User talk:Msh210

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Kham, efshar, kal, etc.

Hi msh210,

I've been thinking we should have a category for adjectives like (deprecated template usage) חם (kham), (deprecated template usage) אפשר (efshár) (sp?), (deprecated template usage) קל (kal), etc. that frequently lead off sentences. ("Kham bakhútz." "Efshár mei-ha'ugá?" "Kal l'havín otó.") Does that seem like a good idea to you? If so, what do you think of the name Category:Hebrew impersonal adjectives?

Thanks in advance,
—Ruakh_TALK 21:15, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

I assume you mean "that frequently start sentences" as a handy description, not as the criterion for inclusion in the category. (Can any adjective start a sentence, somehow? I suspect so.) What is the criterion, then? Cham (and kar) seems different to me from kal and efshar (and naim (google:נעים-לפגוש) and kashe), in that the latter are followed by l'- verbs and the former not. But maybe that's incorrect. (I've never heard efshar mehauga, but assume it's an elision of leechol, yes?) Why do you want to call them "impersonal": is that what they're usually called?—msh210℠ 21:26, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Re: handy description vs. criterion: Er, I kind of did mean it as the criterion. :-/   It's true that any adjective can start a sentence, though with most I can only think of sentences that would sound either poetic ("Khakhamim hem she-yod'im l'sameakh et nashoteihem") or ridiculous ("U-m'fugarim hem she-lo"). These adjectives are notable in that it's normal for them to start a present-tense clause, and in other clauses for them to be preceded only by a form of hayá. (Not counting adverbs and such.) Though, they can be preceded by l'- phrases — basically subjects in the dative case, if Hebrew had cases — as in "Lama l'Yosi mutar v'lo li?" I'll grant that I haven't given a very formal criterion, but to me these words seem to form a natural class; do they not to you? (N.B. most of them also have non-sentence-starting uses — "Ein mayim khamim" — just as in English many adjectives are also nouns, etc. But, not all: I can't think of any sentence using "efshar" as a normal adjective; in all cases I'd prefer "efshari" for that.)

Re: infinitivity vs. not: Maybe. google:"חם לגעת" does get some hits, though admittedly it's not the most natural phrase in the world. BTW, I'd "translate" "Efshár mei-ha'ugá?" as either "Efshár l'kabél mei-ha'ugá?" or "Efshár lakákhat mei-ha'ugá?", depending on the situation, but I suppose "Efshár le'ekhól mei-ha'ugá?" is basically the same.

Re: "impersonal": *shrug* They're always masculine singular, and they seem analogous to the impersonal constructions in English ("it's hot outside", "it's easy to understand it/him"), though of course not every such Hebrew expression translates to such an English one and vice versa ("I'm hot" = "kham li", "Can I have some?" = "Efshar?"; conversely, "It's raining" = "yored geshem"). I don't know what the usual name for them is.

—Ruakh_TALK 23:48, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Re "I haven't given a very formal criterion, but to me these words seem to form a natural class; do they not to you": Well, yes and no, for two reasons. (Well, yes, for the reasons you state, and no, for two reasons.) (1) The "infinitivity" (?) business. It seems like two classes, not one. Note, though, that you can say google:זה-לא-אפשר also (although I think "bilti efshari" is more common now). So maybe it's just one class. (2) It seems (contradicting what you said above) that every one of these adjectives can also be used in the normal adjective fashion (can you find one that's not?), which kinda dilutes the strength of the category. Perhaps call it "Hebrew adjectives that can be impersonal" or something.—msh210℠ 17:38, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

I'd be down with two categories, if you can clarify them well enough that I can apply them accurately. Re: "'infinitivity' (?)": It's not a real word, if that's what you're �ing. Re: normal adjective use: Yeah, maybe. I mean, they are adjectives, and I'm not suggesting otherwise. Re: "Hebrew adjectives that can be impersonal": That seems a bit wordy, and it also risks bringing in non-grammatical senses of "impersonal" (mechanical/robotic; distant/standoffish); are you saying that "Hebrew impersonal adjectives" would be misleading? —Ruakh_TALK 20:29, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Somewhat misleading, yes. No?—msh210℠ 21:01, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Or maybe not; we seem to have several such categories with such names; e.g., English uncountable nouns and English abstract nouns (which latter include fireside).—msh210℠ 21:16, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Did we reach a conclusion here? I can't tell. —Ruakh_TALK 19:07, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

