Wikibooks:Reading room/Archive 9

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[edit] What language is en.wikibooks.org?

I ask, because I've just had a completely valid Australian english word (Glycaemic) repeatedly corrected as being a 'typo'.

Is there a policy as to the language to be used? I looked but couldn't find one. Thanks. Irrevenant 11:15, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

The language is english, although there is no specific rule on which english is being used. There are many differences (although most are small) between the "english" spoken in australia, the UK, and America. A general guideline is people should be tolerant of these differences, but many people don't even know that a word is from a different dialect. The problem is that the word "Glycaemic" might be spelled correctly in Australian english, but the corrected version might be correctly spelled in British english, or American english. no sense getting into an edit war about it, maybe just provide a footnote or something. --Whiteknight (talk) (current) 13:11, 8 December 2005 (UTC)
Okay, Thanks. Irrevenant 20:41, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

I say there should be no "official" dialect in wikibooks, else we would have to have 3 wikibook sites for German, some 100 dialects for the phillipeno one, etc. etc. --Dragontamer 23:05, 26 December 2005

I think that turning the 'offending' word into a link to a footnote or to the Wiktionary entry would be better than correcting it unless it is wrong in all the dialects and variants. Not sure that British, American and Australian English are different enough to qualify as dialects though; most of the differences that people mention are simply variant spellings. I agree with Dragontamer that there should not be an official dialect. This is especially so in English because we do not have any equivalent of l’Académie française or Norsk Språkrådet, the language belongs to the people who use it. Perhaps this lack of policy should be made official :-) --kwhitefoot 11:28, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Recent changes question

As an active member of other Wikis and a newcomer to the Wikibook, I'm having a really difficult time orienting myself around here. My main problem is that I'd like to contribute to the Cookbook, but not the other areas of the site. I guarantee there are plenty of other folks out there like me who feel discouraged because there is too much to wade through before you can find what you're interested in. Specifically, I'd like to use the Recent Changes page to look at Cookbook specific changes. The problem is that there seems to be only a handful of Cookbook related changes per 500, making it near-impossible to selectively follow the Cookbook's progress. Is there some way to access a Cookbook specific Recent Changes page? Kneague 22:37, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Hmmm... you could always watchlist each Cookbook module. I don't think there is another way to just see Cookbook changes. --LV (Dark Mark) 22:39, 8 December 2005 (UTC)
Is there some way such a feature could be programmed, then? Having a single Recent Changes page is a real limiting factor because it means so many new contributions and edits will fall under the radar. Looking through the Cookbook now, there are numerous things that need to be better streamlined, and I think that could be achieved if there a better mechanism for tracking Cookbook specific changes. On a more global scale, having Book specific Recent Changes pages could cultivate a sense of community on those pages, encouraging people to contribute and providing a newcomer with the necessary attention to keep them around. Kneague 22:56, 8 December 2005 (UTC)
On the top of the page, when you are logged in, there is a tab that says "watch". When you click that button, the page will go onto your personal watch list. Then, to see your watchlist, you can click the "My Watchlist" link in the upper right-hand corner (near your user name). Alternatively, when you edit a page, there is a check box labled "Watch this page", which has the same effect. If you want to automatically watch every page you edit, you could click on the "preferences" link (right next to "my watchlist"), and under the "editing" button, click the checkbox called "Add pages you edit to your watchlist". Then, every time you edit a page in the cookbook, it will add that page to your watchlist. If you have any other questions, you can feel free to leave me a message on my talk page. --Whiteknight (talk) (current) 23:17, 8 December 2005 (UTC)
I think it's not exaltly what Kneague was looking for - this function lets you watch only single pages. There's another feature I think will meet your needs. In every article, you have "toolbox" left to the text of article. On its top you have "Related changes" link - it shows changes in every article current article is pointing to. You can watch related changes of Cookbook or Cookbook:Recipes. --Derbeth talk 08:19, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
Another way of monitoring pages is to use a program like Colin Markwell's WebMon to periodically check the pages you are interested in and alert you when the have changed. I do this for the pages that I edit most often. You could tell WebMon to monitor the Related Changes for the contents page of the book. Of course you might need to monitor several Related Changes pages if there is no comprehensive contents page. As with any automated web client please don't overload the servers by careless use, that is, don't check too often. --kwhitefoot 22:18, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
The idea of watching the related changes pages sounds good, but i'm having trouble getting it to work. when i click on Cookbooks, it gives me the option of watching the Cookbooks page. that works fine. However, when I click on "related changes" to the Cookbook, suddenly the watch button disappears. am i doing something wrong or this feature removed for a reason? if its not possible to add those pages to my watch list, i could always bookmark them in my browser, but i thought i should check here first. Kneague 05:23, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
Looks like the related changes don't provide for watching; it isn't just the Cookbook that behaves that way. WebMon works though and gives you essentially the same feature. In fact it could be argued that it is better as it will pop up a messge saying that the page has changed (WebMon Windows only I'm afraid but Unix users can probably throw a shell script together to do the same trick). --kwhitefoot 22:41, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Spoiler info?

