Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 93

message: (1) I seek consensus to add the following:
Avoid the use of wordings such as "note that" and "remember that", which change the tenor by directly instructing the readers.
(2) As the invisible comment says, this is probably better in the Abbreviatinos section: "Abbreviations of Latin terms like i.e. and e.g.,  or use of the Latin terms in full, such as “nota bene”, or “vide infra”, should be left as the original author wrote them. In the main text of articles intended for a general audience, consider spelling out the item in English (“that is”, “for example”).
(3) I wonder whether this is better in the Varieties of English section: "Use an unambiguous word or phrase in preference to an ambiguous one. For example, use “other meaning” rather than “alternate meaning” or “alternative meaning”, since alternate means only “alternating” to a British-English speaker, and alternative suggests “nontraditional” or “out-of-the-mainstream” to an American-English speaker. Tony (talk) 01:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Agree strongly with 1, but it could (should?) be made more general - we do not address the reader directly. I think we already do say that somewhere, so we could just add these examples as subtle variants to watch out for.  Point #2 sounds very reasonable. Same for #3, as far as placement, though I think it probably exaggerates the actual case considerably (not the topic under discussion here; just a side comment). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 04:55, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

text: (2) and (3) are not my suggestions: they're there already, if you'd bothered to look. I disagree that much finely crafted prose uses "note that" and "remember that". Please provide examples. Doesn't sound finely crafted to me. Tony (talk) 09:47, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

text: I would say that that that isn't really what n.b means anymore. It might stand for nota bene, which literally means "note well" (or indeed "note good"), but the usage has drifted so much that it really doesn't mean that literally anymore. Usually, writers use it for emphasis or to denote a caveat. It's not great to use, but I wouldn't want to see it recommended against strongly. Plus, of course, if it's in a quote it gets left alone. SamBC(talk) 18:26, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Usage section 

message: When did not bolding synonyms for a person become the new rule? Or not having it as a standard in MOS? Can I now deBold every synonym in every biography in Wikipedia? See: [] --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) 08:50, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Since that part of MOS was overhauled a few months ago. Now it's optional. "Equivalent names may follow, and may or may not be in boldface." Sometimes it just makes the opening look ugly/lumpy. But don't upset people by mass debolding—unless you think they won't mind. Tony (talk) 09:45, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Why was this made optional? If they appear they should be bolded, for consistency's sake, surely. Either that or don't bold them at all. It's just weird to have some articles bold alternative titles and others not do it (and really weird to have people editwarring over it.) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 07:52, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Because they can look so untidy—bold all over the place at the top of an article. Why is it necessary to bold any more than the subject of the article title? This came up at the FAC page, where one nomination had a large number of synomyms that were all bolded. In those cases, it's better to have the option of not bolding every one of them. It made the page hard to read. Making it mandatory not to bold all synonyms would have been a back-compatibility problem. Tony (talk) 14:02, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: PS It's not something I feel strongly about, so I'd agree with whatever you feel is best. Tony (talk) 16:44, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The rationale as I recall was to highlight the alternate names so that persons arriving at the topic via a redirect would not be left wondering "WTF am I doing at X topic when I wanted Y?" This is perhaps more significant where the alternate names are very dissimilar or somewhat unexpected. Where the alternates are simple variations on a theme, there is little point to the added emphasis. older ≠ wiser 16:55, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  De-bolding synonyms 

message: Hi, I just would like to clarify our usage and capitalization conventions for nobiliary particles.  These are the "of" words used in many European languages to denote that the family belongs to the hereditary nobility.  Examples might be Charles de Gaulle, Simone de Beauvoir, Max von Laue, Johannes Diderik van der Waals and Lorenzo de' Medici.
My questions are whether we should include the nobiliary particle (de, della, von, van, etc.) whatsoever, and where it should be capitalized.  My own preference would be to include it as part of the last name (e.g., "After winning the battle, de Gaulle returned to...") and to capitalize it only when it occurs as the first word in a sentence, e.g., "Van der Waals proposed a modification of the ideal gas law, which von Laue confirmed experimentally..." or (possibly) in a section heading or article title, e.g., ==Della Rovere family==.  
I'm sure that this is treated in one or another style manual, but I haven't found it as yet.  Any suggestions or clarification would be very welcome — thank you! :) Willow 15:15, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Good luck. The article van (Dutch) shows some of the problems that arise as one country differs from another in its use of prefixes. rgds, johnmark† 16:59, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Also note that these are not always "Nobiliary" as they are in German and as such their capitalization varies. Even the usage of Van and van differs between Belgium and Dutch in the same language. We can apply to each name the same common use in English standard we apply in other situations. Rmhermen 20:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

text: We should do what English does. If you are using an English source, follow it, unless a majority of other English sources disagree; this will usually (but not always) be what the original language does. Since the original languages are not consistent among themselves, and English is not consistent in following them, no simpler rule is possible, or desirable; although your example is often a good first guide. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:00, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Nobiliary particles: usage and capitalization?

