User talk:Maralia/Archive 3

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Archive This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
Talk archives for User:Maralia (current talk page)
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Contents

Craving a boon ....

I don't suppose you have time to copy-edit a FAC, do you? It's Hindu-German Conspiracy, which is a much better read than its title might suggest. The editor has worked long and hard on it, and produced a very good article but the English isn't FAC quality. The problems are mostly about cumbersome construction and it would benefit enormously from the light but effective touch that characterises your copy-edits. --ROGER DAVIES talk 23:58, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

How can I possibly refuse a request couched in such masterful ego-stroking? I simply must finish some MOS fixes to FAC Belarus first, but then I'm your (wo)man. Maralia 00:28, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
Thank you so much. It's very much appreciated :)) --ROGER DAVIES talk 01:03, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Re: Hindu-German Conspiracy

Hello Maralia, yes, it seems to have worked fine except one small thing which I have now corrected. Please carry on and let me know if there is something that needs clarified. Much appreciate your help.Rueben lys (talk) 12:32, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Okay, thanks. One thing I'll ask you to watch for: I will of course retain your British English, but I'm hopelessly American, so please keep an eye on my edits to help me make sure I don't introduce any Americanized English by mistake. Thanks. Maralia (talk) 22:30, 10 December 2007 (UTC)
I am not really much bothered wether its British English or American English (or french English, for that matter) as long it makes sense and is understandable. Change it all to American if its easier for your. Again, thanks a heap, you have no idea how much I appreciate this.Rueben lys (talk) 01:05, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
Good job! Happy (copy)editing! KnowledgeHegemony 16:56, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
Thanks. This one is difficult, as I'm wholly ignorant of the subject matter, and largely unfamiliar with the (hundreds of) historical events mentioned as leading up to it. Ignorance can be useful for a reviewer (no really, it can), but it's largely a handicap for a copyeditor, so it's taking a lot of extra reading and reflection to get this one right. Maralia (talk) 18:03, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
I'll keep an eye on the Engvar, if that helps. I'm sorry it's proving a chore, I really am. --ROGER DAVIES talk 21:35, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
It's not a chore! Truly, for such a complex subject it's very well written, as evidenced by my ability to comprehend it, albeit slowly, despite my ignorance. I only lament the resulting snail's pace at which my copyedit is proceeding. As for EngVar: in rewording some content, I properly used 'organised' today—perhaps I am reformable after all :) Maralia (talk) 22:30, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
Impressed I am. Shout if help you need. --ROGER DAVIES talk 23:44, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Hindu-German Conspiracy

Hello Maralia. First of all, a lot of thanks for your efforts as well as comments in the Hindu-German Conspiracy FAC which unfortunately did not work out. However, I worked through article quite a lot today, taking into account Sandy's comments, and think I have done a (half-)decent job editing it. Do you reckon you will have time to look at the article some time and give me some more comments on where it might fall short on an FAC. I gathered language was the main (if not only) problem that stopped it from getting promoted. I plan to renominate it sometime soon. RegardsRueben lys (talk) 00:41, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm confident we can get it to FA, and I will continue working on it with you. I do feel, though, that it still needs a lot of copyedit work (I'm only halfway through the article yet, and this is just a first pass copyedit), and we can definitely trim some sections to reduce the length without unduly affecting the coverage. It is your article and you should do as you feel best, but I would strongly suggest that it not be renominated until a thorough copyedit is complete—it's such a long article that I really don't think copyedit concerns can be adequately addressed in the FAC process.
I'd like to finish my first pass copyedit—by the end of which I should be relatively well versed in the topic—and then tackle trimming for length/depth of coverage. After that, it will need another copyedit (there are definitely some sections I've already 'done' that I'm not really satisfied with), but that would go much faster than my snail's-pace first pass.
How do you feel about this plan? I don't think it would result in renomination 'soon' but personally I think it's what the article needs to get to FA. Maralia (talk) 03:40, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
OakidoakesRueben lys (talk) 13:13, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
Good news: my first pass copyedit is done, and both the article and I survived :) I'm going to start thinking about areas that can be trimmed. If possible, I think it would be helpful to have a realtime discussion at some point soonish; are you amenable? I'm not sure how feasible it would be with our timezones—I'm UTC -5—but I figured it's worth asking. I use AIM, or IRC could be an option, although I haven't used it before. My email is enabled if you'd like to exchange info. Of course, we can manage without, but I think we could speed up the process if we could exchange ideas a bit faster. Maralia (talk) 05:14, 17 December 2007 (UTC)
Wow, thanks for that. Real time chat sounds good. I am in GMT (cant get my head around UTC and all that). I use Gmail, so will sent you an email right now with the address (and/or send you an invite), does that sound ok?Rueben lys (talk) 17:13, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

RMS Strathaird

Thanks for the note and the tidy. I don't think I'm going to make a habit of ship articles, but Strathaird fills in a potential redlink in what the Cricket Project hopes will be its first featured topic, a series of articles related to the 1948 Australian tour of England, its personalities and the matches played. Anyway, it's fun to get out into an area I know absolutely nothing about occasionally, and I found it interesting stuff. It's also nice to go into an area where "mid-importance" articles are still there to be written: in cricket, most of them have already been done! Johnlp (talk) 12:29, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Thank you!

Thank you very much [1]! Coming from such a well-regarded editor as yourself, this is high praise indeed!! --Kralizec! (talk) 17:10, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

You deserved every word of it, and more. While I have your attention: I've just added in the barnstar code a comment that links back to the template, so that substitutions are traceable. Could you sneak that line of code into any barnstars you've given out, or are otherwise aware of, so we can use Special:Whatlinkshere/Template:WikiProject Ships Barnstar as a roughly historical record? Thanks. Maralia (talk) 18:12, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

League of Copyeditors roll call

Greetings from the League of Copyeditors. Your name is listed on our members page, but we are unsure how many of the people listed there are still active contributors to the League's activities. If you are still interested in participating in the work of the League, please follow the instructions at the members page to add your name to the active members list. Once you have done that, you might want to familiarise yourself with the new requests system, which has replaced the old /proofreading subpage. As the old system is now deprecated, the main efforts of the League should be to clear the substantial backlog which still exists there.
The League's services are in as high demand as ever, as evinced by the increasing backlog on our requests pages, both old and new. While FA and GA reviewers regularly praise the League's contributions to reviewed articles, we remain perennially understaffed. Fulfilling requests to polish the prose of Wikipedia's highest-profile articles is a way that editors can make a very noticeable difference to the appearance of the encyclopedia. On behalf of the League, if you do consider yourself to have left, I hope you will consider rejoining; if you consider yourself inactive, I hope you will consider returning to respond to just one request per week, or as many as you can manage. Merry Christmas and happy editing, The League of Copyeditors.

Melon‑Bot (STOP!) 18:21, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Mazagon Dock Limited

Good job on the Mazagon Dock Limited major edit. Thanks. Can you perhaps have another look at Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers and Goa Shipyard Limited too?--PremKudvaTalk 04:10, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I've done Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers; will get to the other one shortly. Maralia (talk) 06:15, 3 January 2008 (UTC)
I just saw edit Garden Reach Shipbuilders and Engineers am quite pleased with the results. Thanks a lot once again:-)--PremKudvaTalk 11:09, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Happy New Year

Firstly, let me wish you a very happy New Year and thank you for all your help in the recent Milhist Tag & Assess 2007 drive.

Secondly, although the Tag & Assess 2007 drive is now officially closed, you are very welcome to continue tagging and assessing until 31 January 2008. Any articles you tag and assess during this time will be credited fully to your tagging tally for further award purposes.

