User talk:R. S. Shaw/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Welcome!

Hello, R. S. Shaw/Archive 1, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Where to ask a question, ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions. Again, welcome! --L$T 27 23:20, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Cribbswh

I have a problem with you undoing my edit and calling it "linkspam". I did not add a commercial link to the census page, rather a link to the 1880 census that is a free service. A VERY useful and relevent reference.

F.A. White

RS, my warmest compliments for identifying the F.A. White hoax. When the anonymous user started inserting these pages I thought they were legit, but the long lists of unrelated references gave me an uneasy feeling. Good of you to spot how Ole Daniel Enersen actually removed the entry from WhoNamedIt.com!

Skills like these make Wikipedia a reliable source. My congratulations. JFW | T@lk 21:29, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Pedigree collapse

The link on that page (Mountain of Names) is the source for the statement that Alphonso XIII had only eight great-great-greatparents. Do you have a source that gives the number as ten? Rmhermen 14:10, Nov 29, 2004 (UTC)

Minor edits

Goodness: Somebody who checks up on somebody else's edits! You certainly do have lots of wikipedia time. (Just out of curiosity, how did you choose me: Did you come across an edit that aroused suspicion/annoyance, or is this something that you have been patrolling?)

Anyway, for 2 years I've marked edits as minor when they involve, say, a grammatical change that doesn't alter the meaning of a sentence, or a rearrangement of existing material so that it flows better - largely because wikipedia's performance can be so wonky that it's a pain to wait for a page to open to check an edit, only to find that it was insiginficant. You will find, I think, that this is very common - many minor edits involve more than a single word (not counting the folks who try to sneak in vandalism, of course).

I will, however, take your advice and be more careful. It's easy to get lazy or in a rut, and it could be that I've allowed a sort of "mission creep" to expand what I think of as minor beyond what it should be. - DavidWBrooks 13:50, 26 Jan 2005 (UTC)

.doc -> DOC

Hi there! Placing a redirect is all nice and comfy, but the articles weren't identical. I trust you will be merging the content of the two articles and thereby finish what you started. Bye, Shinobu 15:27, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Mind if I ask where you're from?

I used to work with a Richard Shaw, and I was wondering if there was perhaps some bizarre cosmic coincidence at play. May I ask you where you're from? – Clockwork Soul 05:28, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Ah - I see. I saw from your contributions that you're very knowledgeable of software-related subjects, and my R. Shaw was a software developer where I used to work. Although you are not the Shaw I know, it's still a pleasure to meet you. – Clockwork Soul 19:47, 26 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Categorization

Thank you for making Category:Computing legible. I just realized that it is always better to display the subcategory section this way. For big categories (more than one page), it is important that the subcategories appear on one page. And for smaller categories, it makes even less sense to divide the subcat section with headlines – most headlines just cover one link anyway! I see two ways to achieve this:

a change request to remove headlines from subcat section;
a bot that does what you did;

Please reply here, I'll be watching this page for a while. Sebastian (talk) 23:43, 2005 Jun 9 (UTC)

Well, I'm glad that someone else thinks the solid subcat arrangement is more readable. I do have problems quickly reading with the alphabet headings interspersed. Those headings are one problem. The splitting of some subcategories to other pages is another problem. A third related problem is that people use the category sort-keys as if they also changed the displayed link text (that they don't is a design mistake I think). When they do that, the repeated prefixes (like "computer" in this case) still appear, yet because of the different sort placement, they don't line up in a nice column for quick scanning.

Having a bot do the category key updates seems fairly plausible, and a very good idea. (I wouldn't want to have to do a larger number of edits than I just did.) Any ideas of how to go about getting some botmaster interested in providing such a thing? -R. S. Shaw 00:21, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I’ve seen requests for bots on WP:HD. But I would rather hold off a bit. This is a general layout problem, so it should be fixed generally. I propose to request the following: “Change layout in subcategory list to (1) not include any headlines and (2) display all subcats on first page.”

Only if this can not be done any time soon then I’d ask for the bot. The bot is only a workaround and has several disadvantages:

Links are less legible. Few people would add them this way. (This might be facilitated by a “subst” template, though.)
It needs to be run continuously just to maintain the status quo. (If only one user adds a subcategory “Zoo” then the “*” list is incomplete until the bot is run again.)