message: What is the policy or consensus on the structure (alignment) of an article?
I realise that all the articles (that I have visited) are left aligned, but has anyone considered the fact that it may be more encyclopaedia like to have the text 'justified' for some or all of the articles. Anyway, since I am new, I was wondering if someone could tell me there opinion on this matter, as it was just an idea I had. -Jack 04:42, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Justified type is, generally speaking, more difficult to read than regularly left-aligned type. I think it could be left alone. EVula // talk // ☯ // 04:44, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Strictly my opinion. What I do feel comfortable speaking on behalf of everyone on, though, is that changing the formatting of the page won't make a document look more reliable; adding references and reliable sources will. Anything less is just a shallow attempt. EVula // talk // ☯ // 06:01, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Formatting of the page is done by the reader's software.  Find a web browser which will do text justification.  (SEWilco 13:56, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's already there. If you are a registered user you can set justification in your user preferences. Go to tab "misc" and check "Justify paragraphs". −Woodstone 21:08, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article Layout 

message: Well, what you have just mentioned leads me to a new question I would like to put forward. Why is it that some articles have a lot of proper references (and citations) and reliable information and yet, some articles (I have also come across) have factual information but few (and sometimes no) citations or references? -Jack 06:29, 2 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Because nobody has provided the references for it yet. :) EVula // talk // ☯ // 13:50, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

text: You know, none of that is really relevant to the talk page for the Manual of Style. EVula // talk // ☯ // 15:48, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Number of references 

message: I see a contradiction between these two sentences as they stand, the section entitled "No common usage in English":
:Wikipedia prefers italics for phrases in other languages and for isolated foreign words that do not yet have common usage in English. However, in an article on a subject for which there is no English-language term, the foreign term does not require italicization.
Surely the foreign term should be consistently italicised throughout? BrainyBabe 08:10, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The second-sentence clarification is key here: "in an article on a subject for which there is no English-language term".  There is no English-equivalent term for enchilada.  In some other article (e.g. Mexican cuisine) this term would be italicized as a loanword.  At Enchilada it would not be italicized, as this italicization would rapidly become tedious for both editor and reader. I can actually see an argument... scratch that, I am hereby making an argument, that the first (i.e. beginning of lead sentence) occurrence of "enchilada" should be italicized (as well as boldfaced per WP:LEAD) at Enchilada.  <yelling for others' input goes here>  I'm not entirely certain that this makes sense.  If not, please WP:TROUT me. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 09:05, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I could go either way on that, to be honest. It does make logical sense, but the meaning of the italicisation may be lost when combined with bolding. SamBC(talk) 11:23, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmm.  In my idiolect, "enchilada" has been accepted as a loan word into English and as such is a poor example, although I acknowledge the point, and the distinction between item-mentioned-in-passing and item-mentioned-as-subject-of-article.  I disagree that consistent and repeated italicisation is necessarily tedious.  Visually, I would have to agree that emboldening and italicising in tandem is too difficult to process.  BrainyBabe 11:39, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I would agree with you on the specific example (I would consider enchilada, taco, burrito all loanwords, and possibly fajita as well - much like bolognese), but I think we all get the gist of what is meant. Consistent and repeated italicisation is okay, and I would say that isn't the best (or even a very good) reason to not italicise the subject of the article. One good reason to my mind, is to avoid any possible confusion as to why the word is italicised, especially with new users. Another is that it seems strange to highlight the foreigness of a word that we're actually writing an article about (or about the actual thing the word refers to). Where there's a subject that is often referred to by a non-English-language name that also has a (possibly less well known) English-language name (not that I can think of an example), then generally I think the article should be at the English-language name as an article, with redirects for the others, and those can certainly be consistently and repeatedly italicised when they occur in the article, even when bolded on first use, in my opinion. SamBC(talk) 11:48, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think enchilada is a bad example, because I agree it is a loan word, meaning "enchilada". Please consider banausos, which is not, despite occasional nonce uses, accepted in English; the article italicizes, and I think it does well to do so. But drawing this line should be a matter of article-by-article editorial judgment, not a ruling here. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:25, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Foreign terms 

message: Why? It might be important, but it's not central to the specific purpose of the MOS. Now it interrupts the flow of sections on style. I think this should go back to where it was. Tony (talk) 02:30, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't see why it's here at all. All of it is somewhere else, mostly in more complete form; see WP:V, WP:CITE, WP:FOOT. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 03:17, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Quite so. Tony (talk) 03:38, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Then let's get rid of it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:27, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Anyone object? If not, it should be removed, say, tomorrow. Tony (talk) 14:32, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Delete it. Jɪmp 06:03, 5 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Sources" section now close to the top 

message: Wiki grammar gurus!  If you're talking about a band, do you use "is" or "are"? "Iron Maiden is a band", or "Iron Maiden are a band"?  Band = noun = is, surely? The members "are", the band "is"...  Cardinal Wurzel 08:29, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I would regard this in the same way as "data" and say it's a singular noun used in a plural way. Only pedantics say "data is". The same goes for "police". Nobody says, "The police is erecting a roadblock." TinyMark 09:42, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

