User talk:Grutness/archive36

This file is an archive - please do not add new discussion here - add it to my Talk page

In the early hours of February 17th 2009, I was rushed to hospital suffering from gastric bleeding, vomiting, and severe abdominal pain. It appears that I had a large stomach ulcer.

I have been advised to reduce the stress in my daily life. One of the biggest stress factors in my daily life is my work on Wikipedia, and as such, regrettably, I have reduced the time I spend here. I am still fairly regularly, extending articles, checking my watchlist and the like, but the major part of my work here - that connected to the stub-sorting project - has seen a big reduction in my work.

I enjoy working on Wikipedia, and 99% of the people I have come in contact with have been wonderful, co-operative editors. Unfortunately, in stub-sorting I tend to come into contact with the other 1% far too often. Not the members of WP:WSS, who are are diligent, hardworking wikignomes, but rather those who fail to understand that even something as egalitarian as Wikipedia still requires rules if it is to work to its optimum. Frequently running into people like this has soured my general demeanour towards other wikipedians who have not always deserved some of the comments I have made about them. I have been worn down by this work; it has in the past affected my attitude to other editors, and it is now affecting my health.

You moved from Barnet to NZ? Sounds like you're a very sensible person - I love NZ, great country! I've put comments on the stub/category discussion, thanks for alerting me. Have a great new year - Wikidwitch (talk) 11:27, 4 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Some things are destined to always remain a stub. There just isn't that much more to say. Regards, Acad Ronin (talk) 02:52, 14 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Probably true, but there's still a lot more that can be said on some of them. This one, for instance, doesn't indicate where in Zanzibar it was based, or say who its Governor was, what sort of banking it was involved with, whether it had branches, and if so whether they were all in Zanzibar, whether it simply closed down or closed because of high debts, other important events in its history, etc etc etc... Grutness...wha? 05:35, 14 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hi,

In this revert, you used the following rationale:

please don't use asbox! It makes maintenance far harder for WP:WSS

Was this discussed anywhere? Is it due to some technical issue with {{asbox}}? If there are irreconcilable differences between the goals of WP:WSS and {{asbox}} then the template should be deleted. If not, it would seem optimal for WP:WSS to use {{asbox}} too, as it's much easier to maintain {{asbox}}-based stub templates than randomly-hacked-up ones. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 12:16, 18 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Ping. I'd appreciate a response to the question of what technical details put you off {{asbox}} at WT:WSS#Strange goings on with Spanish regional stubs if you've got the time. Cheers. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 18:36, 30 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

WOW! Thanks so much. I didn't know about the vast majority of those. Thanks again! StarM 02:59, 27 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Always good to know more are coming. The whole stub creation process totally befuddled me in knowing when they were OK, when they were to be upmerged etc. Totally frustrating, but I love that more specific ones exist to use. When/if new one are added, feel free to add them to the project's list or poke me and I'll do it. Hope your knee surg goes well! StarM 04:05, 27 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Gotcha, we went through the stub creation process with a couple -- Australia was one that then went up for discussion/deletion because I hadn't followed proper steps and lucily someone was able to bot-convert all those articles with Australia stubs and museum stubs to use the new one. Then I knew Bloefeld was working on some when he ran through a few countries but as I've been buried in real life - I haven't had time to write let alone categorize. Glad to know the knee will be straight forward - had mine done a number of years ago now. Best thing was the next morning -- it didn't hurt for the first time in a few years. StarM 13:07, 27 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

