User talk:EncMstr/Archive

Welcome!

Hello EncMstr/Archive, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

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I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you have any questions, check out Wikipedia:Where to ask a question or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome!  HGB 00:23, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

Wiki for Engineering

Engineering Wiki is a wiki entirely dedicated to collecting information about Engineering. The Engineering Wiki is in early development stages at the moment. We invite you to help devlope this wiki.

Johann Pachelbel

Hello! I saw your edits to Johann Pachelbel some time ago and I really liked how you fixed the language in the article. Thank you for doing that! I was wondering if you would want to look at/fix the article again now that the "Works" section is expanded? I'd really appreciate that :) Jashiin 16:26, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Aw, that happened to me too, I know how this feels. Anyhow, there's no rush of any kind. I'm looking forward to see your response and edits :) Jashiin 08:56, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, I responded. Sorry it took so long: I was pretty busy during the last few days, and those replacement texts I'm suggesting (see the response) took me forever to make. Jashiin 15:43, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

Recent Changes Camp in Portland

FYI RecentChangesCamp Tedernst | talk 22:15, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia Project

Hi, my name is Federico (alias Pain) and I am creating a section for nominating th best user page, I was wondering if you were interested in joining the project.

The project has just started, and we need help to spread the word and ameliorate it.

Best regards, Federico Pistono ✆ ✍ 14:28, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

Hoyt Arboretum

Sorry for not adding anything to the edit summary! I had removed the sentence because it seemed redundant to me, considering that "The arborteum has twelve miles of trails (two of which are suitable for wheelchairs)" and "The Hoyt Arboretum (185 acres)" had already been stated. Nickpdx 05:14, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

Exponential

Please stop reverting the page titled exponential to the irresponsible record label article. Some anonymous editor changed the page from a disambiguation page into an article about the record label with that name. I consider that vandalism. Obviously, the many many many articles that link to the page titled exponential are not attempting to link to an article about the record label. I think the person who replaced that with a blank page was improving it. Michael Hardy 00:31, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Page renaming

It was a newby who forgot to sign who asked that. I did the move already. Thanks. KimvdLinde 21:28, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Grin, it happens... KimvdLinde 22:07, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Why so few Wikipedians are engineers?

I am trying to understand why there are so few Wikipedians who are graduate engineers. Once I get a grasp on that, perhaps I may be able to formulate some ideas on how to attract more experienced engineers to become Wikipedians. It would be very helpful if you would respond to these a few questions:

• Are you a university graduate engineer?
• Please indicate in which of these engineering disciplines you obtained your degree:
  1. Aeronautical or aerospace engineering
  2. Bioengineer or biological engineering
  3. Chemical engineering
  4. Civil engineering
  5. Electrical engineering
  6. Environmental engineering
  7. Mechanical engineering
  8. Petroleum engineering
  9. Other
• In what year did you obtain your degree?
• What attracted you to participate in Wikipedia?

If you would rather not answer these questions on your Talk page, then you may respond on my User talk:mbeychok page. Or you may respond to me via Wikipedia's email which I have enabled on my User:mbeychok page.

If you would rather not respond at all, that's fine also. Regards, - mbeychok 04:28, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

References on Moors

OMG! Good job! I was going crazy and was planning to return today to tidy up, learning the referencing in the process...Well, I still have to learn how to properly provide references, but the article looks great now. Thanks for not-teaching me (joking). Best, musti 21:44, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Federalist Papers

The edit summary pretty much conveys the point...in my judgment the ref/note system is substantially superior to cite.php. Certainly, it is much more convenient to edit the article with the ref/note system in place. I would request that you not convert from one to the other on this article in particular, which is a long-term project of mine, and which at the moment has no other major editors. Christopher Parham (talk) 22:22, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Giant's Series

Glad to be of help. Thanks for the encouragement. FrankWilliams 12:38, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Re your inquiry on my Talk page about a summary of my engineer survey

Thanks for your enquiry. There is a summary available at User:Mbeychok/MRB's Survey of Wikipedian Engineers. I posted a notice of that summary at the Village Pump some time ago. Regards, - mbeychok 15:08, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

KPSU

Wow, thanks! You're working on all of Portland's radio stations? That does sound like a sort of lonely job. I took out the bit about corporate sponsorship because I'm not aware of any (KPSU is funded by PSU and listener donations) but if you know something I don't I'd be glad to put it back in. Did you find the entry because of the plea I put on the radio wikiproject page? Also, how long does the entry have to be before the stub tag doesn't apply? Thanks again! Katsam 09:13, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

Ah! I knew that KPSU was underwritten by community businesses, and I guess that for instance The Portland Mercury is probably incorporated, but saying in the first line that the station is "corporate-sponsored" makes my brain flower with ideas about a whole different ballpark of stuff, i.e. Archer Daniels Midland and friends.

Also, KBOO's entry says that they are "non-profit and listener-sponsored," but they also receive funding from neighborhood businesses: [1]. Maybe I can stick a mention of the business funding in at the end of the KPSU entry, where the station's funding sources are described...? Katsam 23:07, 9 June 2006 (UTC)

...that don't say they are radio stations...anywhere. Heh.

