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Notice

Information icon There is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. The thread is User:Tomsmith81727 - an account solely for reverting?. Jayjg (talk) 12:53, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

@Jayjg: Thank you for the notification - my first {{ANI-notice}} in my nine years here. -- John of Reading (talk) 15:39, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
Now we both feel special. :) Jayjg (talk) 15:43, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Blocked

Hi there man! It's your friend on discord from a few days ago. I was wondering why you ended our chat so abruptly. I just wanted to clarify it was my opinion I was stating, and I may have used harsh wording on accident to help my point. I apologize for any disagreements. Please reconsider adding me back. Thank you! BootLover32 (talk) 19:31, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

@BootLover32: What's this about, please? If "discord" refers to Discord (software) then I can't be the person you're after - I don't do online chat. -- John of Reading (talk) 19:45, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
Haha thanks for responding. All right lol, my apologies. BootLover32 (talk) 22:33, 12 June 2019 (UTC)

Remove unsourced additions by User:Specialwood

just made a revert on Costa Rica women's national football team, as i thought maybe you missed it, but just realised you are still in progress as its rather more extensive than i had imagined. Sorry if it seemed i was treading on your toes, not planned. It was on my list to look at tomorrow, as some of the Australia women's national under-17 soccer team had allegedly become 12 year olds !! Matilda Maniac (talk) 11:57, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

@Matilda Maniac: Thanks! Yes, I seem to have missed that one. -- John of Reading (talk) 11:59, 15 June 2019 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

You are far too kind and helpful. Thanks for everything, John.

Puduḫepa (talk) 08:41, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

@Puduḫepa: How sweet! Thank you. -- John of Reading (talk) 10:39, 24 June 2019 (UTC)

Grammar script

Hi John. I'm looking for a basic grammar script. Do you know of any? Regards, Sun Creator(talk) 14:21, 25 June 2019 (UTC)

@Sun Creator: Not really. Among my hundreds of spelling rules I have some that spot odd combinations such as "could also ran" or "will became". But if I wanted to check the grammar of a particular article properly, I'd paste the text into Word and ask it to check. -- John of Reading (talk) 15:15, 25 June 2019 (UTC)
Thank you John. I've used Word in the past, seemed a bit basic at the time. I recall some editor engaged in FA's using a script although I don't presently recall the name. Regards, Sun Creator(talk) 11:12, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

Precious anniversary

Precious
Five years!

--Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:18, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

Five years? That's an awful lot of typos fixed. Thank you! -- John of Reading (talk) 09:19, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

Woman's Symphony Orchestra of Chicago

The correct name of the article should be Woman's Symphony Orchestra of Chicago. Eurodog (talk) 23:34, 12 September 2019 (UTC)

@Eurodog: I've added a {{db-move}} to the redirect so that an admin can move the article. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:27, 13 September 2019 (UTC)

Req

Hello John. If you have some time, could you check the plot? I am not sure that it is grammar-wise. Puduḫepa 08:59, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

@Puduḫepa: As it stands, the draft has no references other than a link to an online copy of the book. You need to show that the book is notable by Wikipedia's standards at WP:NBOOK. Once you've shown that the book is notable, I'll be glad to copyedit the text. -- John of Reading (talk) 11:46, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
I have added a source for the adaptation. As for the book, it is just for confirming that it is a 1922 novella by Zweig. Puduḫepa 12:12, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
@Puduḫepa: You need to show that people have been writing about the book. -- John of Reading (talk) 12:29, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
Thank you. I did.[1] Puduḫepa 12:43, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
If you don't have enough time, I can try to check its grammar by myself via tools like grammarly, etc. Puduḫepa 12:46, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
@Puduḫepa: What does Morley say about the Moonbeam book? That should go in the article, with the Morley book as the reference. Anyway, I'll look through the plot section for you now. Feel free to edit the rest of the article, and I'll merge my copyedits in carefully. -- John of Reading (talk) 12:49, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
Thank you. I am not a native speaker and make grammar mistakes sometime. Puduḫepa 12:52, 14 September 2019 (UTC)
Will mention Morley under the "Analysis" section. Puduḫepa 13:03, 14 September 2019 (UTC)

National varieties of English

Information icon Hello, recently I edited the article of Sir Isaac Newton. And you told me to respect national varieties of English. Thank you for informing me the rule. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shaoki Arrafi (talk • contribs) 04:46, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

@Shaoki Arrafi: Thank you for getting back to me! I hope you enjoy editing here. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:06, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi. Thank you for your recent edits. An automated process has detected that when you recently edited List of Soul Train episodes, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page Manhattan Transfer (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver). Such links are usually incorrect, since a disambiguation page is merely a list of unrelated topics with similar titles. (Read the FAQ • Join us at the DPL WikiProject.)

It's OK to remove this message. Also, to stop receiving these messages, follow these opt-out instructions. Thanks, DPL bot (talk) 07:27, 4 October 2019 (UTC)

 Fixed -- John of Reading (talk) 07:59, 4 October 2019 (UTC)

Speedy deletion nomination of Category:2019 disestablishments in Thailand

A tag has been placed on Category:2019 disestablishments in Thailand requesting that it be speedily deleted from Wikipedia. This has been done under section C1 of the criteria for speedy deletion, because the category has been empty for seven days or more and is not a disambiguation category, a category redirect, a featured topics category, under discussion at Categories for discussion, or a project category that by its nature may become empty on occasion.

