User talk:Gaius Cornelius

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Welcome

Hello Gaius Cornelius, 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! By the way, you can sign your name on Talk and vote pages using three tildes, like this: ~~~. Four tildes (~~~~) produces your name and the current date. If you have any questions, see the help pages, add a question to the village pump or ask me on my talk page. Again, welcome! You (Talk) 19:10, Jun 16, 2005 (UTC)

Working Men's College

Hi. I have reverted one of your edits on this page as the manner of writing the date is taken from my foundation stone inscription photo; this being being a direct quote. Thanks for the other typo correction. Best wishes, --Acabashi (talk) 16:01, 28 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Oops! Sorry. Thanks for fixing. Happy editing, Gaius Cornelius (talk) 18:10, 28 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

DYK for Stuart Macrae (inventor)

On 13 November, 2008, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Stuart Macrae (inventor), which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

Cirt (talk) 20:24, 13 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

AWB making edits not in compliance with MOS.

I see that you are using AWB to convert superscript numbers into unicode: 2 to ² (e.g. this edit). This change does not comply with Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers), and Wikipedia:Manual of Style (mathematics)#Superscripts and subscripts, both of which explicitly mandate the use of superscript tags rather than Unicode characters for superscripts.--Srleffler (talk) 05:15, 2 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I see that you are quite right and thank you for bringing this to my attention. I had thought that the unicode was prefered in, for example, square meters. Although the unicode is certainly exteemly common throughout wikipedia, I see now that I should have been amending the other way - to 2. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 13:14, 2 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Help!

Please see this discussion Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Video_games#Final_Fantasy_Legend_name_translation_woes.2C_mk._II

There is an ongoing issue with Kung Fu Man over an edit dispute which is getting out of hand, and I'm fairly certain the user is relying on sockpuppets to make revisions to the article. Check the revision history yourself to verify this. Also, I've been receiving harassing comments and threats from this user and am not sure where to turn for help. Please get involved and try to act as the voice of reason. Thank you. 74.242.123.2 (talk) 01:19, 7 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Are you a registered user? Please sign in and leave me another note. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 16:30, 7 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Geoffrey Pyke

Thanks for getting some Weasel content into this article. Everyone remembers Pykrete, but the really useful thing he actually achieved does tend to be forgottten. Andy Dingley (talk) 14:10, 29 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You are welcome of course - thanks for your interest. Yes, Pyke does not get the credit he deserves and is generally remembered for glorious failures. I have written the Geoffrey Pyke pretty much single handed and I have learned a lot about the man in my researches, but I would be hard pressed to sum up his character. Certainly he was both physically and intellectually brave. He could also be difficult and downright obnoxious; I have not gone into the matter in the current article, but his involvement with weasel nearly turned into a debacle.

I see from your user page that you have written on the Thornycroft Bison which happens to be another pet interest of mine. Good for you! Gaius Cornelius (talk) 17:48, 29 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

looking help 2 decide what next

At
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template_talk:God_Arguments#What_about_this_change_at_the_proposed_teleological_item.3F
I've proposed this change, at one of the items (words/terms) inside the template:

Teleological [argument] ___ . . . _____to substitute with_____ . . . ___ Teleological [argument] (Argument from design), ___or better___: Teleological (design)
Better (than saying) substitution is 2note that I'm adding that: (design) to the other. And note: Argument from design is a REDIRECT to Teleological argument.

I don't know the procedure to discuss a small change, at an article or template, like that. The question is: it's a small change (I think), 'cause it leave all as it was, and at the reference: Teleological argument ONLY adds another link that is a REDIRECT to the other with the aim to compare easily: Argument from poor design & Argument from design; that are terms/references of those two: cons & pros arguments.

Maybe I wrote too many at the talk, but I wanted my intention not misunderstood. It was the reason to write there too: the original template and the one I propose.

I went first to the creator of the template User:Merzul, but is: retired, "This user is no longer active on Wikipedia". Then I came to you.

Thanks for reading me! And if you can help me with this subject, that is to modificate or not modificate it, and which procedures we have to follow. Dankon/gracias/Thank you! Sincerely.
--PLA y Grande Covián (talk) 05:23, 31 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

AfD nomination of Erlang (programming language)

An article that you have been involved in editing, Erlang (programming language), has been listed for deletion. If you are interested in the deletion discussion, please participate by adding your comments at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Erlang (programming language). Thank you. Fikusfail (talk) 04:42, 4 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

a --> an edits

Hi, Just a heads up - [1]

You've been changing a --> an when before wikilinks, which is technically correct if the wikilink isnt piped, or if the pipe starts with a vowel, but these are wrong.