text: I'm sorry, my mistake. It's the other way round with data! "Data are" sounds awful. TinyMark 10:00, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Police is already a plural noun; you don't say "polices" to indicate more than one, and there is no singular form of the word when used as a noun referring to police officers, so "police are" is correct. Data can be plural or singular in US English (see dictionary.com data for a good explanation). Bands vary, and I'd say it depends on whether the name itself seems more like a singular or plural term. Iron Maiden seems singular, so "Iron Maiden is...." The Beatles (even though a made-up word) seems plural, and people generally say "The Beatles were a great band." The band The Police, to tie in the first sentence of this paragraph, is also generally used as a plural, so "The Police were a great band." If Iron Maiden had been named Iron Maidens, then I'd use a plural verb. If a band were called "The Data," I think a lot of editors would be stumped. :-) Note that I'm just giving my opinion, no sources to back it up, other than checking Google's news archive that my interpretation seems consistent with common usage. -Agyle 11:35, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Bands are technically a single unit each; hence, use it would be correct to use the singular.  "The Replacements is a band", just like "Metallica is a band."  However, it sounds awkward in some circumstances but not others so there seems to be a mini-rule about this.  If you look up "The Rolling Stones are" versus "The Rolling Stones is" in google, for example, plural is running 4-1 against singular.Wikidemo 10:54, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Previous, longstanding concensus across many many articles over this hard fought topic is that proper/international English accepts group nouns as plurals. The "simple" singular form is very common in the U.S.(for various "simple" reasons) In Canada, we accept both variations as norm... depending on who our audience is. The plural form is commonly used in the east(Auld Canada) whereas western Canada(more Yankee-fied... or 'simple') uses the 'dumbed down' singular version. Pink Floyd 'are' a band. Led Zeppelin 'were' a band... They 'are' a band... They 'were' a band.... they/their/are/were/ always plural indicating group. Never "It"... it's not a group of objects... it's a group of people... they/their... etc. Pink Floyd(GB) are, Grateful Dead(US) was... it's been a long standing rule-of-thumb on Wikipedia... and an edit war that's been slowly fading away(or so we all hoped) as more regular editors "catch on" to whats accepted. They WAS a band... They IS a band...????. Dat jus' ain't properly spoke stuff :D. I work at a University. A local band are to perform here on Friday. They are very talented. Wiki-alf... I leave the forum to you :D . 156.34.142.110 14:39, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: "Proper/international" English is an excuse for that deprecated thing: an Anglo-American edit war. In American, which uses (with one glaring exception) "logical" number, a band is, no matter what it's doing; this should be used for American bands; in British English, it depends on whether you are speaking of the band as a whole, which is performing, or as individual players. The anon's suggestion is a hypercorrection, and should be avoided. (In all varieties, if you use "they", you are speaking of the players, and they are.) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:40, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Yes of course it is a matter of British English versus American English. I am sorry to hear that the tradition of denying the existence or propriety of AmE lives on; I hoped it had died half a century ago. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:54, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Still don't agree.  The correct formulation, logically, is to use "is" because the band is a single thing.  There's something peculiar abound bands and I don't think we've hit on it.  In other contexts we don't pluralize the verb just because we have a name for something created out of a plural noun.  We say "the United States is", "The Rolling Stones, a new book on the band, is", "Shingles (the disease) is", and so on.  It seems that insisting on using the plural when referring to a band is fussiness, perhaps not quite coming to grips with recognizing a musical act as a corporate entityWikidemo 18:48, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: As a Brit, I'd find myself saying "The United States is a big place" and "The United States is over there" (points west), but it would be "The United States are involved in this" , "...are dominating the market", "...are negotiating with Canada" and so on...--Alf melmac 19:52, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

text: The well know "Fowler's Modern English Usage" calls these words "nouns of multitude", giving as examples amongst others: committee, crew, orchestra, army, crowd, number, majority. It states that they are treated as singular or plural at discretion, depending on whether they are seen as a group of people or a single entity. So it's definitely not incorrect to use the plural form and we should leave it up to the editor. −Woodstone 18:59, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Interesting.  Useful, although one could draw a distinction between some "nouns of multitude" and others depending on whether the individual members are acting independently or whether the action is instead done by the entity.  I can see why Americans would tend to use the singular; they tend to insist on precision and logic in the language, whereas the British enjoy formalism and convention.  Wikidemo 19:14, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I didn't know of the Brit/Am distinction, but media usage corroborates; NY Times (1999) says "Iron Maiden is a band more....", Guaridan.co.uk (2005) says "Iron Maiden are headlining this year's...." Plural-like bands being the exception: NY Times (2005) says "The Beatles are the most famous rock group...", and NY Times (1997) says "The Rolling Stones are one of the few rock bands...." Wikidemo, I agree with your logic, but accepted proper usage is sometimes independent of any logic. :-) As a legitimate Brit/Am distinction, with a British band, "Iron Maiden are" seems reasonable to me. If this is a previously much-discussed topic, was there a consensus that could be added to the MOS, or a clear non-consensus ("Opinions vary...") that could be added to it? -Agyle 19:18, 4 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: With the exception of United States, largely for constitutional reasons, American will use are with formally plural nouns, like Beatles, and is with formally singular nouns, like Iron Maiden. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:03, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

text: For those interested more information is at synesis. Rich Farmbrough, 13:27 5 October 2007 (GMT).
Thanks, Rich - that's exactly what I needed.  Cardinal Wurzel 16:50, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

text: PS: A side point: In today's world of electronic music, it has probably already happened many times that a single person appears to be a "band" or "act", with a plural-sounding name, but has no bandmates, in which case only "is" makes sense, regardless of the name format.  If I decide to make a one-man ambient electronica album under the name, I dunno, how about "Dark Whispers", the local music mag, and Wikipedia, can only sensibly say that "Dark Whispers is...", not "...are..."  It'll sound funny, but the plural verb would be absurd. :-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 20:31, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Bands - Is/Are

message: A good example of where quotes instead of italics would be better, from WP:MOSNUM:
Converted values should use a level of precision similar to that of the source value; for example, the Moon is 380,000 kilometres (240,000 mi) from Earth, not ... (236,121 mi).
It's basically impossible to tell that the elipsis is part of the example without quotation marks; in fact, the lack of them makes the passage look completely weird.  There are many, many more examples like this I could come up with (I see about 10 per day), but the point ought to already be clear: By using quotation marks as the delimiter of examples and words-as-mentioned rather than -as-used, we actually delimit the passage in question, while italics often do not (except in the source code, which is of no relevance to the general readership). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 16:26, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Followup

