[Wikipedia-l] no:/nb:/nn:/etc. - modified suggestion

Mon Nov 15 04:53:56 UTC 2004

Hello Mark,

On Sun, 14 Nov 2004 17:10:12 -0700, Mark Williamson wrote:
>What would http://no.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noreg redirect to? It would be 
>strange for somebody to end up at the nonexistant article :nb:Noreg, or be 
>re-directed to :nb:Norge only to have to click on the Nynorsk interwiki 
>link to get to where they wanted to be originally.

Try this:

http://nb.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noreg

Yes, this does take you to the Norsk (bokmål) article Norge, where you can 
then click on the interwiki link to Nynorsk (soon probably to be renamed 
Norsk (nynorsk)) to be taken to the Nynorsk article Noreg. I think this is 
a relatively minor problem that is outweighed by the general advantages of 
the drafted solution. There is an alternative solution though:

>Thus I propose there be an additional provision of some sort so that when 
>article titles are different between nn: and nb: (they aren't always 
>different), the Nynorsk name on no: redirects to a Nynorsk article rather 
>than a Bokmål article.

That can be done quite easily in specific cases by creating a 
disambiguation page on nb: -- in this particular case it would contain 
links to :nb:Norge and :nn:Noreg

>In addition, I think one extremely important thing regarding promotion of 
>other Scandinavian Wikipedias is this:
>
>While the Sami language(s) may not be related to sv:/da:/nn:/nb:/, since 
>they are a national minority in all of these countries (excepting 
>Denmark), there should be prominently placed invitations in Sami, if 
>possible (otherwise in the language of the Wikipedia they're on), to come 
>contribute to the Sami Wikipedias if you can.

For the inclusion of Sámi and other minority languages, please see the 
"recent changes" page on nn: and no:/nb: for an example of how this issue 
is already being handled:

http://nn.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spesial:Recentchanges

Note how the languages are listed in the links near the top of the page:
1) Scandinavian languages (minus nn): no: - sv: - da:, and also the 
languages Faeroese and Icelandic
2) Local Finno-Ugrian languages of Finnish and Northern Sami;
3) Languages of national minorities: Greenlandic, Hebrew & Yiddish.
4) Common immigrant languages in Norway: Albanian, Arabic, Bosnian, Farsi, 
Kurdish, Tamil, Turkish, Urdu & Vietnamese.
5) Major languages like English, French, German, Russian & Spanish;
6) Commons and Meta projects.

On the Nynorsk main page, there are currently three links to Northern Sami: 
Near the top of the interwiki list; in its alphabetical place in the 
interwiki list; as one of the specially listed local languages in the 
section "Wikipedia i Skandinavia / Norden og nærområda".

Further actions, like having an "ad" for the Northern Sami Wikipedia on the 
main page of nn:, have not been implemented yet, but I will tend to this soon.

>Just to make things more complicated (and forseeing a possible future 
>issue)... currently, TTBOMK, we only have http://se.wikipedia.org/ for 
>Sami (more specifically N. Sami). Should we create additional Wikipedias 
>for the other Sami languages/dialects/whatever? If so, perhaps we should 
>have a notice on the Norwegian, Swedish, and Finnish Wikipedias (don't 
>forget, Finland has Sami people too!) in some sort of "unified Sami" 
>(which everybody can understand, even if it's not a standard in everyday 
>use) inviting people to contribute to the appropriate Sami Wikipedia.

For Norway, Lule Sami and Southern Sami wikipedias would probably be useful 
-- and possibly also Skolte Sami and Enare Sami. In my opinion, the Lule 
Sami and Southern Sami languages should be offered the possibility of 
creating wikipedias.

Two other national minorities in Norway and Sweden are the Romani people 
(Tatrar, Tatere, Tattare) and the Roma (Sigøynarar, Sigøynere, Zigenare, 
"Gypsies"). I suspect that the interest for wikipedia work may be 
relatively low in these groups, but it might still be worth checking out.

All the best,

-Olve

> > > ==========================================
> > > MODIFIED SUGGESTION FOR LONG-TERM SOLUTION
> > > ==========================================
> > >
> > >
> > > (This suggestion is based primarily on Lars Alvik's previous
> > > suggestion, with modifications/additions based on arguments that have
> > > emerged in the debate locally on no: and nn: as well as here on
> > > wikipedia-l.)
> > >
> > >
> > > 1) The "Norsk" and "Nynorsk" interwiki names are changed to "Norsk
> > > (bokmål)" and "Norsk (nynorsk)" respectively.
> > >
> > > 2) The "Norsk (nynorsk)" wikipedia uses the language code nn:
> > >
> > > 3) The "Norsk (bokmål)" wikipedia is moved to the proper language code
> > > nb:, with the central Wikipedia developers/admins making sure that the
> > > extra workload on the current no: admins is kept to an absolute
> > > minimum. (This will in effect (see #4) only be an internal reversal of
> > > the two domains already de facto used by the Norsk (bokmål) Wikipedia,
> > > thus ensuring maximum continuity.)
> > >
> > > 4) For reasons of continuity and relative size of community, "Norsk
> > > (bokmål)" Wikipedia keeps the domain no:, but for reasons of
> > > impreciseness of the term as regards the language situation in Norway,
> > > this code will only be used as a redirect of links and URLs with the
> > > code to the corresponding nb: page. (Thus parallelling exactly the
> > > Danish usage of dk: and da:)
> > >
> > > 5) The communities on nn: and nb: will commit themselves to
> > > implementing the solution locally, with a special emphasis on
> > > information about and promotion of the other Wikipedia on the "Main"
> > > and "Latest edits" page; and also, to the extent possible, through
> > > putting the interwiki link to the other language first in the list of
> > > links in each article.
> > >
> > > 6) A specific technical solution that has been brought up is the
> > > splitting of the "Donations" link into a locally wikipedia-wide
> > > universal link to the other Wikipedia of the two. This solution, while
> > > admittedly clogging up the quick navigations field slightly, may have
> > > positive effects for the local cooperation, and should therefore be
> > > reciprocally applied to the nn: and nb: wikipedias.
> > >
> > > 7) In the interest of strengthening the Scandinavian Wikipedia
> > > community, I suggest to implement points 5) and 6) also to sv: and
> > > da:, thus facilitating quick navigation between these wikipedias,
> > > effectively creating a half-integrated article pool of about 83,000
> > > articles (on 14 Nov. at ca 7 AM GMT) and an incitement for each of the
> > > four Scandinavian communities to cooperate and expand.
> > >
> > > 8) Work towards more integrated multilingual wikipedias through making
> > > the Scandinavian wikipedias a test project for the development of an
> > > interlingual search function limited to a specific pool of wikipedias,
> > > where searches and no-hit events lead to a search within the
> > > pre-defined pool of closely related languages. For Scandinavian, this
> > > would include, in order of community size, sv:, da:, nb:, and nn:.

___________________

Olve Utne
http://utne.nvg.org