In the example above, a [[Officers' Training Corps|cadet corps]] to an [[Officers' Training Corps|cadet corps]]

Cheers

—Ree dy 14:47, 21 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Tropicana Casino and Resort

I've reverted your change in the InfoBox for the Tropicana Casino and Resort in Atlantic City because you listed Tropicana Entertainment as the owner. For your information a friend of mine is a former employee of the Tropicana and I can tell you that all ownership of the property is now under the conservatorship of a former New Jersey Supreme Court Judge. In fact if you look on the Tropicana Entertainment website official website you'll see that there is no references at all to the Atlantic City property. If you have any further questions please feel free to leave them on my Talk Page. Rosie, Queen of Corona (talk) 20:26, 2 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You are confusing my edits with those of another editor. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 23:38, 2 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

AWB errors

Hello, I've just had to repair some errors after your AWB bot work:

[2] This edit is deleting two sic comments (""), removing the periods at the end of sentences ending with "Dec", and mess with the comment next to Defaultsort.
[3] I had to waste time fixing at least all these. (And I don't even agree that a <ref> should always be forcefully pushed after the final period of a sentence when it is intended to source only the last claim of a sentence and not all claims in the sentence.)
Also you are mass-delinking dates but please note that the Signpost says "An injunction has been issued prohibiting large-scale linking or delinking of dates until the case is resolved" for everyone on Wikipedia.

— The Little Blue Frog (ribbit) 22:15, 15 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry about the Dec thing and thanks for sorting it out. You might not agree with the location of footnotes, but consistency is a very worthwhile aim. Finally, AWB is not a bot and I am not doing anything en masse. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 00:09, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The injunction is against any "bots, scripts, tools, or otherwise", not simply bots. AWB is included. Also note that "mass edits" could conceivably apply to your activity level. I would suggest turning off that part of AWB if possible to avoid running afoul of the injunction. —Locke Cole • t • c 21:27, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have done so Gaius Cornelius (talk) 23:14, 16 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Air well (condenser)

Articles that are moved from userspace are treated as if they were created on the day they were moved. Shubinator simply didn't notice the move and I don't blame him. Apparently, the log for the page doesn't show any moves while the edit history does. I've contacted him and one of us will take another look. - Mgm|^(talk) 10:47, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Gaius Cornelius (talk) 12:17, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The hook fact needs to be cited with an inline citation in the article directly after the sentence in question. - Mgm|^(talk) 10:49, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have added a suitable citation. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 12:17, 23 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Bumping into each other

Hey there We'll probably be bumping into each other for a while, because I'm working on the Blacker Bombard in my sandbox at the moment, and then the Northover Projector and the Smith Gun if there are sufficient sources. Just thought I'd drop you a bell Skinny87 (talk) 16:04, 30 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. You seem to be doing a good job, so I will leave you to it - I did some earlier work on those articles so do let me know if I can help you. Presently, I have other projects on the go such as the Air well (condenser) article. When you do update an article, if it is significantly extended, then it may be eligible for the Did you know section of the main page - a fivefold expansion is the rule for eligibility.Gaius Cornelius (talk) 16:14, 30 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

DYK for Air well (condenser)

On May 1, 2009, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Air well (condenser), which you created or substantially expanded. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

Gatoclass (talk) 12:53, 1 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Air well (condenser) Picture

Hi.

I read a dozen articles every day. I edit one or two every day. I think of it as my way to contribute something tangible to the world. If every skilled Wiki user improves a couple of articles everyday, soon they will all reach excellence. Most of the articles I edit are far from my area of expertise. I do this when I see something I am unfamiliar with, and the article is unclear. If I rewrite it with my understanding and for clarity, then a true expert will look at it and if I am right leave it alone, and if not fix it.

I have no special knowledge of Air Wells. But I do know how to use PhotoShop. So I just decided to clarify the picture, which I found cramped. What you posted contained all the information I needed to make my drawing. Your drawing was great, just hard to see. When I searched the web I found no more information than it already had. So I just redrew it using PhotoShop.

