Talk:Păuleşti, Vrancea

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the debate was Do not move. Instead of getting excited about improperly indexed categories, why not go to WP:BOTREQ and fix the problem everywhere forever? It's a computerized world! —Wknight94 (talk) 02:07, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Requested move

Păuleşti → Paulesti – Unexplained move to a spelling not used anywhere in article itself, mover left behind double redirect from original name to intermediate one so admin intervention needed, and also did not fix indexing sort key. Gene Nygaard 09:28, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Survey

Add "* Support" or "* Oppose" followed by an optional one-sentence explanation, then sign your opinion with ~~~~

• Strong Oppose I am sorry to once again disagree with you Gene, but "Paulesti" already redirects here so I believe there is no reason for getting rid of the correct word, as it writes in Romanian.--Húsönd 00:38, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

• There is no reason to get rid of the correct word, as it spells in English and was used in the article. Păuleşti would still redirect here. But nobody has made any case for Păuleşti being a correct spelling even in Hungarian, let alone in English. Nobody has made any case at all to support the unexplained change to that spelling. Gene Nygaard 01:20, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

• Well, yes, that might have been a slight misconduct. Maybe the editor who proceeded with the move thought that no opposition would arise. Nevertheless, I agree with the move and strongly support the current name of the article. Furthermore, I do not understand your aversion to diacritics. You refer to "the correct word, as it spells in English", but this word does not exist in English in the first place. Writing it without diacritics is a mere limitation of their inexistence in the English alphabet (keyboard). The word is Romanian, and unless a specific variation of the word had been created for English, it must not be corrupted nor Wikipedia's accuracy be compromised.--Húsönd 04:00, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

There's nothing incorrect about using the English alphabet when writing in English. Redirects need to be created to the English alphabet spelling in all these cases—in this particular article, it exists because that was the original spelling of the article name, and it remained as a redirect after the article was moved. But you'd better get out there and start fixing the ones that don't have it, and fit the indexing sort keys in them as well. Even with the redirects, there are still some problems with the articles remaining hidden from some search engine searches, but it is even worse when the redirects do not exist. It even fails the other way as well. Try entering "Păuleşti" in the box on the Wikipedia page, and click on "Search" rather than "Go", for example; nothing shows up yet.

Then try putting "Gheraseni" in that box. In this case, try it with both "Search" and with "Go". Nothing in either case, and there won't be at least until that redlink is fixed. So why in the hell would you want to hide an article when it does exist? Gene Nygaard 09:07, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Try Google, too, for this search for

• Gheraseni site:en.wikipedia.org

Nothing. Of course, there are lots of other search engines as well, and they all work differently. That's what I don't like about diacritics. Start fixing the problem, instead of whining about a requested move that won't make so much difference once the redirects exist. Gene Nygaard 10:06, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

You are posing technical issues as cons. I don't think that creating a new problem is a good escape rope for avoiding technical bugs.--Húsönd 14:48, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

• Stron Oppose - Just what is it that makes English speakers get these anti-diacritic urges from time to time? Every time I create an article with diacritics, I create a non-diacritics redirect to it. Supporting the removal of diacritics just because of some problem in understranding the world outside the US (except perhaps French words or Spanish ones, or even English words like soirée) is simply insulting. Let me also add that the person who is questioned for having moved the article to its proper title is aiming to do just that for all localities in Romania, so the "issue" of "Gheraseni" is moot. Dahn 09:21, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

You may create those redirects; if so, you are in a minority. That's a huge part of the problem. Be informed, of course, that soiree is also a common English spelling. However, even though that link to it is blue, and even though putting "soiree" in the Wikipedia search engine and hitting "Search" rather than "Go" gets 75 hits, none of those 75 hits are the party article to which the link above redirects.