OK, I put that KPSU is "noncommercial" in the first sentence, so that it'll pop up on Google and so forth when people can only see the tagline. Later in the entry, when discussing funding, I say that some of KPSU's funding comes from local businesses. Is that satisfactory?

I might go take a crack at OPB radio later this week. Before I do, I was wondering: is there a radio station entry at Wikipedia that you could point me to that's exemplary? If not, can you point me towards one that's just Good? I need role models. Katsam 00:40, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

OK. I bet I can get KPSU's entry up to KBOO standards.

To continue the corporate banter, I think that in KPSU's case (or KBOO's) it gives the wrong idea. "Corporate funding" makes a person -- at least it makes me -- think of Microsoft, AT+T, the aforementioned Archer Daniels Midland, and so forth, while the businesses that fund KPSU all small, local places like bars, newspapers, and record stores. In the case of OPB, they actually ARE funded by Archer Daniels Midland, Pabst Blue Ribbon, etc etc.

Thanks for your help. Katsam 02:53, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Seattle to Portland

Thanks for improving the readability of the Seattle to Portland article. I do have a question about one change you made. Yesterday, a link to the article on the Cascade Bicycle Club was added to the article and then removed by you. You gave no reason for the removal. Is there a reason that the article on the club should not be linked from the STP? I also asked this question in the talk page for the article. --Patleahy 16:44, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Its fixed. Thanks Patleahy 17:41, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

measurement uncertainty

The theoretical text seems content rich

No, I think the major problem with this article is that the theoretical text has next to no content. It's written like a preface to an article on the subject rather than like an article on the subject. Michael Hardy 14:58, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

Practiced/practised

Thank you for being so civil about my edit, but I have just realised I was mistaken. US English uses -ce for both the noun and the verb; here it is like advise and advice. Ironically, I thought I was standing up for the US version of the language, as it clearly should be in an article about a crash in the US. It is confusing as licence/license goes the other way. I am humbled by my mistake and obviously I have rectified the article. --Guinnog 20:56, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, one lives and learns. --Guinnog 15:24, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Calling programmers

We need coders for the WikiProject Disambigation fixer. We need to make a program to make faster and easier the fixing of links. We will be happy if you could check the project. You can Help! --Neo139 08:57, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

re: Magic Mile

Nah, only about 1,800, most of them about Oregon. :) And when I'm bored at work I tend to refresh my watchlist. That article caught my eye since it was kind of an orphan, in the generic Oregon stub category, to which I was trying to assign more specific stubs. Glad to see it got expanded. Katr67 12:05, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Barlow and which/that

re: Sam Barlow and Barlow, Oregon (and Barlow Road as well)

I don't own the magic book, Oregon Geographic Names, (I had it out from the library) but my friend Twisted86 does. I'm sure he'll be happy to look it up for us when I direct his attention this way.

re:which/that

It's a restrictive clause thing. I don't have my copy of Chicago handy, but here is one source that I trust, even though I disagree with him: [2]. I am a quibbling weirdo who prefers to make the which/that distinction, which was drummed into me during a stint in journalism school, and during my professional copyediting career. I was paid to make this distinction there, but here I am not. I do it anyway. Here are some Wikipedia articles on the subject: Restrictiveness, English relative clauses#That and which. Make what you will of them, and happy editing! Katr67 20:40, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

See comments on Katr67's talk page. — Twisted86 - Talk - at 06:30, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

You're welcome. It is a fascinating book — especially considering that neither author is a professional geographer. — Twisted86 - Talk - at 07:24, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Glad I could help. Yes, OGN is packed with info--it's about 6 inches thick! And the newest version comes with a CD-ROM. Katr67 14:14, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

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Alpental Fix-THANKS

Thanks again for fixing up the Alpental page. It looked 100% better after you had re-arranged/organized the thing. Now, about the pest..... Is there a way to stop this guy from continuing to break the Wikipedia rules and messing up numerous articles with his personal attacks and mis-labeled links to his personal website? (user 67.170.33.237). The guy somehow knows my last name and is now posting it in the remarks section....not a huge deal, but I would rather he didn't do that. Can anything be done to curb his nasty ways? Thanks -- MrHyak

Review

Please review Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Appeal_of_VeryVerily. Thanks! JBKramer 18:23, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I looked at this article, but am unclear about its relevance to deflation (economics). — EncMstr 18:39, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

AnonymousIP is almost certainly Ruy Lopez. JBKramer 18:41, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Okay, so what if he is? Isn't his sentence fulfilled? — EncMstr 18:51, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

No. "Ruy Lopez is prohibited from editing using any sockpuppet account. Suspected Ruy Lopez sockpuppets may be banned, and administrators may ban Ruy Lopez for up to 2 months for each confirmed sockpuppet he uses." This is indefinite. It is indefinite, because if it is Ruy posting from the IP address, "Any administator may ban Ruy Lopez for an article where he is engaged in edit warring, removal of sourced material, POV reorganizations of the article or any other activity which that administrator considers disruptive." JBKramer 18:53, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

That would be one avenue to stop him—if indeed it is true. But surely the effort is better spent to make Deflation (economics) into a well written article that doesn't change significantly three plus times per day. It seems like everyone is likely to be civil: so far the name calling has been minimal and tends to be focused on the proper content of the article. — EncMstr 19:05, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

