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The Scriptorium is Wikisource's community discussion page. Feel free to ask questions or leave comments. You may join any current discussion or start a new one. Project members can often be found in the #wikisource IRC channel webclient. For discussion related to the entire project (not just the English chapter), please discuss at the multilingual Wikisource.

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This section can be used by any person to communicate Wikisource-related and relevant information; it is not restricted. Generally announcements won't have discussion, or it will be minimal, so if a discussion is relevant, often add another section to Other with a link in the announcement to that section.

BOT approval requests

User:Wikisource-bot

At my request, John Vandenberg is going to recreate the previous functions of user:JVbot/patrol whitelist in toollabs based wikisource-bot. I also plan to get some basic voluntary archiving available, predominantly for user pages. The bot will be using pywikibot. To do these functions, we seek the approval of the community to undertake some tests for evaluation. The bots would be persistant, and automated in that functionality. — billinghurst sDrewth 12:07, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Ran some archiving runs using archivebot.py and some liitle issues with captcha they work fine. So not sure if anyone wishes to set up an archiving on their talk page, if they do, I can some more tests. I will set up some instructions on the bot user page (for the moment). Wikisource-bot (talk) 13:22, 31 August 2014 (UTC)

I added it on my talk page. But I do not talk too much, so not too much to archive ...--Mpaa (talk) 14:34, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

I have set the beast to run daily, now not sure whether our 'crats @Hesperian, Zhaladshar: want to wait until @John Vandenberg: gets the patrol component going or not. Noting that component will just patrol, not specifically edit. — billinghurst sDrewth 13:23, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

• I'd like a few members of the community saying yay or nay about having this bot before I flag it. To get that started off, I'll support giving this bot the flag. One question: will it only be used for archiving or will it have expanded functionality in the future?—Zhaladshar ^(Talk) 14:42, 6 September 2014 (UTC)

  @Zhaladshar: At the moment archiving and patrolling to takeover from the defunct JVBot (same script). I would hope that we can utilise this WMF account for additional tasks that the community needs run on an automated basis, without much (any?) intervention. More info about scope of existing scripts is at mw:Manual:Pywikibot/Scripts. I would see that any additional tasks will be requested here, and added to the scope of the bot with approval of the community. — billinghurst sDrewth 11:30, 7 September 2014 (UTC)

•  Support As I am involved in pywikibot, if one notices something strange with edits done by this bot, I can assist. There is also the possibility to open tickets in bugzillaPhabricator (Product pywikibot)--Mpaa (talk) 17:08, 6 September 2014 (UTC)
•  Support – As interested in creating database reports -- George Orwell III (talk) 03:28, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Help

• See Wikisource:Scriptorium/Help

Correspondence between Gandhi and Tolstoj

Dear Madam/Sir,

I am looking for facsimiles of letters (hand-)written bei Tolstoj and came upon the above correspondence. Can you advise whom I have to contact in order to purchase such facsimiles?

Thanks for your cooperation and reply.

Best regards from Germany,

Heidi Hacker

Separating columns

Does anyone know how to edit this table to separate selected columns with vertical lines? --EncycloPetey (talk) 20:04, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Done . Moondyne (talk) 22:40, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks!

Second question: On this page, why are the footnotes displaying above the table? The table needs to span two pages, so is there a way to correct this without using a klodgy work-around? --EncycloPetey (talk) 03:27, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

I was going to refer you to Help:Page_breaks#Tables_across_page_breaks, but upon review it does not explicitly cover this case; nor in fact do I think it is worded particularly clearly (or indeed even correctly—e.g. what are the leading {{nop}}s in the headers even achieving?) 121.216.68.33 04:15, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks! The simple fix makes sense. And yes, there are a lot of these special situations not covered anywhere here in writing as far as I know. --EncycloPetey (talk) 04:28, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

Oops. Upon further checking those "peculiarly placed" {{nop}}s were so documented by our own dear @Hesperian: thus. Perhaps he might be so kind as to reconfirm their placement? (i.e. should they appear at the end of the header blocks instead of at the top? Or are they in fact correct as shown and my interpretation faulty instead [in which case a more detailed explanation might be appreciated]) 101.175.176.10 06:23, 25 November 2014 (UTC) (Yes: I know, I was 121.216.68.33 above. Just blame PPPoA negatioation!)

Table syntax only works if "{|" etc. appear at the start of a line. Previously the templates and/or PHP code that were responsible for pulling a sequence of pages into a single page did not start each page on a new line, so table syntax would break whenever a page started with or within a table. The {{nop}}s were the solution to this. I have no idea whether or not they are still required. Hesperian 12:56, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

They are still required. However, following the instructions for spanning pages does not work as given; additional coding is needing, e.g. "|-". And the instructions don't handle the situation where there are both footnotes and a page-spanning table. Without an explanation of what the {{nop}} is doing, I had to ask for help in figuring this out. --EncycloPetey (talk) 15:07, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

{{nop}} gives information on what it does, which is basically be a placeholder while mediawiki does its iteration of presentation, and it is akin to the magic done for {{=}} and {{!}}.

If the instructions don't carry every permutation, then it is probably a situation that wasn't thought about at the time (so add it), or maybe all the edge cases made the instructions confusing (maybe add it to the pages about references), or there are other MW changes that have been made that have made for a new situation (so add it). To also note that there are a couple of variations to how to span tables, so what is provided there is one person's examples of what worked, rather than the single definitive means of how to do table spanning pages. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:44, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

requesting upload help

Hi,

Due to some unresolved technical issue at my end not been able to download and upload a bilingual book. A book called Marathi proverbs (1899) by Alfred Manwaring is mainly a translation book using english language available on archive .org. I am requesting help in getting the same uploaded at commons and en wikisource.

My further plan is to some how upadate and incorporate same at Marathi wikibooks Marathi language learning page in en wikibooks in course of time.

Thanks and regards

Mahitgar (talk) 07:26, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

@Mahitgar: From some research of sources the author was born 1855, and doesn't look to have died until 1950 which means that the work cannot go to Commons. Due to the multilingual nature of the work, to me it looks like it should be hosted at oldwikisource: due to the amount of mixture nature of the language through it, and with the work only being available at one site. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:30, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

England Birth[1]
Births Jun 1855
MANWARING Alfred Worthing 2b 261

England Death[2]
Deaths Mar 1950
Manwaring Alfred 94 Hastings 5h 339

My other sources are 1932 edition of Crockford's clerics that shows him as the author or the work, living in Sussex, and ordained in 1879 (which is usually when they are in early-mid 20s). 1911 England census has an Alfred Manwaring, a cleric, b.1855; and the 1861 census shows him the son of William (baker, grocer, postmaster) and Eliza in Broadwater, Sussex. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:30, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

The work's explanation and prose is mainly in English and geared for speakers of English. I think the work would be fine here, and would be better served by putting it here. Oldwikisource may have some works, but I've yet to ever see one of them. Their Main Page makes it look as if they don't host anything and the site is impossible to navigate. It would be better to not put up a work at all than to waste time hosting it there. --EncycloPetey (talk) 15:44, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: Thanks for your support in copyright status research. I searched Marathi leanguage sources but could not get any info in Marathi language.

I suppose he worked for Church Mission Society either in Nasik or Bombay region. this mention shows he was at Nasik and probaly refernce in this document may also be related to him. I found another of his title on line at this location.

Your last Sussex guess (son of William) seems to be nearest (but not sure). If we consider average 100 yrs life we shall need to calculate atleast to 1955. Indian copyright act brings books 60 yrs after death so the booke may come in public domain in indian some where in 1956 unless any previous death year gets confirmed. I do not know about UK copyright laws. So I suppose unless we get any more info it is safer to wait for another year (i.e. Jan 2016 per Indian copyright laws) before we upload the book.

About project sutabilty I gave thought and prefer en wikisource since it will be better to advert, seek and divert support of mr-wiki people at limited projects like en wikisource and mr wikisource for me. As such the said book is mainly in english and limited text in devnagari script.

Thanks again and seasons greetings

Mahitgar (talk) 07:03, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Creating a Page

Hi all, I'm trying to explore and help out in different Wikimedia projects. I stumbled across Wikisource and found it contained a library full of texts from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica. I've also found a website online here that contained all the texts from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica. I wanted to copy some articles into Wikisource but I don't know if this is correct.

For example, the first article in the ever 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica was about the A107. Wikisource doesn't have a page on it. So is it possible for me to create 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/A107 and copy and paste the text in? Thanks, TheQ Editor (talk) 20:59, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

While it is possible to copy and paste in text for the EB1911, we prefer to have the information proofread in the Page namespace, and transcluded in the article. For example, the article on Critias is transcluded from this page of Volume 7. The EB 1911 is one of the few organized projects here, with many editors. --EncycloPetey (talk) 15:13, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

CoI and own book (published by reputable source)

Hi all,

I am the author of Open Access and the Humanities, an open-access book itself under a CC BY-SA license and published by Cambridge University Press. I would be interested in knowing if WikiSource would be interested in having a copy/version and, if so, what I need to do to militate against conflict of interest. The book has been peer reviewed and published by a reputable entity, but I appreciate that I have biased placement as the author. I did, however, deliberately choose a BY-SA license so that inclusion in WikiSource and other such projects might be possible.