So it won't be moot, even when and if the redirect is a fait accompli rather there than just your unsupported claim about someone's intentions, doesn't even sound like your own. Gene Nygaard 09:46, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

That is simply absurd. I don't know by what criteria I am in a minority, as it looks as all people familiar with diacritics use them. For people not familiar with them, let them click go instead of search for the non-diacritic word, and then they'll prolly learn what diacritcs are and how the word is supposed to look (and perhaps copypaste the word and try search again). For chrissake, that is what Romanian users have to do on rowiki! And, since you only chose to concentrate on part of my point about soirée, please go and quarell with the French over the use of Angoulême, with the Poles over Oświęcim, and with the Spanish over Vasco Núñez de Balboa (you sure won't find them in search...). Again, if a person is unfamiliar with diacritics, that person better get familiar, or at least get familiar with the notion that they exist instead of trying to find them without diacritics in search. Dahn 10:38, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Get over the silly notion that if someone reads about something in an English-language newspaper or magazine (which aren't going to be using those silly squiggles) or other English publication, and tries to find out more information about the subject on Wikipedia, they are doing something wrong. As I've pointed out before, there is no error in English language publications using the English alphabet; we may choose not to limit ourselves to the English alphabet on English Wikipedia, but we need to do a much better job than we have been doing to prevent hiding whatever information we do have available. Gene Nygaard 10:57, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Interesting spin. But, you see, if a person reads an un-diacritics name in a newspaper (which, btw, should use the diacritics, and most respectable ones do use diacritics), he will be looking for information on... guess what... the name. Since a person will do that, he or she will end up, through the means of a redirect, to... well... you guessed it. So, the problem you mention is... Dahn 11:04, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Note that nobody is ever going to know that it is sometimes written with those squiggles, if they can't find the information in the first place, whether it is because the unaccented spelling isn't used in the Wikipedia articles or because they don't find the listing in a category because it is indexed in the wrong place. So, if you think they'd "better get familiar" (something that doesn't seem all that necessary to me), then you should be on my side and be trying to help them do so. Gene Nygaard 11:04, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

It is not "sometimes written with those squiggles", it is always written with those "squiggles" (unless it is written by ignorants). It is like saying: the title of the article should me misspelled, because many people cannot spell it right; it should be drawn, because many people cannot read. Dahn 11:07, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

And no, there is no "should" about it. They are perfectly in their rights in choosing not do do so, and most do not. Gene Nygaard 11:06, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, they should. This place is not for fostering indifference and illiteracy. Dahn 11:09, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

It is neither indifference nor illiteracy. We have every bit as much right to establish our identity by using our own alphabet as those who can't think of any other way to establish their own identity than to see how cute they can make the letters they write with. Gene Nygaard 11:29, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

You did not establish a monopoly on other languages. Furthermore, proper, academic spelling in English never forsakes the diacritics (or, at least, not since the 1910s). This is not about establishing identity, and I'm becoaming quite jaded after noting that you made no note of any of my previous points. This is about writing the word as is when the "equivalent" for it is not a traditional rendering (Bucharest for Bucureşti), but a misspelling! This is obvious for thousands of languages (do go and propose this change there as well), and the "matter" is a non sequitur with most English speakers but for some Americans. Furthermore, the with-diacritics-version is compliant with wiki rules, not to your need to induce the idea that a Romanian/Polish/Spanish/French/Swedish/Portuguese/Norse/Danish/Albanian/etc/etc word with diacritics taken out becomes "an English word". Dahn 11:59, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

No, we don't expect a monopoly. They are free to spell things as they like in their own language, such as fi:Havaiji which uses two letters that don't even appear in the Hawaiian alphabet. What we need to be concerned with here is the spelling in English.

You are again missing the point. In English, the relation to neologism is the same as in Romanian: unless an equivalent is present in the language, words will be used as spelled in their respective homes (this is what is done by most respectable and respectful dictionaries). The few exceptions do not dismiss the rule. Dahn 13:26, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia naming conventions do not establish that the existence of a version with diacritics means that it should be the article title. That can be, yes; that it must be, no. The burden on establishing reasons for using them should be on those seeking to use something other than the English alphabet in the name of a particular article.