Nick Beeson (talk) 15:53, 2 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

My picture must have been better than I thought. I wondered because the reference was a little obscure. You are quite right about everybody contributing - if only it were so. Thanks again. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 16:06, 2 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Changes to Death Valley National Park

I always appreciate cleanup efforts, especially on FAs— but I wanted to point out two particular types of changes you made in this edit that are not really productive.

If a conversion is already given in appropriately-formatted plain text, templatizing this into {{convert}} just adds unnecessary overhead. This is insignificant in small quantities, but articles with many conversions often intentionally use plain-text conversions to avoid unnecessary load time.
Replacing unicode characters with the html code to produce the same ("km²" with "km2") is...kinda backwards :)

I don't mean to sound ungrateful—I noticed and appreciate that you switched a couple citations into numerical order, and removed a stray full stop, etc—but I do hope to convince you it's unwise to overwrite properly-formatted plain-text conversions with the conversion template. Thanks in advance for your consideration. Maralia (talk) 16:34, 2 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

- Actually, km2 is better than km² for WP:ACCESSIBILITY reasons. Dabomb87 (talk) 17:04, 2 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
 - I'm not sure why you think so; it is my understanding that the ² character is in Latin-1 and would therefore be correctly interpreted by screen readers. Maralia (talk) 17:19, 2 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]
 - I was thinking on a much more basic level: the superscripted version is easier to read than the unicode version. Also, Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)#Conventions: "Avoid the unicode characters ² and ³. They are harder to read on small displays, and are not aligned with superscript characters (see x¹x²x³x⁴ vs. x¹x²x³x⁴). Instead, use superscript markup, created with ." Dabomb87 (talk) 15:06, 3 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

As Dabomb87 has pointed out, km2 is the correct form according to the MOS, I make those changes because they help make wikipedia clearer and more internally consistent. The {{convert|...}} template has been much improved recently with careful consideration to the time taken - it is not very efficient. Its use can be recommended because it does rather more just perform the conversion: it enforces a standard formatting including non-breaking spaces etc. Also, I don't just convert existing instances, but add new converts where they seem appropriate - despite using AWB my edits involve substantial manual intervention. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 19:12, 4 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Gun calibres and convert template

Please do not use the convert template with gun calibres. Nominal and actual gun calibres are often slightly different. When people go to the trouble of looking up appropriate metric measurement of gun calibres for weapons with inch calibres, the use of the convert template destroys information.

It is a problem that far too many people simply do trivial conversions because they do not realise this. By the way I would be surprised at any 3-inch gun having a calibre of 76mm. Most either had a calibre of 76.2 mm or 75 mm.--Toddy1 (talk) 17:21, 16 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Please do not apply the convert template to gun and torpedo calibres because the nominal calibre is not the same as the actual calibre. You have been asked not to do this before, but you did so on 08:51, 20 June 2009 to HMS Hood (51).

It is probably not a good idea to replace true conversions of data with the convert template for armour thicknesses, shell weights, etc. When people go to the trouble of looking up the correct value, substituting a mathematical approximation may not be helpful.--Toddy1 (talk) 22:57, 20 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"Fire one!"

Hi. I'm not sure why you're on your ‘Torpedoes are launched rather than "fired"’ kick. It is, or at least was, the correct term.

PROCEDURES DURING THE APPROACH AND ATTACK; ... When the approach officer believes he is in the best position to fire, he announces "Final Bearing and Shoot" (notice he does not say the word "fire"). ... The Mark 14 torpedo can be fired with a gyro angle of up to 160 degrees right or left, however, this large angle introduces a very large margin of error and is called curved fire. ... After all inputs are generated in the TDC the word goes out "Fire One" (etc, etc, etc). Hopefully the Torpedo Room will announce "Number One fired electrically"! The above firing procedure is for firing one torpedo at the MOT (Middle of Target). If multiple torpedoes are to be fired, ... [4]

The text in those submarine articles was mostly copied from the U.S. Navy's DANFS. E.g.

... As hunting was poor, [Perch] shifted to an area off Hong Kong, and, on Christmas night, fired four torpedoes at a large merchantman, all missing. ... [5]

—WWoods (talk) 16:51, 17 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I cannot say that I'm particularly bothered either way, I happed to be going through a lot of sub articles as it happens - though I think I am done for now. One puts fire to a gun, but a torpedo is a machine so "lauched" seems much more logical and it is the expression generally used in the torpedo. Besides, it it is "copied" from a sourse that appears to still be in copyright, all the more reason to change it. But, if you do object, feel free to change it back. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 17:40, 17 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

As a work of the US government, DANFS is in the public domain.