Being a location for rather in-depth discussion, do we care much for spoilers in regards to Wikibooks on popular culture? I honestly think it's getting in the way of editing the Super Smash Bros. Melee book. Nifboy 03:56, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

I don't recall who first came up with the spoiler-free idea (it's on several guides here), but I don't think it's really necessary. I just try to avoid unnecessary spoilers like "don't bother attacking the fat man, he's invincible until you take out the reactor in the final mission" or whatnot. GarrettTalk 23:11, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
There are templates available to indicate spoilers. Write what you want, just put in a warning. --Whiteknight (talk) (current) 02:55, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
There is no official game guide policy, but there are some drafts of one if you wanna help out making them. Personally speaking, there should be no unmarked spoilers to the storyline, but cheats and so forth are easily forgotten or ignored if you don't want them. So spoilers should only pertain to the storyline. --Dragontamer 22:40, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Japanese Vandalism

The book Japanese (book of the month for December, no less) has been completely vandalized by someone claiming to be "Wikipedia is Communism". Just thought I'd make sure everybody knew about this so it can be taken care of, seeing as it's a frontpage book and all. --MasterSheep 04:24, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Nevermind! As far as I can tell, it's been restored. Thanks! --MasterSheep 04:35, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
The correct place to report vandalism is Wikibooks:Vandalism in Progress. If you mention it there, you will get a quicker response. --Whiteknight (talk) (current) 13:20, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Interesting Web Page

I figure that the Wikibooks community ought to hear about it here before it becomes something else. Check out this website:

http://www.wikipediaclassaction.org/

In some ways I want to say "Bring it on!!!"

I guess that Wikipedia has grown to the point that as*$$$$ want to screw up a perfectly good project. BTW, The Juriwiki List is already discussing this issue and trying to come up with a legal solution to this. If you are a paralegal or otherwise involved in the legal profession, please feel free to join this list and help us all out from the scum that would kill us all with a thousand razor cuts. It looks like they may be going after admins as well as the Foundation board, which should be fun. --Rob Horning 00:37, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

