Hi Tels!
Thanks for your inquiry. This can be a bit confusing
indeed. That's part of the reason why discussion took
so long here.
> I am also confused. Does this mean we will have
> wikipedias for every
> German dialect (saxionian, bavarian etc), too?
> *confused*
> How does "nedersaksisch" relate to
"niedersächsisch"?
1. I believe and hope there will be no Wikipedias for
German or any other dialects. I am quite strictly
against creating Wikipedias for individual dialects.
That's why I voted against WPs for Bavarian and
Ripuarian (please cf. 'Requests for new Languages'
page on Meta).
2. However, Low Saxon (=Nedersaksisch, Niedersächsisch
or Plattdüütsch) is almost unanimously considered a
separate language and not regarded as is belonging to
the German language. As a German, I can confirm and
assure that the two languages are not mutually
intelligible.
3. Low Saxon consists, like most languages, of various
dialects. They are sometimes even considered separate
languages (but for the most part mutually
intelligible).
4. Low Saxon is spoken in Germany as well in the
Netherlands.
5. Due to historical reasons, the dialects of Low
Saxon used in Germany are highly influenced (loan
words, technical expressions, fixed expressions and
especially spelling) by the German language while
those spoken in the Netherlands show many Dutch
characteristics because of a century-long influx
coming from the national, official language.
6. There is a Low Saxon Wikipedia already (nds).
However, this Wikipedia solely comprises content
written in Low Saxon from Germany (where the clear
majority of Low Saxon speakers lives). The possibility
of including content written in "Dutch" Low Saxon was
discussed widely earlier this year at Wikipedia-l (see
archives) but considered not possible by the vast
majority of participants, especially by all
participants coming from Germany and from the
Netherlands. This was not due to any nationalistic
reasons or the like but solely due to practical
reasons (intelligibility).
7. Thus, the varieties of Low Saxon used in the
Netherlands are currently de facto excluded from
Wikipedia. That is why numerous Dutch "Low Saxons"
have requested a new Wikipedia.
8. "Nedersaksisch" (=Low Saxon) is the most common way
of referring to the language as a whole in the
Netherlands. That is why is has been agreed upon as a
designation for the new Wikipedia. Btw: it has been
suggested that it can be referred to as "Low Saxon
(NL)" or the like in other languages where a
translation is needed.
9. "Plattdüütsch" (=Low [or, literally 'flat'] German)
is the most common way speakers refer to this language
in Germany. It is also the self-designation of the
existing "nds"-Wikipedia. This designation reflects
the fact that its speakers have been part of the
German nation for many centuries. It rather alludes to
geographical (it is spoken in the low-laying, coastal
areas of Germany) than to linguistic facts. Including
the component "German", this name is not used in the
Netherlands, of course.
10. "Niedersächsisch" is simply the German
(linguistic) term for the language. ("Plattdeutsch" is
another, less formal name).
Hope this helps a little bit to understand the
background of this request.
Thanks for your consideration!
Arbeo
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Anthere wrote:
>* on a project with no arbcom, the community will have to vote for its
>editors with checkuser access. A limit of votes number has been set on
>purpose. I recommand avoiding using sockpuppet for voting. A wiki
>community with 10 editors and 30 voters is likely to be frowned upon.
And next, we'll be voting for root, database access and CVS access.
Get your votes in now! Brion, Tim or Lir for Mediawiki lead? It's a
hot contest!
[cc: to wikitech-l]
- d.
[cc to wikitech-l]
Anthere wrote:
>David Gerard wrote:
>>Anthere wrote:
>>>But right now, we do NOT have this log. And people are ASKING for the
>>>check user status to go live !
>> I would really like to know who thought voting for checkuser was a
>> good idea and why.
>The polish wikipedia has Taw with checkuser status.
>The english wikipedia has David.
>How did that happen ? (correct me I am wrong on a detail)
>Initially, the developers were doing that job upon request (I myself
>asked twice for information in three years if I remember, to Tim or to
>Brion).
>When the requests started being too numerous, Tim made the checkUser
>tool, in order to hand out to the community the role of doing checks,
>rather than to let it to the developers.
>Two people were given access. David, probably per agreement with Tim and
>support from Jimbo. Taw, because he had developer access, but his only
>activity (if I understood well) was to check on users.
I don't know about Taw, but that's about right for me. Also
(presumably) because I'd been through some detailed investigations
with Tim so he had some idea of how well I understood what the process
involves. He also refers people to me, so he can get on with things
like the software and the servers.
>Then, requests went on pouring on the developers, who answered there was
>a tool now to do this. So, editors asked to have access or asked for
>other people to do the job for them.
>This is when the policy started to be discussed.
> [...]
>Second option : people get checkuser access through an approval system
>(with a community vote or an arbitrator vote)
> [...]
