User talk:TeleComNasSprVen/archives/2011

Breaking redirects.

Please don't. —Ruakh_TALK 13:00, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Speedy and bad redirect

What is the point of your adding {{speedy|Bad redirect}}? I mean, you seem to say that all or most redirect are bad and should be deleted. Have you discussed this in Beer parlour? (I have not noticed that you had.) If admins decide they want to delete redirects, they have tools to find them; they do not need anyone to mark the redirects using a template, one at the time. If you have nothing to do with your time, I can point you to lists of useful mechanical work that needs to be done. --Dan Polansky 08:56, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm trying to apply WT:Redirections, but if you think they are controversial, I am free to undo all the edits I've made. What list is this that you refer to? TeleComNasSprVen 07:51, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Applying WT:Redirections would make sense if you were an admin, as then you could directly delete the entries. Manually tagging the redirects, some of them actually rather useful, seems a rather imperfect idea. Also, note that Wiktionary:Redirections is not a policy. You do not need to undo anything; just stopping adding more tags should do.

There is Wiktionary:Todo, referring to several lists. One such list in particular is Wiktionary:Todo/footnote errors. When you complete a worklist, it is nice to state in the list that you have done so, or remove the completed entries from the list. --Dan Polansky 08:03, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Also s'entendre (et al.) are valid redirections in French as long as this is explained in the entry. Or at least, such redirects are used, so I'm not keen to delete them. Same goes for redirects outside of the main namespace where there is no real reason to delete them. Mglovesfun (talk) 22:43, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

Icelandic noun categories

Why would you want to delete Category:Icelandic noun forms - neuter? It is a subcategory of Category:Icelandic noun forms, as you created it.

And why place Category:Icelandic neuter nouns‎ in Category:Icelandic noun forms? It's a type of noun, not a noun form. Category:Icelandic noun forms - neuter should probably in Category:Icelandic neuter nouns‎.--Leo Laursen – (talk · contribs) 07:55, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Forgive my ignorance, but perhaps I was confused as to whether or not noun forms which are neuter were really equivalent to neuter nouns. Hence, given my right as the sole contributor to the page, previously, I had marked it for speedy deletion. Nonetheless, it seemed Mglovesfun seems to have the issue sorted out at any rate. TeleComNasSprVen 23:33, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Etymology of chronological

Re diff: First, "chronological" is most likely derived from "chronologic" + "al" rather than "chrono" + "logical"; the only dictionary from where I have looked that states etymology of "chronological" explicitly is Century 1911, and it has "chronologic" + "al". Based on what source have you changed the etymology? Second, the summary that you gave--"also"--is meaningless. --Dan Polansky 08:14, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm not aware that I'm supposed to provide a source to my information when changing an entry. Considering that [[chrono]] meant "time" and -logical refers to the "ology" part of "chronology" in adjectival form, I thought it was most logical (no pun intended) to change the etymology to more accurately reflect this; you can see a list of entries with similar etymological formats at Category:English words suffixed with -logical (N.B. none of them have sources for their etymologies). Gynecological, for instance, has gyneco- + -logical as its etymology; will you dispute this as well? TeleComNasSprVen 23:33, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps something like {{confix|chrono|-logic|al}} would satisfy most people.--Leo Laursen – (talk · contribs) 07:18, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

(responding, unindenting) If you want to be adding etymologies and especially replacing them, you should be willing to check sources. Category:English words suffixed with -logical, created by you, three substantially different entries: chronological, gynecological, gynæcological, nomological. The etymology of "gynecological" was added recently by a newbie.

I admit that whether "chronological" should be decomposed as "chrono-" + "-logical" or "chronologic" + "-al" is unclear. However, to repeat myself, 'the only dictionary from where I have looked that states etymology of "chronological" explicitly is Century 1911, and it has "chronologic" + "al"'.