The article has not seen major changes since Sterling's massive cruftremoval earlier this month, aside from Ruy's disruptive edit warring back to his crufty prefered version. I'm happy to work on the article, but before any real work can get done, we need to remove the POVpushing. JBKramer 19:07, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

The article's talk page talk:Deflation (economics) would be a good place to do that. Your favored version of the article (in its own section of course) would probably remain there unopposed. It would be helpful to omit portions not in dispute and include any reasoning, facts, etc. which support your version. — EncMstr 19:24, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

It is nearly impossible to find a cition for "No one worth noting has ever said this." How would you reccomend I do so? JBKramer 19:25, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Proving a negative is impossible. Look for an assertion of the argument you agree with. It is best left to readers to decide whether the arguments are mutually exclusive. — EncMstr 19:37, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Let's be clear - and I know that everyone that POV pushes everything says this, but I don't agree with any of the various arguments about deflation. I do, however, know that the Austrians are all dead. I also know that neo-clasicists do not believe that "In the ideal perfect market world, no deflation can happen because monetary authorities control money creation and prices are allowed to fluctuate." JBKramer 20:00, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

There are a few Austrian school thinkers left, like Mark Skousen (alas, no wikiarticle), Foundation for Economic Education, and the folks of Ludwig von Mises Institute#Faculty_and_administration. What's the point of divining the behavior of a "perfect world"? Would a perfect world have "authorities"?

So, what arguments do you agree with? Who makes them? — EncMstr 20:26, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't have a position on economics except to demand factual accuracy. It is not accurate to say that neo-classicists believe the above statement, yet the IP is reverting it back in, over and over. JBKramer 20:38, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Then you've started doing the right thing by calling for citations. To finish, add to the talk page the points which need cleaning up, lack NPOV, etc. If I were you, I'd make a separate section for each section of the article you've tagged, plus one to cover common issues. — EncMstr 21:00, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

The anonymous vandal removed all of the tags. JBKramer 12:38, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I didn't. I removed your incorrect tag placement and provided sources, before you threatened to spank me and you called me a racist. 81.117.200.27 17:19, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

MetsBot

Sorry about the tagging of those Oregon locations: they were in Category:Cascade Range which is mostly not in California but some of it is in California, and the bot was tagging all the articles in that category as a mistake. I've reverted the ~30 bad edits that the bot made. —Mets501 (talk) 00:27, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

No sweat. I was hoping to learn something about the qualifications of WikiProject California. I'm disappointed I didn't learn anything, but I'm glad it was a minor accident. — EncMstr 00:53, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

List of most-watched television episodes

I didn't believe the alterations to the format of the "Series Finales" table as a "major edit" because I kept all the data you had there before. The source stated that the existing numbers came from Reuters but is there an actual article online those numbers came from. If so, you can also link to it as a citation.

I did add some show finale numbers but the format is basically the same, now with exact dates instead of just the year those finales aired. -- Dechnique23 01:30, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I had copied-then-pasted the text from my previous edit (which was offline) when I added the info for Touched by an Angel and Sex and the City. You're free to reformat the table but I suggest you to keep the finale dates. I think having those dates displayed is more informative than just the year. -Dechnique23 02:01, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Pacific Crest Trail

Note 2. 13180 ft (4017 m) It was my intention to add (4017 m) at note 2. itself. I'll try to implement your suggestion as soon as I have time, but feel free to beat me to it. As for "metric conversions", I have been putting them into a lot of articles, including Mount Lowe Railway. I know the conversion factors by heart and the calculator in the Windows program makes the work easy.

Peter Horn 22:33, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for beating me to it. You did what I wanted to do but could not. How does one get access to (a template?) and others like it anyway?

Peter Horn 02:19, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Ski resorts

Generally, categories should be directly applied to the individual articles themselves; you should never use a template to apply them. For one thing, countries which already have a dedicated subcategory, such as Category:Ski resorts in Canada, shouldn't appear directly in the parent category at all, since the subcategory is already filed there and Wikipedia has a rule against duplicate categorization of that type. Basically, any article that belongs in Category:Ski resorts should have that category directly applied to the article itself, not artificially added by means of the template. Bearcat 00:05, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

Okay, thanks. I've noted that in the template so it shouldn't be added again. — EncMstr 00:20, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

dealing with templates

Thanks for the explantion(s)

Peter Horn 23:52, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

More about dealing with templates

1 how does one find this template so as to be able to correct it? For the sake of accuracy it should read 3'- 3.37" or 3' - 3⅜" instead of just 3' - 3" (in narrow gauge). By the way, I "borrowed" two of your profiles because they happen to be applicable to yours truly

This user prefers the metric system.

&

This user supports recycling.

ckb:بەکارھێنەر:سب/بەکارھێنانەوە, but I'm not a vegitarian, etc.

Peter Horn 01:24, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Yet more about dealing with templates

Thanks for the info, the minor correction I propose appears to be compatible with the general use of this template 1.

