Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Archive 30

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Icelandic transliteration

The name "Davíð Oddsson" I assume his name is "David Oddsson" using the 26 letters of the English alphabet. But the proposed new text says: "and Icelandic/Old English "þ" and "ð" to "th"; " implies that this name is "Davíth Oddsson" is that correct? Philip Baird Shearer 11:25, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

The first would indeed be a more conventional rendering. Most Icelanders are used to either using the full Icelandic alphabet or ascii. Rendering 'ð' as 'th' and keeping 'í', like the disputed paragraph says we should do, is certainly unusual. There aren't any official style guides on this, though, and many ad hoc renderings exist. Here's an almost random example: [1] This is the blog of an Icelander living in Germany. He is using a German keyboard to write Icelandic and he uses 't' for 'þ' (e.g. 'tessi' for 'þessi'), while keeping 'ö' since it happens to be used in German as well as Icelandic. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 11:49, 9 October 2005 (UTC)
That's merely a case of your misreading loose wording in the proposed text, in a "for example" statement (a phrase you omitted), something that obviously needs to be tightened up. It's like the difference between "e.g." and "i.e.". There are various transliteration schemes, and that example is sometimes the correct way to do it, and sometimes a different English letter or letters should be substituted. Gene Nygaard 13:36, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Images and colorblindness

Popular vote map by riding
Popular vote map by riding

Is there an appropriate place to recommend a policy on graphics and colorblindness? The map I've copied here from British Columbia general election, 2005 is completely unintelligible to me. It appears to have red for one party and green for another. That would be hard enough for a colorblind person, but the artist elected to use four different shades of each color. That makes it impossible for me to figure out. It's a shame, because the artist obviously worked very hard on the map.

The map at Canadian federal election, 2004 is much easier to read, as there is no green, and bar graphs supplement the coloring.

People who make graphics like this should keep in mind:

  • Try not to use colors that colorblind people have trouble telling apart. Red and green are especially troublesome, but orange/yellow and blue/purple can be too.
  • If you must use red and green, don't use solid red and solid green. Instead, use colors like blue-green and orange-red (the colors of traffic lights).
  • If you are relying on colors to tell the viewer information, consider supplementing the colors with symbols or letters. For example, the map of British Columbia could have used "N" for NDP and "L" for Liberal.

Mwalcoff 01:30, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

Not lessening the above reasons, the map is red and orange, actually, with some shades difficult to casually discern even for someone with excellent color vision. Femto 10:17, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

"ß" "Ð" "Þ" "Ǎ" etc etc

Should this topic be part of the MOS? --Philip Baird Shearer 16:18, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

  • As sad as it is that it is necessary, the WP Manual of Style is the best place for the debate as to whether and how non-English letters should be used in English Wikipedia. --Tysto 22:00, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

Web versus web, Internet versus Internet, etc.

Could someone point me to the policy (if any) on the capitalization of "internet" and "web?" I'm told it's proper to capitalize them both, since they are proper nouns, but many publications have them lowercase now. -- Foofy 21:22, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

As far as this editor is concerned, many publications would be wrong in doing that. ;) --chris.lawson 00:56, 12 October 2005 (UTC)
Here's a usage note on the subject from The American Heritage Dictionary, 4th ed.
The word Web is usually capitalized when referring to the World Wide Web: "Many sites on the Web have information about used cars." In this use, however, the word is increasingly found lowercase, and this usage may become dominant. In any event, the word web need not be capitalized when it applies to technologies that are typically but not exclusively used with the World Wide Web. A web authoring tool, for example, might be one used for the creation of documents using the HTML markup language, for whatever purpose.
—Wayward 01:11, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

I am confused! Is the name "Davíð" then name used in the Icelandic bible for King David?. If so then "Davíð" using the 26 letter of the English alphabet is "David". It is not "Davith". If it is David, are there well known examples (say from the bible or an Icelandic translation of an Engish work like Shakespeare) where an Icelandic name which maps the "ð" to "th". Philip Baird Shearer 17:35, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

King David is "Davíð konungur" in Icelandic - though it does not follow from this that "Davíð" should necessarily be ascii-ized as David. As for your other question I think Macbeth is rendered as "Makbeð" in the Icelandic translation by Helgi Hálfdánarson, but I don't have it at hand to check. I'm not sure if that's relevant, though. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 17:54, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

