Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers/Archive 93

message: Many, too many problems and dicussions on this and nearby pages result from the wishy-washy, arbitrary and often random rule which decides on orthography, style of dates, system of measurement etc. to use in a given article. Geographic relation and relevance is taken into account, first and major authors, voodoo sometimes and, of course, the loudest and most persistent voices in Talk.
We could avoid, to a sane degree at least, these constantly returning battles, which often get lost in minor details, if we chose one simple style guide once and for all articles. This ruleset would not have exceptions that creep in just to cater for someone’s assumed or possible feelings; only well-founded ones would stay, e.g. such helping disambiguation.
To achieve this, we would have to concentrate on the lowest common denominator among the global readership (or the preference of the majority where no common denominator exists) and on reason. The authorship came second, because the wiki principle allows the individual to diverge as long as the community has a common goal. The goal is a coherent and consistent encyclopaedia of non-pareil quality and quantity.
There is no established form of International English yet, so we would have to create one, probably based on a select one. There really are not that many issues and they are all resolvable without one current variant looking like the major contributor. So maybe we would write analyse the color of the encyclopaedia at the center or analyze the colour of the encyclopedia at the centre or somehow else.
There is an International System of Units, however. It makes sense, though, to keep definitions in different systems intact. Associated standards might not all be applicable to Wikipedia; perhaps an adjective like 8cm instead of eight-centimetre serves our needs best, a small non-breaking space is still problematic on the Web and we use units outside formulas, where italic letters indicate variables, as well.
In numerical dates only an incremental or decremental order makes sense. With alphabetic month for prose, the parts of inversed order should be separated by a divisor, i.e. a comma, or maybe they should not be used at all.
And so forth.
We do not have to follow the established rules for books and newspapers too closely, because those are made with certain restrictions in mind, that do not apply in most usecases of WP (being a huge hypertext), e.g. brevity in thin columns or consequences from sequential reading and looks before logic.
Think about it and have a happy New Year (and new year), Christoph Päper (talk) 14:31, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Taking a step back to reflect 

message: I have some major problems with this attempt to impose standards which may be unrealistic. To me the purpose of an encyclopedia is to record and represent the world. If we accept the definition cited at Encyclopedia then we need to use terms, units etc which have meaning for the readers.
I am not aware of any reliable profiles of the readership of wikipedia (that would be an interesting project in its own right) and therefore it is difficult to be sure what their needs/desires might be. I suspect that most readers look at UK topics if they live here or are considering visiting, or want to learn about what the UK is like, and therefore we should be representing this. I would agree with the comment above that many people in the UK can cope with both metric and imperial units, and that readers from elsewhere in the world can adapt if provided with alternatives and links to further info (eg wikilinking the first occurrence of a unit in an article).
The world related to units in the UK is not standardised it is "messy"  and therefore I feel it is reasonable for wikipedia to reflect that messiness. To give a few examples: This morning I
*Bought a container with 1.44 litres of milk
*Received a letter from the National Blood Service asking for a pint of my blood (as long as I'm healthy & weigh more than 7st 12lbs)
*Was asked by my 18 yr old (normally at university doing a science degree) about the fuel consumption of a 2nd hand car in miles per gallon
*Had to find trainers for my 8 yr old who has just got Shoe size 2 (UK sizes) but her new ones are labelled in EU & US sizes.
I could go on - but that quick snippet of daily life illustrates the reality (not necessarily old-speak) and I would argue against the imposition by those who may not have as much insight into the UK of a simple metric for everything rule.
I don't have a problem with "For UK-related, the main units are either metric or imperial (consistently within an article)." and have taken several articles to GA & FA using that guidance.— Rod talk 09:24, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm with Rod here on this one. The UK's units are a terrible, even politicised mess. I myself however never saw any problem with the previous wording. If the units are consistent and have a suitable conversion, I didn't see any harm, or even any objection from British users. -- Jza84 · (talk) 13:04, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I think there is plenty of agreement here. Even in the examples quoted, there are nuances. The public-facing word for blood taken is 'pint', but blood is officially measured in 'units' (a variable amount of about 400 to 500 ml) or explicitly in ml. The public facing words on road signs are non-metric, but everything else with regard to road design and construction is metric. My only concern with the guideline is with the term 'consistency'. It might be misunderstood by non-UK (or even UK) editors. For example, Pan Am Flight 103 is inconsistent in its use of km, nautical miles and miles but some of the inconsistency might be reasonable if it can be attributed to the source data. Lightmouse (talk) 19:12, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