There were a few issues we discussed:

1. What words get included? Criteria? — This seems to be the (somewhat subjective, but that's okay) criterion that it's usual for such words to start sentences (preceded by "to be" in past and future).
2. Are there two categories: things followed by "to" verbs and things not? — You think not, and, even if yes, we can always fine-tune later.
3. What to call the category. — I have no objection to you original suggestion, Hebrew impersonal adjectives, if that's what they're called in English and they have no English name in Hebrew. (By that latter I mean, of course, that Anglophone grammarians/linguists have no name for this type of Hebrew adjective.)

So we seem to be good to go. I assume, incidentally, that yesh and en will be in this category (even though they aren't preceded by "to be" in past and future but are instead replaced by it)?—msh210℠ 19:19, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

So, we did decide to create at least one category?

1. Sounds good.
2. O.K.
3. I don't know if there's an English name for them, period, applied to either language. google:"impersonal adjective|adjectives" gets only 68 hits (257 raw), and most of them aren't in this sense (though some are). I'm suggesting this name because I don't have a better one; because these are adjectives; and because impersonal verb, impersonal expression, and impersonal construction are standard terms. (In a lot of languages, including at least English and French, you can't use an adjective like this on its own — you have to say something like "it is good/understood/obvious that […] " or "it is cold/hot/rainy in […] " or "it is easy/difficult/interesting to […] " — so it makes sense to view the construction or expression as a whole as impersonal. In Hebrew, you just say "tov/kamuvan/barur she […] " or "kar/kham/[n/a] b'- […] " or "kal/kashe/m'anyen l'- […] ", so it seems like the adjective itself is being used impersonally. And we're a dictionary, so it's more convenient for us to describe these as properties of individual words. (If this were standard category with a standard name — which it may well be, but if so I don't know it — then I don't think it would have occurred to me to ask anyone about it, I would have just created the category. I'd like your opinion because I'm not sure about this, it's just an idea I had. And I think it's a good idea, but maybe not, and anyway not all good ideas work out in practice.)

And I wasn't thinking that yesh and ein would be included, since they don't seem to be adjectives at all, but more like quasi-verbs. For example, they (especially ein) can function as copulas in formal Hebrew (as in Template:Hebr or Template:Hebr). Funnily enough, my Hebrew–English dictionaries all give yesh as an adverb, which I think they're using a catch-all POS, and my Hebrew dictionary seems to give it only as a noun, apparently on etymological grounds. (Speaking only of the grammatical/existential use here. Certainly it has lexical uses as a noun, as all dictionaries agree.)

—Ruakh_TALK 16:14, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Hm. I maintain that yesh and en are used the way adjectives are, and seem to be adjectives. But having thought about it some more, I suppose they're not adjectives of the sort we're discussing here. After all, yesh li sefer is like kasha li handasa=handasa kasha li: still an adjective, just not of the sort we're discussing. Or so it seems to me at the moment.

More importantly: I suggest that the fact that these adjectives are "impersonal" is perfect material for a usage note; perhaps draft a usage-note template that can be included in all these pages and that categorizes.—msh210℠ 19:59, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for all your advice. I've gone ahead and created Category:Hebrew impersonal adjectives. I haven't written the usage-note template yet — I've thought a bit about what it should say, but it's still kind of vague in my head — so right now the category is still empty. I know how you like to keep your talk-page clean, but I'd kind of like to keep this conversation around. Is it all right if I copy it to the category's talk-page? Thanks again. —Ruakh_TALK 00:46, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

If you like, you certainly can, but it's unnecessary: I'll keep it as long as you like, and archive it thereafter. Nice explanation in the cat.—msh210℠ 15:48, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

ASL index

I thought you might be interested in Tom's recommendation at User talk:Positivesigner, "... assign Sign Writing pictographs for each [symbol in his sign jotting system]. The lookup would be visual enough to not even need to know English and it would be general enough to isolate a group of similar signs in a few steps. My code would not be seen except by the computer programs we use to create the slightly-inaccurate Sign Writing indicies. Once the entry is located, you can have it translated from a video to Sign Writing, PSE, and English."

