User talk:Daniel Mietchen

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Daniel Mietchen

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Possible bug?

Daniel, would you be able to take a look at this page here: [1]. I don't know if its my browser or not but the defintions don't appear to be sorting alphabetically. They are all grouped under '0'. Meg Ireland 02:10, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Except for three that lack the subpages template which adds the category (and probably also the 0 somehow, though I could not yet figure out how). And within the "0" subcategory, they do not follow the alphabet either, hmmm... Anyway, standardizing disambiguations is certainly something for the wishlist. --Daniel Mietchen 11:18, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

a new member

We have a new member (User:Karsten_Borgmann), who is apparently editor of a German wiki connected to Humboldt-University Berlin: http://www.docupedia.de/ I don't read German, but I'm wondering if it is a project we'd like to partner with in some capacity. Could you look the site over and see what it's about? Thanks much. --Joe Quick 20:04, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Will do. --Daniel Mietchen 20:25, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Why do my website's 4000 visitors per week include visitors only from the CZ forums and none from CZ wiki?

Daniel, I have had my own domain website for over 12 years now. It consistently gets about 4000 visitors a week, including about 150 per week from http://forum/citizendium.org ... but not a single one from http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/(any of the 100+ articles I've written) .

It makes me ask how many people actually read any of our articles? Is there any way to find that info? Milton Beychok 04:29, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

No idea. I just went there from your user page. Can you see that? --Daniel Mietchen 10:28, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I will be able to see that, but it will be next Sunday. My log report is a weekly one received each Sunday. Does CZ have any such log reports that tell us how many visitors we've had? Milton Beychok 15:41, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Please look at this forum thread

Daniel, this thread might be worth bringing to the attention of the charter drafting committee. See here Milton Beychok 02:13, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

CZ:Buglist examples

Hi Daniel. I noticed you changed the Image references in CZ:Buglist example1 and example2 to mediawiki links. The reason I presented them as http links is when a user uses cz-bugs (which is an email list), the mediawiki link syntax doesn't work. Since these are examples of how to report a bug or enhancement request using email, I think we should leave them as http links. However, I am open to arguments against this if you have some. Dan Nessett 21:28, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

OK, fixed. --Daniel Mietchen 21:47, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

German

Daniel, I translated a small piece by Clausius from German into English, could you please check it? See entropy (thermodynamics). As you know neither language is my mother language. --Paul Wormer 13:33, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

I put my version directly on the image page but think the article may merit a shorter version. --Daniel Mietchen 18:56, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes I had some doubts myself about the length of the inset. On the other hand, I have seen so many mistakes in the quotation and also because Clausius thought of the name Verwandlungsinhalt, that I thought it would be interesting to have it. Maybe just the translation is sufficient and a good compromise?--Paul Wormer 07:05, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

That would be a possibility but I am generally in favour of showing excerpts from original sources, and Verwandlungsinhalt is certainly instructive. So I pasted the whole translation in for the time being. Let's take another look at this after a while, or ask others, and decide then. --Daniel Mietchen 08:34, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

German

Daniel, do you agree with this translation: M. Planck, Über irreversible Strahlungsvorgänge [On irreversible radiation events], Annalen der Physik, vol. 1, pp. 69–122 (1900)? --Paul Wormer 13:50, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

I would go for "On irreversible radiation processes". --Daniel Mietchen 14:48, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

You may link to the original source. Peter Schmitt 17:02, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

I had a link to a scanned version in the Ann. d. Physik, but it was the wrong paper of Planck, so I changed it. Question: the two links give different spellings Über and Ueber, is there a historical difference?--Paul Wormer 17:09, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Both spellings were equally valid in his time, though now Über would prevail (at least as long as the umlaut is available to the typist). --Daniel Mietchen 00:04, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

In particular, "Ue" is sometimes used for the uppercase umlaut. In any case, I prefer using the spelling of the original source. Peter Schmitt 00:09, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Trials

I removed it for now. As to being back, I hope. Still very busy but I want to contribute here more. Chris Day 12:51, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

About Fahrenheit and Rankine temperatures

Daniel, I note that you revised Fahrenheit and Rankine temperatures so as to move the section about conversions and comparisons to a catalog subpage of the Temperature article. I certainly agree that those two sections make a good subpage for the Temperature article. However, they were really some of the core content of the Fahrenheit and Rankine temperatures article and I think they should also remain in that article. After all, there is no harm in having that content in both places, is there? Accordingly, I am going to reinstate a copy of that content in the Fahrenheit and Rankine temperatures article. I hope that you have no objection to having it in both places.