MartinPaulEve (talk) 11:06, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

It falls within our scope, and is therefore welcome here. As for conflict of interest, I should think that all we need is disclosure (achieved above) and continued mindfulness. Welcome aboard Martin. Hesperian 11:10, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Many thanks for the speedy response and warm welcome! I will wait for my account to become confirmed and will then work on this, including a disclosure on the talk page or another appropriate space. MartinPaulEve (talk) 11:45, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

formatting suggestions sought for inscriptions

How should I handle formatting for these inscriptions? Thanks, Londonjackbooks (talk) 01:04, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

If you think the last line being centered and the rest justified is worth capturing, there's a bit of formatting to handle that which works on some browsers, but not all. Prosody (talk) 01:14, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

I would like to keep it as true to the text as possible, but I would also like to keep it as simple as possible (and browser-friendly). I also would not know how to apply the coding/formatting based on the link you provided, being myself technically-challenged... Londonjackbooks (talk) 01:28, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, GO3. Londonjackbooks (talk) 14:39, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Accessing (.edu - type) Open Courseware Materials

Hi, I am currently experiencing a ton of DNS-issue related problems in accessing opencourseware content related to Utah Valley State College (specifically with accessing Joylin Namie's Sociocultural Anthropology course materials - ie. Podcasts), and would like some help. Where/how I can get the best help for these issues would be great!

On this site I tried a few of the links regarding accessing the content and recieved pages that were not available.

Please help! —unsigned comment by LliamShepherd (talk) .

The links that we have may be old, and no longer exist. If you are getting blocking errors, I would suggest that you talk to your ISP, there isn't much we can do for you. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:58, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Soft redirects to other Wikimedia sites

As I have exported most amended Law of the Republic of China as evolving works to Wikibooks, do we have soft redirects to other Wikimedia sites, please?--Jusjih (talk) 06:41, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

I would think that we would just link normally and state that they are at enWB. It is not impossible for us to have a Translation: ns page of a piece of law, so the portal page is a relevant page to keep. — billinghurst sDrewth 12:22, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

A broken redirect was left behind: Additional_Articles_of_the_Constitution_of_the_Republic_of_China_(2000). @Jusjih:, could you look into it?. Thanks.--Mpaa (talk) 21:07, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. I am adding soft redirects for long term.--Jusjih (talk) 08:18, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

When to use 'uc' template to transform text to uppercase

Under what circumstances would it be appropriate to use the {{uc}} template? This template transforms the given text to all capital letters -- for example: {{uc|example}} produces example.

Recently I've been proofreading/validation documents produced on a typewriter that use all uppercase headings, and have been concerned that maybe I've been doing it wrong by just writing the headings in all capitals instead of using the aforementioned template.

Any guidance would be appreciated. (There are similar templates {{lc}} (lowercase) and {{capitalize}} (first letter capitalized) that I similarly do not know the proper circumstances of, but which I've not had the opportunity to use to date.)

Best. -- Mukkakukaku (talk) 04:26, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

When should you use it? Never. Highlight example, copy it, paste it into a text editor: you get "example". Turns out it wasn't upper-case text at all, it was lower-case text masquerading as upper-case text. The template is evil. It should be deleted. Hesperian 06:00, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Disclaimer: some browsers are smart enough to push upper-case to the clipboard, so your mileage on my copy-paste demo may vary. I think my point stands. Hesperian 06:01, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

How does the 'evil' argument not equally condemn {{sc}}? {{sc|Example}} (Example) cuts/pastes as "Example", but it looks like E{{x-smaller|XAMPLE}} (EXAMPLE) which cut/pastes as "EXAMPLE". Not too sure where you are going with this argument? 121.218.57.230 06:50, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

"Example" is obviously styled, and I am comfortable with it decomposing to "Example" when that styling is removed. "EXAMPLE" has the appearance of unstyled text, it can easily be rendered using unstyled text, and I am not comfortable with it actually being completely different text with a surreptitious styling applied to it. Hesperian 00:28, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Not precisely a defence of this template, but there is a good case to be made for using the parser-function equivalent {{uc:example}} — which produces EXAMPLE — which does screen-scrape correctly and reliably as [EXAMPLE] — and that usage is within templates which may need to compare two strings in a case-insensitive fashion. Simply consistently uppercase/lowercase/capitalise both quantities to be compared (say) in a {{#ifeq:}} test.

For reference these parser function/magic keywords exist and produce results as shown:

1. {{uc:eXaMpLe}}: produces EXAMPLE;
2. {{lc:eXaMpLe}}: produces example;
3. {{lcfirst:eXaMpLe}}: produces eXaMpLe; and
4. {{ucfirst:eXaMpLe}}: produces EXaMpLe.

N.B. Functions 3 & 4 affect only the initial letter of the string, so to produce sentence capitalisation something akin to {{ucfirst:{{lc:eXaMpLe}}}} would be required (produces: Example as expected.) (Buried in "official" documentation about two-three screenfulls down from here: MW:Help:Magic_words#Formatting) AuFCL (talk) 10:04, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

I don't prescribe to the "never" scenario, I would say "hardly ever". My commentary is that I use it with some newspaper articles where the capitalisation has been made by the sub-editor, not the author. I use it as newspaper articles when they come back from search engines can look butt ugly. So I get the presentation form for the article, though the text as for a search engine. — billinghurst sDrewth 12:18, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Between Two Loves Title page and TOC

I just got finished proofreading the novel Between Two Loves. Now who wants to add the image at its title page and modify its table of contents? Fix the pages that mark a new chapter, particularly the quotes before the chapter starts? --Lo Ximiendo (talk) 10:43, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

How about the quoted paragraph on the start of a chapter? --Lo Ximiendo (talk) 11:05, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Bracketed limits in TeX formulae

Work: Index:The_evolution_of_worlds_-_Lowell.djvu Pages: Page:The_evolution_of_worlds_-_Lowell.djvu/289, Page:The_evolution_of_worlds_-_Lowell.djvu/292, Page:The_evolution_of_worlds_-_Lowell.djvu/293

Issue: Square brackets have limits on them, which was not seemingly possible to render on the relevant lefthand side bracket, currently rendered on righthand bracket. Assistance from someoenw that knows TeX would be appreciated. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 19:19, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Suggestion: drop usage of \left and \right and substitute \Bigl and \Bigr respectively. You may then either:

1. superscript and subscript the symbol using normal _ and ^ methods, or
2. \overset and \underset the limits per (for example) Page:The_evolution_of_worlds_-_Lowell.djvu/289.

The choice essentially boils down to offset or vertical (my choice) alignment of the limit values. AuFCL (talk) 05:51, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Done, care to do a validation pass? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 22:23, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

With respect with that many unaddressed problematic pages nobody is going to get interested in this work. Come back when you have a real request, rather than a whine. AuFCL (talk) 06:02, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

With respect to your respect I respectfully incline that I'm sure addressing this matter will fix many of the "unaddressed problematic pages" or at the very least give the ability to move forward in addressing many "unaddressed problematic pages." Much respect, --Rochefoucauld (talk) 16:07, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Custom layout

I'd like to define my own layout for books. To test, I copied the code at Help:Layout#How_to_write_dynamic_layouts to User:Chowbok/common.js, but I don't see any difference, and "My Layout" isn't coming up under the Display Options. Do I have the wrong idea on how this works, or did I miss something, or...? --Chowbok (talk) 06:53, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Dynamic layouts are not a personal/custom layout they are all system layouts. To affect personal changes you would need to utilise CSS code in your Special:MyPage/common.css. — billinghurst sDrewth 09:41, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

But that would affect how everything is displayed, right? I just want to have an alternative layout as an option under Display Options. Is that possible?Chowbok (talk) 17:24, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Books without Indexes?

How does it work if I want to edit a book that's already here, but there's no index or source for it? I assume those weren't used in the earlier days of this site. Should I add them as if it's a new project, or start a new project, or something else?--Chowbok (talk) 06:57, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

What is the name of the book? —Maury (talk) 07:41, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Chowbok, you have started a new book, Index:The Confessions of a Well-Meaning Woman.djvu, and have done little on it. Why not complete what you have just started? That is already a "new project". We get too many partial books here the way you are doing. We are backed up with incomplete books started and abandoned for others here to finish. Try completing what you yourself start before looking for another one to start. —Maury (talk) 09:20, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Sheesh. "Done little"? I think I've done pretty well on that considering I just started it a couple days ago, and it's my first project. I can't even ask about other stuff? Guess you guys don't have a "don't bite the newbies" rule like at Wikipedia.Chowbok (talk) 17:10, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

If are looking to replicate an existing work with a scan-supported text, unless you are 100% certain that there is an exact version/edition match, then it would be a case of a separate version, and we would disambiguate the two versions, or maybe delete the version unsupported by a scan (an independent decision). — billinghurst sDrewth 09:44, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Chowbok, I did not know you are new here. You have done so much on Wikipedia and seem to know how to bring in a book and start working on it. But it is still "little done" when you start asking for other books and asking what should you do. I just answered your question and then asked you, Why not complete what you have just started? but I am not going to argue with you over my reply. The book you *started* awaits and is simple. No, you should not "start a new project". You should finish that short and simple book you started that I validated pages on. That book isn't difficult. Oh, it isn't "guys" (plural) you are replying to - it is one person being only myself. Do you want me to do that little book for you so that you can start on a more complicated one? —Maury (talk) 21:27, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

No, I'll finish it, thank you. As I said, and you can verify this, I'm making pretty good progress on it, little as it may be. Sorry for even thinking about the future. I promise I won't even talk about other projects until I've finished this miniscule book you so sneeringly refer to.--Chowbok (talk) 21:47, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Since you are "new" here, and I didn't know as stated above, you are going far better than "pretty good". I didn't intend to mean the book is on a nanoscale. Peace be with you, —Maury (talk) 22:12, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

my first proofread page

My first proofread page at:

http://en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=Page:15_decisive_battles_of_the_world_Vol_1_%28London%29.djvu/101&action=history

seems to have a problem that I don't understand. Please help if you can.