If you think this page should not be deleted for this reason, you may contest the nomination by visiting the page and clicking the button labelled "Contest this speedy deletion". This will give you the opportunity to explain why you believe the page should not be deleted. However, be aware that once a page is tagged for speedy deletion, it may be deleted without delay. Please do not remove the speedy deletion tag from the page yourself, but do not hesitate to add information in line with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. Steven (Editor) (talk) 01:47, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

And... it's back again! -- John of Reading (talk) 08:56, 24 October 2019 (UTC)

I'm sorry

Hi, dear John of Reading. Thanks for your corrections and I'm sorry I didn't see the typos myself. Kind regards, --Gyanda (talk) 19:43, 4 November 2019 (UTC)

@Gyanda: No need to apologise! Do what you're best at, and we'll build an encyclopedia together. -- John of Reading (talk) 21:44, 4 November 2019 (UTC)
You should have seen my smile, when i read your text! :-) --Gyanda (talk) 23:39, 4 November 2019 (UTC)

Experimental Products

This article has an interview text, see in AWB. I'm not sure what to do, maybe you can fix it? Sun Creator(talk) 18:48, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

@Sun Creator: If an IP editor adds kilobytes of unformatted text to an article, it is almost always a copyright violation. I've reverted those edits. -- John of Reading (talk) 19:23, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

ArbCom 2019 election voter message

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Vandalism on Sambandam

Sambandam

Semi-protection: High level of IP vandalism.Revert and protect)

Please use the article talk page to discuss agreements over the text of the article. I am not an administrator here, and cannot protect the article or block any editor. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:27, 20 November 2019 (UTC)

Blackadder Clan

john, sorry if this is wrong thread for compliments and gratitude, but thanks for your incredible work on the Blackadder clan’s esteemed Scottish heritage and members. I’m doing some extensive research for a dear friend and descendant here in the USA, and am flabbergasted by his apparently genetic passion for his beliefs, undeniable fortitude, philosophical Christian warrior/adventurer nature, and passionate defiance against injustice imposed by authority —especially in freedom of speech area.

Now I just need to find the ‘Sailor Blackadder’ as my friend is a proud Navy veteran. I’ll keep reading!

Your work is wonderful, a gift to history and all future generations, and he will be greatly inspired by his heritage, because of your gift. Organized, well-researched & cited & shared knowledge is truly priceless. We are infinitely grateful to you. Thank you.

Sorry again if this is wrong forum. hugs from here....Suzanne. Swarden8 (talk) 12:14, 20 November 2019 (UTC)

@Swarden8: Pages like this "user talk page" are exactly the right place to leave messages for particular editors. Thank you, indeed, for your good wishes - but I think you have thanked the wrong editor! I have edited several articles about Scottish clans and clan members, but only to fix a few spellings and grammar errors. If you look through the "page history" of these articles you will be able to find the names of the editors who did the research and contributed most of the content. -- John of Reading (talk) 12:34, 20 November 2019 (UTC)
Ah, I see, I will be sure to thank them as well, thanks so much for the pointer! please be well! Swarden8 (talk) 13:58, 20 November 2019 (UTC)

An automated process has detected that when you recently edited Open-fields doctrine, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page Osing (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver).

(Opt-out instructions.) --DPL bot (talk) 07:29, 21 November 2019 (UTC)

 Fixed -- John of Reading (talk) 07:44, 21 November 2019 (UTC)

Google Code-In 2019 is coming - please mentor some documentation tasks!

Hello,

Google Code-In, Google-organized contest in which the Wikimedia Foundation participates, starts in a few weeks. This contest is about taking high school students into the world of opensource. I'm sending you this message because you recently edited a documentation page at the English Wikipedia.

I would like to ask you to take part in Google Code-In as a mentor. That would mean to prepare at least one task (it can be documentation related, or something else - the other categories are Code, Design, Quality Assurance and Outreach) for the participants, and help the student to complete it. Please sign up at the contest page and send us your Google account address to google-code-in-admins@lists.wikimedia.org, so we can invite you in!

From my own experience, Google Code-In can be fun, you can make several new friends, attract new people to your wiki and make them part of your community.

If you have any questions, please let us know at google-code-in-admins@lists.wikimedia.org.

Thank you!

--User:Martin Urbanec (talk) 21:58, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

A to An false positive list

I've now added to WP:AWB/T most of the false positives that you provided many moons ago. I didn't do EBU because I think people would say "E-B-U", nor AU$, because that seems to be an Australian dollar, so not sure how that can be a false positive. I notice you are using some 'A to an' regex in the replace with w-links for example here you did a replaced: a Independent → an Independent. Very good indeed. Have you got the the regex working on more complex ones with the second part of the w-link matching, but not the first like 1 and 2? If not, here is the regex that I'm currently using. You can copy paste it to AWB option 'Find and replace', although the XML display doesn't work for the double quote yet sometimes it is required. Notice it got used here and here. I recently notice in your userboxes you are asm-5! A rare thing these days. I can just about read asm (although slowly), but never got to write anything beyond basics. Regards, Sun Creator(talk) 01:14, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

