User talk:Pi zero/Archive 3

'''Please do not edit the contents of this page. It is for historical reference only.'''

Procedure
I place great importance on the correctness of the procedures as it is the only way to validate any conclusion (from science, moral or logic), that is why protocols are created, as to avoid errors and establish patterns and fulfill our need to have expectations. If something in the run of s procedure goes outside of the set rules it is at that point that the process becomes vitiated and any steps needed to correct it must be observed at that point. I cant be moved away from these view, probably because I'm an engineer. I see this as an absolute and any challenge to it consistency is almost physically painful to observe.

"You have a consistent tendency to take a stance on a question of procedure," (correct) "which others do not share" (not particularly, but any argument does require two sides often but not obligatory in opposition, for example the discussion regarding the review flag) ",and then you want to discuss the procedure, instead of actually discussing whatever issue the procedure was being used to address," (not so, one thing has priority over the other, obviously, but I do not exclude myself for addressing the topic of the process, never) "saying that independent of your stance on the issue, you want to see that proper procedure is observed — but proper procedure keeps turning out to favor your stance on the issue." (hum?!? so because at times the proper procedure favors my stance I should not make it the point of argument ?!?)

While it is true that I take all opportunities to point out errors/issues in procedures, I do not intentionally favor specific conclusions. I place the correctness of the process above them, even more as so that all participants understand equally the process. This is why I often intervene in discussions I haven't a specific issue with (or that if I make the issue clearer it would not be constructive to the resolution, for example the undelete vs delete issue). I however, as is natural, select only to speak out in those instance that a) people state as being correct based on a valid process b) and in issues that I have an interest, investment or responsibility in...

To discuss or examine in detail the flaggedrevs, the issues start in the lack of visibility it had (it should have been made move accessible to the community participation) hence the few participants it had (we had larger participative community at that time), this is a requirement that a change that had such a large impact in the project shouldn't be allowed to escape, even by our set policy. The next issue is on the decision process itself, since I remember participating, my non objection was centered especially as it being on a trial base since we at the time did not fully understood the tool and the required changes, even if it would accommodate our needs. Had my understanding been differently I would have clearly opposed the move to adopt something we didn't fully understood in those circumstances. These two simple facts demonstrate that it clearly never had a consensual support for permanent adoption. Hence my glass half empty view, because I recognize the issues the change have created and because I have noted all the negative comments Wikibookians have expressed regarding it along the way, I expect the reduced burden of any future would be challenger to a requirement of seeking a consensus for its permanency. --Panic (discuss • contribs) 19:30, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

A little scary...
It does scare me a little to be considered a member of the set "a large part of the central overall-project cell of en.wb." I have been active on one large and possibly good project; I have helped out a little around the edges where I can; but apart from my one little fiefdom my only real... feature, if you will, is that I have been here a long time. Is that all it takes? Chazz (talk) 17:21, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
 * Well, not everyone on that list is equally central. But it seems to me most of the folks who come and go at Wikibooks never have much at all to do with the overall coordination activities of the project.  So someone who does from time to time, over a long time... maybe so at that.  I remember when I first came to en.wn, and was kind of in awe of the "oldtimers"; it occured to me, after a while, that new users coming in probably saw me as an oldtimer, 'cause an oldtimer is anyone who's been there longer than you have, but it was still a shock when somebody referred to me, along with some folks whom I consider oldtimers, as "the senior editors".  Who, me?  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 18:25, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Template edit review request
Hi. Thanks for reviewing Template:Editnotice load/content. I was wondering if you wouldn't mind taking a look at my edit on Template:Editnotice load. I have all the permissions to edit MediaWiki namespace pages, protect things, etc. but apparently not FlaggedRevs autoreview/review rights. Thanks. --Krenair (WMF) (discuss • contribs) 09:36, 24 March 2016 (UTC)
 * /me attempts to follow the internal logic of that code; thinks of quote: O, what a tangled web we weave...
 * Sighted. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 10:18, 24 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Please see the new changes at Template:Editnotice_load/content and Template:Editnotice_load/core as well. --Krenair (WMF) (discuss • contribs) 21:22, 25 March 2016 (UTC)

If you have a moment
Hi again! When you get a moment, let me know what this was all about!? // Fra nkB 05:37, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
 * A testimonial-style ad for a debt-collection agency.  tagged it for speedy (which reminds me, if I had a bit more time atm I'd import template noping from en.wp [done]).  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:50, 25 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Rock it! You savvy in template coding? I may need a second set of eyes and brains to make something happen. I'm thinking it's 3/4ths done with it, but haven't had time to revisit the issues since fall. I need to block out a few hours to get back to the thing. // Fra nkB 03:57, 26 April 2016 (UTC)
 * I'm pretty fluent in template coding without Lua, tolerably capable with Lua. I cope with javascript when I don't have a choice.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:26, 26 April 2016 (UTC)
 * OK, TY. I'll keep you in mind if I get stuck. Don't know much about Lua either, but can hack some in HTML and mostly follow CSS, so I get bye mostly. // Fra nkB 17:08, 26 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Heh. Forgot to mention html, which I can get by well enough in.  Not so much CSS.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 00:46, 27 April 2016 (UTC)

Didn't say I can write CSS, just read it and interpret someone elses debugged code... like in the common.css library(s) here. Working the Interwiki Template Group project back in ?2006-2007? found out many sister projects had different Common.* files. T'was about that time that various sisters really started to revamp the common files and favor CSS over html implementations. Then came Lua, and I've followed some of that sea change trouble shooting a replace keyword... but didn't go deeper. I couldn't get anything to do what I wanted back then, say 2 years ago, so set it aside. TTFN I noticed I had one of the test templates mostly working, so need to cook in some of the missing features... at that point I may have to yell for advice! Fra nkB 09:17, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Need help?
Apparently you're alone to treat Reading room/Administrative Assistance, and my last request hasn't been touched for two weeks now. Do you need me to launch a vote for my adminship? FYI I have a huge experience of it on several sites, and could allocate a few minutes per day to here. JackPotte (discuss • contribs) 19:43, 6 July 2016 (UTC)
 * Kindly offered. I expect we could use some help.  I often barely touch down here myself on a given day (pouring time like water into Wikinews), though I try to pitch in when I can, processing the odd page out of speedy-deletions and such; and QU hasn't been around much lately ([]).  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 23:40, 6 July 2016 (UTC)

files moved to commons
Hello!

Here is a list of files whose duplicates are available at commons and should be deleted (with necessary updates if filenames mismatch). I could delete as a GS if you don't mind. Also there are double redirects on enwikinews which are protected. Thanks!--HakanIST (discuss • contribs) 00:18, 30 October 2016 (UTC)

Proofs book
Just want to say thanks for you your advice on the Proofs book. There doesn't seem to be any reason to take the existing title as a working title until there's more of a book there. The title should be something to think about at the end of the process rather than at the beginning. So for now I'll worry the things which should be done at the start: settling on an overall description, objectives, prerequisites, audience and chapter summaries.

As for the second book, I'm going to go ahead and assume it's not a merge candidate since it covers material I wasn't going to do anyway. If after some discussion it's decided they should be combined it shouldn't be a huge problem. Either that or titles can be found which everyone agrees with.

Anyway, I've kind of put the project on hold so I could think about the best way to proceed. But I think I'm getting my momentum back again so hopefully there will be some progress soon. --RDBury (discuss • contribs) 17:01, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

Request for comment
Hi Reuesting your comment and guidance.