—WWoods (talk) 18:17, 17 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Move Survey: Your Opinion is Requested

There is a moving discussion & survey going on, on the page "Bitch". Your opinion has been requested, click here to vote, it is urged that you vote in a timely manner. Thank You.

I Seek To Help & Repair! (talk) 22:06, 17 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

AWB edit breaking link to image

Hi. Your recent AWB edit to the Teterboro Airport article (see Revision as of 06:17, 1 May 2009) included changing "TEB logo.png" to "TEB logo .png". As you can see, the space before ".png" breaks the link to the image, preventing it from being displayed in the article (which in turn almost caused the image to be deleted by a bot that tags orphaned fair-use images for deletion within 2 weeks). Luckily I caught this before the image was deleted and made the necessary corrections. I just wanted to bring it to your attention so that you can update whatever AWB setting caused this to occur. -- Zyxw (talk) 23:22, 17 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for pointing that out - and thanks for fixing it. I have hundreds of AWB rules to help format text. My AWB settings are not supposed to do that! I think my AWB was confused by the file suffix ".png" with which it is not familiar and assumed that the full-stop was an end of sentence. And, on this occasion, my manual review missed the mistake. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 06:54, 18 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

BR Standard Class 6

Hi. Could you double-check your recent mod to this page please? The cylinder size convert hasn't worked properly (check the diff).

Cheers -- EdJogg (talk) 12:00, 22 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have reverted that parameter. Thanks for pointing the problem out - convert obviously is quite behaving as expected and to make things worse it LOOKS alright making the error hard to spot. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 12:55, 22 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Cleanup of American White Pelican

Something really strange happened with your 12:28 edit of this article link Apparently when you removed a redundant space it broke the link to a photo. I don't know how it worked to do that and why it wouldn't 'fix' until I cut and pasted the photo link from the previous edition. If you look back and forth on these edits you'll see what I'm talking about. Or maybe it's just because I'm running Firefox? Regards.Trilobitealive (talk) 22:50, 24 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I see it now. My AWB had deleted a space before the close parenthisis as in "(Pelecanus erythrorhynchos )". That is very unusual of course and I appologise for not noticing it. My AWB rules have hundreds of formatting checks for things like this, normally they are typos and I do have a provision for avoiding changes to text in a [[Image:...]] but this does not currently work for [[File:...]]; so that one got through. I will be more careful in future. Thanks for fixing it. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 07:26, 25 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for looking at it. Talk to you another time.Trilobitealive (talk) 00:51, 27 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

North Staffordshire Railway

thanks for the tidy up. NtheP (talk) 21:26, 2 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Pillbox article

The magazine Britain at War June 2009 ISSN 1753-3090 has a six page article on page 75 called defending the defenders all about British hardened field defences. Cheers --palmiped | Talk 12:02, 20 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I will investigate. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 12:43, 22 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've got that copy round here somewhere if you ever need it again. Skinny87 (talk) 10:32, 7 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Accessdate parameter

I saw in this diff and this one that you fixed an "accessmonthday" and/or "accessdaymonth" parameter with AWB. Please be informed that these are deprecated. The preferred way is to put day, month, and year together in the "accessdate" parameter.
See also {{Cite web}}. Thank you, Debresser (talk) 18:59, 18 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I did actually know that. My fix is semi-automatic and I have done such passes through Wikipedia many times before, so I know that there should not be very many of them. I am just fixing those fields so that they can be identified and transformed by a subsequent editor without having to worry about typos. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 09:40, 19 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Air well (condenser)

Hi Gaius Cornelius, I've started reviewing Air well (condenser) which you recently submitted to WP:GAN.

The article worries me somewhat. You have obviously put a lot of work into this article, which is wide-ranging, well-illustrated and well-referenced. Having said that, I am sorry but I would not award this article GA-status as it currently exists. The problem as I see it are two fold: the article is written more in the style of an essay, or technical article, rather than an encylcopedia; and I don't consider that the layout is correct in respect of the WP:MoS.

The work that you have done is not wasted, as you have all the necessary information and the sources that provide WP:verification; but what I would suggested is that the article is reworked, and in places shortened.