It has nothing to do with ascii it has to do with the Engish alphabet, (don't go there! -- in all native English speaking schools the alphabet consistes of 26 letters with a dot above the ij and nothing below the line. Just listen to Barny (shudder) if you do not beleave me). Is David in Icelantic almost always written as "Davíð"? How do Icelantic people pronounce "th" is it like the Germans as "t" and an "h"? If so does that mean that any English name like "Thelma and Louise" get changed? Philip Baird Shearer 07:50, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

We pronounce "th" at the start of a word as an aspirated unvoiced palatal-dental plosive, just like we pronounce "t" and just like the Germans pronounce both. I knew an Icelandic girl called "Thelma" and she pronounced her name with a plosive. I don't know if there are any Þelmas out there. We'll usually not "translate" David as Davíð unless it's King David. Any old David that comes along will get to stay David in Icelandic text.
But there are issues of ascii here. Davíð will more frequently get turned into David because an Icelander is writing (in Icelandic, for Icelanders) without an Icelandic keyboard than because of the perceived comfort of English readers. I'm not saying the second consideration doesn't exist, though. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 08:29, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Variant spellings/names in one place?

I have been following the debate about spelling variants for some time. Independently of how this thorny question (pun intended) is resolved, if ever, let me toss out the following idea:

Currently, many of the articles that allow variant spellings, transliterations, or names, include these variants early, typically in brackets right after the definition:

Beijing (help·info) (Chinese: 北京; pinyin: Běijīng; Wade-Giles: Pei-ching; Postal System Pinyin: Peking) is the…
Charlemagne (ca. 742 or 747 – January 28, 814) (or Charles the Great, in German Karl der Große, in Dutch Karel de Grote, in Latin Carolus Magnus, giving rise to the adjective form "Carolingian"), was king…
Zürich (help·info) (German pronunciation: IPA: [ˈtsyrɪç]; usual English spelling: Zurich) is the…

In some cases, this breaks up the flow of the first sentence quite a bit. In many other articles, the variant names are given haphazardly or not at all; sometimes the native spelling is omitted, sometimes a widely-used English form is omitted. Odin has a very extensive list of names in the second paragraph. Gerhard Schröder tells you that, yes, this is indeed the Schroeder you have been reading about in your newspaper, in very small type at the end of the introduction.

Could we lift this information out of the first sentence (or wherever it appears), and have it appear on its own? I don't care where it's displayed, but right after otheruses would be fine with me. To make this painfully concrete:

Beijing

Peking is also the name of an asteroid, see 2045 Peking.
Beijing (help·info) is also known as English: Peking; Chinese: 北京; pinyin: Běijīng; Wade-Giles: Pei-ching; Postal System Pinyin: Peking
Peking is the…

(I don't have any opinion about what the template text should read. I used "XYZ is also know as FOO, BAR, ETC" in this example for concreteness. I also have no opinion on the visual layout of the paragraph. Make it a pastel-coloured side-bar, or a pop-up over the title. I care not.)

The motivation for this is two-fold: (1) to improve reading flow of the first sentence, which is often overloaded with other information already, like date of birth and death, etc. (2) to add semantic mark-up to what ought to also be a navigational aid. Ideally, the variant names are given in the form of a template that might automatically be used for redirection.

Note that this idea is orthogonal to whether or not the variant name is an alternative romanization, a native form, an English form, and accepted English transliteration, a widely-used misspelling or whatever. We all seem to have opinions about which of these forms "is correct" and should consequently form the article title and why. But for the purpose of this suggestion, I merely want to collect these variant names/spellings/transliterations/common misspellings at a well-defined place, and possibly even make it semantically useful. Arbor 12:53, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

An excellent idea. Sometimes I relegate this information to a footnote (as in Ullr) or to a separate section (as in Lóðurr) since it's so unwieldly to have at the top (as in Hárbarðsljóð). But ideally it does belong somewhere where the reader sees it immediately but still doesn't sabotage the first sentence, often riddled with other "must be at top" information. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 16:09, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
See Choir as a possible model. The introductory sentence is unnecessary short in this case, but note how the terminology discussion is set in a separate paragraph. This could never be handled by a template. For Beijing I imagine you'd need an entire section on naming in the body somewhere and just a short abstract at the top. —Wahoofive (talk) 15:07, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
Not bad, but "terminology" should have the same visual emphasis as the title terms "choir" and "chorus". I've changed that detail. —Michael Z. 2005-10-9 16:56 Z

I agree, there should be a paragraph designated to the various names given, as exemplified by Odin. glocks out 23:46, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

The most common English language versions of the name ought to appear on the first line sentence of the article. Using the example above Beijing and Peking should appear in the first paragraph. -- Philip Baird Shearer 08:19, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

