Wikibooks:Reading room/Administrative Assistance/Archives/2008/November

The Big Unit
I'd like to draw the attention of the community to The Big Unit. The book declares no scope and is in its entirety written by anonymous contributor(s) that also seem to have a keen interest in US History. I've already deleted three of the pages for blatant copyright violations from online sources. --Swift (talk) 16:53, 5 November 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm about to delete the rest. I would have preferred to have the authors clean up the copyright violations, however they seem totally unconcerned. &mdash; Mike.lifeguard &#124; talk 17:10, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Flat lists
Hi - I copied the Template:Flatlist template bits from wikipedia to wikibooks, but it doesn't work. Reason is that the "horizontal" CSS class has no effect over here, whereas it does on wikipedia. Could I request that someone with the relevant ability adds this feature? Obviously not a umungous priority, but let me know if you think it seems reasonable. Thanks --Mcld (talk) 15:42, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Done. I don't think this is any kind of a problem so I added it. If you wouldn't mind, could you add maybe an example to the page at Template:Flatlist to show how it renders? --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 20:02, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks! There already is an example on the template page (transcluded from Template:Flatlist/doc), but since I simply copied-n-pasted it's a load of redlinks at present. I'll make it nicer. I specifically wanted this feature for the page at Cookbook:Cuisine_of_the_United_Kingdom, which I think looks much nicer now --Mcld (talk) 11:10, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
 * PS I have also updated Cookbook:Table_of_Contents which was using simple comma-separated lists. I think this approach is better because the markup is semantic (i.e. the underlying HTML knows that these things are lists), recommend using it... --Mcld (talk) 11:18, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Please be aware that the IB Chemistry Syllabus currently being studied (for examination in May 2009) has changed quite significantly from the one you have on your IB page.

Vandalism
I wish to bring to your notice the disruptive edits of 216.104.143.49. He/she has made 4 edits and all of them have been disruptive. Have a look at this-Ravichandar My coffee shop 15:52, 14 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks for bringing this up and reverting the anon's edits. The user seems to have stopped (after four edits), so a block may be unnecessary. --Swift (talk) 17:03, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Possible copyright infringement
I have been the main contributor on the A-level Physics (Advancing Physics) book, and I was slightly annoyed that User:J-E-N-O-V-A had added a load of chapter headings to the contents page. If this user were willing to write chapters under these headings, this would, of course, be fine. However, this has not happened, and furthermore, the chapter headings have been copied from the official textbook for this UK A-level course. I wrote the first half of the book with the aim of providing a free, better, alternative to the official textbook, whereas these edits appear to be verging on a copyright infringement. What is the correct procedure in this situation - can I just undo the edits, or what? --Sjlegg (talk) 16:23, 24 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Have you contacted the user in question about this? Seems to me undoing the edits makes perfect sense unless there's something we're all missing here. &mdash; Mike.lifeguard &#124; talk 17:28, 24 November 2008 (UTC)
 * I have now done both these things. Hopefully, no problems will result. Thank you. --Sjlegg (talk) 12:03, 25 November 2008 (UTC)

Foundations of Education and Instructional Assessment
I've been requested by some of the teachers of this project to add some boiler plate text to several hundred talk pages for students to use to review each other's work. The first chapter's worth is already visible in the RC feed, and there are about a dozen more chapters to go. I'm going to give myself the bot flag temporarily while I do this task, to help keep our RC list from getting more flooded then it already is. If anybody has any questions/comments/objections let me know ASAP. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 22:07, 22 September 2008 (UTC)


 * The project is done, and I have removed the flag. Let me know if there are any questions. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 12:23, 23 September 2008 (UTC)
 * We might consider using m:Meta:flood flag configuration to cover this sort of thing instead... &mdash; Mike.lifeguard &#124; talk 14:25, 23 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I was thinking that exact same thing myself, but I was under the impression that the flood flag extension wasn't ready for prime-time yet. Maybe I need to learn more about it. Considering that this type of thing doesn't occur very often (you and I might be the only people to really use it, Mike) I don't know how the community would feel about installing an entire extension for the purpose. We can pursue it though, if you think it's right. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 16:59, 23 September 2008 (UTC)
 * It's not an extension, just a configuration setting. Even I could do it (if I had shell access :P). I don't think it would cause problems, and it would be a slightly better way of handling this sort of thing. Rather than using temp bot flags (which you need a 'crat for) it simply lets admins set the flood group on themselves only (ie you can't set it on anyone else). 'Crats can remove it from anyone who has it though (in case someone forgets to turn it off, for example). It's worked well so far on Meta (though it's not been there for long - perhaps a week or two) - I don't see any reason it wouldn't be a good idea here as well. If there's interest beyond WK and I it would probably be worth pursuing. &mdash; Mike.lifeguard &#124; talk 20:42, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Implementing Flood flag and a bot policy
Given that administrators can move subpages (ie rename a whole book at once) and this creates a flood in RC, I'd like to have this implemented here.

