User talk:Warrens/0605

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[edit] Notability of article Kimbo

I need a second opinion on the article Kimbo. This guy looks non-notable although the article is extensive. Flag for non-notable db or no? Sifaka ^talk 17:54, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

Hi, the article doesn't seem to be terribly encyclopedic in places, but that's fixable -- as to notability, based on the article it's a stretch, but there are quite a number of google hits, so it might pass muster. Regardless, WP:CSD is for clear cases of non-notability (like if I made a biography on my cat) or abuse; my suggestion is to go the WP:AFD route and find a consensus opinion from the community. The cool thing about this is that it gets that community consensus "on the record" so that it can be refered to in future discussions. Warrens 18:11, 1 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] ifd for Image:Vista-windows-update.png

Hello, me, the policy says I should inform the uploader on their talk page when one is IFD'ing an image they uploaded. So, uhh, yeah. Warrens 20:39, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Code reuse

Is there any particular reason why you think a separate article from reusability is warranted? The other person who commented on the talk page agrees they should be merged. -- Beland 03:42, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

At the time I removed the tags, they had existed in the article for more than half a year with no consensus being reached. There was one substantive, anonymous comment in favour of merge (on the Code reuse talk page) and one substative, anonymous comment in favour of keeping the articles separate (on the Reusability talk page). The person who originally added the merge tags provided no reasoning for doing so. Likewise for yourself when you re-added the tags shortly after I removed them -- you gave no rationale in the edit summary or on the talk pages. I really don't care about the outcome one way or the other; I do, however, believe that we shouldn't have merge tags floating around forever & ever if no consensus is reached in a reasonable amount of time. By all means, be bold and update or redirect the articles in a way you feel makes sense! Warrens 04:03, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] ASP.Net

Thanks for the tip. How come I sometimes come across pages where the trailing 's' is left off (or am I confusing that with the 's situation)? IstvanWolf 05:21, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps... Mediawiki hasn't always included the trailing s when making links like I described, and many people aren't familiar with this particular shortcut yet. As for article names, they will almost always be singular instead of plural so that it's easier to write sigular-form wikilinks to them. Take Typeface for instance: if the article were named Typefaces, but you wanted to use the word "typeface" in singular form, you'd have to write [[typefaces|typeface]] to get it to display correctly... which is rather ugly. :-) Warrens 05:29, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] TOC

Hi, I had been thinking for some time about the problems associated with the TOC. And today, I found the impetus to formally state the problems. I have done it in my talk page, and am interested in finding if some possible solution comes up (which can then be proposed on village pump). Could you please take a look and if possible give some suggestions. --soUmyaSch 11:38, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Google Earth screens?

You recently removed {{software-screenshot}} from Image:GoogleearthDDA.jpg because "Google Earth images do not qualify for fair use." May I ask where this decision was reached, so I can read it? Also, do you know what the proper tagging for such an image would be? I ask only because several images in the Google Earth article are tagged with the aforementioned template. Staxringold 14:49, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Nevermind, I've reverted myself once I realized the difference (the screens in Google Earth provide commentary on Google Earth itself). Staxringold 15:07, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

It's frustrating, isn't it?  :-/ On the plus side, there is a pretty good free alternative you can check out, called NASA World Wind. Everything on there can be used in Wikipedia articles. I haven't tried it, but if you do and have some success with it, let me know! Warrens 17:25, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Barnstar

		The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
		For endless contributions to so many Computing related articles soUmyaSch 11:23, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

It just can't get any better than this. Enjoy!!! --soUmyaSch 11:23, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Features new to Windows Vista article

In the section for Aero, it says:

Windows Vista will include a re-designed user interface, code-named Aero – an acronym (or backronym) for Authentic, Energetic, Reflective, and Open. The new interface is intended to be cleaner and more aesthetically pleasing than previous Windows, including new transparencies, animations and eye candy, which some report as being similar to Mac OS X^[1].

However, I think that the mention of similarity to Mac OS X(which includes a ref here as well) is not necessary here (coz this is a page detailing the features of Vista). It may be at max included in the Criticisms section in Windows Vista. What do you think?