I'm excited about the possibility of creating a useable index, as the current system still doesn't seem terribly easy to maintain or even to navigate. Your feedback is welcome. —Rod (A. Smith) 18:41, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Why use the current system for the index? If we're switching to ASLSJ, do so for the index, too. Or am I missing something? In any event, I think that since SignWriting (the real thing, not our version) will, I hope, be Unicode characters, we'll be switching over anyway, so any current system is temporary and need not be ideal; so we might as well leave it the way it is for now even if we do think ASLSJ is better.—msh210℠ 18:47, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

No, I don't think a full conversion to ASLSJ (temporary or otherwise) is on the table, because it doesn't seem to solve any problems of the current transcription system. Tom's recommendation was to combine SignWriting symbols with ASLSJ just to organize (and automatically maintain) our sign language indices. I'm sketchy on the details, but presumably the reorganized index would make it easier for a reader to find the entry for a sign of unknown meaning. I told him to be bold with one or two of the existing Index:American Sign Language pages, so we can at least see how his vision might unfold.

Browsing around the Internet, I cannot find any new information on the integration of SignWriting into Unicode. The layout issues seem so much more complex than Unicode combining characters can accomodate, so I suspect it will be several years, at least. —Rod (A. Smith) 20:37, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I have a working solution for encoding Binary SignWriting to Unicode. Binary SignWriting uses sequential 16 bit codes to represent the spatial information needed for SignWriting. You can read about the plane 4 solution. You can view the Hello world. page. You can view the BSW JavaScript library (see function char2unicode). I'm currently rewriting the SignWriting Image Server to use Binary SignWriting rather than comma delimited data. It should be ready next week. -Steve 12:49, 08 May 2009 (UTC)

SignWriting Image Server beta 5 has been released to view and download. Section 3 has the Binary SignWriting definition with ABNF for data and Regular Expressions for tokens. -Steve 19:35, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

nisan

Can you point me to the guideline on this. I don't quite get why Japanese can have an entry but not Hebrew. SpinningSpark 22:39, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Me neither. The rule is, we don't include transliterations. Japanese is an exception, as are some other Oriental languages, I think, but I have no idea why (or which). Hebrew, OTOH, is not an exception. That said, there is an English word Nisan, for which we have an entry.​—msh210℠ (talk) 16:07, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, you asked for a pointer to the rule, and I didn't provide one. Actually, I don't know where this rule is, if it's written anywhere. But it exists anyway.​—msh210℠ (talk) 17:39, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

At least in theory, Japanese has three scripts, and the Latin script is one of them. Mglovesfun (talk) 09:58, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

Perhaps someone should update template:langscript then.​—msh210℠ (talk) 17:18, 30 June 2010 (UTC)

new edits

Maybe you can help me by looking at one of my edits, and telling me what I'm doing right, what I'm doing wrong. --Mat200 11:10, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Okay, looking at [[trinkly]]: The links you added to it are to works that actually use the word, rather than to works that discuss it. Don't put those under a "References" header (which is reserved for works that provide info about the word, like gender or pronunciation.) Rather, those go right under the definition line or on the page [[citations:trinkly]]. The format should be (not just a link but rather) the one outlined in [[WT:QUOTE]]'s section "How to format a quotation", especially if you're putting the citations right into the entry, and should also follow [[WT:CITE]] if you're using the citations: page. (I know this seems like a lot, but you get the hang of it fast.) People have recommended that you use {{quote-book}} or some such, and they've recommended it to me, too, but I never got the hang of it, and it's not required, so I format quotations "by hand", i.e., using the markup described in [[WT:QUOTE]]. Does this help?​—msh210℠ (talk) 11:30, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Razorflame

Can you explain why exactly did you indefblock him? --Ivan Štambuk 07:04, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