text: Pardon my recent absence with illness, but I am not at all sure there is 'plenty of agreement' save that we all notice that currently there is a lack of  standardisation with regard to units of measurement in the UK. Some of us want metric first, some either/or consistently, some don't seem to mind a sort of vox pop usage. I'll come back with a few thoughts soon Insh Allah. Ben MacDuiTalk/Walk 18:25, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

text: I agree with Rodw's remarks here, and I have always taken what Jza84 wrote as read. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that when I did A levels, the education system was in a process of transition so that  I did Physics using SI units, Chemistry using cgs units, and Applied Mathematics using Imperial units. "In the head conversion" is not a problem with me, but I appreciate that others may not find it so easy. If I were to become more prescriptive, however, I would definitely like us all to move to total use of SI units, but the reality (which, once again, I must state is not "old speak", much as I would like it to become so) seems to act so as to restrict us, and we must try to reflect reality here.  DDStretch  (talk) 11:04, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I fear if we persist with the extant wording with its inherent ambiguity, we'll be dredging this one up again in a matter of months. "UK-related" and "officially used" are formulations that are going to continue to cause consternation. As a guideline it's wishy-washy enough that non-UK editors will struggle to interpret it; particularly in applying it as a preferred style for FACs, GACs &c. At the risk of laboring the point, can we not give this one a final, concerted shove, to see if we can get the MOS a little closer to a workable solution? My tuppence is reproduced for convenience: For articles in which the subject matter is principally sited in the United Kingdom the appropriate unit of measurement is metric save in the case of those instances where non-metric units of measurement are consistently applied by officials in the relevant field in the United Kingdom to which the subject matter relates. 05:53, 14 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Advantages and disadvantages of "standardisation"

message: Do single years in dates of birth and death have to be linked? The examples suggest they do. Epbr123 (talk) 18:30, 23 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: See the Archive D4, section "Link only years?" (there's a link at the top of this page) from May 2007. The discussion was inconclusive. The best point was that it's more useful to link ancient years. I agree, if you link a birth year of 1066, I'm not likely to  unlink it, but I'll probably delink 2006. Chris the speller (talk) 19:47, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The reason I ask is because of this edit. From the examples in Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Dates of birth and death, I can see why some users might be confused about whether single year birth/death dates should be linked. Epbr123 (talk) 01:17, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I am not "confused" thank you you very much. My response is here. Cheers, CP 18:20, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Dates of birth and death 

message: The MoS currently notes:
:
Incorrect	October, 1976
Correct  	October 1976
However, if one adds, say, December 27 2007 to an article and saves the page, it gets auto-formatted to:
::December 27, 2007     <--- note the comma
Is this a known issue? If so, is it going to be changed to match the MoS, or is the MoS going to be changed to match the behavior? Right now the inconsistency is a little confusing. :) -- Hux (talk) 03:20, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No, go read that section again. USAF practices do not apply to Wikipedia, and WP:AIR defers to this guideline.  Tony1's statement is correct. Chris the speller (talk) 01:15, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dates: MoS differs from what actually gets displayed 

message: I don't know if this topic has come up yet...
...But about sports seasons like in the Jim Boeheim article. Specifically the notable players section, since the years overlap each other, how should they be displayed?
*Option 1: Use the year the season started in (eg: 2002-2003) Or...
*Option 2: Use only the year the season ended such as the 2004 NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Tournament article.
Salisbury Steak (complaint dept. - contribs) 20:29, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates_and numbers)#Longer periods says "A slash may be used to indicate regular defined yearly periods that do not coincide with calendar years (the financial year 1993/94)." Jɪmp 21:05, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: So then for a players career the correct way would be: (from 1993/94-1996/97)...Thanks, I must have missed that when I was looking at it. Salisbury Steak (complaint dept. - contribs) 01:02, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Sports seasons that overlap years