Also, in a brief scan of the Temperature article, I saw no place where readers are told that information about conversions was available in the catalog subpage ... and many newcomers to CZ probably will not think to look at the catalog subpage. Perhaps, you should add a sentence somewhere in the Temperature article pointing to the conversions in the catalog subpage ... or perhaps it would even better to change the subpage from "Catalog" to "Temperature conversions". What do you think? Milton Beychok 22:14, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

I was hoping for feedback on this, since I think it is core content but currently not very consistently organized. So thanks for being so quick! My preference would be to have a separate article for each unit (i.e. also separate F & R), to have the conversions all in one place, possibly even a separate article (I set up several redirects). A subpage ""Temperature conversion", i.e. with a non-standard name would not be allowed by current rules and also cause the subpages template to choke. Of course, there should then be links to it from everywhere relevant (I started with that for several of the articles but was not done yet when I saw your comment). --Daniel Mietchen 22:23, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

I have split the Fahrenheit and Rankine temperatures article and moved the Catalog page to Temperature conversion. --Daniel Mietchen 23:51, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

redirects

Daniel, it is not necessary to redirect uppercase/lowercase versions: Go and Search find both. (And in links, the "correct" link is preferable.) Peter Schmitt 16:50, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Partial correction: As it seems, this is true only for titles with at most 3 words. Curiosu. Peter Schmitt 17:20, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for checking. --Daniel Mietchen 21:16, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Element subpages

Iron 55.845(2)   Fe 26 [ ? ] [[Iron/Periodic table of elements]]:

Calcium 40.078(4)   Ca 20 [ ? ] Alkaline Earth Metal:

On a related note to the bot deleting all the elemental subpages we have to recall that the Template:Elem_Infobox uses that information. We can easily reconfigure this template and possibly transfer the information to another location (may be to the metadata) where it can be called on by templates such as this. Looking at the calcium one you can see how much information is being drawn from the elemental subpages. Chris Day 21:05, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

I like the template but it suffers from not being used much, basically because most element articles remain yet to be written.My preferred location for this kind of information would be a Data namespace, e.g. Data:Calcium/Atomic number. --Daniel Mietchen 21:16, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

I can definitely see the advantage of a data namespace. This would be very useful for geography too. There is no reason why everything has to be on a different page though. We could easily set up a switch, similar to the format used with the metadata, and have everything related to calcium in one place. Or everything related to the UK in one place. Chris Day 21:30, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Yes, a single page with switches would be a good alternative, another one being properties and types in Semantic MediaWiki, if we were going to install that. --Daniel Mietchen 21:37, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

I had not heard of properties or types. Maybe I am dense but after reading that article I am still unsure as to how such information can be called on by other articles? For example, if The Berlin article tags it as the Capital of Germany, i.e. [[capital of::Germany]], how would we be able to use this information in another article? For example, could we write something along the lines of:

[[Get::(capital of::Germany)]] has a population of [[Get::([[Get::(capital of::Germany)]] population) ]].

Obviously the mark up used here is hypothetical. Chris Day 21:59, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Not exactly sure about your Get functionality but [[Has capital::Berlin]], if placed in the Germany article, would create the semantic association "Germany" "Has capital" "Berlin", and a page Property:Capital could then automatically be populated (similar to categories), such that it lists Berlin as the capital of Germany, along with all other capitals of country articles that have been semantically tagged this way. --Daniel Mietchen 22:22, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

(unindent) These subpages have previously been discussed with Milton: here and here, and in this forum thread. Peter Schmitt 22:35, 12 December 2009 (UTC)

Hi Daniel,

A dialog you say?:-) Could you help me out with a link? I didn't see anything here: http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Talk:Lithium here: http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/CZ_Talk:Chemistry_Workgroup or here: http://forum.citizendium.org/index.php/board,32.0.html. Where should I look?...--David Yamakuchi 00:19, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Whoops! now I see it!--David Yamakuchi 00:23, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, I think I recall where this "discussion" left off:

It seems to me I was in on _this_ one last here: http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/User_talk:David_Yamakuchi#Periodic_tables

And then again here: http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/User_talk:David_Yamakuchi#.22Ethyl.22_Anecdotes

So, let me see if I can sum up for you...succinctly...The reason the Isotopes template was left "broken" on the Lithium/Isotopes page was that it was the only known example of what seemed to be a bug in the template rendering logic on CZ. The "test" _breaks_ when you substitute the template into the page as Caesar did. I wasn't actually continuing that work, just re-creating the only references to the debugging example...as I thought was clear here: http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Talk:Lithium.