Since some books are big, we can't necessarily move them all in one go. now -- one can imagine the mess in RC if someone moves 500 pages all at once. Using flood flag for that makes an awful lot of sense, and would also allow "temp-bot" tasks of the sort WK (and I, but without flagging myself, and others) have done in the past and will be doing in the future.

Being active on Meta, I've used it there, and seen it used. We haven't had problems with this configuration, and I don't imagine it'd be any different here. I'm happy to answer questions and provide clarification as required. If there's agreement, I'll make a local version of the page at Meta so we can refer to it here. &mdash; Mike.lifeguard &#124; talk 03:38, 11 October 2008 (UTC)


 * The proposal is open for vote in Policies and guidelines/Vote/Bots --Panic (talk) 00:54, 24 October 2008 (UTC)

Discussion

 * Moved to Policies and guidelines/Vote/Bots

Note that Bots was approved as policy, per discussion. &mdash; Mike.lifeguard &#124; talk 03:54, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Copyright infringement?
Not clear where to post this, hopefully someone here can act on this. Does http://www.italki.com/knowledge/wiki-Italian%20Pronunciation%20.htm count as copyright infringement of your wikibook on Italian? Thanks.
 * Where, specifically, did you see the infringement in that book? I couldn't find it immediately. &mdash; <b style="color:#309;">Mike.lifeguard</b> &#124; talk 17:14, 9 November 2008 (UTC)
 * I guess the whole page is an electronic copy of Italian/Pronunciation. In fact they (or their user community) seem to copy from several wikibooks on languages. I couldn't find a reference to the GFDL nor a list of authors. Thus, I would consider this an infringement of the GFDL. Is there a standard letter such as wikipedia's standard GFDL violation letter for wikibooks? --Martin Kraus (talk) 14:42, 26 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Who cares? I didn't mean that to sound immature but Wikibooks is part of a non-profit organization and its content consists of work that people produce for free so I can't see any significant harm in someone stealing it for themselves.  We're not some evil Hollywood film studio or American drugs company.--ЗAНИA [[Image:Flag_of_Italy.svg|15px]]talk 00:10, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm all for freedom but I don't agree with that stance. A simple warning note should be sent if not only to protect the rights of the contributors, if wikimedia is not wiling to do it (respecting the license we use isn't that complicated or troublesome), at least post that info on the talkpage of the content you think was used in violation of the license, ultimately only the copyright holders can enforce their rights and the license. (I think that is the punch line of what ЗAНИA said, we aren't obligated nor even required to do anything but if we don't protect or at least inform users about such events then we should make this very clear to them before they contribute)...
 * We can even get into the problem of someone claiming that a copy is the original and request a pulldown. Ultimately we are protecting our right to host that content... --Panic (talk) 00:29, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Excellent points, both of them! --Martin Kraus (talk) 09:15, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
 * This is one of the reason I think authors at wikibooks should make their Ownership of the content known, it would also help in relicensing the works and fight bogus pulldown requests. --Panic (talk) 00:39, 27 November 2008 (UTC)


 * A modified version (Wikipedia &rarr; Wikibooks etc) should do fine. We already freely license our work; they need to respect the terms of that license. However, it is up to contributors to pursue such infringements, I think. If you need any guidance with this, feel free to email me. &mdash; <b style="color:#309;">Mike.lifeguard</b> &#124; talk 03:51, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
 * The problem with this is that many authors are no longer active here (and I guess many of the active authors haven't contributed to the finished books but work on "their own" new books). In any case, I think the best way to proceed in this case is to post it under "action needed" on Non-compliant site coordination (since several wikiprojects may be affected at the same time, e.g., a book from wikibooks with images from wikimedia commons). --Martin Kraus (talk) 09:15, 27 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Ah, there is also a place at wikibooks, which deals with this: Mirrors_and_forks and describes the non-compliance process. Who is going to send the letter? --Martin Kraus (talk) 09:43, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Copyright Symbols
Hi, Does anybody know of a poster image with the copyright and license symbols on it? Thanks, Armchair (talk) 17:45, 24 November 2008 (UTC)


 * What is a "poster image"? There are scalable vector graphics in the corresponding category of Wikimedia Commons (also see the subcategories!). --Martin Kraus (talk) 15:02, 26 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Thanks, that sounds like the thing - I just need an image for a quick-reference drop box. Regards, Armchair (talk) 18:37, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Bot Flag
Is it me or is something strange going on with the bot flag []? How did users TitsMcgee and GoblinReh manage to make bot flagged edits? --AdRiley (talk) 11:13, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Bot approval for inital sighting of authoritative pages
moved to Wikibooks_talk:FlaggedRevs_Extension --Melancholie (talk) 00:06, 28 November 2008 (UTC)