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Please post new sections at the bottom of the page. If you don't, there is a risk that your message may never be noticed, if other edits follow it before I get here.


Minor disputed edit

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Hi JBW. I recently made a minor edit to Gaussian primes in which I deleted the following sentence. "In other words, a Gaussian integer is a Gaussian prime if and only if either its norm is a prime number, or it is the product of a unit (±1, ±i) and a prime number of the form 4n + 3. "

I deleted it because it is incorrect. The first condition should read that the norm is the *square root* of a prime number. The second condition is ok, but I thought it was unclear whether it was still referring to the norm or referring to the Gaussian integer itself. Since these two conditions are just restating the two dot points directly above, I figured it was best to just delete the sentence rather than reword it.

But you've reverted my change. Why? I thought I was doing something a little bit helpful; and I feel confused and discouraged that it was immediately reverted. If I'm doing something wrong, I'd like to know. 103.23.174.114 (talk) 02:58, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The condition that the norm is a prime number is correct. You are probably thinking not of the norm, but of the absolute value, which is the square root of the norm. I agree with you about the second condition being unclear, so I will rephrase it. Thanks for pointing that out. JBW (talk) 09:53, 29 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Ok. Thanks @JBW. I see now. You're right that I was thinking of the absolute value. Apparently there is some ambiguity about what specifically is meant by the norm of a complex number. Sometimes it refers to the absolute value, and sometimes to the square of the absolute value. I hadn't realised that (or perhaps I'd forgotten). Incidentally, the wikipedia article about norms suggests it is the absolute value. But I've now seen a bunch of other sources that agree with what you said. Apparently it is a bit context dependent. 103.23.174.114 (talk) 21:53, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. I have thought for a very long time that the different ways the word "norm" is used in different mathematical contexts is extremely unhelpful. JBW (talk) 23:22, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The article you linked to is Norm (mathematics). I think that is an unhelpful title, because that is just one meaning of "norm" in mathematics, and there are others. The one which is relevant here is to be found at Field norm. JBW (talk) 23:39, 30 October 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This can't be a coincidence...

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User Travekid820 and user Travekid8205555555 were both created today but only the latter has edited so far.   –Skywatcher68 (talk) 18:28, 1 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@Skywatcher68: As soon as I saw that somebody had posted "This can't be a coincidence..." on this page, without seeing the username, I thought of you. Somehow that wording just seemed to be your style. Agreed, it can't be a coincidence. I've posted a vandalism warning to the account that has edited. (You are evidently a nicer and friendlier person than I am, because in your edit summary you called it a test edit, not vandalism.) I think it's almost always worth posting a warning, both because it may deter them from continuing and because it's easier to take admin action against an editor who has continued after being warned than one who has never been warned. Well, actually it isn't easier to take action, as either way it's the same block button to push, but it's easier to make the block stick, and to avoid criticism. Other than that, it's worth keeping an eye on both accounts, and if one turns out to be problematic consider taking action against both. You can give a warning on use of multiple accounts if you like, but personally I wouldn't, at least as long as only one account has edited. JBW (talk) 19:30, 1 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Being in customer service, I'm inclined to assume good faith. I would have gone direct to SPI if both had made problematic edits.   –Skywatcher68 (talk) 20:15, 1 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Skywatcher68: I don't know what kind of customer service you work in, but when, a very long time ago, I fairly briefly worked in a customer service job, fairly frequently at the end of what seemed like a very bad day at work I would stop and think, and realise that, although it felt as though I'd been having awkward and troublesome customers all day, in fact I had had about three awkward customers and about 200 perfectly good ones. (Also, that was on a bad day; overall statistics would be far better.) It's very easy to not notice the absence of problems when there aren't any, but of course you notice when there are problems. Yes, "AGF" was a good policy in that job, and well over 99% of the time it was justified, but it was easy to forget that at times. The same can happen with some aspects of work on Wikipedia: I occasionally have to remind myself to AGF. Unfortunately, there are too many editors who don't remind themselves. JBW (talk) 21:39, 7 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Administrators' newsletter – November 2024

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News and updates for administrators from the past month (October 2024).

Administrator changes

readded
removed

CheckUser changes

removed Maxim

Oversighter changes

removed Maxim

Guideline and policy news

Technical news

  • Mass deletions done with the Nuke tool now have the 'Nuke' tag. This change will make reviewing and analyzing deletions performed with the tool easier. T366068

Arbitration

Miscellaneous

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 10:21, 3 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Anna Larsdotter

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For some reason Anna has 2 different types of parents that could be hers. The first one are Laurentius Mattiae (1550-1612) and an Unnamed Spouse how ever I doubt this because the last names don’t match and the other is Erik XIV and Anna Larsdotter (1530-1601). Both list her spouse as Benedictus Nicolai Cornukindius (1555-1611) but Mattiae’s lists her birth as 1570 but Larsdotters lists it as 1565. So it is hard to list a accurate citation.

Mattiae: https://ancestors.familysearch.org/en/L4TK-MWD/margareta-larsdotter-1570-1652

Anna Larsdotter: https://www.geni.com/people/Anna-Larsdotter/6000000015873546707

I will try to find any other sources. MaxtheBruh47 (talk) 21:02, 7 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@MaxtheBruh47: You have hit a fairly common, and frustrating, problem with trying to establish relationships among historical people. Really prominent and significant people are usually (though not always) easy enough, but for others it can be difficult. The fact that the two sources you mention contradict one another is an illustration of the fact that they are both highly unreliable, which, unfortunately, is true of close to all of these websites which claim to provide information about ancestry, genealogy, etc. You really need reliable published scholarly sources, but finding ones which are available online is likely to be difficult, if it is possible at all. I will have a brief look for information about Anna Larsdotter, but more in hope than in expectation of finding anything useful. JBW (talk) 21:19, 7 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@MaxtheBruh47: Well, the results of my search were even worse than I expected: Loads of genealogy and ancestry sites, which sometimes contradict one another, but nothing that came even near to being a reliable source. Good luck if you choose to put more work into trying to sort this out, but I'm afraid that it looks to me as though doing so may turn out to be just a waste of your time. JBW (talk) 21:45, 7 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Ok MaxtheBruh47 (talk) 22:21, 7 November 2024 (UTC)[reply]
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