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October 2007

XHTML at Kilogram

Resolved

– Everyone seems to be happy now.

Hi,

Just FYI, XHTML does allow elements to occur inside <li> elements. The relevant declarations from the XHTML 1.0 Strict DTD (taken from http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/dtds.html) are grouped here for your convenience:

<!ENTITY % block
     "p | %heading; | div | %lists; | %blocktext; | fieldset | table">
<!ENTITY % Flow "(#PCDATA | %block; | form | %inline; | %misc;)*">
<!ELEMENT li %Flow;>

Expanding the parameter entities defined in the first two declarations, we see that the third declaration is equivalent to:

<!ELEMENT li (#PCDATA | p | %heading; | div | %lists; | %blocktext; | fieldset | table | form | %inline; | %misc;)*>

which is either an invalid declaration (if there's something wrong with one of the parameter entities — unlikely, IMHO, though I'll admit that I've not scoured the DTD looking for errors on the W3C's part), or a mixed-content element declaration for <li> elements, with elements being among the permitted child elements.

—Ruakh_TALK 20:03, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, of course you can use p inside li; that wasn't the issue. The main issue is that you can't open a p without closing it, and the secondary one is that you don't need p inside li; it's just redundant. I would have gone into this, but edit summaries are pretty short. :-) PS: In talk page at that article I mention that I understand the "beautification" idea, but this is something that needs to be done properly, system-wide, by the developers, and I support a move at WP:VPT to urge them to do so, as it also affects line spacing with inline references and inline cleanup templates, not just superscripted content. But we can't have every other article randomly outright abusing XHTML markup to achieve line spacing effects willy-nilly or pretty soon wiki article source code will be impenetrable to the average editor. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:12, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

It's true that you can't open a p without closing it in XHTML; but we're not writing XHTML, we're writing MediaWiki markup. MediaWiki writes XHTML, and does so correctly. Your claim that the p is redundant in this case is simply mistaken; it serves an important role here. (I'd explain, but I rather suspect that you didn't read the wiki markup carefully, as you assumed that it was written by Luddites. Now that you know there's a method to it, it's easier for you to simply take a look and understand what its purpose is.)

As for the sup-thing, I completely agree with you, as you can see from the edit history and the talk-page; but that's unrelated to the li/p-thing.

—Ruakh_TALK 20:20, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

What "important role" is it trying to serve? As for MediaWiki putting HTML into wikimarkup is not wikimarkup it is putting HTML into wikimarkup. While MediWiki itself can correct some XHTML errors on the fly when people use obsolete and otherwise malformed HTML code, it cannot do this in all cases, so writing correct code is a good practice. At least as importantly it has to be remembered that WP is open content, and while some repuprosings of it make use of MediaWiki, others (such as re-use of WP material at ask.com and many other places) do not, and use the WP database (raw code as entered by editors) directly, so MW's compensation abilities are of questionable relevance in the big picture. Anyway, I'm not trying to get into a geeker-than-thou organ-waving match with you. I just want to the code to be clean, and for (X)HTML to not be used when it does not need (distinguish "I need" from "I prefer") to be used, because it is an entry barrier to editing by non-geek editors and is a major vector for errors. I'm highly skeptical that what you are trying to do with <li> cannot be accomplished by a different and less brittle means, though I've been known to be wrong before of course. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 20:33, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

No, it's MediaWiki markup; MediaWiki actually parses what you're understandably thinking of as (X)HTML, and re-assembles everything its own way. When there are two kinds of markup for a given construct (an (X)HTML-like kind of markup and a WYSIWYG-like kind of markup), they're internally converted to the same construct before the XHTML is generated.

The p elements are needed for the very simple reason that each list item contains multiple paragraphs. (This, BTW, is why I assumed you thought p elements were forbidden within li elements; you were removing necessary markup in the name of XHTML validity, so I assumed you thought the necessary markup was invalid XHTML. Now I see that you simply didn't realize it was necessary.)

Any mirror worth its salt will have a full library for parsing wiki code the way MediaWiki does. That said, if it's terribly important to you, we can add all the end-tags. To me they seem like the kind of clutter that deters less technically-minded editors — the less (X)HTML-style markup, the better — but I do see the benefits of being more usable by broken mirrors.

—Ruakh_TALK 20:56, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I stand corrected; I just tried this in a sandbox, and you are right that it doesn't handle paragraphs in XHTML-formatted lists unless they are forced with a p element. That seems kind of silly and unintuitive, but oh well. I wonder why they would have abandoned wikimarkup parsing but only with respect to paragraphization (i.e. '''ing for boldface, etc., still work) inside XHTML (or in your terms "(X)HTML-style") list items. Makes no sense to me, but I see what you were after with that markup. I think it is good to have the , since it reinforces that elements need to close, and that fact is important in many cases even in MediaWiki-parsed pages. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 22:27, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Re: "I think it is good to have the , since it reinforces that elements need to close […]": Oh, an evangelism argument! You found my weak spot. You win, I concede. End-tags it is. —Ruakh_TALK 14:16, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Heh. May the Gods of Good Coding be praised. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 05:00, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

NIFlagInWikipedia userbox

Resolved

– Just an FYI.

