User talk:Tompw/archive1

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Meelar (talk) 22:08, Dec 28, 2004 (UTC)

Essential spectrum -- declared math-stub

Thanks! I forgot about puting the stub thing. By the way, I already know somebody who is willing to expand that article one day. Oleg Alexandrov 16:27, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Grey College motto

With my very limited knowledge I would have thought ascendimus was best translated as "we ascend". My Latin is virtually non-existent so I won't revert you, but perhaps you could point out where I'm going wrong here. I would have thought "ascending" would be something like ascendens. Cheers. — Trilobite (Talk) 02:51, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

You are right that the -imus ending means that a literal translation would be either "we are ascending by degrees" or "we ascend by degrees". However, given the the pun of the motto, just "ascending by degrees" is probably the best translation. Perhaps it would be best to add in an explantaion?

Thanks for clearing this up. I don't think there's any need to note this in the article, as it's only of minor consequence for anyone wanting to know about the college, but I'll copy this exchange to the discussion page in case anyone else wonders about this. Thanks again. — Trilobite (Talk) 00:07, 4 Jan 2005 (UTC)

New Mathematics Wikiportal

I noticed you've done some work on Mathematics articles. I wanted to point out to you the new Mathematics Wikiportal- more specifically, to the Mathematics Collaboration of the Week page. I'm looking for any math-related stubs or non-existant articles that you would like to see on Wikipedia. Additionally, I wondered if you'd be willing to help out on some of the Collaboration of the Week pages.

I encourage you to vote on the current Collaboration of the Week, because I'm very interested in which articles you think need to be written or added to, and because I understand that I cannot do the enormous amount of work required on some of the Math stubs alone. I'm asking for your help, and also your critiques on the way the portal is set up.

Please direct all comments to my user-talk page, the Math Wikiportal talk page, or the Math Collaboration of the Week talk page. Thanks a lot for your support! ral315 02:54, Feb 11, 2005 (UTC)

Anglican chant

Thank you for your excellent work on this article. I just happened to be doing some reading on Psalm settings today and found it very helpful. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 02:20, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Rest (music)

Your summary of notation looks very interesting. One query - you state that a semibreve rest for a whole bar's pause is used everywhere except in 4/2 time. Am I right in thinking that in 3/2 time a dotted semibreve rest is used? Also, surely time signatures such as 6/2, 8/2 etc could potentially be used and was also not take a semibreve rest? thanks, Warofdreams 10:30, 14 Mar 2005 (UTC)

(Taking the liberty of answering since Tompw hasn't yet) For 3/2 time I've seen it both ways, either with or without the dot. I've not seen music in 6/2 or 8/2 time signatures. 6/8 or 6/4 yes, and 12/8, but not 6/2. I don't think I've seen anything in 8 beats to the measure. Such unusual time signatures may exist, but they don't really have established notational conventions, except perhaps in theory. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 16:55, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Actually, I replied in Warofdreams's talkspace. I said that for non-4/2 time signatues, I have never seen anythign other than a semibreve rest being used. I agree that this isn't entirely consistent, so will look it up in the AB Guide to Music Theory when I get a chance. Tompw 17:19, 15 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for updating the image on Rest (music). I'm thinking of merging and redirecting all the individual note values (crotchet, quaver, etc.) into Note value. I don't see much point in having separate pages on each value, since they can only be understood relationally, and the pages have substantial duplication. Any opinion on that? —Wahoofive | Talk 16:14, 17 Apr 2005 (UTC)

New Mathematics Project Participants List

In case you didn't follow the discussion on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics here: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics#Reformat of Participants list, I'm writing to you to let you know that I've converted the "WikiProject Mathematics Participants List" into a table. It is now alphabetical, includes links to the participant's talk page and contribution list, and has a field for "Areas of Interest". Since your name is on the list, I thought you might want to check and/or update your entry.

