Wiktionary:Simple talk/Archive 20

From Wiktionary

Created entries by Raninghai[change]

Not too long ago, a user named Aaqib was indefinitely blocked by the community at the Simple English Wikipedia for refusing advise given to him by other, more experienced editors, and being rude in his responses to said advice. Basically, we didn't think he was competent enough to edit SEWP. As many have noticed, Aaqib is now creating entries here at the Single English Wiktionary, and doing almost the same thing he's been doing at SEWP, this time operating as Raninghai (formerly Aaqib Azeez).

Although Raninghai hasn't been as rude here as he was at SEWP, the low quality of his creations is the same, if not worse. This has made me, along with a couple of other contributors, question his competence. Take a look for yourself. Some of his contributions in the past few days include:

  1. Treating all definitions as if they are sentences (He was told twice about this.)
  2. Creating attack pages (I warned him about this, and the attack sentence in question is still visible, for those of you who can't view the deleted page.)
  3. Creating entries that aren't useful to almost anybody learning the English language, including the attack page in question, but mainly Islamic names like his own (Barras advised him against doing this, but he just created more.)
  4. Finally, and most recently, entries that are incorrect altogether

It has become too much of a chore for me to patrol Raninghai's edits every day, and I'm sure other contributors can attest. Therefore, I have come to the conclusion that Raninghai is too incompetent to edit this wiki, and at least one other editor agrees. Despite all this, I'm not sure what type of action should be taken at this time, though I believe something needs to be done. Thoughts? TCN7JM 19:01, 15 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

But they are names! But come on, I'm a new user here. --Take a trip with Rani Rani 19:04, 15 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I am leaving, looks like this wiki does not appreciate me. You can message me if of what the results are. --Take a trip with Rani Rani 19:05, 15 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
(←Outdent) Thank you TCN7JM for raising this topic and putting the interests of this wiki first. Here are some of my points relating to this:
  • Most of the entries created do provide useful information with regards to the word itself, which can be quite rare for new editors. Other than the occasional editing issues, the entries, in my opinion, meet at least the minimum standard for inclusion. Of course, such entries can have bigger improvements, especially regarding the example sentences providing more information about the word itself.
  • He has not really been rude at all I would agree. I am not so sure about what exactly is happening over on SEWP (and I am not going to find out, due to the weird policies over there), but at least his user conduct does so some form of respect for other editors.
  • However, his scope of entry creations can pose some concerns. Some of his creations include Islamic names, which does not really appeal towards teaching non-English speakers, usually due to the fact that there is a difference in cultural background
  • Some entries are extremely short and pose little or no significant use to helping non-English speakers learn English. Take marshmallow for example, defining it as "Sweet, fluffy food" makes little sense to someone who does not know anything about it. More description can thus be made by providing more details about it being white and other related adjectives.
  • Incorrect entries is also a factor that shows this editor's inability to create accurate entries. While his work is commendable, we tend to avoid creating entries before we have even properly checked the accuracy of the definition. The lack of checking beforehand thus sustains the argument that this editor may be providing misleading information to our users and eventually hindering their progress of learning the English Language.
I would take this opportunity to thank Raninghai for all the contributions that he has made so far, but I would suggest that he:
  1. Takes into account all the comments about the entries he is creating and improve them for future ones
  2. Reduce entry creation per-day to 10 entries or less so that the community would have enough time to review the created pages and provide constructive feedback if necessary.
Thoughts and comments about this too? He is a great editor, just that a few changes need to be made to his entries so that it is more acceptable. (and I apologize for the long post) --Hydriz (talk) 11:41, 16 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Disclaimer: "Sweet, fluffy food" was actually my own shortening of his definition that originally said it was a dairy product, which it's not. I didn't know what else to add, but that's beside the point. I'll fix it in a bit. TCN7JM 16:19, 16 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I would definitely support reducing the amount of entries Raninghai can create to 10 entries. This seems like a reasonable restriction until the user can learn how to contribute better to the wiki. (Oh, and Hydriz, if you're interested, the community ban discussion at SEWP is here. He's definitely been acting more polite since this (retirement template on his userpage aside)). TCN7JM 16:19, 16 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I only read the original comment, the rest is a little TL;DR. Here is a point-by-point reply:

  1. Actually, we use full sentences here in definitions. This is the correct format per Wiktionary:Entry_layout_explained#The_basic_parts_of_an_entry.
  2. This is a problem, perhaps. We should strive to define things, not do that...
  3. Not really a problem, but not very useful pages to people learning English. You can take them to RfD if you want.
  4. Agree.