A page you nominated for deletion has been renominated. To take part in the discussion, see Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Beano ni/UserBoxes/NIFlagInWikipedia (2nd nomination). Lurker (said · done) 15:01, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Noted. Thanks. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 05:02, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Matrona

Resolved

– Just a chat.

Hi: I have removed my attempt at fact-checking the article, and I apologize for not having been more complete. I should note, however, that my summary on removing the no-wiki comment ("remove no-wiki comment") was arguably more precise than yours on placing it there ("just some general improvements"). I should note also that you added a citation tag to a sentence that you added in January. Having noted these things, I leave the article to more capable editors. Jlittlet 05:39, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

If the biblio. stuff you added and then removed was actually relevant, then by all means please add it back, and use it to cite facts in the article. My objection was to removal of the refs cleanup tag, since the article (with or without the biblio section) was not citing any sources for anything. And, I don't exempt myself from any fault for that, which is why I {{fact}}-tagged my own addition. I was sloppy or tired or something that day and forgot to cite my source, so I'm shaming myself for it. :-) Anyway, sorry if I ticked you off; that wasn't the intent. Nor was it to besmirch your three books, but rather to say "use <ref> and {{Cite book}} so we have refs so we have actual ref. citation." :-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 07:47, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Too kind!

Resolved

– Just a chat.

Thanks, SMcCandlish. I'm touched, and thankful for your authoritative input. Me? I'm just a technician with a few ideas. Tony (talk) 07:42, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

It's more the fortitude and "natural leadership" as they call it. It takes a lot of work to watchlist the MOS as attentively as you do and prevent its daily corruption with balderdash. I get a bit irritated with people who accuse you of WP:OWN in there, because you're fulfilling a de facto role, the weight of which no one else is willing to approach, and which would be fulfilled with effectively the same results even if there were another doing it (effectively; if it were done ineffectively, all hell would of course break loose). It's a "wikijob", and you're doing it well. So, kudos where due, for the die-hard effort. I even reacted negatively to your protectiveness on my first foray into the MOS's guts, but you've long since converted me. If I totally had my selfish way, I'd make probably 150 changes to the MoS + subpages, but I've been convinced that this isn't the way to go; it is better to adapt to the established guidelines (spaced em-dashes now look weird to me, after only a month, etc.) and to pursue strongly-desired changes gradually. It takes a lot of patience to deal with the impatience of others. I've seen your patience line get crossed a few times recently, so I thought a show of appreciation of your reserve-when-it-holds might be welcome. :-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 08:09, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Spacing after the decimal point

Resolved

– Just a chat.

Hi. Just wanted to thank you for your change to the title on the MOSNUM talk page :-) Thunderbird2 09:06, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Most welcome. It was actually hindbrain-nagging at me for a while, without my quite seeing it, and then it just sort of whacked me that the entire discussion was biased. I still hold to my opinions, but shooting a fish in a barrel versus wrestling a shark with one's bare hands in the open ocean are two very different versions of "I caught a fish". If my (or your) arguments stand, they should do so without crutches, but also without having to balance on one leg while being shoved. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:37, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Images

Resolved

– Decline involvement.

If you have a problem with people on inappropriate image-deleting sprees, the best place to take it up is probably WT:NFC. Though you may need a leather hide and some persistance, if you're going to take on the "no fair use" and "any procedural irregularity demands instant annihilation" brigade. Types like Zscout will eventually respect consensus, if you can achieve it there. Jheald 10:59, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I'll have to pass; am already knee-deep in various other contentious wiki-issues, enough that I have hardly any time for actual article writing until some of those are resolved. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:26, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

You can blame me

Resolved

– Just an FYI.

see!?? BTW-- Wake UP! <g> Cheers! // FrankB 19:00, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

Noted. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:24, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Biography Newsletter 5

Resolved

– Just projectspam.

{{Wikipedia:WikiProject Biography/Outreach/Newsletter/Issue 005}} To receive this newsletter in the future, please list yourself in the appropriate section here. This newsletter was delivered by the automated R Delivery Bot 15:58, 7 October 2007 (UTC) .

My Signature

Resolved

– Moot; sig. already changed.