The webpage says that wikimedia has a "flawed business model", but considering that wikimedia is a not-for-profit organization, i hardly doubt we have a business model at all. What pisses me off the most is the fact that a few screw-ups on the 'pedia have created a situation where some people are being libeled. Beyond that, attempts to correct obvious cases of libel have been reverted, or discouraged. wikimedia needs to be far more careful on this subject then they historically have been. However, i don't think that this particular lawsuit will hold water. Wikimedia is a not-for-profit, and the contributers are not affiliated with wikimedia in any business sense. Saying that wikimedia should be responsible for the actions of it's contributers is akin to saying that ISPs should be responsible for the content on rented webspace, or that telecom companies should be responsible for terrorists who make phone calls. --Whiteknight (talk) (current) 02:24, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
On a side note, i personally am against the practice of allowing anonymous users post anything at will. I know that such a sentiment is against the general wiki-spirit of things, but i can't see any benefit to allowing anonymous users to post anything that their hearts desire. Further more, people should be legally responsible for the content that they do contribute. By disallowing anonymous posters, and making vandals legally responsible for their contributions, i think that would cut down on alot of the bullshit and nonsense that does happen. Either we should make the vandals responsible for their vandalism, or we have to drop that responsibility in the lap of the wikiemedia foundation itself. I don't think that one bad remark should ever have the power to shut down this project. --Whiteknight (talk) (current) 02:30, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
It's interesting in that it makes this section outdated. Personally, I think it doesn't have much merit. I'm no expert on the law but I've had a couple courses, and WikiPedia shouldn't be liable because it wasn't wikipedia or any of the main people involved making the statement, it was the statement of the editor in question. Xerol Oplan 06:20, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

The GNU Free Documentation License does not have such a clause, but the GNU General Public License has no-warranty and no-liability clauses. Not only do the authors of everything GNU GPL (the KDE desktop, the GNU Compiler Collection, the Linux kernel) feel that they are not responsible for their products, but most other software licenses have similar clauses. Even Microsoft disclaims warranty and liability on most stuff.

And yes, we have a Wikibooks:General disclaimer, and Wikipedia probably has one too. Which makes "Wikipedia Class Action" seem like a bad joke. And even if the Wikimedia Foundation becomes asleep, there are always volunteers who can fix untrue or libelous articles if someone notifies them. Or should Microsoft and everyone else "be held responsible for their" software? --Kernigh 05:52, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Do we need CheckUser?

Probably some of you have heard of CheckUser interface - allowing to find IP address of suspicious registered users. As you can see, we are having some cases of vandalism, there also were claims that people voting for BOTM or COTM were sockpuppets (not confirmed). Use of CheckUser is very restricted - only stewards have CheckUser rights on every project, and as you might know, it's not always easy to reach a steward. I think that we should have users with CheckUser rights, in order not to be dependant on stewards.

Choosing users with such rights will be similar to giving sysop rights, except that at least two users must have such rights (in able to control themselves). But before we can start discussion in WB:RFA, we should decide whether we need ChecUser-s. What do you think? (Preceding comment unsigned by User:Derbeth)

Yeah, I think it might be helpful to give access to a select few users, but I do not know how much it will need to be used. Over at WP, where this is much more needed, a very few of them currently have access to it, and there are a lot more of them than us. I don't know the necessity of this, quite yet. For votes and such, there should be some limit (say 30 edits) before their vote gets counted. That would rule out most socks. But when in doubt, I'd say assume good faith. Just my 2 pennies. --LV (Dark Mark) 17:09, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
I have stayed out of the whole Check User debate, but IMHO this is something that should be given to all admins. I really don't understand the whole issue of "privacy" for a given user. The Wikimedia Privacy policy clearly states that this information is available and can be used against somebody, like the current Siegenthaler case on Wikipedia, if they are caught saying something liabelous or illegal (like the notorious White Heritage Society Wikibook mentioned earlier, if the contributor was a German citizen). This is merely another tool to help keep vandalism under control, and for some exceptionally rare circumstances can be used to identify sock puppets. I have seen things like this on MUDs and IRC servers for decades (yes... decades) and if you are connected to the internet, there is no reason for your immediate connection to presume anonyminty unless you are specifically going through an anonymizer service. Even then, your physical location could in theory still be traced, but you are relying on the policies of the anonymizer service to protect you at least for a brief period of time. Only under the most exceptional circumstances could I see that this sort of feature could be abused, and the administrator vetting procedure alone IMHO is sufficient to keep this from going too far.

