User talk:Tony1/How to satisfy Criterion 1a: redundancy exercises

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Feedback is welcome! Tony 13:54, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Contents 1 Exercise 4 2 Exercise 3a 3 Ghandi 4 Exercise 3g 5 Thanks 6 Yow! 7 Navigation improvement 8 Exercise 2C 9 Improving the formatting 10 Comment and question 11 Thanks 12 Ex 4E & Images 13 exercise 4 14 Exercise 3G 15 An extra exercise?

[edit] Exercise 4

It should be mention that it requires full copyedit, and not just the removal of one word. Since I skipped exercises 2 & 3, I was not able to find a solution by removing one word. -Ambuj Saxena (talk) 07:30, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Exercise 3a

The explanation of the solution should switch one and four (don't want to give spoilers, hopefully you will catch my meaning). -- ReyBrujo 00:34, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ghandi

I think the reference to Ghandi should be removed without a source. Who says he didn't just have a unique writing style? And which person, or persons (of an denomination), says obviously that writing, or speaking, like the way I'm writing now, right now, (with words all included even though they don't need to be), can't possibly, or probably, change or alter the outcome, or fate, of this world? (A.K.A. And who says writing like this can't change the world?). ;) Spawn Man 05:48, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Exercise 3g

Wouldn't the more elegant edit be "These aspects serve to distort such elements of the architecture as structure and envelope."? Moioci 01:50, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks

Thanks for these exercises - if you add more, how about exercises with a whole paragraph containing one sentence (or in harder cases, two) that need to be edited? Ruhrfisch 19:21, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Yow!

I feel particularly dumb as I got hardly any correct. - Ta bu shi da yu 04:37, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Navigation improvement

Hi,

I saw a minor problem with the page. You might not have noticed this, but since I have a slow internet connection, I could. When someone tries to navigate through the page before it gets fully loaded, the results of the exercises show up even when they are not supposed to. To correct this, you may incorporate a "display: none;" in the NavContent style. That is, replace all occurances of <div class="NavContent" style="text-align:left;"> with <div class="NavContent" style="text-align:left; display: none;">. Hopefully this will do the trick. Regards, — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 04:06, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I couldn't get why you didn't apply the above for all the sections. BTW, for the overflowing problem, add height:4em; in the div style of those exercises that need it. Thus, it should look like: <div class="NavHead" style="text-align:left; height:4em; font-size:100%;">. The trouble is that this will be hardcoded for all browser settings. Since, one should prepare it for worst (800x600 screen resolution), those in higher resolutions will see unusually large box. This shouldn't be a problem. Regards, — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 17:29, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Oops. Didn't notice that you asked me if it worked. It did. I first tried it and only then suggested you to go ahead. You may apply it all exercises and forward it backward (to Andy) if you please. PS: If you want to simulate slow connections, simultaneously open over a dozen pages (preferably long FA). This would slow any connection and you'd be able to see what it looks like. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 17:47, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I have been bold and solved the overflow problem also. However, as you'd have seen, it looks odd in higher resolutions. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 18:08, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I have confirmed that it solves both issues. However, I don't know how to code it so that it is adaptive according to screen resolutions. Forward it to anyone who needs it. — Ambuj Saxena (talk) 06:55, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Tony and Ambuj for the help. I'll fix it on my article also. AZ _t 17:25, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

And for future reference "4em" can be boosted to 5 or more where necessary. Tony 04:10, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Exercise 2C

More than two-thirds of the workers have received some university training.

How about: More than two-thirds of the workers have received some university training.

"some university" is used on census (plural?) to distinguish between those who completed university and those who started but did not finish. --Maintain 04:17, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Improving the formatting

Does anyone have a solution for the white areas between each exercise? They seem to be inescapable if the images are to be distributed through the article. The question/answer boxes do need maximum width, by the way.

Also, I can't seem to control the size of the Mandela pic at the top. Tony 04:20, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Comment and question

I've become a lot more shier than before in using words at all; perhaps more than desirable. ;)

QUESTION F: She performs predominantly in minor roles in a wide variety of low-budget and major studio films. 