πr2 (talk • changes) 16:31, 16 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. This does seem a little BITEy. Maybe he has been blocked/banned on other projects, but he's new here. πr2 (talk • changes) 16:35, 16 July 2013 (UTC) (self-strike, unconstructive comment)[reply]
And still adding incomprehensible edits to pages. --Peterdownunder (talk) 02:50, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal - Implement a limit of 10 entries created per-day[change]

Looking at the recent entries he created, such as dodo, it does show some form of improvement. I guess he is starting to work on point number one I wrote above, though I believe it would be best that we add a restriction of 10 entries per-day (excluding plural forms created with Accelerated). This is in fact a limit higher than most of the people in the community here actually do. Also, since I can only have the time to patrol new pages during the weekends, reviewing ~50 pages should not be too much of an issue (unless someone volunteers to patrol them as well). So, shall we enact this 10-entry-per-day restriction till someone feels that he is up to par (and at the same time award autopatroller rights)? --Hydriz (talk) 09:52, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Other comments
  • Sorry Chenzw, we already made a decision to just leave me alone. So far, my contributions are helpful. You are not even active. End of discussion. --Rani Rani 21:09, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Chenzw, I think your comment has no effect on the discussion of the fact you are trying to bring a terrible discussion. Thus being bity. No matter what, the discussion is over. I made peace with everyone who commented here (except you). --Rani Rani 21:13, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Another thing to bring, those incorrect entries were a long time ago. --Rani Rani 21:15, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
End of discussion --Rani Rani 22:28, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
This is a thread proposing to set an editing restriction on you, so naturally you cannot tell people that's it's the "end of discussion". You will likely need to wait for an admin to close the discussion. In response to your other comment, how is anyone here being BITEy? If you lack the ability to edit competently and follow the advice given to you by others, then clearly there is a problem which needs to be dealt with. -Mh7kJ (talk) 22:38, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
N.B.: While I do not want to bring over a matter from Wikipedia to here, I wanted to make sure it is known that he was previously blocked for incivility on a Wikimedia project and that I would definitely have expected him to have learned how to interact with other editors, in case any admins wish to look out for that kind of thing here. Using ginormous letters and being flat out rude to another editor is definitely not showing any improvements in my eyes. Raninghai, one does not need to be active to comment on things. Your comment above, particularly the huge letters, is completely unhelpful and proves that you have learned nothing from your incivility block on Wikipedia. -Mh7kJ (talk) 22:54, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Please do not declare an end of a discussion, especially if you are the editor involved in this discussion. For everyone else, thank you for all the discussions about his conduct over at the Simple English Wikipedia and the concerns raised over his civility with the community. I would like to encourage the community to think neutrally about him and his conduct over here on Wiktionary, which I believe has shown some form of civility (other than the big "end of discussion" message).
With this, I am also calling an end to the debate regarding his conduct on the Simple English Wikipedia, as such discussions should take place on the Simple English Wikipedia instead. I believe in giving him a chance, unless of course if this chance is abused a follow-up discussion about his conduct will be started accordingly. --Hydriz (talk) 07:51, 18 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Good decision. Now please look at the guidelines for formatting entries before creating others. You can look at existing entries (but not all are good) too. if you do this, you have a higher chance of creating useful, correctly formatted entries. πr2 (talk • changes) 00:24, 18 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This user has not be helping the Simple English Wiktionary with his entries created. He is instead creating more work for the current editors of this project and as such, I propose that a 1 week block be instated so that he has time to think about his actions and how they effect the rest of the editors of this project, after which he would be welcome to come back, and if he shows signs of complying with our formatting guidelines, he will be allowed to edit again. At this point in time, though, he is doing more harm than good and needs to be blocked for a period of time to give him time to think about things. That is my opinion on this matter. Razorflame 19:58, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Well, the user has "retired" a few days ago and not edited since, so I don't think it's necessary to take any action right now. If he returns later and continues flooding simplewikt with abysmally low quality entries, then we can have this discussion. Tempodivalse [talk] 04:25, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, I wasn't saying that he should be blocked now, especially since he hasn't edited since this discussion has started. I was merely bringing this up as an option in case he does return. Razorflame 19:37, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Also, I don't think a block like you describe would have any positive effect on Raninghai. Judging from past experiences, he doesn't seem to be able to learn from mistakes. In general, blocking is a bad way of getting people to "think about things". Tempodivalse [talk] 04:27, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

RFD problem[change]

Hello all Wiktionarians! I was wondering about the past RFDs we had. We have texsuasion that its discussion is still going on. Why can't we close it and delete or keep it? I mean, scene changes have last a long time (since 2012)! Cheers! --Take a trip with Rani Rani 21:29, 16 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Y Done I deleted both and the specific reason is provided accordingly. Note that RfD discussions can drag for very long as we might be waiting for a decision off-wiki to be made or we simply want more time for more comments. Thanks for raising this though. --Hydriz (talk) 10:02, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Flood flags[change]

Do flood flags exist in Simple Wiktionary. Because I contribute a lot, and it usually floods on the new changes. --Rani Rani 22:38, 17 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

No, we don't have flood flags here. Also, in general, the flag (on other wikis) isn't used for major changes.  Hazard-SJ  ✈  01:06, 18 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Unacceptably bad entries require extensive cleanup[change]

I've come to the conclusion that most of Raninghai's entries are unsalvageable. For instance, Prevail was so badly written (uppercase title, nonsensical definition and example sentence, labelled an adjective) that I decided it was easier to delete it and start a new page from scratch than attempt to fix the existing material. I'm trying to assume good faith, but it's getting to the point where I feel Raninghai is being harmful to the project.