Reading_room/General

Thanks and regards Mahitgar (discuss • contribs) 03:15, 11 March 2017 (UTC)

Archive page on user talk
I changed it. PokestarFan*Talk*Contributions 22:42, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

Old
1 ; 2

New
1 : 2

Equity
Hi. Regarding this, this type of equity should be part of Subject:Law. Any suggestions? Green Giant (discuss • contribs) 01:01, 18 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I'm about to look into it a bit. We generally don't like to create a subject unless we've got at least two books to go in it; if we do want to go ahead and finish setting up the subject, there will be more pages to create, which I can take care of.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 01:05, 18 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure I understand. Equity itself is a branch of English law just like contract or criminal law, with the main difference being that it intervenes in other areas e.g. property law. Technically it has potential for two books because the largest component of equity is trust law i.e. a book on equity (principles, maxims, remedies, estoppel) and one on trusts (resulting, constructive, secret etc). I was thinking of keeping it in one book but perhaps two would be better. Green Giant (discuss • contribs) 01:14, 18 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Please don't split up the book in order to satisfy a technical requirement. There's nothing wrong with putting a book in a higher-level subject &mdash; in this case, Subject:Law &mdash; when there isn't a more specific subject that it belongs in.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 01:33, 18 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I think you misunderstood me. The subject is generally known as Equity and Trusts but some academics regard Trust law to have changed enough to warrant it being a separate branch. The problem with Equity is complex in that it stands at two levels. It is one of thee sources of law with the Statutes and the Common Law (which includes areas like criminal and contract law) but academically it is also regarded as being parallel to the lower branches like criminal and contract law. I'm happy to leave it as one book but I can see potential for a book on Australian Equity, which has forked off from English Equity in several ways. Green Giant (discuss • contribs) 01:40, 18 April 2017 (UTC)
 * The way we have usually handled this sort of thing in the past is that we don't create a Subject page that would have only one book in it, and if additional books are later created that would belong to such a Subject, then we would create the Subject page and put all the relevant books in it. It's not a hard-and-fast rule that things must be done that way, but it's usually recommended.  We don't want to have every book in its own special singleton subject; subjects are supposed to be a way of grouping books. If we did go ahead and set up a subject for Equity,
 * do you see any other books at Subject:Law that would belong to a subject Equity?
 * can you suggest a more qualified name for the subject than "Equity", to distinguish it from other senses of that word?
 * --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 01:56, 18 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I don't see any other books at Subject:Law but Equity affects property law (through and ) and contract law (through ). As a subject the branches in Australia and the US have diverged enough to warrant their own books (at a later date).
 * As for the name, there is no other name it is known by unless we use something like . Green Giant (discuss • contribs) 02:08, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

Perhaps we should put this book in subjects property law and contract law, as well as law? --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 02:18, 18 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Agreed, that would make some sense, at least until new books are written. Green Giant (discuss • contribs) 02:26, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

"light enough"
Hi Pi zero: I just wanted to seek clarification on what you mean when you said "this scope issue is not light enough to treat as speedy." Just not sure what you meant by it not being "light enough." I've taken it to RFD but just wanted to see what you meant. I'd been following the speedy deletion guidelines which included "Pages that cannot comply with the scope or policies of the project." Thanks! Only (discuss • contribs) 19:30, 22 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I had considered leaving a note of further explanation on your talk page, but since you were so prompt in setting up an RFD, I'm composing a remark for there. Hopefully it will make clear what I meant; if not I'm happy to try to clarify further, of course.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 19:41, 22 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Thanks for that information. Since I'm not a usual editor of this project, I was going based solely on the policies spelled out.  I didn't know of the background/controversy.  Only (discuss • contribs) 19:52, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

Respect for authors
I repeat my question because it is important. You are an administrator; if a contributor wants to destroy my books, with his criticism, will you protect me ? --Thierry Dugnolle (discuss • contribs) 20:26, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
 * That's a vague hypothetical question. If somebody is destroying a book, that sounds like a situation where an admin should step in to prevent them.  What constitutes "destroying" would have to be judged based on the actual situation, and there is no actual situation because it's a hypothetical question.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 20:48, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I know that. Noone never tried to destroy my books, neither to modify them, except minor corrections. And I know that an administrator would never let a clearly malicious contributor do any damage. Otherwise they would not be administrators. I trust you. There is not any problem on this side. I know that because I am an old wikibookian. But many authors do not know that. They do not want to write on Wikibooks because they do not trust it. I would like the rules to state explicitly that authors can trust Wikibooks, because I want many new authors to join us. --Thierry Dugnolle (discuss • contribs) 21:01, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
 * Ah! I see, or I think I do.  I don't think that requires a change of policy; it may, however, want some sort of presentation, a way to convey the right sort of reassurance to authors.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs)
 * According to me, my proposal WB:RFA is not really a change of policy, but only a way to put the theory in accordance with practice. Both kinds of cooperative work are already made on Wikibooks. When there is clearly an author of the book, noone enforces modifications against the author's will. It would be nonsense. So why not say it ? It would not change anything to practice but it would be a great change in the way people think of Wikibooks and it could convince many writers to work with us. A part of this discussion has been copied or adapted in Wikibooks talk:Respect for authors. If you want to keep discussing, it might be better to go on that page. Thierry Dugnolle (discuss • contribs) 22:02, 28 April 2017 (UTC)
 * I hope you'll forgive me putting my two cents in here. It is not always obvious who "the author of a wikibook" is. In particular, the book that I am currently most associated with, The Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter, was originally started by an author who is no longer active on Wikibooks, assisted by about six other editors who are no longer active on Wikibooks. As their contributions decreased, I and another author took over, and I found it necessary to somewhat change the direction of the book to make it more useful. Am I the author? No, Matt clearly started it. It could be argued that by changing the direction of the book, I "destroyed it". I don't think I did, but if Matt was still working on it he might feel differently.
 * I think that all we can expect is that the administrators will assist editors in ensuring that edits to Wikibooks remain constructive rather than destructive. We cannot, and should not, ask them to ensure that every author's private ox is not gored. Chazz (talk) 03:19, 29 April 2017 (UTC)
 * According to me, this is a wikibook of the original kind. There is not an author, or a group of authors, who are clearly responsible for the book. Any one can participate on an equal footing with any other one. Thierry Dugnolle (discuss • contribs) 03:31, 29 April 2017 (UTC)
 * for what it's worth, the major contributors can be found by clicking on the "Contributors" link in the history of a page. For the Harry Potter guide see https://tools.wmflabs.org/xtools-articleinfo/index.php?project=en.wikibooks.org&article=Muggles%27_Guide_to_Harry_Potter. Scroll down the page and there should be two pie charts showing rough levels of contribution. Green Giant (discuss • contribs) 10:25, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
 * I suppose I should mention also that the tool there seems to look only at the one page, not the entire thousand-plus-page book... but the book was created, I think, by UncleG, and largely built by withinfocus, both of whom are no longer active, so that tool is useful even with its limits. Chazz (talk) 23:54, 2 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Ah yes, good point. I don't think there is any way of finding out the totals for all the pages without a bot. It does underline how unwieldy it would be to have all contributors signing. Green Giant (discuss • contribs) 01:36, 3 May 2017 (UTC)
 * Fwiw, I'm not a fan of bots anyway, and I have in mind that many (most?) of the functions of bots could be taken over by semi-automated tools. Instead of a bot doing things strictly automatically, you provide a button for someone to push, in this case a button to update a table of data.  At least that's the idea.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 01:49, 3 May 2017 (UTC)

Regarding LaTeX/Tables edit
Hi there, I saw you reverted my edit on LaTeX/Tables, mentioning that my fix didn't match the pictures. However, I believe it is the other way around: the pictures have multiple vertical bars in the tables, but the code on the left only has one single |, which gives a single vertical bar. I've double checked with TeX Live 2016. Could you take another look? Thanks! Hexcles (discuss • contribs) 04:34, 30 April 2017 (UTC)


 * I see the difficulty. I was going by what I saw when I looked at the typeset page.  All of those vertical lines are rendered as single for me, in both of the web browsers I have ready access to (Xubuntu Firefox and Opera).  I hadn't even noticed that the wiki markup for the tables specifies double vertical lines.  If there are some platforms where the double-vertical-lines render correctly, on those platforms the LaTeX markup would mismatch the typeset display.  How awkward.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:30, 30 April 2017 (UTC)