And probably it is time for a Comparison of features in OSs or similar article, as you has somewhere suggested, to keep either OS articles from getting flamed. --soUmyaSch 15:30, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Comparasins with OS X surely belong in the Criticisms section. It can be dumped from the Features article... either that, or we go adding in lines to the OS X articles saying "ABC, a feature similar to Windows XP's DEF." Yeah, that'd get far. ;-) Warrens 17:26, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

I am gettin too tempted to try that out. :-) --soUmyaSch 09:21, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Request for arbitration regarding inclusion of Aqua UI similarities to Windows Aero in Windows Vista and Windows Aero articles

Given Gnetwerker's persistence against consensus regarding comments about Aero's similarities to Aqua, I have forwarded the dispute to the arbitration committee and am notifying you as an involved party as required. Paul Cyr 20:56, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "Disruptive"

If you are going to call me "a disruptive editor" in edit summaries, you had better supply some proof. The edit you reverted was not improper. It would appear the only thing I am disrupting is your desire to WP:OWN a set of Windows-related articles. -- Gnetwerker 22:19, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Future software template

Personally I'm against the template as a whole. If I had more time on my hands I'd probably nominate it for deletion. I think people are getting a little template-happy around here.

No article on Wikipedia should contain speculation. Just because the software is unreleased is not an excuse. I work hard to keep speculation out of pages here, and I've seen you do the same. If these pages contain speculation the speculation should be removed.

The thing about "may change dramatically" is not limited to future software releases. Architecture of Windows 2000 changed dramatically five years after Windows 2000's release, because User:Ta bu shi da yu suddenly got a bee under his bonnet. Maybe we should stick "This page may change suddenly" at the top of each page in 50px text.

The only notable thing the template should be telling people is that the developers are still working on it, but that should be clearly stated in the intro paragraph. We don't need a great big stinkin' template at the top of the article.

Anyway rant over, to specifically comment on your exact question. The problem with "not publicly available yet" is that it doesn't apply to Boot Camp or Internet Explorer 7. Perhaps "final version not publicly available yet", but like I said, I'm opposed to the template as a whole. AlistairMcMillan 22:22, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. Definitely gives me something to think about. I use the future software template mainly because it's there, not because it's the best way of doing things, and certainly not because I like a clunky big rectangle interrupting the flow of an article! I definitely agree that the introduction of any given article describing a future product (or revision) should be clearly characterised as such, without the help of a template... some of the articles I work on are good in this regard, but others could use some improvement. I'll get to work on that in the near future.

I don't feel strongly about the template one way or the other (though I'd probably support its deletion), but I'm probably going to remove the future software template from the Vista-related articles when a public beta becomes available. Warrens 00:31, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] RE: RealBasic

I sprotected the page again. no use blocking as the IP is changing daily. Just ignore the other guy's rhetoric. It's been stated over and over and has gotten no support (i.e. we're right, (s)he's wrong). Remember to Wikipedia:Do not feed the trolls. Sasquatch t|c 21:06, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I tried a range block, hopefully that will slow him down without causing too much havok. Cheers. Sasquatch t|c 06:47, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to look into this! Warrens 09:17, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Image:Vista-windows-update.png listed for deletion

Joe Beaudoin Jr. ^{Think out loud} 23:24, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Great work :)

You're still doing fantastic work on the Microsoft and other articles - thanks! Try not to spent too much time here though, it can be inefficient and suck the life out of you if you're not careful :). Thanks again! Just another star in the night ^{T | @ | C} 09:31, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks! :) Coming from you, that's quite a compliment. I'm taking some time off soon as I am moving at the end of the month (Wikipedia is relaxing compared to packing, I swear!), then I've got a vacation planned shortly afterwards. I work with Windows and other Microsoft products in a professional capacity, so I contribute to these articles with the idea that, "Hey, why not write what I learn into Wikipedia while I'm at it?" ... that will keep me motivated and interested for a long time. Sometime in the summer I'd like to get a few articles up to GA status... my new place has a nice patio I can work on. ;) Warrens 10:43, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Pah! I'm really not that good of an editor, you do a much better job :). Anyway, yeah, I work on them in a "professional" capacity as well (albiet I'm a cross platform Windows/Linux/OSX developer, anyway...) - for instance I did the rewrite of DirectShow after messing around with it for a couple of years :). As for GA status it really depends on what article you choose to work on :).

A couple of things - 1) If you are interesting in some REAL SLOGGING CLEANUP there is a new article at History of Microsoft, it may even be a copyvio but at any rate it needs serious cleanup and seems to be written from a very, very pro-Microsoft point of view :). 2) Those Vista screenshots you put up are amazing and tantalizing - what are your impressions? Yeah, offtopic I know :). It is as it always was ^{T | @ | C} 09:14, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Just realised I hadn't responded to this yet, sorry. :) I've tried to pick a few screenshots for Vista features that represent significant functionality enhancements, and tells a bit of a story on its own, as opposed to demonstrating pure visual aesthetics. Anyone familiar with Windows Firewall configuration, for example, should be able to immediately look at the screenshot of the new MMC console and go "whoah! much better!"