BTW, can a bureaucrat grant Check User status? --Rob Horning 01:11, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

No. You have to use special meta page after being accepted by the community. --Derbeth talk 18:46, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
Upon further review of m:CheckUser Policy, it seems as though Wikibooks will be a couple of years before we can even get the 30 or more active users to approve somebody for the CheckUser status, and it can only be granted by a Steward or Developer. I really don't understand the privacy concerns here, but the only way I see the policy being changed is to run for the Wikimedia Foundation board with this issue as one of my platform planks. This is something to keep in mind if there is a problem, but for now I don't see anybody getting this "authority". --Rob Horning 02:25, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
After recent vandalisms, I am going to candidate for CheckUser for English Wikibooks. There are some vandals who use registered accounts and CheckUser will help me blocking their IP's and notifying their ISP's in serious cases. But I need at least one more person wanting to become a CheckUser (there have to be at least two at a project). I think we are able to have CheckUsers - f.e. Polish Wikipedia has four. --Derbeth talk 18:46, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
If you want to put your name up on the Wikibooks:Requests for adminship page and add a section for CheckUser status, you got my vote right now. And a standing offer to support any current admin on this project (baring any discussion for abuse where a vote for deadminship if it is currently occuring). As for the requirement for two CheckUser privileges as a minimum, I think that is just simple paranoia from the group that wrote the CheckUser policy, not anything that came from actual experience (and a bad reason to write any rule of that nature). The number of people with this "privilege" on all Wikimedia projects is appallingly small. They aren't even giving this status to Stewards (although Stewards can give it to themself... if they can find a "justification"). Since this option can also be given to non-admins, I would consider supporting other users here as well, but you would have to go through a vetting process that you might as well become an admin here too. We could use the help even if done on a small scale. Let's see if we can get the required 30 votes of support. We might as well try. --Rob Horning 13:19, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
I'll wait for another user wanting to become a CheckUser before I sign my application to RFA. --Derbeth talk 13:32, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
Can it be just any user, or does it need to be a sysop? I don't think i'm right for the job, so that's one admin out. --Whiteknight (talk) (current) 15:42, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
There is no particular need to be a sysop prior to the CheckUser privilege, but at the moment there are far fewer people with CheckUser than sysop privileges, and CheckUser can only be granted by a stweard, so the process involved in actually getting the status is much more involved. I pity people who work in non-English Wikimedia projects that have to deal with this issue as communication with stewards is much harder in that situation. That is why I suggest that you become an admin first if you want CheckUser privileges. --Rob Horning 17:58, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
I wish we could at last begin voting for CheckUsers, but there are still no candidates. I can be one, but I need at least one more sysop who also wants to be a CheckUser. --Derbeth talk 01:31, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Colon Convention Usefulness

I hope to get a little more attention to the policy since it's been quiet for a while: discussions over the naming policy (specifically obsolete styling) here at Wikibooks really needs to be solidified. I'd like to get some people over there to vote on the issue and see what they think of my ideas on removing the acceptace of the colon convention. The best place to talk about it is over there I would say. -Matt 23:35, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Criticisms of Wikibooks

I thought that the Wikibooks community might be interested in this exchange I had with one of the early pioneers of e-book publishing, Ben Crowell. I personally value his opinions considerably, perhaps even more than Jimbo's in many ways, and he does know how to organize collaborative e-book projects, with one GFDL'd Physics textbook he helped co-write that pre-dated Wikibooks by over three years. You can read the full discussion at:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=170873&cid=14234478

which is attached to an interview review that Jimbo gave earlier for Wikinews.

There are a number of interesting points brought up, including a very low S/N (signal to noise for non-techies) to be able to find a high quality Wikibook, and the quality of the stages icons. I know there are many other areas of Wikibooks that need work, but some effort perhaps should be done to fix up the front page for those visitors who are perhaps not familiar with Wikimedia projects and editing styles. I'm comfortable with Wikibooks, but I've been here for some time now. The front page is the "public personna" of what we expect visitors to see.