Regards, Paul August ☎ 16:17, Mar 22, 2005 (UTC)

Areas of mathematics

Hi,

I replied on my own talk page ... I did have a question. (Wish WP would automatically mirror the entire conversation between all the talk pages of the various participants. That would make this conversation less akward). linas 03:56, 13 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Monty Hall problem

Excellent diagram. I'm sure that it still won't convince some. Oh well, at least we tried. ;-) hydnjo talk 22:37, 23 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, this is my first edit (I just made an account). Great diagram, but I think you may have made a small error. When the contestant has orignally chosen the car and the host shows G1 or G2 and then the contestant switches, he should get the other goat. Your diagram shows the contestant switching to the goat that host has shown, something which I *hope* would never happen. Other than that nitpick, good work. ~Jurvis

That's now been fixed... got the far right G1 and G2 the wrong way round. Tompw

I know that this may be an imposition but, what if at the bottom of the tree, the switcher legs were of a different length than the non-switcher legs. That may add emphasis to the distinction as one could scan horizontally to observe each result. Respectfully, hydnjo talk 20:02, 24 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

- Following your suggestion, I tried it, and I personally feel it doesnt clarify things. Tompw 20:21, 24 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, I just thought it might help, Respectfully, hydnjo talk 03:26, 25 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Please vote on list of lists, a featured list candidate

Please vote at Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of lists of mathematical topics. Michael Hardy 20:44, 13 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Will do, but my IP co-incides has been auto-blocked (hopefully temporarily), as it conincides with that of a banned user. I think this because I am using a computer at my university to access Wikipedia. Tompw 22:30, 13 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

What I'll say.... Strong support. According to What is a featured list?, it should feature Wikipedia's best work and represent what is unique about Wikipedia (agree); be useful (I find it so), comprehensive (very), factually accurate (definately), stable (seems to be), and well-organised (I can find what I want quickly). It should also be uncontroversial (it doesn't get less uncontroversial than this article). It could with a better intro, the pics need tweaking to fit in with the text better, and it could some more would be nice. Tompw 22:30, 13 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed renaming

About the renaming of the list of mathematical topics you suggested earlier, see discussion Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics#Proposed renaming. Oleg Alexandrov (talk) 05:32, 15 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for that! Tompw 12:53, 15 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Wikiproject on English non-league football

I've been thinking about creating a WikiProject for English non-league football, and am trying to find out if there's enough interest to make it worth doing. It would be useful to have somewhere for people who are interested in non-league football to have a place to discuss articles, and if there's enough interest we could get a monthly collaboration going with a view to getting non-league articles on the front page. It would be listed as a sub-project of WikiProject Football unless the members of that project objected strongly to it, and people would be able to join either or both (or neither) depending on what they were interested in. I thought you might be interested so I'd like to know if you are - if I get more than 3 or 4 positive replies I'll set it up. File:Yemen flag large.png CTOAGN (talk) 12:46, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

(Message of suport left at talk page). Tompw 17:27, 28 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There was plenty of support so I'll go ahead and set it up. I've been busy setting up WikiProject Poker and working on my RfA but I'll try and get round to it in the next couple of days. File:Yemen flag large.png CTOAGN (talk) 12:14, 31 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Non-league project

Hi,

I've created a project on non-league football at Wikipedia:WikiProject Non-league football. There isn't much there yet, but please add your name if you're interested and feel free to add any content or put any suggestions on its talk page. CTOAGN (talk) 10:11, 4 February 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Template:Western League Premier

Thanks for your message. I had checked to see if the teamlist template was being used on any other page - didn't notice Western League! --Marknew 10:24, 3 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Template talk:UK Major Railway Stations

Hi, would you mind having a look at the proposal I've put at Template talk:UK Major Railway Stations? Since I put it there, discussions have gone quiet, and I wanted to know what people thought about it. Thanks, RFBailey 10:29, 15 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Anglicanism and the Anglican Communion

Hello! I noticed that you have been a contributor to articles on Anglicanism and the Anglican Communion. You may be interested in checking out a new WikiProject - WikiProject Anglicanism. Please consider signing up and participating in this collaborative effort to improve and expand Anglican-related articles! Cheers! Fishhead64 22:17, 11 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Nunavut Template