Thirdly, if you have the time, it would be good to have your feedback/comments on the drive at the Tag & Assess workshop

Thanks again for your help, --ROGER DAVIES talk 09:54, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks very much for your thoughtful and useful observations. If you don't mind, I'll paste them into the workshop page as they deserve further consideration. --ROGER DAVIES talk 01:15, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
I don't mind at all—I just didn't want to take over the page with my musings :) Maralia (talk) 03:23, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
Done by your e-manuensis (groan). It'd be great if you could find the time to wade into the clutter, particularly on the draft FAQ section wot I'm about to create :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 19:23, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
Link to Draft FAQ. --ROGER DAVIES talk 19:28, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
'E-manuensis' is without a doubt the single best thing ever posted on my talk page. It may also be the worst thing ever posted on my talk page, but that 'honor' is less likely to stand the test of time.;) Maralia (talk) 04:16, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Queluz National Palace

This article, to which you contributed, will be featured on the Main Page on January 5, 2008.[2] Risker (talk) 17:50, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Re: Template:Submarine

Well, since you asked... ;-)

{{Infobox Ship Example}} does not, as far as I can tell, support the surface/submerged distinction that {{submarine}} makes. If you can come up with some simple way of dealing with that, we can go ahead and convert it (but keep in mind that the participants from our side won't necessarily know anything about ships, so the instructions do need to be reasonably simple).

As an aside, it would be really helpful if you guys could put together some detailed documentation (i.e. what each field is to be used for, and so forth) for the new infobox. Kirill 21:15, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Good Articles January Newsletter

Happy New Year! Here is the latest edition of the WikiProject GA Newsletter! Dr. Cash (talk) 04:02, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Nautical cats

Since I seem to have a strange affinity with seagoing animals, I give you the heart warming and occasionally tear jerking story of...the Ship's cat! Benea (talk) 21:15, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter — Issue XXII (December 2007)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter
Issue XXII (December 2007)
Project news
Articles of note

New featured articles:

  1. Battle of Albuera
  2. Battle of Dyrrhachium (1081)
  3. Battle of the Gebora
  4. Constantine II of Scotland
  5. Francis Harvey
  6. Vasa (ship)
  7. Wulfhere of Mercia

New A-Class articles:

  1. 1962 South Vietnamese Presidential Palace bombing
  2. Evacuation of East Prussia
Current proposals and discussions
Awards and honors
  • Blnguyen has been awarded the WikiChevrons with Oak Leaves in recognition of his efforts in improving the quality of articles related to Vietnamese military history, including the creation of numerous A-Class articles.
  • Woodym555 has been awarded the WikiChevrons with Oak Leaves in recognition of his outstanding work on topics related to the Victoria Cross, notably including the creation of featured articles, featured lists, and a featured topic.
  • For their outstanding efforts as part of Tag & Assess 2007, Bedford, TomStar81, and Parsival74 have been awarded the gold, silver, and bronze Wikis, respectively.
Tag & Assess 2007

Tag & Assess 2007 is now officially over, with slightly under 68,000 articles processed. The top twenty scores are as follows:

1. Bedford — 7,600
2. TomStar81 — 5,500
3. Parsival74 — 5,200
4. FayssalF — 3,500
5. Roger Davies — 3,000
6. Ouro — 2600
7. Kateshortforbob — 2250
8. Cromdog — 2,200
9. BrokenSphere — 2000
9. Jacksinterweb — 2,000
9. Maralia — 2,000
12. MBK004 — 1,340
13. JKBrooks85 — 1,250
14. Sniperz11 — 1100
15. Burzmali — 1000
15. Cplakidas — 1000
15. Gimme danger — 1000
15. Raoulduke471000
15. TicketMan — 1000
15. Welsh — 1000
15. Blnguyen — 1000

Although the drive is officially closed, existing participants can continue tagging until January 31 if they wish, with the extra tags counting towards their tally for barnstar purposes.

We'd like to see what lessons can be learned from this drive, so we've set up a feedback workshop. Comments and feedback from participants and non-participants alike are very welcome and appreciated.

To stop receiving this newsletter, or to receive it in a different format, please list yourself in the appropriate section here.


Note: This newsletter was automatically delivered. Regards from the automated, Anibot (talk) 23:49, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

{{Infobox Polish Navy}}

I've finished converting all of the article namespace instances of {{Infobox Polish Navy}} to use {{Infobox Ship Begin}}. What gets done to the old template now? — Bellhalla (talk) 23:13, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Great! I don't see it being useful as a redirect, so it should be nominated for deletion. Let me know if you need a hand with that. Thanks! Maralia (talk) 05:18, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

Diaper blues

The twins must have been hitting a stash of prunes when I was not looking, `cause I have changed about a dozen diapers so far today. When did you start potty training? My eldest was potty trained by about 2.5 (much like his daddy, he is detail oriented), but his sisters show very little interest. --Kralizec! (talk) 18:09, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

I answered via email :) Maralia (talk) 21:58, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Edit revert

Apologies. I wasn't aware that US English spelt "cancelled" with one l - once again, my apologies. Regards, Rudget. 19:10, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

No worries; I suffer the same general affliction in reverse :) To clarify this particular distinction: American English does not double many consonants that are commonly doubled in British English—examples are the American English modeled, fueling, and traveler. Maralia (talk) 19:58, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
You learn something new everyday. I really never knew that, guess I should have paid more attention in lessons. :) Thanks once again, Rudget. 20:00, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Moving 'source' Templates to Talk Page

Good idea - I like it. I'll follow your idea from now - thanks WikiWriter (talk) 08:47, 19 January 2008 (UTC)


IRC cloak request

I am Maralia on freenode and I would like the cloak wikimedia/Maralia. Thanks. --Maralia (talk) 18:07, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

USS Ronald Reagan

Hello. I appologize for incorrectly stating that the USS Ronald Reagan was the first Navy ship to be named in honor of a living former president, rather it was the first aircraft carrier to be named in honor of a living former president. I read it wrong. See:

Sorry about that, but I think it merits inclusion with my clarification and citations. Thanks, Happyme22 (talk) 22:27, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Ahh, you were going for carrier in there. Yes, that's entirely credible. No further objections, sir—carry on! Maralia (talk) 22:43, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Sorry about that. Thanks! Happyme22 (talk) 23:17, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
I could swear that I removed the erroneously phrased sentence from Ronald Reagan right after I removed it from the ship article, but it's still there. Please do tweak it there as well. Maralia (talk) 00:20, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
I fixed the carrier thing in the RR article and nice catch with the navy ship naming. Best, Happyme22 (talk) 18:32, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Re:HGC

Hi Maralia. Yes, I cant say I am not glad its been promoted, and not least its thanks to you guys who also helped out. I think I am more or less done with getting out on new articles on the topic, although I might start another one or two on people on the counter-intelligence, but I cant see any major split article in the horizon, so feel free to hack right through. Much appreciate your help. rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 17:51, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

Rollback

Would you be interested in having rollback to revert vandalism? I would gladly assign the user-rights if you want it. I trust that you will not abuse this privilege and you will find it useful if you ever need to revert vandalism from pages you have watchlisted. Let me know, -MBK004 21:04, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes I would, thanks; I used to do a fair amount of recent changes patrolling, but since rollback came out, I can rarely get a reversion in without someone beating me to it! Maralia (talk) 22:43, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Done. Take a look at these two places before utilizing your new tool in the fight against vandals.
Also, if you ever want to relenquish rollback, just ask any admin and they can remove the rights from your account. -MBK004 22:47, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

theater

Just saw your edit to Judy Garland re "theater" --> "theatre". Shouldn't all the instances of "theatre" have been changed instead, since the subject is American? Regards, Melty girl (talk) 18:40, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Probably. But because it's up for FA, and many of the named theaters in the article are actually spelled 'theatre', I figured I would hold off and post it as an issue for the FAC discussion. Maralia (talk) 18:47, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
Gotcha. I do think though that all generic mentions should be "theater" as per American English, while any proper noun should be spelled as per the official name. Don't think there's really a conflict there. Glad you're reviewing! --Melty girl (talk) 20:04, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Reese Witherspoon