message: Since when is it acceptable to put AD after the year? I was just pointed here because I changed the illiterate "471 AD" to the correct "AD 471" and someone changed it back, saying the Manual of Style allows it. Quite apart from the CE vs. AD issue, can we at least agree that if AD is going to be used, it should at least be used correctly? (Of course AD comes after the name of a century; "2nd century AD" is the only phrasing possible.) —Angr If you've written a quality article... 19:01, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: We could agree to put AD before the date.  Or we could agree to put AD after the date, a now-common usage.  I see no reason for specifying either; I'd say leave it alone unless the change is being made for purposes of consistency in an article.  Gene Nygaard (talk) 01:43, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: If we were writing some kind of textbook to show people what usages are acceptable, listing two choices would be fine. That is not the purpose of a style manual for a single publication; the purpose of this style manual is to choose among the acceptable usages in order to make Wikipedia more cohesive. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 04:01, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Position of AD 

message: The term 'SI' is officially defined by the SI authority as "the modern form of the metric system". Thus for most purposes in the last few decades the terms 'SI' and 'metric system' are synonyms for units under the control of the SI authority. I know that there is a bit of fuzziness when it comes to legacy articles and the belief of people that some non-SI units are metric. However, the MoS uses both terms as synonyms. Certainly, I can detect no difference in intent between either use.
I was going to replace each instance of the term 'SI' with 'metric'. Or vice versa. It will not add or remove any constraint on editors, it will merely make the text more consistent. What do people think about using a single term rather than both? Lightmouse (talk) 16:19, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't really have an opinion on your question, but if you're going to do some updating, the page should mention the International System of Units by name, instead of tossing around the "SI" acronym without being clear about who's in charge of this stuff.   -/- Warren 16:30, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I agree with Warren that "SI" should be spelt out, at least on first use.  I don't know whether "SI units" and "metric units" are used synonymously in the MOSNUM text (it would not surprise me), but it is important to distinguish between them in general.  Crissov recently made a well argued call for reflection on whether SI should be adopted more widely.  He did not say (and I believe did not mean) "metric".  Having said all that, I trust Lightmouse to make a sensible judgement here.  If you think it's an improvement, be bold and do it. Thunderbird2 (talk) 17:41, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, "metric" is broader in general than the "International System of Units", a limited subset of the former. There is also the set of units which are "acceptable for use with SI", to further complicate things (the liter, for example, is not and never will be an SI unit, but it is acceptable for use with SI). Let's not have any foolish consistency in the MoS, but rather determine which term is appropriate in each case.  Gene Nygaard (talk) 16:51, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

text: A peek at :Category:Non-SI metric units might help some people better understand this; note especially the subcategory :Category:CGS units and its contents as well.  Gene Nygaard (talk) 16:55, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Should we tidy up usage of the terms 'SI' and 'metric'? 

message: On a related note, consider improvements to .  -- SEWilco (talk) 17:33, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  related Template:Daterange 

message: OK, you've convinced me there's no significant advantage in permitting the space as alternative to the mid-dot.  Does anyone object to this?
* When units are combined by multiplication, use a middle dot to separate them (e.g., for newton-metre, use the symbol N·m, not Nm, N-m,  N m or N•m).  
Thunderbird2 (talk) 13:57, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Further revised counter-proposal

message: # Why do such little things generate such protracted discussion?
# I added it because of an edit changing my usage of a middle dot · to a big ol' • dot.  I am pretty sure the latter is not recommended by any standard or style guide.
# I based this recommendation on the usage in kilowatt-hour, the standards, and what I've seen as the consensus of Wikipedia editors over several years.
# I italicized the units because every other unit in this section is italicized when used as an example.
# We should stick with standards unless they are really out there.  This is just a style guide, after all.  Anyone is free to ignore it.
# "Descriptive" in this context doesn't mean "describing the way units are used in conversations at the mall" or even "the way units are typically used in Wikipedia articles by people who don't care"; it means "a generalization of the outcomes of many independent Wikipedia discussions on this subject".
# I personally don't like the space variant, and it will be interpreted as "they left out the slash" by too many people. — Omegatron 02:07, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Oh geez 