 * Ahh I see your point now. I didn't even notice the figures on the side were rendered from TeX code... On my Firefox, they show up as PNG pictures, probably because of my Wiki preferences (MathML with fallback to PNG). When I tested on Chrome, I finally understood what you were seeing. This is indeed awkward. I believe the original intention was to demonstrate the use of multiple vertical lines. And now... Honestly I don't know what is the best way to fix it (is a bug of Wikipedia or browsers?) Hexcles (discuss • contribs) 05:35, 2 May 2017 (UTC)


 * I agree the examples are meant to demonstrate multiple vertical lines, the difficulty being that they do on some platforms and don't on others. Fwiw, I count it as a wikimedia bug, because there are always idiosyncracies of individual browsers and those idiosyncrasies are a normal part of the challenge of wiki software support.  (I rather disapprove of WMF policies that lead to piling on fancy geegaws that are hard to maintain; imho they should be simplifying the platform to make its maintenance easier, emphasizing features that delegate complexity to empowered volunteers; but that doesn't get us any closer to a solution for LaTeX/Tables.)  I see about four imaginable ways to address the problem.
 * Try to get the devs to fix the rendering. I don't, honestly, see that as a practical solution.  At best it'd be slow, difficult, and frustrating.  I doubt they'd act on it, because they don't actually care about such things unless it seems to them (not the volunteers) that it would matter to Wikipedia (not to a non-Wikipedian sister like Wikibooks); and even if they gave it enough priority to be acted on, it would probably be either difficult to fix or likely to get broken again.
 * Figure out a way to trick all browsers into rendering correctly, and warn users that they would have to do that. This would be technically challenging for us, to figure out the fix, and I'm not all that enthused about this type of solution.  There is something a bit like it done at Quenya/Tengwar, as a result of which I've never seen what that page is supposed to look like.
 * Warn readers that it might not render properly in all browsers/on all platforms.
 * Change the TeX code to not use double vertical bars, so it's consistent with what can be rendered.
 * If I had to choose instantly, I think I'd go for (3), warn readers it might not render right. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:29, 2 May 2017 (UTC)


 * IMHO, immediately carrying out 3, followed by 1, is the way to go. 3 is something we editors can easily do at the moment -- add a side note that strengthens those demos contain multiple vertical bars, but they might not render properly on browsers, and don't forget to add the multiple vertical bars back to the LaTeX source listings.  For this edit, it would be great if you could spend some time on the wording and make the edit, since after all I am not familiar with (this) Wikibook at all (I made the original fix only because I thought it was a small typo.)  For 1, is there an issue tracker for these sort of bugs?  I can file a bug there (and probably spend some time investigating, as I know some web dev stuff).  2 and 4 are not desirable because: this is a fundamental rendering bug and should be fixed from the platform, otherwise other people might run into the same issue eventually; a demo for multiple vertical bars (in fact, almost every detail in those demos) is definitely useful, at least to me myself and another user (see the talk page). Hexcles (discuss • contribs) 07:33, 14 May 2017 (UTC)

Help:Dialog
Did you consider trying to create the desired infrastructure at MediaWiki level? At first sight, it seems to be the correct approach.

How would it be possible to accumulate wisdom through this thing as you mentioned? --ZxxZxxZ (discuss • contribs) 13:09, 24 May 2017 (UTC)
 * I did consider trying to do it at that level. I concluded that was something to avoid at all costs.
 * If the Foundation had any creative control at all over this, the Foundation would not allow it to go in the direction I'm trying to go. I want to empower ordinary users through wiki markup, and that's fundamentally contrary to what the Foundation has been trying to do for the past decade at least.  I've thought deeply about that; it's not even about what individual people at the Foundation are trying to do, although there have been some individuals there with some really bad ideas, it's about the Foundation as a structured organization.  Without getting into details: the Foundation is centralized and top-down, the sisterhood is decentralized and bottom-up; see Conway's law.
 * The red tape of the approval processes would utterly strangle a project like what I'm doing; even without the overhead it's taken me years to get to where I am.
 * I'm not working to a plan; there are no blueprints detailing what is going to be done, and writing such would be impossible. Nearly every step has been following my nose; the design process has been immersive.  That's one of the reasons it couldn't go through an approval process:  without a plan there's nothing to ask for approval of.  An approval process would also mean not only making a plan but locking it in, and my work has routinely gone in directly I hadn't anticipated.
 * Although I've spent way more time implementing than trying to explain, I did write this essay. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 14:08, 24 May 2017 (UTC)

A request
Hi,

Undersigned has made a request at Reading room/Administrative Assistance. Please do exmine the request Request to import page from en:wp and if apropriate for wikibooks then pl. do help import the requested article.

Thanks and warm regards

Mahitgar (discuss • contribs) 03:58, 26 June 2017 (UTC)

See you're doing the bookcat thing to the Muggles' Guide
I also see you're doing it by hand. Usually I'd expect that to be done by a bot; there's a heck of a lot of that project to do, some 600 articles or so. If it would help, there is a collection at Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/All pages that lists most of the pages in the book -- there are a few that have been added since that page was last touched, but not many. Chazz (talk) 15:18, 28 June 2017 (UTC)
 * It's worse than that. I'm moving the book categories from the old naming scheme to the new one; all 2800+ book categories.  The BookCat thing gets done at the same time because BookCat (and a few other templates) know to detect the name of the book category under either name.  So my list of pages to be done is actually Category:Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter, and my list of pages already done (which I check as I go, so hopefully I won't accidentally drop a page somewhere) is :.  Cf. WB:Reading room/Proposals. :-)  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 15:34, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

Cheese
How did you mark my edits as vandalism if i tried to improve this boook ! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.28.60.106 (discuss • contribs) 16:50, 10 July 2017‎
 * Circumstantial evidence suggests you didn't. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 16:57, 10 July 2017 (UTC)

Subpages imported from Wikipedia and not well improved
I thought about requesting deletion on these. However, I wonder whether they can be improved. Thoughts? --George Ho (discuss • contribs) 18:12, 28 July 2017 (UTC)
 * LGBT Young Adult Literature/Boy Meets Boy, copied from w:Boy Meets Boy (novel)
 * LGBT Young Adult Literature/Annie on My Mind, copied from w:Annie on My Mind
 * LGBT Young Adult Literature/Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, copied from most of w:Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

Backlog
Check out Category:Candidates for speedy deletion. There is quite the backlog! PokestarFan*Talk*Contributions 02:49, 3 August 2017 (UTC)

Calculus/Algebra
Just a reminder of IP reverting your edit while I cannot judge who would be right. If I were already an administrator, I might consider temporarily protect the page pending mediation of disputes.Jusjih (discuss • contribs) 04:00, 31 August 2017 (UTC)


 * I thank you for the thought. My first impulse, reading your remark, was that the situation is too messy for that sort of action, but even that I'm not sure of.  Dozens of pages are involved, a whole bunch of IPs, an investigation of sockpuppetry (at least I think that's part of what was involved) on the Japanese Wikipedia, and multiple global blocks of IPs who reverted each other before I had the misfortune to even get involved in the mess.  All the edits here are by IPs, which I find suspicious in itself.  And some of the edits involved are obvious vandalism, some are subtle vandalism, and some... may also be vandalism although, if they are, it's too subtle for me to have pinned down with certainty yet.  The reversions of reversions of reversions, done indiscriminately by IPs, are... disturbing.  Admittedly, semi-protecting the pages involved might bring home the point I had tried to make about the inappropriateness of massive reversions by an IP.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:15, 31 August 2017 (UTC)
 * As this place has considerable administrators but not me yet, avoiding the conflict of interest may be easy. I meant temporary protection if I were a disinterested and uninvolved administrator. Based on my experience as an administrator on 12 other wikis, I have met a newbie changing a high-risk template on Chinese Wikisource without discussion, then reverting and temporarily protecting it would prevent disrupting the wiki pending discussion, as templates affect wikis much more than typical articles.--Jusjih (discuss • contribs) 01:54, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

LTA
see w:en:WP:WIKINGER


 * tools.wmflabs.org/whois/gateway.py?lookup=true&ip=178.42.242.178


 * tools.wmflabs.org/guc/?user=178.42.242.178

self-admittently vandal wrote: (rvv By wikinger), so "rvv by vandal himself"


 * en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?title=WJsn&type=revision&diff=3284529&oldid=3287232


 * tools.wmflabs.org/whois/gateway.py?lookup=true&ip=178.42.96.42


 * tools.wmflabs.org/guc/?user=178.42.96.42

Please tell stewards to rangeblock him globally at 178.42.0.0/16, as was once done here below.


 * meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log/gblblock&page=User:79.185.0.0/16
 * meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log/gblblock&page=User:79.191.0.0/16
 * meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log/gblblock&page=User:83.24.0.0/16
 * meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Special:Log/gblblock&page=User:83.28.0.0/16

64.207.136.18 (discuss) 14:20, 31 August 2017 (UTC)

Category:Biblioþeke
I spent a while fiddling around with this and couldn't work out why it was pulling the wrong categories through... I like the delete option! QuiteUnusual (discuss • contribs) 14:53, 13 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I'm still fiddling around with it myself, trying to understand what's going on with these Niw Englisc things. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 14:57, 13 October 2017 (UTC)
 * I've set up a Subject:Niw Englisc under Subject:Constructed languages, and put the various books in the subject. There are apparently two books that have been started for the language as a whole, Niw Englisc and NiwEnglisc; somebody will have to untangle that mess at some point.  I also suspect that template subjects is wired to detect and reject a subject explicitly specified with the same name as the book, a holdover from the old naming scheme; I'm going to have to fix that in the template... when I have another bit of free time.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 16:00, 13 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Ah, I see. Thanks - QuiteUnusual (discuss • contribs) 16:06, 13 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Fixed. Turned out to be easier than I thought.  Found it in subtemplate subjects/leaf.  Cf. Category:Books with book name as subject.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 17:26, 13 October 2017 (UTC)

Category deletions
I know there's a lot of discussion about what you're doing in the categories and I haven't read all of it, but... are you starting to delete all the old categories? They might not be linked to from inside this wiki, but surely they are linked to from other places around the web and user's bookmarks, etc. Should we not keep the redirects? - dcljr (discuss • contribs) 20:53, 24 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Category redirects cause problems; I avoid them. In essence, they create a partial appearance that there is a category where there is not and, to use a technical term, things get gummed up.  We don't want several thousand redirects &mdash; worse, several thousand redirects from unprefixed names, whose potential for confusion was central to the motive for changing them &mdash; cluttering up our category space.  I'm not entirely without sympathy for the problem; there ought to be a warning on each category that pops up prominently when it's deleted, though I think that might have worked better with the first thousand or so we did than it has with the later batch (alas; no malice, but things didn't go according to plan).  Hopefully the book categories won't have been externally linked very much... though it's worrisome that you apparently noticed rather quickly once things shifted away from the originally planned procedure, after that original plan had been underway systematically for several months.  Possibly I should adjust how I do this so that each elimination of an old-style name is technically a rename-without-redirect, as had originally been planned.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 21:38, 24 October 2017 (UTC)
 * My noticing this so quickly was basically coincidence. I just happened to visit WB:PROPOSALS and then check your User:Pi zero/cats subpage right after the (redirects at the) last three category pages listed there were deleted. Upon further reflection, I admit having the deletion notice that's left behind at, say, Category:Histology is probably better than having a redirect there (since users can still get to the new category title without having anything at the old title). So nevermind, I guess. [grin] - dcljr (discuss • contribs) 04:18, 25 October 2017 (UTC)

Hello, Question
Hi, Pi zero,

Whenever I tried posting at Permission request, my post go into closed discussion. So I want ask you here. Thanks Ammarpad (discuss • contribs) 18:45, 7 November 2017 (UTC)


 * There was a technical problem with the closure of another nomination on the page. I've fixed that.  Note, though, we don't usually give people the reviewer bit very early.  Our autopromotion criteria are chosen for more than just making sure users are acting in good faith, or making sure they have experience on wikimedia wikis, but also ensuring they have had a chance to learn by osmosis about the unique culture of Wikibooks that makes it different from other sister projects.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 19:08, 7 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Ok, Thank you, I just start coming here now after I was referred to a particular books and even downloaded some books, there is really vital resources here. So I just thought I can review normal edits here too. But I understand you. Ammarpad (discuss • contribs) 19:15, 7 November 2017 (UTC)

Bot flag for DPMaid
Greetings, can please you grant the bot flag to User:DPMaid, my menial edit user? Or can you please direct me to the proper forum in which to apply? I intend to use the user for undoing volume changes done by an unapproved bot. I will not use the bot interface but the volume will be bot-like, and the changes will be mechanical. --Dan Polansky (discuss • contribs) 18:55, 10 November 2017 (UTC)
 * You should apply for the bot flag for the account at WB:RFP. (I'm not a crat on en.wb, so if the community approves, I would not be able to do the granting of the bit myself.)  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 19:25, 10 November 2017 (UTC)

Flood flag
Have you considered getting the flood flag for yourself? Artix Kreiger (discuss • contribs) 02:46, 15 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I hadn't, no. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 02:59, 15 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I suppose there are two reasons I hadn't considered flood. One is, all my edits are purely manual; I'm a big believer in the human element, the value of a sapient mind considering each detail in relation to the Big Picture, and therefore avoid full automation and am cautious of semi-automation (I've gotten more and more that way over the past few years).  And I tend to associate the flood flag with automation, so my manual edits didn't suggest flood to me.  The other is, from my experiences on Wikinews, I found that using flood on a small project created an illusion of even less activity than there was, which seemed psychologically not-good for a small project; and while Wikibooks isn't as small as Wikinews, the principle still came naturally to me. Do you think my un-flood-flagged activities would cause a problem?  I wouldn't have guessed they would, but admittedly I mostly monitor my watchlist rather than RC.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 13:43, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Nah, its just its on RC and it just looks repetitive. Never mind then.

Btw, I am looking at Category:Alphabetical and do they need to moved to Bookcat ?? Artix Kreiger (discuss • contribs) 04:51, 17 November 2017 (UTC)

Categories move
Why do you move things back and then to the same place? Artix Kreiger (discuss • contribs) 04:37, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Believe it or not, the following is my "short" technical answer; I've struggled not to get into the backstory, which I think of as something of a human tragedy (and about which I feel bad for my own part). Each book category requires human attention to recognize and cope with whatever issues come up; and roughly the first half of the book categories on the project were handled one-at-a-time without disturbing any book category until we were ready to do its manual processing.  But then, a (young, so I understand) user trying to be helpful moved most of the remaining old-style book categories, about 1400 of them iirc, from the old name to the new one.  Which is a mixed curse since, on one hand, it left many of those 1400 in an incomplete state for a protracted time until manually processed, but on the other hand ultimately eliminated a huge number of null-edits that would have been required the other way and so probably reduced the length of the total operation by as much as three or four months.  But some of those 1400 were linked to by Wikidata items; and when someone moves a page like that here, the software attempts to automatically update the link there &mdash; but the update on Wikidata is done through the account that did the move here, and in this case, the user who did the 1400 moves here is indefinitely blocked on Wikidata.  So none of those Wikidata items was updated.  When I'm finished with manual processing of one of the remaining book categories, amd move the new category back over the redirect from the old name, then forward to the new name without a redirect, that does two things:  it leaves a message behind at the old name that identifies, right at the top, where the category was moved to, so that if someone gets directed to the old name by some old link (perhaps off-wiki), they're told immediately where to look for it; and at the moment I move it forward again to the new name, the wiki software informs me if there was a Wikidata item linked to it, tells me which Wikidata item was linked to it, and asks me to double-check that the Wikidata link was adjusted correctly (which it sometimes isn't:  for no predictable reason I've discerned, sometimes the software deletes the link from Wikidata instead of switching it over to the new location).  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 14:09, 13 January 2018 (UTC)


 * ah I see. The moves are meant to deal with the links on Wikidata. I see. It is mostly software and linking things that requires matching up. Those 1,400 categories.... thats a lot. How far are you? 15:24, 13 January 2018 (UTC)