Hi just want to say congrats on the FA. That's a great article. Hopefuly there are more to come!! I would strongly welcome you at Wikipedia:WikiProject Actors and Filmmakers. Please feel free to join. Congratulations ♦ Sir Blofeld ♦ $1,000,000? 20:08, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Good Articles Newsletter

The February 2008 issue of the WikiProject Good Articles Newsletter is ready! Dr. Cash (talk) 05:24, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

HMAS Melbourne peer review

I've put the Evans collision section on the slab and had a bit of a tinker, per your comments about possible COI issues. At the moment, the underlined sections are still cited to Jo Stevenson, while the plain sections are cited to other authors.

Please have a look and comment on its progress. -- saberwyn 07:12, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the note—I'll take a look at it soon. If I haven't gotten to it in a few days, please do remind me; I'm in the midst of several FA reviews but I don't want to forget you. Thanks. Maralia (talk) 00:31, 3 February 2008 (UTC)
This is your requested poke on having a squiz at the rewrite-in-progress section. You may also be interested in this diff, where I've cut out some of the more detailed material which would be better suited to either the article on Frank E Evans or the collision subarticle. -- saberwyn 08:44, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
This is your second poke... I think the section is as good as it is going to get (bar a bit of a spitshine). There is one cite of Stevenson in the article, but that is because I can find no other source for the dates of the inquiry, or the names of the two Americans other than Admiral King assigned to the BoI. Some of the more detailed information has either been ported out to the Melbourne-Evans collision article or deleted altogether. Your thoughts? -- saberwyn 09:29, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
Rats, I missed that previous note. Really sorry. I'll make a point of going over it tonight. Thanks for being so patient with me. Maralia (talk) 19:22, 12 February 2008 (UTC)
You've mainly addressed my sourcing concern, thanks; I know it must have been a fair amount of work. I remain concerned, though, about comments like "King...was seen...to be biased", "King's attitude, performance, and conflict of interest were criticised by ... the Press", and "significant attempts were made to reduce the US destroyer's culpability and place partial blame for the incident on Melbourne". You have sourced all those statements, but they are unattributed in the text, and therefore come across as some sort of global condemnation rather than the reaction of an aggrieved party in a dispute. By way of comparison, imagine if I quoted "Stevenson was seen to be careless and negligent" and "the RAN was criticized for attempting a coverup", all referenced to American books but not qualified in the text as American opinion/reaction—I completely made those up, obviously, but I hope you can see the problem.
Since we can't find any significant non-US and non-Australian coverage, it seems like the best way to proceed might be to compartmentalize the two 'sides' and present them as such in the article. I propose a reorg of the Inquiry section:
  1. Proceedings - a strictly factual summary of the inquiry proceedings (who, when, where, etc and the official findings)
  2. Reaction in the US - the subsequent 3 courts-martial
  3. Reaction in Australia - controversy over King's selection as president, accusations of bias in the proceedings, and info about Stevenson's court-martial and effect on his career
I think this would alleviate most of my concerns about POV here. What do you think? (and my apologies for proposing what will likely, in the end, be more work for you.) Maralia (talk) 04:31, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
Half of me wants to get this article to FA, but the other just wants it gone already. I'll have a bit of a play around over the next few weeks... work on this is gonna slow down because university is going to start up again in the immediate future, so Melbourne is kicked onto the backburner, and I'm going to have difficulty accessing the books I need. I'm also concerned that I lack the NPOV required to fix this section.
I'm gonna insert the section into the article (because its better than what's there now), slap an NPOV tag on it (because its still not good enough), and try to continue to work on it over the near future. -- saberwyn 06:45, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
Okay. I'm sorry it's gotten so tiresome. Do you mind telling me what you think of my suggestion above? If you are okay with it, I might implement it myself to see if it feels better. I don't want to muck with it if you object, though. Maralia (talk) 15:08, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
Its not your fault... when I began this I thought I'd have it complete by Xmas and presented to FAC by mid-late January. Stuff happened. Oh well.
Any NPOV is good NPOV, but my main concerns are that any additional material will bloat the section (by my eye it is the largest section in the article in its current form), and in turn will add 'somewhat irrelevant' (I use these words very loosely) material to an article about Melbourne. My crazy idea was that the basic Melbourne-related stuff would be in this article, the basic Evans stuff would be in the Frank E. Evans article, and everything + additional detail and nitpickery would be in the Melbourne-Evans collision article. Maybe that's not the way to go. Also, the section itself may appear lopsided if broken up the way you suggest, because of the all-Australian/no-American sourcing issue. The Americans reprimand 3 officers and get it over and done with while the Australians whinge and moan and complain and let the one guy off the hook anyway.
Feel free to mess around with it if you wish, although you seem very busy at the moment, and I don't want to overload your efforts. If you really want to be awesome and play with it, I can email you the Death of a Destroyer article by Sherbo and with a few days delay scan and email the 8-10 pages Frame has to say on the subject, so that you have some of the sources at hand and can alter the section accordingly. -- saberwyn 11:07, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
I think I'd start with a draft reorg of the inquiry section of the collision article, actually. It probably will appear lopsided, but that portion of the story itself really is rather lopsided, so perhaps that's okay. I'd love to read the Sherbo article (my email is enabled), but if it's much trouble to scan the Frame, don't put yourself out—it might be quite a while before I get to this. Thanks! Maralia (talk) 17:29, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm back! Sorry to bother you again, but I've recently received a suggestion from Nick Dowling about cutting the investigation material for each collision down to a paragraph, and letting the subarticles deal with all the nitty gritty. Does the article as it currently stands satisfy your immediate concerns about NPOV/balance? -- saberwyn 04:23, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I'll take a look at it now. Maralia (talk) 04:32, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
From a POV standpoint, that paragraph looks fine. I've tweaked it a bit to clarify a few minor points and to make it flow better. On a different note, if you're thinking of going for FA soonish, I do see some reference formatting issues that I could help with. Let me know. Maralia (talk) 04:49, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
Lets fix them sooner rather than later. What's wrong with them? -- saberwyn 05:50, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
On the whole the citations look very good, but when I edited the collision section, I noticed some minor inconsistencies in citation punctuation. As an example, consider Hobbs, pp. 5-6. vs Hall, pp 16, 72, 83: the former has punctuation after the pp and at the end, while the latter has neither. Another quibbling point at FA would be that endashes, rather than plain old hyphens, should be used in page ranges and time/date ranges (like in the infobox). And with that, I'm off for the night - catch up with you tomorrow. Maralia (talk) 06:12, 2 March 2008 (UTC)
I'll play with it while you get some much deserved sleep. Look in sometime tomorrow for the result. -- saberwyn 06:18, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

sigh...