I just saw that and I think it looks great. I've made a couple of changes. I added the National Parks and put in a few ", Nunavut" to avoid redirects. I made Bathurst Inlet full size as it's recognised by the GN as a community. I also removed the native/former names as nearly all the communities would have both and would overcrowd the template. I'm not sure if places like CFS Alert, Eureuka, Nunavut should be added or the other mines such as Jericho Diamond Mine. Cheers. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 21:36, 30 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think the airports are out as there are 32 of them and would crowd the template. My problem is that I'm so close to the subject that I'm not sure what would be interesting to people in other places. What might work to put more information in without crowding is things like [[:Category:People from Nunavut|People from Nunavut]] and a link to Portal:Nunavut. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 23:11, 30 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The template looks really good and provides a great addition to the articles. But now I have to write up the other parks so the don't come up red linked. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 16:09, 4 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sheffield Sports and Athletic League

Hi Tom

I was wondering if in your research for the pyramid site, you had come across much info on this particular league? I'm trying to add a list of clubs to its own page and all its divisions to the big league system table, as I've been doing for a bunch of other leagues, but all I can find online is a Full-Time page which doesn't work! - ChrisTheDude 07:45, 8 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry for takign so long to reply... when I knwo somethign more definate, I'll let you know. Tompw 13:00, 17 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Maps

No, I haven't, sorry. -- Earl Andrew - talk 01:34, 25 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

List of Saskatchewan general elections

Apologies for the delay in getting back to you- real life has a habit of getting in the way! I like what you've done, and with an updated version of the SK2 chart, I'll certainly be supporting the FL- see my comments on that page as well. It looks good! --G Rutter 18:20, 28 September 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Listing Graded Articles

I can't quite figure out where (or how) to list the mathematics articles I've graded. Could you give me a hand on that? Thanks for bringing this step of the grading process to my attention. shotwell 15:43, 7 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your very helpful reply! shotwell 15:53, 7 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Manitoba provincial elections

Manitoba is missing 1988. Nice job though. This seems rather an odd interest, given your location and other interests! Maskinonge 18:43, 7 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, after creating the History of Hawaii template, I fancied something closer to home. :-) Tompw 18:49, 7 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Importance of Functional Analysis

I changed the importance level of functional analysis to "top". Almost any modern analyst will be working directly in functional analysis. Moreover, the theory of PDE's (clearly important) is entirely predicated upon functional analysis. Other current research areas in math are highly dependent on the theory of Functional Analysis: geometry, automorphic forms, dynamical systems and chaos, etc...

Please let me know if you disagree with this assessment. shotwell 08:45, 8 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Navigational footers

Hi Tompw,

the consensus at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Mathematics is strongly against navigational templates of any kind in math articles. If you want to argue for them, please bring it up there. --Trovatore 14:58, 9 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

"Oh bother" (well, somethign stronger). I was completely unaware of this - thanks for drawing this to my attention. Tompw 15:01, 9 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

you have put a lot of work into those footers

Hi, I just looked at your contribs and see that you have put a lot of work into those footers and that you are an experienced template editor. I apologize for coming down on them so hard. It had more to do with my frustration at not being able to navigate WP in a more structured way than by link-hopping. --Jtir 18:15, 9 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Football Templates

I didn't know there were so many templates made up for English regional leagues. Basically I changed the main templates to ensure that the English templates match up with various international and european templates which are using that colour. I'll try to get through those other templates in the next few days. Sorry bout the trouble. Niall123 23:57, 18 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You know what, it didn't take that long. Would you have a quick look and get back to me if I've missed something. That's incredible details ye guys are going into. We are only going down to Serie D so far on Italian Templates which is only Level 5 although we should be doing Level 6 soon. Plus, I hope you like the job I did with the flags on the Premier League template. :) Niall123 00:11, 19 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

BTW, that's a hell of a lot of templates you've made. We messed around with using collapsable templates a few months ago. Couldn't get them to work when we tried to reduce their width to a standard Tnavbar one. Have a look at Template:World_Cup_Squads. That template works if you are using IE 7 beta, but doesn't work with IE6 or Firefox. A pity cause it takes up far less space than a standard template. Niall123 00:42, 19 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Need your expert opinion

Hello! I hope you are feeling great. I need your wise opinion on the comments I made in this page. Your views in this matter would be highly regarded. Thank you for your time! --S iva1979^{Talk to me} 16:48, 22 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Tanquary Fiord