 * I have 104 to go. Cf. WB:Reading room/Proposals. As a side note, my long-term plan calls for wiki communities to grow their own semi-automated assistants in much the same way that they grow the content of their wiki (essay); and making that happen has two major phases.  In the first phase, one implements wiki markup primitives to make wiki pages interactive; and I've spent several years making that happen (see Help:Dialog).  In the second phase, one figures out how to use those primitives to make the community-grown-assistant concept work in practice.  In order to prepare myself for that second phase, seems to me I'd need extensive hands-on experience with the sort of endless, tedious task that should not be fully automated because there is unbounded potential for special cases that only a sapient mind can recognize and decide how to deal with.  (The paramount importance of hands-on experience is part of why I believe assistants must be grown by the community instead of provided by a segregated organization such as the Foundation.)  I mean to draw on my experience from moving these book categories as I try to figure out phase two.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 16:08, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Cryptographic malheur
Hello Pi zero,

unfortunately, I reset my password to my WP account during times of illness, resulting in me forgetting it. I'm pretty ashamed of it, and have designed mechanisms which will act as a security backup the next time. The e-Mail address I entered into the form does, shamefully, not exist (even though, to be precise, I registered it, for it never to be used). Still, from the user page of the "smalledits" account it may be inferred that this is indeed an account of mine, see its edit history.

Since I've got some work to do on two wikibooks that I intend to finish in the near future, I'd be glad if you, or someone else, could fix my shameful and stupid mistake. --Mathmensch-Smalledits (discuss • contribs) 16:19, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what you're asking me (or someone) to do. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 16:23, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
 * To reset my password. --Mathmensch-Smalledits (discuss • contribs) 16:24, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
 * More precisely, the one of the User:Mathmensch account. --Mathmensch-Smalledits (discuss • contribs) 16:27, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't think I have the power to that, as a lowly admin. I'm not even sure what level of privs would allow it.  I suggest you consult with .  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 16:34, 7 February 2018 (UTC)
 * There isn't a MediaWiki access right that allows this - even Stewards can't do it. The only people who can recover your account are the system administrators by using shell access and they will only do it if you can prove to them that you really are the owner of the account, which can be challenging. QuiteUnusual (discuss • contribs) 13:23, 8 February 2018 (UTC)


 * file a ticket on Phabricator. The developers can do it. Artix Kreiger (discuss • contribs) 00:47, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

Chess Opening Theory
Hail Pi zero, king of Wikibooks!

I have been beavering away at Chess Opening Theory for several weeks. 'Twas I who spun it off from the Chess Wikibook in 2005.

It is a well established part of the Wikibooks universe. Wikipedia convention on chess opening articles is to link them to the equivalent Chess Opening Theory Wikibook page. There are many such chess opening explorers on the net, but ours is the only open-source one that's ever had any traction, and I happen to think it's the best if you want to know why the moves get played.

The problem is, it doesn't look very book-ish by the standards of WB:NOTWP. It looks like an encyclopedia of chess opening positions. It might look like a chess opening book if we put the pages into some kind of order, which is sort of what I attempted with Chess Opening Theory/Great Big Opening Survey, but then chess opening books don't necessarily look like books to normal human beings.

Is the community eventually going to vote to delete it on the basis that it isn't a book? Is there anything I can do to prevent it suffering that fate, like writing to the council of Wikibooks elders and requesting a waiver of the normal rules on linearity (like the Cookbook has)? Chi Sigma (discuss • contribs) 23:58, 13 February 2018 (UTC)


 * Every book is different, and some of them deviate more than others from the ideal of a linearly ordered series of pages. In this case, it seems to me there is overmuch general content on the book main page.  As a suggestion, perhaps you should aim to have only a paragraph or two of introduction, and a directory/table-of-contents, on the book main page; other overall content would go in subpages.  A notional example you might find broadly useful is Wikijunior:The Elements, though of course that book doesn't do a great job of presenting the per-element pages, whereas it looks like you've got a much neater tabular presentation.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 01:07, 14 February 2018 (UTC)

Notification of suspension
For extended use of admin tools, you have made admin policy useful. As such, your access to administrator tools have been suspended for the 1st of April.

Best regards, Artix Kreiger (discuss • contribs) 15:05, 1 April 2018 (UTC)

Subjects and shelves
Hello Pi zero,

as you might have noticed, my admin candidature has recently been turned down. Even though I can scarcely imagine that you would find a more qualified person to do the job than myself, you are now in charge of the decisions to be made on shelves, subject pages and in particular templates.

I had, a while ago, expressed my concerns about the internal workings of templating. In particular, some (certainly not all) of the subtemplating is, in my view, badly done and could be replaced by careful code indentation and structuring. Also, there is another perspective that should enlighten this debate: Speed. It takes time for the Wikimedia software to scrumble together all the subtemplates that are needed in order to display a page (unless the coders of that software were already focused on the case where this would become a problem; maybe someone familiar with the internal workings of Wikimedia software could investigate?).

Hence, I'd like to offer my assistance for the design of the "shelf" pages, in particular the templating. Maybe we can also make it more flexible, so that it allows things like, I don't know, a subject tree? --Mathmensch (discuss • contribs) 16:05, 11 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Regarding your candidature. I have no wish to antagonize, nor to beat a dead horse, but I do prefer always to hope, looking forward into the future.  So.  It was clear to most of those vetting your request &mdash; and clearly wasn't clear to you, which is itself significant &mdash; that you have atm deep flaws as a candidate for admin.  You've clearly got genuine flaws that resulted in your being blocked elsewhere, and you've clearly been unable to recognize your own responsibility for that; and understanding stuff like that is important to being an admin, and evidently these things that you're not square on are part of your reason for wanting to be an admin.  It seems to me you're a very honest person (a virtue near and dear to my heart), and when you quoted your request for unblock and the response, it seems quite apparent (imho) you believed that that evidence supported your position and would help your case &mdash; but others looked at the same thing and saw evidence that you were in the wrong and failing to see that you were in the wrong.  I was struck by your interpolated comment where you interpreted a remark to mean you were being asked to make a superficial show of contrition &mdash; whereas I saw the response as well crafted to avoid superficialities. Regarding the shelves.  The shelves are meant to be an incremental improvement, preserving most of the existing know-how which, frankly, has been evolved over more than a decade (cf. Wikibooks Stacks/History).  I've pointed out, iirc, how that tree could be fit into the current subject structure, and coming shelf structure, without disrupting it.  I believe I have seen this done, in physical card catalogs, where one comes occasionally to a particular card that has some sort of fold-out page attached to it.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 17:14, 11 June 2018 (UTC)


 * Dear Mr. Pi zero, your analysis above is so ridiculous that I wish to relinquish communications for a while. --Mathmensch (discuss • contribs) 06:59, 12 June 2018 (UTC)


 * I suppose you are talking about my analysis of the RFP. I am sorry to see you further support my analysis.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:40, 12 June 2018 (UTC)

205.189.94.12 and Quachthanh
Take a look at this IP user's contribution and the deleted contributions of Quachthanh. Both of them


 * edited at a really fast rate
 * created pages only on Physics (but found no common article edited by the two)
 * have an unusually similar page structure

... making me feel like the IP is cleverly trying to evade the latter's copyvio ban, though copying some text from a sample article into Google revealed no solid evidence of copying. Do you think that the former is a sock of the latter?