How can we get User:Prof .Woodruff to stop making so many new articles that need tons and tons of work? I'm not good with the type of wrangling that is needed here. I don't know why I'm asking you.... heh. It just seems that I end up following him around making hundreds of corrections to his articles. I think one day I had to redirect 8 of his new entries to articles that already existed. I tried the invite to the ships project in the hope that he would visit and catch on but no response there. --Brad (talk) 16:23, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

It's frustrating, I know; I've cleaned up plenty of his cut and paste work myself. Since you and Benea have been taking such good care of Wikipedia:WikiProject Ships/New articles I had kind of forgotten about him. I see that he's getting better, at least wikifying some of his new articles a bit, but yeah, duplicates are a concern, too. I'll drop him a note today. Maralia (talk) 17:41, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
Thanks :) I do agree that he has improved a lot from a few months ago but the ratio of people cleaning vs the ratio of how many new articles he creates in one week is a losing battle. Seems counter-productive to tell someone to stop making new articles but it's one reason there are so few ship articles past start class. --Brad (talk) 19:11, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
Speaking of ship articles past start class, I did do rather extensive image research for USS Constitution. I have to put my list into a format comprehensible to humans, though :) I'll let you know when I have something respectable to show you. Maralia (talk) 19:17, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
I did find Image:Chase of the Constitution, July 1812.jpg which was nice but it didn't look right when placed into the infobox so I put it down under the War of 1812 section. Thanks for reminding me about Constitution, I have to set my sights back onto it. --Brad (talk) 21:21, 1 February 2008 (UTC)

I've left him a note finally User_talk:Prof_.Woodruff#Adding_new_ship_articles. Hopefully I wasn't too mean and nasty. --Brad (talk) 23:38, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

I completely forgot to leave him a note. Do feel free to pester me about things I've promised; I'm shamefully forgetful lately. Looks like he has almost never posted to talk pages, but I hope he at least reads it. If things don't improve, let me know and I'll give it a go. Maralia (talk) 04:08, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
No problem..Nothing on WP is that important where something must be done immediately. I saw an opening with the duplicate articles to say something constructive about his article creation volume. About another issue though.. would you care to discuss another bot assessment run on ship articles? --Brad (talk) 02:01, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
Yes, absolutely, but I want to get the new articles ruleset tightened up first so we're missing less incoming new ones. I am really mystified about it missing Prof Woodruff's articles, and I kind of let that stall me out even though there's a long list of obvious improvements I can make regardless of that mystery. I'll get back to playing with that; bug me again about bot tagging in a week or so if you can remember :) Maralia (talk) 04:34, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

KoJca

In re: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=USS_Koka_%28AT-31%29&diff=188679411&oldid=188677038, DOH! Must be going blind. Yeah, trying do dig up dirt to try to push USS Constitution to GA. --J Clear (talk) 23:25, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

No worries. I need to get my butt in gear and get back to working on the images for that, too. Maralia (talk) 00:26, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXIII (January 2008)

The January 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.
This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 00:31, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

SS Christopher Columbus almost ready?

Hi... It's been way too long but I think I got all the changes suggested back in November! made. What spurred me was sheepishness that you were editing and I wasn't. What do you think? Ready for a run at FA yet? I'd appreciate your input/suggestions, etc. :) And yes it was because I was here, planning to ask you about this very thing... but got distracted and saw the USS Constitution article ref which led me to reading and then wondering, that caused that post about "in ordinary" :) ++Lar: t/c 12:43, 5 February 2008 (UTC)

I thought you'd never ask! Of course, when you finally did, just as I finished reading your post, my damn power went out (and stayed out for 6 flipping hours). Irritating!
I have been participating in FAC reviews quite a bit lately; I think I've actually learned something, so I should probably give old CC another run through the wringer before you/we nom her. I'll take a look at her shortly, once I get the kid to sleep. Maralia (talk) 02:17, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
cool... thanks for being willing to take another pass. Part of what was holding me back was the concern that I wouldn't have the block of time to address the issues that might be raised.... I think I'm there now. Maybe. :) Hope all is well at your place, when we lose power it's always an uproar even though we have a generator (lots of ice storms, so we lose it a fair bit.) FA looks like something you can't really pre-create the pages and things, as it seems like bots do some of the work etc. I think I am going to create the base nom page but not place the FA notice on the talk or embed the nom in the FAC page till things are good to go. Should I create stubs for some of the redlinks we have, do you think? PS I won't ask "what" it is you've learned from FACs :) What ever happened with that one matter? ++Lar: t/c 04:12, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
I created the nom page at Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/SS_Christopher_Columbus, partly to write what I wanted to say, (comments?) and partly to get the link checker to work. I found a few deaders which I am trying to correct. I'll edit only one section at a time to reduce conflict potential... fixed one already. Another will be tough, the other pages of the SS Meteor site, the main page is still there but it's too new for the wayback machine to have. Maybe have to just excise it... haven't checked the rest yet. ++Lar: t/c 04:33, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
I wouldn't worry too much about your available time to address FAC, if you're comfortable with me addressing issues there also; I'm far too involved with the article to review it at FAC, so I might as well help on the nom end there. We had good weather today (somehow 60 degrees) so the power outage wasn't too terrible. Fortunately the mini DVD player battery was charged up, so we were able to watch a movie when we got tired of coloring and puzzles and such :) I do think stubs for some of the redlinks would be wise; if we can't come up with enough info for a stub, then perhaps they're not deserving of links. That other issue was addressed with this, although somebody is perhaps not happy about it. Maralia (talk) 04:43, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
OK cool. I fixed the meteor museum link but am stumped on the Worlds Columbian Exposition biblio link... see the talk page. Finding a solid cite for the "longest" claim is made tough by all the mirrors of WP carrying from our article! :) But I found an ad, making the claim.... that's PART of what that source had. I'd be grateful if you helped with the nom but I wasn't trying to put you on the hook to do that... thanks for offering, because... heck I'd be VERY grateful. :) I dunno what to do about all the NY Times links... I think it's the tool thrown off, because they work on the article itself. The tool gets stopped by a bazillion redirects. I'll see what I can do about the stubs. Goodrich Transit and the other whaleback are dead easy to write one para stubs, I can give 3 cites for each in my sleep. :) Alex McD is currently a redirect but it's an article I want to write "someday" so I think I'll leave it redirected to whaleback rather than do a not very good stub. ++Lar: t/c 05:26, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
In general, don't stress too much over online links to tangible references like books and news articles. If you've accessed a beyond-reproach reproduction of the original (like articles at the NYT archives), you've done your due diligence, and the absence of an online link to the article isn't going to sink an FA nom.
With respect to those specific NYT links that are getting tossed out by the tool: those are repairable via the tool itself. On the tool results, click the "Moved Temporarily" heading next to one of the rejected NYT links. The tool will come up with a better link, and give you a clickable button to fix that link in one step. Neato, eh? Maralia (talk) 05:40, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
I've started working on reference formatting. In some cases I'm cleaning up cites where you just didn't fully utilize the cite parameters; in other cases I'm making bold decisions to convert some cite webs to cite journals, cite books, etc. I'm basing each cite type change on a review of the linked site—some I agree should stay as cite web, because they are not faithful complete reproductions of the original—so don't freak out too much :) If you disagree with some, or all, of the changes, I'll change them back myself—but in most cases I think retyping to a cite template that matches the main source (i.e. citing a magazine as a journal, rather than citing the web site that reproduces it) enables us to provide more information for verifiability, and inherently displays it in the proper format. As a side note, there are some sources that will definitely be brought into question at FAC, so I'd suggest you hold off the nom for a bit while we identify and try to address those. Maralia (talk) 16:37, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) "When the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail". :) I overuse {{cite web}} because, long ago I was lazy and wrote some javascript, invokable from a tab while I am editing, that can populate it more easily than doing it by hand. Your adding more parms, converting to journal or book etc... all goodness. one nit I spotted, you converted one story from a Chicago Tribune story to an NYT. (the "racing ministers" one). I could swear that was a Chicago Tribune article originally that just happened to be in the NYT archives... (wire services??) One question, are both newspapers and magazines to use {{cite journal}}? As for holding off, Yes. When you're ready maybe develop a list of the few (hopefully) that are shaky and let's purge them (and if they are critical, find others to replace or find where in ones we already have the fact is covered). I will spend a bit more time on the stub Goodrich Transit Line, as it turned out to be a bit harder than I thought. I removed the link from the painter, Sprague... there was almost nothing findable on him. The last redlinked whaleback in the article though, that one's easy. One style thing I noticed, the last sentence before "disposition" lacks oomph. That para just trails off lifelessly but I can't find much more to say there. ++Lar: t/c 23:05, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