If possible, only one title term should be in bold face. Only if two or more title terms are absolutely equal in prominence, and elevating one or the other is controversial, should we resort to having two bold leading title terms (this weakens the visual impact). To me choir seems to be an edge case; "choir" and "chorus" seem like equal synonyms, but I would just pick one to be bold.
Translations should not normally be bold. When there are several synonyms and/or translations, they can be moved to a sentence at the end of the lead paragraph, or to their own paragraph. See a couple of examples at Theodosia and Polesie. —Michael Z. 2005-10-9 16:56 Z

Diacritics

I object to the following which someone is tring to insert into the MOS

Diacritic marks should be kept, but tone marks (language-dependent, often ´, `, ^) may be ignored in non-defining occurrences.

Is the person who using an IP address really saying that if some foreign language uses a diacritic, all articles in English "should" use them? For example do we have to spell Zurich as Zürich in all articles? Philip Baird Shearer 10:17, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Well, yes for names only and mainly for consistency. I'm actually an opponent of using diacritics in article titles when an English name is suitable. For example, I prefer the English spelling Zurich over Zürich, but since Zürich is the preferred spelling in the article itself then it should be the spelling adopted in all articles. --Mark 10:53, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

Then I object strongly. Perhapse you have not read the talk pages at talk:Zürich Perhaps you are not aware that there is a different interpretation of the word Should on the two sides of the pond?. I suggest that the word "Should" is replaced with "may". But in preference delete the whole sentence as it is far too contriversial for the MOS to dictate this.

BTW Mark are you aware of the WP:3RR? Philip Baird Shearer 11:36, 9 October 2005 (UTC)

What do you mean of the difference of the word 'should' on both sides of the pond? I'm from Australia, mate. You obviously didn't read my message properly, read it again. And if you're going to be so picky, 'perhaps' is spelt with no 'e', check your spelling MATE! It only makes sense with consistency to use diacritics for all words in which that word uses diacritics itself in its own article. You people really take yourselves too seriously, lighten up. --Mark 13:26, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

Spelling mistakes and typos happen. This is a talk page so no harm done and on an article page you can always fix others spelling mistakes. So "should" I assume that you are you are aware of the difference on either side of the pond or not? Philip Baird Shearer 16:18, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

No, please educate me on the differences of "should" on both sides of the Atlantic, I always assumed it was the same? Mark 05:46, 13 October 2005 (UTC)

Disputed tag at National varieties of English

There is a Disputed tag after the last bullet point (Indian English) under National varieties of English. I can't see from this Talk page (or the archives) what factual information in that section is disputed.

From the history it seems that User:Maurreen first placed the Disputed tag in Revision as of 2005-09-27 10:48:53, on the following first-level bullet, "When abbreviating 'United States'". The tag remained, though the change to the text of that bullet point petered out in a couple of days.

Then user 63.215.248.3, in Revision as of 2005-09-30 12:56:45, inserted a line break at the start of that bullet point, which had the effect of isolating the Disputed tag and making it appear to apply to the preceding "Indian English" sub-bullet.

User 203.164.184.23 removed the Disputed tag with the Revision as of 2005-10-09 03:30:17, but that change got reverted as a side effect of removing a separate tag about the ever-popular usage of eth and thorn. It looks like the Disputed tag ought to be a separate issue.

I propose removing the Disputed tag. If someone can clarify what the dispute is about, please make a note of it in this section. Thanks!

JDLH | Talk 05:13, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

Yes, this should probably be removed one way or another. If something is disputed it doesn't really belong in the MOS anyway. I'll remove the tag since it was I who reinserted it as a side effect of the revert war. Collateral damage, I guess. If someone wants to dispute this U.S. abbreviation thing then let her speak now. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 06:29, 10 October 2005 (UTC)

If Winston Churchill had been a diacritics crusader

The following is an attempt at humour - please don't read it as anything else.

We shall go on to the end, we shall fight on the French pages, we shall fight on the talk pages and the policy pages, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength on Wikipedia:Requested moves, we shall defend our Wikipedia, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the naming conventions pages, we shall fight on the manual of style pages, we shall fight on Talk:Zürich and Talk:Gdańsk, we shall fight on the mailing lists; we shall never surrender, and even if, which I do not for a moment believe, this Wikipedia or a large part of it were subjugated and starving of diacritics, then other Wikimedia projects across the Internet, armed and guarded by the Unicode standard, would carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time, the New Projects, with all their power and might, step forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old.