Leaderboard (discuss • contribs) 19:50, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

Prunes and others.
just letting you know im starting a new book on prunes and i will create others too. Larvou81 (discuss • contribs) 01:44, 13 September 2018 (UTC)
 * In order to start a book, you'll need a clear vision of how to make it more than just a page that mentions a topic. I recommend reading Using Wikibooks. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 01:52, 13 September 2018 (UTC)

Block request
Hello, could you please block 185.46.76.35? This is a troll from he.wikipedia. Thanks, Guycn2 (discuss • contribs) 17:15, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Request for a partial lock
We have an IP editor who is repeatedly inserting his own name into Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Magic/Legilimency. Can I request a partial lock on that page, please, so we don't have to keep reverting his name out of there? Thank you. Chazz (talk) 20:12, 8 October 2018 (UTC)


 * It seems that one IP editor is mostly doing all this, so I've given him a one-week block. Not sure that protection is the best move in this case. Leaderboard (discuss • contribs) 20:48, 8 October 2018 (UTC)


 * We'll want to keep an eye on 223.185.13.43, in case. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 21:34, 8 October 2018 (UTC)


 * That was kind of the reason I was looking at a partial block rather than blocking the single IP. I would suspect that he's editing from two different locales, with distinct IP addresses, and I believe it's the same guy because the name that gets inserted is always the same. If he's blocked from "home", he may simply start doing things from "school" -- and this does feel very much like a high-school level thing. Chazz (talk) 21:44, 8 October 2018 (UTC)


 * Maybe. The times are separated, within the 24-hour cycle.  Looks like there's a pretty significant distance between those IPs. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 22:32, 8 October 2018 (UTC)


 * True enough, although geolocate shows both IPs in India... they do seem to be a fair distance apart (Gurgao versus Punjab). Both ends of a cross-country trip perhaps? If so, then blocking the current IP is likely enough. But it is worth keeping an eye on. Chazz (talk) 04:37, 9 October 2018 (UTC)


 * I've just blocked 61.3.85.170 for the same thing. To note, the first one blocked was 103.58.137.177.  --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 21:59, 10 October 2018 (UTC)


 * I'll note that this IP also geolocates to India (Punjab), and that all three IPs so far have added the same text to the page. Thank you for catching this one... Chazz (talk) 03:09, 11 October 2018 (UTC)

Another one: ‎45.121.171.228 - locating in Andhra Pradesh - pretty far from the other places. Anyway, I've now partial-locked the page for two weeks seeing that a rangeblock is not an option. Leaderboard (discuss • contribs) 10:24, 14 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Having the opportunity to strike while the iron is hot, so to speak, I also dealt a one-week block to 45.121.171.228, because that produces more of a permanent record of that IP's involvement in this. If I've followed this correctly, all but one of the IPs used now have one-week blocks on their record. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:32, 14 October 2018 (UTC)

Reminder
Old English is not a conlang. Lojbanist (discuss • contribs) 04:13, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, and so it isn't. Forgot that one was in the set.  It seems kind of already covered, for a kids' book, by English, though.  If you'd like to make a case for it on the book main talk page, please do. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:55, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Content
What type of content goes on Wikibooks pages? — Eli355 ( 👄👄👄👄  •  📜📜📜📜  •  🍩🍩🍩🍩 ) 22:27, 11 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Hi, Eli355. We write collaborative educational textbooks.  I've added a welcome template on your user page, which may be of help.  We also have a book &mdash; in fact, a Featured book &mdash; all about the project, Using Wikibooks. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 00:23, 12 November 2018 (UTC)

Deep filing for book help
Yes, I want some different, something like that:

Category:Book:The implementation of E-Government:
 * subcategory E-Government by country
 * subcategory E-Government in Russia
 * subcategory State open data of Russia
 * subcategory E-Government in Thailand
 * subcategory State open data of Thailand
 * subcategory E-Government in Ukraine
 * subcategory State open data of Ukraine
 * subcategory Non-commercial web-projects that use public data

And in all of this categories and subcategories will be some pages.

For clear understanding me you can also see my project on Russian Wikibooks or Ukrainian wikibooks.

Danilka5469 (discuss) 12:51, 13 November 2018 (UTC)


 * There are two separate issues here. There are naming conventions used on English Wikibooks to keep track of things, so you'll need to choose names for the categories that are consistent with those conventions.  And then there is the question of which pages go in which subcategories.
 * Naming conventions on English Wikibooks.
 * We recommend (by the way) the title of each Wikibook should use Title Case, rather than Sentence case. That is, all the important words in the title of the book get capitalized, rather that only the first word and proper nouns.  So in this case, the book ought to be The Implementation of E-Government (with "implementation" capitalized).  I can rename the book for you (as an admin, I can do it in a single operation, rather than as a whole lot of fussy separate page moves).  But that's an aside.
 * The main category for a book has the name of the book with prefix  added.  We have a template for doing this, BOOKCATEGORY.  If you call BOOKCATEGORY without parameters on any page of a book, it'll name the book category of that book.  You can also pass the name of a page as a parameter to the template, and it will tell you the name of the book category for the book the named page belongs to.  So in this case,  would produce.
 * If a book has additional subcategories for some of its pages, the name of each subcategory starts with the name of the book category, as given by BOOKCATEGORY, followed by a slash and some other stuff. For example, there might be a subcategory for Russia called .  If that subcategory has a subcategory, the subcategory should have the name of its parent, a slash, and another field; for example, there might be .  Each of these subcategories should have BookCat on it, which files it in the next category up, so that  gets filed in, which gets filed in.
 * There is, by the way, also a convention for naming templates that are specific to a particular book. Each template is named by the name of the book, then a slash and some other stuff.  (Some books may also have a template with the name of the book and nothing else after it.)  There's a template for deriving that template stem, too, BOOKTEMPLATE.  So  would produce .  Each template should noinclude BookCat, which files it in  ; thus, in this case,.
 * Grouping of pages into book subcategories.
 * There is more flexibility in this regard. I described to you the deep-filing arrangement supported by BookCat.  If, for example, you have a page, and you would rather have the page filed in subcategory  , rather than directly in BOOKCATEGORY, then, instead of putting BookCat at the bottom of the page, you'd use something like
 * The warning you received a while ago from QuiteUnusual was because you were creating subcategories that didn't follow our naming convention for subcategories of a book category. We've put those conventions in place to allow us to keep track of everything. In the case of your book, I would tentatively suggest that each country have a subpage of the book whose page name is simply the name of the book (that's BOOKNAME, btw), a slash, and the name of the country, and a subcategory whose name is simply BOOKCATEGORY, a slash, and the name of the country; and then each country subcategory could have a subcategory that adds . --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 13:13, 13 November 2018 (UTC)
 * The warning you received a while ago from QuiteUnusual was because you were creating subcategories that didn't follow our naming convention for subcategories of a book category. We've put those conventions in place to allow us to keep track of everything. In the case of your book, I would tentatively suggest that each country have a subpage of the book whose page name is simply the name of the book (that's BOOKNAME, btw), a slash, and the name of the country, and a subcategory whose name is simply BOOKCATEGORY, a slash, and the name of the country; and then each country subcategory could have a subcategory that adds . --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 13:13, 13 November 2018 (UTC)


 * Thanks a lot. Can you review my categorizing? I'm on a right way? :)

Danilka5469 (discuss) 17:17, 13 November 2018 (UTC)

Chess Guide Book
Why deleting my first-person pronoun? U$3rname008 (discuss • contribs) 13:06, 26 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Oh, hi. :-) I'd been meaning to raise that issue somewhere (such as the book's main talk page).  I noticed the book is written largely in first-person singular, as if it was the personal work of a single author.  Wikibooks is for writing collaborative textbooks; that's the point of the project; even though quite often a single person does most of the initial work on a book, perhaps even adding up to a complete first draft of the book, in the long run there is no single owner of a wikibook, and so a wikibook shouldn't be written in a way that gives people the impression it belongs to someone so that others need to ask permission.  Such as, writing it in first-person-singular.  In all the years Wikibooks has been in operation, I'm only aware of about one incident I've heard of where there was an actual dispute over the direction of a book; each book is understood to have a community, and when joining a book's community one exercises respect for the pre-existing community, even including to a significant extent past authors who are no longer present &mdash;adopting a book is a thing here, and is done cautiously&mdash; and things generally work out just fine. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 13:55, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