See his block summaries.​—msh210℠ (talk) 07:07, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Well, did he edit in languages other than those 5? --Ivan Štambuk 07:11, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Yes.​—msh210℠ (talk) 07:12, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

So you blocked him indefinitely because he added a Persian transliteration in a translation table that already existed on هوش ? --Ivan Štambuk 07:15, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

I blocked him indefinitely because of his numerous bad edits. I thought I could get away with no one's complaining about the block because of [1].​—msh210℠ (talk) 07:19, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

AFAICS, he made some ~2500 edits since June 17th when he made a promise not to edit other languages, all of which where OK except that one. Apparently he was adding Esperanto and Ido translation at intelligence, saw Persian هوش without a transliteration, clicked it, saw it provided at [[هوش]], and then propagated it back. The original entry was created by a knowledgeable Persian editor, so there is no reason to assume that Razorflame willfully spread potentially wrong material researched on his own. I wish he hadn't done it but...wouldn't you agree that indefblock is bit too excessive? He didn't do anything wrong after all. Would you agree in lifting the block if Razorflame specifically promised not to edit translation tables in languags other than those 5? --Ivan Štambuk 07:32, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

I think that any reasonable reading of what he wrote includes translation tables. Anything else ignores the reason for his promise, which is that people found that they could not trust his edits in other languages: where those edits are made (definition lines, translation tables, Descendants sections) doesn't really matter. That this particular edit can be trusted because it's a copy of an edit by Kaixinguo is false (because Kaixinguo may have made a typo, and Razorflame does not know otherwise, or, at least, cannot be trusted to know otherwise) and irrelevant (because the block is not just for this one edit: it's for many).​—msh210℠ (talk) 07:39, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't answer your question. No, I wouldn't.​—msh210℠ (talk) 07:40, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

I agree with msh210. We've been through this so many times, and I'm tired of it. Razorflame has been caught making bad edits more times than I can count (and has probably make a whole lot more, which haven't been caught), and always promises to change his behaviour, but never does. -Atelaes λάλει ἐμοί 12:53, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Agree with msh210 and Atelaes. Mglovesfun (talk) 12:56, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Me, too. (BTW, Ivan says every edit was O.K. except that one, but I've not seen any evidence to support that claim. If he's made 2500 edits in the past two weeks, it's unlikely that each one has been fully scoured by knowledgeable editors.) —Ruakh_TALK 13:30, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Incidentally, I just blocked him twice, the second time to add a comment to the block log. I noticed afterwards that the first block had a timespan of "infinite" set and the second "indefinite". This should not be taken to mean that I intended to change from an infinite block to a merely indefinite (but eventually to be removed) one. I did not so intend. The wording change was unintentional, and I intended the block to be permanent. (Obviously, if there is community consensus in disagreement with blocking him permanently, I will abide by it. I'm talking about the more likely scenario that there is no such consensus, and, in any event, about the current situation that such consensus has not been shown to exist.)​—msh210℠ (talk) 13:37, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

I disagree with this block. Adding a transliteration to a trans table from elsewhere on Wiktionary does not seem like a violation of his promise, and I doubt that he though so either when adding it. He specifically asked for a final chance, and to be permanently blocked if he doesn't keep it, and I'm inclined to believe him. --Yair rand (talk) 18:17, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Believe him about what? I believe him when he said "If I stray at any point, you may block me indefinitely. This will be the final chance"[2]. Not penultimate. What are you believing him about?​—msh210℠ 18:22, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

"This is the first and only time that I am serious about this. I will seriously only edit those five langauges." I have no reason to think that he was lying. --Yair rand (talk) 18:31, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

At the time, you mean, I assume, because in retrospect he clearly was. Maybe at the time he thought he was telling the truth, I don't know. What's the difference?​—msh210℠ 18:47, 1 July 2010 (UTC)

Razorflame has now e-mailed me, asking for an unblock or a revision of the block to be short-term (he suggests a fortnight or so), saying he learns from his mistakes, that he knows he messed up, and he wants "one final chance". I think my comments in the block summaries and above are reply enough to all that, but I have a question for all interested parties who may be watching this page. It seems to be that he really might learn, or mature, or whatever — though not likely in a fortnight. Perhaps the block should only be a year long, so as to give him another chance (yes, yet another chance, but this time a year later)? What think you all?​—msh210℠ 19:49, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