Hmm? That is a few days old now. I have fixed my signature, EVula gave it the thumbs up. Doyley Talk 15:04, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

The problem I ran into may have been from a few days ago then. The current one looks fine. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:15, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I wrote this one myself. Where did you run into the problem? Doyley Talk 15:17, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Trying to recall. It was on a "Wikpedia talk:"-namespace page, in which your sig was not "sticking" to your indented replies, but going to the line below, with no indentation, presumably because of the spacing problems mentioned by EVula. I fixed it in-place where I found that problem. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 15:21, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Ah ok, Many thanks! Doyley Talk 15:23, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Agreement

Resolved

– Just a chat.

I'm really not difficult to agree with. The only things I object to in the MOS are prescriptive rules which are not in fact the consensus of English usage as a whole. Either stick to what English always does, or use normally or we recommend, and I will not dispute it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 02:04, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

It's a guideline, though, not a policy, so everything in it is "we recommend" by definition. And the purpose of WP:MOS is to be prescriptive, as to what to do on WP; it is not a general publication for off-WP consensus as to what "proper" English is, what English always or usually does, what the differences between various dialects and registers are, etc. Its sole purpose is to help editors write articles that will be maximally useful to our readers (especially via consistency and lack of ambiguity), that's all. This will necessarily differ in a few ways from traditional style guides, which are both more permissive in some ways ("there's no standard about this, so just do whatever you like") and at times excessively dogmatic about the "correctness" of something that is entirely arbitrary. These conflicts come up especially when it comes to the limitations of the medium (online media in general, and WP in particular in some cases), the needs for balancing a multicultural editorship and readership without it being a freeforall, accessibility and usability issues, need for precision, and various other concerns that a general style guide doesn't have to focus on because it is written for students writing term papers, journalists, and the like. Aside from all that, there is precious little that "English always does". Just as even American scientific publications have abandoned typesetters' quotation, despite it being the traditional "consensus of English usage as a whole" in America, to most people, for a long time, WP has to defy a few prescriptive traditions (yes, even as it is being prescriptive in its own way). So, I'm not sure how MOS can every make you happy, with the expectations you bring. Another way of looking at it is, if you fork a copy of it over to WikiText, to serve as an online reference work for general usage, it would rapidly diverge from the Wikipedia MOS, because its purposes, audience, scope and very nature would be radically different.— SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:36, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

The way to "defy a prescriptive tradition" is to say you don't have to follow it, which is distinct from you have to use this other method. I encourage the first, within reason; I object strenuously to the second. The most effective way to say you don't have to follow tradition is to enumerate the disadvantages of the traditional method, and the advantages of the new one; to be convincing, it helps to add the advantages of the old and the disads of the new. In short, treat our editors as adults, in the hope that most of them are, or can be persuaded to pretend to be. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:39, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

WP:ELG and relationship to WP:FLAG

Resolved

– Moot; WP:FLAG is a MoS guideline now.

Please see WT:ELG, WT:FLAG, and my talk. FLAG is still a proposed guideline, and even though there may be consensus there, it doesn't apply yet. There are already others objecting to your changes, visually obvious or not. O ₂ (? • ?) 00:10, 14 October 2007 (GMT)

You are not expressing a clear understanding of how guidelines work. Guidelines do not dictate consensus or best practices; the opposite is true. A guideline doesn't "apply" at all, like a law (and like official WP Policies can be said to, since in several cases like WP:COPYRIGHT and WP:BLP they are external impositions from the legal department); a guideline "summarizes and reflects" extant consensus on best practices. Cf. the talk page of WP:NFT for a similarly misguided attempt by a few editors to label WP:NFT either {{essay}} or {{disputed}} because they had some problems with its wording and tone.

I would be perfectly comfortable with putting {{guideline}} on WP:FLAG since it has been through the proposal process, with markably little strife. I don't see any need for me to be the one to do that, so I haven't bothered, but I'm sure someone else will.

I have no idea what you mean by "visually non-obvious" objections; on Wikipedia there is no such thing. I will be happy to check out the discussions you point me to, of course.

My objections to your editing with regard to this are a) you have been reverting without a substantive reason expressed for doing so (maybe you've already provided one at the talk pages mentioned, so that may be a moot point), and reverting very heavyhandedly, with apparent disregard for what you were reverting (you reverted a large number of formatting twiddles that had nothing to do with the ELG vs. FLAG issue at all.) Please be more careful. I apologize if I snapped at you, but honestly I am completely shocked to being reverted so broadly; I think the last time that happened to me was at WP:MOSNUM ca. April or June, and I edit nearly every day, so I genuinely think your rv tactics in this case were highly unusual. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 00:52, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Intro

Resolved

– Just an FYI.

Howdy, just fyi, I reverted and commented at Template talk:Intro#Shortcut dablink. I can't think of a good solution atm. --Quiddity 19:16, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Noted. I replied over there. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 23:09, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Well Done

Resolved

– Just a chat.