Thx. I'll remove other first-person pronoun. — Preceding unsigned comment added by U$3rname008 (talk • contribs) 14:00, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

vandalisms
173.244.132.4 and 173.244.132.6 [//en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?title=Wikijunior:Ancient_Civilizations/Ancient_Pueblo_Peoples&action=history here] --Wim b 20:21, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Doled out some blocks. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 20:45, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Thanks
Any chance you could semi-protect my talk page? I'm not active here. I'm getting pings from the LTA regularly on various projects. Thanks. Doug Weller (discuss • contribs) 15:20, 7 February 2019 (UTC)
 * No problem. :-) --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 15:29, 7 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks. It's my understanding that this particular fool is being tracked down with some hope of success. Doug Weller (discuss • contribs) 15:37, 7 February 2019 (UTC)

Blocks needed
Hello. Please see the history of Hebrew Roots/Holy Days/Firstfruits. The account, Matt yeved, and the IP, 161.43.216.6, should probably be blocked. Thank you, Vermont (discuss • contribs) 00:50, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Blocks applied. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 01:17, 19 March 2019 (UTC)

Dropped Balls
You must have been distracted by something and forgot to get back to these. I'll take care of the few in the Trainz book, but I'm distracted by other priorities to be chasing this. Best regards, Fra nkB 17:06, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Looks as if they were converted by PokestarFan but not sighted, then later undone along with some other stuff. Taken care of; thanks. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 19:49, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Thanks a lot!
Thank you for reviewing my changes. It had been sitting there for a while. Thank you also for clearing my doubts in the reading room. You are one good reviewer! Thanks yet again. Debanshu.Das (discuss • contribs) 16:12, 4 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Happy to be of help. Btw, unless you're using "mobile" view (I wasn't under the impression you were), talk pages should have a bunch of tabs at the top, one of which should be called something like "new topic" (or, if you're using a different skin, it might be called something else, like "+"), which creates a new section at the bottom of the page. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 17:04, 4 June 2019 (UTC)

Where to get help
Hi Pi zero, please forgive me for contacting you through your talk page. I can't find the correct forum for this request. I maintain the A-Level Computing wikibook and we have a lovely landing page that works on desktop but is invisible on a mobile device:

https://en.m.wikibooks.org/wiki/A-level_Computing/AQA/Paper_2 https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/A-level_Computing/AQA/Paper_2

I can't find anything about this in the template file, do you know where I can seek some support on this?

Pluke (discuss • contribs) 20:42, 6 June 2019 (UTC)


 * I'd suggest starting with a query at Reading room/Technical Assistance. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 22:29, 6 June 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks! I've been on an editing holiday for a few years and forgotten how everything works! Pluke (discuss • contribs) 09:03, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

Reviewing QBasic pages
I have seen that you have been reviewing the pages in QBasic. You have also reviewed my pages(thanks again). Well, if it does not sound like a demand, could you please review the changes I have made to the home page of QBasic, and also see the new page "Images", I have made. That will be very helpful. Please dont refrain from making any changes if you see anything wrong in the new page. Thanks in advance for your time. Debanshu.Das (discuss • contribs) 09:42, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, and ... about Wikijunior:How Things Work/Binary Numbers
Hi Pi,

Thanks for the edit the text that I added reads much clearer now. Not to make the discussion about binary too complicated for kids, the point about using 10 binary places is that binary makes the use of the 10 'finger-switches' more efficient than how used every day. Most people especially children think that using binary is limiting and inefficient, the important point is that binary can be more efficient. It's probably worth adding another sentence about how more efficient the use of 10 digits is when using binary.

I'll take some photos with my kids to update the Finger_binary wikipedia page so that the images depict (base 10): 1 to 31 at least. Shame it's incomplete currently. Would like to add that link to the book, but wiki regulates links in books. Is it worthwhile trying to get that link added?

Stephan
 * Just a quiet note here on the finger switch idea - dealing with kids and gestures a little here myself. When taking pictures of the finger switches, always show them palm towards the camera. Facing palm towards the viewer will defuse some of the more... easily misinterpreted numbers (4 and 18 spring to mind). This also has the advantage that right-hand then reads L to R for the viewer, a more normal bit orientation. Chazz (talk) 15:17, 11 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi Pi zero, how can I start my wikibook ?
Hello Pi zero,

I would like to start a wikibook, where do I start ? How do I start ? Do I use the sandbox ?

Regards --Sutton Publishing (discuss • contribs) 11:43, 13 June 2019 (UTC)


 * When you start creating a book, generally you create it in mainspace. There is a good deal of how-to information about creating books at Using Wikibooks (which is itself a featured book). --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:54, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

LTA
Was this an oversight or did you mean to restore an LTA's edit? Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 20:08, 30 July 2019 (UTC)


 * I'm moderately sure that was a mistake by the wiki platform: I had just applied a one-week block to the IP, and then clicked rollback on the diff for the IP's edit &mdash; and apparently during that time you had reverted the edit and the software only recognized that I had requested a rollback without validating that the thing rolled back would be the same thing I had told it to roll back. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 20:19, 30 July 2019 (UTC)
 * No worries, I figured as much. It might be worth it to protect that page for a few hours...Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 20:20, 30 July 2019 (UTC)


 * A semi-protection of the page might be useful since it's ongoing. -- Tegel (discuss • contribs) 20:20, 30 July 2019 (UTC)

Need your help to review following pages
Hi Pi Zero,

Kindly need your assistance to review as followed:

Puzzles/Word-In-Word Puzzles/Seven Bridges of Königsberg Puzzles/Chess puzzles/Rook Polynomial Puzzles/Chess puzzles/Knight and 16 pawns Puzzles/Analogies

Encik Tekateki (discuss • contribs) 08:39, 4 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Done on behalf, thanks for contributing to wikibooks. --Cohaf (discuss • contribs) 13:29, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

Lojban Book and Conlang Book
Jawitkien (discuss • contribs) 14:34, 9 August 2019 (UTC) Some questions and ideas:
 * I've recently become interested in Lojban (about 2 years ago) and found the Lojban book here on wikibooks today (9Aug2019).
 * I also found the Conlang book which looks much better maintained.
 * I wonder if there is a section for examples of conlangs which could point to the Lojban book.
 * I wonder if there would be any objection toward trying to spruce up the Lojan book by connecting to the lojban wiktionary and the Appendix:Lojban of the english wiktionary.
 * I certainly don't know the politics of wikibook, and how books get changed or updated or reviewed or approved. If there is something I should read to get up to speed, I'd be interested.