I believe it is clear that wiki conventions frown upon the title being different from the definition given in the article (it is, for example, not recommended to have an article "Bucharest" that will begin with the sentence "Bucureşti is a city in Romania etc."). Furthermore, it is simply abhorrent to begin an article with the line "Ciocanesti (Romanian: Ciocăneşti)", thus indicating that Ciocăneşti has a variant "in English" and one "in Romanian"! Moreover, diacritics in Romanian indicate different sounds, and wikipedia should encourage people to understand the pronounciation of words as they are pronounced, not as ignorant Americans feel like pronouncing them (I have also explained at some point how and why Romanian has a prevelance over English in marking its own phonemes for its own words). Dahn 13:26, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia conventions also clearly establish that using those diacritics in the indexing sort keys is improper. Gene Nygaard 12:56, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

That is why you type a non-diacritic version in the category links. Dahn 13:26, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I often do that—usually when cleaning up after fools such as the one who moved this page to "Păuleşti", though in this particular case I deliberately left that to someone else to accomplish, which someone (not you nor me) did before you jumped into the discussion, and as I did in deliberately leaving Gheraseni, where, if you were to take the hint and fix the redlink, you could also discover that the indexing remains bad. Gene Nygaard 13:43, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Thank you, o magnanimous one. You may wish to know that everybody tends to do that, and that Bogdan, whom you've just called a fool, spends most of his time on this. He may be excused for having missed one in this tedious task, for which he is generally complimented. As for Gheraseni, go ahead and create the redirect to Gherăseni yourself, if it is that stringent. You are simply proposing a highly unorthodox and overblown "solution", with unmanageable consequences, to a problem that anyone can fix in 2 seconds, and one that, no matter what system you condone, will always be present (it is, basically, synonymous with carelessness). The very same for indexing. Dahn 13:57, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Oh, good grief. The only things User:Bogdangiusca has been spending his time on is fixing things he screwed up in the first place, by creating articles and making moves without fixing the indexing. He only woke up and smelled the coffee and started "spending most of his time on this" cleanup after himself after I fixed several of them which he had screwed up and I proposed the move here. Gene Nygaard 04:10, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Fixed Gheraseni myself, then, since nobody else took the hint after it was made twice, and Dahn explicitly declined the invitation. Gene Nygaard 11:56, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Ever heard of that wiki rule calling for people not to disrupt wikipedia to prove a point? You just broke it. As for the "invitation", I have better things to do on wikipedia than take orders for you, although it looks like, if you continue intervening like this, I and others can only look forward to cleaning up after you. Dahn 12:13, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Gene, please refrain from adding personal attacks to a civilized discussion (See WP:PA). Nothing justifies such behavior. Please stay calm. Thank you.--Húsönd 14:56, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Dahn, please do not respond in a snide manner. If you two realize that your arguments are not leading to the desired repercussion, then it might be better option to rest the case or wait for further developments. Now please don't resort to attacking each other. Consider having a look at Concordia. Thank you.--Húsönd 15:04, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

• Oppose Aquilina 22:17, 11 September 2006 (UTC)
• Strong Oppose. The diacritics are there for a reason. Nobody is asking you to have a keyboard layout with such characters on it. You may simply enter the name of the article without the diacritics and there would be a redirect. I have a bot which does this kind of redirects. If you use google, searching for "Paulesti" yields results which include both "Paulesti" and "Păuleşti". bogdan 22:33, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes. Both. Because it is indeed written in English as Paulesti. The proposed move fits the "best known in English" rule. Gene Nygaard 04:11, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

And how many times have you heard of Păuleşti, Vrancea, before? Is is common in English to mention this particular locality, and to do it without diacritics? Or is it that youse reckon i'is? Dahn 09:59, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

You can see for yourself, by using this better crafted search than the one Bogdangiusca used, throwing out most of the Wikipedia hits and limiting it to English (realizing that the language limitations are something that doesn't work particularly well).[1] Gene Nygaard 11:56, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Say, why not have a look in your own link and read all all them links with all them squiggles that pop up even there. Perhaps then you'll begin to fathom my point. Dahn 12:02, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