BTW, it looks like we have had a similar erroneous deleting incident in the Plutonium subpages as well. Isn't it's a sad state of affairs when we need to spend our time removing the Plutonium rather than adding to the Platinum :-) Eh?--David Yamakuchi 02:11, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

Hi Daniel,

Just thought I'd post this:

http://forum.citizendium.org/index.php/topic,3054.0.html

here for you in case you were willing to relocate our discussion over there...--David Yamakuchi 01:47, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Request

Hello, Daniel. Could you edit my user page again, please. I don't know how to turn the pink bits blue & get the little boxes that you made before. Cheers - Ro Thorpe 01:57, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Done. No boxes for subsubpages like Catalogs, no blue without metadata. --Daniel Mietchen 09:10, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Right, thanks - Ro Thorpe 12:42, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

...And many thanks now also for the English spellings AOW nomination. Ro Thorpe 21:17, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

AO(T)W needs more activity. I simply took it over for the time being because nobody else seemed to care. English spellings, by the way, is featured prominently in our contribution to OKCon 2010. Feedback appreciated, since the presentation has yet to be worked out. --Daniel Mietchen 21:23, 10 April 2010 (UTC)

translation

Daniel what do you think of my translation:

Ersetzung der Hypothese vom unmechanischen Zwang durch eine Forderung bezüglich des inneren Verhaltens jedes einzelnen Elektrons [Replacement of the hypothesis of non-mechanical constraint by a requirement regarding the internal behavior of every single electron] ? --Paul Wormer 15:36, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Dit past goed, maar force in plaats van constraint zou nog beter zijn. --Daniel Mietchen 16:17, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

potential Dutch member

Hi, Daniel,

Sorry about confusing the NL and Belgium -- I was drinking my morning coffee! Now there's a prof at a NL university named Paul de Laat who has emailed saying that his *two* applications have never been attended to. As far as *I* can tell, we never received an application. Do you know anything about him? Thanks! Hayford Peirce 16:18, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

No, but I see the problem is already solved. --Daniel Mietchen 22:49, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Aha! So it was Daniel...

... who should get the hug and kiss for archiving the WaT page! Thanks!! Aleta Curry 21:49, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not eligible for the thanks this time, but I guess Peter is. --Daniel Mietchen 22:49, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

CZ:Bot status

Daniel, I saw that you weren't happy with that table either, so I was trying some stuff. However, I'm stuck trying to get the text to align left on the template Template:BotReq2. What am I missing? I'm still not totally finished and would appreciate any changes you feel are improvements! D. Matt Innis 18:52, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

I took another look but the changes I have in mind would take too much time right now. Will have another look later. --Daniel Mietchen 21:12, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

No problem, I'll keep playing, too. I enjoy the tediousness of it all :) D. Matt Innis 21:39, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Feedback page

Daniel, I do not want to interfere with the drafting committee. But this will not work:

"Please do not change the phrasing of the Charter text herein — if something has been changed in the draft itself, please strike out the phrasing here and add the new one below."

because a change may change acceptance or disproval. When a change is made, comments have to be removed, too, I think. --Peter Schmitt 22:00, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Right. Changed. Thanks! --Daniel Mietchen 22:05, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Friedrich-Wilhelm(s) Universität

Daniel, I see sometimes Friedrich-Wilhelm and sometimes Friedrich-Wilhelms (see [2]) for the name of the Berlin University before the war (now Humboldt). (I don't mean the university in Bonn). Is this a genitive and is the "s" arbitrary, or is this a mistake?--Paul Wormer 09:31, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

It is "Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität" (from 1828)-- see the official site: HU-Berlin. Therefore it is the genitive. --Peter Schmitt 10:30, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Peter. --Daniel Mietchen 21:17, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

bots

Daniel, we need to put the link to the Feedback page in the edit summary of all bot edits. D. Matt Innis 20:34, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Good idea. Will often require some shorthands which redirect there, though — edit summaries have a character limit. --Daniel Mietchen 21:16, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Ping

Not sure how closely you're watching my talk page, just wanted to alert you that I replied over there. -Pete Forsyth 00:02, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks but it's on my watchlist. --Daniel Mietchen 11:51, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Web archive

Daniel, I saw that the external link subpage contains the advise to use "web archive". I tried that and see that an e-mail address is requested. Do I use my own or Citizendium's? --Paul Wormer 14:30, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Your own - it won't be displayed. They just use it to send you the link once they're done processing the info you submitted. --Daniel Mietchen 14:45, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks

Hi Daniel. Thanks for sorting out the Liverpool move. I think I understand where I went wrong. All the best. --John Leach 14:08, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

You're welcome. --Daniel Mietchen 20:53, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Would like to have your comments

After discussion on the Talk page of Water, I entered the Freezing point of water as "Not measurable" in response to the comments made by you and Paul Wormer. David Yamakuchi's subpage transclusion has now revised it to " 0 °C* " ... which has me at a loss. Please visit the Water Talk page and offer your comments. I really don't know what to do about this. Milton Beychok 05:54, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure why but Peter changed it back to 0˚C. I just reverted it back to the last version that mentioned it is not measureable. Chris Day 06:01, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

No time right now, but this paper may be worth a look for details. Will get back later. --Daniel Mietchen 07:00, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