Much of the text that you have put into the first section is quite detailed; and this would probably work much better if it was moved into the body of the article and a new WP:lead produced once the article has been reformated.

There are a number of ways forward:

I can put the article On Hold and you can make the changes and we discuss the way forward from there.
I can make the changes that I think are needed and we discuss the way forward from there.
I close this review and/or fail it.

How would you like to play this one?Pyrotec (talk) 21:59, 28 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Pyrotec: I certainly appreciate your offer of help; please make any changes that you see fit. We can then discuss the way forward. Thanks. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 07:00, 29 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the offer. So far I've just worked on your Dew section by renaming it and copying in text from the Introduction; and later I will rewrite the WP:lead. The rest will take a bit longer, but the process will be similar - although I think that the prose in the sections on "design" need sliming down a bit.Pyrotec (talk) 07:42, 29 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I think the article is now in a reasonable state, where I would be happy to consider it for GA-status. However, I will give you time to consider the changes. The article appears to be in British-English, so I used that; and I'm happy to discuss any concerns at this point. After that I can start reviewing it against the WP:WIAGA; and my comments will appear on the Talk:Air well (condenser)/GA1 page.Pyrotec (talk) 20:12, 29 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Pyrotec: I have check through the article and I am content. As I see it, only the lead has changed significantly. Thank you for your efforts. Please do go ahead with GA review. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 16:15, 30 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]

In view of timescales, my preference would be to remove unreferenced material which would then allow me to award GA-status. You can of course re-add the deleated material at a later date, when you have suitable citations, without compromising any GA-status.Pyrotec (talk) 07:53, 13 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Pyrotec: OK. I have removed the offending paragraphs; I think that the article still reads alright without them. Hopefully that will be all you need for now! Gaius Cornelius (talk) 20:14, 13 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Its now a GA. Pyrotec (talk) 20:28, 14 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Pyrotec: Excellent! Thanks for your help and hard work. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 20:33, 14 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Syracuse University

Thanks for brining it to my attention, and I've fixed the problem. I am aware of AWB's shortcomings, and I likely just didn't see that when it came up. Also, while I understand your concerns, next time please refrain from using phrases like "you need to take take a little time" and directives like "Please put things right and take more care in future" as they aren't necessary. From the looks of it, we've both edited on WP for a good long while, and I think that merits being talked TO instead of talked AT. I'm not trying to be hyper-sensitive, make a mountain out of a molehill, or infer intent that likely isn't there, just letting you know how your message came across. Thanks. - Masonpatriot (talk) 16:17, 12 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

For your hard work

		The WikiChevrons
		For your hard work on British anti-invasion preparations of World War II. Skinny87 (talk) 10:28, 7 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Frankly, you deserve this barnstar just for all the hard work you put into British anti-invasion preparations of World War II, which has inspired me to start working on some of the improvised weapons that would have been used if the country had been invaded. I've just finished getting the Blacker Bombard to B-Class, and brought Sticky bomb to the same class, as well as the PIAT to GA-Class, although that would have been to late for the invasion I'd imagine. So thanks for that! Skinny87 (talk) 10:28, 7 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks! Blacker Bombard and Sticky bomb look good - will you shoot for Good Article for them too? I will read the articles more closely at a later time. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 07:16, 8 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hey, thanks for that, and the advice with the Bombard. I'm thinking about moving onto the Thornycroft Bison after the Northover, and perhaps an article on the improvised vehicles used by the Home Guard. I'm trying (unsuccessfully) to find a copy of David Fletcher's The Great Tank Scandal which I know has a section on them, but do you know of any other books or articles that might be of help in that area? Cheers, Skinny87 (talk) 21:26, 10 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You are welcome. I wish you well with the other aticles and I will help if I can. The Great Tank Scandal is available at a price, but I don't have a copy. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 07:43, 11 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I've replied at the article's talkpage. When I have time, I'll add in about Macrae's claim to making the sticky bomb, although I can't afford to purchase his book, and there are few libraries that have it available. Skinny87 (talk) 11:45, 12 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