		Happy New Year!
		Hey there, Grutness! Happy new Gregorian year. All the best for the new year, both towards you and your family and friends too. I know that I am the only person lonely enough to be running this thing as the new year is ushered in, but meh, what are you going to do. I like to keep my templated messages in a satisfactorily melancholy tone. ;) Congratulations to Coren, Wizardman, Vassyana, Carcharoth, Jayvdb, Casliber, Risker, Roger Davies, Cool Hand Luke and Rlevse, who were all appointed to the Arbitration Committee after the ArbCom elections. I am sure I am but a voice of many when I say I trust the aforementioned users to improve the committee, each in their own way, as listed within their respective election statements. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to update the 2009 article, heh. Best wishes, neuro(talk) 00:49, 1 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Grutness,
Thanks for the feed back, I'm still very new, and as such welcome ANY input. Re: the Joyride article, so what would have been the proper thing to do with this article? I was trying to go by what I had seen on other pages, and was trying to help by clearing out some of the backlog of new pages that had not been "patrolled". Should I have put stub on the article, and created and added comments on talk page, I think I'm still way too new to suggest anything be deleted - but very open to any positive suggestions experienced editors have. Thanks again for your time and input ;) Ched (talk) 01:49, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the help. 2nd time updating an article on here. I'm slowing making the article better!

Pteddy (talk) 03:32, 3 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Grutness, I don't know where to report this, but a newspaper has copied what I wrote on wikipedia. I thought I remembered seeing something about this type of thing somewhere on wikipedia, but I don't quite recall where. Do you know where I can post on it? If you want to check it out (I am proud), compare this with John Pandeni and Kalla Gertze. Thanks--Thomas.macmillan (talk) 16:16, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm glad to be back, like a man just released from prison. I do have one question though, as it could help me avoid being blocked again: Am I allowed to remove stuff from my talk page that is no longer needed (or true)? Such things would include my block notice that is no longer in effect, conversations with other Wikipedians, and resolved {{helpme}} questions. If I am not allowed to remove such stuff from my talk page, then could it be archived occasionally and how would I archive it? I'm just trying to tidy the page up.--Almax999 (talk) 20:17, 5 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I saw the renaming discussions you had between calling a person who does canoeing as a profession in sport such as the Summer Olympics or the world championships. Even though I am in the minority on this and was not able to participate in the discussion, I look as the name as "canoer" because there can be one person doing the paddling or more than one. To me, "canoeist" sounds superior and also implies that there can only be one person in the world (or country) who can canoe for a living. This may come across as simple-minded, but I would like to know your thoughts on this since I have been doing most of the recent canoeing biographies in Wikipedia.. Chris (talk) 03:45, 9 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

To be honest, that's the first time I've ever heard such a distinction suggested. We have cyclists, typists, tourists... "-ist" is a standard suffix for someone who does something. I think you're confusing it with the superlative "-est" ending (which is attached to adjectives, not verb stems - e.g., "biggest"), to which it is not in any way related. In any case, as I mentioned in the original nomination, in many countries the term "canoer" does not exist (my google search of New Zealand sites, for instance, found a ratio of over 1000:1 in the uses of the two terms, and half the uses of "canoer" were typos for cancer). In the few countries where it does exist, the term canoeist is also regularly used, so it's not one of those standard US vs UK English things, either. Grutness...wha? 05:54, 9 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Just saw this nomination after all the edits Cydebot had to do to effect the change — anyway, good job! Canoeist is definitely the better name here and you're keeping my bot in business :-P Cyde Weys 16:30, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

My rough estimate is that it took Cydebot 7,000 edits to make all of those changes :-O. Who would've guessed there were so many notable canoeists? Good thing we have automated bots to handle the grunt work of this for us — I didn't even realize how monumental it was until it had already been done automatically. You can probably chalk this up as a personal CFD best, too. --Cyde Weys 16:38, 10 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

My apologies for not responding to your request earlier. Although the merge discussion has closed, I would like to say that I agree that a merge was no longer warranted. Well done for your work. Terrakyte (talk) 16:34, 9 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, I goofed on this one, but please see my comments in Talk:Runway (fashion)#Catwalk where I posted the following list of articles that link to catwalk which I made into a disambiguation page until I can figure out a better solution, perhaps a new article like cat walk? Grating linked to it as well.

