User talk:Peter coxhead/Archive 9

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Auto ed

Hi Peter. I've started going through USDA Plants common names (User:Plantdrew/USDACommonName), creating redirects and tagging existing redirects with "R to scientific name|plant". I was wondering if you could help with coding for auto ed to append "R to scientific name|plant" to redirects. Right now, I still have auto ed set up with your code for appending "|plant" to redirects tagged with just "R to scientific name". Plantdrew (talk) 18:53, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

Actually I have this action set up at User:Peter_coxhead/autoedit.js. So just copy this file and it should work. (I've taken a temporary break from working through the BSBI plant names to do some work on Cistus species, but I do intend to finish off the list. USDA Plant common names – wow, that's a big task!) Peter coxhead (talk) 08:52, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, that works. I may have bitten off more than I can chew; so far (after 4 days of work) I'm about 40 pages into a 610 page list of USDA common names. Plantdrew (talk) 18:07, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

Slow and steady is my philosophy with such tasks; I work on something more interesting and then come back to it. Peter coxhead (talk) 22:49, 20 March 2015 (UTC)

@Plantdrew: depending on what you want to do with the USDA common names, you might find User:Peter coxhead/Test/T5 useful. It's a template that suppresses output if there's no page at the common name (1st parameter) and creates a link directly to the talk page of the common name, which serves to check that it exists. Thus:

* {{User:Peter coxhead/Test/T5|wild celery|Apium graveolens}}
* {{User:Peter coxhead/Test/T5|European marshwort|Apium nodiflorum}}
* {{User:Peter coxhead/Test/T5|spreading dogbane|Apocynum androsaemifolium}}

generates

• Wild celery – Apium graveolens – Talk:wild celery
• European marshwort – Apium nodiflorum – Talk:European marshwort
• spreading dogbane – Apocynum androsaemifolium – Talk:spreading dogbane

If you want to check existing common names, this makes it a bit easier. I decided that creating all the missing common name redirects for the BSBI list was too much work for a first pass. I may go back to this task.

(By the way, Apium graveolens should not redirect to Celery, at least in my view. The species should have a separate article.) Peter coxhead (talk) 11:19, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

I'm mostly interested now in creating missing common name redirects for the USDA list (about an order of magnitude more species than BSBI deals with, so maybe I'm insanely ambitious), but I also want to check existing redirects of USDA names for missing redirect categorization or possible conversion to SIAs. I might play with your T5 template; I think it'll be helpful for my purposes if redlinks in both of the first two parameters suppress the the entry. I haven't been tagging talk pages of common names as WP:PLANTS redirects; it seems like a bot could invoked once the redirects are categorized, but your T5 certainly makes it easier to get to the talk pages for manual tagging.

Splitting Apium graveolens and celery has been on my radar for a while; we've already got Celeriac split from the binomial. Previous discussion was pretty negative on splitting. Sorting out geranium and pelargonium is another ancient split/move discussion I'd like to revisit if I find the energy. Plantdrew (talk) 05:10, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Square capitals template

Hi Peter,

I really don't know if you'll find this interesting, but as a template guy you may find a use for it: A new template {{Sqc}} (square capitals) created by Erutuon.

[Here is an example] of it being used.

The full discussion that led to its creation can be found here:

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Latin#Small caps (or query the page for "{{Sqc}}" to find the heart of it, as the section is rather long).

All the best, Hamamelis (talk) 15:14, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Interesting. Although not of direct use to me, it does raise similar presentation issues as the problem of how to style selling names, as per {{tdes}}. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:01, 22 March 2015 (UTC)

Next meetups in North England

Hello. Would you be interested in attending one of the next wikimeets in the north of England? They will take place in:

• Leeds on 12th April 2015
• Manchester on 26th April 2015
• Liverpool on 24th May 2015

If you can make them, please sign up on the relevant wikimeet page!

If you want to receive future notifications about these wikimeets, then please add your name to the notification list (or remove it if you're already on the list and you don't want to receive future notifications!)

Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 22:55, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

Mandrake move

You recently participated in a move request discussion at Talk:Mandrake (plant). I have posted a follow-up request at Talk:Mandragora officinarum if you are interested in participating. —  AjaxSmack  00:23, 28 March 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for the research and work on Mandrake, Peter. Soon enough The Cabal will initiate you to the rank of apprentice sorcerer, and you will be able to use its magical powers to your advantage. With these skills you can win all the content disputes on Wikipedia. Regards, No such user (talk) 20:44, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

I wish! Seriously, the more I look into the scientific literature on Mandragora, the more uncertain I become as to the best approach in Wikipedia. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:58, 4 April 2015 (UTC)

rewrite

I thought it best to refrain from what I was about to write on the other thread. Please. An editor will read a statement like "No, you don't agree with me" and interpret "No, you don't agree with me". In a recent discussion I perhaps unwisely used the example, despite a plethora of others that could have been used, of Arnold Schwarzenegger as a perhaps over famous example of a person who is afforded long title description in Britannica and absurd scaremongering exaggerations ensued in that thread. Here I say, in effect, that recognisability is a foundational principle of article titling and I get hauled over the coals for it by a variety of editors. WTF. GregKaye 19:07, 6 April 2015 (UTC)