The first footnote seems to have a space before the "big dot" which is supposed to be an "asterisk" (*). What did I do wrong? or is it because I use Mozilla Firefox? All help appreciated as I try to be helpful making improvements to Wikisource.

KenJ

---

• KenJ

*KenJ

Look at how the asterisk works above. That volume states this at the top: "Source file must be fixed before proofreading". The guys that started that volume found out that pages are missing. That is shown. It should not be worked on until those pages can be found and inserted from another source.

You did not do anything wrong with the asterisk. They are like that when they touch the left margin. We just know to remove it when it is time to use the text that follows that "big dot".

Several of us here use Mozilla Firefox. I am using the newest version now 30.0.5

I have done that page you are writing about. Look at it now and compare the before and after to see the way the asterisk and cross footnotes are now used and how they appear both under "edit" the page and when page wasn't edited. Once a page is edited you click the yellow circle under the page to indicate the page has been proofread.

Register your name or alias as shown at the beginning of wikisource. Then instead of signing you type 4 tildes in a row and save. That automatically saves your name and user page and talk page. The reason for registering is so those internet service providers that you use will not show in the message above. Some people don't worry about it and don't do this which is fine but it is safer to register - especially if you get into an argument (rare here) and someone wants to track you like you encounter using Google search engine and other search engines and websites.

I am now going to type those four (4) tildes in a row but what will show is my name and talk page. Please find a different book because of the problem with the one you worked on and asked about. I hope that this reply helps you. Happy Holidays !, —Maury (talk) 09:32, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

After Action Report 770th FA

I have in my possession, what I believe to be an authenic after action report, dated 21 August - 30 Sept 1944. My father, Robert F Williams was a T/Sgt in said unit.

I am wondering what, if anything, this report is worth.

If anyone sees this...please email me at:

    [email protected]

David Williams

Problem with MediaWiki:PageNumbers.js in Ukrainian Wikisource

Hi! We are using MediaWiki:PageNumbers.js in Ukrainian Wikisource, it works fine, but we've got a problem with one specific page. If you go to this page in Chrome, the link to page 58 will be not shown. In Firefox everything is fine. Can anybody help me to find the cause of this issue? --DixonD (talk) 17:02, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Works for me in Firefox. I can see the page number. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:56, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

That was sort of the point DixonD was making. I also use Firefox (and the page reference works) which is why I did not feel it worthy of mention before. Now can some kind Chrome user try/verify/analyse this issue? AuFCL (talk) 07:41, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Yes, it works in Firefox and IE. It doesn't work in Chrome and Safari (I guess because they both use WebKit). --DixonD (talk) 11:26, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Fwiw... it works in IE 11's F12 Developer Tools using Chrome emulation. Granted, that is not the same thing as running Chrome itself but its been fairly consistent with actual Chrome behavior in my experience.

Since I can't replicate the problem, I have to ask: are the embedded links for 59 on also not rendering?

And as an aside; my console is also reporting several instances of Use of "addOnloadHook" is deprecated. Use jQuery instead. (see here) which could be affecting things related to this particular issue. Someone who knows better than I should be able to help straighten that out. -- George Orwell III (talk) 22:27, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

User:Ignatus/Old Russian birch barks

I wanted to translate into Wikisource some birch barks from http://gramoty.ru. What do you think about this idea and the way I'm using for it? Ignatus (talk) 15:19, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

Update Easton's Bible Dictionary total pages and percentage

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Talk:Easton%27s_Bible_Dictionary_%281897%29#Status

I've updated the number of pages on the above, but could someone please update the total and percentage of pages. It has a maths percentage template and I'm not good at maths. --kathleen wright5 (talk) 01:55, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

Done Beeswaxcandle (talk) 02:30, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

categories link in header broken

Something changed recently, so that the {{header}} template no longer seems to link correctly to categories whose name includes an apostrophe.

See this version where the problem is manifested. I have cludged a workaround for now by moving the category in question out of the header. --EncycloPetey (talk) 00:32, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

I think it has more to do with Module:String -- which is called by the header template to handle the category parameter -- than anything else. I'll have to ask someone over on Wikipedia to take a look so this might take awhile (unless somebody here has the chops to troubleshoot this of course). -- George Orwell III (talk) 01:24, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

(e/c)I would hazard it was this edit to {{header}} which is most likely responsible. I might further guess that the pattern group [%w%s-] which occurs twice therein should probably be amended to at least [%w'%s-] (i.e. add single quote to match element) as %s does not match any punctuation. Further analysis of allowed characters is probably justified.) AuFCL (talk) 01:28, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Made that change and it seems to work now. We'll deal other punctuation failures as they present themselves I suppose. Thanks for the fix, AuFCL. -- George Orwell III (talk) 02:14, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Here is a short list of existing representative categories (a couple of whom are empty and perhaps ought to be deleted instead?) of cases which still trip up the LUA filters:

1. Category:"Danforth Report" documents
2. Category:0%
3. Category:? births
4. Category:Bangkok Metropolitan Administration Act, BE 2528 (1985)
5. Category:Beck v. Eiland-Hall

I make no pretense this list is comprehensive, but bearing in mind the broad variety above may I make a case for replacing the overly-complicated coding (Honestly! One replace to remove the empty entry created in error by the other two?) in {{header}}:

   -->{{#if:{{{categories|}}}
|{{#invoke:String|replace|{{#invoke:String|replace|{{#invoke:String|replace|{{{categories}}}|([%w'%s-]-)%s?/%s?|[[Category:%1]]|plain=false}}|([%w'%s-]-)$|[[Category:%1]]|plain=false}}|%[%[Category:%]%]||plain=false}}
}}<!--

with the somewhat simpler (though still ugly)

   -->{{#if:{{{categories|}}}
|[[Category:{{#invoke:String|replace|{{{categories}}}|(%s)/(%s)|%1]][[Category:%2|plain=false}}]]}}<!--

? I appreciate the output of the latter is not stripped of spaces like the original code; the wiki engine really does not seem to care and still finds the correct category (at least in all my experiments to date. Feel free to verify/repudiate, please.) AuFCL (talk) 05:42, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Partial scan page in edit window

I am able to see only part of the scan page at this page, but the full page is visible on clicking the image button. Hrishikes (talk) 04:36, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Whilst I am sympathetic, as of right now the scan really does show up correctly for me. Did you perhaps purge the page (or possibly even the very act of your editing the page "fixed" the issue)? Is it still misbehaving for you? AuFCL (talk) 05:49, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

The page is now OK. I did not purge or did anything, I did not understand the mechanics. Anyway, now it's OK. Hrishikes (talk) 06:23, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Sad to say sometimes these things "just happen" and after the problem goes away there is nothing really logged to indicate what had gone wrong. All I can suggest is, if it happens again try, in turn, each of the page operations "Purge", "Hard purge" and "Null edit" (all available from the tab-menu at the top of the page—may be hidden under the "More" tab.) I do not mean you need to execute all three operations; merely try one and see if the problem goes away and if not move on to the next choice and repeat. These tend to fix most problems, but of course in cases of stubborn failure ask again for assistance as the cause in that case might then still vary from server/database connection problems to system/javascript errors etc. etc. (Unlikely but possible.) AuFCL (talk) 10:23, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

No, the problem is still persisting in my tablet. Previously I had checked with my mobile, and there the page is OK. But not in the tab. I have tried all your given methods; null edit fails, and purge/hard purge does not give any result in this case. Sorry for bothering, but I am not able to fix it. Does not much matter, I think, as it is OK with other browsers. Hrishikes (talk) 11:23, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

@Hrishikes: Right at present I have completely run out of useful ideas. However in order to assist anybody else who might be able to solve this issue here are some thoughts as to items it might be good to collect and report (in no particular priority; skip items which make no sense/are impossible):

• What make and model is the tablet?
• Are there particular pages which always show the partial scan problem (which ones?) or is it intermittent and/or random (i.e. sometimes works)?
• Do you know which browser it/you are using? Please report its name and version number.
• Does the tablet/browser have any kind of javascript or error console/log, and if so does it contain any messages which might help diagnose the problem?
• Are you using the standard browser referrer/user-agent? (This probably only makes sense if you have taken deliberate steps to change it.)
• Can you think of anything else which makes your tablet/browser "different" from a browser on which the problem never (or rarely) occurs?