The particular nature of the mistake doesn't seem very bad. It is only the continuing saga of broken promises and interpersonal conflict that seem to waste time and cause public drama. That those with regular contact with RFlame seem to not value his contributions very much is troublesome. I had encouraged him to make contributions in English, but he did not seem very interested. He seems to be seeking to learn by making mistakes, which approach may be good for him, but is a drain on the patience of those who correct them. This seems like an area where the bulk of editors should defer to those in the best position to assess the contributions since the previous drama. There doesn't seem to be any matter of principle that is not being honored in the process as it is now being carried out here. DCDuring TALK 20:55, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

A year seems quite reasonable to me. He certainly has enthusiasm, which is a very useful trait here. A year-long break would certainly give him impetus to rethink his modus operandi, lest he suffer another one. -Atelaes λάλει ἐμοί 04:58, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

(In reply to DCDuring.) I suppose people who know Ido, and Esperanto, and Italian, and whatever, can go back and look at all his edits. They shouldn't have to, is sorta the point. If an editor, after so many edits, still is so untrustworthy, he should not be editing.​—msh210℠ 18:12, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

I think you guys should cut him some slack. It's a really harsh interpretation to say that he broke his promise by making a contribution in the translation tables. The kid is willing to learn. A block of one year is ridiculous, by the way. --Dijan 05:50, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

Before you can block a well-intended editor indefinitely (or for a long time), you have to specify the reasons. "Numerous bad edits" is nebulous and unacceptable. You have to give diffs to the specific edits that you are blocking him for. So far, the only thing that I can make out from this undocumented accusation is that he copied a Persian transliteration from one page and added it to another page. I don’t know which Persian word was involved, so I can’t judge the value of his edit. Razorflame may be a thorn in some of our sides, due to his young age and immaturity and lack of experience, but he tries hard to improve and has his heart in the right place. Like any other editor, he deserves due process, and this block denied due process. If he is to be blocked, it has to be done correctly and fairly. —Stephen 09:48, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

See numerous discussions about his bad edits on his talkpage and its archives. Some of those link to diffs, most do not, but it is clear that all parties to the conversations — Razorflame included — knew what edits they were talking about.​—msh210℠ 18:12, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

Re due process and fairness: Blocks generally are done by one admin on his own say-so. There is no other process, except that sometimes people contest the block on the blocking admin's talkpage or by e-mailing him. Anyone who wants to do so in this case may do so (and Ivan and you did here, and Razorflame did by e-mail), but as you can see the general opinion — as expressed on this page, anyway — is that a block is in order, forever or at least for a good long time. So I think that the process we usually follow has been followed, and that the general opinion is that the block was fair.​—msh210℠ 18:21, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

As requested by Razorflame in an email, I will give my opinion here: While Razorflame has done a lot of good here, he has also done a lot which is not really acceptable - while he goes through phases of apologising profusely (to anyone and everyone) he forgets, very very quickly, any of what he has been told and returns to making mistakes. If it could have been shown that he learns from his mistakes, sure, we can unblock him as another "lesson learned". The sad fact is that he doesn't (and there is a very long history to show this), so unblocking him will lead to another fortnight of editing, and then another indefinite block. There is simply no point in going through this any more times, so, let the block stand. Conrad.Irwin 15:48, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

It needn't be indefinite, but I agree there should be a block of significant length. Equinox ◑ 15:50, 5 July 2010 (UTC)

Razorflame emailed me to give an opinion too. The languages we work on don't overlap, but from the related conversations it seems to me that if you lift the block now you'll have the same discussion pretty soon again. In my life I've seen "second last chances" work, but "third last chances" only lead to more - if there wasn't a temporary ban of some sort, it always ultimately came to a permanent one. That said, I don't know whether Razorflame isn't of the age in which "one year" still almost rhymes with "eternity". --Thrissel 17:57, 5 July 2010 (UTC)