WAHAHAHA. That's hilarious. Not really relevant, but certainly hilarious and a roughly accurate description of this ongoing mess over diacritics. --Coolcaesar 17:10, 10 October 2005 (UTC)
Speaking of which, nobody ever gave the editors of Talk:Zürich and Talk:Gdańsk any authority to determine the usage for the rest of Wikipedia, did they? Those aren't Wikiprojects, and they aren't the Manual of Style. I think that "loud" (huge red box) and obnoxious Danzig/Gdańsk template, with its claim that other articles are "affected" by any decision there and that the "following rules apply" to other articles, should be deleted.
Compare the frequent discussion on Talk:Aluminium which has also spilled over onto the MoS pages; they do not claim that because the editors chose to use "aluminium" on that page (supposedly, not on the basis of national varieties of English, but rather on a particular professional organizations supposed "preference" of one of the two spellings it considers "acceptable"), that all Wikipedia articles must use aluminium rather than aluminum. When someone wanted to consider that as a possible guideline, that's when the discussion was moved from the talk page of an obscure-to-many-editors article to the MoS talk pages, because it wouldn't be right for the editors of aluminium to make that determination for all articles. Gene Nygaard 14:01, 11 October 2005 (UTC)
I agree with Gene. I'm mystified by the mock Churchill speech. Do you see this as some kind of war? If you are looking for quotations, I think Martin Luther said something about putting things in a language understood by most of the people. CDThieme 15:00, 11 October 2005 (UTC)
Please see the disclaimer above the text. Coolcaesar found it funny (thank you, btw :) You should feel free not do find it funny. But you don't have to be mystified or read something into it that's not there. If anything I'm poking fun of myself. - Haukur Þorgeirsson 18:29, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

Hyphens

What do you think of adding such a subsection:

Hyphens

When two or more words modify the same noun, they should be connected with hyphens. For example:

In the first sentence, "Canadian" and "football" are separate modifiers. In the second sentence, "Canadian-football" is a compound adjective.

Exceptions:

  1. Hyphens should never be used after adverbs that end in "ly." (Write "a slowly cooked meal," not "a slowly-cooked meal.")
  2. If there is no risk of confusion, the hyphen may be omitted from a two-word modifier. In the sentence, "I failed a high-school class," the hyphen is optional.
  3. If the double modifier is a single Wikilink, the hyphen may be omitted, as in the following sentence: "Printers is a Canadian football player."

Mwalcoff 03:59, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

I don't believe your proposal accords with standard punctuation rules, jguk 06:43, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
Actually, most of this advice is pretty much what my copy of Oxford American Guide to Usage and Style says: "When a phrase functionas as an adjective...the phrase should ordinarily be hyphenated. Most professional writers know this; most nonprofessionals don't". There are a few exceptions for how this proposal differs with the Oxford guidance: -ly adverbs in longer phrases should be hyphenated (the not-so-hotly-contested race), and the Oxford guide's author Bryan Garner recommends never omitting the hyphen if it's "optional", although he acknowledges that other style guides have different advice on that point. Probably wikilinked phrasal adjectives should be puntuated identically to plaintext phrasal adjectives. Nohat 08:22, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

Using them to help the reader follow what written word is really the adjective is okay. But hyphens aren't panaceas, and where the phrase would be ambiguous if spoken, we shouldn't rely on the hyphen to do the job when writing, so write the "man who plays Canadian football" rather than the "Canadian-football player" and the "Canadian who plays football" rather than the "Canadian football player", jguk 08:42, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