Looking at your contributions to Wikipedia, I see that you've participated in a number of move/titling discussions. So you're undoubtedly aware that people have strong, even passionate, views about titles, and that we all come to this particular table with history. One problem with recognizability and naturalness is that there can be ENGVAR issues – see e.g. Talk:Maize, noting the number of RMs. I edit mostly plant pages, and there are constant problems with editors from one country assuming that the English name they use is recognizable and natural to everyone. So I'm primed to insist on full consideration of all five principles, on a case by case basis. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:30, 6 April 2015 (UTC)

I appreciate what you say and, if anything, I think that I would prefer precision to be foremost amongst the fundamental issues that we stick by. In that discussion you told me curtly "No, you don't agree with me". There was no disagreement. I should not have refrained but should have confronted this at the talk page. Now I am being told that I seem formalistic. What I am doing is expressing the importance, as I see it, of issues such as recognisability and true precision (not just as a front for the dissection of disambiguation) in title choice. We should have accurate content. We are unnecessarily failing. No one seems to care. GregKaye 19:15, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

I think you are unnecessarily pessimistic. We should have accurate content – titling and content are different issues. In electronic media, a unique title is needed to unambiguously identify an item. Wikipedia could have used numbers and still had perfectly accurate articles, whose lead sentence and section identified the topic. No one seems to care – to the contrary in my view, in relation to titles: editors care too much about titles. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:33, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

A barnstar for you

	The natural history illumination barnstar with extra prongs
	Thank you for your wonderful work on Mandragora! You have carefully put together so many components that they illuminate a popular subject that was previously quite hopelessly muddled. Sminthopsis84 (talk) 13:35, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

@Sminthopsis84: Thanks! I particularly appreciate the extra prongs! Peter coxhead (talk) 14:17, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Primary meaning of "Mandragora"

Noticing your barnstar above, I had a look at the article at Mandragora (genus), which is, of course, excellent. I realise, however, that either that article or the disambiguation page currently at Mandragora (disambiguation) should really be at the plain title Mandragora (in place of the current redirect). Can you advise me which page ought to be moved? It hinges on whether the genus is the primary meaning of the word "Mandragora". If you're not sure, I'll happily let it go, but the current situation looks a little untidy to my eye. --Stemonitis (talk) 20:17, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

I think that "mandragora" doesn't have a clear primary meaning. A Google search shows a wide variety of uses, usually at least vaguely connected with its mythological or magical aspects, although not always obviously so. So I personally would move Mandragora (disambiguation) to Mandragora, and leave Mandragora (genus) as it is (in spite of my bias in favour of the plant genus).

A different but related issue is what to do about Mandrake and Mandrake (disambiguation). I will raise this again at Talk:Mandragora officinarum. Peter coxhead (talk) 21:22, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

I see it had already been re-raised. Peter coxhead (talk) 22:02, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

I'm also inclined to move Mandragora (disambiguation) to the the base title. I was prepared to object to having the genus at the "(genus)" title when the first round of moves took place, but once I googled "mandragora" I wasn't certain that the genus was primary. Plantdrew (talk) 22:26, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks both for your input. I have moved the disambiguation page to Mandragora and fixed all the incoming links. There certainly are some interesting uses of the word "mandragora". --Stemonitis (talk) 05:38, 24 April 2015 (UTC)

Missing BSBI names

Hi Peter. I've come across a fair number of plants that occur in the British Isles (and in the part of the alphabet you worked on) that don't have common name redirects yet. The latest was Early Medick. I haven't been paying close attention to what, if anything these plants have in common, but I see that Early Medick is non-native. Were you skipping common names for introduced species, or is there another reason why you might have passed some of these over? Just curious, no criticism intended. Plantdrew (talk) 20:37, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

I've been working from the BSBI 2007 list, which isn't the latest, but which is available in Excel and from which I can easily prepare wiki-formatted lists. So it's possible that some names aren't in this older list. On the other hand, Early Medick is, so I'm not sure why I missed it. I supposedly completed to R in the 2007 list, and then got a bit bored. I'll get back to checking S onwards sometime, I guess!

Can you tell me some others in the A-R range without common name redirects? Peter coxhead (talk) 20:51, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

I can't remember the others I've come across, but keeping it in Medicago A-R, Hedgehog Medick (Medicago intertexta) and Button Medick (M. orbicularis) are red-links as I write this. I'll let you know when I come across some more. Plantdrew (talk) 21:12, 30 June 2015 (UTC)

Ah, right, I understand now. Given a BSBI English name and the corresponding scientific name, and assuming the standard case that the BSBI English name should be a redirect to the scientific name, these are the cases and what I was initially trying to do:

1. Neither the scientific name nor the BSBI English name are the titles of WP articles – ignore
2. The scientific name exists, but the BSBI English name redirect doesn't – create the redirect and go to (4)
3. The BSBI English name redirect exists, but the corresponding scientific name doesn't – make a note to be sorted out later
4. Both exist – ensure that the redirect is labelled as a plant redirect; ensure that the article contains the BSBI name with a source.