(od)I was hoping I might bend your lughole for a moment with a question? I'm looking at Thornycroft Bison and Standard Beaverette and the mentions in British anti-invasion preparations of World War II about Home Guard vehicles. Now, there doesn't seem to be much on the 'net or in my books on the Bison, and although there's some more mentions about the Beaverette it isn't a great deal. And as for the other vehicles they made - well, given that each type was different, I doubt there'd be enough info for an article. I was therefore thinking of writing Vehicles of the Home Guard (United Kingdom) or somesuch, with the possibility of merging the Bison into it and having info on the Beaverette but still leaving the latter as a seperate article. What do you think - do you know if there would be sufficient sources for it to work? Skinny87 (talk) 09:19, 15 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Skinny: I wish you well, but I think you will find this difficult. I have looked and found very little on the Bison and Beaverette. There were other vehicles too: the Armadillo, which was protected by gravel between boards, the Scorpion, which seems to be similar but protected by Plastic armour and the cockatrice, an early flamethrower. There may have been more besides. These official and semi-official improvisatoins were not necessarily intended exclusively for the Home Guard. Rather than trying to rewrite information about them, a Vehicles of the Home Guard (United Kingdom) article might describe the many private attempts to construct armoured cars (and even armoured trains) for use by individual HG units. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 22:00, 17 September 2009 (UTC).[reply]

Blacker Bombard

Could I get you to look over the talkpage when you have a moment? I've answered your queries and would like some advice/guidance on the matter. Skinny87 (talk) 19:08, 28 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have done so. You really need those books I have mentioned, it should be possible to get them via a lending library or can be purchased via Abe books or similar. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 07:14, 29 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thank-you. Unfortunately, both ideas cost money that I can't afford, particularly the latter option which would set me back at least £30. I'll simply have to put the article on hold until such time as I can get a hold of the book. Skinny87 (talk) 08:00, 29 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Skinny87: I know you are interested in unusual WWII weapons. The other day I came across the Lagonda flamethrower article for the first time - although it must have been on Wikipedia for some time. If you have not seen it before, you may find it interesting. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 08:16, 29 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hmmm, very interesting - no, never heard of it before. Hmmm, I'll need to see if I can get ahold of Secret War by Pawle! Cheers, Skinny87 (talk) 08:29, 29 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Don't get tripped up by temperature conversions

You made a common mistake in the Teignmouth article. When talking about temperature difference the normal °C to °F conversion does not apply. A 10 °C temperature is 50 °F, but a 10 °C temperature difference equates to a difference of 18 °F. This is because you don't add 32 when doing differences. Think of it like this - 20 °C (68 °F) is 5 °C (9 °F) warmer than 15 °C (59 °F). Did I explain that OK? Anyway, I corrected your mistake in the article. --Simple Bob (talk) 16:08, 1 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well spotted and thanks for the fix. I will be more careful! Gaius Cornelius (talk) 08:01, 2 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Even more careful, please. It happened again here. Thanks. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 13:10, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Defaultsort for taxa

Hi there. I noticed a few of your edits that added a capitalized defaultsort using AWB. I haven't used AWB in a while - is this a standard feature now or is this a special regex or code you use? I note that adding such capitalized defaultsorts isn't really supported by guidelines or policy. In fact, I think it was removed from WP:CAT as it had been disputed. I'm of the opinion that they're unnecessary on species-titled articles as only other species in those articles will get sorted next to each other in categories. And currently the system of some articles with capitalized defaultsorts and some without has made for a lot of messy categories. I approached User:Rich Farmbrough with this, but only got one response and no further discussion. Do you have any strong opinions on this matter? It's unfortunate what a mess things are right now. Cheers, Rkitko ^(talk) 21:38, 21 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Rkitko: it is a built-in AWB thing. If it is disputed, then it should be removed and the place to bring this up is Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser or possibly Wikipedia talk:AutoWikiBrowser/Bugs. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 10:19, 22 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

More on AWB

Thanks to AWB for picking up some repeated words and a missing capitalisation in Scale (map). On the other hand the diff file seems to flag vast chunks which were deleted and replaced without any changes in the source code. Am I missing something? Peter Mercator (talk) 12:01, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The "difference" indication will show up for any change in a paragraph. It will pick up on differences that are invisible to the human eye and I can only speculate as to what these might be in this case. AWB will exchange certain characters for different, but identical looking, unicode characters; AWB will also remove certain non-printing characters. Maybe an article that uses Greek characters for maths equations may be particularly prone to aquiring such characters? Gaius Cornelius (talk) 12:29, 11 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Conversions