I have never submitted a request, but I could try this over the weekend, unless you’d like to do it. While we’re at it, we could also submit a request to display piped links under the piped name. (If the piped name consists of only one letter then the current functionality should be kept: Display the physical name and just use the piped name for sorting. As a “nice to have”, we could also set off or bold the “*” entries.) Sebastian (talk) 01:38, 2005 Jun 10 (UTC)

I have to agree that a change to the category display code would be better, especially because of the continued re-running if bots are used. Go ahead and request it if you want; I'd support. There might be more push back on the alpha headings than on the "all subcats on first page" (or rather "all subcats before any articles"). An intermediate approach for headings would use them only when there are more than say 10 items in a group, which might require generation of headings like "A-C" instead of single letters. -R. S. Shaw 02:54, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

---- There are already two pertinent bugs:

Bug 491: Categories need piping feature to list by alternative name: Unfortunately, this one started off on a bit of a wrong foot because it referred to a very special case of a redirect. Not sure what would be best: Add a comment to the bug that it's actually more general, or post something on Wikipedia:Village_pump (proposals) – I have no experience with either.
Bug 1211: Subcategory paging is not separate from article paging: This one is set to Severity: minor. Maybe it could be increased if we point out that it affects a lot of people. — Sebastian (T) 22:24, 2005 Jun 12 (UTC)

Thanks for the tip about cats

I did know that, but I had forgotten it when I made those changes. I've fixed them, thanks for letting me know. JesseW 06:26, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Hello

Hi, and thank you for your advice. Bronks

apologies

I have no idea how your vote here: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Islam&diff=19735835&oldid=19735796 got deleted. I dont even know why that edit even exists, why would I go back and change the minute of the timestap I posted at... I've been looking at it trying to figure out what happened and the only thing I could think of was maybe I clicked the Save Page more than once by accident... --GNU4Eva 02:57, 1 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks

You wrote

You might find things go easier if you copy (for pasting) from the main title area (next to the wikiGlobe) rather than out of the URL (in the location box of the browser). (I'm guessing that's what you're now doing.) For instance, that way you would get "Embargo (journalism)" instead of "Embargo_%28journalism%29". The text is bigger too, which makes it easier for me. -R. S. Shaw 08:01, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I just wanted to say thanks for the note and suggestion. Calicocat 06:11, 1 August 2005 (UTC)[reply]

WP:CS

Hi there! Regarding the renaming of WP:CS... I'd prefer to discuss this rather than vote on it. My point is that the page is used for notifying the many people who read it about relevant debates, polls and surveys, usually on policy or process issues. And of course it's useful to have such notifications in a single location. The point is that about half if its content simply isn't a survey. So it would kind of make sense to make the name match the process. Of course my recommended name might not work well either. I'm really not sure what Maurreen is up to except that she seems to like opposing everything I do, so I'm afraid that's not really helpful. Would you mind to change the vote back into a discussion? Of course arguing about a name is mainly semantics, but a wrong name can confuse new users - for instance, we've just renamed Votes for Deletion for that same reason (that it isn't supposed to be a vote). Yours, R adiant _>|< 08:35, August 30, 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for CPU block diagram

Hey, I just wanted to thank you for creating that block diagram for the CPU article. I've been really busy as of late and haven't had the chance to finish adding and revising the article as I've wanted to yet, but I'll get to it eventually. Glad to know that I'm not the only person in the world that's interested in this becoming a respectable and informative article! -- uberpenguin 14:14, 6 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Umm... I'm a vandal?

Could you kindly take a moment to explain to me how my copyedits to Shrimp farm constitute vandalism to be reverted? Thanks. IceKarma ॐ 03:41, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Note: I made a procedural mistake and apologized on his talk page -R. S. Shaw

That's alright, I've restored the clobbered edit myself. Thanks for clarifying. IceKarma ॐ 04:02, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Merging Computer storage

Thanks for the warning. I haven't been on Wiki daily any longer. I wouldn't have noticed. --None-of-the-Above 09:10, 24 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]

194.83.191.3 reversions

Oops my bad, sorry and thanks for the heads up. Inexperience and all that - I'll try better next time. I saw the damage was being done over a period and just went into overdrive in exactly the way you suggest. Again sorry. :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)} 09:32, 25 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

binary

Ravn pointed out in the edit summary why binary star was removed (WP:D "this is not a search index", please only add links to this page, if there is a significant risk of confusion). --A dam1213 Talk + 05:43, 22 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Date links

Since you have previously taken an interest in links. Please be kind enough to vote for my new bot application to reduce overlinking of dates where they are not part of date preferences. Thanks. bobblewik 20:49, 25 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There is now a new proposal on the same subject. You may wish to see the proposal at: Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(dates_and_numbers)#linking_of_dates. Thanks. bobblewik 08:54, 15 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

GML

You said that you cannot put the JS in directly...that should be impossible. If it works as a reference, it works in your JS.