Pardon the dump of questions and I hope somebody can take up this cause with more success than I. AuFCL (talk) 20:16, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

It's Galaxy Tab3, Chrome 38.0.2125.114. I think it's more to do with the cache from some earlier time, having some network problem at that time. This cache is not going away with purging. This is the only page where this problem is occurring. Please don't bother, it's not very important, this page being the only one. Hrishikes (talk) 00:29, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

Repairs (and moves)

• See Wikisource:Scriptorium/Rebinding

Other discussions

Epub ebook download

Hi. I'm new here. I downloaded some articles (books) as epub, but I noticed that they don't have covers. Is there a way to automatically create a simple cover just with the title and author name?

Mr White (talk) 01:14, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

Most of the works that resurrect are library editions where the covers are non-attractive, as the libraries have bound them. Depending on the works, in the past few years we have been better reproducing title pages and tables of contents that lead to more attractive presentations. Which works are you looking at? Otherwise, we may need to talk to @Tpt: to see what can be done by his tool to give that option. — billinghurst sDrewth 02:07, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

A photo of an Kobo ereader device showing the cover page of Something New by P. G. Wodehouse.

I thought that all epubs had basic coverpages like the one at right. Maybe it depends on which book is exported… which did you try? In general though it would be pretty cool if the epub cover page could be the titlepage has transcribed from the book. Don't know how easy it is to identify that text though.

— Sam Wilson ( Talk • Contribs ) … 03:07, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

That appears as the first page. A cover like that would be nice. I downloaded Agatha Christie's books and The Golden Man. Mr White (talk) 02:04, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

I utilise EPubRead firefox extension and I get cover pages when I click the sidebar link. So I am not sure what you mean by a cover, well one that is separate/different. — billinghurst sDrewth 08:38, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

I also get a cover with the epub exported for The Golden Man. Perhaps this is an issue with ereader compatibility? What device and/or software are you using, Mr White? Would you mind checking the same epubs on a different setup, to see where the problem might be? I know Kobos have a setting to turn the title page off, by the way; could that be the case with your device? — Sam Wilson ( Talk • Contribs ) … 00:42, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

I use Google Play Books on Android and on the web. Other books (uploaded or bought from the store) appear with cover. See: http://postimg.org/image/6u1mt29fr/ Mr White (talk) 20:27, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Index:The Rhind Mathematical Papyrus, Volume I.pdf

Can someone check the copyright status on this? Archibald was still alive in 1955.. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 17:15, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

Fair dinkum SF. Would you mind paying attention to the copyright tags applied to works. Look at the tag applied, then come back and tell us how the date of death is relevant. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:12, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

Ah fair enough. PD-US-Not renewed, and Archibald was in the US in 1927. This one's OK ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 00:45, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Every so often -

Every so often I see what appears to be works from Project Gutenburg here on Wikisource. Why does anyone need to take from Project Gutenberg, (other than it is easy), images or text or both images and text to promote Wikisource? Shame! I am strongly opposed to it. I have always thought that we are capable enough to create our own works. There is a feeling of pride and honor in that as opposed to a shame to taking (stealing?) someone's work from elsewhere. Am I mistaken? —Maury (talk) 17:12, 29 November 2014 (UTC)

Preference versus scope. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:25, 29 November 2014 (UTC)

Maury, Gutenburg does allow expressly that kind of use, as long as they are credited as the source. It's a quick-and-dirty method of getting a work into Wikisource. It has the advantages of (a) filling a gap in our coverage quickly, and (b) being easier for new editors to manage. I won't mention the disadvantages, as I expect you already know them. --EncycloPetey (talk) 23:55, 29 November 2014 (UTC)

I know that Gutenberg allows free use as long as their ownership? text remains attached. That is as good as Google watermarks and various universities. Since it is okay then okay, - but I personally dislike it being on Wikisource. A few works from Gutenberg can cause one to wonder how much work do we do here on Wikisource. If we produce 1 million books and among those are added 10 quality Gutenberg books an outsider who browses may think we build with other project's works - and would not know what percentage is our work.

I was reading billinghurst's remarks about epub books and tried his epubreader. I saw a book *somewhere* that we already have here along with others like it. I refer to

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Author:Edgar_Wilson_Nye

and specifically to https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Index:Nye%27s_History_of_the_USA.djvu.

I saw a version of A Comic History of the United States by by "Bill" Nye from Project Gutenberg. Now, I spent a lot of time with text and moreso with images on that same book. Several people took the time proofing the work, editing the work, and transcluding that work and for what when Project Gutenberg has a version pulled onto Wikisource? It negates our Wikisourcer's work does it not? We did not need to take from Project Gutenberg along with its mandatory retention of text. —Maury (talk) 00:22, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

[edit conflict] I don't follow you. We've got a sourced and proofread version of a text, then we don't include a Gutenberg text. There would be no reason to duplicate a text. We only have (or keep) Gutenberg texts when we have no sourced and transcluded copy of our own. When did you ever see a Gutenberg copy added after a Wikisourcer worked to transclude a text? --EncycloPetey (talk) 00:41, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps it was a link from the ereaderpub program I saw Billinghurst book of PG's book? I really don't know at this point. However, the book did belong to Project Gutenberg and I did the same one mentioned above without knowing what Gutenburg has. I never go to PG and I don't read there.—Maury (talk) 01:02, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Over time our culture has changed. Several years ago the focus was on getting up as many public domain texts as possible. Grabbing Project Gutenberg works was an effective and efficient way to achieve that, and was encouraged by the community. These days our focus is on reliable, validated, properly sourced texts; we see very little value in copy-paste jobs, and discourage grabbing stuff from PG. Maury I think nearly everyone agrees with you now, but it would be a mistake to judge the past by our present values. Hesperian 00:39, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Okay, well, I am still a beginner with lots of things. However, I was not judging anything by date (past or present) because even now I have not looked back at those dates. I am still (always) learning fellows and I thank you for your knowledge. With all due respect, —Maury (talk) 01:02, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

In a somewhat related note. I've been getting annoyed by a lot of text that are unsourced, no publication information etc... For example, Cur Deus Homo has the title and author but no other information. Was the text digitized by another source? Are there digital scans of it, and where? Or did the editor simply have an old copy of the book and digitized it the old fashioned way? I've seen this being done on a daily basis of users creating pages that aren't properly sourced, especially that relating to foreign material. At what point do we sacrifice quality over quantity? Also, at what point do we make it official policy? To allow users to go to a pages djvu file makes wikisource unique in it's verifiability of old text. At what point do we make it official policy for scanned material? What problems could occur with these considerations? I'm not looking for a debate, I would just like to hear user opinion on these matters. --Rochefoucauld (talk) 05:32, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Cur Deus Homo https://archive.org/details/curdeushomowhyg00ansegoog

@Rochefoucauld: I doubt that it will ever be a prerequisite to have a scan to go with a work, though it will always remain our preferred means, and the only means to proofread and validate an older work. To be a featured work, it will be close to the only means to achieve that status. We should always query an unsourced work and usually this is done during the patrol phase. In patrolling we challenge and request sources, and tag it and nag the contributor. — billinghurst sDrewth 07:51, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Any unsourced work should not be allowed. The person who brings a work to wikisource should provide that source and if not it should be removed. Nag the contributor, no, demand that the contributor provide the needed source materials. We must stay clean of any copyrighted works. —Maury (talk) 08:14, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

"Unsourced" and "copyrighted" are not synonymous. An unsourced work may still be in the public domain. It may also be famous and have an article in Wikipedia. Moreover, this is a volunteer service. No "demand" can be made here of anyone. Yes, the contribution may be removed, still, no "demand" can be made. There are plenty of unsourced works here, with original contributors now inactive. Instead of throwing a tantrum, objectors should be of a positive and constructive disposition and try to find sources for those works. If someone could add it, surely another one, if sufficiently laborious, can find a source in most cases. Hrishikes (talk) 09:04, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

I know they are not the same. When I was writing about "unsourced" (I also provided a source for Cur Deus Homo ). When typing it also came to mind that copyrighted materials must not be allowed either. That is why I wrote "materials". No debate on my end about it. Discussion, yes, anything else - No. A "demand" can be made here on anything and anyone by our editors _voting_ if anything gets to far out-of-hand. Wikisource is democratic. Who is "throwing a tantrum"? Not I. Any person can be locked out of Wikisource by a majority vote. Yes, I know no older unsourced materials cannot be removed according to what Hesperian stated on the same. Just for the record, I do not get angry easily and especially not here on a computer. That would be silly. I don't get angry face to face either. I am old enough and capable enough to know what to do in any case. Luv ya bro, —Maury (talk) 09:31, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

I haven't seen a convincing argument to change our scope, though I respect that some would like it to be tougher. I am more in favour of a process to work with users to get sourced material, and to have a deletion process that reviews whether a work is within scope. As has happened previously where we get a sourced version of a work, we have deleted an unsourced version, and maybe what we are looking to do is maybe highlight by text additions to {{no source}} and as part of our conversation with contributors of unsourced works. New contributors who bring unsourced work have plenty of potential to have demonstrated that the having a source for a Wikisource work is equivalent to having a citation for a Wikipedia work. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:30, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Maury, I think one of our biggest challenges here is our very high barrier to entry:— you have to learn an awful lot of complex stuff before you can become very effective here. Many of us started off with unsourced works, got comfortable with how that part of the site works, then "graduated" to the complexities of DjVu files, index pages, the page namespace and page transclusion. If accepting unsourced works is the price we have to pay to make ourselves tolerably accessible to new contributors, then I'm glad to pay it. Hesperian 10:43, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