message: I guess I figured it out by looking at the edit-warring between Crissov and Avraham (Avi) about those numbers as used in an example in the Which system to use subheading under the Units of measurement header, it was just a very unexplanatory subject header here with no explanation of where those numbers were coming from in the original posting here.
It has nothing to do with the rule being illustrated there.  It has no more relevance there than it does up above in the very next subsection, Conversions. No, take that back.  It is a change that needs to be made in the "Conversions" subsection, with its own examples.  Changing it in the "Which system to use" subsection instead borders on the frivolous.
I agree with that ultimate change, that 23 mi = 37 km are better than either the 10 mi = 16 km or the 25 mi = 40 km used before.  But it doesn't really improve that section at all. It does nothing whatsoever to clarify the points being made there.  It only really has any relevance with respect to totally unrelated rules as to the precision of measurements, a topic relevant to the "Conversions" subsection but unrelated to the "Which system to use" subsection.  Gene Nygaard (talk) 11:33, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It indeed doesn’t improve the section much but at least a little, that’s why I marked my initial edit as minor and didn’t expect reversion (or discussion). Christoph Päper (talk) 14:54, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Choice of numbers for use in our MoS examples

message: I am involved in an argument with another editor about the interpretation of the above:
:per WP:DATE:"Wikipedia has articles on days of the year, years, decades, centuries and millennia. Link to one of these pages only if it is likely to deepen readers' understanding of a topic." While there will undoubtedly some dates which require linking, I believe the vast majority do not warrant linking. The other editor contends that WP:DATE says that dates should be linked for autoformatting.  A date is a unit that includes all three of day, month, and year, and that it never says that a date should not be linked. However, I'm afraid I really don't get the distinction. What is the consensus interpretation on that "rule"? Ohconfucius (talk) 08:23, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: This is the subject of heated debate. I will soon launch a proposal to make the auto-lemon optional. See above and archives of this page for copious discourse on why. I've held off pending the development and implementation of a solution to the coupling of autoblotch and linking, at Bugzilla, but I'm not confident. Tony (talk) 09:53, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Tony, you are in a distinct minority in regard to not formatting dates so preferences work.  But like you, I think it is senseless that Bugzilla complaints for years haven't led to a better way of implementing autoformatting independent of linking.  Gene Nygaard (talk) 16:34, 5 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: That's your opinion, is it? Tony (talk) 14:45, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Wikilinking and autoformatting

message: There is discussion here about improved markup for the hard space (non-breaking space, non-break space,  , etc.). Some of us are working towards an important proposal for this essential element in good editing (relevant for proper formatting of numbers with their associated units, formulae in mathematics and the sciences, and many other purposes). It usually escapes attention because spaces are invisible. See some of the earlier discussion at WT:MOS.
Editors still have the opportunity to vote for their preferred markup for the hard space. But voting ends soon: about 24 hours from the time of this posting, at 00:03, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Markup for hard space: voting ends soon! 

message: The hard-space working group has voted on preferred markup. See the results and join the discussion HERE. All editors are welcome, of course. The page has been trimmed and archived. Get oriented by reading at the top. The current agenda item is highlighted in yellow.
These discussions and votes do not aim at "official" status, but they will feed into a big proposal that we will make to the whole Wikipedia community.
– Noetica♬♩ Talk 08:58, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hard space: results of the vote on preferred markup 

message: Feedback is requested on the following problem.  The text "N·m" (the symbol for a newton metre) appears in my internet browser as 
*letter "N" and letter "m" separated by a black square, like a check box, about half the size of the letter "N",
whereas it should be
*letter "N" and letter "m" separated by a middle dot.
I am not looking for a solution to this problem (though I would be grateful for one nevertheless).  Rather, I am trying to establish how widespread it is.  Which of the following do you see here: "N·m" ?
:a) a black square between N and m
:b) a black dot between N and m
:c) something else (please specify)
Thanks Thunderbird2 (talk) 09:30, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It shows as a correct middot on my IE7. −Woodstone (talk) 10:30, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It's a correct middot for me too (Firefox on Windows XP, using Verdana as my standard display font). —Angr If you've written a quality article... 15:50, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It shows as a middle dot for me, using Windows XP SP 2, with two browsers, IE7 and Firefox. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 20:02, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Same for me. EdChem (talk) 12:14, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