I'm not convinced that "a wide variety of" is totally useless if "variety" qualifies an attribute other than the budget. Can you please explain? -- Sundar ^{\talk \contribs} 09:23, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

"A wide variety" is so vague that it's not worth including here. I'd recommend either removing it altogether or replacing it with more specific information, such as "minor roles in low-budget police and hospital TV dramas and cinema productions set in comtemporary Australian urban environments". "Wide variety" makes me suspicious that the writer just meant "many" or "several" or "numerous", in which case s/he might have specified the number, at least. After all, we do want precise summary information in a WP article. Let me know if this doesn't convince you, and I'll think of changing it. Tony 13:29, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I agree with the above suggestion: be specific rather than use a vague phrase. When I posed the question, I wasn't thinking in Wikipedia articles' terms; I was thinking of its uselessness in the language itself. By the way, I'm a native speaker of Tamil which has no notion of a case traditionally and case markers are suffixal. I don't know the mapping between the markers in Tamil and the prepositions in English (if one exists). So, I'm never sure of my preposition usage. Is there a good tutorial for me? (Articles are a problem too, but I'm improving there.)

I have another problem. I'm not confident about my vocabulary even though I have a decent range. That's because, I only know the dictionary definitions, but do not know if a word is appropriate in a given context. How to overcome this? -- Sundar ^{\talk \contribs} 13:57, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks

These exercises made me aware of redundant words used in everyday speech. I'm beginning to notice it in my writing immediately after going through the page. T REX_speak 01:38, 29 September 2006 (UTC) W

[edit] Ex 4E & Images

Cheers for the exercices. That's appreciated, the images are just beautiful and make you feel at home. In the exercice 4, you have

QUESTION E: The territory's path of evolution has been a challenge for the government.

Shouldn't this become

SOLUTION E: The territory's path of evolution has been a challenged forthe government.

effectively gaining 3 words?

Keep it up!--SidiLemine 13:25, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] exercise 4

Hi Tony: might you go further with the following sentence? "Has been the target of" still reads like filler to me.

QUESTION B: The military doctrine has been the target of both criticism and praise from a wide variety of groups.
SOLUTION B: The military doctrine has been the target of both criticism and praise.

I am thinking of "The military doctrine has [brought or produced or effected] both criticism and praise" (although both words do give the "doctrine" a more active role). Just a thought... –Outriggr § 05:25, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, I see my suggestion is not strictly improving redundancy, the subject of the page, so fair enough. –Outriggr § 05:28, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, it certainly could gain one word by saying "has been targeted by"; and four by "both criticism and praise targeted the military doctrine", althought the phrase certainly looses savor, and the emphasis is lifted from the doctrine to the comments.--SidiLemine 10:45, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps just "has received both criticism and praise"? Tony 13:50, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I guess "received both criticism and praise" is fine :). If it had been a person or an organisation, probably not, as "received" somehow implies (even passive) acknowledgement of the praise and criticism; but in this case it's the same. --SidiLemine 15:35, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

I like "received". Simple wins again. Tony, you pointed out that "targeted by praise" doesn't make any sense, which I hadn't noticed, but you're right. My intuitive objection was and is that "has been the target of" sounds like word padding, but the other issue is: do praise and criticism have only one target? Changing it to "has been a target of" loses some rhetorical punch, which provides insight into why the phrase was used in the first place. Well, I think I won't analyze that any more. :) –Outriggr § 00:12, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

One could probably find something to say about the military doctrine being a target; but I think we're arriving to the frontier of our subject here ;)--SidiLemine 11:04, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Exercise 3G

I disagree with that solution, as "This commercial success" does for me not mean the same as "This kind of commercial success" _→AzaToth 16:38, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

In the larger context, it's not different, but I think you're right—as a stand-alone sentence, there could be a change of meaning. I'll change it soon. Tony 03:42, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] An extra exercise?

Hi Tony, I enjoy doing these exercises and believe they are very beneficial. The only problem I notice is that there are redundancies in every sentences here, which is unlikely to be the case in an FAC or PR. Perhaps another exercise can be added where there are for example, six sentences and only four of those need to be shortened. It is easier to find superfluity in these exercises because you are certain of it whereas you only half-expect it in an actual article. Thanks Gizza^{Chat ©} 23:21, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Excellent idea; I'll do this when I can manage to find time. My plan is to create a series of "advanced" exercises that have a number of less-densely occurring problems, but you're right, one or two here would be good. Tony 00:12, 12 December 2006 (UTC)