That Tribune thing was actually a NYT article, in the NYT archives, that had a byline 'from the Chicago Tribune'; I felt it was slightly more appropriate to cite it as NYT especially since we're linking to it there. While they may have lifted it verbatim from the Tribune, we're not terribly concerned with credit here, only verifiability, so NYT seems the way to go unless we can verify the Trib story.
Magazines and newspapers are {{cite journal}} and {{cite news}} respectively; I must have been spaced out. Will fix.
Glad you removed the Sprague link; I was going to suggest it, since I couldn't find much on him either.
Something to think about: the gallery will be an issue at FAC. Galleries in FAs are quite rare; an FA I recently reviewed took a fair amount of heat for a gallery of the artist's work, even. I have some suggestions for working around that issue, but I'm off to dinner, will save that for the next dispatch :) Maralia (talk) 00:57, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
I'm not very wedded to that gallery, I just added it a few days ago, easy come, easy go. That one oredock pic was cool so I wanted it but it looked lame all by itself. Forcing all the images into the article probably won't work out well so ... oh well. I say let's try it and if it gets a lot of flack, pull it (I don't want to try to psych ourselves out here :) ) ++Lar: t/c 03:18, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

redlinks sorted?

... I think... Howard Sprague delinked. Goodrich Transportation Company created, it's a bit sloppy but it's a good starting point for a much longer article, SS Charles W. Wetmore created, and taken to where it's T:DYK able... not a bad little article. (if you get bored with Chris, give it a once over? I don't quite get the new infobox stuff but I think I got it mostly right...) I think that's all the outbound red links. ++Lar: t/c 05:51, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Excellent. Will take a look at Charles tomorrow, with fresher eyes. There are a few redlinks left: Van Buren Street, plus the engine and boiler manufacturers in the infobox. I'm pretty confident Cleveland Shipbuilding will turn out to be worthy of a stub; dunno about the other two, though. I'm off to get some sleep :) Maralia (talk) 07:08, 8 February 2008 (UTC)
forgot about those. Van Buren st is probably an unlink. dunno about the builders. ++Lar: t/c 10:35, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Thank you spam



My RfA
Thank you very much, Maralia, for your support in my RfA which I really appreciate. It closed at 83/0/0. I was surprised by the unanimity and will do my best to live up to the new role. All the best, --ROGER DAVIES talk 16:49, 5 February 2008 (UTC)


The patio at the Partal Palace in the Alhambra, Andalucia.


I honestly don't think I'll find it that beguiling :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 06:08, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
If you must know, I secretly hope you find it stultifying, and retreat to Jackie Fisher for solace :) Maralia (talk) 06:19, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
(Giggle) I feel really guilty about that. I was waylaid (it seemed like a good idea at the time, your Honor). The problem is I'm currently working on at least four imminent FACs with a couple or three heavy-duty peer reviews on the boil as well. He is on my my to-do list though :) Incidentally, how many people have sussed what your name actually means? --ROGER DAVIES talk 06:27, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
No one has ever even commented on it, actually. I rather expected that anyone pondering my name's origin would come up with 'malaria' :) Knowing you, though, I have a feeling you could probably quote it at me, at length! Don't feel too guilty about Jackie; I'm still working on Hindu-German Conspiracy, all these months later. Maralia (talk) 06:46, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Ship infobox debate

Hi Maralia! There's been a discussion going on at Wikiships for a while now on fields for the new ship class infobox. Your input would be very much appreciated if you can find the time. The relevant thread is here]. Thanks, Gatoclass (talk) 12:37, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

I wrote up a small summary of the issue. TomTheHand (talk) 21:58, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Military history WikiProject coordinator elections

The Military history WikiProject coordinator selection process is starting. We are aiming to elect nine coordinators to serve for the next six months; if you are interested in running, please sign up here by February 14! Kyriakos (talk) 21:05, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

Halo Graphic Novel FAC

I think I've addressed your grammar concerns; as to making the plot of the stories and their relations more open to a casual reader, I've rewritten the stories for each with some more background and explanatory text. See if this helps the comprehension. David Fuchs (talk) 00:58, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

I think I've addressed all your concerns. Can you take another look? Thanks, David Fuchs (talk) 23:54, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Because I can't buy you dinner

The Working Woman's Barnstar
I joyously bestow this genderless barnstar to Maralia for giving invaluable assitance in the FA process for Birmingham campaign and Everglades National Park. Thank you very, very much. Moni3 (talk) 01:06, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Tel Aviv

Hi. I have spent some time working on the points you made for the Tel Aviv FAC. Please advise as to whether this is now up to standard. Many thanks. Flymeoutofhere (talk) 20:11, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the note. One thing I noticed in a brief glance just now is that the reference formatting is still off.
  • Some things are still in the wrong parameters: Haaretz and Jerusalem Post, for example, are newspapers (works), not publishers.
  • Italics are never used on company names such as the publishers Longborough University and Mercer, nor do they belong on website names such as Hatarbut.co.il. You don't really need to assign italics at all within cite templates; just make sure you have everything in the right parameter, and the templates will automatically italicize the right stuff ('title' in cite book and 'work' in cite news and cite journal).
I'll review your changes more thoroughly in a bit. Do you think we should copy my previous oppose to the new nom page for continuity? Maralia (talk) 21:35, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
Sorry - I misunderstood you. I have done that now - put everything into correct citation template and removed the italics. What do you mean about copying your previous oppose? Flymeoutofhere (talk) 10:17, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
When the nomination was closed as 'not promoted' on the 12th, the old FAC page was archived and a new blank one started. I'll copy my previous list of copyedit notes into the new FAC page; that way we can continue working through them there, and when you're ready to re-nominate the article, it will be clear to other reviewers that we've addressed my concerns from the old FAC nom. Maralia (talk) 21:11, 14 February 2008 (UTC)
  • Hi Maralia. Do you think you could possibly help to address the points put forward by Doc glasgow on the FAC page as a NPOV editor! Thanks. Flymeoutofhere (talk) 14:13, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Wand of magic!

Gentle creature, this is what you get for doing a good job. I'm working on To Kill a Mockingbird for a potential FAC. As usual, my citations are a mess. Might you be able to run your wand over them? Do you use a bot or do you do them all manually? Please don't say manually. That does not bode well for me ever making my citations better. I appreciate anything you can do. --Moni3 (talk) 20:51, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

I sit down to the computer, still simmering in the wake of roaring at my son to pick up his flipping toys for the umpteenth time today, only to find myself addressed as 'gentle creature'. The irony! I shall endeavor to better deserve such an appellation :) To the business at hand: I'm ever so pleased to see you bravely leaping right back into the fray after the marathon of the last two FACs. I wouldn't dream of disappointing you; of course I will do it. I'm afraid the answer is manually, though! How much time do I have? Maralia (talk) 22:39, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
The more you procrastinate, the longer I have to avoid the wrath of the FAC process. I don't think I want to nominate it within the next 2 weeks, but I might get braver as my memory begins to fade. Thanks again. And you know those toys on the floor are just an expression of love. --Moni3 (talk) 01:02, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Milhist coordinators election has started

The February 2008 Military history WikiProject coordinator election has begun. We will be selecting nine coordinators to serve for the next six months from a pool of fifteen candidates. Please vote here by February 28! --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 17:57, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks!