I do not know how this happened. I thought I only corrected some typos. (Template influence?) --Peter Schmitt 12:33, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Is it possible the window had remained open in your browser from an earlier time? Another problem we had in the past was that the two server clocks were not synchronised, but in that cases it was only a few minutes difference. 13:11, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

A few minutes? This is the diff betweeb 5:59 (David) and 12:50 (me), but this is in between at 06:13. This could not be an edit conflict. (At 6 I was asleep, and the computer turned off.) --Peter Schmitt 15:12, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

That's what i mean by only a few minutes difference, it did not seem likely in your case. And if your computer was off, that rules out the other possibility. Very strange. Chris Day 15:36, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

The only rational explanation is that I did not edit the most recent version but that before it. I don't remember it, but I must have arrived there from the page history. (Perhaps being confused and taking the (then) current page as the talk page -- with signed comments???) --Peter Schmitt 15:58, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

That makes a lot of sense. The signed comments confused me and are inappropriate. Chris Day 16:02, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Spellings

Belated thanks for sorting out the colour - Ro Thorpe 18:14, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

Supercooled water

Daniel, re the issue of the freezing point of water, I thought a section in Water on supercooled water would be cool. Milton suggested I approach you about starting one if interested and time permits. Anthony.Sebastian 04:49, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

I am actually working on a more intricate integration of research publications with encyclopedic content, and the paper I chose to demonstrate the feasibility of this happens to be about cold hardiness, to which supercooling is essential. So more on that them is bound to come in (depends also a bit on the future CZ policy with respect to original research), but it will take time, since my current research focus is on brain morphometry and related stuff — far off any supercooled water. --Daniel Mietchen 11:57, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

About Bar and Bar (disambiguation)

Daniel, don't you think that the Bar article now needs to be moved/renamed to Bar(location) or perhaps better yet Bar (establishment) ? Milton Beychok 22:21, 19 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, and thanks to Chris for fixing it. --Daniel Mietchen 10:26, 20 February 2010 (UTC)

New User

Thank you for your welcome. If I can help you with anything German, please ask (nothing too scientific, as I haven't got a clue there, I'm afraid.Ralf Heinritz 16:31, 28 February 2010 (UTC). Danke für Ihre Antwort. Ich werde sicher nichts von WP eins zu eins hierher kopieren, warum auch. Probleme bei WP sind meiner Meinung nach: zuviele triviale Artikel über Blödsinn; der Tonfall vieler Mitarbeiter (mit Ausnahmen natürlich); in der de WP der übertriebene Neostalinismus; admins, die Regeln ad-hominem anwenden. Viele Artikel sind wirklich schlecht, es gibt aber auch wirklich sehr gute, die mir aber oft viel zu lang sind (während z. B. Encycl. Britannica Artikel oft viel zu kurz sind). Ohne größenwahnsinnig zu sein, stelle ich mir ideale Artikel etwa doppelt so lang wie die üblichen Britannica stubs vor. Na ja, mal sehen (Ich werde versuchen, Dich/Sie in Ruhe arbeiten zu lassen und mich einzuarbeiten - Sie können das hier natürlich gerne löschen, ich wollte es aber gesagt haben). Ich denke, ich fange hier mit Lévi-Strauss an und versuche dann vielleicht über Franz Boas zu schreiben.Ralf Heinritz 09:56, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Friedrich-Wilhelm(s) Universität again

Daniel, I'm reading a biography of Fritz Haber (and will write about him). The biographer states that Haber got his PhD at the Friedrich Wilhelm University, i.e., the biographer does not use the genitive (no ending s) for the name. Should one not use a quote in English: Friedrich Wilhelm's University as the proper translation of Friedrich Wilhelms Universität? And how about the hyphen? --Paul Wormer 18:30, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

In which language are you reading it? Anyway, I think there are too few rules to make this case a clear one. For instance, one might also go for the English variant of the king's name, ending up with Frederick William University, and University of Berlin was also commonly used in that period. I would go for Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität, with redirects from all reasonable corners. --Daniel Mietchen 19:54, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

The book is an English translation of a book in German. I will mention the German name once and then use Berlin University.--Paul Wormer 06:05, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Sounds fine. --Daniel Mietchen 07:08, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

It seems to have been: Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität, but will keep checking. Thank you, my old Meyer has Friedrich- Wilhelms Universität, so Berlin University really is the best solution. Ralf Heinritz 10:03, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for checking, and yes, butting in is encouraged here, not just on onomastics. --Daniel Mietchen 10:06, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Your write-a-thon suggestion

When you suggest "Context" for this week's write-a-thon, do you mean finding "red links" in Related Articles pages and creating new articles for them, or am I misunderstanding the context of "context"? Bruce M. Tindall 16:40, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

My understanding of it is to create or improve Related Articles subpages to topics for which some content already exists (and be this a stub or a definition), which may well include some colour changes from red to blue. --Daniel Mietchen 16:48, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