Copy in the GML directly from the reference [1] and make some modifications to the function "function AddRevertButtons()". Change it to:

function AddRevertButtons() {

 var l, article = , vandal;
// Add 'revert' links to a diff page
 l = document.getElementById('bodyContent').getElementsByTagName('td');
 for (i = 0; i < l.length; i++) {
   if (l[i].className == 'diff-otitle') {
     article = l[i].getElementsByTagName('a')[0].href.split('&')[0].replace(/[^\/]*\/\/[^\/]*/, );
   } else if (l[i].className == 'diff-ntitle') {
     var toplink = l[i].getElementsByTagName('a')[0].href;
     vandalip = l[i].getElementsByTagName('a')[1].href.split(':')[2].split('=')[1];
     vandal = l[i].getElementsByTagName('a')[1].href.split(':')[2].split('&')[0];
     var t = l[i].innerHTML
     n = t.indexOf('</a>) <br') + t.indexOf('</A>) <BR') + 1; // XXX: WOW HACK!!!!
     if (article !=  && toplink.indexOf('oldid=') == -1) {
       if (vandal == 'Contributions')
        {
       l[i].innerHTML = t.substring(0, n + 5) + '    <a href="' + article + '&fakeaction=rollback&vandal=' + vandalip + '&token=' + hex_md5(article + vandalip + document.cookie) + '">' + rollbacklink + '</a></str ' + t.substring(n + 5, t.length);
        }
       else 
        {
       l[i].innerHTML = t.substring(0, n + 5) + '    <a href="' + article + '&fakeaction=rollback&vandal=' + vandal + '&token=' + hex_md5(article + vandal + document.cookie) + '">' + rollbacklink + '</a></str ' + t.substring(n + 5, t.length);
        }
     }
   }