Wikipedia:Manual of Style (flags) well done on this, you put alot of effort into it.--Padraig 20:41, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. It seemed important, and not something that was going to achieve consensus without consistency shepherding. Glad it worked out! (So far; it's only been designated a guideline for a day, so I'm not counting the eggs yet...) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 23:10, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Template:jct and nonbreaking spaces

Stale

– Old issue.

Can you look at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (exit lists)#Nonbreaking spaces, and also at a few of the exit lists that use the template (check that the template is used in the exit list, not only in the infobox) to make sure I placed the nbsps correctly? Thank you. --NE2 17:58, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Looking at the rendered source code is instructive (I've "cheated" for our reading benefit by forcibly line-breaking this and shortening the image URLs):

<dd><a href="/wiki/Image:NY-100.svg" class="image" title="NY-100.svg"><img alt="" 
src="25px-NY-100.svg.png" width="25" height="20" border="0" /></a><a 
href="/wiki/Image:NY-119.svg" class="image" title="NY-119.svg"><img alt="" 
src="25px-NY-119.svg.png" width="25" height="20" border="0" /></a> <span 
style="white-space:nowrap"><a href="/wiki/New_York_State_Route_100" 
title="New York State Route 100">NY 100</a></span>/<span style="white-space:nowrap"><a 
href="/wiki/New_York_State_Route_119" 
title="New York State Route 119">NY 119</a></span><span 
style="white-space:nowrap">&#160;(Tarrytown Road)</span><br />
</nowiki>

It looks to me like there needs to be a ... (i.e. a "nowiki" in the template code) enclosing the first shield through ...NY 100</a>/, to a) Keep the icons from ever being separated from the beginning of the text, and to keep the "/" attached to the first of the text as well.

There are several of the following in the template code: {{#if:{{{3|}}}|{{#if:{{{to2|}}}| to |{{#if:{{{name1|}}}{{{dir1|}}}| / |/}}}} which appear to only put spacing around the "/" sometimes. I think it would be more readable if spaced. If done that way, I think some of this code would be redundant since it would be saying "if x applies, do this, and if it doesn't apply, do the same thing". A non-breaking space appears before "(Tarrytown Road)", as the #160 entity instead of the nbsp entity. Not sure why or where that came from without looking at the template code again, but it is already in a nowrap so it doesn't seem to serve any purpose. Doesn't hurt anything though.

I'm going to insert a maximal example here so we can look at everything:

{{jct | state=CA | I | 40 | I | 280 | I | 80 | dir1=E | dir2=N | dir3=W | to1=yes | name1=name1 | name2=name2 | name3=name3 | city1=city1 | city2=city2 | city3=city3 | city4=city4 }}

To I-40 e (name1) / I-280 n (name2) / I-80 w (name3) – city1, city2, city3, city4

Rendered code:

<a href="/wiki/Image:I-40_%28CA%29.svg" class="image" title="I-40 (CA).svg"><img 
alt="" src="20px-I-40_%28CA%29.svg.png" width="20" height="20" border="0" /></a><a 
href="/wiki/Image:I-280_%28CA%29.svg" class="image" title="I-280 (CA).svg"><img 
alt="" src="24px-I-280_%28CA%29.svg.png" width="24" height="20" border="0" /></a><a 
href="/wiki/Image:I-80_%28CA%29.svg" class="image" title="I-80 (CA).svg"><img alt="" 
src="20px-I-80_%28CA%29.svg.png" width="20" height="20" border="0" /></a> To&#160;<span 
style="white-space:nowrap"><a href="/wiki/Interstate_40_%28California%29" 
title="Interstate 40 (California)">I-40</a></span>&#160;E<span 
style="white-space:nowrap">&#160;(name1)</span>&#160;to&#160;<span 
style="white-space:nowrap"><a href="/wiki/Interstate_280_%28California%29" 
title="Interstate 280 (California)">I-280</a></span>&#160;N<span 
style="white-space:nowrap">&#160;(name2)</span>&#160;to&#160;<span 
style="white-space:nowrap"><a href="/wiki/Interstate_80_%28California%29" 
title="Interstate 80 (California)">I-80</a></span>&#160;W<span style="white-space:nowrap">&#160;(name3)</span>, road&#160;– <a 
href="/w/index.php?title=City1%2C_California&action=edit" class="new" 
title="City1, California">city1</a>, <a 
href="/w/index.php?title=City2%2C_California&action=edit" class="new" 
title="City2, California">city2</a>, <a 
href="/w/index.php?title=City3%2C_California&action=edit" class="new" 
title="City3, California">city3</a>, <a 
href="/w/index.php?title=City4%2C_California&action=edit" class="new" 
title="City4, California">city4</a>