@Billinghurst: I fine that no source maintenance is an acceptable means to handle this matter.(I did not know such template existed, thanks.) Probably the best way to handle it, so that we don't scare off new contributors. I know that wikipedia says that any work that is not sourced can be deleted. Usually this never happens unless the article is of popular interest. It is best that we refrain from doing this, as it is most likely counter intuitive to our project. Unless of course there are fidelity issues. Thanks for everyones insight to this matter. --Rochefoucauld (talk) 13:40, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

• Good people all - above the work Cur Deus Homo was mentioned as unsourced material. I found a source for that work - Cur Deus Homo https://archive.org/details/curdeushomowhyg00ansegoog - so what will be done with that work now? Will this source I found be applied to that work? There isn't much we cannot do working together. Respectfully, I am, —Maury (talk) 14:25, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

  In this case, I would hope that the DjVu you found for Cur Deus Homo is suitably complete and is uploaded to Commons (if it is properly in public domain; IA sometimes makes mistakes). Then, I would hope that diligent editors proofread and validate the work, and the results are transcluded over the previous unsourced edition. That's not always how I think it should happen, though. Some of the older "unsourced" editions can have their sources tracked down, and some of them should remain alongside other editions. Some of them are well-formatted and cleaned up better than the old print copies. However, in this instance, the existing copy of Cur Deus Homo has minimal formatting besides being unsourced. There would be no reason to preserve it if we had a properly sourced edition to replace it. --EncycloPetey (talk) 19:33, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

  I do not think those ideas are realistic. "Who ya gonna call?" [GhostBusters] I assume everyone works on their own projects or they aren't here on wikisource. —Maury (talk) 22:11, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

  I've found that they can be. I'll sometimes find an abandoned and incomplete transcription that I happily jump in to work on. Sometimes I help another person get started on a project they want to do. There are also lots of lists people have made of cool books that someone ought to do. People here do find those lists and will find projects listed that they eagerly attack. I know that my own lists have spawned work from a couple of new contributors looking for a project, and I likewise have found books to work on myself listed by others. The community here may be a little loose, but there are some nice interconnections like that, where editors inspire each other to achieve. --EncycloPetey (talk) 01:24, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Successful Validation Month

A typical WS proofreader

We have just completed this year's Validation Month. During the month 6071 pages were validated and 26 works were moved into the completed status. 36 editors worked on the books that were displayed on the Main Page and there were several more editors who validated pages from other works. We are still working to get a complete list of all Wikisourcerors who validated during the month.

The additions during the month bring our completed Indexes to a total of 1,566 and the total validated pages is 186,779. If we continue to validate at our normal rate (ca. 100 per day), we should reach 200,000 towards the middle of next year.

Thank you to everyone who took part in the month and also to those who kept the other aspects of our Community going at the same time. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 08:43, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

Huzza! This is terrific; good to see some stats. Thanks to everyone who keeps this running! I love being able to amble along here to do just a few pages. — Sam Wilson ( Talk • Contribs ) … 23:59, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

. (On mouse over.)

I would like to know how many books have been downloaded & which are the most popular downloads. —Maury (talk) 02:22, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

What is the mediawiki code editor's font-style and size?

The code editor of our personal javascript & CSS has a very interesting font style and size. How can I implement it for my textarea editing? — Ineuw talk 23:26, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

CodeEditor is an extension now installed by default. I guess you can browse the file tree for the .css modules handling the formatting but I'm not so sure its as simple as that - some that is based in ACE or GeSHi (like our LUA is really Scribunto) and again, may have quirks under the Wiki mark-up. -- George Orwell III (talk) 00:40, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Actually, all I was curious about is, if I could affect the #textarea1 font, with another monospace font other than Courier New. I am not sure if it can be done and my efforts were unsuccessful. If it's possible to do, and you have time, do you mind taking a look at my CSS page? — Ineuw talk 07:16, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Yeah Wiki mark-up isn't going to like that but I suppose you can force [some] of the settings using !important; (already done & used correct anchor id).

The other thing to remember is, when in doubt, wiki mark-up will look to your editing prefs for a fallback font and that is usually set to 'the browser default'. Now most browsers set a default family and have fallback(s) as well -- Wiki mark-up might go through a bunch of font families before it decides what to render & when without any predictability. You might want to try some other fallback family in your preferences just to be able to usurp it in your .css is what I'm getting at in a nutshell. -- George Orwell III (talk) 07:39, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Very helpful and a terrific explanation. Thank you. — Ineuw talk 07:43, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

I have alternate editing fonts working in my stylesheet with this: body.action-edit #wpTextbox1, body.action-submit #wpTextbox1 { font-family:DPCustomMono2, monospace; font-size:10pt } I would’ve thought your "Liberation Mono" would work, but maybe the font is called something a bit different internally? By the way, I recommend the DPCustomMono2 font for proofreading! :-) — Sam Wilson ( Talk • Contribs ) … 09:21, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

@Samwilson: Sorry for the late reply but I really wanted to put this matter to rest, so I tried in Windows 7 using three browsers, Firefox 34.0, which is my working browser, Opera 25, and Internet Explorer 11. In all three browsers the #Textarea1 font was controlled by the browser, regardless what was specified in the CSS. The next order of font style control is the Preference/Edit setting of "Browser default", "Monospace font", "Sans-serif" or "Serif". For example, if the Wiki Preference/Edit was set to Sans-serif but the browser monospace font was Liberation mono, then the font-style changed to the proportional font specified in the browser. The only font settings I could change in the Common.css was the line height and the font-size. So, GO3 is right again. — Ineuw talk 06:06, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

That's very strange. I’ve got it working fine under Windows 7 FF 33 and Ubuntu FF 34. Must be something else at work. :( — Sam Wilson ( Talk • Contribs ) … 06:32, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

@Samwilson: Could kindly upload a screen shot of the #Textarea1 to Wikisource? Since email contact through WS does not provide for attachments and I would very much like to see it. — Ineuw talk 19:57, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Please don't bother to upload an image, finally managed to locate the font and download it. — Ineuw talk 20:58, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

@Samwilson: Final note. You were right about the css font specifications. My earlier mistake was that I selected Liberation Mono in the browser, so, I couldn't tell from which setting affected the text area. Thanks for your directions. — Ineuw talk 21:13, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Display Middle Age text's capital U as V

What's the best way to display a Middle Age era font that display what we now call capital U as it was, which looks like V? Therefore, if people copy paste it and turn it into plain text, it will still be "u", not "v". I tried looking for a font that will do it, but I couldn't find any. Bennylin (talk) 11:07, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

If the source uses a "V", then that's what should appear in the text. We don't modernize spellings or alter texts like that; we reproduce the text as it was printed. --EncycloPetey (talk) 14:38, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

French WS implemented a way to switch between original and modernized spelling (e.g. ſ/s). I haven’t looked into how they do it, but maybe it would be a nice feature to have? See fr:Gargantua/Édition Juste, 1535 as an example. Abjiklɐm (tɐlk) 19:49, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

That's not a difference in spelling; that's simply different orthography. It's like a change in font from ɑ to a. The symbol ſ was how "s" was rendered in the middle of words in handwriting. For some texts, we choose to preserve that orthography, but most search engines recognize ſ as an s. --EncycloPetey (talk) 01:57, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Sorry I’m unclear as to the difference between spelling and orthography (they both translate to the same term in French). In any case, I still think an easy way to switch between ſ and s, uu and w, þ and th, etc. would be useful. While it is important to keep a faithful transcription of older texts, a character modernization option could be very useful for legibility. Abjiklɐm (tɐlk) 02:59, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

orthography = conventional spelling system of a language. —Maury (talk) 03:09, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

A rough distinction is: orthography is how the letters look when printed, while spelling is which letters are used to make up a word. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 05:25, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Sadly no.

c.f. w:orthography vs w:typography: I think you will find you are describing the latter, not the former. 58.168.74.59 05:48, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

OK, poorly worded. I meant the general shape of the printed letters rather than serif vs san-serif, &c. i.e. a capital P vs a capital Π. They are the same letter in spelling, but not the same in orthography. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 06:09, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Beeswax, you were correct. The IP was linking to encyclopedia entries, and not to definitions. See wikt:orthography to note that there are multiple meanings of the word orthography, and that the WP article treats only one of those definitions, because Wikipedia articles concern ideas, not words. Hence, the article on w:Plant covers only green living organisms, and not the manufacturing sort. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:14, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

So it's technically impossible to do that? Bennylin (talk) 14:05, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

It could be possible, for example if you create a template similar to what {{ls}} does. However, I think the point is that you should just use V. Beleg Tâl (talk) 14:49, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

"ſ" is another way to write s; I'm not a huge fan of bothering with it at all since it conveys so little information over just writing an s and letting those few who might care look at the scans. þ doesn't appear in modern English basically at all (see w:þ), and Middle English has much worse things then that. U/V as positional variants of each other is complex, but is certainly not something that should be handled at the font level.

I'm all for modernized spelling editions of our works; they're useful and relatively noncontroversial. I don't see much point in work at such a low-level as stressing about a few characters.--Prosfilaes (talk) 16:00, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

My opinion on the matter depends on the work. When transcribing a philosophical treatise by John Locke, I see no point in worrying about ſ because almost no one will care. But when transcribing a copy of Shakespeare's First Folio, I fret over every possible point of presentation because people going to that work may very well care. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:14, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

Search engine visibility of wikisource content

I posted the same question on the multilingual wikisource, but it looks like there is nobody active on the local scriptorium, so I am reposting here.