I turned off the contribs rollbacks long ago (I am an admin, and only use this script for rollbacks for different purposes). Notice that either vandalip or vandal is used depending on whether vandal gives "Contributions". See if this works.Voice-of-All^T|@|ESP 00:08, 18 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
As an alternative, consider putting {{User:VoA/monobook.js}} in your JS file instead of the GML "doc.create" reference. This will give you my standard non-admin RC patrol kit.Voice-of-All^T|@|ESP 00:14, 18 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
It's here!!!
Dear Ms. Shaw:
And it's here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Announcing my CS 492 term-end paper: On Wikipedia — the Technology, the People, the Unfinished Work. File:Wikipedia.pdf
Thank you for all the kind help you have lent me during the paper-writing process!!!
Long live Wikipedia!!!
Shuo Xiang 22:27, 27 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Cleanup tags
We've been thinking about the cleanup tag problem for a while on Wikipedia talk: Cleanup process/Cleanup sorting proposal; see our hashed out tags on User:Alba/Workspace/Cleanup tag proposal. Our idea so far had been to have a {{cleanup|topic|date}}, with "topic" being a text field and date being the same as the current cleanup-date. I'm concerned that a Babel-like tag would deprecate too many current tags. However, how about this? What if a bot autonoted additional tags and added/subtracted their descriptors to the text tag, so that the total set of problems could be kept track of? Would that fix the dangling-cleanup problem? (i.e., when zero problems remain in the text field of the cleanup tag, the article is deemed 'clean' or sent for a final review). Please add your ideas! Thanks for contributing!
Alba 13:32, 4 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Anti-Psychiatry
Hello RS Shaw. I noticed you added a cleanup tag to anti-psychiatry after Dcfleck noted it on WP:PNA. However, that was over a month ago and, since then, a concerted effort from Dc, myself and a few other editors have sorted out the page to a decent standard. Thus, i'll remove the tag in a day or so unless you object, as i don't believe it is in any real need of a cleanup anymore. I'll let Dc know also, to check he has no objections either. Thanks! Rockpocket 05:38, 17 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Cleanup Archaeology
thanks for sorting the anomalies on Wikipedia:Pages needing attention/Archaeology. Thanks :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 07:54, 18 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Re: Different than/to/from
Thanks for your message. I'm changing the edits I made to "different from" wherever applicable, and will check the sentence to make sure they read properly. To address your specific example, "he looked different than he did on the show" would be incorrect to many purists, while "he looked different from the way he did on the show" or "his look was different from that on the show" would be acceptable to everyone, so I'll probably plump for one of the latter versions. Unless you strongly object, of course! Waggers 11:36, 13 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
RE: mr Ruud
Look. Read my bio. I've been around. Mr Ruud needs to learn some manners. He's turned into a lawyer now, quoting copyright law while I'm flogging my arse off to improve the page. As the self-appointed page-god he re-emptively reverts my damn good work. What am I supposed to do here? Get into a reversion war? because if that's what is needed, so be it. There won't be a dialog between us because all 20 years of him is so goddamn smart that there will be no discussion. Why is it that I don't see any constructive work coming out of Mr. Ruud? he could have edited my work, removed the quotes and reworded. But no, just his pre-emptive revert. Dick-behavior is dick-behavior. Of course Mr. Ruud is a lovely fellow, beloved by all who know him. But he is suffering a bout of dick-like behavior. Another person sighed too -- read the Algorithm discussion page. This, right here, is why many of us are not contributing to Wikipedia as we could and might. My son, a post-doc, refuses to even read Wikipedia let alone contribute to it. This is damned upsetting, and a waste of my time. End of discussion.wvbaileyWvbailey 19:43, 30 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Do you remember Jimminy Cricket on Mousketeers Club? He used to sing the song:"beauty is as beauty does/That's what the wise men say." Well: "Civil is" as "civil does". That's the point of this little cat fight.wvbaileyWvbailey 21:12, 30 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Magic numbers
I noticed this edit you made on mitochondria. What is the significance of 415 vs 400. I had not noticed this before. David D. (Talk) 08:14, 8 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Error?
Hi, you said there was an error in this. Would you please explain it to me? Al 02:26, 9 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

My Bad