message: A completely different idea is that this could be handled the same way that non-transgender-related alternate names are.  Typically (there's no rule about this, I just see it), it goes something like this:
:Joe Foobar (born James F. Bazquux, date, place) is a professional Scrabble player, four-time world champion. He is also the banjo player for the bluegrass group My Hands are Too Small.
:Born to a coal-mining family in West Virginia, blah blah blah.  Bazquux, a poor student despite his obvious gift for words, left school at age 16, and while working as a waiter took on the name Joe Foobar when he entered his first regional Scrabble championship.
:By 1983, Foobar had won the Eastern Regional Championship three years in a row, and took the national title in 1984, and the international title a year later.
I.e., the original name is used up until the new name was assumed, and use of either is avoided in the lead's additional sentences. Works just fine. Pronouns would be adapted in the same way to the extent that they should be used at all; it is quite easy to write around them. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 02:10, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Alternative approach

message: I find two things unclear with the ellipses policy:
:(1) The example of "Even more rarely, before an exclamation mark…!" seems to contradict the given rules. Is this intentional, or a mistake?
:(2) What do we do for ellipses that separate complete sentences? Using "…." seems misleading, since it suggests that the elided text came before the end of the sentence. I think that ". …" would be more appropriate, but that form is not mentioned.
Tristan Schmelcher 21:15, 7 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You're right on the first count: thank you. On the second, isn't it four dots without space before them? ("The house was on the hill.... It had been unoccupied for many years.") Tony (talk) 00:56, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It is normally so done; the fourth dot being the period at the end of the first complete sentence. Many readers will be likely to miss the distinction between three and four dots, however; if it matters, we should mark the difference explicitly.  Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:41, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Right, it is normally done that way.  But what could be more explict a marker that four instead of two dots?  Any reader paying enough attention to care about what was elided seems to me to be likely to care enough to noticed four vs. three dots.  But maybe it's just; I tend to notice four dots instantly, maybe it doesn't "resonate" for others as well. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 02:24, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: What could be more explicit? A footnote; a statement in text. Most of the time, whether the elision is whole sentences won't matter; when it does, we should say so. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 20:51, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ellipses policy unclear 

message: This page is again causing Firefox/WinXP to crash due to its bulk, on systems that don't have gobs and gobs of RAM (100%-repeatable crash on my system). — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 18:14, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There are auto-archiving bots; we could install one here.  SMcCandlish has no problem requesting that we adapt to the peculiarities of an operating systme when it's his OS; perhaps he will be less dismissive of the foibles of other operating systems hereafter. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:50, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: As per Tony and others, why do you always seem to attempt to muddy the water with logically fallacious arguments? Things not looking perfectly pretty with your particular font in your particular browser is nothing at all like bluescreening applications that make WT:MOS completely unusable in circumstances that are likely to affect a large numbers of user (WinXP, Firefox, less that 1GB of RAM). Jee-zus. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 02:19, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Done. OS problems or not, the page was just too damn long. Strad 23:24, 8 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you! — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 02:19, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Somewhere in the text archived, IIRC, is an assertion that the archiving by topic (as opposed to copying the section headers into an index page) wasn't working very well, and has been abandoned. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:47, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: As far as I know, there some of the archives are sorted by subject but most (and all recent ones) go in chronological order.  I'm not aware of any dual achiving whereby the same thing is archived twice.  It would be nice but who's about to devote the time to sorting the archives by topic? Jɪmp 04:30, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Please archive again 

message: What standard is followed in issues of term usage between British and American English? For example, the use of 'paraffin' in Tractor_vaporising_oil. Britain uses 'paraffin' for both kerosene and paraffin wax, while all other English-speaking countries, as far as I know, call it kerosene nearly exclusively. I know that in matters of spelling, articles are left in the style in which they were written, but terms seem to have a much larger impact. What should be done in this case? Phasmatisnox 01:58, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Seems best to me to avoid ambiguous terms, dialect issue aside.  I assume that UK readers will understand "kerosene" and "paraffin wax"?  Also, linking to more specifically-termed articles is often helpful in situations like this. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 02:21, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Agree with SMcC, if a suitable alternative term would be universally clear. If there is no single term that would be commonly understood in both places, I'd say pick one, and on first usage explain the other term. An example would be the Williams pear, called the Bartlett pear in the U.S. and Canada; I doubt many people are familiar with both of those terms, or the formal name which is universal. -Agyle 06:30, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

text: It isn't always obvious that an article incorporates terms or spellings of one national variant, rendering the idea of keeping a consistent variant a bit tricky.  A consistent way of flagging source to say something like en-ca spoken in 37 places in this article might be helpful.  A bot could presumably be devised/devized to scan against the list of national spellings.LeadSongDog 17:56, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: NB: It's "devised" even in American English; AmEng is not terribly consistent with this sort of thing.  E.g. we advertise with advertising, but criticize with criticism. Go figure. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 17:12, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

text: In fact, that BrEng does distinguish, calling one "paraffin" (wax) and the other "paraffin oil" (kerosene) but there are less verbose ways of expressing it. Both OED and SOED mention kerosene predominating in technical contexts. So, I agree with SMcCandlish here. --ROGER DAVIES TALK 10:46, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: British vs. American English for terms