Okay, so I think what we are aiming for something more like this (additions in ALL CAPS though of course that would be wrong as real code):

<SPAN 
STYLE="WHITE-SPACE:NOWRAP"><a href="/wiki/Image:I-40_%28CA%29.svg" class="image" title="I-40 (CA).svg"><img 
alt="" src="20px-I-40_%28CA%29.svg.png" width="20" height="20" border="0" /></a><a 
href="/wiki/Image:I-280_%28CA%29.svg" class="image" title="I-280 (CA).svg"><img 
alt="" src="24px-I-280_%28CA%29.svg.png" width="24" height="20" border="0" /></a><a 
href="/wiki/Image:I-80_%28CA%29.svg" class="image" title="I-80 (CA).svg"><img alt="" 
src="20px-I-80_%28CA%29.svg.png" width="20" height="20" border="0" /></a> To&#160;<span 
style="white-space:nowrap"><a href="/wiki/Interstate_40_%28California%29" 
title="Interstate 40 (California)">I-40</a></span></SPAN>&#160;E<span 
style="white-space:nowrap">&#160;(name1)</span>&#160;to&#160;<span 
style="white-space:nowrap"><a href="/wiki/Interstate_280_%28California%29" 
title="Interstate 280 (California)">I-280</a></span>&#160;N<span 
style="white-space:nowrap">&#160;(name2)</span>&#160;to&#160;<span 
style="white-space:nowrap"><a href="/wiki/Interstate_80_%28California%29" 
title="Interstate 80 (California)">I-80</a></span>&#160;W<span style="white-space:nowrap">&#160;(name3)</span>, road&#160;– <a 
href="/w/index.php?title=City1%2C_California&action=edit" class="new" 
title="City1, California">city1</a>, <a 
href="/w/index.php?title=City2%2C_California&action=edit" class="new" 
title="City2, California">city2</a>, <a 
href="/w/index.php?title=City3%2C_California&action=edit" class="new" 
title="City3, California">city3</a>, <a 
href="/w/index.php?title=City4%2C_California&action=edit" class="new" 
title="City4, California">city4</a>

Depending on exactly how the template is using that other template to get the goods, that new  might have to be even later. The rendered markup is a little redundant in parts, but this is unavoidable without having this template send the embedded one a new value telling it not to make its own nowrap spans, and of course that second template would have to be modified to be able to process that. Probably not worth the trouble. Ideally, it would be best if the N/S/E/W stuff was inside the nowrap span of the "I-40" stuff; I'm skeptical that something something else would not break between "something" and "something else" in some browsers. Maybe not enough of big deal to worry about.

Was this any help? — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 23:59, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Stanislavski and related

Resolved

– Just a chat.

Hello. It's good to see you trying to clean up those Method acting and Stanislavski's 'system' articles. However, looking at the last edits on the Stan. I've reverted them. Your changes are not in line with standard critical usage. If you'd like the citations, let me know. But it is Stanislavski's 'system' - lower case and 'marked', and it is the Method - capitalized. You were also confusing a "quotation" with a word 'used' in a unusual way. Regards, DionysosProteus 00:58, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

MOS

Resolved

– Way old news.

You and Noetica have been doing a fine job in overhauling the page: great to see. I do have a few concerns about the ellipsis section, now that I'm back on Earth after a horrendous deadline-week in the real world. But perhaps I'm misunderstanding it. Tony (talk) 07:37, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

What are the concerns? Some of what Noetica put in there was simply wrong, some of it unsourced and conflicting with established sources, like "... .", some of it impenetrable, other parts great. I tried to clean that up. You then cleaned up my cleanup, and I then did another round. I'm okay with it as it stands as of my last edit, but I've been staring at it a lot, so I may be simply temporarily unable to see the problems in it. I don't find the "is suspension/pause usage really an ellipsis?" matter to be of any concern; the flow from "use it this way, use it that way, and when you have to combine them both, use them this third way" is more important. Other than that, I'm pretty open on it. I just don't want to see nonsensical instructions get back in there. The yesterday versions were just unparseable. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 07:51, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

My answer

Resolved

– Noetica and I actually get along just fine now, after this and other initially unfriendly arguments.

[Thanks for your note at my talk page. Here is my answer, as I have posted there.]

SMcCandlish:

Thank you for bringing your issues here. Here are some particular replies to things you say above:

Yes, I do feel your edit summaries have been "arrogant" (your word), and more to the point WP:OWNish and seemingly intended to intimidate other editors.

One editor's boldness and directness is another editor's arrogance. I find many of your edit summaries and your high-handed and often patronising dismissal of lesser mortals arrogant; you obviously consider them bold and direct, as I see from what you say above.