In my user page I have a problem lining up the boxes one above the other, what it the trick there? In my Afrikaans user page, http://af.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gebruiker:Peter_Horn, I have another strange problem. This problem is a fast list of other languages which I can't tell why they are there, except that for some reason they are all linked to

Wikipedia:Babel

af-1Hierdie gebruiker het 'n basiese begrip van Afrikaans.

Search user languages

. Strange...

Peter Horn 14:26, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the pointers and explantions, {{Boxboxtop

works like a charm. By the way, I see that you had two years of Latin. I had only had one, but even that has been of great help to master the English language. You may find the following site interesting: http://recherche.univ-montp3.fr/cercam/rubrique.php3?id_rubrique=36 or type in "Vita Latina" into Google. Cheers, Peter Horn 00:14, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

RE:Experiencing some problems

I left some comments here. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 02:17, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your concern! Completely blank here means that even the Wikipedia logo is absent. In fact, there is absolutely nothing in that page! Moreover, my Firefox (version 2.0) browser tab shows http:/en....City_F.C. and the URL shows http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leicester_City_F.C. View | Page source shows up a completely blank page as well! And on a side note, I am facing similar problems with my archive talk page number 10. But the other archive pages seem to load correctly. I hope you can help me with this. I am using a Windows ME OS. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 05:56, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

This seems strange but now, I am able to load the above mentioned article from your user talk page but not from my talk page or anywhere else. The page source is <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">. I am still unable to load my archive talk page number 10 and I am unable to load Category:Leicester City F.C. as well. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 06:08, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, first of all, I wish to thank you for your help. I followed your instructions and the problem seem to be gone. However, the problem re-surfaced again after a few clicks and I had to clear my private data again. After re-logging again, the problem disappeared and re-appeared. At least, I can still view these pages, albeit for some inconvenience. I have scanned my system for spyware and viruses and it seems reliable. I think that the problem has got to be with my OS. I feel that version 2.0 of Firefox does not work too well with the out-dated ME OS. Anyway, thank you for your kind help in this matter. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 07:38, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, my system shows 69% free space and my hard disk is 20GB of storage space (I know, it is embarrassing!). Is 69% too little? --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 17:48, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, ME does have a scandisk. --Siva1979^{Talk to me} 10:36, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Pictures from the German Wikipedia

• • Riggenbach system
  • Strub system
  • Abt system (3 bars)
  • Locher system
  • Rack railroad switch
  • Rack railroad switch of the Wengernalpbahn in the Lauterbrunnen station

I had asked another Wiki user (Slambo (Speak)) to help me incorporate these images into the Rack railway article (from de:Zahnradbahn), but he never got around to it. What modification(s) need(s) to be made to show these images? Thanks...

Peter Horn 01:05, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Hello again Peter Horn. Somehow your signature has lost its wikilinking to your user page. Are you using ~~~~ to sign? If so, check your preferences. For example, mine has — [[user:EncMstr|EncMstr]] in the signature box, with the "raw" checkbox set. Maybe you just need to uncheck the raw setting?

I think you are asking how to incorporate, for example, the German wikipedia image Bild:Zahnradbahn riggenbach.jpg in the English rack railway article, right? Unfortunately, there is no direct way to include media from another language in an article. The workaround has three steps:

1. Download the full resolution image from the source wikipedia. (Keep clicking on each version of the image until it is no longer a link to a bigger version. Then use your browser's save this file function.)
2. Upload the image to either the English wikipedia (press the upload button in the toolbox menu at the left side), or to wikimedia commons. For content such as this which has no language dependencies, commons is the preferred choice. There are three boxes to fill in on the upload page, which can be challenging to fully and properly determine the contents. 1: The easiest is the file on your computer to upload. After entry, the destination filename presumes the filename: change it if it's not descriptive enough. For images from another wikipedia, I'd keep the same name to reduce confusion. 2: Fill in the summary using the {{Information}} template. Add appropriate categories (outside the template), just like at the bottom of an article. 3: select the type of license from the dropdown. Then press upload.
3. Edit the article to incorporate the image, and add [[image:whatever the filename is]] to the appropriate place in the article. See WP:IMAGE for details of using this feature. Almost always you want to use the image thumb parameter in an article. For example, [[image:Zahnradbahn riggenbach.jpg | thumb | detail of cogwheels | right]]. Normally, the original caption can be used, translated, but this one is useless: Here is a high resolution version for downloading.

If you followed this, you might think I left out how to tell the English wikipedia to use the commons image. I didn't. The image namespace wikireference first tries to use the local language upload area. If not found, it tries commons. If the same named media is on both wikis, the commons version is not accessible. — EncMstr 03:03, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation, I'll have to try out the procedure(s) when I find some time. I don't understand how my signature would get lost because I use it all the time.

Peter Horn 22:13, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Re: Taps and dies

Thank you for correcting my errors/mistakes. It is appreciated. Jaymac407 17:49, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

WP:IMAGE#Forced image size

Though I think you did it with the best intensions, I reverted most of your edits where you enforced this recommendation. This because most of our readers (the not logged in IP’s) don’t have the possibility to adjust their thumbnail preferences. They are therefore forced to look at thumbnails with the same default width, whatever aspect ratio the image has. I don’t think that is something we want. Furthermore, I think forced thumb sizes are one of the most flexible ways for an editor to control framed image sizes with caption. --Van helsing 11:11, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

A discussion on whether or not pixel sizes should be recommended for "thumb" images is ongoing at Wikipedia talk:Image use policy#Forced image size. Mike Dillon 21:45, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Strange edit summary

Yes, you're right, the problem lies with the AWB user interface where the focus is given to the edit summary field, so a stray "scroll" can change the edit summary. I usually see if this happens. Thanks for letting me know. Rich Farmbrough, 22:46 29 November 2006 (GMT).