message: Can we have a guideline that states that one does not have to put the US in front of $ for articles that are clearly talking about American things? I find the US$ wording to be an eyesore and usually unnecessary. Alternatively, perhaps have a template that goes towards the end of the article (such as in "Notes" or "References") that reads something like "All $s in this article refer to United States dollars." Other countries' dollars could have similar templates. It seems that the need to specify which dollars is only needed for articles that talk of things of a global nature.--SeizureDog 05:50, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: If the practice really is that common then I suppose a proscription ought to go in. There's no need to write US$ for obviously American prices, just as there's no need to write UK£ for obviously British prices. Strad 05:59, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's been there for a while: Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style#Formatting. Tony (talk) 06:30, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

text: As Tony notes, it is already in there, but we should not get any more prescriptive that we already are on this one, I would think.  In an American article about US economics in which the US dollar was compared to the Canadian and Australian dollar, it would make eminent sense to use "US$", etc. (but linked only the first time).  Likewise, some editor or another once wanted to change UK£" to simply "£" in all the snooker bios until it was pointed out that just because snooker is a rather British game does not mean that all players' professional earnings were in fact reported in their infoboxes in UK pounds.  PS: Speaking of pounds, what's up with there being two symbols: £ and ₤ ?  On my monitor it looks like the second has two lines thru it as opposed to one.  Which is the correct symbol for pounds sterling, and what does the other represent? — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 14:21, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: See Pound sign. -- Arwel (talk) 21:50, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Cool. I have updated the MOS text to distinguish. I assume that is still in there; I haven't looked lately. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 17:14, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  US$ 

message: I have added the caveat that it is good to number lists where the number itself is of some importance, for example track listings. Rich Farmbrough, 14:04 9 October 2007 (GMT).
:Good point. I've just massaged the whole section. I clarified the case and punctuation of elements that are (1) whole sentences, and (2) sentence fragments. Tony (talk) 14:13, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Bullets and numbered lists

message: I can find nothing about the treatment of individual letters of the alphabet in linguistic contexts.  The MoS should recommend lower case italics as follows: c sounds either like k or like s. Rothorpe 18:00, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This is already covered at "Words as words", under the "Italics" section. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 23:16, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Where are we using español instead of Spanish, and why? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:53, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

text: If I'm following PMAnderson's lead correctly, I have to say that this is irrelevant and substandard here; English capitalizes proper nouns, whether they be directly borrowed or anglicized.  I don't know much about the language Gujurati, but if they use latinate orthography, and happen to not capitalize the name of their language in their language, and render it as "gujurati", in English we would still render it as "Gujurati", because that's simply what we do in English.  I'm with PMA in asking why an en.wikipedia template is using non-English names like "español" at all; this is not going to be helpful for our readers. In the article Spanish language, by contrast, I would expect to see "español" somewhere in the lead, italicized as a foreign word, bolded as an alt. term for the article topic, and lower case since we are reporting a foreign word, not a loanword in this context.  Oppositely, if, here in the American Southwest, I start an ESL school called "The Español-English Institute", it would be capitalized, and non-italicized, because here it is being used as a loanword in an English-language phrase, and in English we capitalize proper nouns. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 23:16, 9 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: My question was a question; I think the answer that español is a datum in  is quite reasonable. The case for capitalization is that it is being used, in that infobox, as part of a title, and should therefore be capitalized, in both English and Spanish. But this is a issue on how that infobox should work, and should be discussed on Template talk:Infobox Language, not here. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:55, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I have continued there - Rothorpe 14:29, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Letters of the alphabet; français and italiano

message: Please read and comment at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (exit lists)#Proposals for clarifications. --NE2 05:16, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposed changes to the [[WP:ELG|exit list guide]]

message: The sentence sentence with a McDonald's example of glyph style was changed by one character, and I don't understand the distinction.
Old: For example, searching in an article for McDonald's (typewriter quote) will fail to find McDonald’s (typographic quote), and vice versa 
New: For example, searching in an article for McDonald's (typewriter quote) will fail to find McDonald's (typographic quote), and vice versa.
For me, the old sentence's second occurrence of McDonald's wouldn't be found by Firefox or Internet Explorer (U.S. English browser settings, on U.S. Windows XP) searching for "McDonald's," while in the second example, the two examples are rendered the same way, and both are found by either browser. Do they appear different with other language or country settings? Note that I copied and pasted the "New" sentence, and it's possible my browser lost something in that process, so you might want to check the MOS itself. -Agyle 05:36, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It needs to be changed back.Strad 00:22, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This seems to have been changed back-and-forth a bit. The example of a typographics quote should really be a typographic quote, or it doesn't make sense. SamBC(talk) 16:19, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Is this resolved now to everyone's satisfaction, or is something still broken? Looks fine to me. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 19:33, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: McDonald's glyph example

message: Any reason we need to list all of the daughter manuals in a section towards the end as well as in the infobox at the top? I see that the two lists aren't quite the same, too.
I'd rather just keep the box at the top. Tony (talk) 11:00, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That makes sense, from both a redundancy and a maintenance perspective. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 16:21, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Submanual section 

message: Featured Articles are supposed to meet our MOS guidelines.  Well apparently not, as an ongoing discussion shows.  violet/riga (t) 20:17, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I invoke WP:IAR. From the sound of it, some featured articles use US-style punctuation consistently. Why fix what isn't broken? Strad 22:08, 12 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: IAR is great when there is a reason to do so.  The only reason mentioned there is that it would make maintaining the article more difficult, but I find that to be a poor argument.  It's not something I would FARC an FA about, but if the article is changed to follow the MOS it shouldn't really be reverted without a very good reason for exemption.  violet/riga (t) 07:48, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  MOS and FAs 