>That lets the second option... I think any large community can be fully
>trusted to give that status to good people who will not abuse it.
Voting for access to the user database access still seems a
fundamentally defective idea, precisely analogous to voting for root
or voting for CVS access. What do the devs with access think?
It also notably doesn't solve some of the bad examples you gave
before, e.g. the Wikipedia where they wanted to routinely use it on
all votes.
I am entirely unconvinced this is a less worse idea than no access at all.
- d.
>But right now, we do NOT have this log. And people are ASKING for the
>check user status to go live !
I would really like to know who thought voting for checkuser was a
good idea and why.
- d.
Hey guys,
I've read a lot on the whole wikidata thing in the past view
month. The whole project will IMO be a enourmous advantage not only to
mediawiki and wikipedia but also to the whole idea of free information.
I think, however, that most of you concur with me in this point.
There are loads of amazing ideas in the minds of all us and in
meta.wikimedia.org, so this is not the point ;)
What the project lacks of at the moment is a better coordination and
organisation.
I think that we should link the idea of wikidata with some other
improvements that mediawiki needs, especially better semantic web
abilities, iow. a xml in- and output implentation, the possibilty to
tag articles with a standart (as for Jimbo's "1.0"-proposal) and maybe
also a improved discussion system (liquidthreads).
So I propose to take all this together and call it MediaWiki 2.0 resp.
phase4.
I know, the idea of MediaWiki 2.0 existed all the time as a "dream for
the future" with no atcual plans for the moment.
But why not start working more target-aimed?
When to start, when not now?
Even if you think that this is too much for one task, IMO we should do
this just for wikidata as well.
So I propose to do the following:
- create a newsgroup "gmane.org.wikimedia.mediawiki.wikidata"
or "gmane.org.wikimedia.mediawiki.2-0" to discuss the stuff
there instead of on [[talk:wikidata]]
- and, which is very important, decide ASAP how to implent
wikidata into the database, there are quite a few models flowing
around in meta.wikimedia.org
(e.g. after a last regarding of pros and cons of the different
models in the newly created newsgroup ;) )
- decide ASAP in which areas of the current mediawiki code major
changes are needed
(e.g. if we want to rewrite the parser to support different output
formats natively or if we just include a xml/rdf output abilty into
the existing code
when all this is and further discussion is done we should
- create a new cvs branch 'mediawiki20' (or use the wikidata tag that
does already exist) or a new module 'phase4'
- create a roadmap which shows the *concrete* steps towards
the realisation
I think we have enough guys out there who're more than willingly to help
coding, but the problem is that no one really knows where to start ..
Concerning myself, I think I will not be able to write too much of code
myself, because my little freetime is already rather occupied, but I'd
love to contribute to the project as much as possible.
best regards,
Frando
Mark Williamson wrote:
> Arbeo left out the part where there was lots of
> fighting over the request.
I left it out because the "fighting" is over now.
> The proposal for Veluws got 7 support votes and 2
> oppose, one of who is Arbeo himself and the other
> which is conditional and may convince
> to change.
Correct. And the proposal for Nedersaksisch got 17
support votes and 2 oppose (Mark + one anonymous).
> The "Nedersaksisch" proposal, on the other hand, has
> 17 support votes after a period of over 5 months,
and > there is still significant opposition.
Incorrect. There is no significant opposition. There
is only one user trying to block something the rest of
the community accepts.
> It seems that, in the long term, it will be better
to > allow the mutually unintelligible Low Saxon
languages > in the Netherlands have their own
Wikipedias.
Wikitech-l is actually not the right place to discuss
such details. Only the result matters here. Matter of
fact is that nobody from the area concerned shares
this individual opinion (actually, nobody from Europe
altogether).
A.
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Hello Wikitechnicians!
Hereby I would like to request the creation of the
Nedersaksisch Wikipedia (request filed 2005-06-12) as
soon as possible.
Domain code: "nds-nl" (ISO language code + ISO country
code, because no individual language code exists
here).
Thank you very much in advance, also on behalf of the
speakers of Low Saxon living the Netherlands who will
now be able to contribute to Wikipedia.
Arbeo
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I've changed the lucene-based search to require all given terms to match
by default. This gives more focused results and is more consistent with
typical search engine practice, and our behavior under the old MySQL search.
You can still make terms optional by explicitly using the 'OR' operator
such as: "civil OR war", "blueberry OR pie". (Note that 'OR' must be
capitalized.)
-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
Hello
One of the inconvenience of the discussion page in wikipedia is the
fact that does not have a mail-client type of interface/display. That
is neither there is a email-summary type of display, nor a display
which would allow to display the threads easily.
Are there any plans to include such a feature.
A possibility to would be to have a input and output filter for a
neutral mbox format. For example the Debian bug track system has such
a possibility.
Regards
Uwe Brauer