text: And have you changed the default browser font, encoding preferences, or the regional settings of your operating system? For the record, it works for me on WinXP x64 edition, with the latest Firefox or IE7, with the default settings for the UK, except the font set to Arial Unicode MS. – Kieran T (talk) 20:19, 7 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I use MS Internet Explorer v6.0, with Windows Millenium. I haven't (knowingly) changed any settings or preferences. (At work I have Firefox with Windows XP; it works fine there) Thunderbird2 (talk) 10:22, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Shows as a mid dot on my UK default Safari 3.0 on Mac OS X 4 Dick G (talk) 21:23, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  appearance of N·m on your browser 

message: I added an extra bullet to the units section regarding citing sources. It stated: Measurements should be accompanied by a proper citation of the source using   tags and a citation template such as  from :Category:Citation templates.  That was disliked for the reasoning that "citation TEMPLATES are not required; any method of formatting citations is allowed".  Therefore, I made the bullet much more generic and inserted as: Measurements should be accompanied by a proper citation of the source using a method described at the style guide for citation.  My question is: shouldn't we have a preferred method of citing a source for units of measurement?  If the the Harvard style is used it could result in something that looks clumsy or cluttered (for lack of a better words).  Does anyone have any thoughts on this?  —MJCdetroit (talk) 16:35, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the second version of the edit is a definite improvement. I don't think we can have a different method for measurements than for the rest of the article. There seems to be no hope of establishing a uniform system of citation for Wikipedia, but if I were choosing a system for a paper with lots of measurements, I would choose Harvard. This is because the superscripted numbers used with notes might be confused with an exponent. --Gerry Ashton (talk) 16:58, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm happy with the change and with the use of "Harvard"; strictly, Wikipedia goes a bit beyond Harvard as ISBN's are added for books, but that is not a bad thing.Pyrotec (talk)  —Preceding comment was added at 17:21, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: More senseless instruction creep.  Gene Nygaard (talk) 01:03, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Senseless instruction creep is the insistance on this or that citation style but I'd say that (at least generally) there is sense in the insistance on a citation of some sort but this latter is not a case of instruction creep since it's already policy, it's simply been given an explicite mention here, which ain't really a bad thing. Jɪmp 03:23, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Citation of some sort is no different for measurements than for anything else.  The rules for that aren't in the province of the MoS.  It's instruction creep for the MoS to deal with it.  Gene Nygaard (talk) 05:11, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Then it's an existant instruction creeping in where it doesn't belong. Jɪmp 08:37, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Extra bullet regarding citation in units 

message: See User:Omegatron/Date formatting for examples and explanation of the "ISO as markup" proposal.  Please comment. — Omegatron 05:16, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  ISO dates as wiki markup for formatting 

message: Just a quick one, hopefully, as I can't see this discussed on the page anywhere. Ignoring for now the merits or otherwise of date linking, what is the preferred method of linking when the exact date is not known? e.g. should I use November 2007 or November 2007 - both of which return valid articles? Thanks in advance, Steve T  • C 08:48, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Where you don't have the full date, then the answer is neither.  Unless the month or year has some special relevance to the article, and following the link would be useful for the reader.  Date linking is used, where the date hasn't got special relevance, only for auto-formatting according to user preferences.  Since auto-formatting just controls whether, for example, "9 January 2008" or "January 9, 2008" is displayed, there's nothing for it to do when you don't have the full date.  So, to answer again:  neither. HTH. Carre (talk) 09:12, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Many thanks; that was indeed helpful. Best regards, Steve T  • C 09:31, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: And give the full auto-lemon a miss, too; your readers will appreciate not having silly blue blotches everywhere. Tony (talk) 14:18, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Please stop, Tony. You have not achieved consensus for your positions on this matter. Rmhermen (talk) 20:19, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I will not stop. Read the text of MOS carefully and you'll see problems in enforcing what you call a mandatory function. Tony (talk) 00:05, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Question about linking 

message: :: Her son died at the age of 1.
:: Her son died at the age of one.
: 
Are such usages as the one above mentioned here?  It seems as if this should be another exception to the rule of spelling out one-digit ages. Michael Hardy (talk) 23:57, 11 January 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: If we are not talking about arithmetic (or addresses), then I'd been led to believe that numbers of ten or less should be speltout as words not written as numbers; e.g. one, not 1; whereas 11 or 12 was OK. On that basis the preference would be Her son died at the age of one., not Her son died at the age of 1.. I'm not sure whether it is in MoS, or where?Pyrotec (talk) 01:17, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  One-digit ages