message: If this page does not specify a preferred usage, discuss your issues on the talk page of this manual. When either of two styles is acceptable, it is inappropriate for an editor to change an article from one style to another unless there is a substantial reason to do so (for example, it is acceptable to change from Canadian to British spelling if the article concerns a British topic). Edit warring over optional styles is unacceptable. If an article has been stable in a given style, it should not be converted without a reason that goes beyond mere choice of style. When it is unclear whether an article has been stable, defer to the style used by the first major contributor.
:The way I read this is that if an article with BrEng spelling about, say, a US president or an American literary figure has been stable in BrEng, it should not be changed to AmEng spellings. Or if the same article starts in AmEng, is changed to BrEng, remains stable in BrEng, it cannot be reverted to AmEng. Is this the intention? Strong national ties seems to me a one-off change or a one-off revert which cannot lead to edit-warring. --ROGER DAVIES TALK 12:26, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: In those two cases, AmEng must be used, and the article should be changed accordingly no matter how stable it has been in BrEng. See "National varieties of English". Tony (talk) 14:37, 13 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I.e., such cases constitute "a reason that goes beyond mere choice of style". — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 19:32, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That should probably be included. It currently implies that If an article has been stable in a given style, it should not be converted without a reason that goes beyond mere choice of style overrules strong national ties. --ROGER DAVIES TALK 08:18, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: SMcCandlish made the point I neglected, which is the clincher. And in addition to the beyond mere choice of style, there's the unless there is a substantial reason to do so clause above, and, of course, the section that is devoted to this issue below. Do you feel that it's unclear for a casual visitor to this page? Tony (talk) 08:29, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes. I've had it quoted to me as meaning that change on national ties grounds is insufficient once the article is stable. --ROGER DAVIES TALK 08:36, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, that user needs to be alerted to the relevant sections of MOS—and perhaps even this discussion. Rv wars over varieties of English are really tiresome. Tony (talk) 10:29, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Done that. I still it would do no harm if the intro were explicit. --ROGER DAVIES TALK 11:42, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

text: (For the main arguments in a nutshell, see talk:Mary Wollstonecraft and Talk:Mary Wollstonecraft/Archive 3#National spellings.) The issue is not writing in AmEng but subsequent ring-fencing against edits into BrEng, which has been a feature of - and regular cause of complaint in - these articles since February. Effectively, any changes need to be negotiated with Awadewit or Kaldari who will not consent to BrEng spelling changes. To put this into perspective, these articles are written in Standard ("high") English with AmEng spellings, and typically only a dozen or so words, out of around 5000 are effected. There are also at least 20 spin-offs articles on British topics in AmEng. It is a good example of how refusal to accept an across-the-board guideline, based by years of consensus, leads to divisive debates. This will only escalate when the replacement Jane Austen article in AmEng goes online. I have every respect for Awadewit's scholarship. --ROGER DAVIES TALK 12:22, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not sure why you think this will escalate when the Austen article is posted. We are going to have that article "translated" into BE, as I mentioned at Talk:Mary Wollstonecraft. Please don't misrepresent the situation. Thanks. Awadewit | talk 18:53, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Misrepresent!? Harsh words. Your mention was made less than 30 minutes before I posted here and I simply hadn't seen it.--ROGER DAVIES TALK 06:49, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think they were harsh. You assumed that we were going to post the Austen article in AE without even asking us first. You represented the events you described as inevitable when in fact you had taken no steps to discover whether or not they were going to occur. To me, it looked you were automatically assuming bad faith. But, hopefully that is all behind us. I look forward to your transformation of the Austen page when it is complete. Awadewit | talk 07:23, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Let's just agree to disagree on this? Public squabbling will just make us both look silly. Yes, I do look forward to working on it so, um, more power to your pen.--ROGER DAVIES TALK 07:39, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

text: The Jane Austen replacement article will not "go on-line" in American English. The few of us who are working on this are all North Americans (as far as I know) and are working on the draft in American English for our own convenience. We've been discussing for almost two weeks (independent of this discussion) the need to bring someone in just before posting to convert the article to British English, and that is what will be done. (Quotations of course will be in the language in which they were published.) We're certainly sensitive to the issues and are not interested in giving offense, only in completing our work efficiently. The temperature of these discussions is much too high, especially given the WP injunction to assume good faith. Simmaren 02:14, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Excellent news! Absolutely agree, especially about assuming good faith. --ROGER DAVIES TALK 06:49, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Intro section 

message: This has been proposed (under the working title Wikipedia:Use of flags in articles and some others) since April 2007 (and was "officially proposed" at WP:VPP more recently, with plenty of helpful feedback and virtually no opposition). I was about to go put  on it, but thought I'd let folks here know before hand in case anyone here hasn't seen it yet.  The only bone of contention I know of at present is that WP:ELG conflicts with WP:MOSFLAG in a few ways. Discussion about that is ongoing, and I don't think has any bearing on whether the general material in WP:MOSFLAG has consensus. It's a dispute over whether the most general language in WP:MOSFLAG would also cover roadsign icons (I think it does; it was certainly intended to cover any such usage of symbols and seals especially their abuse as image cruft – and especially especially in the main prose of articles rather than in tables and lists – though much of the detailed material is flag-specific). Anyway, that aside, WP:FLAG is ready to roll as far as I can determine. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 01:56, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Other editors have now designated it a guideline, after zero complaints or concerns were raised, and I've added it to .  A question has arisen about whether to summarize and link to WP:MOSFLAG in WP:MOS the way we do with some other MOS subguidelines. Opinions? — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 18:11, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Manual of Style (flags)]] 