I have only systematically carried out case (4) up to R; I have not created all the missing redirects required by case (2). I've now created a list of the missing ones at User:Peter_coxhead/Sandbox2#Missing redirects if you want some work to do!! Peter coxhead (talk) 06:38, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

I'll work on it, but you might end up getting to it first. I'm looking at another 2-3 months of work to get through the USDA PLANTS common names. Then there's the common names from state threatened/endangered lists that I can also download from PLANTS (shouldn't be too many of these though). I think I might tackle the BSBI names after that.

I have been much sloppier than your step 4 for my PLANTS work. I've only been adding a source when I need to add the common name itself to the page. If it's already there and uncited I just do the redirect and move on (bad, I know). And I don't usually add the exact PLANTS common name if a close permutation is already on the page ("narrowleaf foowort" vs. "narrow-leaved foo wort"), though I do create the redirect. I really ought to download a clipboard manager so I can easily switch between pasting PLANTS as a reference and pasting redirect markup.

Once PLANTS and BSBI are done, I'll see what other downloadable sources of common names I can find. I've got California's Jepson Manual to start with (User:Plantdrew/JepsonCommonName); proportion of blue-links for species is really impressive, Wikipedia basically has California plants covered. 17:04, 1 July 2015 (UTC)

Bletilla article

Hi, I'm still in the learning process of adding ethnopharmacological based information to Wikipedia. I don't disagree with your subtracting out the references to the animal based studies at all.

If I happen to run across one or more clinical studies, would I be able to run it by you beforehand, as a preemptive 'peer review'? [posted by User:Chango369w)

Well, I'm not by any means an expert on this topic. If you haven't done so, you need to read WP:MEDRS; personally I think that the way it's interpreted by some editors is sometimes unnecessarily strong, but it is the standard to be followed. The two key points seem to me to be:

• We are always free to, and inded should, report established ethnobotanical uses for plants, whatever those uses are, including uses in traditional medicine.
• Research related to use in traditional medicine should only be reported if it meets the standards of MEDRS, i.e. there are reliable reviews. It's not appropriate to report "research in progress" or "investigations proceeding", nor to report in vitro or animal studies.

By all means ask if you think I can help. WT:MED is where the real experts hang out!

By the way, don't forget to sign your posts with ~~~~. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:03, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure that we can include anything about ethnopharmacology on Wikipedia under MEDRS. By definition, the field is at the intersection between ethnobotany and clinical medicine. There's this quip, "what do you call alternative medicine that works?" : "Medicine". Ethnopharmacology is about (potentially) validating ethnobotanical use clinically, but it's the phase in the process where the research is mostly in vitro or in animal models. When you search Google scholar for the vast majority of plant species, the results are taxonomic and ecological studies. For a handful of plant species, the literature is dominated by ethnopharmacological studies, and it ought to be possible to mention that somehow, but it is tricky to do while complying with MEDRS. It would help if Wikipedia had an article on ethnopharmacology (there was a stub that was merged into ethnomedicine, but it's certainly a topic deserving of it's own article). Plantdrew (talk) 18:59, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

@Plantdrew: It's tricky, I agree. Some thoughts:

• We can say that the plant has an ethnobotanical use, including traditional medicine, and what this use is.
• Under phytochemistry, we can say what compounds it contains that are known to be biologically active in animals, and what their effects are.
• If the plant is in any of the reputable pharmacopeias, we can say this and what it's listed for. There are traditional preparations in the British Pharmacopeia (I don't know about the US equivalent); the first such I found in the index was "Acanthopanax Bark". We would need to be careful not to imply efficacy unless there is WP:MEDRS-compliant evidence.
• The difficult issue is reporting that active research is going on. WP:MEDANIMAL doesn't forbid altogether reporting animal and in vitro studies. If there are many studies – ideally with a substantial review – then they can be mentioned, so long as it's made clear that they don't provide any evidence to support use in humans.

Anything more? Peter coxhead (talk) 19:51, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

Inquiry

Per the debate here, which is rapidly beginning to generate more heat than light, I'd be interested to know if you could point me to any third-party sources that verify that this is a valid concept. I respect your knowledge base and you seem to know the topic better than some of the other folks debating it. Montanabw^(talk) 08:39, 27 July 2015 (UTC)

I agree about the "more heat than light". The discussion seems to me to be typical of those we have in Wikipedia when dealing with ill-defined concepts that have a core meaning but whose detailed meaning varies by context. "Race" in the context of the classification of organisms does seem to me to be worth an article, which would deal with (1) the broad historical use of the term for infraspecific classification (2) the current use, limited to some groups like fungi, otherwise now largely abandoned in favour of concepts like subspecies or clines. I'll have to think more about sources! Peter coxhead (talk) 13:33, 27 July 2015 (UTC)

Your idea might be worth sandboxing. When full-fledged, perhaps could replace the existing version. Montanabw^(talk) 07:07, 30 July 2015 (UTC)

cladograms

Cross-posted form my "talk" page

You undid an edit I made to the cladogram page, saying that "this must be discussed first." You have not seen fit to start that conversation so I will. The section I wrote is based on what is stated - apparently unobjectionably - in the earlier part of the Cladogram article:

"a cladogram is a diagram used in cladistics which shows relations among organisms. A cladogram is not, however, an evolutionary tree because it does not show how ancestors are related to descendants or how much they have changed; many evolutionary trees can be inferred from a single cladogram ..."

and

"Researchers must decide which character states are "ancestral" (plesiomorphies) and which are derived (synapomorphies), because only synapomorphic character states provide evidence of grouping.[10] "

Phenetic algorithms do not use outgroups, and neither they nor ML or Bayesian methods group by synapomorphy alone.. This is why the material in the "Selecting a cladogram" section is incorrect - particularly, the statement "Algorithms for cladograms include least squares, neighbor-joining, parsimony, maximum likelihood, and Bayesian inference." These things are not "cladistics" and do not, therefore, produce "cladograms." Abrower (talk) 12:26, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Apologies; I thought you would understand that the comments I made are on the talk page of the article. See Talk:Cladogram#What is and is not a cladogram. Please respond there so that others interested in this topic can join in. Peter coxhead (talk) 12:33, 31 July 2015 (UTC)

Cinnamon

Hello, Peter - I just reverted an edit to Cinnamon. While there, I again noticed the image in the lead. I think I had left a comment months ago either at User:Sminthopsis84's talk page or on the article's talk page (can't remember now) when the lead image was changed to this one. I really liked the previous image better. It showed cinnamon sticks up close. Even if that earlier one can't be found or you don't like that one, couldn't we find a better photo of cinnamon sticks than the one that is there now? In the image that is there, the cinnamon sticks are so skinny and far away that they look like pencils, and there is no need for a pile of cinnamon powder in an image labeled "cinnamon sticks". The powder can be shown later in the article. What do you think? Can you either restore the one that was there before or find another image? CorinneSD (talk) 02:54, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

@CorinneSD: yes, I agree that the image wasn't the best. I created a lighter version of the rather dark one that used to be there; what do you think of that? Peter coxhead (talk) 08:02, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Well, I think it's better than the one that was there, but I wonder if we can keep searching for an even better one. This one has the cinnamon back-lighted for the most part. I'd prefer a photo that had the light source in front or above so that one can really see the texture of the cinnamon stick, and perhaps show a little more of the bark, that is, not quite so close up. But I would leave this one there for now. Thanks! CorinneSD (talk) 18:46, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Mandrake

If you wish to delete an article, please take it to WP:AFD. Red Slash 15:33, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

No-one has deleted an article, in my view; you basically moved material from existing articles to convert a redirect to an article, when there had already been extensive discussion about this topic. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:34, 4 August 2015 (UTC)

Cornus

The Cornus (genus) article describes the fruits of Cornus as drupes. Is that an error? Plantsurfer 11:25, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Well, Stace (2010), New Flora of the British Isles, p.509 says of Cornaceae "fruit a drupe with 1 2-celled stone". So I guess not. But it's not clear to me that all botanical sources use the 'fruit categorization' terms in precisely the same way. Peter coxhead (talk) 11:28, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Picking up my last comment, I see that the Flora of China here says "Fruit a drupaceous berry", so it seems that you can take your pick. I'll ask at WT:PLANTS. Peter coxhead (talk) 14:41, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Judd et al say the fruit is a drupe. Heywood etal agree, but use the word "drupaceous". Is there a word "berryaceous"? That would cut us some slack. Plantsurfer 17:04, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Wayne's Word uses "bacca" for some of the weirder "berries" (kiwi, avocado). It appears that Wayne's Word is attributing this usage to Spjut, but Spjut's "bacca" is the typical berries (see here). Plantsurfer 15:53, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

@Plantsurfer: by the way, in changing some Berry links to Berry (botany) I haven't been considering whether "berry" was correctly used in the first place, just what sense of "berry" was intended. Peter coxhead (talk) 14:34, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Yes, me too. Plantsurfer 17:08, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

An f. sp. example

It's become clear that a fungal race in pythopathology is kinda-sorta the same thing as forma specialis is mycology; it's principally the context that differs (the latter article even says so, pretty much). Are you aware of any case where mycologists have named a f. sp. (like Bandersnaticus frumiosus f. sp. carolli) and phytopathologists have designated the same population with a race name (e.g. race X3 of Bandersnaticus frumiosus), or vice versa? I think that would greatly help clarify at the Race (biology) article, at least in one field. And if there's a case of two+ races being classed as one f. sp., or vice versa, (i.e. if there may not always be a 1:1 correspondence), that would be important to factor in. All the literature I'm seeing clearly indicates (but does not spell out) that a mycologist is in a position to classify something as a f. sp. as a matter of biological nomenclature, while a phytopathologist is not (being a botanist of the host species), but may be in a better position to actually identify unique populations of the fungus to begin with, in applied work to develop resistant cultivars of the host plant, and whose IDed population might at some point be given a f. sp. name (that will probably not match the race name, since the former must be a Graeco-Latinism, and the latter is often just an alphanumeric code).  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  11:55, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Well, I'm definitely not a mycologist – although I lead "fungus forays" in the autumn, I only use field guides. My impression is that you're on the right track, but I can't help you with the detail. User:Sminthopsis84 might know more.