Edit summaries

When reverting vandalism, I seldom say that I'm doing so, because I think they take some delight in some kind of response. The silent treatment seems better. If I'm actually contributing some text, I'm more apt to put something in the edit summary. Wahkeenah 01:35, 1 December 2006 (UTC) However, maybe when reverting vandalism (RV) I should just type "Winnebago". That should confuse them for awhile. :) Wahkeenah 03:10, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

ORS COI

Thanks for making that stub--I hesitate to do too much to the article because I was part of the team that helped compile the 2005 ORS. (I helped make sure it was all spelled right, among other things.) I don't work for the Leg. Counsel anymore, but since it's a possible conflict of interest, I thought I'd let you know. I can help expand the ORS article and a Legislative Counsel Committee article if it gets written, but other people should be involved as well. Katr67 21:51, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Oregon Revised Statutes—I agree with Jgilhousen: I think you are a long way from COI if all you did was read and/or correct the thing. But by looking at most of it, you ought to be great at identifying, from a lay person perpective, the noteworthy items. I remember the news reporting in the 1970s when it was revised en masse. Pretty amazing really. That's an obvious item for the article. Also would be the unique things contained in the body of law, like the public beaches. It should also reference the various ballot measures passed. — EncMstr 22:47, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Mt. Hood

What is it that makes climbing in warm months so dangerous? Is it that the snow on top of the glaciers melts, exposing crevaces and making for unsure footing? Wahkeenah 03:40, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi Wahkeenah, sorry if you felt scolded over the soft glacier comment. I was quite rushed this evening, and handled this edit summary poorly. It should have said something to the effect that the causes for most accidents are otherwise. I'll put something in the article, unless someone beats me to it. Again: sorry.

By definition (see glacier formation), glaciers don't soften, only the topmost portion, rather like a minor skin abrasion: it doesn't remove "the skin", only the top layer. So it would be correct to say the surface softens—not the glacier.

The main point is that weather exposure causes most of the fatalaties, not avalanches, nor soft snow. Falls seem to be the second most frequent cause, but are they caused by soft snow, poor judgement, or something else? I'm still digging through the accident reports, but "judgement" is in the lead.

Late spring is considered prime climbing season due to the snow being stable (usually) and the weather more predictable and hospitable. Earlier, the weather is likely to be nasty; later, snow and rocks tend to fall. Late summer is a fairly dangerous time; just hang out and listen to the mountain midday in August: rockslides almost continually.

Avalanche danger is highest when there is a sudden warming of the top layers of snow, especially when they haven't had time to compact. Also, the grade of the slope naturally has an effect, but it most dangerous around 40 degrees (85%): shallower is intuitively safer, but steeper is safer by preventing dangerous buildups.

Thanks for the Mount Hood edits: the article is shaping up nicely. — EncMstr 08:39, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

No hay problema. I appreciate the clarification, and I think we were pretty much saying the same thing. Obviously, only the top layer of the glacier is likely to "soften" very much, barring a St. Helen's type eruption which melted the glaciers in one fell swoop. Aside from that, it's mostly just the recent snowpack that melts, yes? Although global warming (or whatever) has made some of Hood's glaciers recede over the years. And in looking through Grauer's list of accidents, most of them are due to misfortune or carelessness of some kind. It's also fairly clear why May is considered the optimal time to climb, at Everest for example: The worst of winter is over, and hopefully the surface is still firm, though it can be chancy. But climbing Hood's north slope in December, apparently without having watched The Weather Channel first, is practically suicidal. It will be a miracle if they find those guys alive. As I told one of the other editors, Mt. Hood, like many mountains, is both beautiful and sinister, which is part of the reason mountains were thought of as being like the mythological gods, with human-like moods and whimsies. Wahkeenah 14:12, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

In the Mount St. Helens eruption news coverage, I think I remember seeing large chunks of glacier floating down the rivers, like so many icebergs. Certainly lava and ash flowing into a glacier will vaporize and melt it on contact, but the always-present running water under a glacier will increase dramatically and "lubricate" glacial movement. Perhaps the acceleration or impacts with terrain will break it up and give it a fluid appearance.

Jon Krakauer, the author of Into Thin Air, clearly explained how would-be Everest climbers wait for the weather window in May: the jet stream shifts from too far south to too far north which transforms Everest's weather from artic to monsoon. During the transition, there's calm air and good climbing. Logically, there should be another one in the fall, but no one appears to climb then.