@Sun Creator: Good morning!
I included EBU as a false positive because an editor writing "a EBU" might be expecting readers to pronounce it as "a European Broadcasting Union". But I have no objection to changing that to "an EBU".
The problem with AU$ is that "a AU$7 purchase" is probably meant to be read out as "a 7 dollar purchase", so needs "a", whereas "AU$8" would need "an".
I have two regular expressions for A to An, one for wikilinks and one for numbers. I don't currently have one for plain text, as that's covered by the rules in WP:AWB/T.
\b(a)\b(?<!\]\]a)(?<!\b(?:class|division|double|grade|group|homage|homenaje|jr\.|junior|list|model|serie|single|triple|type|vitamin)\s+[´’'‘`]?a)(?<!(?:\-|\&|[a-zi]['’‘]|a\.k\.|U\.S\.)[Aa])(\s+\[\[([^\[\]\|]+\|)?(?:a(?!aa)|e(?!(u|we))|i|o(?!ax|bra|cho|d\b|f\b|ggi|kol[íi]e?\b|mr|nce|ne(\b|[a-fhj-qs-z0-9]|r[a-np-z])|rfu\b|opa|rasului|ra[s?]ului|ui)|u(?=(?-i:[a-z]))(?!ga[ln]|k|na(\b|n|r)|nes|ni([^m]|mo|\b)|[rst][aeiou]|vula))[^\[\]\|]*\]\]\w*)

\b(a)(?=\s+(?:11|18|8))(?<!\]\]a)(?<!\b(?:Büyükçakır|jusqu|Sana|Shi)[´’'‘`]a)(?<!\b(?:autoroute|bundesautobahn\s+\d+|Bundesstraße\s+\d+)\|a)(?<!\b(?:a\.k)\.a)(?<!\b(?:F|N)/A)(?<!\b(?:Applied\s+Physics|autobahn|Bantam|Bundesautobahn|Canzona|chega|chlorophyllide|Chromatogr\.?|Chromatography|circular|class\.|Cod\.|Concerto|Crucifixus|Curlew|Divertimento|Divizia|esquina|Galaxy\s+Tab|harmonica|Junior|Magnificats?|Messa|Messe|Miserere|Missa|NZR|Pater\s+Noster|Physics\s+Letters|Phys(?:ical)?\.?\s+Rev(?:iew)?\.?|preludio|Q\s*&|Royal\s+Society[\"\',]*|Sci\s+Series|Section|Série|Te\s+Deum|uitată|y|\d\d|\d\d\d\d)\s+a)(?<!\b(?:id|pages?|volume|type_strain)\s*=\s*a)(?!\s+1[18]\d\d(?<!00)(?:\s+| |-)(?:acre|cc|ft|ton)\b)(\s+\d+)(?!\d)(?<!\b1[18]\d(?:\d\d\d)*)(?!\s+(?:anni|años|ans|autobahn|autoroute|Buckhurst|de|del|et|éves|Hornet|Interceptor|la|las|le|los|millones|voces|voci|y)\b)(cc|hp|K|km|m|mAh|mhz|mm|nd|nm|rd|s(?<=\b\d\d\d0s)|sq|st|th)?\b(?![ \(\)\.\,\;\-\'\"\+\&\w\d]*\.(?i:(?:gif|jpe?g|ogg|ogv|pdf|png|svg|tiff?|webm))\b)([\d\.\,%]*)(?<!\b(?<!trans-)title\d*\s*=[^\|\{\}]{0,255})
These still occasionally give false positives, of course, and I developed them so long ago that I'd have trouble working out what all the exceptions are trying to catch.
Quote marks are partially handled by [´’'‘`] at various points, but I see that I've failed to allow for a " double quote mark and for bold/italic markup.
The left hand side of a piped link is skipped by ([^\[\]\|]+\|)? - this works as a "Find and Replace" rule, but will never work as a WP:AWB/T rule because AWB removes wikilinks from the text before running the typo-fixing rules.
I have rules for "An to A", both in plain text and with wikilinks. They still have many false positives, since "an" turns up a lot in foreign-language text, and every correction needs careful review, since maybe 20% of the time the "an" needs to be corrected to "and" not "a".
"asm-5", yes, but that was a few decades ago now... -- John of Reading (talk) 07:35, 23 November 2019 (UTC)
Thank you! Always fascinating to me, to look at new code. Those rules deal mostly in exceptions when numbers are in the text. I think you have another rule that did [this edit, as neither posted above seem to apply. The A to An rule I'm working on deals with the letters rather then numbers. Still more exceptions and even new words to expand, for example a Xbox -> an Xbox, which is not currently dealt with. Sun Creator(talk) 22:05, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
The first rule here did make the Stephen Donnelly edit - I should have mentioned that these rules, like most of my rules, have "case sensitive" left unticked. -- John of Reading (talk) 22:16, 24 November 2019 (UTC)
Thanks, that explains it. I was incorrectly assuming compatibility with WP:AWB/T. Sun Creator(talk) 10:49, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

Making a dent

Hi, hopefully I'm making a dent on the number of articles with typos. How many articles do you consider have typos? Sun Creator(talk) 23:46, 5 November 2019 (UTC)