• Railway air brake
• 2008 Atlanta tornado outbreak#Atlanta tornado
• Architecture of the California missions
• Lena Water Tower
• Diamond plate
• Guard rail

Some of the original article in my list I have redirected to catwalk (theater) or footbridge (in the case of grating) as the case may be. There may still be more like it linking to catwalk. Any suggestions? Peter Horn 18:11, 9 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Grutness, I don't get it--did I say something to offend you? I'm only trying to learn what can happen besides deletion. And how is it me who is wasting your time? I hope you would have harsher words for whoever wrote the dumb article in the first place, or the editor who AfD'ed it instead of redirecting. Drmies (talk) 00:57, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Huh? What harsh words? I didn't make any harsh remarks about anyone - if they've been interpreted that way, I'm sorry, but that was never the intention. All I did was muse that while we might go "by the book" and waste lots of time, it makes far more sense to ignore all rules and close the discussion off early. Grutness...wha? 05:16, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I thought that "Y'mean waste everyone's time," since it followed my remarks, was directed at me...now I see that you directed that at the last part of my question (which was indeed about going "by the book"). Sorry for the confusion; I'm glad you took care of the redirect. Take care, Drmies (talk) 05:41, 11 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, With all due respect, is there any good reason for your turning cat walk into a redirect page? If you would but check the context in which it is used in the articles that link to it, you might possibly realize that this redirect to catwalk (disambiguation) is somewhat less than usefull. The use of the word "catwalk" in a building, structure or refinery etc. is probably older than its use in the fashion industry. Incedentally, I found two (2) more articles that had to be linked to "cat walk". However a solution would be to redirect cat walk to a new section called "Footbridge#Catwalk" in the article footbridge as is done in the case of Runway (fashion)#Runway. Peter Horn 16:23, 12 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Lots of reasons - the most important of which is that it makes no sense to have two disambiguation pages that would be virtually identical for what are frequently alternative spellings of the same thing. The term "cat walk" may be far older, but that is irrelevant. The spelling most commonly encountered is catwalk, and by far the most commonly encountered meaning of the term catwalk is in the fashion industry. Given that you'd have to redirect cat walk to sections called footbridge#catwalk, scaffolding#catwalk, gantry#catwalk, skyway#catwalk and the like makes the other solution you suggest impractical. As to finding two more articles, two is a very minor problem, especially as they should now quite comfortably link to a disambiguation page from where it is easy to navigate to the correct page. That's one of the main purposes of disambiguation pages - to provide a "soft redirect" to any of several options where a single redirect (such as the one you suggest) is still likely to reach the wrong target. There's also the possibility that someone looking for a fashion catwalk may uses the term with the spelling "cat walk" (although not the standard spelling in this usage, it clearly does happen), in which case those articles would clearly link incorrectly. Having cat walk link to a dab page is, overall, a preferable situation. The only viable alternative would be to move the disambiguation page to catwalk, and have everything go to that. Given the huge preponderance of fashion articles that link to catwalk, though, makes that solution far less practical. Grutness...wha? 22:48, 12 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I shall go ahead and create a section "Footbridge#Catwalk" and take it from there. Everything that links to "Cat walk" will then be temporarely (?) redirected there. That is probably the best compromise and solution Peter Horn 15:45, 13 January 2009 (UTC))[reply]