Hi, I am wondering why wikisource content is not at the top of search results. I have this experience from my language search results but I doubt there will be much difference in different language search results. Why does major search engine after input of exact name of a book, that is fully published on wikisource gives instead of a link to the books text here on wikisource (which I would expect since I didnt state "where to buy exact name of the book or something else) some other results such as bookshops to buy it and articles on the author etc. I know that exact algorhytms for ranking pages are known only to employees of the search engine companies, but I wonder if there is any information publicly known about this "problem". Thanks --Wesalius (talk) 07:30, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

1. Many books we digitize come from other top sources such as

• Google books
• Internet Archive

• Both sites have huge traffic and have hosted the content much long than we've had it.
• They use OCR, so all content is transcribed(poorly) but enough to show up on search results.

This goes for many other book sellers too, they have previews of the book that show up in search results.

2. Google tracks book sites on price, availability, and review ratings, right on search results pages. (wikisource currently fails to adhere to these guidelines.)

• This enables sites to:

• Attract potential buyers while they are searching for items to buy on Google.
• Control product information and maintain the accuracy and freshness of product information, so customers find the relevant, current items they're looking for.

Source: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/146750?hl=en

--Rochefoucauld (talk) 13:13, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

I went and did some reading at Google, then Schema.org, then played with the JSON-LD version, failed, asked some people who could explain. The response is 1) mediawiki disallows the use of <script ...> for security reasons (JSON-LD), and 2) disallows the addition of microformats (the inline components). So basically at this point "checkmate". I have been a little pushy and emailed wikitech-l, and cc'd wikisource-l to see if they can better address the matter and assist to get better search results per the Google webmaster instruction. One could see that we could template into {{header}} for works, and {{author}} for authors either the microformat, or the JSON methodology, or pull the data from wikidata, or some better method, it is just being recommended on the best means, and being allowed to do so. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:46, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

• fwiw... see previous attempt at something along these lines at Wikisource:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archives/2013#Wikisource_site_administration_basics -- George Orwell III (talk) 01:21, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

  Just found this and seems related mw:Extension:GoogleAnalyticsTopPages; wish it existed back when I was first pursuing access to Google stuff :( -- George Orwell III (talk) 09:25, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Thank you for clearing it up for me. Its too bad it is beyond our possibilities (if I understood it correctly) to make the content here more search engine visible. Compared to archive.org it is stored in a way more readable way and availability compared with google books, well that depends a lot on country you are viewing the content from :/ I know that google is not a public serviec, but a for-profit company, so I cant really blame them to prioritize content, that can be monetized. --Wesalius (talk) 10:12, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Validated works' category browser

I’ve had a little crack at compiling a basic single-page category-tree browser for works that are in Category:Index Validated (well, the ones that have corresponding mainspace pages, which is maybe not all of them). I mainly wanted an easy way to find books to read on my ereader, but it makes for an interesting way to browse the structure of things. If anyone’s interested, it’s at: http://static.samwilson.id.au/2014/ws/ (warning: in a completely ridiculous move on my part, it's a single 12.6MB HTML file, so I don't know, maybe save it offline or something... I’ll get around to making it more ajaxy if I can be bothered!). :) Oh, and the data I used is from 26 November (in case it looks out of date; it is). — Sam Wilson ( Talk • Contribs ) … 02:02, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

Copyright Sanity Check

This work: https://archive.org/details/castlekirbymuxlo00peerrich is a 1917 Guidebook published under HMSO Auspices.

It's written by am author that died in 1952 , seemingly in an official capacity?

Would it be reasonable to apply Crown Copyright rules to this? - If so the work is copyright expired and can be put on Wikisource.

Opinions sought. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 16:29, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

On the front cover of the work it says "Crown Copyright Reserved" so that is what it will be. Presumably written in the course of employment. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:26, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Which as it was written seemingly in 1917 . It can be put on Commons :) ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 00:33, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Copyright Act, 1956 (United Kingdom)/Part 6#53 — billinghurst sDrewth 01:46, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Index:Kirby Muxloe Castle near Leicester (1917).djvu and the file needs 2 duplicate pages removed, and the images uploaded, other than that I can have this proofread very quickly :) ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 17:41, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Kirby Muxloe Castle near Leicester- Hows that for efficency :) ? No images though. ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 18:28, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Tech News: 2014-50

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent software changes

• All users are now getting pages from servers that run the HHVM tool. HHVM should make pages load faster. [3]
• You can join a video chat about Phabricator on December 11 at 18:00 (UTC). Phabricator is the new tool to report issues. [4]

Problems

• There was a problem with Phabricator on November 29. It was due to a network issue. [5]

Software changes this week

• The new version of MediaWiki (1.25wmf11) has been on test wikis and MediaWiki.org since December 3. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis from December 9. It will be on all Wikipedias from December 10 (calendar). [6]
• You can now exit VisualEditor by pressing the "Esc" key. [7]
• It is now easier to use VisualEditor with IMEs. Typing in Malayalam now works better. [8] [9]
• The new version of OOjs UI fixed many issues with the size and layout of buttons in dialogs. [10] [11] [12]
• (Lua) You can no longer use mw.text.unstrip to get the HTML from special page transclusion. You can see a list of scripts to fix. [13] [14]

Future changes

• Starting next week JavaScript tools won't work if they use jQuery Migrate. [15]

Tech news prepared by tech ambassadors and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

17:10, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Index:US Senate Report on CIA Detention Interrogation Program.pdf

Will continue later, but any hints? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 14:29, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Forth Bridge (1890)

I think it would be possible to finish Index:Forth Bridge (1890).djvu by Christmas with a little help on validation, formatting and tables. It's already had some great input from others and the lion's share of it is complete. RandomPerson137 (talk) 15:05, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

@Beeswaxcandle: may be worth slipping into the PotM remnants. — billinghurst sDrewth 11:33, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Help with drop initail image

1. "

Is there any way I can get the [1. "] that is before the drop initial Image to be in the top left corner as per the source at la:Pagina:DELITIAE SAPIENTIAE DE AMORE CONJUGIALI.djvu/2? I've used "expand template tool" to get it as it is since there is no template for it at the Latin wikisource, so I don't have a clue what the code I'm using means and how to use it. I'm new to wiki and would appreciate any help. Thanks.

Here done this way:

" 1.

 

Hrishikes (talk) 14:24, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

I can't help you much with that problem, but it appears that this is entirely in Latin, and would be better suited for the Latin Wikisource.—Zhaladshar ^(Talk) 14:57, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Umm, Zhaladshar, it is on the Latin Wikisource. Look at the link. --EncycloPetey (talk) 19:43, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

If you could specify the page where you need this to be done, and precisely what it is you need, we might be able to help. You've shown us an example where it is done, so you could copy the code and paste it in to wherever it is you are doing whatever it is you are doing. The details of what happens would depend on what it is you're trying to accomplish and where you're trying to do it. --EncycloPetey (talk) 19:49, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

See if this is OK for you. I watched at the HTML code ("view source") generated here and tried to replicate it there.--Mpaa (talk) 20:14, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Yes Mpaa that's perfect. Thank you very much! --Jpez (talk) 05:12, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

The Condor title page

I've created a title page for The Condor, and you can see it at Page:Condor5(2).djvu/1. Before I go ahead and use it on all ~100 issues, does anyone have any criticism or suggestions for how to do it better? Beleg Tâl (talk) 03:26, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Instead of a standard hyphen, I suggest using an en-dash ( – ) between the month names. Otherwise, it looks fine to me. --EncycloPetey (talk) 03:29, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Looks jolly good. I think the illustrator's signature is part of the illustration and should have been left there rather than extracted and rendered as text. Hesperian 03:56, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Tech News: 2014-51

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent software changes

• You may see a new tool tested on the mobile site of the English Wikipedia. It asks simple questions to make the article better. In the future, your answers will go to Wikidata. [16]
• You can watch a video to learn how to use Phabricator to manage projects. [17]
• You can test a new version of the Content Translation tool.

Software changes this week

• The new version of MediaWiki (1.25wmf12) has been on test wikis and MediaWiki.org since December 10. It will be on non-Wikipedia wikis from December 16. It will be on all Wikipedias from December 17 (calendar). [18]
• You can now find and replace text in VisualEditor. You can open the tool via the menu, Ctrl+F or Cmd+F. [19]
• VisualEditor now doesn't change the space at the end of a text that you make bold. [20]
• The "Apply changes" button in the reference window of VisualEditor is now disabled until you make a change. [21]

Future changes

• The star image of the watchlist may change soon. [22] [23]
• You won't be able to use Phabricator on December 18, 2014. It will be down between 00:00 and 08:00 (UTC). [24] [25]

Tech news prepared by tech ambassadors and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:43, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Index:The Botanical Magazine, Volume 2 (1788).djvu

Is it just me going crazy or are Index's not previewable right now? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 21:28, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

also when doing a preview of a page I KNOW is a proofread (Yellow band) I get a RED one? Anyone? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 21:33, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

All looks fine. Sounds like you have a connection issue, and where a page exists but cannot connect it is serving a cached version. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:00, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm having a similar problem right now in that the text layer of files is not showing up in the edit window. It isn't a connection or cache issue at my end, as far as I can determine. Could it be a result of today's software update? --EncycloPetey (talk) 03:40, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Category:PD-UN

<striking original to put in something more neutral>

Apparently there was a policy change at Commons concerning PD-UN licensed materials Commons:Deletion_requests/Template:PD-UN., back in June.

