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Australian or British ?

Some editors have taken issue with the designation of whether Australian english is a valid English variant in tags on articles, usually by reverting...

This may have been dealt with before, and may have been very clearly explained, but I am sure it would be great for a clear reason why engvar designations on very clearly Australian items in the full range of Australian articles might have something else added like EngvarB ...

The parallel universes are intriguing...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Use_Australian_English

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:EngvarB

Perhaps the proponents or explainers might wish to return and explain, but like most things perhaps there will be deadly silence. JarrahTree 13:40, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Some editors have taken issue - links to relevant edits would be helpful here. Mitch Ames (talk) 13:46, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Answering Mitch - ::Pointless and quite confrontational and of no long term benefit to anyone to do so. I do not wish to take issue with the editors doing either side of the intriguing parallel conceptions of what articles should be designated.

It is not a personal issue, it is specifically whether the Australian project as totality of the over 200,000 australian articles [1] actually deserves to fit into in multiple language designations for whatever reason. JarrahTree 14:02, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

We did have a discussion sometime ago after an editor started tagging untagged articles with EngvarB, which was only marginally better than being untagged. I can't see why anyone would claim that Australian English isn't a valid variant. Australian and British English are certainly not the same anymore. They used to be but the influence of American English has had different detrimental effects on both. --AussieLegend (✉) 13:53, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Answering AussieLegend - still at it... JarrahTree 14:02, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Queen's English please, and may G–d bless her with another century. ~ cygnis insignis 13:58, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

I agree, we should be speaking the Queen's English. Unfortunately even Britain doesn't speak that anymore. As for another century, we're still 7 years away from the end of her first. --AussieLegend (✉) 14:03, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

According to {{EngvarB}}, it is suitable to use on any article that is not American or Canadian English, if the tagger can't work out which of the other 16 variants of English with more specific templates to use. It is read by bots to ensure they don't "correct" spelling to North American when it clearly should not be. It seems to be perfectly valid to replace EngvarB with the specific dialect when known (and almost all articles about a thing or person in Australia will be in Australian English). --Scott Davis ^Talk 14:04, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for that Scott - if that is uncontested at this point - this discussion, and there is no technical argument against what you present, then the recent substantial additions of Australian items to the british english are in error, intriguing. JarrahTree 14:07, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

Theres an argument to be put that in Western Austraia we speak a southwest australian variant of Australian English. Such is the need for someone to temper their way of speaking when on the otherside of the paddock, and that once outside Australia its even more difficult to communicate with those in that little island on the eastern side of the north atlantic puddle. Gnangarra 16:13, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

If you speak a variant of en-AU, then use {{Use Australian English}}. If you think it's a different variant of English, I guess it needs to be {{EngvarB}} until someone creates {{Use Western Australian English}} and gets whatever bots fixed to recognise it.

{{EngvarB}} is explicitly neutral (not British or anywhere else except North America) according to its documentation. {{Use British English}} and {{Use British English Oxford spelling}} are for tagging British English. Sometimes, template documentation changes and people who use it all the time don't read the changes. Maybe the people using things an old way need to be gently brought up to current use. --Scott Davis ^Talk 22:20, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

See the discussion at TFD No-display English variant types: short answer: consensus was keep Australian English & other varients. Main source of reverting is the editor whose script does not work on other variations Find bruce (talk) 22:24, 9 September 2019 (UTC)

I assume the editor is not Ohconfucius because I'm using his script and it most certainly does handle Australian English. --AussieLegend (✉) 08:38, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Interesting - I had understood that was the reason that Ohconfucius & acolyte referred to Australian English and others as a ghetto language - but your posts shows that to be hollow. Despite the consensus keep from TfD, Ohconfucius keeps facing into the wind [2], as you have noticed [3]. They obviously have skills & commitment to the project, sad that it is not coupled with an ability to peruade people of his fervently held cause. Find bruce (talk) 09:56, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Ohconfucius & acolyte referred to Australian Enlgish and others as a ghetto language - WTF?!? --AussieLegend (✉) 10:00, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for quoting my typo, delightfully ironic given the subject. I will switch to direct quotes Incidentally, I don't think it's helpful to entrench language ghettoes that these other templates seem to imply. [4] and there is no benefit in having a multitude of [country] English templates other than creating minority English ghettoes[5] Find bruce (talk) 11:46, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