Hello, Only "talk pages" now link to "Cat walk", every thing else now links to Footbridge#Catwalk. Problem solved. Peter Horn 18:29, 13 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Grutness. I have just found out that someone who has been editing this article about the "Four Horsemen" had been removing cited material from the article controversally, and he has done this multiple times from multiple IPs. An IP Geolocate shows that this is coming from the same source in Portland, Oregon. I know that the article is currently protected to avoid those kinds of IP edits that are causing edit wars with registered editors. What I was wondering is if he could be accused of sockpuppetry, as it is obviously the same person (or someone related to him) who was repeatedly removing cited material without consensus. I realize that because I am not an admin, I cannot accuse him. I did, though, leave a warning on the talk page of his latest IP stating that his edits are unconstructive and constantly changing IPs to try to avoid scrutiny is not allowed. If this could be a sockpuppetry case, I can show you the diffs for evidence:[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] Look at all the talk pages for these IPs and do a Geolocate, they are all from Portland, Oregon. Some of these may appear to be the same exact edits, but they are just the results of reverts (I mentioned edit warring). I am not trying to bite the newcomers, but this guy has been given plenty of warnings for his unconstructive edits. I hope this helps, it took me nearly half an hour to gather all of this and write it. And BTW, the first diffs listed here are the most recent. You can check the dates of each revision to confirm that. Sorry this is so long.--Almax999 00:08, 14 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. Almax is right, and that anon user has actually been around for much longer, since late October. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Four_Horsemen_(Supreme_Court)&diff=248188463&oldid=248188247 and http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Four_Horsemen_(Supreme_Court)&diff=248253276&oldid=248236471 and http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Four_Horsemen_(Supreme_Court)&diff=248260343&oldid=248255336 and so on. RafaelRGarcia (talk) 00:50, 14 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, thanks for clearing that up. But if he does create a user account and continues to add controversial edits to the article, could he then be accused of sockpuppetry? Of course before he would be accused, an admin would have to use checkuser to see if the IP that is being used by his account is from the same service as the others he's used as a anon. If evidence is needed, there are 14 diffs in this thread alone of his IP edits, and more would be found in his user account edits (assuming he does create a user account to continue his behavior). Anyway, I just thought I should give an admin a heads up about this guy. I'll let you know if I find him doing the same from a registered user account.--Almax999 01:54, 14 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Let me preemptively say -- get well soon. Raul654 (talk) 06:16, 21 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Dear Grutness,

I have recently expanded the short article on William Mason (18101897), who was the first Mayor of Dunedin but other things besides. It is titled "William Mason (Mayor)". I wonder if it is possible to change the title? Mason was Mayor for two years, a member of the NZ House of Representatives for five and a practising architect for about forty years. He was also a farmer and others things too, but out of all of these architecture seems the most important. John Stacpoole made him the subject of the first book-length study of any New Zealand architect in 1971. He is primarily remembered for buildings he designed like the second Government House in Auckland, the now demolished Stock Exchange in Dunedin and also St Matthews church and Columba College here. The Dictionary of New Zealand Biography on him gives him primarily as an architect. I don't know what the rules are about changing titles - or how one goes about changing them. But if it is possible I'd recommend changing it to "William Mason (architect)".

Also, the article is now rather long and has no subheadings. I don't know how those get inserted. I know you've done this for some of my articles before and wonder if you felt like doing it here?

Further, it would be nice to have some pictures. I have some images of some of his buildings in electronic form and might be able to get more. There are also some photos of the man himself. I have no idea how to insert those into articles - or put them anywhere else for that matter - and I'm not sure I understand the Wikipedia's policy about copyright. I imagine if one puts an image in one of their articles one is saying it's copyright free. Obviously if one takes a photograph of a building then copyright in the photo belongs to oneself. One can cheerfully put that forward forsaking one's own copyright. Similarly, if one photographs a photograph or picture copyright in that belongs to the photographer too (unless they're commissioned). So one could cheerfully put that on too, forsaking one's rights in that photograph. Now I have some images like that which might be useful to illustrate the article - or could get some. But would that meet the Wikipedia's rules?

If you wanted to contact me directly my email address is portdanielpress (at)actrix.co.nz. It's probably a more reliable way of getting hold of me than posting things in here.

Sorry to bother you with all this.

Regards,

Peter Entwisle

I've replied on Peter's talk page.-gadfium 21:35, 21 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Grutness, thank you for the vote of confidence :-) I'll take a rain check at the moment, but am happy to revisit the topic in six months or so. Wishing you the best for the knee surgery and a swift recovery! XLerate (talk) 23:02, 27 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]