Would someone here be willing to review what's potentially affected here if anything? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 00:05, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Wikilivres down?

Maybe I haven't looked hard enough, but I am just wondering what became of the site (not French Wikibooks): all the links are dead at the moment, earlier there was a notice that payment for the domain name was overdue, and it's definitely worrisome that a legal Canadian site for PD-old-50 books would go down so suddenly. Mahir256 (talk) 03:26, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Seems to be up now. Maybe someone forgot to pay the bills? :) — Sam Wilson ( Talk • Contribs ) … 05:41, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Still down, as far as I can see. Sminthopsis84 (talk) 13:25, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

It looks like it was a DNS issue, which is fixed now and the fix will finish propagating sometime soon I would imagine. This was posted on the Wikilivres Community Portal:

Recent outage.

For those of you who have been wondering why this site was off line for more than a week, a little explanation order. The payment for hosting or for the domain was never in question. The "unpaid" account was for nameservers, the service that allows the site to be found on the internet. Since our last transfer of hosts this was be done by DNSever, a South Korean company. The choice of that company was a technical one, beyond my technical understanding. Initially DNSever provided a free service. More recently they decided to commercialize their service. The amount of money in question was trivial, less than $1.00 per month. What was unacceptable was terms of service that included compliance with United States copyright laws and having those terms subject to Korean law. All this necessitated a change of nameserver, and this is now being handled by Interglider.

—Eclecticology 10:57, 19 December 2014 (PST)

It seems it's down again at this moment.— Ineuw talk 06:12, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Wikilivres is back. --kathleen wright5 (talk) 20:47, 27 December 2014 (UTC)

Index:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 24.djvu

Which volumes exist on archive.org?

ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 20:46, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

The display options of the main namespace are in the garage for repair?

I was just wondering. Also, I am curious what is the purpose of the new option of hiding the the page layout of the Index page? — Ineuw talk 06:09, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Nothing has changed re: Display Options. If it's gone rogue on you, you most likely need to do the full-blown cache clearing thingy thanks to something in the last core update conflicting with the 'cookied' version. Same thing happened to me a couple of days after the upgrade before this last one fwiw.

As for the collapsing thing on Index: pages - just me tinkering. When more people notice it, I guess we will go from there (keep or kill it). -- George Orwell III (talk) 08:27, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Index:The cutters' practical guide to the cutting of ladies' garments.djvu

Any "volunteers" to typeset the adverts at the back of this? ShakespeareFan00 (talk) 12:29, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

LST

"Easy LST is now a default enabled Gadget -- The simplified syntax for section labeling in the Page: namespace is now a selectable Gadget in your User: Preferences. If you've been contributing to Wikisource using this "easy" method for labeling prior to this - you don't need to do anything in response to this change. Easy LST will work just as it did before. For those User:s who prefer contributing to Wikisource using the standard (or Old) section labeling syntax, simply disable the Gadget in your User: Preferences. Please post any questions or comments to the Central discussion page."

I have always used the old method. I did suggest and use the script to protect eyes though. I do not know what the new editor looks like and I have a big concern about trying new things here (codes) that I don't use. My concern is that if I try to change anything I will mess something up and lose what I do have now.

Maury, this is not like previous instances where "code" was manipulated in the "raw". Gadgetizing something just means all of that raw-code type of nonsense has already been whittled down for you and all that is required is selecting or deselecting a checkbox more often than not.

Go to your User: Preferences HERE, scroll down until you see section dealing with tools for the Page namespace and un-select the entry for Easy LST: Enable the easy section labeling syntax in the Page: namespace. Remember to save your changes at the bottom of that page before you leave it. Thats it; you are done. -- George Orwell III (talk) 04:18, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

I understand and have always understood the word "Gadget" and what they are here and I use them. Throw codes into a "BAG" name it, squeeze it to hear it scream. —Maury (talk) 04:51, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

(1)Old way or new way, I am concerned about code and the acronym that goes with new codes developed under each acronym. Therefore, what is "LST" and whatever it is it should not be written as "Easy LST" unless that is it's full name.

The culprit behind the terms used is long gone. Fwiw... Labeled Section Transclusion is not Wikisource specific -- just about every Wiki____ whatever can do it -- but we rely on more than the others.

The hope was using symbols (### & such) instead of beginning and ending section tags (in 2 below) would be easier to work with because symbols don't need translating into any other language. They sold that lack of initiative as some sort of "enhancement". All it did was eat resources and compound the translation issues for every Wikisource. -- George Orwell III (talk) 04:18, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

(Have read) —Maury (talk) 04:51, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

(2) "method for labeling" -- "labeling" what? I don't know the meaning of it here.

You know it as... <section begin="blah blah" . . .text text text. . . <section end="blah blah . The blah blah is the label of the section we wish to transclude in certain cases. -- George Orwell III (talk) 04:18, 22 December 2014 (UTC)(Have read)—Maury (talk) 04:51, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

(3) I still cannot widen the book's pages I edit. I have had to do without it and that was a very good option. —Maury (talk) 03:47, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Thats a reality for everybody. There is a Bug report already filed asking if it can be restored but its not likely to happen any time soon -- if ever -- I'll paste it here the next time I trip over it looking for something else to fix. -- George Orwell III (talk) 04:18, 22 December 2014 (UTC) (I did not know others here are missing the option of widening to transcribe! I felt like I was the only person here with that problem. I had been using it often because, alas!, my eyes are giving out at times due to diabetes. So, a larger page to transcribe was a grand cup of tea for me and then it disappeared. I thought I had messed something up. When enlarging a .jpg page I have to move the page.jpg around or as I prefer and do, I download the page.jpg and use an image reader to enlarge that .jpg page and look at that as half screen and look here on WS for the area to transcribe. I thank you kindly, George, and again I hope and pray that not only do you and your loved ones have Happy Holidays -- a happy rest of your life -- for everyone here and their families as well. Respectfully, —Maury (talk) 04:51, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

 Comment where was the discussion about this change? I wasn't aware that we stopped having discussions and arriving at consultation prior to making a change. This is a very clumsy implementation as there is ZERO guidance on what is LST, what is easy LST, and what is old LST. This is exactly why we should discuss and plan things, than just into an implementation based on the consensus of one. — billinghurst sDrewth 12:10, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

+1 Billinghurst. Ironically this is also how I felt when "easy LST" was first foisted upon us. That too was done without discussion; and we had no recourse, as no amount of community opinion can force an extension developer to roll back a code patch. Very frustrating. Hesperian 12:24, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Merry Christmas? Consider this the roll-back 5 years in the making (I not all that smart; just persistent). The only thing that has changed is attention has been drawn to something that's been in effect for ~5 years and in the manner in which it now loads. When this was first pushed on us, regular (or "old") LST was just an extension available to all on WS whether it was used or not (of course its key to doing our transcription work).

Easy LST came along and overrode that default -- one that could not be stopped from loading -- again whether one used it or not. The only alternative was to opt out via a gadget (so everybody loaded "Old" LST only be overriden without choice by Easy LST only to be opted out of by choice by most -- I say "most" cause I can't get hard numbers on who-uses what-gadget thanks to Developer Dept. of Secrets).

Now that Easy LST is a gadget itself rather than a choice to opt-out-of after the fact, nobody is forced to accept the resource "hit" unless they want to use it. More choice is always better and that is what we get with this change.

Recap for those technically retarded like myself:

• BEFORE - Tick (enable) the user preference to turn off Easy LST
• AFTER - unTick (disable) the user preference to turn off Easy LST

Everything else to be said (or already said) in this matter are just semantics. -- George Orwell III (talk) 13:50, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

┌──────┘
 Comment² I.C.B. If either Billinghurst or Hesperian were remotely serious regarding their objections (and not grandstanding) they would use their rights to reverse this change (its a wiki!) and risk taking the heat for their actions. Every user who is really interested has long since found out what LST stands for (and probably at least some of the easyLST controversy); and those who were not interested… on the whole remain uninterested as of right now.

Give praise for good work where it is due, and stop punishing a wholehearted attempt to publicise a legitimate change. Lets be honest, how many people would have noticed if it were not for the banner notice and this very discussion?

Using senility to suggest that the conversation bubbling along for as long as I can remember had lapsed/didn't happen is not a good look either. AuFCL (talk) 20:50, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

That is just ridiculous AuFCL and you are being needlessly provocative. There are many ways to contest the means that an action has been undertaken without a declaration of war with a revert. The rest of argument is unsubstantiated verbiage that is neither helpful nor supported by evidence

There is simply a due process and due courtesy of having the conversation in a community before undertaking an action, and GOIII knows it and chose not to undertake that process. There was neither necessity nor urgency to undertake the actions at that time, or in that way, and it is not unreasonable to ask for that consideration.