• Vehement Oppose I don't see the problem here. We have a redirect, and Romanian uses diacritics, as does academic and professional writing in English. If we are to write Paulesti, then would you also have us write Brasov, Constanta, or Basescu? I'd also like to point out that unlike in (eg) French, where accents over vowels often don't make a great difference in pronunciation (Angoulême, Île, or Étienne sound the same with or without accents), in Romanian they make a huge difference. Try pronouncing Lucretiu Patrascanu or Gheorghe Tatarescu without diacritics. Furthermore, some words can only be distinguished by diacritics: atâta ("so much")/a aţâţa ("to annoy"); ură ("hatred")/a ura ("to express good wishes"); raci ("crabs")/a răci ("to become ill"), etc. Those "squiggles", as you deprecatingly call them, have a purpose, and they ought to remain. Biruitorul 01:29, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

• Very strong Oppose Ignorant solution proposed by an ignorant user. Mihai -^talk 07:51, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Mihai, please refrain from launching personal attacks against other users. Nothing justifies such behavior. Calmly state your opposition instead. Concordia promotes civility among all users. Thank you. --Húsönd 12:04, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, Hús. Oioane/Mihai shouldn't be calling me ignorant anyway, when he/she is the one who makes moves like this one, adding categories to articles with diacritics in the name, without fixing the indexing sort key. Will you please go fix that and anything else you've done along those lines, Mihai? Gene Nygaard 12:08, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

As if it matters shit if one does it or not when the diacritic is in the middle of a word included in two quite limited categories! Dahn 12:15, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Dahn, do refrain from using such language. Be civil. Thank you.--Húsönd 12:19, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry for calling you ignorant, I appologise for publicly calling you that way, it was a little bit exagerated. About your comments related to the way I categorise names with diacritics, I generally try to fix the indexing sort key as you can see here for example and also in many other cases. If in some cases I have not that's it anyway it's less damaging comparing to ignoring diacritics and accents. Mihai -^talk 12:28, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I've gotten a little carried away at times as well. But you are totally wrong as to what causes damage. It is damage, something broken that needs fixing, to add a link or enter a "Go" or search in the Wikipedia search engine or any other search engine for the proper English alphabet spelling, and not be able to find an article which exists. It is damage to not find something in a category, because it is mis-placed. It is not "damage" to enter a word with diacritics in the search box or a link in an article, and be taken by a redirect to an article whose title does not contain those diacritics. That doesn't hide information; failing to include the redirects and to fix the indexing does. Gene Nygaard 12:39, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Discussion

Add any additional comments

• I find it strange that from the discussion above, you'd think that Bogdangiusca/Bogdan, Orioane/Mihai, and Dahn are always careful editors, trying to get things right, yet there are articles such as Săcele which all three of them have edited and which remain mis-indexed. Gene Nygaard 13:09, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

What are you doing now, error-hunting? Mihai -^talk 13:16, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Of course; that is a quite legitimate Wikipedia pursuit. We want to keep our quality up. But on further checking, I see that at various times in the you, Bogdan, and Dahn have all done the indexing correctly, at least in some of the categories. Where you may have fallen short was in none of you noticing the changes made by User:Mentatus which undid your indexing. Gene Nygaard 13:21, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I was not watching that page, and indeed watch little pages for cities, towns, etc. I don't know what the problem is, after all: nothing ensures wikipedians will not err, and nothing prevents info from being unwittingly hidden (in the worst case scenario, hiding info for some clueless users would be equivalent to the articles not having existed at all! pray tell, who's going to ensure that all articles exist?). Let me also not that all three users cited here do far more than to patrol for such changes, and that at least I would be in Gene's debt if, instead of sitting here pointing fingers and proposing magically disruptive solutions, he'd just fix the indexing for such articles (especially since such articles are the minority in Romania-related ones). May I also add: given the relative obscurity of cases "investigated" by Gene, we can safely assume that not many users of researchers have been "hurt in their quest for knowledge". Dahn 13:39, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I'd have to say that the problems in Romania-related articles have been reduced significantly in the past couple of days, more so with the indexing than with the missing redirects. I must have fixed over a hundred of them myself, and you and others have been spurred into action as well. But even with respect to the indexing, the job is far from done. Witness:

• Beştepe, Tulcea
• Crişul Alb
• Crişul Negru
• Andreea Răducan
• Păcii metro station

Warning: that last one is trickier than most. Do you know how to fix it? Gene Nygaard 15:02, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

You can also just look at categories such as Category:Communes and villages in Romania and find more. Gene Nygaard 15:17, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.