His website, http://theassayer.org/ , is one that people on Wikibooks should also be aware of, as it lists free (as in speech as well as price) e-books, many of which can be used as resources for Wikibooks as well. It may be wise to have some of the better quality Wikibooks be reviewed there as well. --Rob Horning 02:17, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

With en.wikipedia (if not other languages as well), it can be generally assumed that if one user starts an artical, other users will quickly come in and add to it. There are enough users on wikipedia, that you can assume that each given area of expertise can be well covered by contributers. Unfortunately for wikibooks, there simply aren't enough contributers to get any new project up and running (to a reasonable degree of completion) in any amount of time. Some books are started, but there aren't enough knowledgable contributers to complete it. Once a book has been dropped to the bottom of barrel, it is unlikely that potential contributers in the future will be able to find it, and they won't be able to coherently figure out what previous contributers had in mind. Textbooks require much more planning then a single encyclopedia artical, and it can be very difficult coming in the middle of the creation of the book. I know that I spend a good amount of time planning each new book I introduce, although i don't always leave enough notes around to aid future contributers in my absence. It's just a fact of life that we will need to deal with here until our numbers get larger. --Whiteknight (talk) (current) 04:49, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
Wikipedia is an abnormally large project.
But even when comparing Wikibooks to Wiktionary, for example, many users (including myself) contribute to the Wiktionary, but few users contribute to any Wikibook (except very large books like Cookbook). Wikibooks is split into many individual books. Sometimes I work on one book, then switch to another book (or to Wiktionary or some other wiki), and when I come back, no one has edited the first book except for me and the anonymous IP that fixed the spelling and grammar.
Wikibooks also includes many abandoned stubs and incomplete books, which are only useful when some Wikibookian comes and restarts work on them, as I sometimes do.
Some users confuse Wikibooks or Wikisource with a project like Wiktionary. AccidentalLinking (just putting brackets around words that you like) fails here when it succeeds at Wiktionary. In fact, sometimes I change red links into Wikipedia interwiki links. When I have time, I would like to work on the Wikibooks FAQ at WB:FAQ and explain some of this. --Kernigh 06:07, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
That's exactly the problem. When you walk away from a particular book, and come back to it, nothing substantial will have changed. I would say that our ratio of Active Contributers-Per-Book is incredibly low. I know that I personally am the primary contributer to 6 books. Most contributions to those books by other people are usually (but not always) limited to simple fixes. --Whiteknight (talk) (current) 15:46, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
I really think we need a better method of either
1)Getting contributors together to coauthor books. Books with 1 author stall easily, books with 3 or 4 authors have peer pressure working for them. It might be a good idea to push people to get at least 1 co-author before starting a book.
2)Groups of people willing to move from book to book within a subject, improving one at a time. THis way books get concentrated resources for a while. Probably best done within bookshelves (a math group, a CS group, etc). Anyone else interested?
I agree, we have way too few editors/book on most books. I've written the differential equations wikibook, and other than a few typos corrected, I have had 1 correction and a short intoduction to the idea of a solution added. Thats it. No example problems, no content additions, nothing. Its currently stalled since I moved in September, due to my lack of time. Unless my life changes again, or hell freezes over and someone else contributes to it, it will likely stay that way for another year at least. --Gabe Sechan 18:32, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

http://theassayer.org/ now links to http://www.lightandmatter.com/article/infrastructure.html where Ben Crowell discusses infrastructure for free textbooks, including Wikibooks....

