Why are article names case sensitive? There doesn't seem a good reason for it - multiple articles that differ in case would be unnecessarily confusing.
Changing it to be case insensitive would make it simpler to get links right, reduce the need for redirects, and just generally (as far as I can see) be a Good Thing.
I'm sure there's arguments against that I can't see - what are they?
At 2002-10-03 09:52 +0100, Khendon wrote:
Why are article names case sensitive? There doesn't seem a good reason for it - multiple articles that differ in case would be unnecessarily confusing.
Changing it to be case insensitive would make it simpler to get links right, reduce the need for redirects, and just generally (as far as I can see) be a Good Thing.
I'm sure there's arguments against that I can't see - what are they?
I think I agree with you.
By the way, I was just editing and adding about 20 articles on the Dutch Wikipedia (mostly about vegetables and computer languages) and I would like to draw the attention to the fact that one should generally not use a plural as the name of an article. If it's about 'herbs' call it 'herb'.
Greetings, Jaap
Khendon wrote:
Why are article names case sensitive? There doesn't seem a good reason for it - multiple articles that differ in case would be unnecessarily confusing.
Changing it to be case insensitive would make it simpler to get links right, reduce the need for redirects, and just generally (as far as I can see) be a Good Thing.
I'm sure there's arguments against that I can't see - what are they?
Mainly that we'd have to think up a clean way to define the "official" display case of the title, and use it consistently, and change it when it's wrong. Simply Capitalizing The First Letter Of Every Word Like Most Of The Non-English Wikis Have Been Forced To Deal With For Some Time Is Not Acceptable.
-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
On Thu, Oct 03, 2002 at 04:20:04AM -0800, Brion VIBBER wrote:
Khendon wrote:
Why are article names case sensitive? There doesn't seem a good reason for it - multiple articles that differ in case would be unnecessarily confusing.
Changing it to be case insensitive would make it simpler to get links right, reduce the need for redirects, and just generally (as far as I can see) be a Good Thing.
I'm sure there's arguments against that I can't see - what are they?
Mainly that we'd have to think up a clean way to define the "official" display case of the title, and use it consistently, and change it when it's wrong. Simply Capitalizing The First Letter Of Every Word Like Most Of The Non-English Wikis Have Been Forced To Deal With For Some Time Is Not Acceptable.
Simple enough to deal with; have the title adopt the case given in the URL.
Khendon wrote:On Thu, Oct 03, 2002 at 04:20:04AM -0800, Brion VIBBER wrote:
Khendon wrote:
Why are article names case sensitive? There doesn't seem a good reason for it - multiple articles that differ in case would be unnecessarily confusing.
Changing it to be case insensitive would make it simpler to get links right, reduce the need for redirects, and just generally (as far as I can see) be a Good Thing.
I'm sure there's arguments against that I can't see - what are they?
Mainly that we'd have to think up a clean way to define the "official" display case of the title, and use it consistently, and change it when it's wrong. Simply Capitalizing The First Letter Of Every Word Like Most Of The Non-English Wikis Have Been Forced To Deal With For Some Time Is Not Acceptable.
Simple enough to deal with; have the title adopt the case given in the URL.
No, it is not acceptable. Some words in many langages do not have the same meaning with big or small letters. Sometimes for grammar reasons, sometimes for conceptual reasons. We need to be able to make the difference.
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On Thu, Oct 03, 2002 at 04:55:59AM -0700, Anthere wrote:
No, it is not acceptable. Some words in many langages do not have the same meaning with big or small letters. Sometimes for grammar reasons, sometimes for conceptual reasons. We need to be able to make the difference.
Are these not normally small distinctions (like the English god -vs God), where it make sense to cover both words on the same page anyway, explaining what difference the case makes?
If not, surely it's possible to disambigute in other ways? Say, if flirble meant "big red house", but Flirble meant "a kind of jelly", then flirble could be a disambiguation page to "flirble (architecture)" and "Flirble (jelly)".
If not, surely it's possible to disambigute in other ways? Say, if flirble meant "big red house", but Flirble meant "a kind of jelly", then flirble could be a disambiguation page to "flirble (architecture)" and "Flirble (jelly)".
In this way, I think this is a non-discussion, since the current software already does not make distinction between 'flirble' and 'Flirble' - the first word is automatically made upper-case, also when it is inserted as lower case. So it is only when there is a difference in a further word where we get a difference, for example between "Big flirble" and "Big Flirble", or when there is a capital inside a word, between "Bigg" and "BigG".
Andre Engels
On Thu, Oct 03, 2002 at 01:38:47PM +0100, Khendon wrote:
On Thu, Oct 03, 2002 at 04:55:59AM -0700, Anthere wrote:
No, it is not acceptable. Some words in many langages do not have the same meaning with big or small letters. Sometimes for grammar reasons, sometimes for conceptual reasons. We need to be able to make the difference.
Are these not normally small distinctions (like the English god -vs God), where it make sense to cover both words on the same page anyway, explaining what difference the case makes?
If not, surely it's possible to disambigute in other ways? Say, if flirble meant "big red house", but Flirble meant "a kind of jelly", then flirble could be a disambiguation page to "flirble (architecture)" and "Flirble (jelly)".
In German there is a common play of words:
Er hat in Moskau liebe Genossen. ( he's got friendly comrades in Moscow )
Er hat in Moskau Liebe genossen. ( He enjoyed Love in Moscow )
Both differ slightly in pronounciation, and are very case-sensitive!
Regards,
JeLuF
Jens Frank JeLuF@gmx.de writes:
Er hat in Moskau liebe Genossen. ( he's got friendly comrades in Moscow ) Er hat in Moskau Liebe genossen. ( He enjoyed Love in Moscow )
My favourite sexual partner is French Polish. My favourite sexual partner is French polish...
... Suddenly I wish I hadn't said that...
Khendon wrote:
On Thu, Oct 03, 2002 at 04:20:04AM -0800, Brion VIBBER wrote:
Mainly that we'd have to think up a clean way to define the "official" display case of the title, and use it consistently, and change it when it's wrong. Simply Capitalizing The First Letter Of Every Word Like Most Of The Non-English Wikis Have Been Forced To Deal With For Some Time Is Not Acceptable.
Simple enough to deal with; have the title adopt the case given in the URL.
The URL doesn't contain the title in the recentchanges list, user contribs list, watchlist, short pages list, orphans list, long pages list, image list, yadda yadda yadda.
-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
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