I'm not really sure where it would fit. As far as I know there really is nothing much there but it does appear that the Polar Continental Shelf Project may have something there and it might fit under other. One person who might know more about what is up there is Ansgar Walk, seems more active on the commons) but is at User:Ansgar Walk. He seems to have been around the north quite a bit. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 14:47, 26 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Angle

I saw your rating of the Angle article where you in the comment requested more diagrams, so I created and added a couple (are they ok?)… What else in the article do you think lacks explanatory illustrations? –Gustavb 21:36, 8 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Reply left on your talk page. Tompw 22:12, 8 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You read my mind!

Tom, I was just going to fix up that Olympics template myself. I went to press preview, and you had already made the changes. That's funny. → JARED ^(t) 12:47, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I just fixed that template up using Template:navigation, which I think looks better. I used your edits as a jumping off point. I like how I did the "rings" with the five links. It looks good, right? Anyway, edit it at your will, I just thought the nav. temp would make it more uniform. Thanks for getting me started! → JARED ^(t) 13:08, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, I think I was the one who came up with those colors. I had originally planned to have colors for each set of games (see User:JP06035/sandbox3) but that was too obnoxious. That said, the colors can stay or they can go. It doesn't matter to me. And I do see your point. It looks almost exactly the same anyway. → JARED ^(t) 13:35, 22 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Portal:Geometry/box-header reverted

In your edit summary, you stated that you changed the colors "from the default." Well that wasn't the default. I prefer the old colors. If you think it is better with the new colors, I will not revert it again. 'FL a RN' (talk) 03:03, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Okay. White background is fine.

'FL a RN' (talk) 14:49, 24 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

For your excellent work on British railway articles

Tom, thanks for the excellent work you have done on the British railway history articles:

For your stalwart work on articles about British Railway history. Gwernol 15:35, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

{{NL-ED}} in Torngat Mountains

Torngat Mountains is an article about the actual mountains. You added the {{NL-ED}} templateto the article, it doesn't seem to belong there, you probably meant to add it to Torngat Mountains (electoral district). Removed navbox. --66.82.9.54 19:50, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Good point... thanks for pointing it out. Tompw 19:51, 25 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Applied mathematics

Hi, Tom!

You put a "maths rating" tag on the applied mathematics article back in October. I've rewritten the "Divisions of Applied Mathematics" section. Please take a look and tell me what you think. DavidCBryant 13:35, 26 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

reply

History of rail transport in Great Britain

Hi. Just a quick note regarding the {{fact}} tag concerning the date of establishment of HMRI as "1842"... Your original edit said something like '1986' (check the history!!), and I corrected it - looking at the dates, '1842' seemed like a good guess. I tried checking against the HMRI article, but THAT doesn't state what year either!! (perhaps you could amend it in due course?) I dropped the tag on the sentence hoping that someone (ie you?) could check the date, as I could not be certain.

You're doing great work with these articles, although I can't match your editing pace with my copy-editing :o) Maybe I'll take another look when they've stabilised...

Cheers -- EdJogg 00:30, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No edit of mine put in the 1842 date... in fact it pre-dates my involvement with the topic, as it goes all the way back to the start of 2006 (diff). It's got a fotonote for a source - see History of rail transport in Great Britain#_note-5, though History of rail transport in Great Britain 1830 - 1922 need it adding as an inline reference.

Thanks for your kind comments - very much apreciated. Although the rate of my edits has been rather high, they've mostly been reference-related.

Regards Tompw 00:56, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

See also this... although it merely tells us that 1840 is the earliest possible date.