As always [3], you are fantastic! --Kralizec! (talk) 16:48, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Drop me an email, turkey; haven't heard from you in like two months! How's life? Maralia (talk) 17:27, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Fields on ship infobox

Hey Maralia! I saw this edit and wanted to talk to you about it. What I meant when I wrote that was if you wanted to come up with a subset of the Full code specifically for, say, aircraft carriers or oil tankers, you should feel free to do so; I want people to understand that they can freely use as many or few fields from the Full code as they want. I don't think people should add fields to the template without discussion, but they should feel free to use the existing code in whatever ways they need. I know that my meaning wasn't quite clear and has been misunderstood, but I'm not sure how to phrase it so that people understand what's easy and requires no discussion and what requires real changes and needs discusion. TomTheHand (talk) 18:31, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Oh! I assumed it was old language dating back to before the subsets had been fully fleshed out. You know what they say about assuming :) I think I get what you're trying to say; I'll see if I can come up with a clearer way to present it. Thanks. Maralia (talk) 22:21, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Of nuns and buccaneers

Thanks for your kind message about the nun of Amherst and the buccaneer of Kilverstone :) What I really need for Jacky is a collaborator to do some of the donkey work. His later career at sea needs further research cos the sources are contradictory and the affaire Beresford is complicated, intricate and needs carful explication. But, yes, he is ever closer to my thoughts. --ROGER DAVIES talk 05:58, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks!

Thank you very much for your kind words (and your incredibly helpful review and !vote of support, of course)! It was a real pleasure writing Dickinson's biography and I'm glad that the hard work shows. I'm not disappointed to let her go, however; it was fantastic to return my load of books to the library. :) María (habla conmigo) 13:05, 22 February 2008 (UTC)

Milhist copy-editing

I've been meaning to post something on Milhist copy-editing for ages and have actually done it here. --ROGER DAVIES talk 05:54, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

PS: Forgive the circular nature of this communication. [RD]


USS Ticonderoga

Hey there Maralia. I see you have an interest in ships, and would like to point out to you another article because I don;t know if the infobox is current: the USS Ticonderoga (CG-47). Only if you're bored and have nothing else 2 do :) Best, Happyme22 (talk) 07:16, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

Any ship infobox created via table, rather than a template, is definitely outdated. I have updated that one. If you happen across any others, please let me know, or you can tag the talk page with {{newinfobox|type=ship}}. Thanks! Maralia (talk) 16:54, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
I most definitely will. Thanks! Happyme22 (talk) 18:20, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

Time to run the bot again?

Hi Maralia. You had mentioned on the WP:Ships talk that you intend on having PbBot2 do another run once the unassessed backlog is under control. The Category:Unassessed-importance Ships articles is currently down to 25 entries (and should be completely empty in another day or so), and the Unassessed-class has been more or less empty for quite some time now, so I was wondering if you wanted to start the bot, so we can do it all over again :) Regards, Parsecboy (talk) 03:29, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Soon—but first I want to tweak the ruleset for the new articles feed a bit. Seems like it's missing a fair amount of new articles lately, and I'd prefer to make sure we're not still missing new articles before we do a big tagging run on the old ones. Maralia (talk) 05:43, 26 February 2008 (UTC)
That sounds good. As of right now, both categories are completely empty (probably won't last long though, they do continually pop up in onesies and twosies), so whenever you finish tweaking the ruleset and run the bot, we'll be ready to start assessing again. Parsecboy (talk) 17:21, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Thank you



Milhist Coordinator elections
Thank you very much for your support in the recent Military history Wikiproject elections. I went into it expecting to just keep my seat and was astonished to end up with the lead role. I anticipate a rather busy six months :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 13:45, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

Haut-Koeningsbourg castle, Alsace.

Thanks for your support

Maralia/Archive 3: I wish to thank you for your support in my unsuccessful bid at becoming an Assistant Coordinator for the Military history WikiProject. Rest assured that I will still be around, probably even more than before, and I have the utmost confidence in the abilities of the current and new coordinators. I might also mention that I am already planning on running again in August. As always, if you need anything, just get in touch. -MBK004 21:34, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

WikiProject Good Articles Newsletter

The March 2008 issue of the WikiProject Good Articles Newsletter is ready! Dr. Cash (talk) 06:05, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Good grief!

Thank you for your gracious and elegant flattery kind words :) In the meantime, the Logistics Dept is up and running in Spartan form. Do feel free to sign up for those depts which you can meaningfully contribute to (ie all of them) :) In the meantime, Kirill has kindly agreed to look after the script for Tag & Assess 2008 (Part I). You, I recall, very kindly offered input. Perhaps you and he should have speaks (or types). All the best, --ROGER DAVIES talk 12:47, 3 March 2008 (UTC)


Thank you

Thank you for your kind welcome to the ships project. I look forward to working on this.

You or others might like to know that I have very extensive collections of on-board photographs of certain Royal Navy warships. The MoD has enabled me to visit certain ships - sometimes in harbour, sometimes at sea, sometimes both - for the purpose of writing magazine articles, and I typically took several hundred on-board photographs of each ship. The ships that I have 'photo-documented' in this way are : HMS Illustrious (R06); HMS Campbeltown (F86); HMS Marlborough (F233); HMS Fearless (L10); HMS Edinburgh (D97); HMS Gloucester (D96); and the submarine HMS Trenchant. I also have smaller numbers of on-board photographs of other ships. I thought that, once I've mastered the uploading process, I might add a small number of photos to one or more of these ships' Wikipedia pages, but am not sure if this would be appropriate?


Kind regards, --Vvmodel (talk) 20:27, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

How fascinating! If you undisputably own the pictures, and are willing to release them under one of the wiki-compliant image licenses, I'm sure we could make use of some. You can find more information about licensing here: Wikipedia:Image copyright tags#For image creators. Let me know if you need any help! Maralia (talk) 22:25, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. No possible dispute about ownership of the images - I visited the ships in a wholly freelance capacity. Some of the most useful images (e.g. Illustrious) are the interiors of all the gallery decks and bays. For the frigates and destroyers, I did complete panoramics of the superstructures. But it might be overload for users just interested in portrait shots! --Vvmodel (talk) 22:58, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Experimentally, I have just uploaded two onboard photos of Edinburgh, showing her distintive forecastle arrangements, to my user page. I'm still a long way from getting fully acquainted with the image upload process. --Vvmodel (talk) 11:50, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Re: Tag & Assess changes

Yes, those all look pretty reasonable; I don't see any real problems with implementing them. Kirill 04:44, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

I've set up talk pages for both the B-class drive and Tag & Assess 08. Your comments would be greatly appreciated. --ROGER DAVIES talk 05:31, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

The Military history WikiProject Newsletter : Issue XXIV (February 2008)

The February 2008 issue of the Military history WikiProject newsletter has been published. You may read the newsletter, change the format in which future issues will be delivered to you, or unsubscribe from this notification by following the link. Thank you.
This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 05:02, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Icarus/Independencia

I have the 99-00 edition of Jane's Fighting Ships, and she is not listed in the Dominican Navy section as either in service or having been recently deleted. Cheers Buckshot06 (talk) 01:57, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

I've got access to the HQ NZDF library which has back issues of JFS back to the 50s. Next time I'm in I'll take a look and see when in the 95-99 period she was decommissioned. Buckshot06 (talk) 04:44, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Caps at FAC