Please excuse me putting words into your mouth. Please edit or remove as necessary. Chris Day 17:15, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

I am fortunate enough not to have to type with my mouth, but I think that fits well otherwise. --Daniel Mietchen 18:56, 2 March 2010 (UTC)

quote templates

Daniel I was looking at {{Quote}} and {{Cquote}}. They are both a disaster. They bring over a ton of baggage from wikipedia. The code is swollen due to their inability to compromise and it seems to have features that are never used as well as features that cannot be used. I'm wondering whether we should just recommend to go with <blockquote> for most occassion? Or, at least rewrite those templates to serve our needs before they proliferate here too much. Specifically it is silly to have a third parameter that is not used. It is also silly having the author and source as 4th and 5th parameter (should be 2nd and 3rd to be more intuitive). A second opinion would be good here, thanks. Chris Day 11:04, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

I agree with your assessment. On a different note, I thought of ways to get templates more organized, perhaps by using {{r}} (or some variant thereof, with definitions and Related Templates) may be a valid option (indeed, I am also considering this for other kinds of content, e.g. all the policy pages in CZ namespace), e.g.

Template:r [r]: Add brief definition or description

Welcome to Citizendium [r]: Add brief definition or description

CZ:Templates [r]: Add brief definition or description

What do you think?

--Daniel Mietchen 15:07, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

That idea might work quite well. No harm in trying it out. As to the quotes, I seem to recall a thread that discussed the style of quotes quite extensively. I'll re-read that and then try and summarise where I think we ought to be in a new thread on the messageboard. Chris Day 15:19, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

SERP vs Search engine results page

Daniel you want to switch it so the main article is "Search engine results page" (where the text goes) and SERP is the redirect? Just pointing out that the "hot" keyword is SERP not the four term version, but ultimately I don't know if it matters much. The whole idea as you know is to write articles with titles according to your "list of keywords driving traffic" (which are also highly read on WP) and SERP is one of them. I'm waiting to see if there's any bump in traffic here.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 13:16, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I think SERP should redirect to Search engine results page because full titles is the way pages are named here in general — it is sensible to keep an eye on SEO but we shouldn't let this dominate the way we structure content. TO see the uptake will probably take a few weeks (CZ is not yet spidered very often). --Daniel Mietchen 15:07, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Okay, thanks, I didn't know, I'll strive for full names from now on.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 23:38, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Also, btw, by working on articles about SEO and link farms, and combining this info with my Wikipedia stuff, I'm getting some new ideas about how to possibly boost readership to CZ. (I've been using your list to target articles as you know, and bring them in, like Acai berry, SEO, etc.)--Thomas Wright Sulcer 23:38, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

One thing I tried was googling my name and your name. (I used quotes like "Tom Sulcer" and "Daniel Mietchen".) We both have somewhat unique names. What I noticed was that your CZ page comes up on the first Google SERP before mine. Why? I think it's because your name on the web has more links (plus you've been on CZ longer than me) to other websites. Plus I saw your "Google profile". I copied your example and did a Google profile, which is great because it lets people LINK to pages like the Citizendium user page. Long story short: what may help Citizendium boost readership is not only more internal links (and targeting "hot" articles that drive traffic like you listed), but, as much as possible, having well-trafficked sites (Google, Amazon, Wikipedia, Yahoo) link to as many Citizendium pages as possible, including user pages, article pages, etc. The more, the better. So, a tentative policy suggestion which I'm thinking about is: suggesting CZ contributors get a free "Google profile" page in which they list Citizendium as one of their links.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 23:38, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Wondering what you think? Plus I'm working on an article about DVDs (do you want me to name the article "Digital versatile disc"?--Thomas Wright Sulcer 23:38, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

1) I didn't find your CZ user page on Google and yes, robots.txt indeed prohibits it from being indexed. Interestingly, the policy of demanding everyone on the forums to link to their user page creates links to the user pages that search engines are allowed to index, since they are free to spider the forum. Not a coherent strategy in my view, and I said so in this forum discussion.

2) My user page appears because I have linked to it from several places.

3) Higher numbers of relevant links to CZ certainly help its page rank scores but I do not think we should make any attempt towards coordinated creation of Google profiles to link to CZ. It would be way better to legitimately link from blog posts to CZ pages providing background (I do this regularly on my blog). But I do not think many here do blog.

4) As far as I know, there is no officially recognized expansion of the three-letter name DVD, and WP just pointed me to a link that supports this vague memory with loads of details it never had.

--Daniel Mietchen 23:57, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Daniel. I read this after loading the DVD article, and I'll switch it around so the DVD is the main article. Plus, the Usenet forum had better info than WP, and I'll try to include that. Thanks for updating me about the robots.txt issues; I agree with your ideas about fixing them, let me know how I can support you. And if I blog, I'll put links back to CZ, good idea. I don't mind if the public sees my CZ userpage.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 04:11, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Did the change I made to test wiki work?