List of Saskatchewan general elections

Thanks for letting me know that this was up for voting again. It looks like it'll go through this time, so well done! It looks good! Sorry it took me a while to reply- RL is seriously getting in the way at the moment! --G Rutter 13:06, 27 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Other Candanian elections

Thanks! I've supported Alberta and Manitoba and will support British Columbia once you've tabulated the earlier elections, as has already been done for Manitoba. Sorry about causing you extra work! --G Rutter 20:32, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Great- thank you! I've now voted support. Keep up the good work! --G Rutter 22:27, 1 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. I'm sorry, but I'm afraid that I've had to vote object for the Nova Scotia list- I don't think that you've got it upto the high standard you've set with the other lists I'm afraid- I've left more specific comments on the FL page. --G Rutter 19:52, 2 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Your GA nomination of History of rail transport in Great Britain to 1830

The article History of rail transport in Great Britain to 1830 you nominated as a good article has failed , see Talk:History of rail transport in Great Britain to 1830 for reasons why the nomination failed. If or when these points have been taken care of, you may apply for a new nomination of said article. If you oppose this decision, you may ask for a review. Chrisfow 01:31, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

NB elections

my sources were two books, one from elections NB, and another that I had found in the UPEI library. unfortunatly I did not write down the title of the book nor do I live in PEI anymore, but I remember it also had the NS results, so I suspect it was a summary of provincial elections of somesort. Pellaken 07:20, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Major UK stations

It doesn't really quite show the criteria for what qualifies on the talk page. Perhaps a list of criteria is needed. Anyway, Norwich is under the list of ones that may be included. Norwich is the Terminus of the Great Eastern Main Line. It also has destinations to London, Cambridge, Peterborough, Nottingham. Thee are also many other stations i can think of which should be under there. Clarity? Simply south 22:42, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, one main problem is that the usage figures cannot be trusted totally (see my link i have pasted fresh on the talk page under passenger numbers). If it has the be a major transport hub, Norwich, Manchester Vicoria, Cambridge, Peterborough, Exeter St Davids, Swansea, Derby, Ipswich, Hull Paragon, Aberdeen, Inverness and many other stations along this trend also apply. I agree about not including Chelmsford, Woking and St Albans as they are only commuter stations and am a bit uncertain about, for example, Finsbury Park, Harrow and Wealdstone, Tottenham Hale, etc qualify. Simply south 23:14, 3 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Hull should be included because it could be counted as interchange between two regional TOCs - Hull Trains and Transpennine Express. Both of these are effectively Intercity routes. Doncaster - interchange between the main route north and the main route to Leeds. Annoyingly i can see Manchester Victoria going i.e. not being included. Btw, for more up to date figures anyway (although better, still not totally trustworthy) see the 2004-05 usage figures (including some interchange). Simply south 11:40, 4 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Nunavut general election, 1999

Can you make sure that my last edit makes sense. Thanks. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 14:49, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The "List of Nunavut general elections" looks good and should pass. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 15:15, 6 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

List of Newfoundland and Labrador general elections

Unfortunately Image:NL elections2.gif, which you uploaded a few hours ago, was created using wrong data for some elections. I have reviewed the results and I am reasonably sure that the seats numbers are now accurate. If you still have your Excel file, you may want to update the graph; if not, leave me a note and I'll make one myself. — ABCXYZ (talk) 21:53, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comparison of Dewey and Library of Congress subject classification

Thanks for making the table at Comparison of Dewey and Library of Congress subject classification sortable. --Bejnar 16:10, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Areas of Mathematics

Hello again, Tom!

You and I were both editing the Areas of mathematics article at the same time today. I was the guy who took #97 out of the "General" section, and misunderstood about the use of a semi-colon to control the article's format. Anyway, I finally caught on when I hit my first-ever "edit conflict" message from the Wikipedia servers. I think I understand what you're up to in that article, and the first part should be OK now. But you might want to check it out.

Oh -- I also wrote a blurb for the "Analysis" portion of the article, and I'd appreciate your opinion on what I wrote. I tried to make it interesting to the non-mathematical reader. But do you think it might be just a little too bright and bubbly? I'm not sure, myself.

Thanks! DavidCBryant 18:24, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for deleting the pretty prose, Tom. I understand your concern about making this article too big. But I went back and counted them, and there are exactly five major subdivisions (foundations, algebra, analysis, geometry, and applied math) within the article. Surely there's room for more than two sentences to introduce an important subject like analysis, don't you think?