Their import appears to be "don't dare revert me, or I will edit war with you or get nasty with you on the talk page".

My record will show that I very rarely edit-war. I nearly always discuss, at length. And in the course of discussion I will be polite to the polite, and rude to the rude. I do quickly revert edits that I judge patently ill-founded or ill-considered. So do you. So what?

I realize I can be abrasive myself, ...

Yep!

... but I don't go out of my way to be so. I was polite (I think) both times I criticized your edit summaries today, and only did so because I believed that a pattern was in evidence and was a hindrance to consensus building and normal editing. I also feel that your edits have been incautious and not thought through enough in some cases.

To the extent that you understood them, right? Quite frankly, anyone who fails to grasp the universal consensus concerning how brackets and sentence endings work is not much of a critic of these things. Sure some points I put forward needed clarifying; I would have been amazed if they didn't! And I joined in the clarifying myself. But it's impossible to do these things in a way that pleases everyone. There are a couple of things I put in because I knew the point could be missed by an over-zealous pedant who might take them over-literally, and not apply them with discretion.

While I agree that the ellipsis section needed editing, much of what you put in there wasn't logically parseable, and some of it was just plain incorrect.

Whistling in the dark. Parse "wasn't logically parseable" like this: "wasn't understood by SMcCandlish". Such self-centredness! And what, pray tell, was "incorrect" in "some of it"? Which of it? How? By whose lights? (Let me guess... CMOS?)

Thinking back, your edits of substance appear to get partially reverted or edited into unrecognizability more than anyone else's in recent memory (by contrast, PMAnderson's often simply get reverted, period, because they only reflect his position, and often seem to be WP:BRD actions, so their reversion is expected, perhaps even intended.)

A fatuous and unsubstantiated claim.

Further, I understand being a solid debater, but there's a difference between defending one's arguments well and taking everything personally.

Don't get me wrong (again). I don't take this so personally as you do. Mainly, I'm irritated because you have wasted a lot of my time. As for defending my arguments, I have no trouble doing that by reason alone – setting aside mere appeals to authority and like fallacies.

Your unwillingness to let sleeping dogs lie, in repeatedly bashing editors in one dispute for their perceived errors in other ones in the past, is a debate (if it can be called that) tactic more suited to Usenet than Wikipedia.

My unwillingness? It is you who persist in obvious error, against the world at large. Every style guide that addresses "that" issue disagrees with you, and so do all publishers. But rather than admit your error, as I suggested, you rattle on about my simply having a margin over you in the debate. That's what I get, for making the effort to show you something you could learn from! And I never have "bashed" you. You're too sensitive.

I don't have anything against you personally, but some of your behaviors at WP:MOS and WT:MOS have been very grating (not just to me). I do not go so far as to say disruptive, but close enough for discomfort.

Rubbish. You are too enmeshed, too flustered perhaps, to come to a clear judgement about all this. Simply put, you have been challenged in way that discomfits you, and you're not quite sure how to respond, except with denial, blame-shifting, and projection.

I manged to tick people off in my early forays into the MOS, so my horse is not very high.

That's better. Focus on that fact. So have I, ticked people off. I don't care. I am helpful and polite (some would say painfully so!) to anyone who is civilised enough to accept such an approach. But I grow impatient after a while with arrogant editors who seek too rapidly and too inexpertly to "correct" others.

Anyway, while this is critical, it is intended constructively, and isn't some declaration of enemyhood or any such nonsense, just a request to tone it down a notch. I will endeavor to do likewise.

Tell you what: how about if you go and do likewise first, and I'll manage my own behaviour my own way, in my own good time. Deal?

Another way of putting this is that I find that your actual actions do not mesh with your statements in your #Not editing for a while comments up top.

That is mainly about a ridiculous and disruptive dispute that I chose not to be involved in. Tony knows very well what it's about. He has behaved very poorly, in my opinion: and he knows that is my opinion. I am still unsure that I will stick around, if that dispute is not settled soon.

If any of it is relating in some way to my own edit summaries being brusque ("Shorten longwinded example", etc.), they're just short and to the point; ...

O sure! They're OK... aren't they?

All that said, I don't think any MOS regular suffers foolish edits lightly, and we all pretty mercilessly revert anything that doesn't work.

Why are you telling me such things? I was here in early 2005. Then, after a one-year break, I've been here since early 2006. The fact that you haven't seen me around doesn't mean I wasn't around, you know.

Happens to me and Tony too (both of us have been editing the MOS long and hard enough that we are more apt than most to not do something boneheaded in there, but we still do boneheaded things in there, inevitably). It's nothing personal, and isn't an attack.