Please don't replace accurate conversions (in Asian House Martin) with the awful conversion templates. The latter are a lazy short cut, and when a range is small can result in nonsense like "99–99 in". If you think my conversions are wrong, recalculate them, there is no reason to impose a less accurate and ugly template. I should point out that there was no criticism of the manual conversions in the recent GA Jimfbleak - talk to me? 07:24, 3 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Just noticed the comment higher up this page - these templates encourage carelessness because they remove the need to think about what is being done, or to check that the answers make sense Jimfbleak - talk to me? 07:26, 3 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I really don't understand why you find the convert template so objectionable. As far as I can see, all instances of the template in that edit produced well formatted text and perfectly accurate conversions with appropriate significant figures. I suppose it is a matter of personal taste, but I don't find "20.2 x 14.1 mm (0.79 x 0.55 in)" to be any less ugly that its convert template equivalent. I don't think there is anything lazy about using the convert template; in fact it takes a little trouble to learn how to use it properly. The advantages include avoiding awkward " " non-breaking spaces while automatically enforcing the MOS formatting rules; consequently, it is clearer to other editors and makes updates easier. I cannot see any example of a conversion such as "99–99 in" that you seem so concerned about.

Of course, you are welcome to revert my changes, as I see you have already done. You may want to check the assertion that: "The adult Asian House Martin is 12 cm (5.5 in) long" the correct conversion is 4.7 inches. Some of the other conversions are a little inaccurate, although the instances I checked the difference was too small to worry about.

Happy editing. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 14:30, 4 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I see that following your revert of my edits, User:Simple Bob has been fixing incorrect conversions in the Asian House Martin article - some by using the convert template and others in plaintext. Can we persuade you that the convert template is not so very evil after all? Happy editing. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 09:59, 6 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I accept that there were no mad conversions in this article, although I've had nonsensical ones in the past. I just wondered what the point of the exercise was, it seems an inefficient use of time when there are so many articles with no conversions that need fixing. Anyway, I won't revert again, Happy New Year Jimfbleak - talk to me? 13:18, 6 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

A file you requested

Hello! I saw you requested a file on Commons a short while ago. I sent the Flickr user a message and asked for them to relicense it, and they were quite prompt in their response and more than happy to oblige. I've uploaded it as File:1926 Fordson snowmobile.jpg. :-) Killiondude (talk) 05:46, 18 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks very much! I have tried asking Flickr users in the past but to no avail, perhaps my approach was wrong, I did not even think to try on this occasion. I will add this image to Screw-propelled vehicle. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 09:43, 18 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

DYK for Cultivator No. 6

On January 28, 2010, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Cultivator No. 6, which you created or substantially expanded. You are welcome to check how many hits your article got while on the front page (here's how, quick check ) and add it to DYKSTATS if it got over 5,000. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the Did you know? talk page.

Wikiproject: Did you know? 06:01, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Hey, congrats for getting that articlr up from a stub! I've been wanting to get that worked up for ages, but never could find the sources. Great article - do you think it can get any larger? Skinny87 (talk) 20:48, 1 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. There are very few sources. Turner is the motherload and I managed to get a copy on an inter-library loan. If you do find any more material be sure to let me know! Gaius Cornelius (talk) 20:53, 1 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

AWB on Norwegian American

Hi, your edit using AWB on Norwegian American broke the page, because you changed the code <ref>Erling Viksund “The Ægir People.” January, 2005 [http://www.norwayheritage.com/articles/templates/voyages.asp?articleid=95&zoneid=6]</ref> into <ref>Erling Viksund “The Ægir People.” January, 2005<ref>http://www.norwayheritage.com/articles/templates/voyages.asp?articleid=95&zoneid=6</ref></ref>. AWB doesn't do this in the current version, so you should check your Find and replace or update AWB. Thanks. Svick (talk) 10:38, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That certainly was not supposed to happen. Thanks for pointing this out and for reverting the error. Gaius Cornelius (talk) 14:10, 10 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sciencelab.com removal

I can give you half a dozen references suggesting that this company commits systematic fraud, if you are interested. Out of respect for the wiki, I'm slaving over finding replacement entries. I just spoke to a local journalist who called up the TX attorney general's office, and although their lips are sealed, they could say that they have 12 pending fraud complaints with similar profiles. The BBB has over 80 unanswered complaints. The modus operandi seems consistent, they charge the client right away, and they either don't ship anything, ship items scavenged from old labs, or make a partial shipment and never refund the difference. I forget that trick to sign with date... sorry! [[[DrippingGoofball]]]