Both my near-death experiences have been due to "impressive" mountain weather, once near Mirror Lake, the other near Mount Jefferson. Besides a weather forecast (which always has some error), it would be good to always be thinking about what to do in case of an instant whiteout. At least have a direct compass heading and GPS programmed to the parking lot and the nearest chairlift. Judging by their equipment list revealed today, I'm guessing they will be found tomorrow, alive, when the weather breaks. Hope so anyway. — EncMstr 02:49, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Interesting info. Seems like you know about these matters first-hand. Yes, after that news today, indicating they are well-equipped, their chances of survival appear to be much better than previously supposed. However, the entire Northwest has been pounded by this storm, and these three guys will have to move down the priority list. But what a story they'll be able to tell, if they survive... and they'll need to write a best-seller, to make restitution for all the rescue attempts. Wahkeenah 04:09, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

ISBN formatting use

ISBNs should be thirteen characters long (until the end of 2006) - according to the standard: nine digits, three dashes or spaces and one check digit than can be a digit or X. However wiki magic that makes ISBNs linkable will not work with spaces so we have to use the dash or close the characters up. Therefore I remove ":"s between the "ISBN" and the "number", and hyphenate the ISBN according to the rules published by the International ISBN Agency[3]. This means:

1. Wikimagic will now work
2. The ISBN is correctly formatted
3. Language area and publisher can be told from the ISBN together with other hints.

At the same time I flag any invalid ISBNs, there are currently over 1600 articles in this category. Rich Farmbrough, 20:31 16 December 2006 (GMT).

Ah, I see: SmackBot's formatting can be interpreted to mean that the ISBN was validated to some degree. I enter ISBNs as an unpunctuated string of digits mostly because my primary source of them—Amazon.com—shows them that way. That's a lot of erroneous ISBNs—and that's just those easy to identify! Maybe I'll look for some interesting articles to fix.... Thanks. — EncMstr 23:10, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

Hello, EncMstr and Rich! I just came in the middle of this conversation, but I assume it's clear that going through articles just to add hyphenation is not really worth it. SmackBot does it for free, and lately, it seems to come around every ten minutes :-). The real excitement (in my opinion) comes from fixing the *invalid* ISBNs, which are in the articles listed in Category:Articles with invalid ISBNs. Amazon's ISBNs aren't really erroneous without the hyphens, and it's not a big problem if people just enter them that way. EdJohnston 16:49, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

I figured it wasn't a big deal, but whenever my edits are immediately changed, I feel as though I should learn something from it. But since wikimedia's ISBN keyword appears to strip punctuation, I was curious what purpose they served. I guess it's like most country's phone numbers: they're universally written with punctuation, but the phone systems have no use for hyphens, dots, parenthesis, etc., yet humans insist on them. — EncMstr 17:46, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I think that's a good analogy. Some people in the book industry may actually recognize the publisher codes, the way we recognize US telephone area codes. Without the hyphens it would be very hard to see or recognize the publisher codes. EdJohnston 04:15, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Mount Hood proseline

I'm curious about this edit you made to Mount Hood. You made another edit which I understand and agree with, as that part of the article frequently needs cleanup. However the first section (Incident history) should tend to be stable. Do you think it should be refactored as a separate list article? Or, at the other extreme, be combined into a paragraph detailing the accidents? — EncMstr 08:00, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

I made these changes. In my opinion, that's sufficient. -- tariqabjotu 13:11, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

What template

Hi, what template did you use to welcome this newbie? Thanks // FrankB 07:47, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

That is {{welcomeg}}. — EncMstr 08:15, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Thank you

Hello Sylviaa, This article shows that you are correct. It was indeed on Delta Park's location. I remember seeing old photos of Vanport somewhere decades ago, and believed it to be a little south of that, nearer the Columbia Slough. I vaguely remember seeing Jantzen Beach—or where it should have been—way in the background. I'll update the article, unless someone beats me to it. Thanks for the question. — EncMstr 08:14, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Cool, thanks, and thank you for the welcome to Wikipedia.

--71.193.147.95 22:43, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

NOS

Fifth entry. A Ramachandran 00:05, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Alpental

Thank you for fixing the Alpental page, though I can say our pal will return and will revert what you have done. He has an obsession with parking Lot3 and Lot4 which is why he keeps going into detail about hiking from these lots, etc... If I try to edit the page he attacks me in the comment page. Is there any way to have my name removed from the comment section where he has numerous times added it in? Mrhyak 17:22, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

I believe edit summaries can be hidden/removed, but it requires admin—or maybe higher—powers. My interpretation of WP:RFAA is that WP:ANI is the proper place to ask.

Ullr Siffson seems to have several issues. Changing the article and mostly ignoring the wiki Manual of Style—let alone encylopedic writing style—apparently to serve one particular viewpoint. Some of his content appears to be worthy of inclusion, but his apparent attitude and modus operandi seem to be far from effective collaboration. I don't know whether it's sad or funny that no discussion has taken place on talk:Alpental. I guess the edit summaries are substituting for that. If he'd present coherent issues, perhaps there are grounds and material for two articles: Alpental (ski area) and Alpental (backcountry) (or something like that). —EncMstr 18:45, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Paulins Kill now a Featured Article

As of a few moments ago, Paulins Kill was promoted to Featured Article status. I just wanted to thank you for your contributions to and suggestions for improving the article over these past few months and that I appreciate your help in bringing this article to notice as a Featured Article. Once again, thank you, and keep up the good work. —ExplorerCDT 22:49, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm baaack