Daniel. Two days ago you reported a problem with bot access to the test wiki. I made a change about 1 hour later and asked if it fixed the problem, but you have not replied. Did it? (see http://reid.citizendium.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=39) Dan Nessett 22:32, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the reminder, Dan — I hadn't noticed your reply and not tried again since I filed the bug. Just did a test edit, and it works for the one test I did. Thanks! I will now do bot testing mainly on the test wiki. And while we are at it, may I also ask about the current state of bug no. 30? As I see it, no problems surfaced on the test wiki with the setting of n=20000, and that is vastly better than the current n=100 at the live wiki. --Daniel Mietchen 23:06, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Let me know what your testing of the error "TypeError: unsupported operand type(s) for +: 'dict' and 'list'" turns up. This doesn't appear to be an API permissions problem, but perhaps I haven't correctly analyzed the issue. I asked Greg if he made the change on the live wiki for the random page criteria and asked him to do so if not. I'll let you know of any update on this that I receive. Dan Nessett 00:23, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

OK, thanks. --Daniel Mietchen 00:30, 4 March 2010 (UTC)

Greg has changed the article random length criterion to 20,000 on the live wiki. Dan Nessett 19:32, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Cool, thanks! --Daniel Mietchen 19:59, 6 March 2010 (UTC)

Delete Talk

Daniel, I think that it is neither necessary nor useful to add this to the new Category. The template is used on pages whose talk page is to be deleted, and its purpose is to catch the link from the speedydelete list which leads to the page instead of the talk page. Adding this to the list would only cause a second entry, this time for the page itself and thus only confuse the situation. (If the page is also to be deleted then a second entry will appear). --Peter Schmitt 22:06, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for keeping an eye on these matters! Some of the DeleteTalk requests have been sitting around for quite some time, so there may be some value in having one central place that Constables are expected to check on a regular basis, and I think Category:Call for Constables is the most suitable of the currently three relevant categories. Anyway, we are still in the testing phase with this new arrangement, and if it does indeed lead to confusion, then there are a number of options to react, including reverting the changes I just made. --Daniel Mietchen 22:20, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Ask Hayford! The template was created to help him. I would do whatever he prefers. --Peter Schmitt 22:27, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Added: A separate Category page for "Delete talk" templates could be useful to check for templates that have been forgotten to remove. --Peter Schmitt 22:42, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

He would prefer whatever is simplest! I don't really understand this green template that asks me to first go somewhere else and delete a talk page, then use the reverse arrow (not explained to me, I figured it out) to go back to the green box, then hit Edit and remove a line of text, then hit Save, then go somewhere else and do something. What a kludge! Have either of you heard of Rube Goldberg and Heath Robinson? One was 'Merkin, the other Brit, and both exactly the same. The two of them must have collaborated on this weird apparatus. I tell you frankly: if there were other functioning Constables here to do some of this stuff, I would simply refuse to spend my time trying to figure all of this stuff out. If it gets any more complicated, I'll just bug out.... Hayford Peirce 22:47, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, Hayford. I don't have a better idea how to solve the problem that the main page is listed instead of the talk page. A good solution needs serious changes in how CZ is organized, and this will need a lot of work ... and a working EC.

What is simpler? I do not know what is simpler for you. Whatever you say.

You need not go back to remove the template. You also can remove the line with the template first and then go to the talk page to delete it. The order does not matter. --Peter Schmitt 23:08, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

I keep saying over and over, and apparently no one believes me, I will NOT remove a page unless there is an actual Speedy Delete Template on it. If there are three layers of pages within a single cluster to delete, then I want to see a Template on each and every one of them. I got tired of deleting pages and then being told that I wasn't supposed to delete *that* one. No more. Please. I'm not a computer guru or a rocket scientist, I just want to understand what I'm doing. Hayford Peirce 23:29, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

As far as I know, labeling each page individually is what everyone does, the only problem being that talk pages are not displayed separately in the deletion category. Specifically to address this problem, the DeleteTalk template was created. For further discussion, please use the forum. --Daniel Mietchen 23:35, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Nobody wants you to delete a page without template. We are just discussing how to make it as simple for you as possible. The reason: Daniel made a slight change, as you know, and we discuss if this change is an improvement. --Peter Schmitt 23:40, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Religion and pseudoscience

I saw you revert my deletion at Creationism. I wonder if we are talking about the same thing?

If a religion, such as Hinduism, says that God has blue skin and loves cows, shall we call this idea "pseudoscience"? How about if a movie reviewer says that Avatar has an interesting plot?

In general, where do we draw the line between calling something pseudoscience and simply recognizing that it's completely unrelated to science? --Ed Poor 01:49, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Pseudoscience, to me, is when scientific evidence (be it theoretical or experimental) is challenged on non-scientific grounds. This seems to be the case with creationism, which challenges radiometric measurements of the age of the Earth with guesstimates derived from ancient scripts.