I didn't mean anything by quoting the typo. Referring to variants as "language ghettoes" seems rather racist. --AussieLegend (✉) 12:30, 10 September 2019 (UTC)

And typically as this particular conversation actually clarified something - the tagging of Australian items with the EngvarB continues enthusiastically and unabated, pity we have so few editors who are even cognisant of this problem, less interested in resolving the issue JarrahTree 02:44, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

MOS:TIES says An article on a topic that has strong ties to a particular English-speaking nation should use the (formal, not colloquial) English of that nation. I create a lot of articles but always tag them with {{subst:Use Australian English}} {{subst:Use DMY dates}} when they are created. I have not noticed anybody breaching the instruction at the top of {{EngvarB}} An article tagged with one of the specific language templates must never be changed to {{EngvarB}}. I have noticed people tagging pages with EngvarB when they had no language variant specified. Is the concern about wrong tagging or just imprecise tagging? --Scott Davis ^Talk 14:12, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterside_Workers%27_Federation_of_Australia - in view of what has been said above so far, I fail, so far to understand why or how the item is British, specially in view of the nature of Australian trade unions being in any way anything other than Australian. JarrahTree 14:55, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

There really is nothing wrong with this edit. EngvarB is not British, it's the generic non-US English variant. The correct thing to do is simply replace "EngvarB" with "Use Australian English". --AussieLegend (✉) 15:37, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes, that is the correct thing to do. Unlike British English, Australian English is codified in the Commonwealth Style Guide, so we know exactly what forms should be used. I do have a solution in the form of a Bot that can replace {{EngvarB}} with {{Use Australian English}} on articles in this project's scope per MOS:TIES. (The concern is not just about the wrong tagging; the EngVarB script is buggy. Note how "pickup" became "pick-up", which is incorrect.) Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:33, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

I wouldn't say "buggy", just more traditionalist. When I did English at school in the 1960s we were taught to join words by adding a hyphen, not just create a whole new word of our own by combining them as the US does. e.g. Over there they've just added "dadjoke" to the dictionary. To your suggestion of using a bot I say good idea (or should that be "goodidea"?). --AussieLegend (✉) 03:30, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

JarrahTree, I can't see that Waterside Workers' Federation of Australia has ever been tagged with , so Ohconfucius' edit was not wrong to mark it as {{EngvarB}}, it was simply imprecise to effectively just tag it as "Not North American English" rather than specifically Australian. @Ohconfucius: - is it possible to update your bot/script to specifically insert {{Use Australian English}} on articles it finds that are in Australian categories? That would be a better long term outcome than having Hawkeye7's bot trotting along behind yours and making a second edit. --Scott Davis ^Talk 22:52, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

There are more misunderstandings here that seem to take on a life of their own, and hard to know whether the classic say nothing pr style response would not help anyways. Scott Davis - I had reverted the WWFA edit, and would have thought a simple look at edit history would show that. Also - I did not want to take issues with any individual editor per se, it was much more the generic issue, not individual editors. Having had eloquent explanation from editors that engvarB is a way of saying, 'not-US' rather than engvarB = British usage, I could have left it that, and perhaps this is the first time (in a while, or at all?) that the Australian project has had the explanation of engvarB as being 'not-US' clearly explained to place the au variety in context. As for aussielegend and hawkeyes comments it looks like that perhaps there are other things to consider as well. JarrahTree 00:29, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

@ScottDavis: - The script used to do Australian spelling but that was removed in February 2014.[6] --AussieLegend (✉) 03:38, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

@AussieLegend: I wonder why Australian English was explicitly removed from that script. It appears there is a call for it to be reinstated here. @Ohconfucius: do you recall why Australian English was removed from your script in 2014?

@JarrahTree: I did look at the edit history of Waterside Workers' Federation of Australia. You recently reverted the addition of {{EngvarB}} but I failed to find then or any other time that it had ever had {{Use Australian English}} removed, in particular not at the times the bot added EngvarB. --Scott Davis ^Talk 04:02, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

EngvarB is a superset of Use Australian English, Use British English, etc. If an article that appears to be connected fo Australia is untagged, there is nothing wrong with tagging it with EngvarB but it is probably better to tag it as Use Australian English. But as our history is very interwined with British history, there are a lot of articles where I am not 100% confident in saying it's definitely all Australian or all British, so I opt for EngvarB to keep both options open. Kerry (talk) 23:04, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