@Sun Creator: That's a difficult one! There are some numbers at Wikipedia:Typo Team/moss#New statistics, but that approach does not attempt to count multi-word typos such as "to became". Overall, I think we're making progress; it's getting much harder to find common typos. Some years ago, each time I downloaded a fresh database dump I'd find hundreds of "the the" errors; now I find about 30. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:13, 6 November 2019 (UTC)
An AWB typo scan through a random list of 1000 articles gives a match in the region of 120 articles or 12%. Scale that to the current EN article count of 6,909,032, gives about 720,000 articles to be done. Quite a bit more than the statistics above. Sun Creator(talk) 16:48, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
What fraction of these matches are just the quote-straightening style rule? -- John of Reading (talk) 17:37, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
About 100,000 or so according to this, although I checked a small sample and found that 50% are quote-straightening ’s → 's. Not including the similar rules: isn´t → isn't, haven´t → haven't, they’re → they're, don’t → don't etc. Sun Creator(talk) 20:19, 16 November 2019 (UTC)
I downloaded a copy of the Wikipedia text of 20191121. Then used the database scanner to search for ’s (the incorrect apostrophe type) and it quickly hit a 30K article limit. Based on the % done the total number of articles is nearer 500K then 100K. I'm reluctant to continue correcting them on bulk as although I've not had any complaints some edits do get reverted with unnecessary. Sun Creator(talk) 18:56, 23 November 2019 (UTC)
@Sun Creator: The 30K limit is configurable on the "Searching" tab of the database scanner, though if the true figure is 500K it will probably run out of memory somewhere and crash. If the quote straightening rules get moved into the general fixes (phab:T231012) then it is possible that a bot might get approved to do those. -- John of Reading (talk) 19:46, 23 November 2019 (UTC)
Scanned again with only main/article space. RAM was easy, requiring less then 4Gb. 571440 matched articles. Some would be in parts of an article off limits to AWB/T like within references and quotes, but still it is a lot. Sun Creator(talk) 20:47, 23 November 2019 (UTC)
?<=\w)[´ˈ׳᾿‘’′Ꞌꞌ`;]s\b(?<!'\w[´ˈ׳᾿‘’′Ꞌꞌ`;]s|&[#\w]{1,99};s)</nowiki>

Now scanned with the "'s" regex rule above and matched 558380 main/article space articles. Sun Creator(talk) 21:56, 23 November 2019 (UTC)

John, I know you keep lists of typo in some way, so I pasted a list of 662 typos I checked and corrected in November. It might be useful to check these typos again after giving it a few years to attract occurrences in articles. Sun Creator(talk) 11:05, 26 November 2019 (UTC)
@Sun Creator: OK, I've copied most of those to my "to do" list. If I continue with my current editing pattern, that means I'll look at them once sometime in the next two years (James 4:13–16) -- John of Reading (talk) 07:25, 27 November 2019 (UTC)

thanks

Thanks, as always, for stepping in and doing some manual HD archiving. But the bot is fixed (for now). —Steve Summit (talk) 15:54, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

@Scs: Excellent news! -- John of Reading (talk) 15:55, 13 December 2019 (UTC)

Skip matches...

...where a single word is inside double quotes Regex: (?(?<!"\w*)|(?!\w*"))

Can you clarify how the above applies. Is it when using AWB 'Find and replace' with "Ignore templates, refs, link targets and headings" Unchecked?

If so, why only focus on skipping a single word? I'm thinking about the possibility of many short sections in quotes like song titles where there is a misspelling/grammar issue for stylist reason. As far as I can tell this doesn't apply in Regex typo fixing as all(?) text in double quotes is ignored. Sun Creator(talk) 20:05, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

@Sun Creator: Yes, I use Find+Replace on the whole page. If I want to disable a rule within most explicitly-marked quotes I use

(?<!(<blockquote>|\bquote\s*=|\{\{(?:blockquote|cquote|quotation|quote|quote\s*box)\s*\|)[^\|\{\}]{0,9999})

which catches most of the relevant templates and markup. It doesn't work if templates are used inside the quote.
Text fragments "in double quotes" are quite tricky. I've tried this sometimes

(?(?<!(''|"|“|‘|«)(?=\w)[\s\w\&\:\;\-\–\—\.\,\?\(\)]*)|(?![\s\w\&\:\;\-\–\—\.\,\?\(\)]*(?<=[\w\.\?\(\)])(''|"|”|’|»)))

which works if the opening quote is immediately followed by the first quoted character, and the closing quote is immediately after the last quoted character or punctuation. So a match inside "this example" will be skipped, but if you " throw in some " spaces it gets « too difficult ». Most of my rules don't have these complicated additions, and I have to pay attention not to edit file names, quotations etc inappropriately. -- John of Reading (talk) 20:19, 17 December 2019 (UTC)
Got it. Creating the Regex is hard or maybe impossible.

An example: 

"quoted text" unquoted text "more quoted text"

From an isolated perspective the central part " unquoted text " looks like it's surrounded by quotes! Regards, Sun Creator(talk) 20:43, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Yes, I'm sure that when AWB hides quotes from the text before running WP:AWB/T, it uses real C++ code that is able to count how many quote characters it has seen. -- John of Reading (talk) 20:46, 17 December 2019 (UTC)
Right, it looks like with regex you have to ensure that a letter is immediately inside the quote at the beginning and end. Although this is the case with your single word regex((?(?<!"\w*)|(?!\w*"))). So perhaps a multi word regex is possible. Sun Creator(talk) 20:59, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

Cheers

Damon Runyon's short story "Dancing Dan's Christmas" is a fun read if you have the time. Right from the start it extols the virtues of the hot Tom and Jerry

This hot Tom and Jerry is an old-time drink that is once used by one and all in this country to celebrate Christmas with, and in fact it is once so popular that many people think Christmas is invented only to furnish an excuse for hot Tom and Jerry, although of course this is by no means true.