Can I get some users to help me look over all of his contributions? Despite previous efforts to oversee Raninghai's entries, a lot still appears to have not been vetted. Tempodivalse [talk] 16:32, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Some examples: [1] [2] [3] [4] Tempodivalse [talk] 17:47, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
He has retired. πr2 (talk • changes) 17:50, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
He previously tried to retire on the Simple English Wikipedia to avoid scrutiny while his ban was being proposed. I think he's also "retiring" here for that same reason. As I said above, he probably should not be editing any Wikimedia project, given his maturity level.--Jasper Deng (talk|meta) 19:40, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Note, the user has retired twice in the space of three days. Tempodivalse [talk] 20:40, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
HI there! I'll go ahead and take a look at these entries. If I find any that are too badly written, I'll request them for deletion myself. Razorflame 22:22, 19 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I was trying to review all the new pages yesterday. I must admit that it was too much work that I had to stop from further reviewing (got a little fed up from doing so). Please feel free to request deletion for pages that are beyond salvage and I will look into it. --Hydriz (talk) 02:50, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It is suicide to think about fixing ALL of them all at once. You've got to do it a little at a time. I'll go look through some of them now. Razorflame 03:05, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
  • Another thing: some good-willed contributors did go through some of Raninghai's earlier entries and tried to clean them up, but in the process did not themselves use correct formatting or style as mandated by WT:SE, so those need to be double-checked as well. Tempodivalse [talk] 18:55, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

General entry formatting[change]

As I've been looking through entries created here recently, I've noticed that the formatting that I use and that most of the entries on this site use have not been enforced while I was away. All entries on this site should be uniform in terms of formatting and by using multiple ways of formatting entries, we start to look less professional than we want to be. We also look like we don't know what the hell we are doing as well. Do you think it would be possible to mandate a way of formatting articles and keep that one way over all entries made? Cheers, Razorflame 03:09, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I guess this is best time where we properly review the guidelines listed out in the Wiktionary:Sample entry and other rules governing how we format our entries. There has been many changes over the years, and it would be great that we start to standardize a little. Razorflame, can you provide some rules that you remember of so that we can all decide on changing or keeping it? --Hydriz (talk) 03:35, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah. Most of the rules in WT:SE still apply, most importantly:
  • The bolding of the headword and the using of the headword in the definition.
  • The general entry layout from WT:SE.
  • Having no wikilinks in the example sentences and having the headword bolded in the example sentences.
Everything else from WT:SE still applies today that I know of. Other than what is included in WT:SE, there are no other formatting guidelines that I am aware of. Maybe you could include some changes to the formatting guidelines that you've had in the past year or so? I'd be happy to look over them and see if they are possible to add to WT:SE. Razorflame 19:55, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It is quite weird to know that we don't link in the example sentence, I suggest that we change that (and I see no reason why we should not link). --Hydriz (talk) 01:00, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Any reason why we have this rule? πr2 (talk • changes) 01:19, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
It's the same on the English Wiktionary. That's why the rule is in place. Furthermore, example sentences are supposed to still be written in Simple English. Razorflame 02:57, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
In that case, I must not be as familiar with the style guide as I thought, because I recall not infrequently linking to other words in example sentences. *blushes* It seems counterintuitive to forbid links. I don't find "en.wikt does it" to be a satisfying justification. Thoughts on removing this rule? Tempodivalse [talk] 16:47, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
I mean, you can remove the rule, but it seems kind of silly to have a dictionary linking words in an example sentence to other articles. It's all about having people not have to go look at other entries to understand what the example sentences was trying to get across. It is all about having them be able to stay on the same entry to get all the information they need without having to do more reading to understand the meanings of a few words. That's the other reason why this rule is in place. Razorflame 19:34, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
But there isn't a rule against linking within definitions, even though this would also have the same drawback you describe. What if the reader doesn't understand some more complicated words in the entry? If the reader is going to get distracted by links and can't keep his attention on one page ... well, then he's going to get distracted by something else anyway. Tempodivalse [talk] 20:34, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
The links within the definition are in place because they are almost always related to the entry in general so that if the person reading the entry wants to, they can go to the blue-linked words to find out more information about the word that they were linked to the new word from. Links in the example sentences almost never relate to the entry in question, hence why they aren't linked. I would be fine with amending the rule to say that they can be linked, if and only if they are related to the entry they are on and would benefit the reader of the entry in terms of being able to find out more about the entry they were on. I hope this makes sense, Razorflame 23:58, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Can you review this? Did I miss something? πr2 (talk • changes) 23:47, 20 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Everything is right except the linked words in the example sentences. Furthermore, more simplification could be done on the example sentences. Razorflame 02:57, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Archive bot for simple talk[change]