The problem with that, it is a personal preference, not a useful guideline, the understanding of engvarb as being a basically 'not-usa' designator has nothing to do with whether an article is english or british either in context or subject matter - I was sure when I started this discussion, was about whether articles in the scope of the Australian project, as to whether the parallel tagging could be corrected to either one or the other - or whether editors of the australian community can handle a split system with little guidance as to how to go forward - it seems we are in a sense no closer or further from an clearly understood means of either standardising a commonly accepted guideline that even non Australian editors may actually acknowledge. JarrahTree 23:20, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

It's not a personal preference, but a reflection that there is more than one country with a "strong tie" which prevents a more precise determination. I see the problem a lot in biographies of British-born people who immigrate to Australia. If they are only notable for things in Australia, then it's easy (Use Australian English) but if they have notability in both, what then? A similar problem occurs with ship articles. Kerry (talk) 16:55, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

This discussion ostensibly about my Engvar script appears to conflate several issues more generally related to WP:ENGVAR and how that applies to the Australian code. I would like to re-centre it on the central premise of my script.

I created the script and initiated the tagging of articles using the {{EngvarB}} template to track article maintenance. As stated in the script documentation, it stems from the recognition that, as far as spelling variants are concerned in the context of the script, the major variants of spelling here on WP can be conveniently grouped under "US", "Canadian", "Other Commonwealth", and (to a limited extent) "British Oxford". Internal to the script, there are modules catering to each EL group and specific tags to reflect each EL group consistent with the output. None of what I have said or what I will say negates the existence of various other codes of English in general, nor is there any intention to insult speakers of these codes grouped under "other" and globally tagged {{EngvarB}}.

Please note that there is a semantic difference between "language ghettoes" and "ghetto languages": I never referred to Australian as a "ghetto language", and one could be forgiven for questioning whether anyone who cannot distinguish between the two notions ought to be editing en.WP.

The Engvar script evolves according to the needs that I perceive when editing articles here. I have a number of them, and like the Engvar script, each has a test and production version that I take pains to maintain and keep up to date. The decision to stop maintaing the {{Use Australian English}} template was taken to ensure ease of script maintenance, especially considering that there are no differences that I am aware of between Australian spelling and standard Commonwealth spelling in the context of the script. No purely-Aussie words are modified by the script.

I am not a programmer, and I would not be able to parameter my script to tag according to which category an article belongs to. Thus {{Use Australian English}} will continue to be unsupported going forward, unless some significant differences emerge between the codes so grouped. However, you will be pleased note that the vast majority of these other "Use xxx English" templates were put in place by User:Dl2000, and I believe this user continues to do so.-- Ohc ^¡digame! 20:44, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

No worries. A crucial difference between Australian English and the others is that it is codified, and not just a Wikipedia construct. So we can always tell if something is compliant, and it therefore lends itself to automation. A proposal a few years ago to create a standardised Commonwealth English was rejected by the UK. There are enough differences between Australian English and the other forms to warrant special processing. I will file a bot request. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:54, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

There are no grammatical differences. The only difference in spelling is program/me, and some Australians still use the -mme form (though I change it when I see it). I discourage unnecessary silos on en.WP, so I'd prefer not to see a specifically AusEng tag, just over one spelling variant that's optional in Australia. It's bad enough having US and non-US tags; but we can't avoid that. Tony (talk) 06:37, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

The "-mme" form is no longer part of Australian English. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:17, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

There are grammatical differences. I've been caught a couple of times when editing articles outside of my usual sphere. The most recent was when I set out to "correct" the grammar of an article about a band. I obviously wasn't the first, as there was an HTML comment in the source to alert me that in British English, it was correct to use plural pronouns/verbs to refer to a singular band. Sorry - I can't find the precise reference tonight, but it read "wrong" to me to use plural for for a single object. --Scott Davis ^Talk 12:08, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Indeed, formulations such as "Queen are a British rock band" are commonplace in British English, but I cannot see why we are arguing over grammar for the purposes of script maintenance, as it seems to me to be an utter red herring. These differences are not acted upon by the Engvar script - only spelling differences are. -- Ohc ^¡digame! 22:26, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

@Ohconfucius: I was responding to Tony1 who asserted that there are no grammatical differences between Australian and British English. I have not personally encountered issues with your script, but it is being discussed here because it is tagging Australian articles with {{EngvarB}} when the authors and project members would in general prefer articles on Australian topics to be tagged with {{Use Australian English}} instead. --Scott Davis ^Talk 22:50, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