"When two or more words modify the same noun" is too broad. No one would call Wikipedia "a valuable-online resource". The rules are elaborated in the Hyphen article. Perhaps the MoS could simply refer to that article. JamesMLane 11:07, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
I agree that the wording in the proposal is too imprecise. "When two or more words modify the same noun" almost sounds like the description of coordinate adjectives (two or more adjectives that modify the noun in a similar fashion, e.g., "the tall, slender, attractive woman"). —Wayward Talk 12:03, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
I'm open to other wordings. I was trying to avoid the jargony "compound modifier," but if someone can think of a better way to say it, please do so. -- Mwalcoff 16:37, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
People have a range of views on hyphens. Many references suggest that people use hyphens more frequently than they deserve.
  • generally be sparing with hyphens and run together words where the sense suggests and where they look familiar and right; eg, blacklist, businessman, goldmine, knockout, intercontinental, motorcycle, takeover, and walkover. Unusual hyphenations will be listed separately in this Style Guide. However, a few guidelines can be specified:
  • usually run together prefixes except where the last letter of the prefix is the same as the first letter of the word to which it attaches: prearrange, postwar, prewar, nonconformist; but pre-empt, co-ordinate, co-operate, re-establish.
  • hyphenate generally in composites where the same two letters come together, eg, film-makers, but an exception should be made for double r in the middle: override, overrule (not over-ride etc), and note granddaughter and goddaughter.
  • generally do not use dangling hyphens - say full and part-time employment etc; but this does not apply to prefixes - pre- or post-match drinks.
  • always use a hyphen rather than a slash (/) in dates etc - 1982-83 (not 1982/83)
  • when they are used to qualify adjectives, the joining hyphen is rarely needed, eg, heavily pregnant, classically carved, colourfully decorated. But in some cases, such as well-founded, ill-educated, the compound looks better with the hyphen. The best guidance is to use the hyphen in these phrases as little as possible or when the phrase would otherwise be ambiguous
  • when they are used to qualify adjectives, the joining hyphen is rarely needed, eg, heavily pregnant, classically carved, colourfully decorated. But in some cases, such as well-founded, ill-educated, the compound looks better with the hyphen. The best guidance is to use the hyphen in these phrases as little as possible or when the phrase would otherwise be ambiguous
  • Do not use a hyphen unless it serves a purpose. If a compound adjective cannot be misread or, as with many [...] terms, its meaning is established, a hyphen is not necessary. For example: 'covert learning techniques' 'health care reform' 'day treatment program' 'sex role differences' 'grade point average'.
  • In a temporary compound that is used as an adjective before a noun, use a hyphen if the term can be misread or if the term expresses a single thought (i.e., all words together modify the noun).
  • For example: “the adolescents resided in two parent homes” means that two homes served as residences, whereas if the adolescents resided in “two-parent homes,” they each would live in a household headed by two parents.
  • A properly placed hyphen helps the reader understand the intended meaning.
  • Most compound adjective rules are applicable only when the compound adjective precedes the term it modifies. If a compound adjective follows the term, do not use a hyphen, because relationships are sufficiently clear without one.
  • Hyphens tend to clutter up text (particularly when the computer breaks already hyphenated words at the end of lines).... Do use hyphens where not using one would be ambiguous, eg to distinguish "black-cab drivers come under attack" from "black cab-drivers come under attack". Do not use after adverbs ending in -ly, eg politically naive, wholly owned, but hyphens are needed with short and common adverbs, eg ill-prepared report, hard-bitten hack, much-needed grammar lesson, well-established principle of style (note though that in the construction "the principle of style is well established" there is no need to hyphenate). Finally, do use hyphens to form compound adjectives, eg two-tonne vessel, three-year deal, 19th-century artist
  • The hyphen has a number of uses, most of them confusing... If you take the hyphen seriously, you will surely go mad. Even Fowler’s Modern English Usage (ELBS and Oxford University Press) is harsh on the hyphen, quoting Winston Churchill’s famous dictum: One must regard the hyphen as a blemish to be avoided as far as possible. In protesting against the hyphen, Churchill argued ‘that you may run them together or leave them apart, except when nature revolts’
In many cases people use hyphens too much because they have fuzzy knowledge of hyphenation rules and think it is a matter of spelling. In most cases, they hyphen is just another tool to help the reader choose between two reasonable interpretations of the text. The Canadian football player example is a good one. As far as I can see, the styleguides quoted above seem reasonable. Bobblewik 13:45, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
We could do away with a number of hyphens by adopting American spelling. :) —Wayward Talk 22:23, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
I guess there is more uncertainty about hyphens than I thought. I learned AP Style, where you always use a hyphen in double modifiers unless it's an -ly adverb. I brought this up because I had written "The Trojans won their 27th-straight game," and someone deleted the hyphen. I figured that without the hyphen, the sentence meant that there is something called a "straight game," and the Trojans won their 27th. Who's right? -- Mwalcoff 16:37, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
IMHO, you're right. The phrase could be misread; the hyphen removed any ambiguity. —Wayward Talk 22:23, 16 October 2005 (UTC)
I do not think a hyphen is necessary. In my opinion, there is only one reasonable interpretation of The Trojans won their 27th straight game. I do not believe any other interpretation is reasonable. Other authors seem to think the same:
Anyway, I think the phrase itself is clumsy and colloquial. That may be the source of any ambiguity that you guys perceive. I would be inclined to use an explicit phrase such as 27th consecutive game or 27th game in a row. Bobblewik 13:01, 17 October 2005 (UTC)
I do not understand the suggestion by Wayward that American spelling has fewer hyphens. Please can I see an example? Bobblewik 13:07, 17 October 2005 (UTC)