My first comment at WP:Village pump, and I put it in the wrong section...aye-yi-yi! All I can say in my own defense is that I was still laughing about the 'fetish site' comment. You're obviously an old hand around here, can you correct it? I don't want to compound my error. Thanks a lot for your patience with a newbie :) Doc Tropics 03:13, 18 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the clean-up, I appreciate it. If it had been on my Talkpage I would have taken care of it myself, but since it was a public forum I didn't want to 'tamper' with my own comments. In the unlikely event that I can ever help you with anything, just let me know and I'll be glad to. Happy Editing :) Doc Tropics 03:54, 18 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
oh my god, what did you do?
that is so not how you're supposed to archive the reference desk, there's a bot that does it, only the bot doesn't wipe the entire history of the page--71.247.107.238 15:53, 30 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Um, the bot has been screwing up; this change is trying to improve archiving and other aspects. The new way doesn't wipe history any more than the bot does. This should be discussed on Wikipedia talk:Reference desk. -R. S. Shaw 04:12, 1 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Relations
Are you related to any Shaw's in NC? (Sorry to ask this here but you do not have a email address enabled.) ...IMHO (Talk) 10:43, 4 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Census data estimates 194,000 Shaws in the U.S., and I know almost none of them, am related to fewer, and none of those are in NC. -R. S. Shaw 21:34, 4 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
AfD
The List of life extension-related topics has been nominated for deletion. --Transhumanist 18:44, 11 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
WP:PNA update
The last time or times Pearle ran its PNA-update scripts, it didn't process the new converted PNA pages that are under Wikipedia:Pages_needing_attention/Social_Sciences_and_Philosophy. Apparently there is a list or something that needs to have the new pages added to it. If you would like, you could tell me where it is or what format Pearle needs the page list in and I can set that up. In any case, it would be good to get these pages fleshed out by the bot. Thanks. (unsigned comment from User:R. S. Shaw)
The list is actually in the source code. It's there to keep the bot from mangling sections which have been improperly converted. I've been checking sections before adding them to make sure they won't get screwed up. I just need to get around to doing that, and I didn't want to hold up updates on the medical section (which I was going to refer someone to) in the meantime. I will make an effort to update the list and do another run in the next few days. -- Beland 15:48, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the info (and for writing and running the PNA sorting). The new PNA pages are not a pressing issue for me, I just expect them to be useful when updated. Sorry for forgetting my sig above. -R. S. Shaw 19:14, 21 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Not a problem...thanks for the reminder. It's nice to know that there are people who are actually checking these pages. It turns out I have far less time this weekend than I'd previously planned, so I'm going to take off the blinders and let Pearle run wild on all the PNA pages. Most improper operation can be reverted and fixed by editing the pages in question to set them up in the right format. There is a different list of subpages to process in addition to the four main ones. This is needed for topics like Computing and Education where there are sub-sub pages. Let me know if there are any more of these I should add. -- Beland 02:39, 22 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Avianca Flight 52
Thank you for correcting the note about Avianca Flight 52 departing out of MDE airport instead of EOH, and for pointing out the source! -- AirOdyssey 19:44, 20 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Sarah Edmondson Discussion
Thank you for quoting additional sources in the discussion regarding Sarah Edmondson at Talk:James E. Edmondson. By the way, the Crime Library website was already cited by me. --TommyBoy 22:07, 25 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I know you gave a link to the Crime Library site, but not to that page on the site (which discusses the relationship). -R. S. Shaw 23:51, 25 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Aha Variable
Dear R.S. Shaw,
The article I created,Aha Variable,is no hoax. If you could,check out the "Key To Algebra" Series,Book 1-Operations On Integers. When my algebra professor read the historical note,I decided to write about Aha. It shows the problem written in hieroglyphics. Or,check Problem 24 in the Rhind Papyrus. Please,if you attain any comments,go to my talk page. Thanks. ~~User:Hempfel
Barnstar of Diligence
I was searching for a WikiFairy to help with a disambiguation project, and found your page. Your history is impressive:

The Barnstar of Diligence

For distinguished service across the board. Ling.Nut 00:15, 7 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Bit
R.S. - Please teach me. Now that I've registered, I was the one that added the reference to positions on 'bit' (where position 0 is the 1st). I originally went to wiki - bit, didn't find it, followed other links, didn't find it - researched it, and kindly added it to where I thought it should have been in the first place. But then you reversed it. Now, I have no problem with that -> after all, I'm new and I'm learning about the proper use of wiki. And in that light, where would something like that go, properly?
Thanks, Jim Gale
Response made on his talk page, User talk:JimGale. -R. S. Shaw 19:40, 14 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I have considered it
Its not going to be easy for me to do as I am a busy guy studying for my G.C.S.E's. I agree that some of them should be reverted however they are not all bad and i do not have the time to do it. I hate to have to take this approach but I'm sure that whoever is next editing the article can decide what to do.
Appologies yet again-- JiMoTh Y^TALK 21:18, 17 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Noticed that you changed some IBM 407 edits
I would have thought the inline 'tabulating machine' link was the correct Wikipedia style. What am I missing? Or, same question expressed differently, why is correct to link inline to IBM but not to Tabulating machine? Thanks, wanting to learn 69.106.254.246 05:26, 21 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

note: using parens for square bracket so that I can describe your edit.
Thanks for the quick reply, but the question above is about an internal link, not external. As best I recall, it looked to me as if you had changed '((IBM)) ((Tabulating machine|tabulating machines))' to '((IBM)) tabulating equipment' and, since the 407 is a tabulating machine, I'm curious why the internal link to IBM is ok, but the internal link to "tabulating machine" was not.
There is also a terminology question. I would have thought a consistent vocabulary should be used: if the "Tabulating machine" article has established that term, shouldn't the 407 article use it rather than "tabulating equipment"?
Again, I'm more interested in why you made those 2 changes than in what appears in the article.
Thanks and apologies if I seem to be dragging on a piece of trivia, but if I don't ask I'll never learn.69.106.254.246 07:15, 21 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Main
Another Oops? I saw "main" at beginning of an article (forgot which one); thought it was pointing to an overall article. I added a "Guide to Unit record articles" to the "Unit record equipment" article, then put a "main" in each article listed. So from "Unit record equipment", for example, you can click "IBM 407", do what everyou want there, and click "main" to get back. What should I have done? "Unit record equipment" is a thin, sparse, article right now, but expected to grow. Thanks, 69.106.232.37 07:10, 9 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Later: I was also thinking that if someone found the IBM 407 article first, they could get to the "main" article without having to know what it was.
Still later: Ahh, now I remember. "main" in "IBM 407" would be ok if I had used "details|IBM 407" in the "Unit record equipment" article, right? So I should get rid of the "Guide" section, and in the case of IBM 407, use "details|IBM 407" below the "Tabulating" heading. I did the "Guide" section so that readers could see a map of all the unit record articles; will have to see how it turns out done the other way. I'll add a "details|IBM 407" there now -- just in case my writing here is as confusing as it often is -- so that you can see what I've tried to describe. Thanks again. 69.106.232.37 07:30, 9 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I'll reply here. Well, it's not as straightforward as I thought. The most common use of {main}, by far, is in a short section of an article to point to a full article that covers the subject of that section. But after I del'd the main in 407, I went and looked at the talk for template:main and saw that they seemed to say that there was also another use, I guess complemented by use of {details} at the other end. That talk page also leads to the guideline page on the subject. The thrust seems to be how to break up a huge page into a group of pages connected by {details} to subpages and {main}s back. But what you're up to is more like connecting a set of pre-existing pages together, which is not quite the same thing (but could be related). At that point I decided I was too tired to sort it out now. So I don't think I can give reliable guidance on this. Best to ignore my 407 edit (put it back if you decide that's right). -R. S. Shaw 07:53, 9 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I added a comment to Talk:Unit record equipment suggesting that what might be appropriate here would be a "Unit record equipment" category, with the articles for various pieces of unit record equipment having [[Category:Unit record equipment]]. This discussion should perhaps be continued on that page. Guy Harris 22:09, 9 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
RefDeskBot
Hi - I'm sorry for the delay in responding to your message - messages I got yesterday (24th) were not (mostly) responded to, since I had food poisoning :( - I've been on the mend today, and am mostly better now :) Anyway - to the subject - that's a very interesting note - I'll take a look through the regex in the program. I think the problem was that I was expecting users to start a new section using the wikipedia standard, but whoever added that question must hve typed the ==blah== themelves (in that part of the program, the bot only recognises == blah == - I've fixed it further up in the program, so just need to do it again now :)). Thanks for reporting this - I'll fix it tomorrow (hopefully when I'm back to 100%!) M a rtinp23 21:37, 25 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your help on the Chainki:Disambig thing
re: problem of disambig pages on http://da.chainki.org.
Thanks for your help in the "Chainki:Disambig" thing. Following your clues, I ripped out all the content of the Disambig template and just left it with the [[Category:Disambiguation]] line, got that working (though I had to force an edit on each of the disambig pages). From there I just copied the original content back into the template and now it seems to work! Dunno quite what's going on, but problem more or less solved. So, thanks again for your help.
80.201.218.42 09:01, 4 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Mitochondrion
I apologize for my sincere mistake. Thanks for fixing again. Fred Hsu 07:43, 23 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
No big deal, but ....
Regarding your very recent relocation of some equations in the Hydrodesulfurization article. As the primary author of that new article, I deliberately had the two equations further to the left of the page because I believe it looks better that way. Do you feel very strongly that they should be centered as you did? If not, I would like to revert your change. Please let me know here on your Talk page. Regards, - mbeychok 23:24, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
No, it doesn't have to be centered, but the lack of alignment in the previous version wasn't good. (Remember that different browsers render pages differently.) I'll take the centering out. -R. S. Shaw 23:31, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. You are correct to use a table ... I had indeed overlooked rendering by various browsers. There are more such equations further down in that article. Would you be so kind as to also "table" them exactly as you did that first set? Thanks, again. - mbeychok 23:52, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Done. -R. S. Shaw 00:23, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Doing something about the ridiculous date autoformatting/linking mess
Dear RS—you may be interested in putting your name to, or at least commenting on this new push to get the developers to create a parallel syntax that separates autoformatting and linking functions. IMV, it would go a long way towards fixing the untidy blueing of trivial chronological items, and would probably calm the nastiness between the anti- and pro-linking factions in the project. The proposal is to retain the existing function, to reduce the risk of objection from pro-linkers. Tony 15:00, 10 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]
sexuality pages needing attention
Hi. You reverted my edit to Wikipedia:Pages needing attention/Sexuality in which I said "deleted supposedly-bot updated section because it doesn't seem to make any sense. I checked two articles listed there which neither were about sexuality nor had cleanup tags as of the last update." Your re-addition is all well and good if you are sure that the bot is actually going to update it sometime soon and that the update will make sense. Do you know these things? --Strait 23:25, 11 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No, I don't know that the bot will be run soon. It unfortunately depends on a single individual (who happens to be busy). Nevertheless, keeping the page in format ready for it seems very much the thing to do.