• @ScottDavis: First of all, let's correct the stinking grammar that no WP editor should be perpetrating—whether American, British, Australian, or anything: outside OF. The outside of the apple, and the inside of the tennis ball, yes. But please drop the low-down insertion of "of" where "outside" is not a noun. Otherwise we'll have kids doing it when they see it in WP articles. Second, this. plural/singular for sporting teams and companies is a moveable feast in Britain and most other places. And it's pretty trivial. Is that the best grammatical "difference" you can cite? Tony (talk) 23:05, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

I think that it is very difficult to identify grammar distinctions in modern spoken mainstream English given the ubiquity of television. Sub-national regional dialects do not get wide coverage. I felt "of" was appropriate in the sentence above, you clearly didn't. Whether that has to do with regional grammar/dialectal difference or the fact that I did poorly in high school English subjects, I have no idea. The (paper) Macquarie dictionary at hand (1988 reprint) does not define "outside of" in the way I used it, but the online Merriam-Webster does,[7] with 180 years of history. I tend to write "spoken English" on talk pages, and may have found a different grammatical form for article-space. This discussion started from whether it is appropriate to tag articles about Australian topics with {{EngvarB}} rather than {{Use Australian English}}. What constitutes "correct" for either of those should be a separate issue. --Scott Davis ^Talk 01:59, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Australian English follows US grammar. The only grammatical difference between the two I am aware of is the -t ending in words like "dreamt" and "learnt", which would be "dreamed" and "learned" in US English. However, for many Americans the two forms sound identical. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:17, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Back to the crux of the matter.....

To me, none of the templates mean anything to me except {{EngvarB}}, and many of the language codes that are tagged with variants aren't codified (unlike Streyan) yet I'm left with an unsatisfactory situation where I replace or update tags during maintenance, and it sometimes risks over-writing existing templates such as {{Use Australian English}} or {{Use Hong Kong English}}. Any suggestions as to what I ought to do? -- Ohc ^¡digame! 18:35, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Any article that is already tagged with "Use XX English" should not be changed without local consensus of the editors of that article. Even if the spelling or grammar variations are not codified, it's likely that the native speakers can tell the difference. For pages not already tagged, the decision could be a little more complex. Does your script currently use categories or text analysis or what to guess if the article could be {{EngvarB}} or {{EngvarA}} (or anything else)? Maybe an edit summary that includes "You may replace EngvarB with a more specific tag" would satisfy everyone. --Scott Davis ^Talk 22:24, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

That is indeed the crux of the matter - to the vast majority of editors "EngvarB" is meaningless - it is an artificial construct that does not exist outside wikipedia. People understand what "use Indian English" or "use Hong Kong English" refers to, even though they probably don't understand the differences between variants, let alone the effect of the template. Trying to force editors to adopt something that means nothing to them has met with active opposition from a large number of editors. The whole point of scripts etc is to make things easier for editors by automating routine tasks. I would suggest you need to review your script to work with what is a clear preference that has been repeatedly expressed by editors. I am sorry that I do not have the technical skills to assist with how to do that. --Find bruce (talk) 23:11, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Like {{EngvarB}}, {{Use Australian English}} is a maintenance template. It is only visible in edit mode and isn't visible to the average reader.

From the views expressed above, it now seems necessary for me for my script to ignore the {{Use Australian English}} template and insert a {{EngvarB}} template. It's not an ideal solution because it contributes to clutter, and in addition, it will potentially render inaccurate the figures I rely on to tell me the number of artices treated because of double-counting (articles that will have both tags) going forward. -- Ohc ^¡digame! 14:58, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

@Ohconfucius: It would be more helpful if the parse phase of your script recognise any {{Use XXX English}} and treat them as {{EngvarA}}/{{EngvarB}}/{{EngvarC}}/{{EngvarD}} and remember which one it found. The rest of the script can do whatever it currently does, and put back the tag it found at the end. There should be no need to add the generic tag to any article that already has a specific one. There would therefore be no articles with two tags. Is there something I have missed that would make it desirable to have both {{Use Australian English}} (or {{Use Indian English}} etc) and {{EngvarB}} on the same article? A and C redirect to two specific national variants. It seems that every other dialect of English is lumped in group B. --Scott Davis ^Talk 14:45, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