I've left the Race (biology) article aside for the present, though noting the real progress you've made. There's something of a mess created by splitting Berry and Berry (botany) to sort out – masses of existing links which may now go to the wrong article. Grumpy remark: being selected as the current "article for improvement" is no guarantee of improvement... Peter coxhead (talk) 14:31, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Speaking of such messes, see the genus merge stuff I posted to WT:FUNGI the other day. Just cleaning up one species has been a nightmare! You have my empathy as well as my sympathy. Anyway, are there any particularly recommendable botanical dictionaries/encyclopedias? I have and can otherwise get hold of plenty of general dictionaries of scientific jargon, but they end to lose too many nuances, and I've repeatedly notice people WP:GAMING definitions from them, on lot of articles, e.g. to apply an overbroad and imprecise definition in favor of a more narrow one in more topical, non-tertiary sources, or conversely to stick to a detailed definition that may be dated and not reflect current usage.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  15:35, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Hi User:SMcCandlish. I think you are seeing all types of literature that I am aware of. A factor that may be complicating things quite a lot is that many biologists refuse to dabble in nomenclature, and I think that explains them using race terminology. A plant pathologist and a mycologist are both permitted to apply the rules of nomenclature to establish a name, but many prefer not to. This may be because what they are studying is not something that they consider to be in itself a discovery. I expect that they also probably don't deal with very large numbers of organisms, so they aren't as acutely aware of the benefits of concise naming. So to summarize, I think you are right, that f. sp. simply provides a way to name a fungal pathogen race, the two are equivalent. It is rather a weird thing, that "informal" status of the f. sp., and for that reason I wondered if it was actually included in the latest code of nomenclature, but it is, and I think that probably means that it is here to stay, because matters to do with mycology have been thoroughly reworked by recent botanical congresses.

I too have put the Race (biology) article aside for the present as a blood-pressure-defense mechanism, but have been planning to look in later. Sorry to see the massive mis-communication that has been going on there. It is very hard to deal with such complete misunderstanding of whatever one writes, as if one is trying to communicate with a different species. Sminthopsis84 (talk) 15:16, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Glad you were WP:JAGUARing; I'd meant to ping you and forgot. That one guy on that article (and the new sock who's arrived) are driving me nuts, but the solution seems to be to just keep adding sourced material until they have no argument left to make. I think this will be a months-long cleanup process. The landrace article needs similar work, and raises similar interference (not from the same party but from a different one who has also been active on both; there are basically three, not two, "camps").  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  15:35, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

PS: I have to retroactively apologize for helping create some of the drama at that page. I let the Dunning-Kruger effect sneak up on me. My familiarity with the disuse of "race" in mammalology (and remembrance of being told by biologists when at university that it's avoided in that field, most especially by primatologists), combined with not having seen it used in caudatology in years, lead to an assumption that the term was also disused in other fields, so I argued that it was obsolete without checking my assumptions. I think that inspired some of the "delete this page!" stuff, inadvertently. I'm now committed to seeing the page done right.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  15:35, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish: so you can see that we're both happy to leave you to it for the present, but don't hesitate to ask for assistance if there are new problems.

Choosing my words carefully, as you will realize, I'm impressed by your example of calm reasonableness. :-) Peter coxhead (talk) 17:16, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Hyacinth (plant)

While violet blue was meant, I actually separated the word links on purpose to lead to the separate colour links; but I prefer it as you left it, that is, Indigo (violet blue), for two reasons: 1/ It is the real colour of Wild Hyancinths; and 2/ There are enough other links for 'violet' and 'blue'. Werdna Yrneh Yarg (talk) 20:55, 23 September 2015 (UTC)Andrew

@Werdna Yrneh Yarg: colour is a tricky issue; there was some argument, for example, over the colour of bluebells. I would point out, though, that in Wikipedia, it should be possible to support every statement by a source (see WP:RS). So the real question is: what source says that wild hyacinths are "violet blue"? Mathew (1987: 103) describes them as "mid-blue" (with "whitish or pinkish" forms also found). If you can't find a source that gives this description, then it will have to be removed. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:53, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

References

Peter Coxhead: Thank you for your edit; I accept whatever you decide to do; however I shall look for a reference if that will help. It should be noted that for flower colours, what some folk term as violet blue or blue violet - such names are rarely used - 'mid blue', that you cited, is the general concensus, following what some people may term as old fashioned colour names. Ancient purple was really the colour of beetroot juice! Terms like BLUE and WATCHET have been in the English language for longer than PURPLE. The idea was to reserve the details as to PERSENCHE, if an user wished to look it up - very difficult to find elsewhere. Werdna Yrneh Yarg (talk) 08:41, 24 September 2015 (UTC)Andrew

Spiders

Excellent recent work on spider related articles, Peter. (especially palpal bulb!) Hamamelis (talk) 01:22, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks! It's not usually the area I work in, as you're probably aware (although I've had a long-standing interest in spiders, and have a small collection of 'reference specimens' for my own use).