Just a note:[4] I want to make sure that hidden comments were capped by the reviewer, not by someone else, so if you add your sig to the cap (where I see it) when you cap it helps. Best, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:41, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Royal Blue (B&O train) FAC

Hi Maralia, Many thanks for your helpful review comments, which I've tried to address. Please take another look and see if it meets with your approval. p.s., I'm glad to hear you're a steamship gal-- I belong to the Titanic Historical Society myself and have done a little (very little) work on that article. JGHowes talk - 02:10, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi again, more revisions have been incorporated into the article pursuant to your updated review comments JGHowes talk - 13:30, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Thankyou

The Reviewers Award The Reviewers Award
I Woody, do hereby give Maralia this reviewers award for all the hard work and excellent reviews you give at the FAC process. They are much appreciated. Thankyou. Woody (talk) 11:26, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
Truly a pleasure Maralia! I know who to go to for reviews now. ;) Quality reviews at FAC are much appreciated by all!! Woody (talk) 16:45, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

DC

Your help is needed in planning Wikipedia:Meetup/DC 4! Any comments or suggestions you have are greatly appreciated. The Placebo Effect (talk) 19:55, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Mr. and Mrs. Iyer FAC

Hi! Thanks for the scrutiny of the article in the FAC. The reference formatting has now been done, and excessive interwikilinks removed (except in case of some not-so-global terms which have been wikilinked more than once). Please check the FAC where your oppose has been replied.

The particular examples of grammatical faults and lapses that you pointed out have been dealt with. However, I admit the article needs a fresh pair of eyes for copyedit. While we are trying to request others, can you spare some time? It would be great if you can have a go at the article. With your meticulous scrutiny for grammar and language, I strongly believe the prose status of the article will become top notch. Thanks a lot. Regards.--Dwaipayan (talk) 09:59, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Gears of War

Thanks for the FAC heads up. --ShadowJester07 ► Talk 21:52, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

New! BCAD drive from Milhist

Can I invite you to particpate in our new assessment drive? It's strictly for experienced wiki-gnomes and has a degree of friendly competition built-in. It involves re-evaluating around 3500 Milhist B-Class articles to ensure they match our new criteria. As ever, we're offering a range of awards as our way of expressing our thanks. The drive doesn't start until 18:00 (UTC) on March 10 but you can sign up in advance here. It would be great if you can spare the time, --ROGER DAVIES talk 05:33, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

One Stripe (200 articles)
Two Stripes (400 articles)
Three Stripes (600 articles)
Chevrons (1000 articles)
Golden Wiki First place

Re: Giants: Citizen Kabuto FAC

Hi Maralia, thank you for informing about my rights to object this article's nomination for FA. I am however prepared to let it go on. I consider this as my first article to go through FAC, and look forward to learning from the process (whether it fails or succeeds) to improve my future contributions. Thank you. Jappalang (talk) 03:00, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

WP:Featured article candidates/French Texas

Hi Maralia. I've responded to your concerns about the article formerly known as Fort Saint Louis. It's been moved to French Texas, as has the FAC nom, and I wanted to ping you here because your watchlist may not notice the updates. Karanacs (talk) 17:23, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

RE:JSTOR

You should have mail... Regards. Woody (talk) 02:30, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

It is usually quite slow, I tried a test a while back and it took some time to get there. Have you got it yet? Woody (talk) 09:14, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
I have tried it using a second address, it sometimes takes about a day. If you don't get this one, maybe try someone else on this list as I am disappearing for two weeks! Regards. Woody (talk) 12:25, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Ima Hogg

Thanks :-) I just checked George Washington (inventor), and it wasn't nommed until March 27 last year, so I 'spose we still have time. I'm worried that the other participants on the talk page aren't on board. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:53, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Template:US Navy navbox

Seems we disagree on how to mark up song titles. I haven't seen anything in the MOS, but based on the navbox on the article for Anchors Aweigh itself, I figured the accepted way was just italics. If there is no "official" policy on how to format song titles, I would like to match Template:American songs. bahamut0013♠♣ 01:52, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

I was wondering why you would have changed it; the article itself uses quotations when referring to the song, but the songs template (which I hadn't noticed) is just...wrong. Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Italics says, "Italics are used for the titles of works of literature and art, such as books, paintings and musical albums. The titles of articles, chapters, songs and other short works are not italicized, but are enclosed in double quotation marks." The MOS subpage Wikipedia:Manual of style (titles) says, "Titles of shorter works (particularly those that exist as a smaller part of a larger work), such as the following, should be enclosed in double quotation marks: [...] Songs and singles". Maralia (talk) 02:09, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Appreciation

The WikiProject Films Award
I, twelsht (talk) 03:29, 16 March 2008 (UTC), hereby award Maralia the WikiProject Films Award for his/her valued contibutions to WikiProject Films. Thank you for your detailed feedback on Jack Warner.
Awarded 03:28, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Discovery gets promoted

Discovery Expedition has got its FA star. Thank you for your interest in the article & the careful review you gave it - much appreciated. Brianboulton (talk) 13:21, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

notable

Saw your review of the renomination of Tel-Aviv at FAC and was impressed with your control of the language and the issues. Although your interest is mainly in ships, we'd be delighted if you reviewed FACs whenever you find time! It's a powerful way of influencing the whole project WRT standards of prose. Tony (talk) 13:19, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Effects of Hurricane Ivan in the Lesser Antilles and South America

Sorry to bug you. I have an article on FAC right now, and User:SandyGeorgia requested a look-through of the article, as it is close to passing. Do you think you'd be able to give the article a look? Thanks if you can, but if not, no problem. ♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 16:00, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Actually, scratch that. However, if you're still up for it, could you comment on another FAC of mine - Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Tropical Storm Vamei. Thanks if you can, but, again, if you can't or don't want to, no prob. ♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 22:17, 18 March 2008 (UTC)
Thanks a lot for the copyedit and comments. I addressed those issues on the FAC page. ♬♩ Hurricanehink (talk) 15:30, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Miss Ima

No, I don't have the Iscoe book. When I saw that it was added as a reference in the article I assumed that someone else was reading it. I'm pretty sure my library has it, so if it would require a lot of energy from you to get a copy let me know and I'll go pick it up on my way home this afternoon. If I'm thinking of the right book, it is really short, so we should be able to pull any remaining info out of it pretty quickly. Karanacs (talk) 11:58, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Is that the one that has First Lady of Texas in the title? I think I added it in my first pass, only to cite that she was referred to as First Lady; nope, don't have the book. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 14:59, 19 March 2008 (UTC)
Yeah, that one, Sandy; figured that was how it came to be included. A friend is picking it up today, just in case we need it. Maralia (talk) 15:16, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Dumb question: why do you change real endashes to html endashes? Are they better? Someone once changed all of mine back, telling me the real ones were easier on the server or something like that.[5] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:13, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

It's not a dumb question - I didn't realize at first that those were real endashes. I noticed later in the article, and stopped changing them. I need a bigger font or something, my eyes are old :/ Maralia (talk) 03:15, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
LOL -- good one -- I can relate to that :-) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:22, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

RE Operation Igloo White

The following is the answer given last year to another editor wishing to push an article of mine to FA:

The answer is emphatically no (see my comment on my user page). Have had two articles pushed up the FA ladder by other editors, neither of which made it because: the prose was not up to the editor's opinion of "excellent", they were too long and too detailed (and, therefore, should be split or shortened), they were not geared for the "average" reader, blah, blah, blah. I won't waste my time on rewriting an A-Class article to suit them. That's not what I'm doing this for. I have better things to waste my time on, like writing new articles. I don't have an opinion on the process because I refuse to participate in it, all I can say is that it seems too much like "ticket punching" and ego stroking. RM Gillespie (talk) 11:00, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Already withdrawn. By the way, this is perfect; everything we need in one place. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:19, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
Okay, will stick to that format. Thanks. Maralia (talk) 16:30, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

RE: a small token

Yes! Less pain would be good!