It does seem rather suspicious that the entire History of Microsoft article sprang fully-formed from a new editor, as it did, but short of finding the books given in the references (and I won't have time to do that until next month), copyvio checking is going to be a bit hard to do. It may just make sense to merge some of the useful details from that article into the History section of the Microsoft article itself (and other articles), since the Microsoft article is (clearly ;) ) much more adherent to Wikipedia's standards. For example, it mentions the Stac Electronics litigation and recall of MS-DOS 6, whereas the Microsoft article doesn't. More info on that here. There are some factual problems with article, too; it states that Windows Server 2003 was built on the .NET Framework, but that's obviously not the case. The original release of Windows 95 didn't include IE 3.0. And so on... Warrens 17:02, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] OPENSTEP -> Mac OS X or not

Just curious what are you basing this edit [1] on, as far as the kernel goes. AlistairMcMillan 18:49, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

OPENSTEP isn't a kernel. Seems clear enough, yes? Warrens 19:25, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

... though I think I may have worded the edit summary wrong. I wrote "not based on OPENSTEP's kernel" when I meant "not based on the OPENSTEP kernel". Warrens 19:28, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Do you think people would have been confused by that? I thought it read pretty clearly as the kernel from OPENSTEP, rather than the kernel called OPENSTEP.

I can see where you are going with your edit though, but to my mind your version reads as if there isn't that much in common, whereas, below a certain level, they are a hell of a lot alike. AlistairMcMillan 19:38, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

I've been using Macs for years and even I found the phrasing to be confusing enough that I had to go read the OPENSTEP article to see if I was missing something. It doesn't help that the history is a bit convoluted, so anything we can do to make it crisp and clear to people reading about the subject for the first time would be good. I'm still not really happy with that section; the meandering into NEXTSTEP's porting efforts seems more like a topic for the "history" of OS X rather than a "description" of it. Warrens 20:12, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

So much work, so little time.

BTW You wouldn't happen to know what the OPENSTEP kernel was actually called, would you? I've been trying to find out. I have a feeling they might have been a bit lacking in the imagination department at NeXT. It seems to have been called... drumroll... "kernel".[2] AlistairMcMillan 20:22, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Everything I know about NeXT's products, I learned from Wikipedia. Sorry. :) Warrens 20:43, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] hey

Nice to see your name showing up in my watchlist again. :) Warrens 01:04, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Just trying to get back on track after being idle for a while. :-) — Alex ^(T|C|E) 05:20, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Office 2007

Hey, I created a list of outstanding tasks for the Office 2007 article. Could you please take a look to see if something is missing? --soUmyaSch 08:13, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] REALbasic

I've put this article on my desk and will keep an eye on it for a few days, and will reapply protection if the issue is still going on. — xaosflux ^Talk 13:52, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

I'm not going to actively watch this anymore, there have been no edits at all since your last revert, that alone also speaks to the lack of need for sprotection at this time as well, IMHO. If it starts getting bad though, please leave me a talk message. Thanks, — xaosflux ^Talk 03:03, 3 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] List of Microsoft Windows components

This should be a fun project (and probably a nice break from the heavy learning we both have to do to write our articles :) ). I've been working on building up this list for some time... it's not complete, but I think we have the genesis of something that we could get listed at WP:Featured Lists. Maybe we could have some tables showing when certain components were introduced / deprecated? Anyhow, have a look and give it some thought. Warrens 02:47, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

Well that definitely is quite promising. One thing I felt though that just listing in not going to be enough. We need to specify which version of windows they can be found in. May be a table to do that. What do you think? --soUmyaSch 12:38, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Office products

I may have acted prematurely though, my appologies for that, but I stand by the moves, I believe they are in line with Wikipedia's naming policy. +Hexagon1 ^(t) 07:10, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't think the present naming policy gives us very good guidance as to article names for software products (and software components, for that matter). The matter is brought up from time to time by various editors, but there aren't enough people interested enough in the subject to commit to pulling something together. We face a rather unique problem in this area, too: The names of products can change at any time! Wikipedia is largely built up around subjects whose names don't change every few years at the whim of bored marketers. :-)