Shire names

It seems to me that all LGA articles are at "TYPE of PLACE", like "City of Melbourne" or "Shire of Broome". But I just noticed the presence of Yarra Ranges Shire in Victoria, together with a few other similar names, e.g. Golden Plains Shire. Does this reflect real life (if you live in these places, you say "My LGA is the Whatever Shire"), or is it a matter of a few articles not meeting naming conventions? I'm an American, so aside from centuries-outdated usage, the whole concept of a "shire" is foreign. Thank you. Nyttend (talk) 05:18, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

With your example of Yarra Ranges, the LGA is the "Shire of Yarra Ranges" but the "Yarra Ranges Shire Council" is the name used by the local government organisation that administers the area. Hack (talk) 06:31, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

I concur - the dual terminology is common in most states of Australia, and has to be understood before editing in the area... JarrahTree 06:48, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

It's also not consistent across the country. For example, City of Swan can refer to both to the LGA and the local government agency. Hack (talk) 09:41, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

Thank you. "has to be understood before editing in the area" — that's why I asked here, rather than moving the "X Shire" pages. Nyttend (talk) 10:46, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

There are probably more examples of inconsistencies to be found, but in general Hack's original statement is a good point to start from. JarrahTree 13:56, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

JarrahTree, you apologised (thank you), but there wasn't anything for which to apologise; I interpreted you as meaning "it's wise that you asked here". The important point is that the two of you gave me a solid answer on my question of whether or not these pagenames need to be standardised. Nyttend (talk) 00:39, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

As a resident of the municipality in question above, I just checked my current rates notice. It is simply headed "Yarra Ranges Council", and has been so going back as far as 2011. The word "shire" doesn't appear at all on the notice. The website is yarraranges.vic.gov.au. Google Maps and signage at the council offices says "Yarra ranges Council". The Annual report says "Yarra ranges Council". I did find one place on the council website where it says "Yarra Ranges Shire Council". I know it is a shire, but the council doesn't seem very proud of the fact. HiLo48 (talk) 23:30, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

the rate they are going

There will probably be no portals left in the Australian project soon - no Australian eds seem the slightest interested

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/Portal:Australian_Capital_Territory JarrahTree 13:34, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

I mean - no one has ever used them. Seems fair enough to me. Frickeg (talk) 23:58, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Problem is the average australian editor is incapable of even fulling in the talk pages of their new articles properly, let alone even understand maintenance of the larger project and its components... As for no one has ever used them that is not correct. JarrahTree 00:28, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

JarrahTree could you please provide a link to the Wikipedia guideline that tells us how to "fill in the talk page of a new article properly", so that we all know how to do it. Up until I've been following WP:TALK#CREATE, in particular the sentence that says "This and similar talk-page notice templates should not be added to pages that do not have discussions on them."

Perhaps you could also link to some of your recent edits to maintain the portals, as an example of the things we should be doing. Perhaps the Western Australian portal, or the Australian one.

Mitch Ames (talk) 00:56, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Mitch it is nothing to do with weird and wonderful rubbish from rules - that is so redundant as to be hideously out of date. In relation to the other material, due to the climate, I make no comment on wiki, you will have to find out other ways JarrahTree 03:41, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

As I suggested earlier today, if you think WP:TALK#CREATE is wrong or needs updating, propose a change to it, e.g. to suggest the inclusion of appropriate project templates. You could then provide a link to the updated guidelines to help the average Australian editor do it "properly", to the net benefit of all concerned. I realise that Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, but we have policies and guidelines for a reason - in this case to help achieve our goals. Mitch Ames (talk) 08:29, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

sorry I have already stated I dont comment re the issue on wiki, and I do not bring personal conversations to the goldfishbowl. sorry. JarrahTree 12:57, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

I rarely put anything on the talk pages of new articles I create, either. It seems self-indulgent to rate an article I wrote myself without independent review, and unhelpful to tag an article with a project that previously had no knowledge of the creation if I don't give it quality etc tags. Someone who cares about project tags usually notices my new pages within a day or so and tags them appropriately.