In response, thanks for all the nitpicking. You asked the questions that had to be asked, and instead of laying down ultimatums like some PR/FA responders do, you were more than happy to go out of your way to work to a mutually beneficial solution, and took the time to review the sources to make sure we were correct.

I owe you:

  1. my undying gratitude
  2. Assistance to drag an article of your choice and writing to FA standard, kicking and screaming if necessary

Again, thank you! -- saberwyn 09:05, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

SS Christopher Columbus is a FAC

I have (self) nominated this article at Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/SS_Christopher_Columbus. As one of the significant editors of this article by number of contributions, as well as a participant in its GA candidacy, your input would be valuable. Thanks. ++Lar: t/c 20:18, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Per the discussion on my talk page which you may not have seen, I'd be delighted if you chose to affix your name to the FAC as a co-nom, you did a lot of hard work on this article... thanks in any case. ++Lar: t/c 20:04, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Stats

Thanks for the stats :-) I removed Oscar Wilde, I left up Southern Vectis (the editor is number four on stats, so it's marginal), and I cribbed a copy of Roger Davies' nice message, and stored it in my sandbox (see the link in the userbox on my userpage if you ever need it). SandyGeorgia (Talk) 06:04, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Noted. I was thinking more along the lines of the notification for others, though - "An article to which you have been contributed has been nominated..." with the explanation about withdrawing without a fail. Anyway, no rush; we all have other things on our minds :) Maralia (talk) 06:11, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, we need one of those; let's just crib one from somewhere and save it in my sandbox for now. I'll try to get on it tomorrow. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 06:25, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Nine, time-consuming steps to withdraw (note this is different than an archive, which is done by GimmeBot):

  1. Stats on the nom [6]
  2. Notification to prnciple editor [7]
  3. Note on FAC [8]
  4. Move FAC page to next open archiveN [9]
  5. Clear redirect to leave main FAC page ready for next submission [10]
  6. Clear article talk page [11]
  7. Remove nom from WP:FAC [12]
  8. Tag FAC closed: [13]
  9. Notify nominator: [14]

That's my morning; Happy Easter !! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:15, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

On the other hand, when a regular (non-driveby) FAC is withdrawn by nominator after substantial opposes, much simpler. The transcluded FAC page is moved from WP:FAC to the top of the correct monthly archive file, which triggers GimmeBot to close the FAC, update the talk page, etc. The only other step is to make sure the nominator left the {{fac}} tag on the talk page (removing it stalls GimmeBot) and to remind them to wait for the bot, with WP:FAC/ar. FACs that are driveby or didn't have significant opposes don't need to be archived into articlehistory, while FACs that are withdrawn after significant opposes should be recorded in articlehistory and archives by GimmeBotification. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 18:59, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

Tel Aviv FA

Retained; see current talk page or following archive period. Maralia (talk) 14:47, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank You!

The TomStar81 Spelling Award
Be it known to all members of Wikipedia that Maralia has corrected my god-awful spelling on the page Montana class battleship, and in doing so has made an important and very significant contribution to the Wikipedia community, thereby earning this TomStar81 Spelling Award and my deepest thanks. Keep up the good work! TomStar81 (Talk) 19:03, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

On an unrelated note I saw your two hidden comments in the article. I suppose I don;t really have a good reason for bring up the comissioning since, as you pointed out, they never were commissioned. As for the second note, I understand that the Second Vision Act was a armed forces bill relating to the navy that authorized the construction of several naval vessels, but to date I haven't been able to track down a copy of the act. I'm content to continue the search though, so when I know something so will you (and by extension, so will everyone else :) TomStar81 (Talk) 19:03, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

With the Second Vision Act, part of my concern was the spelling (Second Vison Act) - I wasn't sure what, if anything, it should be corrected to! I'll get back to the Montanas in a bit, but must force myself to work on something that I've been neglecting. Maralia (talk) 19:05, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
No hurry, take your time. I won't have the capacity to revisit the article much after this week, so I put it up a little early in order to get the ball rolling toward a higher class rating and get the needed feed back to improve it over summer break. Just make sure you leave all relevent comments/questions/concerns at the peer review page so I know where to look when I get back on here in full force. TomStar81 (Talk) 19:11, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks

Re my talk page. Guess I neglected to read the details of the conversation. Thanks for the fix :) Equazcion •✗/C • 15:02, 25 Mar 2008 (UTC)

Drive-by FAC nominations

This may interest you. --ROGER DAVIES talk 17:22, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

Re:Barnstar

Thank you! Nishkid64 (Make articles, not love) 17:36, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

Congratulations, and thanks

Dear Co nom :).. please see [15] and [16] ... We did it! I will be more formally thanking all the major contributors but wanted to thank you first, never could have done it without you! I know you're an old hand at this but since this is my first one you'll have to forgive me for being a bit excited... ++Lar: t/c 01:48, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Congratulations and kudos for all of your outstanding work!! --Kralizec! (talk) 02:20, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Something for you

The Content Review Medal of Merit  
In recognition of your much appreciated reviews of military history articles, I am delighted to award you this Content Review Medal. --ROGER DAVIES talk 06:16, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

We did it, SS Chris is a Featured Article!

you're a star!

yaay!

 Thanks for your help in getting the good ship SS Christopher Columbus to Featured Article status. The nomination went swimmingly, it was clear sailing all the way, no one turned up to torpedo it, and she passed easily. your very own free pass!

that's the ticket!

Well co nominator, here's your formal thanks... thanks again for all your hard work. Much appreciated! ++Lar: t/c 22:30, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Captain Scott

Just to let you know that Captain Scott has gone to FAC today. If you can give it the kind of meticulous going-over that you did with Discovery a few weeks ago, I'd be delighted. And I hope you will enjoy the article. Brianboulton (talk) 00:00, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Issue from Bridgeport FAC

Hey, I've been meaning to ask you about a issue raised at the Bridgeport FAC, in regard to the scattering of bold ship names in the lead section. What would be a good way to handle similar situations but still remain within WP:LEAD guidelines? I'm working on some similar World War I era liners that were seized and renamed, and it would nice to handle them in an acceptable manner. Thanks. — Bellhalla (talk) 20:15, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

"Miss Ima"

Nice job on "Miss Ima"!
To all of the excellent editors who were part of the Karanacs-led collaboration to bring Ima Hogg to featured status, it was a pleasure working with you on such a fine article about a great lady. Thank you so much for your contribution to this fun collaboration.

Best regards, SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:24, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Tedium pays off sometimes.

For Maralia, with gratitude
For Maralia, with gratitude

I wish this were a barnstar, but it serves the same purpose. One hundred and twenty one references! Thank you for going over all of the citations in To Kill a Mockingbird. I would not have been able to nominate it for feature without your help. This is the 2nd article you have jumped in to rescue. I wish I could take you out to dinner. --Moni3 (talk) 22:18, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

You mustn't wish it were a barnstar. I love this picture! As to 'jumping in to rescue': I find that you tend to pick articles that are eminently worthy of rescuing; I merely have the common sense to recognize your talent, and the mechanical ability to plug data into parameters at lightning speeds :) I'm off to really read the article now - thank you for this little present, and the bigger one I'm about to enjoy. Maralia (talk) 03:41, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Help needed

Retained; see current talk page or following archive period.