message: Back on 28 September I posted a merge tag on MOSHEAD, but neglected to post a corresponding tag here; I've now done this. The Headings subpage contained little extra information to what was already here, and the recent overhaul of the first two sections (Now "Article titles, headings and sections") has made this redundancy clearer. All that remains is MOSHEAD's little point about floating the table of contents, which in any case links to Help:Section#Floating the TOC. I've suggested that MOSHEAD be deleted in about a week's time. Tony (talk) 11:36, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Go for it. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 19:38, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Just noticed also that parts of Wikipedia:Guide to writing better articles are also redundant with this part of MOS, and even with itself! (Guidance on things like lead sections, headings, etc., appears in two widely separated places at that page.) Also, if it is designated part of the MOS it should probably be proposed for rename to Wikipedia:Manual of Style (writing better articles).  However, my overall sense of the purpose of that document is getting more hazy.  I don't see that it actually serves any purpose, as it mostly just regurgitates the rest of the MOS in piecemeal fashion. Different problem, that the one this topic is really about, I guess, and better discussed over at its talk page; just wanted to flag these issues as a mental sticky note. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 19:53, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: <Sigh>. That page has little to do with style, in the sense of WP:MOS, and covers that better than we do here. Excommunicate it from   by all means, but please do leave it alone. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:49, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposal to merge MOSHEAD with this page 

message: See merge and rename proposals at end of Wikipedia talk:Trivia sections. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 20:46, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Some further input would be of use there. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 19:27, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[WP:TRIVIA]] big cleanup proposed 

message: The Images section doesn't say anything about panoramas, which are possible using template:wide image (see Denver, Colorado for two examples).  Do we want to make a definitive statement in MOS about use of full width panoramas?  I've started a thread at talk:Denver, Colorado#Panoramas? about the ones that are there, but it seems like a broader issue. -- Rick Block (talk) 00:57, 16 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Panoramas? 

message: Yes I know they both show the Union Jack, (and I figured no one would object to my changes, as a result). Yet I'm being disputed and reverted, the flagicon link should be flagicon|UK (respecting a British boxers full nationality), not flagicon|GBR which does not. The last time I checked, Northern Ireland was included in the UK. GoodDay 14:10, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Dispute has ended, I was unaware of IOC and ISO codes. GoodDay 21:35, 17 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: [[List of current world boxing champions]]

message: The link "How Users Read on the Web" contains lots of interesting data, but hello, no reference to the study (there is a link to an eye-movement study at the bottom, but who knows what that is). I'd like to be presented with a few details of the study on that page.
Then we're confronted with a link to an invitation to buy, clothed in an academic reference to a "conference": "Full-day tutorial on content usability and writing for the Web at the User Experience 2007 conference in Las Vegas and Barcelona".
It's a pity, but I don't think this link should be on MOS. Any thoughts? Tony (talk) 01:34, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I disagree. The author is a well-known author on web usability, and has published several books on the topic. The fact that he has some advertising on his website has nothing to do with the usefulness of the article for the purposes of linking from the MOS. He did the study himself, so I don't understand what you think should be referenced there. Sure, it's not written like a full-blown academic paper, but it can still be a useful guideline. --Itub 11:11, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for letting us know that he did the research himself. It needs to be transparent on the page. I have no confidence in the data, and just what the data means is quite unclear from the page. Link it from some other page if you're keen, but not MOS. Tony (talk) 13:18, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It's quite funny how that study proved itself. Their conclusion was: users don't really read; they just skim. And the proof is that, had you actually read the entire page, you would have noticed the parts where he said what they did (search for "we") and what the data means (click on "measured usability"). --Itub 13:28, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry, call me conservative, call me old-fashioned, but "we" doesn't cut it. Who's "we"? Our readers deserve a proper, formal reference. What kind of sample was this? It probably isn't, but this could all be kitchen science, and we have to work hard to get to the bottom of it, at some further linked page, I suppose. The page itself needs to convince otherwise. It is not the kind of authoritative reference that should be staring out from WP's MOS. Tony (talk) 15:39, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Legibility" subsection contains link to unreferenced data and advertising 

message: Most editors feel the revised wording reflects what we already do and provides a simpler way of resolving disputes than the previous version. With the exception of Gene Nygaard, who has now been blocked for incivility and disruptive editing, I think there is a broad consensus to adopt this wording. Thanks to everybody who commented on this. Tim Vickers 17:05, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Summary of discussion

message: There aren't any rules on bolding. We should reach a consensus on these rules. LuisGomez111 20:31, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: There are, at WP:MOSBOLD#Boldface. --PEJL 20:35, 20 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: And that page is about to be merged with MOS, yes? I see that its guideline on "Words as words" still sings from the old song-sheet. But there seems little point now in changing it now. Tony (talk) 01:50, 21 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Bolding Rules

message: Charon's status as a satellite of Pluto is rather uncertain. I do not mind the example much as it stands now, but perhaps it would be better if it could be changed to one which might produce fewer disputes in the future? Waltham, The Duke of 15:42, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think anybody would object if you just changed it to an example of your choice. Phaunt 21:28, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This remains to be seen; I have now changed the example. Thank you for your prompt response, Phaunt. Waltham, The Duke of 22:40, 26 October 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Celestial bodies|Charon as a moon]] 