On the topic of this thread, I have never really worked out the point of portals. WP:PORTAL says they are "enhanced main page"s, but I don't know how a reader is supposed to stumble upon such an alternative. As a result of this conversation, I ran a critical eye over Portal:South Australia, including modifying a did-you-know claim that ceased to be "current" in 2007.--Scott Davis ^Talk 13:09, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Victorian coal mines

I have stuck verification tags across the coal section of Energy in Victoria. Does anyone know if the Morwell mine is still operating? Both of the power stations that are listed as buying its coal are closed according to their own articles, but I didn't find an authoritative answer to the mine itself, or if the railway just goes the other way now and carries coal from it to a power station somewhere else. Thanks in advance for some help. --Scott Davis ^Talk 10:40, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

https://www.lvmrc.vic.gov.au/latrobe-valley-mines/ and https://www.lvmrc.vic.gov.au/mine/hazelwood/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hazelwood_Power_Station claim 2017 closure of the Morwell mine and Hazelwood power station - Loy Yang and Yallourn power stations remain operating JarrahTree 10:48, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks. I've removed the mine from the list of currently operating mines, and dated and cited the mine fire. That just leaves a need for a citation for predicted increases in the cost of electricity. --Scott Davis ^Talk 15:30, 21 September 2019 (UTC)

As someone who used to live in that neighbourhood, I'd like to point out that closing a coal mine doesn't make it go away, especially if it's an open cut mine like the Latrobe Valley ones. The mine fire, in fact, began in an area of the mine that was already no longer being used. Water systems used to wet the coal in an operating mine so it doesn't catch fire had been removed or were inoperable. There's little in place to stop it happening again. This may be opening a big can of worms, but maybe we need to address the "closed" but non-rehabilitated aspect of the mines. A closed mine is still a mine. HiLo48 (talk) 01:30, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

there is insufficient (as far as I can find) adequate in wiki or in the mining project - that discusses the process of mine rehabilitation and the requirements for the forms of mining. Land_rehabilitation is a poor lead into the issue, and probably Hannan, J. C. (John Crawford); New South Wales. Department of Mineral Resources; New South Wales Coal Association (1995), Mine rehabilitation : a handbook for the coal mining industry (2nd ed.), New South Wales Coal Association, ISBN 978-0-949337-62-7 would be a more likely candidate for the very many issues that arise... JarrahTree 13:04, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

@HiLo48: A closed mine no longer belongs in the table under the lead-in sentence "Coal mines in Victoria operating in 2019 are:". If there was an article about the mine, I'd agree it should be linked from Energy in Victoria, but without a page about the mine, I'm not sure that rehabilitation of a closed mine belongs in that article. Perhaps you could add it to Latrobe Valley or Gippsland if it fits there, or Engie? The equivalent information for South Australia is in Telford Cut (the mine), Leigh Creek, South Australia and Northern Power Station (South Australia) (the last power station to use coal from that mine) but only in passing at Energy in South Australia. --Scott Davis ^Talk 13:29, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Mine maintenance of former mines is in many situations in most states more of a problem than the actual open/active mine, I do hope someone at some stage picks the subject to improve coverage here in the oz project. JarrahTree 13:33, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Yes. I shall just re-emphasise my point that we mention the fire. The fire began in an already closed portion of the open-cut mine. Then we say it's closed, and we stop, as if that somehow is the end. It's obviously not. Closure actually makes the fire risk worse. We are writing as if the closure is a good thing on it's own. It's not, and we must not give that impression. HiLo48 (talk) 22:28, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

The fire still has the same mention in Energy in Victoria that it had, but now has a date and a reference. If there have been more fires, only one was mentioned before, and still is. I removed the row from the table about currently operating coal mines. Putting in a new table about former coal mines would need more research to identify if there have been others in Victoria. --Scott Davis ^Talk 22:57, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Portal:Australia

Proposal to delete all portals. The discussion is at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Proposal to delete Portal space. Voceditenore (talk) 08:37, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

While I am generally inclined towards inclusion, I am really failing to recognise the value of most portals. Does anyone here have any argument at all that any of the state-level (or city-level if any exist) portals should be kept? I think I am more inclined to allow the stepwise deletions to continue rather than cut the whole concept off, but I'm open to being convinced either way. I neither use nor routinely maintain any portals. --Scott Davis ^Talk 12:36, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

Historical concept, that had some success and which a many still act as designed. I think its best that they are kept of the part they play in Wikipedias history. Gnangarra 06:17, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Fully support the idea - {{historical}} - better than a bad faith delete JarrahTree 07:37, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