As to the article selection "making sense" -- well it's just a dumb robot, and just follows the categories it's given and the categories assigned to articles. So it's far from perfect, but it still seems useful. The sexuality page doesn't seem all that bad to me. One can easily skip over "Adenylosuccinate lyase deficiency" and choose to look at "Age of consent reform". This is very much easier than, for instance, looking through the thousands of entries in Category:Cleanup from December 2006 for those articles that might be related to sexuality. -R. S. Shaw 02:17, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well... the bot shouldn't really have a hard job. All it needs to do is find articles that are, for example, in both Category:All_pages_needing_cleanup and Category:Sexuality. It doesn't seem to do this, for the reasons I have given.

Anyway, whether or not the bot will ever come by, I'm going to change it to the empty bot template, since the current list is useless. Is this compromise ok with you? --Strait 15:12, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Since that will allow the bot to update it in the future, and since you're probably the only current user of the page, I'll not persue trying to have the previous bot-generated content remain visible. Enjoy. Of course little remains on the page, mostly long out-of-date comments from 2004 and 2005.

I must say, I don't see why you object to having a semi-useful list available for those who might be interested just because it isn't perfect. And it is certainly imperfect (having already-cleaned pages still listed, and having irrelevant pages like Allelic exclusion and DNA listed). But also in the list are actual pages related to sexuality which do in fact still need cleanup (e.g. Ejaculation, Facesitting, Feederism, Frenulum clitoridis). Although you might find it too tedious to browse through the list, leaving it available for others wanting to do cleanup work in the subject area wouldn't seem like such a burden on the rest of the readers. After all, this is not an article, just a maintenance-assistance page. -R. S. Shaw 21:27, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Mass consumed in atomic explosion
In your last edit summary to Little Boy, you said, "it'd be nice to have the actual mass destroyed". The introduction to the article already says, "Approximately 600 milligrams of uranium was converted into energy. It exploded with a power of 13 to 16 kilotons of TNT..." — which you can check for yourself using E=mc².
—wwoods 07:32, 14 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for pointing out the previous para (duh!). I've put it in the Basic Design section also, in different form, as I think it is good to have in both places, for slightly differing reasons. -R. S. Shaw 20:09, 14 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"...the simple eight-bit 8085 architecture, which resembles neither CISC nor RISC"
What's wrong with this? The basic principles behind the 8085 (i.e. the 8008 / Datapoint 2200 from the late sixties) has very little in common with what is now called CISC (i.e. VAX, 68000 etc), and certainly nothing in common with the RISC computers of the eighties (except for basic "von neumann" principles, and the lack of microcode).
Just because I don't want to further establish this shallow and historically incorrect divide into either the "RISC" or the "CISC" category, does not make it POV, it actually makes it more NPOV.
If you can't agree, tell me whether 8085 is a RISC or CISC design? ;)
HenkeB 14:36, 20 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm glad you belive those are not great categories, but how can they wither away if we continue to re-establish them over an over (particulary on WP)?
Regarding their more concrete technical meaning: I assume you can agree that one of the central ideas behind RISC was to leave complicated addressing modes out, as such addressing was normally implemented by varied length microcode routines, which, at the time, was very hard and/or expensive to fit into a pipelined execution model.
With that in mind, it's a little hard to digest that architectures with even simpler addressing modes (such as the 8008) should be labeled as complex. I have no problems with the term "RISC", as it means something. "CISC", on the other hand, is a sloppy retroactive label (as implied by yourself), which can meaningfully describe only a subset of all non-RISC computers. As such, the term should be used very sparingly and only for machines that fits the description. To just give up, as you suggested, and quietly accept whatever usage of terms and language, is wrong :)
(Sorry for my limited english)
HenkeB 22:15, 20 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

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