It's also noteworthy that there is no single naming philosophy that's applied evenly across the entire encyclopedia; for example, we enforce English capitalization rules on music recording articles (even if that means being less accurate), but we aim for accuracy on many computing articles (even if that means breaking English capitalization rules). Personally, I tend to favour accuracy over convenience when making decisions about article names, because I feel that accuracy is a vital trait of a trustworthy encyclopedia, whereas convenience is just a technical detail. To be more specific, I feel that if a company gives a product or technology a particular name, then that's the only really valid name for an article, even if it's not the most commonly used name. It's their creation, after all, who are we to disagree? Common usages can be collected by redirects; Lord knows we've got a huge pile of redirects for MS-related articles for exactly this purpose already.

Hope that explains where I'm coming from on this subject. Warrens 08:05, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Enjoy ur vacation

Have a nice break!!! --soUmyaSch 08:12, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Ditto - hope its sunny/rainy/yourpreference there!!! RN 08:20, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hey

I don't want to sound very annoying or like a wikipreacher, but even anon editors deserve some civility[3]. Of course, I don't know the circumstances of the situation, and I'm sorry for any trouble this post may of caused. Yanksox 05:09, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

This person has been vandalising REALbasic for five months, has threatened Wikipedia and individual editors with lawsuits, has caused the page to be sprotected multiple times due to persistent vandalism, has refused to work with other editors, has been blocked for multiple 3RR violations, and has had several sockpuppets banned. Civility? Shyeah. Warrens 05:13, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

All I am saying is that comments like that just fuel an uncontrolable fire. And fire is...well...not...good. Have you considered reporting to the incident board? Yanksox 05:17, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

And for the record, I reported 67.0.72.247 to WP:AIV. Yanksox 05:25, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

And this happened[4]. Yanksox 05:28, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

It's a dial-up modem pool; the user will be back on another IP before that block expires. Warrens 05:34, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Led Zeppelin article

Hey Warren (and JGM) - I've just had a thought about what has been said about the length of the Led Zeppelin article - would it be possible to make the page appear shorter by putting large sections - such as the band's history - into drop-down boxes (as used for Wikipedia "Contents" lists)? I think that if it would be possible to do that (and have them set to "hide" as default and let the viewer "open them up"), that would be a good idea.--RichardHarrold 14:50, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Hi RichardHarrold, thanks for the message. Wikipedia's guidelines regarding article length generally encourage us to separate out large sections into their own articles, while leaving a concise description of the most important details and events in a few paragraphs in the main article. I like your idea, and I'm always in favour of new and interesting ways to improve the readability and usability of the encyclopedia, but we should probably stick with the tried-and-true methods as a first resort, and if there are still serious problems, experiment with novel ideas after that. I always like to look to Featured Articles as inspiration on how to write and lay out a great article. Warrens 15:10, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Smart Folders

Hey, do you think Smart folder be merged into the Virtual folder in a Mac OS X section. --soum^সৌমোyasch 21:57, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm actually wondering if it makes sense to merge the Smart folder text into the Spotlight article, as it is part of the Spotlight technology. Reference to Spotlight's Smart Folders would certainly have a place in a good article on virtual folders, too. I haven't reviewed the text of these too closely (I'm still dealing with moving-related issues plus catching up with work, and preparing for a vacation :) )... so this is just my gut-feeling on it, rather than from an analysis of the text we've got. Warrens 22:11, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Meanwhile, I will be creating the section and fill it with material borrowed from Spotlight and Smart Folder articles, over the next few days and put it up for discussion. You enjoy your upcoming vacation :). Btw, have you seen the almost redone Microsoft Office 2007 article? I am confused whether to move it to 2007 Microsoft Office system though!!! (What pain would it have caused MS to capitalize 's' in system? Or put 2007 at end? <sigh>) --soum^সৌমোyasch 22:20, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] thanks

Hey Akhristov, thanks for reverting the vandalism on my talk page. :-) It's becoming a bit of a problem lately... Warrens 15:04, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

No problem!  :-) — Alex ^(T|C|E) 17:21, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Edits on Ars Technica