 * Hi! I'll see if I can shed light on some of these well-chosen questions.  Apologies for writing a much longer response to your simple inquiry; but your questions come very close to some things I've been meaning to try to add to Using Wikibooks, and I've had trouble figuring out how to explain these things, so when I do try to explain them it becomes partly a dry run for that.
 * When I first arrived at Wikibooks, I was excited that there was a Conlang wikibook, but kind of disappointed by the state it was in. It was a very mixed bag, with some good material, some not so good, gaps, and not enough coherent vision for the book as a whole.  I wanted to help, but was reluctant to step in and didn't know whose toes I might be stepping on.  Based on advice I got from veteran Wikibookians, before making major changes I announced my intentions on the book's main talk page, and gave it a week or two for folks who were watching but not very active to respond (which one did, after a significant delay; though I think I had trouble waiting as long as I'd meant to: two weeks is subjectivley a long time!).  You never know, when first approaching a wikibook, what sort of community there is there.  Sometimes there are folks watching and interested even though they don't have time to do much lately, sometimes those involved have really moved on.  I, at least, tend to weigh the intentions of my now-absent predecessors on a book, trying to hang on to the gems in their thinking yet, with due notice, bringing my own ideas to improving the book.
 * What I learned about Conlang, after a while, was that it had been started by a bunch of conlangers who came over from the ZBB (Zompist Bulletin Board), and worked with considerable enthusiasm for a while but then gradually lost their momentum as the project dragged on and turned out to be rather more difficult than perhaps they'd thought it would be. Writing a book, I've observed, is not as easy as one might imagine.  There are considerations of overall organization that are not easy to coordinate in a large group of people on a wiki.  I also discovered that the folks who wrote it had apparently had some of their important discussions on the ZBB, so that we don't even have a record here of what they had in mind.  I've been working on Conlang now for about ten years, and it's slowly getting to be a bit better organized, with some specific problems I'm still thinking about just how to address.
 * One of the defining characteristics of a book is that it's self-contained. We prefer wikilinks in the body of a book to be, whenever possible, internal to the book.  Only occasionally might it be appropriate to wikilink to another wikibook (usually, to its main page rather than to any of its internal pages, since changing those around shouldn't require worrying about other wikibooks).  As a rule, all the wikimedia projects are cautious about external links (i.e., to pages outside the wikimedia sisterhood); external links generally should not be embedded in the main text, but should be set aside in some way that makes very clear to the reader that if they click on that link they are going somewhere that's less privacy-safe than wikimedia.  An intermediate case is links to pages on other wikimedia projects, which are generally minimized, but different authors may have different thinking on whether they should be isolated the way external links are.  I lean toward isolating them, myself.
 * (It turns out, btw, that keeping links internal to a project makes a huge difference in how much it feels like a coherent project; we learned this lesson the hard way on sister project Wikinews, where in the early years, for some subtle reasons most of the keyword links in our news articles were links to Wikipedia and it kept Wikinews from feeling like an independent project. This leads to an interesting insight into Wikibooks:  Each book is a semi-independent project.  It's as if, instead of Wikibooks being a medium-sized sister project, it's really a confederation of about three thousand incredibly tiny sister projects, that have enough similarities they can share a common administrative infrastructure that no one of them could afford on its own.)
 * In fact, a few years ago I hit on a neat trick for internalizing links in Conlang, which was always a problem because there are lots of references to conlangs that don't have their own wikibooks or even their own Wikipedia articles but do have their own external web sites. I've built up the glossary of the book.  I've crafted a book-specific template for creating links to glossary entries.  And there's a whole section of the glossary devoted to languages.  I hope to accomplish two things with this.  Each glossary entry can have links at the end of it to other wikibooks, to sister projects, and to external pages; so eventually I hope to isolate all non-internal links in the glossary.  And the glossary (whose entries I've worked hard to endow with big-picture insights) also gives me a sort of road map to topics that maybe the book itself doesn't cover yet but maybe should.
 * Perhaps some of this can be helpful for working on the Lojban wikibook. I'd love to see that book neatified and straightened out, and would be happy to try to offer consultation/advice/suggestions. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 19:06, 9 August 2019 (UTC)

Please indef and yank TPA, it's another sock.
here.Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 15:07, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Blocked. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 15:15, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

Patroller right
Hi Pi zero. Could you assign me the patroller right (since it contains rollback) so it'll be easier to combat vandalism? 大诺史 (discuss • contribs) 15:13, 25 August 2019 (UTC)


 * I don't think we have a patroller right on this project. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 15:17, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Oopss. I meant the reviewer right. 大诺史 (discuss • contribs) 15:22, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Hmm. I'm not sure why you haven't been autopromoted already (looking down the checklist of criteria), except maybe for whatever mysterious rules the software platform uses to decide when to check the criteria.  I'm tempted to leave it alone for a few more days just to see whether it gets around to autopromoting you... but, really, I can't see any reason not to just toggle in manually and get it over with. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 15:42, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Alright :) 大诺史 (discuss • contribs) 15:44, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * and thanks! 大诺史 (discuss • contribs) 15:45, 25 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Toggled. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 15:48, 25 August 2019 (UTC)

highly disruptive LTA
Hi there, I tried getting steward attention but they don't seem to be available. Please range block 159.146.0.0/16 locally for a bit until a steward can lock. Single blocks won't help and they vandalize rapidly. Thanks!! Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 14:22, 27 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Blocked locally for six hours. (I need to go out, should be back in far less than six hours.) --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 14:32, 27 August 2019 (UTC)

Rangeblock
Hey would you mind temporarily range block 37.154.0.0/16? They've moved from another project here and will continue their idiotic vandalism. Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 13:12, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
 * If you'd like, I can import a filter I just tested and created to combat this, just say the word. Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 13:23, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Nothing too draconian, I trust? I think we'd be happy to give your filter a try. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 13:27, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
 * It's set to disallow (once I import it you can take a look) but tl;dr i don't wanna be too obvious because they'll be able to evade it but there is virtually no reason anyone should hit that filter that isn't a vandal. Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 13:28, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
 * imported, ran it against past and it's good. Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 13:37, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

IPs
Hi, please remove their talkpage access too. Thanks. 大 诺 史 ( Talk/留言/토론/Discussion ) 13:22, 4 September 2019 (UTC)

37.154.214.114
Hi Pi zero, could you revoke the IP's talkpage access? 大 诺 史 ( Talk/留言/토론/Discussion ) 02:52, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Forgot this moron likes to do that. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 02:59, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Could you just range block it? 大 诺 史 ( Talk/留言/토론/Discussion ) 03:02, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
 * IP is back as 37.154.178.180. 大 诺 史 ( Talk/留言/토론/Discussion ) 06:04, 19 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Rangeblocked. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 11:39, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

159.146.0.0/16
Please block with talkpage access remove. Thanks. 大 诺 史 ( Talk/留言/토론/Discussion ) 14:05, 6 September 2019 (UTC)

Block
Please block Thebestlibrarianever indefinitely. Clearly a VOA. Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 16:05, 23 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Got it. (Huh; as a Wikinewsie, VOA = Voice of America.) --Pi zero (discuss • contribs)
 * Vandalism only account too! ;) It also appears they are socking xwiki. Yay...Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 16:22, 23 September 2019 (UTC)
 * in case you are interested Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 16:34, 23 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Hi, please block Special:Contributions/159.146.45.90. Thank you very much. --Hasley (discuss • contribs) 14:34, 26 September 2019 (UTC)


 * Please range block this. The Turkish IP has returned. Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 14:42, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Applied a block. I had already attempted to apply a range block this morning, and I suspect I botched it.  (Obviously I'm annoyed with myself for that, but I also wouldn't clear the platform interface of complicity in helping me get it wrong.) --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 14:59, 26 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Looks like we're gonna need another one, may as well /16 or /17 this one too. Praxidicae (discuss • contribs) 15:59, 1 October 2019 (UTC)
 * Applied a /17 block. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 16:36, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

TPA access Special:Contributions/178.243.18.87
Please yank TPA --TheSandDoctor (discuss • contribs) 23:25, 2 November 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm hesitant to do that, since they haven't yet abused it. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 23:33, 2 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Didn't they though with the spam? Or am I getting my order of events backwards & that was prior to block? --TheSandDoctor (discuss • contribs) 23:38, 2 November 2019 (UTC)
 * Oh, I guess they did spam there; but it was wiped out by the nuke, and hasn't come back. --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 23:50, 2 November 2019 (UTC)

Moving some pages
I am contributing in the wikibook about micronations, and I have copied some information from Wikipedia to certain pages of this book. However, I was told that it’s against the rules to copy information from another Wikimedia project, and that I must move the pages that I want from Wikipedia, and only than start editing. But since I don’t have moving permissions, can you please move the following pages from Wikipedia? (1) “Nation of Celestial Space” to “Micronations/List of already existing micronations/Nation of Celestial Space” (2) “Freetown Christiania” to “Micronations/List of past micronations/Freetown Christiania“ (3) “Conch Republic” to “Micronations/List of already existing micronations/Conch Republic” (4) “Freedonian Republic” to “Micronations/List of past micronations/Freedonian Republic”. Please note that I’m asking to move Wikipedia pages to Wikibooks. Thanks in advance. Dino Bronto Rex (discuss • contribs) 17:39, 27 November 2019 (UTC)


 * The term for moving a page from one project to another is importing. I did the first three of these for you; there is no Wikipedian article "Freedonian Republic", though.  There is a standard page for requesting imports, WB:RFI.
 * Micronations/List of already existing micronations/Nation of Celestial Space
 * Micronations/List of past micronations/Freetown Christiania
 * Micronations/List of already existing micronations/Conch Republic
 * --Pi zero (discuss • contribs) 19:58, 27 November 2019 (UTC)

Thank you very much! Next time I will request imports in the standard page. Dino Bronto Rex (discuss • contribs) 13:43, 28 November 2019 (UTC)