message: Comment: No, it is not a good idea. This project page is getting too long as it is. The edit section even warns people: "This page is 108 kilobytes long". If we merge other articles into it, it might collapse, and all of the information on fixing articles to meet Wikipedia's quality standards would be lost. Wilhelmina Will 00:28, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: They might, but they will wonder whether it's technically true that MOS might collapse from size. I have always understood the size limits to apply for the sake of the readability of our "normal" articles. One would expect a MOS—a highly segemented one at that—to be large. I think it's still short for a MOS. In any case, SMcCandlish has suggested that the now-defunct MOSHEAD be simply redirected here rather than being deleted; it contains no information that is not either here or at other policy or how-to pages, and is now much less well written than the equivalent sections here. Tony (talk) 01:09, 27 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Wilhelmina has redirected the page; thanks to her. Tony (talk) 09:45, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

text: The countervailing view is that the more MOS subpages there are the fewer editors who know about them.  Tony is right that the size "limit" (it's not really a limit but a suggestion) is about the readability of topical articles.  MOS is an internal reference work, our editors are generally more patient at reading than our general-public readership, and MOS is really meant to be referred to in looking for specific things - few literally read it from top to bottom. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 21:11, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bad idea, this whole merging business. 

message: I believe one of the example pages in our project article needs disambiguating.
The current text is 
*Generally, right-alignment is preferred to left- or center-alignment. (Example: Race).
I believe this possibly should be disambiguated to:
*Generally, right-alignment is preferred to left- or center-alignment. (Example: Race (classification of human beings)).
Alice.S 08:36, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Just do it, and better yet, link to a specific diff, since the layout of the page could change. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 21:05, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Images 

message: I was looking at an article tonight that seemed to be sacrificing readability in order to adhere to the 'subject bolded/nearest the beginning of the sentence' structure. Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy is the article.
"The Scott Thomas Beauchamp controversy concerns the publication of a series of diaries..."
is the start of the lede, which is awkward.
Now, I know if the title is descriptive, it doesn't need to be placed/bolded, but I'm also wondering if it might be acceptable to improve the language of the sentence by saying something like:
"Scott Thomas Beauchamp caused controversy after the publication of a series of diaries..."
That is less strained linguistically, but splitting the subject even by one word might not be the best option, either (the whole article needs a rewrite, it just reminded me that I'd hit a similar article a few days ago, and also thought that the language sounted awkward, for the same reason; often the subject, even while a noun, just doesn't fit nicely into the format. Unlike a couple days ago, I had time to ask this today ;-) )--Thespian 08:51, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't mind the wording of the first option (looks better than the suggested replacement). I note that it's a different tense, too. At the same time, I'm all for lattitude when it comes to this bolding thing. Tony (talk) 13:34, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah; I absolutely would prefer to keep the subject together if possible, but it's just so awkward and stilted on this page. I may well find a better way of stating that, while keeping the whole subject together, but the first one as it stands has a feel of a paper turned in on a subject the student doesn't really care about. As to tense, I'd be rewriting the whole thing, so that doesn't bother me as much; I think that the second is more encyclopedic because the first has a more 'current' feel to it (using 'concerns', of ambiguous tense, with 'caused', which is past tense). Thanks for replying, --Thespian 18:47, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: But again, why is the first one awkward (given that it should be "was")? Tony (talk) 23:42, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

text: Concur with Tony.  Keep the article title phrase together and same as article title.  We can live with a little alleged awkwardness.  If the awkwardness is real, then it calls for either a rewrite of the sentence (e.g. something other than "concerns..." - I'm not sure that a "controvery" "concerns" anything.  My cat's misbehavior concerns me, but I am both animate and sapient.  The empty food bowl concerns my cat, who is animate and while not sapient is thinking on a level, emotional, and instinctual.  A controvery is inanimate, and unthinking, so it can't concern itself with anything.  Where the agency of a sapient party can be conveyed by their inanimate creation, "concern" can also be used, e.g. my paper concerns gluons and muons.  But that isn't the case with a controversy. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 20:58, 7 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Another first-sentence question (re: bolding) 

message: Do we have a guideline about what types of templates can be used as headers? - Peregrine Fisher 01:33, 8 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This is an example of what's being discussed I think. . Personally I think it's very ugly, and non-encyclopedic seeming. We're not espn.com - cohesion 16:20, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Templates as headers 

message: Please archive this page's old threads and include this and similar comments in the archiving (at least the last two times, the "please archive" topics have remained, which is kind of silly, wasting bandwidth/RAM in the very name of saving it.)
This page is getting so long that it is somewhat (about 50/50 so far for me) causing Firefox/WinXP to crash (totally, taking all windows/tabs with it) when this page is edited or even diffed as a whole unit (this happens automatically any time there is an edit confict, so "just edit one topic" is not an adequate answer).  I'd do it myself, but I've already had 4 crashes here when I try to do anything other than edit/create one specific topic and get lucky enough to not have an edit conflict. If this is hitting me, with a 1yo snazzy Dell laptop, it must be wreaking untold carnage among people running old, piecemeal machines with 1MB of RAM or worse. Please archive with extreme prejudice or we'll just be back in crash city in a few days.  I.e., if there are no new comments of substance, then file the entire thread.  This probably means auto-archive with some software on the first run then human judgement to archive even more.  WT:MOS is high-traffic and then some. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont]  ‹(-¿-)› 15:22, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Just for reference, this page has never caused me a problem under IE 7 (on a machine older than yours; with XP SP2 and 1 Gb of RAM). Why don't you give IE 6 or 7  a quick fire-up and see if you still get the same problems? If not, perhaps you can upgrade Firefox?140.168.69.130 02:15, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

text: Formatting the index for each new archive is tedious enough; sorting topics by theme is masochistic. Strad 23:42, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Please archive