No matter what concoction is your favorite to imbibe during this festive season I would like to toast you with it and to thank you for all your work here at the 'pedia this past year. Best wishes for your 2020 as well JoR. MarnetteD|Talk 04:52, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

@MarnetteD: Thank you - that's new to me, as I only grew up with Tom and Jerry. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:14, 18 December 2019 (UTC)
Me too!! You are welcome JoR. MarnetteD|Talk 07:46, 18 December 2019 (UTC)

Catherine Mawer

Thank you for correcting the typos in Catherine Mawer. No, they were not transcription or scanning errors. My sight is failing - I am a touch typist but cannot see easily to proofread. Keep up the good work! Storye book (talk) 18:11, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Puerto Rico Crash

Hello, you made some excellent edits to the 1972 Puerto Rico DC-7 crash page, those edits were reverted by an admin without any real reason. I just want to give you a heads up. You have a huge number of edits and possibly that means you can navigate restoring the page without creating conflict. Maybe the page needs some better citations but deleting all edits by numerous editors over several months seems over the top--the admin could have tagged what they wanted clarified. There is an FAA accident report available now that found provide better source content. Please help.2601:647:5A00:A4A0:4DB5:CD63:24C6:1B8E (talk) 01:35, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

I suggest you use the article talk page, Talk:1972 Puerto Rico DC-7 crash, to discuss this. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:30, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Happy New Year!


George Bellows, North River (1908), Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. 		Best wishes for a healthy and prosperous 2020.
Thank you for your contributions toward making Wikipedia a better and more accurate place.
BoringHistoryGuy (talk) 13:08, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
@BoringHistoryGuy: Thank you! -- John of Reading (talk) 17:38, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

your change to Norton Isolastic frame

I don't know whether your use of AWB includes trawling-back through the editing history, but I consider this internal link to be particularly inappropriate, considering the target is car-orientated and has been unreferenced since 2009. My original use of {{what}} in this edit makes it clear, both in edit summary and in 'reason=...' {{tl|[clarification needed]. The annotation was intended to alert anyone in the future who may have access to the book cited to check the accuracy (from original upload, August 2010). rgds,--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 17:21, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough. I have undone my edit. -- John of Reading (talk) 17:24, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
Thank you, looking back I see it was picked up for fact checking in 2012 before my time, but that's part of another story!--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 17:29, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

Help desk error

It seems that the "Edit conflict" mechanism is gathering up additional Help desk posts adjacent to the one in question. Looks like a bug to me.--Quisqualis (talk) 18:13, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

@Quisqualis: Could be! I've never learned how to use the "edit conflict" user interface; if I run into it, I save my post in a text editor and start again. You could pick out your text from the diff of my revert. -- John of Reading (talk) 18:16, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
I normally do the same; in this case, the other editor made a more useful post.--Quisqualis (talk) 18:18, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Short descriptions

There seem to be two different instructions. As you mentioned in MOS:Order it lists it first, but on Help adding short descriptions it says it should be below any hatnotes. Also, I read awhile ago that it tends to interfere with redirects if not placed below them. So now I'm not sure. I'll have to ask over there. Cheers. --The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 12:00, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

@The Eloquent Peasant: Oh dear - yes, that help page hasn't been updated to reflect the change to MOS:ORDER. I've never seen a short description on a redirect, but in that case you are correct, the template would have to go below the #REDIRECT. -- John of Reading (talk) 12:23, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
Ok. Thank you. So I'll leave the short description first unless it's with a redirect. If on a redirect I'll place the short description after the redirect!--The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 01:32, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Changing apostrophes

Could I ask why you changed all the apostrophes to foot marks in the Gudrun Zapf-von Hesse article? I'm sure there's a specific reason that relates to Wikipedian guidelines. In the world of typography, however, it is a noted faux pas. I'd just really like to know. Thanks. Unionpearl (talk) 13:37, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

@Unionpearl: Yes, the Wikipedia guideline is at MOS:PUNCT. -- John of Reading (talk) 15:32, 6 February 2020 (UTC)
@John of Reading: Thank you so much. I wish the reason were given, but the guidelines are helpful! Unionpearl (talk) 18:25, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

A kitten for you!

Thank you for your help :-)

Puduḫepa 17:21, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

The Editor's Barnstar
You're awesome! The Eloquent Peasant (talk) 12:42, 20 February 2020 (UTC)
@The Eloquent Peasant: Thank you! -- John of Reading (talk) 15:26, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Italian?

Hello John of Reading! I see that the head ribbon and the side navigation menu of this article are in Italian. In fact everything is in Italian except the page content. In other articles on Italian personalities everything is in English. Can you help? Thanks! Bernardbonvin (talk) 14:04, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Moreover, User:Boja02 changed the link "Italy" to "Kingdom of Italy" in the infobox of the article. Bernardbonvin (talk) 14:38, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

@Bernardbonvin: There are two separate issues here. The sidebar was a software issue affecting many users and many languages, not just Italian. It's discussed at Wikipedia:Help desk#Sidebar changes and the section following that one. Apparently the issue is now fixed, so if you're still seeing the problem, try asking your browser to re-load the page.
The change at Fausto Cercignani is at least arguably correct. Cercignani was born in 1941, and a good way to learn about Italy at that date is to jump to the article about the "Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)". However, the full description of the birth_place parameter, at Template:Infobox person#Parameters says that countries should not normally be linked. -- John of Reading (talk) 16:55, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

@John of Reading: Many thanks for your comments! Very instructive, as usual. Bernardbonvin (talk) 18:05, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Changes to Check Point page

Hi John, thanks for your prompt and detailed response to my edits. my main intention is to ensure the factual accuracy of the Check Point Portfolio of products. The product section was not updated for a long time and I want to make sure it accurately represents our offering to date (2020) I used an objective and neutral language that has no marketing appeal to it, nor it discusses any superlatives or sales bias. these are mere updates to the actual offerings Check Point delivers today to market Please let me know what is the best way to accurately reflect that Many thanks Rafi Product marketing at Check Point (talk) 09:50, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