There don't seem to be many editors around with an interest in spiders at present. The taxonomy/classification material is woefully under-referenced, and when I've found references, well out-of-date. A lot of work is involved in sorting this out, however. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:48, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Distribution

Agree, geographical not political. Your edit is wise as part of UK in Ireland! Thanks.Osborne 16:59, 25 September 2015 (UTC)

Unreliability of Plant List and World Checklist of Selected Plant Families

Just wanted to make a quick mention of how unreliable & outdated these two sources are, and a recommendation that they probably shouldn't be used as references. See their presentation of genus Astroloba as a case in point. S Molteno (talk) 12:22, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

@S Molteno: you have to understand the nature of Wikipedia. It's supposed to be prepared from secondary or possibly tertiary sources; it's not meant to be as up-to-date as possible. (See WP:RS and in particular WP:WPNOTRS.) So secondary sources like the World Checklist of Selected Plant Families are what we have to use, at least as a starting point, since we have to be sure that the views expressed by individual taxonomists in sources like academic journals have found acceptance in the wider community; WP:NPOV is also an issue with using primary taxonomic sources. Of course we should present and discuss any taxonomic research later than the revision of the genus in a source like WCSP, but it can't be used as the only source.

The Plant List is another matter. One issue is that its algorithms for extracting information from Tropicos are seriously deficient, so whenever a list includes Tropicos sources, you need to check there. Peter coxhead (talk) 14:21, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Orange

Bot would move it to wikidata if you leave it there. Or do it by yourself. --Melandr (talk) 17:21, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Better, surely, if it is put in Wikidata in the first place? Peter coxhead (talk) 17:42, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

New Zealand flax redirects

Hi Peter. You retargeted New Zealand Flax from Flax in New Zealand to Phormium. You also retargeted New Zealand flax from Phormium tenax to Flax in New Zealand. Is this state of affairs intentional? There are quite a few pages linked to "New Zealand flax", and Flax in New Zealand may indeed be more relevant than Phormium for the linking pages, so I'm wondering intended it to work as it does now. 16:22, 30 September 2015 (UTC)

Looking at the page histories, I did these at different times, and had probably forgotten about the mess created by Flax in New Zealand. Certainly "New Zealand flax" and "New Zealand Flax" should have the same target, but what that should be, I'm not sure. I'm happy to leave it to you! Peter coxhead (talk) 09:36, 1 October 2015 (UTC)

Category:Limes (fruit)

Hello,

I'm working on better categorizing the lime articles but I want to avoid any missteps with the plant/botany categorization. Any concerns with me placing this list of limes in the new category? RevelationDirect (talk) 01:38, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

I always have serious reservations about the whole system of categorization on Wikipedia; I'm not at all convinced it's useful to (or much used by) readers. So maybe I'm not the best person to ask! However, if Category:Limes (fruit) is defined by its main article Lime (fruit) then it should have as members items fitting the definition given there, i.e. citrus fruit known as "lime". So those plants listed at Lime (fruit)#Plants known as "lime" that aren't members of the genus Citrus shouldn't be included. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:43, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for your input; I'll limit it to "limes" that are citrus. RevelationDirect (talk) 11:17, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Ping

Popping by because I think your perspective may be useful here: Talk:Feral_organism#Requested_move_2_October_2015. Montanabw^(talk) 20:13, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Commented there. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:34, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Thirteen at Dinner

hi dear wikipedia user. could you plz paraphrase "Thirteen at Dinner ". what does exactly mean? Alborzagros (talk) 12:55, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

@Alborzagros: not sure why you asked me, as it's not a phrase I've used. However, see Triskaidekaphobia. Peter coxhead (talk) 13:01, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

flower spider

I'm wondering what the function is if the tiny pits on the spider's back. Flower spider (talk) 11:35, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

@Flower spider: I'm not an expert on spiders, even though I've been editing spider articles lately, but I think those you can easily see are likely to represent the bases of internal projections which form an "endoskeleton" or internal skeleton to which muscles, etc. are attached. There are also very small sense organs which form pits and secretory pores, but these require a high power microscope to see. There don't seem to be any real spider experts around at present, unfortunately. Peter coxhead (talk) 12:00, 14 October 2015 (UTC)

Orangutan

Hello Peter coxhead, I don't understand your revert in above. I corrected it as the headline. What is here wrong? That's usual to do so...Regards -- Sweepy (talk) 20:45, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

I see your point, but the article is about the genus Pongo, which has two species. Look at what is there now. It says "The orangutans ... are the two exclusively Asian species of extant great apes". Your change made it say "The orangutan ... are the two exclusively Asian species ..." which doesn't make sense grammatically. Look at Wolf spider or Penguin or Moss. When an article has an English name as its title and is about a group of species, not just one species, you'll find the singular as the article title, but the article correctly beginning with the plural.