The generalization to all religious statements, or to all of theology, is yours — as long as there is no scientific evidence for the existence of God, it is probably fair to say that the scientific community will gladly leave the debate on whether God has a skin, and of what colour, to the religious community.

--Daniel Mietchen 19:55, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for the clarification. --Ed Poor 23:57, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Idea for experiment

I'm wondering about whether the "subpages system" (related articles, definitions, bibliography on separate pages as you know) hurts CZ's web presence. But I'm wondering if there's a way to test this somehow. Like, if we use current articles there would be too much history and other random variables in there (length of time, last Google crawl, etc). But suppose we create two entirely fictitious articles -- like with nonsense names -- with the exact same number of letters; and say on the page that it's just a test (in case anybody else sees it). And we google the made-up article title names to make sure they're indeed obscure. Next, with one article we create a thicket based on subpages. With the second article, we create a thicket of feeder articles (perhaps with just a number after the title name; so if the article title is Xrjslfffs, then the feeder articles may be Xrjslfffs1 Xrjslfffs2 Xrjslfffs3 etc. We'd try as best we could to make both thickets equal, by creating at the same time. Then after a month, we do a PageRank analysis and see which one had a higher score. Wondering what you think? I'm curious as to what would result. If you think it's a good experiment do I have to get permission from anybody first b4 doing it? Or put some kind of message on the articles so they don't get fussed with (and no redirects or wikilinks to them allowed etc). --Thomas Wright Sulcer 12:14, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

I do not think a Xrjslfffs series would be tolerated in the main namespace, and the experiment wouldn't make sense elsewhere. So you have to rethink if you wish to go that way. Good candidates, in my eyes, would be drugs or other things that come in different name variants. Definitely needs more thought before you start. --Daniel Mietchen 12:47, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

I have started Jelly bear research and Jelly-bear research on April 1 and set myself the date of May 5 to review the matter. So I suggest you do your experiment on them or related articles (Gummi bear and Gummy bear would be a suitable pair too, and certainly a legitimate topic) if you are still inclined to do so, and I am available for further comment. --Daniel Mietchen 02:54, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Great idea. I have no idea how the hyphen character (-) influences google crawlers, or whether they ignore it, so I'm wondering whether differences between Jelly bear research versus Jelly-bear research would be a result of the hyphen or would some crawls thinking they're identical (?). Or would it be better to compare: Jelly bear research versus Gummi bear research or are the terms too different? Wondering what your thinking is about this.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 12:06, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Finding out about how the crawlers handle hyphens and composites is part of the preparation of the experiment. "Waste water treatment", "Waste-water treatment" and "Wastewater treatment" give an idea. Probably nothing wrong with including Gummi bear research or similar synonyms (the "research" part may easily be dropped if it's too difficult to write about, but "gummy+bear" there are some scholarly references, and I am trying to track down another one. --Daniel Mietchen 19:31, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm wondering if the whole hyphen issue can be avoided, because it might be one more variable which influences the results; and rather than exploring how it affects crawlers, maybe it can be avoided entirely? (Or will it affect results anyway somehow?) But a bigger question I have is regarding articles wikilinking to the main articles -- for example, if Gummi bear research is the main article, and I need to come up with, say, 20 articles pointing to it, then what names can I give them -- Gummi bear research in India, Gummi bear research in the United States, Gummi bear research in Austria etc with 17 more countries? Or will this skew the results. The idea is to have a matching second thicket that only is different in that the wikilinks happen on the "related articles" pages, not on the front page (or main article page like Wikipedia does). So the second thicket would be exactly the same, but instead of Gummi bear research, it would be Jelly bear research (main article) plus 20 "thicket" articles. They'd be launched roughly the same day (so time-of-launch wouldn't be a distorting factor hopefully). And then waiting a month and checking PageRank. Would this work? And would it be conclusive and persuasive?--Thomas Wright Sulcer 20:20, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

The need to have something pointing to the test articles was what caused me to suggest that the jelly bear level may be more suited - shouldn't be too hard to find 20 useful topics to point there. One such pair certainly wouldn't be conclusive, but once we have one in place, it shouldn't be too hard to come up with others, and after about ten or 20 or so, a pattern will emerge. This is another reason why the topics should all be legitimate. --Daniel Mietchen 19:09, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