Hey, you probably noticed I'm back, but I thought I would say hi and thanks for keeping things tidy while I was gone. I like your ideas for the ZIP Code page--maybe we can work on making that ready to go live soon. I'm trying to cut back on my wiki addiction, but I'll probably be fully back in the fray soon enough... Katr67 20:55, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Welcome back Katr67! It wasn't hard to keep things under control: there really wasn't much going on. Perhaps everyone pressed their reset button. Here's a fun idea: a project for wikiaddicts! WikiProject: WikiAnonymous.  :-) —EncMstr 22:02, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

The Inza Wood middle school page

I assure you that the editors of the Inza Wood Middle School page have no intention of "vadilizing" other wikipedia articles. It was created as a joke and I am quite sure that no random person searching for knoledge will stumble upoon this page. It is a little inside joke between the teachers and students of our school and we would be perfectly happy adding a real article along with out joke article.

Many thanks 66.82.9.53 03:59, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Gopher Valley, Oregon

Thanks for the cleanup. Are you still working on this? I was going to slap a {{wip}} tag on it, but I don't want to negate anything you're working on right now. There goes my lunch break... Too bad my OGN is at home. Katr67 20:24, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Like minds I guess. If you're OGN-less, perhaps I'll shave some of the roughage away now. —EncMstr 20:25, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Check out the 2nd Edition of Early Oregon Atlas (1972, 1978) by Ralph N. Preston, page 13 for the George Gibbs & Edmond A. Stalling(sp) sketch. Admittedly, my article was originally intended for a much smaller audience, and an audience which will have memories (unencyclopedic) of the subject. Frogface345 03:26, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Table

Yep, that does it. I was wondering if there was a way to do it without a class though, similiar to the "bgcolor" qualifier. Just H 12:17, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Also, do you know how to force a table to keep its size? That is, not to have it scrunch up when a window doesn't take up the whole screen? It's probably on Help:Table, but that page can be very unhelpful sometimes. Just H 12:29, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

HTML Classes

I was really hoping there was a way in wiki markup to control text color, that's what I was looking for ultimately. Oh well, HTML Classes will work just as good for now until the developers invent some new code; I'm just more used to wiki markup. Just H 18:03, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Round Barn

Wow, thanks for fixing the Round Barn photo! As soon as I had uploaded it, I was thinking, I should really have lightened that…and mere hours later, it's done! Much appreciated. -Pete 18:49, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes thanks--my browser at home renders everything really dark, which I figure is my problem, but it's nice to be able to actually see the image! Katr67 19:37, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

You're welcome. Why such darkness? Even if the browser were using some Darth Vader skin, photos are unlikely to be affected. Maybe you should get yourself a Brighter Browser™!  :-) —EncMstr 20:20, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Ah, I meant monitor of course. It's unrelated to Darth, but is perhaps related to a dinosaur. And yeah, I already fiddled with all the settings. Though I have yet to try Hit-It-With-A-Big-Stick ™! :P Katr67 21:08, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Reverts

...actually, I only noticed the vandalism when I was doing a normal edit, so I found it easier to just delete it. Normally I do use the 'undo' feature. Thanks for the thought though. --Helenalex 23:32, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Craigslist

I finally took a stab at replying on the Craiglist talk page, but I really wanted to find a clear citation that Wikipedia cannot be used as a reference to another Wikipedia article. I know I have read it somewhere, but darned if I can find it. Do you think you could? Things seem to have calmed down over there, hopefully this won't open up a new can of worms. Jimbo seems to be on the job though, so I don't think we have to worry. Katr67 18:42, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Hi Katr! Thanks for pitching in. These seem to be on point:

• Wikipedia:Reliable sources#Self-published sources .28online_and_paper.29
• Wikipedia:Reliable sources#Bulletin_boards.2C wikis and posts to Usenet

What do you think? —EncMstr 19:09, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Rogers Communications and battery eliminator

Hi EncMstr: I think linking Edward S. Rogers, Sr. to the modern Rogers Communications article is not very useful, as the modern company is only a remote descendant of the company that actually made battery eliminators. The original Rogers company made things; the modern Rogers company just owns things. The ESR article is a lot more relevant to the battery eliminator than some modern media combine. Regards, --Wtshymanski 16:05, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Help_talk:Table#I want different sized cells in each row

Thanks for telling me you replied, I missed it on my wathclist for some reason. Anyways, I replied at the original discussion. Basically I want it all in one table, not seperate tables that look like one. This is because I want to use it with the class="sortable" function. Mostly, it looks like the sortable thing is limited. I couldn't find a work around with the sorting function, so I was looking for a workaround on the table end. It's not looking good. - Peregrine Fisher 17:20, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

I want to make sortable filmographies so a user can choose if they want the newest works at the top. I was hoping to make a table that doesn't look like a table, but looks like the filmography at Claire_Coffee#Filmography. I played around with some ideas at User:Peregrine Fisher/Workspace/Testpage, which makes me think I'll have to wait until someone changes the class="sortable" stuff. Oh well. - Peregrine Fisher 06:18, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

It can be done with <span style="display:none">sortkey_with_separator</span>displayed_item. - Peregrine Fisher 15:06, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Advice for a relative newbie regarding prioritising a task

