User talk:Marudubshinki/Archive 39

Wikipedia's downtime

What happened last night...? Wikipedia was inactive for quite awhile; nine hours I believe. --Zero^Talk 04:53, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There was a power failure. --Jedi6 -(need help?) 05:54, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

See Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Downtime. --maru (talk) contribs 14:14, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Two recent deletions

Hey Maru, why did you delete Zebadiah W. Ziegenbein and Zeb Ziegenbein? There's not a word of explanation in their deletion logs. Thanks. - the.crazy.russian τ ç ë 06:15, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Crazy Ivan, because they were totally non-notable. --maru (talk) contribs 14:15, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Your BeBox question

In case you don't have random geeky articles on your watchlist, you are hereby notified of my attempt to answer your question at Talk:BeBox. Hope that helps :) --Qviri (talk) 17:41, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I didn't have it watchlisted- 1700 articles is quite enough! (One must draw a line somewhere). I'm glad the answer is a good one, and a geekport isn't... something else I feared it might be. --maru (talk) contribs 23:25, 10 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Got reply from Wayne Muromoto (regarding Kaijo)

Hey. Got a PM from above mentioned dude today: "Hello Fred (?),

I just happened to have salvaged the jo notes from my office disaster...and found the source rather quickly, considering the mess things are in right now. I probably took the date of 1629 from an article in Hiden Koryu Bujutsu, 1991, v. 6, titled "Muso Gonnosuke Katsuyoshi," by Osano Jun.

Osano gave the date of publication of the "Kaijo Monogatari" as 1629, or Ganmon 6. According to Osano, Yoshikawa Eiji probably read it and developed the chapter on Muso Gonnosuke in his "Miyamoto Musashi."

Wayne Muromoto"

So that is his source. I think we should make it as you suggested, that "this author claims 1629" and "that author claims 1666" type of entry. I'll get right on it :) --Fred26 08:05, 11 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough. Any chance that you could get that article from Hiden Joryu Bujutsu? If you can't, and if it is in English, my local research library can get a copy for me. --maru (talk) contribs 18:35, 11 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Ignoring guidelines language?

After our discussion on IRC tonight, I wonder if you would like to help me work on some language for WP:POL that would help describe the status of guidelines better? I've been operating under the misapprehension that:

A guideline is something that is: (1) actionable and (2) authorized by consensus. Guidelines are not set in stone and should be treated with common sense and the occasional exception. Amendments to a guideline should be discussed on its talk page, not on a new page - although it's generally acceptable to edit a guideline to improve it.

meant that it would not be acceptable to completely ignore a guideline (especially when doing mass edits) that you disagreed with. I think the above quote is really misleading given what you told me on IRC. I bet others don't understand it either, so it'd be great to get the policy language more in line with reality. So can I pick your brain to try to write a proposal, or do you already have some ideas about how it could be rewritten to be more correct? Thanks! --TreyHarris 05:52, 12 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Just link to WP:IAR. :) --maru (talk) contribs 05:07, 14 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Heh, whoopsie

(re) Had no clue Machiavelli had written a book called The Art of War. D'oh! --EVula 18:13, 13 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I don't blame you in the least! It is a fairly obscure work, and The Prince deserves its greater fame (I've read NM's Art of War, and frankly, it stunk as badly as your typical antique treatise on war. Not nearly as good as Sun Tzu's.) --maru (talk) contribs 05:07, 14 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you! (re: Wikipedia essay)

Dear Maru:

Thank you for your suggestions.

Yes, my essay is absolutely, 100% positively under the GDFL, and I personally cannot think of any scenario or reason why it isn't GDFL.

You have my permission to do anything to my essay that you think is necessary. (since it's GDFL). Speaking of "open-source" I think I should probably also give you a copy of the original "source" M$Word file. But right now I'm home on a dial-up Internet connection so doing anything fancy on-line gets tedious for me. I'll take care of this once I'm back at school.

Again, thank you. You may do anything to my essay. --Shuo Xiang 18:06, 14 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the response. I deleted your test.pdf file, since it wasn't doing anyone any good, and you said you wouldn't mind, and I also deleted Image:Wikipedia.pdf, since I uploaded it to Commons as Image:Shuo-Xian-Wikipedia-essay.pdf. I hope you don't mind. --maru (talk) contribs 03:26, 15 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Foucault's Pendulum index wikideletion

The list was deleted as an experiment to see if anyone actually would notice. Apparently someone did. Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by ShadowyCaballero (talk • contribs)

Two people did. Please don't do such things again- they're awfully close to violating WP:POINT. --maru (talk) contribs 17:10, 15 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Heroin reversion

Hi maru,

Yes, anon was correct about heroin metabolizing to morphine beyond the blood brain barrier, and anon could be right regarding Bayer being embarrassed. However no reference was given for the Bayer claim (and I think one is probably necessary) so I just found it easier to revert the whole edit. Perhaps that was a mistake and if so I apologize. Feel free to re-add anything you feel I inappropriately removed.