You both do boneheaded things. Tony is a fine editor, and I have learned things from him. He, in turn, has learned from dialogue that he and I have had concerning our own joint efforts at MOS. He has said so, publicly. I may well learn from this interaction with you, and from some of your work at MOS and its talk page. But spare me your lecturing, young SMcCandlish. I am not impressed, and am ahead of you on a couple of fronts, I fear. Of course, I don't expect you to see that, any more than I will concede the converse about you.

Now, is that all? I have other things to do.

– Noetica^?? Talk 12:44, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Replied at User talk:Noetica. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 14:03, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

One thing's for sure: we both talk a lot. I'm going to stop in a moment, now that feelings are sufficiently vented. I strongly disagree with your analysis at several points – to the extent that it can properly be called "analysis", rather than wild surmises and allegations about, for example, my "demanding" not to have my contributions edited! But there is obviously no point labouring things. Thanks once more for bringing the dispute here instead of clogging the MOS talk page, which is already overflowing. I don't know how much useful collaboration we can do, since I find your style as repellent as you find mine. And I judge you as self-deceiving as you judge me! Enjoy your editing at Wikipedia. Let's learn and move on.

– Noetica^?? Talk 20:03, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Fair enough. I've taken a Wiki break anyway. I was finding MOS to be too annoying to put up with for a bit (and no, not just because of your and my interaction). Will go over your reply later. No big hurry? — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:17, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Hey, no problem. Welcome back! The whole business of MOS and its dreary subsidiaries is tediousⁿ. I don't think much can be achieved using the present practices and protocols. I fear we'll never get a stable and truly reliable MOS under present conditions. It's no one's fault in particular. Tony is optimistic, I think; and my disposition tends that way also. But it doesn't matter how much talent and inspiration editors bring to the task, things regress really quickly. You have particular insights into the technicalities of HTML – which people fail to recognise or respect. Then again, perhaps your brilliance in that area "crowds out" a few insights that others might more readily come to. (Who knows? I'm speculating, that's all.) I have particular knowledge and skills too, but I can't deploy them very effectively at MOS if others are dazzled by their own bright guiding lights, as perhaps I am sometimes by my own. This sort of thing happens all the time.

We'll eventually catch up at WT:MOS, yes? (At least I have learned from you that convenient redirect for the talk page.)

– Noetica^?? Talk 09:47, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

I remain optimistic too, though I recognize what you are saying. I think that the need to not regress is one reason that MOS editors are so "revert-happy". Could be better, could be worse. I'm still working on other stuff right now, but yeah, we'll catch up properly at some point. PS: The WT: shortcuts work for most such pages; when I find one that doesn't have such a shortcut I usually add it on the spot. There's hardly anything more annoying that having the type out somethign like "Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)" when "WT:MOSNUM" would do fine. Heh. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 00:23, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Time to delete MOSHEAD?

Resolved

– Old news.

Hi SMcC—It's been about to happen for weeks. Does one post a "speedydelete" at the top of the page, or what? Only an admin can do it, I suppose. Tony (talk) 08:30, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Shouldn't be deleted, since people refer to it; it should be redirected to the #section in MOS that it applies to, so that the links don't go red. :-) — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:16, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Adminship

Resolved

– Not seeking adminship at this time; too busy IRL.

I have been complaining about how we need more admins, and I am going to do something about it, so I have picked some of the best editors I've spotted who have expressed a previous interest in gaining the extra buttons. Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/SMcCandlish 2 needs to turn blue so it can pass, I think. Would you like me to nominate you? I have no doubts you'd sail through this time round. Neil ? 10:42, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

I'll think about it. Had several other nomination offers, so it should probably be done as a co-nomination thing. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 19:13, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

If someone else is already willing to nominate you, then I'll step aside (I have this strange dislike for co-nominations). If, however, you want it doing some time soon and other people are dithering or whatever, and I'll nominate you like *that*. You can't see me click my fingers, but that's what I just did. Neil ? 20:59, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Stanislavski System