Since the math portal points directly at this article, it's likely that some non-mathematical readers will take a look at it. Personally, I think the existing article is pretty boring. And I'm a mathematician. What are we trying to do here? Invite the reader to get an education? Or put him to sleep? ;^> DavidCBryant 19:21, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the quick response, Tom. Now I have a question about "big" articles. I've heard somewhere that there's a 64K (=65,536 byte) limit on the size of an article. But I haven't seen that explicitly defined.

Do you know if that limit applies to the wiki markup file that editors/authors can actually access? Or does it apply to the whole XML package that the server serves up, with all the javascript in the <head> section, and all the wiki tags converted to XML, etc? If you're not sure, do you have any idea where I'd look to find out? You've been working with Wikipedia a lot longer than I have; I do appreciate your help / suggestions.

Just FYI, I loaded the Areas of mathematics article a few minutes ago. Firefox tells me that the source file (javascript and all) contains 12,509 bytes. So at this point it looks as if the file is roughly 20% of the maximum allowable size, more or less. ;^> DavidCBryant 20:41, 13 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for writing back yet again, Tom. This is more fun than e-mail! Anyway, I take your point about 32K being a long article. I noticed that the article isn't very complete, even though it's been around for two years, more or less. I'll work on fleshing out the missing sections (where I understand the field well enough to write something useful) before I bother to raise this issue again.

Have a great day! ;^> dcb

Good morning, Tom! Just wanted to let you know that I tweaked the intro to this article today. I also added a bit about the history of mathematics. I hope you like it.

Oh -- I found the guideline about article size. "Salix alba" thinks that the guideline doesn't really apply to "Areas of Mathematics". I also learned a neat trick from the "article size" guideline. I thought I had to use the "edit this page" button to edit the introductory section of an article. But now I understand how to edit only the introduction.

Right-click on the first "edit" tag on a section following the intro.
Select "copy link location" from your browser's pop-up window.
Paste this url into your browser, then change "&section=1" to "&section=0" and hit enter.

Maybe you knew this trick already. I think it's pretty useful. Have a great day! DavidCBryant 13:18, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Election timelines as a featured topic

Hi, Tompw. Very good work on the Canadian election lists. For when you nominate them for featured topic status, can I make a couple of suggestions? First, don't just limit the topic to the provincial elections; leave room for the timelines of federal elections and pre-confederation elections to be added some time down the road. Secondly, make sure that the name of the topic just includes the timelines, so it doesn't become a massive topic with the articles for each individual election. Thanks, Arctic Gnome 01:06, 17 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I think that "Canadian election timelines" sounds the most like a topic name, whereas "Timelines of Canadian elections" sounds like a list. "Canadian election timelines" could include the provinces at first and allow us to expand later.

I couldn't find anything online for those three provinces. I found lists in a printed encyclopaedia, but it didn't give exact dates or seat counts. I'll check the rest of the Canadian encyclopaedias at my school library once my exams are over.

I was thinking that Timeline of Canadian elections could include federal elections, I just couldn't think how. A double-width column should work, or a thicker border between it and the provinces. In the summery chart at the bottom, you could put federal totals beside (but not included in) the totals by party.

I also think we should add the NWT and Nunavut. I know that it would be just "no affiliation" all the way down, but for comparison purposes it would be useful to be able to see graphically when they had each of their elections and when they were formed, as compared to the provinces. It would also mean that the table would have links to every single election, which would be cool. --Arctic Gnome 20:21, 18 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

ISBN hyphens

I noticed that SmackBot put hpyphens into ISBNs on History of rail transport in Great Britain to 1830m which is all well and good. However, I'm intigued as to how they are placed.... four ISBNs were changed from to no hyphens to 0-7153-7603-9, 1-898937-42-7, 0-434-98083-8 and 1-84033-077-5 respectively - four different ways of grouping the digits. Is there any deeper significance to the different ways of grouping? Tompw (talk) 22:38, 22 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, the second group of numbers represents the publisher, the system is designed for smaller publishers to get longer ID's (later in the numeric range - say beginning with 7,8 or 9), there are more of these (because they are allowed to be longer) but correspondingly less actual numbers - which is OK because they'll publish fewer books. See ISBN for more detail. Really big publishers (Penguin, Oxford, Cambridge) have the ids 00 to 19. Rich Farmbrough, 08:16 23 December 2006 (GMT).