Thanks, --Bk0 (Talk) 21:46, 15 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Alright then. In that case, I shall partially restore it and add a verify tag to the embarrassment claim. --maru (talk) contribs 22:08, 15 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hen Fap vandal

A few weeks back you (quite rightly) upgraded User:TuomasTumour's block to indefinite (although I thought I did this myself earlier... must not have gone through properly). I think it may be necessary to institute a bot to revert and autoblock anonymous IPs that continue to place Tumour's catch phrase "hen fap" in articles (it struck again today). Unfortunately we can't block anon IP's indefinitely. Do you have any idea how one would go about creating a bot to catch future occurrences of "hen fap"? Thanks. --23skidoo 23:27, 15 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Go to CVU's IRC bots, Lupin's vandalism tool, whoever's running CryptoDerk's VandalFighter's filters, and possibly Tawkerbot, and ask to have the henfap fed in as a indicator of vandalism. Or at least, that's what I'd do. --maru (talk) contribs 00:01, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Dates in Star Wars

Thanks for fixing and clarifying my incorrect revert about the Lars and Jawas. It didn't make sense to me and was added by an annon, but I have now removed the warning from that IP address. Sorry; thanks. --Xol 02:20, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Think little of it. You probably could've done the same thing if you had paused to untangle the grammar of the anon and pondered the plot of Episode IV. --maru (talk) contribs 02:32, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Tarkin

Sorry, I mis-read the article thinking it said "... executed at the Emperor's Will." Sorry again. ;) --The Filmaker 02:26, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That's just silly. I am disturbed by your lack of careful reading... --maru (talk) contribs 02:33, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Welcoming newcomers

What's the best practices in welcoming people to become new editors? --Kakurady 05:45, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, if it is an anon, I use the {{anon}} template, since it contains most of the good reasons to register. For regular users, I use the ol' {{welcome}} template. If it is more than a casual welcome, I sometimes go through their contributions and give advice or quietly (but clearly) fix some things up. --maru (talk) contribs 05:56, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Editing

Sorry man - didn't know you were working on it. I was categorizing pages in the Category Needed department when I came across Dokkodo - I clicked on Musashi Miyamoto to figure out some background on the book and fixed some wording in the intro. I wasn't stalking your edits or anything - pure coincidence. I can look it over if you need some proofreading but I don't know much about Japanese culture... The article seems interesting though. Regards, Gardar Rurak 06:25, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No no- you misunderstand me. I was telling you I'd finished editing, not that I intented to keep editing it. If you could copyedit it, that would be good. I'm certain there are any number of things that could be fixed that I'm blind to. --maru (talk) contribs 06:54, 16 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Writing for the Encyclopedia Project

Hey, Maru. You only writing here these days? --Uncle Ed 23:41, 19 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Not at all, Ed. I sent off my contract for Fujiwara no Teika a few days ago, but the problem is I've been both busy with projects and mildly sick, so I find editing Wikipedia to be rather soothing. I did get some of the books and suggestions I need, so if my health permits, I'll finish in a few days. After all, the article really doesn't need that much work. --maru (talk) contribs 23:45, 19 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, something isn't really clear to me. When I submit my final product, should it be a link to a particular Wikipedia revision, or should I copy it over to the EP site? --maru (talk) contribs 23:46, 19 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

PAGENAME template

Although it unfortunately cannot always be used (e.g. when the title is Metal Slug series or Cabal (arcade game)), I don't see there's anything wrong with using this template. In case you can convince me it's evil I'll remove it of course, for that matter i'll sum up the articles I've made (massive) use of it in. (just give me a second). --elias.hc 06:33, 19 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Blood Bros., DoDonPachi, Final Fight, Garou: Mark of the Wolves, Giga Wing, Guwange, Mars Matrix, Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter, Metal Slug, Metal Slug 2, Metal Slug X, Metal Slug 3, Metal Slug 4, Metal Slug 5, Metal Slug 6, NAM-1975, Progear, Soul Calibur III, Street Fighter Alpha, Street Fighter II, Street Fighter III, Super Street Fighter II. --elias.hc 06:42, 19 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

It's needless abuse of templates, confusing, space-wasting, and so non-standard I'm not sure there are even any rules against it. FWIW, everyone I asked on #Wikipedia thought using PAGENAME that way was a bad idea. --maru (talk) contribs 15:07, 19 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Honestly, I get none of your points. I don't see how it's abusive, confusing (it's obvious what it does) or spacewasting (it doesn't waste space on 13 of the 22 articles I used the template on, it even saves space on 6 of these) to use the template the way I did. Also I wouldn't count being non-standard as a bad thing... Sorry I didn't take a good look at how it (the talk page) is already formatted before. --elias.hc 17:55, 19 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

First, thanks for formatting your post. I really do have reasons for formatting all posts to my talk page this way- it's not merely a personal preference; my Emacs macros which I have to use to archive in anything under an hour pretty well require a uniform formatting.

