody Fucking Cunt of a Damn Word for this Shitty-Ass Day (which produces the simple acronym "BFCoaDWftSAD")? --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:25, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

All Canadians learn French in school, but outside of Quebec, it isn't really used by people on a day-to-day basis. "Use it or lose it," as they say. Hence many (if not most) Canadians, particularly in western Canada where I'm from, either have a limited grasp on French or are exclusively Anglophone.

Salty Sailor's Swear o' the Day? Wins points for alliteration. Astral (talk) 04:55, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Oh, I know that feeling. I've been forcing everyone I know who speaks Latin to have awkward conversations with me so that I keep up my vocab skills.
Besides the fact that it seems to denote you as being the titular navigator who has a curious epithet that denotes the presence of halite, that seems excellent. It would be interesting, but then again, would you really feel like your work was worth it if not too many people ever saw it (prominent NSFW content could kill us)? --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 05:21, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

"Salty" as in sense 3 ("coarse, provocative, earthy") and "sailor" as in "mouth of a sailor." :) NSFW topics generally don't end up as main-page featured articles on Wikipedia, but there's specialized portals for topics like sexuality, and these choose their own, often NSFW, articles to feature. Which is why the naughty WotD would be on a subpage: it wouldn't greet unsuspecting visitors on the main page, but it'd still be available for people interested in it to find. Of course, this is something Urban Dictionary already does very well, so perhaps it would be best not to steal their thunder. Astral (talk) 08:02, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

I know you meant those defs/connotations... it was just an ironic joke. I am a native speaker (I think!). Considering that people do manage to find stupid appendices pretty easily... And I didn't know UD has any "thunder", or really anything worth stealing at all. But then again I would be happier if they didn't call themselves a dictionary, just so's not to peeve the haughty amateur lexicographers around here (like me). --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 13:52, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

My irony detector obviously suffers periodic malfunctions. :) UD is handy for getting an idea of the meaning of slang terms which are attestable but not defined in any proper dictionaries, but one must often sift through a lot of made-up junk and bad jokes to obtain usable information, and even the good entries tend to be written in a jocular tone. Astral (talk) 15:23, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

I stopped relying on UD for slang when it said that fruit denotes a gay man, and then said that it means a man who is not gay, but metrosexual, and then reneged on that definition as well. I'm all for wikis and the wiki spirit — but there's a reason that we end up spending a lot of time reverting anons. The thing is, UD is anons. --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 23:45, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

The more reliable entries tend to get the most upvotes. If a term has several pages of definitions, like fruit, the top two or three are probably the only ones worth trusting to any degree. Astral (talk) 01:23, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Er, bump ≠ lexicography. See, it's a world of anons! --Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:33, 25 August 2012 (UTC)