Hello Warrens, I recognize you from Ars Technica! I wanted to make you aware of this section of the Talk article: [5]. It is one of several areas where myself and a couple other users have explained our removal of materials. You will probably notice that there is an edit war going on. If you can look over my Talk contributions, you will see that I have explained my actions more than once. I might not be convincing, but I would appreciate any comments you have. Tsetna 20:48, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Hey, thanks for the message. Upon reviewing this I just realised I made a silly mistake -- I was looking at the edit prior to yours as the one that needed to be corrected; what you had there was just fine and definitely more in line with what should be in the article. Apologies any confusion I may have caused. :-) I don't want to get too involved in that particular edit dispute, unless it comes down to a straw poll or something... Warrens 20:54, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Windows 2000 article

My name is Jeremy Lowery and I am currently working on Microsoft Windows articles too. My user name is jdlowery and I am sorry that I was making factually incorrect changes to the Windows 2000 web page. I had been reading some stuff on the Windows 2000 web page that said that they were currently still selling the Windows 2000 Professional upgrade so I thought that meant that it was not discontinued. Then I took a look at the Microsoft Lifecycle web site that you referred me to and saw that it was in extended support. Sorry to have given you so much trouble on that and I understand why you got so mad at me. I recently did some work on some stubs on the Windows Me page so I hope you like those. If you have any comments or questions, feel free to talk to me about them. Thank you so much! -- jdlowery 11:30, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Windows Live Messenger

Oops, dunno how I deleted that text in the WLM article. I didn't intend to do so. Thanx for telling me about it in my talk. --Pfc432 02:53, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Windows XP and the .NET framework

Are you sure that currently shipping XP machines do not have the framework installed? I thought that it was included with SP 1 (maybe SP 2) and since current ships would have that SP installed I presumed they'd have the fw. Leotohill 03:44, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm quite certain. Read this, which has a pretty good list of where the .NET Framework is used in various MS products as of late 2004. Warrens 03:58, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WinFS

Hey, now that WinFS is dead (in MS' word, evolved), what do u suppose should be done with its article? --soum^সৌমোyasch 06:31, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

We need to see where Microsoft goes with the tech that they're retaining. It sounds like ADO.NET 3.0 (or whatever it's going to be called) is going to be a pretty huge leap forward, given that it will have both LINQ and Entities.http://msdn.microsoft.com/data/ has seen a lot of updates since TechEd about the new ADO.NET, so that's where we need to start. I'm really hoping that we can retain and recycle some of the great stuff you and I wrote into the article over the last six months. As for the WinFS article itself, we can keep the whole thing... it still accurately describes what WinFS was, but we will need to update it to drop any kind of "this is what's coming" language. Warrens 17:45, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Long back I had a feeling this was coming...when reading the future plans 4 sql server, they said they were building better support for semistructured and unstructured data...which overlapped with much of WinFS's vision. I may go ahead and update sql server and ado.net articles (may be create new articles) over the coming days. --soum^সৌমোyasch 08:54, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] I'm sorry- have kids...

Wow. I'm very sorry: but my youngest son got on and, you know: "thought it would be funny."

Sorry about that, it won't happen again!

Just remember to sign your posts on talk pages. I write it here, because you may come back to look for potential repliesand then read it. --Pfc432 21:51, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Offtopic: Is there a list where I can get those "categories"?

Maybe it's not the right place to ask something like this, but I was wondering whether there is somewhere a list where I can see all the available caegories to be placed in the user page. I mea, those like the ones which say where the user is from and which languages (s)he speaks. As I saw you have many of them, thought maybe you know. --Pfc432 21:55, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Hey, yeah, there's two ways you can go about adding categories to your user page. You can look at Category:Wikipedians and start digging through its many (, many, many) subcategories that are in there, and add as many as you like to your User page. The other way is through userboxes... userboxes are templates that have categories built into them. If you look at the source code for my user page, you'll see the user boxes right near the top... they are pretty easy to add in. Have a look at Wikipedia:Userboxes and the pages underneath that for lists of the available user boxes (there are a lot of them). Hope this helps! Warrens 22:21, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Build 5456 not a CTP?

I'm just curious, where's your source for this build not being a CTP? Wouldn't the release of this build to MSDN and TechNet make it a CTP? — Alex ^(T|C|E) 21:47, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

A Microsoft employee told me this, noting that the build hasn't undergone the rigourous testing that is normally done with CTPs; aside from that, it's not called a CTP anywhere on Microsoft's sites, it's called simply "Windows Vista Build 5456", and that's the naming that we should stick with. Warrens 21:53, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

Okay, thanks! Robert McLaws made me a little confused. :-) — Alex ^(T|C|E) 21:55, 29 June 2006 (UTC)