@Rafi.kretchmer: Please read through Wikipedia:Best practices for editors with close associations and use the article talk page, Talk:Check Point, to suggest changes to the article. -- John of Reading (talk) 13:27, 12 February 2020 (UTC)


Hi John, I submitted all changes through the Check Point Talk Page Talk:Check Point and provided all relevant references requested per the guidance. Can you please let me know what should be the next step ? Product marketing at Check Point (talk) 09:19, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

@Rafi.kretchmer: I've added another {{request edit}} template so that your post gets looked at by one of the editors who specialise in your kind of request. -- John of Reading (talk) 09:33, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

new comment

Hi John, thanks so much for your help and support here. I have edited the request based on great feedback and assistance by Spintendo. as I am new to wikipedia it took me a while to get used to the formatting and I am sure there's still a lot to learn. regarding the change request, after editing it to be purely descriptive of product capabilities, I was surprised to receive a decline message. my question is the following, can't a vendor ensure at least an accurate description of their offering ? I am asking to know what is the policy since other vendors seem to have much more descriptive representation on their pages. I am adding below again my request and hope you will be able to revisit the decline decision

Next Generation Firewall – Running R80.x software, Check Point next generation firewalls and software platforms support small and medium businesses (SMB) to large enterprise data center and carrier-grade environments. [1] Each security gateway includes next generation firewall, IPS, VPN, WAF, SSL, and Data Security (DLP) as well as threat prevention technologies blocking known and unknown cyber-attacks. The security gateways are available as a cloud service, software-only products that can run on standard hardware, or dedicated security gateway hardware appliances.[1]

Rafi.Kretchmer at Check Point 08:52, 27 February 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rafi.kretchmer (talk • contribs) 08:52, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ a b Hils, Adam. "Magic Quadrant for Network Firewalls", Gartner, Pages 5-7, Published: 17 September 2019. ID:G00375686
@Rafi.kretchmer: I'm not comfortable making this kind of assessment; I mostly stick to correcting spelling and grammar. -- John of Reading (talk) 09:31, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for being one of Wikipedia's top medical contributors!

please help translate this message into your local language via meta
The 2019 Cure Award
In 2019 you were one of the top ~300 medical editors across any language of Wikipedia. Thank you from Wiki Project Med for helping bring free, complete, accurate, up-to-date health information to the public. We really appreciate you and the vital work you do! Wiki Project Med Foundation is a thematic organization whose mission is to improve our health content. Consider joining here, there are no associated costs.

Thanks again :-) -- Doc James along with the rest of the team at Wiki Project Med Foundation 18:35, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Could you please keep an eye on the Sniff 'n' the Tears article?

Hi, we have a problem with the Sniff 'n' the Tears article and I'd like your help. There's a very persistent IP editor who keeps changing the information on the band's early line-up. More specifically, even though all credible sources (record sleeves, AllMusic, interviews with the band at that time, the band's founder himself) explicitly name Keith Miller as the musician who came up with the solo to "Driver's Seat", the IP editor keeps changing the name to Miffy Smith. Even though Miffy Smith had never had anything to do with the band. Can you help at all? Thank you in advance! Odysseus Giacosa (talk) 10:35, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

@Odysseus Giacosa: OK, I've added the article to my watchlist. -- John of Reading (talk) 10:43, 11 March 2020 (UTC)
@John of Reading: Thank you! Cheers!

Another request: Suckless.org

Hi again, I have another request. Some editors are repeatedly removing well-documented information on the Suckless.org Linux-related project: namely, they are repeatedly removing the sections documenting the criticism this project's community has received for actions with Nazi connotations. I don't think we should let Anselm Garbe off the hook for his actions. Could you please keep an eye on it? Odysseus Giacosa (talk) 07:56, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

@Odysseus Giacosa: That kind of dispute is outside my comfort zone. But the material sourced to a Wikipedia talk page post should be removed, as any person can register an account here with just about any user name, and claim to be anyone. If Garbe's opinions have also been published in a reliable source, one with editorial oversight, then that source could be used instead. -- John of Reading (talk) 09:20, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
The section in question details controversies that happened outside of Wikipedia when Garbe participated in a tiki torch march (and, when called out for it, he denied it had any political connotation) and when a systemd developer received a message from a member of the Suckless.org team - in the latter case, the hostname of the computer from which the message was sent was named after one of Hitler's bunkers. Quite creepy, I might say. Yet, it seems that, right now, members of this project's community are trying to hide all this and are taking action that may verge on an edit war; I think there seems to be some coordination in their actions, and perhaps a check for sockpuppetry may be in order. Odysseus Giacosa (talk) 09:30, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
Please take note of Greyjoy's edit summary here and the 3RR warning on your talk page. -- John of Reading (talk) 10:06, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Template talk:F#Misused and unused

 You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:F#Misused and unused. —⁠andrybak (talk) 21:17, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Help/welcoming pages

Hi John of Reading! Looking through the talk archives/page histories, I've been seeing your name come up a bunch as a contributor in the help/welcoming space. There's been a bunch of recent activity surrounding the "Intro to" series you contributed to, the standard welcome template, etc. Invites to all those discussions can be found at the talk pages for either WP:Help Project or WP:Welcoming committee. Just wanted to make sure you know about them; feel free to add your thoughts if you have them, and if you've decided to move on to contributing in other areas instead, no worries about that either. Cheers, Sdkb (talk) 22:51, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