Can we perhaps set up a bot to archive old conversations on Simple talk? Thus far, that's been done manually, which has resulted in irregular intervals and, at present, an unmanageably long page. Automating the process would take some work off our hands. Tempodivalse [talk] 04:34, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Currently, this page isn't uunmanageable. People just need to be more careful in where they archive this stuff. They need to know when to make new archives and stuff like that. I don't think that we are a big enough project to start using bots to help archive this talk page yet. Razorflame 19:36, 21 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Request for comment[change]

Could I get some extra opinions on a matter I brought up at talk:rescue? It's a bit baffling to me. Tempodivalse [talk] 14:58, 22 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Pywikipedia is migrating to git[change]

Hello, Sorry for English but It's very important for bot operators so I hope someone translates this. Pywikipedia is migrating to Git so after July 26, SVN checkouts won't be updated If you're using Pywikipedia you have to switch to git, otherwise you will use out-dated framework and your bot might not work properly. There is a manual for doing that and a blog post explaining about this change in non-technical language. If you have question feel free to ask in mw:Manual talk:Pywikipediabot/Gerrit, mailing list, or in the IRC channel. Best Amir (via Global message delivery). 13:45, 23 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

For the community's information: HydrizBot is based on this framework, and I will be scheduling a switch-over to the Git repository tomorrow, so do not worry about an outdated bot running. --Hydriz (talk) 09:50, 24 July 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Bot request[change]

Hey, guys I'm Pratyya Ghosh and I'm here requesting for approval for my bot.

  • Name- Ghosh Bot
  • Task - Welcoming new users and Cleaning the Sandbox here.

--Pratyya (Hello!) 12:57, 6 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]

No stupid auto-welcome messages to users. Most/all new user creations here are from spambots. As for cleaning the sandbox: totally unneeded, especially when I see edits such as this one. I guess this can be quickly closed as N not approved. Regards, -Barras talk 15:11, 6 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]

HTTPS for users with an account[change]

Greetings. Starting on August 21 (tomorrow), all users with an account will be using HTTPS to access Wikimedia sites. HTTPS brings better security and improves your privacy. More information is available at m:HTTPS.

If HTTPS causes problems for you, tell us on bugzilla, on IRC (in the #wikimedia-operations channel) or on meta. If you can't use the other methods, you can also send an e-mail to https@wikimedia.org.

Greg Grossmeier (via the Global message delivery system). 19:39, 20 August 2013 (UTC) (wrong page? You can fix it.)[reply]

Notifications inform you of new activity that affects you -- and let you take quick action.

(This message is in English, please translate as needed)

Greetings!

Notifications will inform users about new activity that affects them on this wiki in a unified way: for example, this new tool will let you know when you have new talk page messages, edit reverts, mentions or links -- and is designed to augment (rather than replace) the watchlist. The Wikimedia Foundation's editor engagement team developed this tool (code-named 'Echo') earlier this year, to help users contribute more productively to MediaWiki projects.

We're now getting ready to bring Notifications to almost all other Wikimedia sites, and are aiming for a 22 October deployment, as outlined in this release plan. It is important that notifications is translated for all of the languages we serve.

There are three major points of translation needed to be either done or checked:

Please let us know if you have any questions, suggestions or comments about this new tool. For more information, visit this project hub and this help page. Keegan (WMF) (talk) 19:12, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

(via the Global message delivery system) (wrong page? You can fix it.)

Speak up about the trademark registration of the Community logo.[change]

two word entries[change]

Are two word entries like temper tantrum, holy ghost, and vice versa allowed? Oregonian2012 (talk) 01:22, 9 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

For words that can or are usually only used together, like vice versa, yes. For stuff like holy ghost we usually stick to two different entries, just as we don't have holy water. -Barras talk 13:51, 10 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

thought I was adding words to Wiktionary and they ended up in Simple Wiktionary[change]

I added three words I made up while writing a novel but thought I was adding them to wiktionary.org and they ended up in simple.wiktionary.org

wiktionary.org does not recognize them

what should I do?

these are the words-

psychbot clonebot pliginiforisity

They probably won't be kept on either project if they're words you made up yourself that aren't sourced by something else. If they haven't already been deleted here, you could tag them for deletion and try to create them on regular Wiktionary. Purplebackpack89 (talk) 16:54, 16 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]