@Gnangarra and JarrahTree: You need to go over to the main proposal and make your opinions known. At the moment, after cleaning up the Portal:South Australia Did You Know.. section, I would be inclined to delete that on the grounds that nobody had maintained it for almost a decade. --Scott Davis ^Talk 14:53, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

read the proposal and discussion in full - and then think about it - on my part no comment. JarrahTree 04:56, 26 September 2019 (UTC)

James Park Woods

Views sought here about whether article introduction is ambiguous. Thanks, Meticulo (talk) 14:50, 28 September 2019 (UTC)

Lawrence power station

Is anybody aware of a current or former coal-fired power station that might have been called something like Lawrence power station? It features in Wikidata as Lawrence Energy Centre (Q19379100) with a very short article in Norwegian, and a dead link as reference. I can't find anything to match it to. The article seems to say it had 4 steam turbines for a total output of 600MW, but does not give a location more precise than "Australia", constructed(?) 1954–1971. There appear to have been a number of stubs in Norwegian with similar references. I have matched most of the others and merged the wikidata entries, but this one has me stumped. Thanks. --Scott Davis ^Talk 07:10, 4 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi Scott, Australia as location may be an error? There's a Lawrence Energy Center in Kansas. This mentions dates of 1955 and 1971. JennyOz (talk) 08:40, 4 October 2019 (UTC)

Thank you Jenny. @Bjoertvedt: is it possible that the location of that article is wrong and it should be updated in Wikidata and Norwegian to Kansas? The Lawrence Energy Center is in a list at Evergy#Generation portfolio. Thank you. --Scott Davis ^Talk 23:38, 4 October 2019 (UTC)

I think you've solved it. 2 Lawrence power stations of the same size and dates are listed in no:Liste_over_verdens_største_kullkraftverk, Australia & Kansas. That user did also later create no:Lawrence_kullkraftverk_(Kansas) with virtually identical text. They did create it in between making other Australian power plant stubs, such as Vales Point, Kwinana, Swanbank and Torrens Island, but everything else points to a mixup. This source has no mention of a Lawrence or Laurence Power Station in Australia. The-Pope (talk) 04:28, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Victoria for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Victoria is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Victoria until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. Certes (talk) 20:46, 4 October 2019 (UTC)

Peanut Allergy Staple Products page. Where to begin? Advice to start up?

Hi, I've only ever made minor edits to wikipedia pages before now, but have just had an idea which I'd like to float by you all beforehand. When shopping for an Australian with peanut allergies, there are 2 main types of warning printed on packaging: "Contains" and "May contain traces". The former is obvious, but the latter means something like "We made 10,000 chocolate bars with peanuts, cleaned the equipment, then made 10,000 bars without peanuts. The first 100 bars out of 10,000 might have peanut residue. 9,900 will be fine, but we don't know which ones." This makes shopping for basics difficult as Coles and Woolies sometimes only use 2 or 3 suppliers and the warnings change.

Rather than setting up some kind of whitelist website which I would never be able to keep up to date by myself, it would be great to have a wikipedia page/website where people could list where to go just now to find items such as soup mix or jars of garlic which can be hard to find when planning and shopping.

I'm happy to learn how to do it, and can use those skills to do some of the other to-do list jobs here once I get my head round it. Thanks in advance.

PS, what's the best way to get alerts or messages when you reply? — Preceding unsigned comment added by F4fvs (talk • contribs) 02:53, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

Hi F4fvs, thanks for your idea, but that isn't really what Wikipedia is about. You are probably better off looking for a Facebook group or a forum where they could maintain a list. We rely on secondary sources, not original research, so we'd need a reliable source to confirm all of the information, not just people reading labels. And, to be honest, you couldn't trust that someone isn't being malicious and adding items that don't qualify. The-Pope (talk) 04:07, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

I suspect that answer is that Wikipedia is not the right place for this information.

• Compiling and maintaining such a list would probably be original research.
• Such a list would probably fail WP:NOTCATALOG, WP:NOTADVICE, WP:INDISCRIMINATE

@F4fvs: The best way to get notified of replies is by watching this page. I've {{ping}}ed you this time, but normally I wouldn't, and you should not generally rely on others to do so.

Mitch Ames (talk) 04:17, 5 October 2019 (UTC)

Thanks both. Your advice is gratefully received. F4fvs (talk) 16:39, 5 October 2019 (UTC)