@Sdkb: Thank you! Yes, I've been monitoring the recent changes in the Help and Help talk namespaces for about ten years now. I mostly stick to reverting vandalism and trying to answer new editors who've found their way to a talk page. -- John of Reading (talk) 05:02, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
For the latter, I've introduced {{Talkpage of help}} to a few more pages recently, but there are probably other pages that could use it. Sdkb (talk) 05:04, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
@Sdkb: All "Help talk" pages have an editnotice, but editors don't read those either. -- John of Reading (talk) 05:09, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Revive the article

Dear;

The List of ATK players has duplicated the actual content published at List of ATK (football club) players and has not done anythin' before that of. As the article is supposed to merge with it in order to avoid duplication. The authors simply pasted the materials and devoid the initial article List of ATK (football club) players usin' redirection and devastin' the actual published content.The appeal is urge deletion of this article and profound sustain of List of ATK (football club) players as it also include the article List of ATK (football club) Overseas players by the same author whereas List of ATK players is just a mere stub that doesn't enlist even more tham 3 players of the first season before the appeal of merger that one can access using the contributions and editin' history. List of ATK players is profound (upto 99.9%) duplication of the content of List of ATK (football club) players. Anyhow the author of List of ATK (football club) players managed to revive the article. The user is usin' his might immorally.

I would love if you will furnish the views at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of ATK (football club) players


Regards,

SHISHIR DUA (talk) 11:57, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

No, thank you, I rarely comment at AFD, and other editors have already made the points that I would make. -- John of Reading (talk) 13:01, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

User:2601:82:C380:26C0:287E:827D:FAD:8EC8

Hi and thanks for restoring my talk. No I am not User:2601:82:C380:26C0:287E:827D:FAD:8EC8. In fact I noticed you reverted a third edit of that user, and so I slapped an Uw-delete4im onto its talk page. Again, thanks CapnZapp (talk) 11:47, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

@CapnZapp: Yes, I was roughly 100% sure it wasn't you, but I always try to make my edit summaries polite! -- John of Reading (talk) 12:05, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Virginia Graham

Sorry - am new to Wikipedia editing - I have added sources to the changes to the dates of birth and death, and her husband's name. Both sets of references are Crown copyright, but are freely available to the public on attending the General Registry Office in London. Also if you subscribe a genealogy site you may have access to them (they are on Ancestry but behind a paywall). Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.6.242.252 (talk) 13:55, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for getting back to me. That's much better - your edits are much more likely to be accepted if you cite where your information is coming from. -- John of Reading (talk) 15:29, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Barbara Ayrton-Gould date of birth

Thanks John of Reading for your change/note on this article. I have found a source https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/50046 and amended accordingly now.

Kaybeesquared (talk) 22:08, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

@Kaybeesquared: Thank you for adding the reference. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:33, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Strange

Don't know how this happened. Sorry about that. Amanuensis Balkanicus (talk) 20:17, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

@Amanuensis Balkanicus: No problem! I bet you couldn't make that happen again, even if you tried. -- John of Reading (talk) 21:01, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

"Man Alive (fim)" listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Man Alive (fim). Since you had some involvement with the Man Alive (fim) redirect, you might want to participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. Regards, SONIC678 19:42, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

I didn't mean to notify you twice...I had to tag it again to get it to appear on the page. Sorry about that. Regards, SONIC678 19:44, 27 April 2020 (UTC)
Not a problem! -- John of Reading (talk) 20:43, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for your edits

Thanks for your edits on Ridley Wills II. You are much more than a harmless drudge. Carry on! Eagledj (talk) 12:18, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

@Eagledj: That was Samuel Johnson's description of himself, so I am in good company. -- John of Reading (talk) 18:41, 28 April 2020 (UTC)

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday!

Have a very happy birthday on your special day!

Best wishes, CAPTAIN RAJU(T) 02:18, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

@CAPTAIN RAJU: Very many thanks for the first birthday greeting I've received today - the family aren't awake yet. -- John of Reading (talk) 03:58, 2 May 2020 (UTC)

Jesse Bushyhead

Hello. I’m Maynard Kent Whetstone. Jesse Bushyhead was my Great Grandfather. As his Daughter was my first native Great Grandmother. Married John Gunter. Renamed Catherine Gunter. Cherokee name Ghego heli. My cell is [details removed]. South Carolina. I’m searching for my Cherokee Family.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.16.32.23 (talk) 10:04, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

Jesse Bushyhead (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
Hello, Maynard! I can't be of much use to you, I'm afraid. Although I edited the article about your relative, it was only to fix a small grammar error. (I've removed your phone number to protect your privacy) -- John of Reading (talk) 10:21, 5 May 2020 (UTC)

G2 speedy deletion in userspace

Hi John of Reading, I saw that you nominated Help:Andrewhistory/sandbox Improvements for G2 speedy deletion, but that criteria doesn't apply to userspace test pages. I removed the template and talkpage notification. Let me know if you think I shouldn't have. --IamNotU (talk) 11:18, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

@IamNotU: That page is in the help namespace, not in userspace. -- John of Reading (talk) 11:20, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
Well that's embarassing. I put it back, very sorry. I'm going to stop editing now and get some coffee... --IamNotU (talk) 11:29, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
Here, I've made one for you -- John of Reading (talk) 11:31, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, I needed that! --IamNotU (talk) 11:33, 8 May 2020 (UTC)

LTG Max W. Noah

Hi John,

I am to assume goodwill according to the rules. Please help me understand the goodwill of deleting all of LTG Max W. Noah's wiki information and leaving a stub?