I commented that the change in the means that it has been made is uninformative and lacks context. Please explain how the statement "Easy LST" is self-explanatory to any new or occasional user. LST is not a widespread concept, and in that sense should be explained as labelled section transclusion, and preferably off to a wikilink. There is neither context, nor pointer to the means to undertake either means of transclusion which could have been done. — billinghurst sDrewth 12:19, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

You may be right on that last point. The problem, again, was whether or not to assume opting-out is the majority Gadget setting or not & there is no current tracking of such user preference data. The choice was either piss off the people opting-out or confusing the Easy-users; I made a call and now I will have to live with it. Does anyone contest the outcome however? -- George Orwell III (talk) 16:06, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

---

Thanks ever so much for the personal abuse Billinghurst. So often the resort of an unscrupulous scoundrel. I can only conclude you are actually trying either to make this easy for me or perhaps this is an inept attempt at entrapment? I could debate you and even possibly win; frankly that would not either serve the project nor do I value your opinion or that of your sycophants sufficiently highly enough to so bestir myself.

The facts remain these: for good or bad reasons George Orwell III has done a good thing in the long-term interests of the project as a whole and for such I applaud his actions. For whatsoever your own reasons you (and here I suspect largely to protect your steward status, and certainly not in any way to promote project progress) make protest that correct procedures were not followed. Your further unwillingness to back out GO_IIIs changes pending resolution of your fatuous call for debate prove you lack the courage to follow through upon your so-called convictions.

Final points and take-home messages:

• Don't rock the boat; this is far more important than attempting to improve any situation, and it makes the bureaucrats (cringe!) actually think.
• Don't advertise future "improvements"—you will be punished for having the temerity to do so.
• The emperor does rather appear to be lacking in apparel.

AuFCL (talk) 23:26, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

AuFCL, it is not acceptable for you to speak to other contributors this way, regardless of what you think of them. This is not the first time and Billinghurst is not the first person you have targeted. It is past time you reviewed the way you interact with people here. You are regularly dragging the tone of discussion down to the level of personal attack and it is bad for the project. Hesperian 01:03, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

To corroborate: I am a reasonably new user, and I use this Easy LST all the time, but I didn't know it was called that, and had to do quite a bit of searching to figure out what this announcement and discussion were about. Beleg Tâl (talk) 14:52, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

And now, sadly you have learned more than you ever wanted to know. "They" say learning should be fun. "They" were clearly lying… AuFCL (talk) 23:26, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Somewhere in the rules it states something to the effect of Be Bold. George Orwell III should have that same option. I am glad he took the time to explain all of what I asked to me. As long as the option of using Easy LIST or not using it is there I see no problems. There only a few high ranking coworkers who labor for free in the arguments. I appreciate what George Orwell III did and another person in the above also learned about LST which he had wondered about. Another point is to treat others with some leeway as well as politeness. Think fellows, imagine George Orwell III leaving here. We all would suffer because he is excellent with codes aside from being helpful to the rest of us. It looks like a game of oneupmanship of the smart fellows to me. I make this statement because I believe it and because I regret asking questions here that have caused others problems and arguments -- friends vs friends? Man, it is Christmas time. Apparently George was Bold but he has that right -- by the rule to "be bold". I don't know the politics behind it and for that I am glad just from reading the attacks and arguments here. The world is getting crazy and dangerous enough with killings and protests. Let there be peace here during holidays we (I) cherish. Seriously, these arguments are saddening. —Maury (talk) 02:50, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

I agree mostly with what Maury said above. I am new and have not yet learned the politics here. But it seems to me that there are a few interfighting camps here. This is a good project and we should not sabotage it by fighting amongst ourselves. There is so much to do here, you know, everyone can do or find something to do here without colliding with others. Let us work peacefully and in harmony. Merry Christmas to you all. Hrishikes (talk) 03:16, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Amen to peace and harmony. Merry Christmas! May we find common ground... Londonjackbooks (talk) 03:48, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Peace and harmony comes from a community approach to moving this site forward. I asked for a consensus approach for such a change and the consideration to be given to the community to have an opinion on a change prior to a change being made. Review what I have said, and I have not expressed an opinion either way on whether I am for or against the change. I did express an opinion that I thought that change had not been handled well, and is not informative.

Re being bold, that is about editing and at enWP, and I can point you to the other rules talking about consensus, and consensus has always been our preferred methodology here. I ask that we look to a consensus and informed approach for making changes at our site. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:53, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

I beg to differ... you yourself asked for exactly what was delivered - albeit ~4 years ago (2nd to last and last paragraph quoted below):

Is it possible to still leave it as a gadget, though default to ON? I would prefer that we set it up so that it is easy to turn it off. Doesn't seem right to have the instructions not readily available, ie. you have to have read this thread on the wiki. — billinghurst sDrewth 07:10, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

sure, we can have make it a gadget. ThomasV (talk) 11:12, 20 October 2010 (UTC)

Comments since then (October 2010) only reinforce the notion that forcing 'Easy' LST for everyone and allowing folks to opt out after the fact was inferior to making it a Gadget with the default state as "enabled" (ON) for everybody -- which also allowed folks to opt out if they wished so. The upside was 1.) as a Gadget, the function(s) within East LST would have the benefit of ResourceLoader management, and; 2.) Folks opting out of the Gadget recovered the resources forced to be used when loaded the other way via Base.js. There were no discernable downsides to the Gadget approach that I could find at the same time.

Now, to be clear, is the expectation to re-visit consensus established in the past (or the accumulated consensus reached over time) before implementing changes in the here and now that meet that consensus? -- George Orwell III (talk) 01:47, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

Tech News: 2014-52

Latest tech news from the Wikimedia technical community. Please tell other users about these changes. Not all changes will affect you. Translations are available.

Recent software changes

• The Technical Operations team is now using Phabricator to track their tasks. The Operations team manages the Wikimedia servers. In the future you will be able to see the tasks that are not private. [26]

Software changes this week

• There will be no software changes this week and next week. This is because of the end-of-year holidays. The next update of MediaWiki will be on January 6. [27]

Future changes

• The system that displays citations will change in the future. The new system will not change the style of citations. [28]
• A new design for VisualEditor will come in January. You can try it now on test wikis. [29]

Tech news prepared by tech ambassadors and posted by bot • Contribute • Translate • Get help • Give feedback • Subscribe or unsubscribe.

16:52, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Multiple translations with different title

Three with the Moon and his Shadow, Drinking Alone in the Moonlight, and Drinking Alone by Moonlight are three different translations of the same Chinese poem, originally titled zh:月下獨酌四首. My understanding is that there should be a disambiguation page that links to the three, and that page would be linked from each version and from the other-language Wikisources or Wikidata. Is there any protocol about how that should be titled? Is there a policy page that addresses issues like this? Rigadoun (talk) 04:45, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

A {{versions}} page not a disambiguation page. I don't think there is a policy page. You would have to take guidance from the template documentation together with pertinent examples such as The Iliad. Hesperian 05:43, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Why would you use a {{versions}} page and not a {{translations}} page? My understanding is that, since you are disambiguating translations, you would use the latter? (for example, see Veni Creator Spiritus (Maurus)). Help:Disambiguation seems to agree with you, but I don't understand why. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 18:27, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Also, I just noticed that User:Chris55 asked the same question in 2012 on Help talk:Disambiguation with no response. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 18:35, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Because the translations are considered different versions of the same work. So you would want the different translation pages inside versions.--Rochefoucauld (talk) 19:18, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

So what's the point of a {{translations}} page? From what I understand, it is a versions page, specifically for works where all English versions are translations of an original. If we want "the different translation pages inside versions", by which I understand "the different translations listed on a versions page", then there will never be a need or use for translations pages, so we shouldn't have that as an option.

In my opinion, it would make a lot more sense to use a {{translations}} page to list different translations of a work. For example: Dies Irae is a {{translations}} page, which lists translations by Coles, Crashaw, Dillon, Dix, Irons, Johnson, and Slosson. Then, you would use a {{versions}} page to list versions of a particular translation—for example, Dies Irae (Irons) lists different verions of Irons' translation: one published in 1902 in The Seven Great Hymns of the Mediaeval Church, and another published in 1912 in the English Missal. —Beleg Tâl (talk) 21:57, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm sorry apparently I wasn't very clear; translation pages are used for works that are translated by wiki users. For example, a page like Translation:Catullus 30 was translated by wikisource users. For instance Three with the Moon and his Shadow(E. P. Dutton & Co., New York, 1922)., Drinking Alone in the Moonlight(translated by Amy Lowell published in Fir-flower Tablets by, Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1921), Drinking Alone by Moonlight( published by Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1919).) are works that have been published in the united states and are out of copyright. If we did not use the current method there would be no separation between works translated from wikisource users and works translated by respected translators and publishers. Published translators, translate the entire work themselves and as a result tend to be more persistent in their translation throughout the work. They also use a certain set of standards and rules. It's important that we separate the two.--Rochefoucauld (talk) 22:23, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

No, I think a {{translations}} page is more appropriate here than a {{versions}} page; when I replied earlier I momentarily forgot about {{translations}}. Hesperian 23:46, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

OK, I made the page Yue xia du zhuo, under the transliterated title (along the lines of using the Latin titles of these hymns for the translation pages). Thanks for the help and suggestions, everyone. Rouchefoucauld, I think you're mixing up the {{translations}} template with the Translation namespace. I agree with the others it makes sense to use translation instead of versions here. Rigadoun (talk) 05:43, 26 December 2014 (UTC)