Now, on to the subject matter. I say it is abusing templates because templates are designed for adding complicated and/or changing information to multiple pages, and for doing it in real-time; hence the whole transclusion thing. You're using them to display page-specific, static, unchanging content which is rather obvious, and could well break if the articles are ever merged or split or whatever- unlike the text that the templates replaced. It also breaks common-sense rules of not using complex and tricky things that few people really understand when they hold no advantage over the universally used other way. Overuse of templates where static text would work just as well is also strongly discouraged because changes in the template have to be immediately mirrored in the pages, which can bring a server to its knees, in addition to the havoc that any changes wreak on a page's history.

"Use the simplest markup to display information in a useful and comprehensible way." -WP:STYLE

"Templates are used to duplicate the same content across more than one page. You can change a template in one place and it will immediately propagate to the pages that use it."

"Templates should not masquerade as article content in the main article namespace; instead, place the text directly into the article." -Wikipedia:Template namespace

--maru (talk) contribs 23:00, 19 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I wasn't quite aware of what you quoted from WP:STYLE. Although I have to disagree on the possibility that any problem could arise from changes in the template, because PAGENAME is not editable, I've replaced it wherever I'd put it. --elias.hc 06:58, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Glad I finally convinced you! And I hope you didn't do those replacement manually, but with a good editor. --maru (talk) contribs 17:09, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hey dude - Muso Gonnosuke

I've added the diplomatic stuff about the Kaijo Monogatari in the Muso Gonnosuke article. Sorry it took so long but I've been a bit busy. I'm still trying to figure out the best way to modify the Jodo article. I've added a short list of ryu that uses jojutsu in one form or another and will keep searching for more. :) --Fred26 11:03, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Looks fairly good. Glad to see the quote from the Nitenki. --maru (talk) contribs 17:29, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

#9 Dream

Forgive me for killing your #9 Dream link in the number9dream article. I won't do it again as you've clearly got a lot more experience at this than me -- however the link still doesn't go to the blank/new page. You click it and you stay at the number9dream article. And http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/#9_Dream takes you to the Main Page. It's all a problem with the # sign methinks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Adamiwebb (talk • contribs)

Hmm. I never checked the red link. Now that I think about it, internal links starting with a hash mark generally redirect to another section in the article (so it would be trying to go to a section entitled 9dream, which does not exist). I do not know what happens if the specified section does not exist. I guess I'll have to point it at number9dream (song) or something. --maru (talk) contribs 20:10, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I hope you'll forgive me for trampling through your garden. I'm obviously very new at this and I'm learning and reading all the tutorials as I go. I fiddled with the link so that it read like the song is written (with the # sign) but still directs to the page you've made. All this because I saw David Mitchell give a wonderful reading last night. Love his books. Adamiwebb 21:49, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You saw Mitchell at a reading? That's odd; I thought he was still resident in Japan. But anyway, I know of no way to avoid the parsing of the #, so writing it out is the only praticable solution. --maru (talk) contribs 21:52, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

He left Japan a few years ago (when he began work on Cloud Atlas) to return to England. He now lives in Cork, Ireland, where (he told us last night) he's continuing to work on his big historical novel about a Dutch colony in Japan. BlackSwanGreen was written during a dry spell on the new one. He's touring America currently. Last night in Boston was the first night of the tour (since Homeland Security kept him from getting to Philadelphia on time) so depending on where in the world you are, you might be able to see him soon. Adamiwebb 22:03, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Tsk. Boston is nowhere near me. That's too bad, as I would rather have liked to see him- he's one of the few contemporary regular literature authors I actually care about. That novel about the Dutch colony sounds awesome, however: I've never seen any decent treatments of it. --maru (talk) contribs 23:58, 20 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Re: Recent Unix program edits

Are you really sure adding a See also to List of Unix programs is the best way to go? Categories are usually used for that purpose. --maru (talk) contribs 19:21, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

I was thinking the same thing, after seeing some pages with categories. I don't know if there is a category for Unix Programs yet, but I will check it out. Thanks for the tip. --Unixguy 11:00, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, there sure is - it is Category:Unix software. I will start making the updates. --Unixguy

Well, I guess all's well that ends well. Too bad about the extra work, but you did learn something. --maru (talk) contribs 20:12, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia Cat Lovers' Committee

Marudubshinki/Archive 39, I can see from the fact you own a Russian Blue, that you may be partial to cats.

Would you be interested in joining the Wikipedia Cat Lovers' Committee?

If you want to join, you can add yourself to the members list, and contact me, Sergeant Snopake, on my talk page, or the committee founder, GeorgeMoney, on his.

I also see that you voted keep on the deletion page.

Thank you very much for that!! :3

I appreciate that you are on a Wikibreak, just get back to me as soon as you can, please! --Sergeant Snopake, 22:35, 21 of April 2006 (UTC)

Ah, I'm afraid I'm just a dilettante where it comes to our furry feline friends. I would be of little use, and the articles seem to be in good hands. Indeed, the MFD vote happened only because I noticed the page in another editor's contribs. --maru (talk) contribs 01:05, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Web link

Please try this link. --Uncle Ed 00:13, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

OK. I'm in. I've started my user page, set up me preferences etc. --maru (talk) contribs 01:06, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]