Personally, I think this is illogical and the article title should be the plural, but it's the convention in the English Wikipedia as per WP:PLURAL. Peter coxhead (talk) 21:59, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

Dog breeds

I can't participate in that discussion any time soon (see here). If you like, feel free to point people to User:SMcCandlish/Organism names on Wikipedia#Capitalization (and disambiguation) of breeds and cultivars, which has a collected pro and con arguments section with regard to capitalization of standardized breed names (and cultivar names, the arguments for which are sometimes different). I remain neutral or at least wavering on the issue, and have tried to do both sides justice (I wrote that in 2014 for the post part but revised it a little today).  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  00:29, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

@SMcCandlish: ah, right; will do. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:01, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Template:Taxonomy key

Hi there. I noticed you edited Template:Taxonomy key, and I think you might have inadvertently emptied a couple thousand categories, see Wikipedia:Database reports/Empty categories (permalink). Not sure if this is related to the error that appeared along with the daily update. You may want to look into it. — ξ^xplicit 01:50, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

@Explicit: it's not inadvertent, but a direct consequence of the changes. Taxobot was supposed to maintain these categories, via a toolserver tool which was never migrated. Neither have run since 2013, so any information in the categories is out of date and of no use.

The error with BernsteinBot I don't know about. Peter coxhead (talk) 07:19, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

I think the point you missed was that your edit added an HTML comment start marker ("<!--") without a corresponding end marker ("-->"). That has been fixed by a subsequent edit. --R'n'B (call me Russ) 23:42, 19 October 2015 (UTC)

Ah, yes, sorry, that was a bad mistake. I've now commented out more code, as I had intended to.

The categories in question are useless, because they are part of the "automatic taxobox system" that was once maintained by Taxobot running a tool that was never migrated. Both stopped working by 2013. (In my view they were always a mistake.) Basically all the categories need to be deleted. Peter coxhead (talk) 08:01, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

To tell you the truth, I never understood what function those categories were supposed to serve. However, this change requires the deletion of several thousand categories. This might be worth a note to one of the CFD bot operators. --R'n'B (call me Russ) 11:25, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

They had a possible maintenance function when Taxobot ran, but certainly don't now. "CFD bot operators" are outside my experience; can you suggest some? Peter coxhead (talk) 11:37, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

I made a request at User talk:Cyde#Mass category deletion?. --R'n'B (call me Russ) 20:14, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Thanks! Peter coxhead (talk) 21:23, 21 October 2015 (UTC)

Excavata

Hi, Peter. Thanks for editing the taxonomy template. How is that done, by the way? I've been laboriously editing individual pages. :D

I'd suggest removing Bikonta from the template, if possible, since there is no longer anything like a consensus in support of the group. Two flagella is the ancestral state of all eukaryotes (see He et al, 2014, Derelle et al, 2015 and, of course, Adl et al, 2012) and even Cavalier-Smith seems to have left Unikonta/Bikonta behind. In any case the root of the tree is still in question, so it might be better to leave speculative deep phylogeny (Amorphea/Diaphoretickes, Opimoda/Diphoda, etc) out of the taxobox, for now. Deuterostome (talk) 14:20, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

If you look at a taxobox which results from the use of templates like {{Automatic taxobox}} or {{Speciesbox}} you'll see a red pencil icon beside the heading "Scientific classification". If you click on the icon it will take you to the source of the bottom level of the taxonomy, in this case Template:Taxonomy/Excavata. The full hierarchy is shown on the right of this page (with links to view and edit the appropriate templates). So if you want to cut out Bikonta, just edit this page. If you change |parent=Bikonta to |parent=Eukaryota then Bikonta will be by-passed.

In general, the parent taxon for a taxon with the name "X" is stored in "Template:Taxonomy/X". You have to be a bit careful in editing these taxonomy templates, since the effect will immediately be visible in all pages linking to any part of the taxonomic hierarchy. There's an introduction to the "automated taxonomy system" at Template:Automatic taxobox/doc/intro.

At present I don't keep up with "deep phylogeny" as much as I used to, and you are obviously more expert than I am, but I do agree that the Unikonta/Bikonta division is out-dated. I leave it to you to fix the classification as you see fit. Peter coxhead (talk) 16:39, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the help. I'll edit the template. Deuterostome (talk) 17:31, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

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Saffron

Hello Peter,

I was reading the article about Saffron. If I understand correctly the plant does not grow in the wild. When I mentioned this to my father he stated that this plant gr used to grow wild in the small village that he is from in Souther Itally. The towns name is acceturra. I just wanted to share this with. OWouldn't it be something if there was a youvarient of that plant growing there. Franco Volpe (talk) 19:39, 29 October 2015 (UTC)

@Franco Volpe: well, I'm not an expert on saffron, but deciding whether a plant that has been long established in cultivation is truly wild (i.e. grows as a native) is difficult. Saffron is said to have been introduced to Italy by the crusaders (see here), and is certainly capable of naturalizing. Peter coxhead (talk) 22:29, 29 October 2015 (UTC)