In any case, for such an ambiguous etymology, you should not summarize its change with "also", and switching from {{suffix|chronologic|al}} to {{suffix|chrono|logical}} without having a source that supports that switch is undesirable. The correctness of such a change cannot be resolved by checking what seems "most logical" (which means "most intuitively plausible" rather than "most fitting the laws of correct drawing of conclusions") to the editor. --Dan Polansky 07:42, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Like I said, I'm not aware of any current practice or policy demanding that I supply a resource to explain my actions, or whenever I change an etymology, so it would do me good in the future if you would just point it out. But in any case, I've googled it and found Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “chronological”, in Online Etymology Dictionary. to satisfy you; seems like we're both wrong, and hope it resolves the issue. TeleComNasSprVen 08:22, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

There is no written policy that asks you to provide your sources for etymologic information. Nonetheless, it seems kind of obvious to me that you should not be changing an etymology on your whim, without knowing what you are doing. Furthermore, it is clear that the only at least in part reliable sources of etymologies are academic sources, and that etymologists wonna-be eager to invent etymologies without having a deeper knowledge of the subject are not hard to find. If you reject to check sources for your changes in etymology in future, we may take it to Beer parlour to find out what other Wiktionary editors think. I am not saying that you should not be making your unsourced decision about what to make out of what sources say, as sources often disagree, but I am saying that you should be checking sources to make Wiktionary a reliable dictionary.

The source you have linked to has "chronology" + "-ical", which is just another way of decomposing the term or bracketing the decomposition; the most atomic decomposition seems "chron-" + "-o-" + "log-" "-ic" + "-al" anyway. The source has made the choice to enter this sort of decomposition, as is clear from its entries for "biological", "astrological", "ideological", etc. --Dan Polansky 08:56, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Rollbacker

Hi TeleComNasSprVen. I added you to rollbackers, so please use "rollback", and the reverted edit will automatically be marked as patrolled.--Leo Laursen – (talk · contribs) 07:54, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

their/they vs he/she/his/her

There have been debates over this. However, the they/their form's what I've been taught and what my high school English teachers encouraged me to use. See this: [1]. The they/their form is used more in the UK or so I've been led to believe and I have seen its use in formal documents. This is the ground that I based myself on when I reverted a change to something that is accepted and widely used. Please note that I do not consider the his/her form to be wrong, but I do not like replacing something that's already correct with something else. If you are not happy, you are most welcome to bring this issue up in the Tea Room. Jamesjiao → ^{T ◊ C} 05:12, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Well, OK, it's just that I've been taught differently, by different teachers as you can tell, so I gave my reasoning in the edit summary stating my different understanding of the matter. Perhaps I had incorrectly assumed it was a mistake of rollback, and it was probably my fault, but thanks for pointing that out to me. Hopefully, bringing it to the Tea Room as you suggest might clarify this. You are also free to revert me if you wish. TeleComNasSprVen 05:16, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

I guess it's really an issue of first in first served and British English. vs American English - quite a common issue on WP, where the general consensus is the format/wording should be kept with the original author, be it BE, AE or one of the other English dialects. If the example was originaly written in 'his/her', I'd have left it alone as usual. Anyway, it's no biggie. I won't revert your revert, because it will just look bad, haha... Jamesjiao → ^{T ◊ C} 05:24, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Template:alcohol

Hi. I don't think that {{alcohol}} is a good idea. "Alcohol" implies methanol, ethanol, etc. so it is very confusing that it is categorized under Category:Alcoholism. The template is only in use on drinking game, which is not about alcoholism, but rather consumption of alcoholic drinks i.e drinking.--Leo Laursen – (talk · contribs) 08:25, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Now that I think about it, "alcohol" in the sense of its chemical structure does have a distinction between that and everyday parlance. However, both Category:Alcoholism and Category:Alcoholic beverages appears bloated, and only restricted to a special set of entries that make sense within their own context. I agree that perhaps {{alcohol}} is not the best qualifier, but another better alternative may be needed whilst we sort out this kludge? TeleComNasSprVen 08:31, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean by "bloated" in this context, "Alcoholism" has only 74 pages. I think Category:Drinking is quite appropriate.--Leo Laursen – (talk · contribs) 08:38, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

I've taken it to WT:RFDO#Template:alcohol, to get some additional input.--Leo Laursen – (talk · contribs) 13:11, 7 June 2011 (UTC)