I would have to check the text of the GFDL and CC-BY-SA again, but I believe that images at Wikimedia Commons which use these licenses are not restricted to only free textbooks as Ben Crowell claims. Instead, a free image may be aggregated to a non-free book. I can also put a CC-BY-SA image on a GFDL wiki page, even though the two licenses are incompatible. --Kernigh 02:39, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Hijacking a Bookshelf

Hello, my name is Paul, and I've been looking around Wikibooks for a few months, but haven't really contributed anything. I have a great interest in adding things to the economics bookshelf and changing the way it looks, but I can't seem to find any activity on the whole bookshelf. Should I just start making changes, or is this rude? Thanks, DettoAltrimenti 04:51, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

It helps to have a link to the bookshelf being discussed.
I was able to make lots of edits to Computer software bookshelf. I had posted proposals at the talk page with almost no response. It seems that the best choice is to just start making changes. It should not be "rude" because other users are free to make their own edits improving the bookshelf, and to revert bad changes.
However, your idea of adding things to the bookshelf gave me attention. Note that bookshelves, in general, only hold existing books (the top-level Wikibooks modules, see Wikibooks:Naming policy). So if you were planning to add many red links for proposed books, put red links at Wikibooks:Requested Wikibooks instead of a bookshelf. --Kernigh 06:31, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Where to report vandlism

because someone has vandalized the front page. DettoAltrimenti 15:06, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

well, no one's around, but users 207.253.115.170 and 68.215.139.117 have been vandalizing, don't really know where to report it and can't stop them- they just keep doing it.

Please use Wikibooks:Vandalism in progress. --Derbeth talk 17:03, 15 December 2005 (UTC)


[edit] Don't ask the school librarian

I noticed that sometimes instead of linking straight to the study help desk, it's a link to Wikibooks:Ask the school librarian- Does anyone else think all of the links to this page should be changed to a link straight to the study help desk, and this redirect deleted? DettoAltrimenti 04:38, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

The problem was that it was a double-redirect: Wikibooks:Ask the school librarian redirected to Study help desk which redirected to Wikibooks:Study help desk. I fixed it. I also bypassed some of the links around the redirect, but not in all places. --Kernigh 23:46, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Bureaucrats

Is there any active bureaucrats around here? Nobody has yet to reply me... -- WB 07:49, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

Looking through <>, apparently this user (signs as "WB") had posted to User talk:Aya and User talk:Dysprosia asking to be renamed to User:Watter Bottle. I recall that only bureaucrats can rename users. --Kernigh 22:27, 18 December 2005 (UTC)
That's me. And those two are named bureaucrats in the admin section.
I havn't seen any seriously delayed actions that require specific action by a bureaucrat so far. If there needs to be some action in that regard, it may be time to start the nomination process of a new bureaucrat... there are plenty of admins now that finding an admin who is doing a good job might be reasonable to "promote", so to say. Aya has been doing a pretty reasonable job, even if he hasn't been particularly active in the forums lately. --Rob Horning 02:43, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
I must say Wikibooks is not so active recently... -- WB 22:00, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
I'm also wondering if perhaps we need to have a formal page for name change requests? I don't know of any, and the usual forum so far is to simply ask a bureaucrat directly on their user talk page. This shouldn't be a huge issue, but it is something that with multiple bureaucrats could become harder to deal with, and we should have a central place to put stuff like that.

BTW, if you compare Wikibooks to Wikipedia, yeah, we are as dead as your mother's web page. But there are many things that show up in Special:Recentchanges that will indicate a very active community here... it just doesn't always show up in the usual places you would normally expect. --Rob Horning 04:26, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

Good idea. -- WB 19:35, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Qrai

The only two references to "Qrai" that I can find are the Qrai module at Wikibooks and http://www.geocities.com/qrai_dreamer/ at a free web host. It seems to me that one document is a derivative work of the other, which makes it either a copyright violation or an original work (candidate for speedy deletion). See my post at Talk:Qrai#Copyright violation where I explained my {{copyvio}} tag on the Qrai page.

Recently, anonymous users edited the Qrai page and removed my {{copyvio}} tag. One anonymous user (posting as an IP address but signing as "User:David", which is a user that never contributed to Wikibooks) posted to Talk:Qrai, claiming that these edits resolved the copyright-violation problem.

I would like someone other than me to examine the Qrai page and determine whether we have a GFDL license for the page and whether this page can remain at Wikibooks. --Kernigh 23:22, 18 December 2005 (UTC)

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