Move reversal

Dear Peter Do you have administrator privileges? I want to reverse a move as a subsp. has now been sunk as insufficiently distinct from the species. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Ulmus_minor_subsp._minor_%27Variegata%27 I've managed to revert all the other U. minor cultivar pages, but this one was moved from species to subsp. some time ago. I'd normally ask Rkitko, but he has temporarily withdrawn. Regards, Ptelea (talk) 16:11, 2 November 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, no, I'm not an admin. If you ask at WT:PLANTS usually someone will answer. Peter coxhead (talk) 21:05, 2 November 2015 (UTC)

Automatic taxobox child taxa

I closed the two TfDs related to the automatic taxobox yesterday, here and here, and deleted the Child taxa template but retained the subpages as you had recommended in the latter discussion. What do you think is a reasonable amount of time to keep these around, or how will we know if any of the data in them should be retained? (I never use the automatic taxoboxes; I hadn't even noticed there were problems with them.) Opabinia regalis (talk) 00:07, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

@Opabinia regalis: in response to the first question, I disabled the subsystem on 22 October, posting at Template talk:Automatic taxobox, which is the place that editors usually come to report problems with automated taxoboxes. I fixed the only issue raised there. It's now three weeks since I acted. I think that if we waited another week it would do no harm and would ensure that no-one could really object later.

In response to the second question, what would have been the content of "Template:Child taxa/TAXON" had Taxobot been running can be found by the search "Template:Taxonomy/ insource:TAXON". (Compare this with this as an example.) So the only information that would be lost is historic, i.e. the content of any lists of child taxa created by Taxobot before it ceased to operate that are now out-of-date. I can't see that this could matter. Peter coxhead (talk) 10:24, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

Got it, thanks. Good; that'll be some time to find out the most efficient way to delete 10k pages. Last time I did ~800 at once it briefly locked the database. Opabinia regalis (talk) 21:26, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Identity

Moved to Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Confusing gender constructions; please don't add any more comments here.

"Avoid confusing constructions (she fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., she became a parent)." was added in a slightly different manner and then adjusted slightly in July 2015 by SMcCandlish citing a discussion at the village pump (there were a few around that time about the topic). It was removed on November 8, 2015 by Dingsuntil citing a discussion somewhere. I restored the content that was removed today (November 20, 2015) per WP:BRD. You reverted my restoration. I don't plan to edit war about it, but the sentence in question which stood for about sixth months should be restored, as there was no consensus for its removal. It would be more appropriate for a discussion to be initiated for removal, than one for restoration, at this point. Regards,—Godsy(TALKCONT) 00:06, 21 November 2015 (UTC) It actually pre-dated that in one form or another, too. The #1 way to avoid flamefests about pronouns and TG people is to avoid using pronouns (especially for historical material predating their change / outness). The sentence is essentially a contextual application of the MOS lead instructions to rewrite when a conflict becomes intractable.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  03:35, 21 November 2015 (UTC) @Godsy: SMcCandlish has clearly expressed my view. If you review the relevant talk pages, there is an emerging consensus that while we should always be respectful to transgender people we should not re-write history, which is what using pronouns retrospectively often does. Peter coxhead (talk) 09:46, 21 November 2015 (UTC) @Peter coxhead: @Godsy: @SMcCandlish: My edit had nothing to do with "Respect transgenders vs. Don't rewrite history." The text on Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Gender_identity was supposed to be the distilled fruit of the discussion. It wasn't (I checked), it was somebody's opinion, so I deleted it. It can be replaced when it becomes the consensus. Dingsuntil (talk) 10:20, 21 November 2015 (UTC) @Godsy: Just a note, one can search the WT:MOS archives for the word "fathered" to see the many discussions of that sentence that have happened over the past several years. I stated my impression in the most recent one that the line gets added or removed based on some discussion with a few participants, only to be re-removed or re-added later by another discussion with as few participants. People seem to have different opinions (and odd bedfellows) on not only whether but also why it should be present or absent. -sche (talk) 11:25, 21 November 2015 (UTC) The advice on avoiding confusing constructions very clearly does reflect several years of consensus on this; ongoing back-and-forth on the Village Pump, in discussions that have not even concluded, doesn't change that.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  13:32, 21 November 2015 (UTC) Reviewing this, it's clear that the contentious part is the suggestion to revise by using a pronoun-based construction that is presently hotly disputed at VP, and has previously been disputed at VP and at MOS, and at other places. The obvious solution is using this language instead: "Avoid confusing constructions (she fathered a child) by rewriting (e.g., Smith became a parent)." And this discussion should really be happening at WT:MOS, or people will just vent again in a month or a year, accusing that this was "never discussed", not having seen this user-talk discussion. I opened a WT:MOS thread at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style#Confusing gender constructions.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  13:40, 21 November 2015 (UTC) re "the contentious part is the suggestion to revise by using a pronoun-based construction": actually, I don't recall and can't offhand find anyone objecting to "she became a parent" because of the pronoun. The most common reason I've seen people give for opposing the line is that "[woman] fathered a child" is not (in their view) confusing or otherwise problematic, and hence it shouldn't be avoided at all, no matter whether the potential replacement would be "she became a parent" or "Name became a parent". -sche (talk) 03:45, 22 November 2015 (UTC)

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