Hi, i was wondering if you could give me some advice. I really would like to see the regular expression page split up so that the common usage is disambiguated from the technical comp-sci/mathematical usage. The two are perhaps unfortunately not at all the same as the most commonly used engines aren't actually compliant with the definition of the a regular language, and i think wikipedia should be a source of resolving confusion and not perpetuating it. Unfortunately its a task that I'm finding really difficult to do alone. I was wondering if you could advise me as to how I should best proceed to get help to get this done. Feel free to nuke this comment and move it to my talk page. BTW, im asking you because you were kind enough to message me some tips when i first started here, thanks a lot. Demerphq 13:55, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Minor edits into the public domain

I'm curious what it means to release your minor edits into the public domain. Suppose you correct some grammar. Would that entire sentence become public domain, or just the comma that you added, or the capital 'P' that you changed? What is the purpose of the distinction that you've made between your minor edits and the other edits that you make? Thanks Sanchom (talk) 02:29, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

Backpacking

Hello, I noticed that you contributed to the article Backpacking (wilderness) and simply wanted to thank you for your contributions (no contribution is too small). If I could give a "Random thank you for contributing to a much under-valued subject" reward, I would, but for now I hope a hearty thank you will suffice.

Regards, Leif902 23:51, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Marshall Greene

Hi there, you're a skiing-type person I gather...would you check out Marshall Greene? I just cleaned up his article, but I'm not sure if a 16th-ranked skier is particularly notable...perhaps I'm biased because it appears he started his own article, kinda like that nice philanthropist guy at that afd. Someone also added a bit about XC Oregon at the Bend, Oregon article. Despite what appears to be advertising and/or COI, I think XC Oregon might deserve an article--wanna give it a go?--and it would eliminate that pesky embedded titled link that's nestled in there. Thanks for checking it out. P.S. I stuck my toe in the water re:FAing the Oregon article, over at the WPOR talk page... Katr67 15:14, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

(You might want to check your signature settings. Or maybe you typed something other than four tildes...) I'm a skiing-type person, but only as a doer—not a watcher. So I'd be next-to-useless looking at such an article. Besides, this guy is a Nordic skier, so that's like once-more-removed uninformed. But thanks for thinking of me. —EncMstr 22:37, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Conversions

Thank you for your suggestion, EncMstr! I will not make the changes right away, but I will take care of the naming issue later, when (and if) all the disputes similar to the one with Caroig above have been settled. Best,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 19:28, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads-up! I'll make sure to investigate this. I am pretty new to this conversion stuff, so there may very well be something important I am missing.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 22:54, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Backpacking

Hello, I noticed you seem to like Backpacking and was wondering if you'd be interested in WikiProject Backpacking, a new project geared towards improving backpacking related articles on Wikipedia. If you'd like to join, show support by signing your name at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Council/Proposals#Backpacking and by helping to edit our beta project page at User:Leif902/WikiProject Backpacking (which will be moved to the Wikipedia namespace after support is built up). Thank you, and have a nice day! -Leif902 00:59, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the Barnstar!

Thanks very much. It is always nice to be rewarded for fighting vandalism! :) Thanks again. Chickyfuzz14^{(user talk)} 04:38, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Mill Ends Park and citations

Hi there, thanks for the quick copy edit on my addition to the Mill Ends Park article. One small but significant objection though: the work is inPortland, a section of the print edition of the Oregonian. The URL is provided as a convenient way to view the article online, but fundamentally, the story was published in print. This is particularly important in the case of the Oregonian, which has a byzantine approach to web publishing (as I'm sure you're well aware!) The URL probably won't be much use for very long, but finding microfilm at the library is still pretty reliable. -Pete 22:09, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm a little baffled by the "work" thing too - but in this case, I think the choice is clear. I'll do the edit - just wanted to explain my reasoning, since I know you keep an eye on details like this! -Pete 22:35, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the Wikipedia User Manual

Hi! I just wanted to give you a big thanks for the Manual. I'm hoping that I'll eventually be a professional Wikipedist! Enjoy!

Emprovision has smiled at you! Smiles promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Spread the WikiLove by smiling to someone else, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Happy editing!
Smile at others by adding {{subst:Smile}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

KATU

With all of the former personalities current employment is listed...whether in television or at Microsoft. Is there an issue with having current employment for Jeffrey Babcock listed?

To be consistent wouldn't you want to remove the mention of Microsoft, simply noting that Lou Gellos left to become a communications director and spokesman at a technology company? "Microsoft spokesman and communications director Lou Gellos was a former Sports Director at KATU in the early 1990s. Prior to joining KATU, he also held that position briefly at Seattle's KING-TV."

Your choice, of course.(Jeffrey Babcock 14:14, 20 March 2007 (UTC))

Note your choice to remove current employer of Lou Gellos. The beauty of consistency. Sad though to make it hard for anyone interested in past personalities to find them. Your choice, of course. (--Jeffrey Babcock 23:54, 20 March 2007 (UTC))

Thank you

Thank you for editing my user page. Jet123 04:59, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Re: thanks

no problem! --MattWright (talk) 18:31, 2 April 2007 (UTC)