I look forward to hearing from you.

Van Noah — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:1700:F90:5190:4C5B:F356:F8E4:134E (talk) 15:36, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Max W. Noah (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
Because Wikipedia is the "free encyclopedia", free to read and free to re-use, it cannot accept copyrighted text. The long text added to the Max W. Noah was originally published in the Washington Post and they almost certainly hold the copyright to it. -- John of Reading (talk) 15:45, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

John - I wrote that obituary with my mother and my sisters and published it in the Washington Post. My mother called me crying that someone removed everything from her husband, my father's wiki page. I restored it and looked for any edits that were useful to include and thanked you for your edit of the stub that was left. I realize that we are supposed to view other's edits from a perspective of goodwill but that is hard to do when all previous edits with the full information have been deleted. Could you please restore those and help me understand what our family and others would need to do to have something other than the stub that is left to survive? Thank you Vnoahpe (talk) 16:22, 16 May 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vnoahpe (talk • contribs) 16:15, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Hello Vnoahpe. Due to the licence requirements of Wikipedia, we cannot host text you own the copyrights to unless you make an explicit release. To make such a release, please follow the procedure documented at WP:DONATETEXT. As a relative of the article subject, you should also note our conflict of interest policy, which applies to editors with any external relationship (family, friends, essentially anything outside of "I am writing about this person"). Please also note that Wikipedia is very different in style and tone from many other texts, and an obituary may need to be revised significantly in order to be included. Secondary sources, such as any news articles that contain significant analysis from a journalist, are the most appropriate type of source to draw article content from. Even if a copyright release can be obtained, sources should generally be summarised via paraphrasing. Alpha3031 (t • c) 08:27, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
It may be quite doable to add "Obtituary in Washington Post" under a "External links" heading, though. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:46, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
But for WP:s purposes, which includes WP:NOTMEMORIAL, this [2] is not good enough. If WP has an article on him, it will be in the WP-way. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:02, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Help

Hello — Preceding unsigned comment added by Frankline NTY (talk • contribs) 21:28, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

"Fix"

Hi. What kind of a fix is this? You messed up the page by inserting additional blank space. I keep stumbling upon articles that have this weird blank thing, and I fail to understand why it keeps cropping up everywhere. I've been working on removing it for months now. 83.21.62.206 (talk) 00:48, 24 May 2020 (UTC)

Before removing any more of these blank lines, I suggest you read WP:STUBSPACING, where it says Leave two blank lines between the first stub template and whatever precedes it. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:13, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
That's totally weird. But thank you for informing me. 21:31, 24 May 2020 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:11BF:610:8B00:D4CF:E022:1948:E96E (talk)

I needed a good laugh today

And your cabinet of curiosities delivered. Thanks. --Kent G. Budge (talk) 21:14, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

@Kent G. Budge: ...and, seven years on, Talk:Unicycle Football League still has that curious message. -- John of Reading (talk) 06:26, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
G-d moves in mysterious ways. --Kent G. Budge (talk) 12:40, 9 June 2020 (UTC)

Thank you

Acknowledging your message. Thanks 331dot (talk) 09:56, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

Dynamic tonality

Thanks for cleaning up my article Dynamic tonality. I have learned from your systematic changes, and hope to make such cleanup unnecessary in any future articles I write. I appreciate your contributions to sharing human knowledge.  :-) — Preceding unsigned comment added by JimPlamondon (talk • contribs) 03:07, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

An automated process has detected that when you recently edited ERMETH, you added a link pointing to the disambiguation page Hardware (check to confirm | fix with Dab solver).

(Opt-out instructions.) --DPL bot (talk) 06:19, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

 Fixed -- John of Reading (talk) 07:37, 8 July 2020 (UTC)

Build up

Re this edit, according to the OED, "build up" is two words, not one. - SchroCat (talk) 11:23, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

@SchroCat: I'm surprised; I thought that most dictionaries listed it as two words when used as a verb, and either one word or hyphenated when used as a noun. I don't have access to a full OED, though. This spelling rule has been in place since 2014, so I would have expected any major error to have been caught by now. -- John of Reading (talk) 11:44, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
Maybe it's one that may be thought to be a difference between UK and US? I don't know. I've taken it out of that list and I'll start a thread on the talk page there. Thanks. - SchroCat (talk) 11:49, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

"Compatiblity" in the article Falsifiability

Hello, just to say that it was not a copying error. In the original, it was written "compatiblity". Though, this quote has been used in many books and the misspelling corrected. 173.206.162.45 (talk) 22:08, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for checking. I'll leave my correction in place, though, as the Wikipedia manual of style says that insignificant spelling and typographic errors should simply be silently corrected. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:04, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
I agree. Just wanted to point this out. 173.206.162.45 (talk) 16:58, 25 July 2020 (UTC)

Archive talk page

Hi John, sorry for the inconvenience. I wanted to ask you if you can contribute your help to archive a long a discussion page. The page is Talk:Names_and_titles_of_God_in_the_New_Testament. I have no idea how to proceed.--Jairon Levid Abimael Caál Orozco (talk) 21:47, 25 July 2020 (UTC)

 Done - the archiving bot should process the page in the next 24 hours. -- John of Reading (talk) 07:03, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
Thank you for your help.--Jairon Levid Abimael Caál Orozco (talk) 07:07, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
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