If you can specify a test approach which will establish whether subpages confuse the crawlers, then let's do it. I don't think it has to be "conclusive" but rather "suggestive", but that as much as possible, we remove any extraneous variables, and focus the experiment on the effect of the subpage system on the PageRank of CZ articles. My continuing concern is that the requirement "all test articles must be legitimate" will distort the experiment. For example, I don't know whether "Jelly bear research" ranks higher than "Gummi bear research", or whether there might be some kind of interaction between 10 or 20 feeder articles (which also have to be "legitimate") and either of these two topics. I'm concerned that differing legitimate topic titles on the 20 may have some other impact, or introduce other noise into the experiment. My sense is few, if any, people read Citizendium, and an obscure test topic (which is labeled as a "test" in case anybody bumps into it) won't hurt CZ's reputation, since even fewer people, if any, will bump into the test articles compared to "real" CZ articles, and if they do wander on to a test page, there will be a notice on the page that it's only a test. Further, the test articles would be removed in a month or so anyway after the experiment.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 13:17, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

How about this as an experiment: two main articles for comparison would be these: Jelly bear research test1 and Jelly bear research test2. For each main article, there would be 20 feeder articles which point to the main one. The 20 feeder articles would be something like this: Jelly bear research testONEa, Jelly bear research testONEb ... (18 more). On each of these test articles there would be a wikilink on the main article page pointing to the article Jelly bear research test1. And these 20 feeder articles would have NO subpages, no definition pages, no metadata page. The second set's feeder articles would be: Jelly bear research testTWOa Jelly bear research testTWOb etc (18 more). And these 20 articles would have subpages with the "related articles" page having a wikilink to the main article Jelly bear research test2. But there would be no wikilinks on the main article-space parts of the two articles pointing to the article Jelly bear research test2. The idea would be to compare two different approaches to inter-linking between articles -- direct wikilinks on the article-space (the Wikipedia way) with indirect wikilinks using the "R" template on subpages (the Citizendium way), and to try to remove any extraneous variables. Additional precautions include: monitoring all 42 articles for the "what links here" page -- to make sure that CZ contributors don't put links on other articles to any of the test pages, including the main ones as well as the feeder ones, and to encourage people (via the forums) not to talk about the test but rather ignore it.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 13:17, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

And I'm wondering whether 20 feeder articles would be sufficient. It may take 50 or perhaps 100 articles to magnify any differences, but I realize this will take work (and add to deleting fuss after the experiment is over). What is your thinking about this? If you feel the requirement that "all articles must be legitimate" is too important, then I'm wondering what alternative experiment you might suggest that would still give us good results; it's hard for me to imagine what the 20 other article topics would be that wouldn't introduce more noise into the experiment.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 13:17, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

As long as all these test articles are legitimate, I see the experiment covered by CZ:Being Bold. If any of them is not, any Citizen can label it for deletion, which Constables will do. If you are uncomfortable with jelly bear research (which still smells of its April 1 origin), then we can think of another thicket. British and American English#Vocabulary gives a list of other possibilities, and anything that can be written with or without hyphen would qualify as well. Many chemical substances (especially drugs) have multiple names, and so do biological species. The choice is your's — jelly bear research was just one suggestion, and certainly not the best possible one. --Daniel Mietchen 20:05, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

(outdent) Thanks for your thinking. I may keep thinking about this, but at the time I think I'll put it on the back burner, and work on other stuff. If the editorial committee begins to function and there is an urge to explore the issue of whether the subpage system confuses the crawlers, I'll be glad to help. Right now I'm working on articles related to Aeneid and seeing whether I can get web exposure.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 21:07, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Sure, do whatever fits your interests better. But please keep in mind that using CZ:Subpages is the current standard. Also, please remember filling in the credit line for images you upload. --Daniel Mietchen 23:13, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

OK, thanks. I tried out the CZ:Start Article thing, but then I realized this makes the task of doing the metadata & related pages to others. So, I guess what I'll do is create the article and metadata page with the categories, and begin the talk page. When I get into the routine, it goes quickly. But the other pages I may or may not do depending on how much time I have. About the "credit line of the images" -- I have no idea how to do this. I thought I was filling in all the required fields. Are you talking about when I upload the image? Or, is it immediately after the image is uploaded, there's another step? Sorry if I've been doing it incorrectly.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 01:15, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, if you follow CZ:Start Article, you can leave the metadata setup to others, and they will be able to find these pages. If you are comfortable with setting the metadata up, please do. The credit line can be filled in by clicking on the "Please click here to add the credit line" link on the page of any image for which it has not been filled in yet. --Daniel Mietchen 01:35, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

large delete

Hi Daniel, you made a pretty big delete here. Don't forget to discuss it on the talk page. Thanks, D. Matt Innis 12:02, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm fine with the changes. I thought it might help the article Panton Principles get more Google Juice but the higher principle is excellence in content.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 12:08, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

You were both faster than I could rework that passage, and I have commented, as usual, on the talk page. Google juice, by the way, is a common term that might well deserve its own page here. --Daniel Mietchen 12:19, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Wrote Google Juice will put in redirects soon.--Thomas Wright Sulcer 12:25, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

Ah, sorry for jumping in too quick! The end result looks good, thanks. D. Matt Innis 23:56, 8 April 2010 (UTC)