Some of those changes have to be restored (though I'm unlikely to bother doing it myself), because the extant text is ungrammatical. When we speak of his system, we refer to it as a system, not a "system", which is his term/formatting not ours. Do not confuse the personal style preferences of the progenitor of the theory with third-party commentary on the theory. Also, per WP:MOS we use double-quotes, not single quotes, even where this "system" usage would be appropriate in that article, which is very few places. I do understand what you are getting at, but the usage is simply outright incorrect in many places there, as is abuse of capitalized "Method" at the Method acting article, which frequently confuses "the Method" as a proper name with references to the Method as a method (cf. "the system" as a system), in which case it is not a proper noun. As far as other issues like 'Stanislavski's "system"' (which is fine in quotation) and 'the Stanislavski System' which is which is how a neutral third-party publication like WP should more generally refer to it, it's the same probleml again. It does not matter that theatre publications like to honor Stanislavski's weird formatting for traditionalism reasons; we are not such a publication, and not have a traditionalist theatrical audience. All that said, I'm not going to fight with you about this. I have no opinion on the systems in question, and am just doing WP:NC and WP:MOS cleanup work. You can certainly expect that others will come in from time to time and make the same fixes. If you want to categorically challege them and get some kind of exception or clarification added to the Manual of Style, you'll need to take that up at WT:MOS. Also, I am having no such use-mention distinction confusion as you claim that I am; rather, you are mistaken in how that distinction is handled in Wikipedia according to the MOS; please see the sections there on quotations and italicization in particular; single-quotes are only used as quotation-marks-inside-quotation-marks, never by themselves, even for mention cases (either italics can be used, or double-quotes, or single-quotes when inside of double-quotes). For the few cases in the article where is is appropriate to retain Stanislavski's "scare quotes" I think what you want is double quotation marks, not single (regardless of Stanislavski's original, which probably did use single, since he's European, but WP consistent uses the North American style doubled ones), since MOS forbids that, and probably not italics since it doesn't convey quite the same implication as the scare-quoting. PS: Stanislavski is misspelled as Stanislavsky in the names of several sources; someone needs to look up those sources and see if the typos are WP editor typos or those of the authors/publishers of the cited works. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 01:16, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps I wasn't clear. It is not merely Stanislavski's personal preference, but the standard way of refering to his 'system' in the critical literature; that is, in scholarly third-party commentary on the theory. I can provide a heap of citations if you're skeptical. You'll need to point me to the correct subsection of Wikipedia:Manual of Style because having taken a look I can't see where it insists on "this" over 'this', since it is not the use for a quotation that I am referring to, but the use when using a word in an unusual way. i.e. a 'grammar' of acting, suggesting the use of the word grammar in an unfamiliar way, rather than actually citing a quotation "grammar" of acting, he said. Re: the Method. I can only see one instance of what you're referring to in the intro (having scanned quickly). The article needs a lot of work, but it is standard to refer to the Method, as in Books on the Method. He taught the Method. Both of those are proper name uses. Again, I can provide citations of scholarly works if need be. With Stan, it's precisely because it's not a system that it's 'system'. Its not there as a quotation of what he said. It's that the word 'system' is the best approximation for what it was. Most commentators follow this practice. You point to the single/doube US/Euro usage. How do you distinguish between saying that you're quoting someone and merely highlighting if you use identical marks? This isn't a scare quote because it carries no negative intention and is used to specify use--i.e., I'm not quoting. It's odd that you say it's a US/Euro thing, because I'm fairly certain I learnt the distinction from the MLA when studying in the States, but I don't have the manual to hand. Glancing at some of my sources, they are both UK & US. RE: spelling of the name. It's Russian, so beset with problems. Constantin Stanislavski is the biggest google hit. It's what his books in English use. It's not ideal. But consistency is to be encouraged. In general for all these points, my understanding is that the wikiuse should reflect the majority use outside of wikiland. Stanislavski's 'system' is that. DionysosProteus 01:47, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Again, I do understand the point you are trying to make, I simply don't buy it. I've gone into this at less conversational depth at WT:MOS#Problems in theatre land. The main issue is that using the the 'system' notation (aside from using single quotations marks against MOS) is that it violates WP:NPOV. Theatre press publication do not have an NPOV rule, so this problem does not arise there. As for the MOS quotation marks and use–mention distinction stuff, I normally refuse to do people's guideline homework for them, but I'll make an exception in this case. Will take a few minutes. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 02:16, 19 October 2007 (UTC)Make that several hours; got sidetracked. — SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:39, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

WP:MOS#Quotation marks:

Double or single
Quotations are enclosed within "double quotes". Quotations within quotations are enclosed within 'single quotes'.

While it did not state this specifically as of this writing, everything in this section that addresses quotation marks used for actual quotations also addresses other uses of them; just a textual oversight that I'm about to go fix. Done. The "Quotation marks" section now leads with

The term quotation(s) in the material below also includes other uses of quotation marks such as for song/chapter/episode titles, unattributable aphorisms, literal strings, "scare-quoted" passages and constructed examples.

I imagine that this will stay in there; it certainly does not reflect a change in advice, just a spelling of it out, because some of the examples in that section did not consist of actual quotations per se, but things like aphorisms and other non-quotation uses of quotation marks. The MOS itself is full of usage of "scare quoting" of contructed examples and of terms, where italicization of them wouldn't work well (though it otherwise prefers italicization for its purposes).

— SMcCandlish [talk] [cont] ‹(-¿-)› 09:39, 19 October 2007 (UTC)