User talk:Rodw/Archive 1

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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.
Hi! Welcome to my talk page.


Click here to leave me a new message. Also, please remember to always sign your messages with '- - ~ ~ ~ ~'

Hi. Welcome to the 'pedia! Thanks for posting a link to that Guardian article on the new user log. It's one of the most accurate and comprehensive descriptions of Wikipedia that I've seen in the media, and I sent them an email saying so. Hope you like it here, and if you ever have any questions, you can always drop me a note on my talk page. Isomorphic 17:53, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Hi Isomorphic - thanks for the welcome. I'm still not sure I'm posting all these talk things in the right place for anyone to see them? Must check the help files more thoroughly. I like what I see of this site & have run web sites, bulletin boards, blogs etc for years about 10 years !


Contents

Nurse Topics

Hi - Welcome to Wikipedia. I see you have been added to Nurse Category.

 Navigation:
  1. See the Medicine project pages (navigation box to the right). There is always a risk that us doctors editing articles will end up writing a medical textbook, rather than an encyclopedia for everyone. So other health professionals & patient-orientation required in health related articles :-) We tend to hang out at the Doctors' Mess.
  2. I, as a UK GP, have just created pages on Health Visitor and District Nurse, both are stubs and clearly from my UK & doctor perspectives. They need expansion, both as to the nature of the roles in the UK and equivalent services worldwide (on enquiry a US Nurse interpreted 'District Nurse' as being private nursing care at home - a DN's role is clearly distinct from this definition, see my talk page). Could you have a look at the articles and offer any comments please.

PS To sign your entries, finish with 4 tilde characters (~~~~) and wikipedia will add your name & date of edit - e.g. David Ruben Talk 00:05, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley Lake

Hi - thanks for your message, happy to help. I think the Chew article is actually really good, all it needs is a bit of editing to bring it into "house style". The main things which need attention, in my view, are:

  • number 1 priority would be to remove anything that is an opinion rather than a fact, as this violates Wikipedia's NPOV policy - even quite innocuous opinions that almost everyone would agree with are covered by this - e.g. there was a bit which talks about a visit to Chew being a "lovely day out" - I think you may have removed this now though - loveliness is too subjective for Wikipedia. If you can find, say, a printed source in which a person expresses an opinion that a day out at Chew is lovely, that they have stated that they have this belief is a verifiable fact and can be quoted (do you see the distinction?)
  • Wikipedia isn't Bristol Water's mouthpiece, so where there are conditions such as dogs being kept on leads, permits needing to be carried, no fishing from the dam etc, rather than giving this in the form of an instruction, use a form of words such as "Bristol Water, who operate the site, impose the following conditions on visitors: ..."
  • Anything that could be construed as a "peacock term" e.g. "Bristol Water has created a haven ..." is generally frowned upon; better to separate intention from realisation and then state evidence which links the two (as well as any evidence which doesn't or which indicates that the correlation is incidental rather than causal). Again opinion should be avoided, but the existence of opinions is factual and OK to mention.
  • Don't include things which are predictions of the future e.g. while Bristol Water may be restoring two islands, we don't know categorically that they WILL attract roosting birds.

Hope that helps - let me know if you feel you'd like any more input. Steve SP-KP 18:13, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi - good work, it looks a lot better. The only remaining things I can spot which you might want to improve are all pretty small:

  • "Denny island ... a haven for wildlife" - is it any more or a haven than, say, Stratford Bay, or any other part of the lake? If so, what's special about it?
  • the word "available" (used iro the visitor facilities) feels a bit "tourist brochure" - you could just say "There are ..." (being picky now!)
  • "recognised ornithological and naturalist societies" - might be better to prefix this with "what Bristol Water terms to be" (again, picky)
  • under the sailing section, I wasn't sure what "The full area can be used" vs "the restricted area applies" meant? Is this another BW condition, or something which is down to physical conditions of the lake?
  • Fishing - "Care must be taken" is "advice". I don't think there is actually a Wikipedia policy saying "no advice" but it feels like an unencyclopaedic phrase.

On another note, you perhaps ought to standardise the presentation & wikilinking of species names (and check them, too - some links are misleading, saxifrage, for instance). Let me know if you need some help with that, as that's my area of expertise. Also, I notice that the birdwatching section has some info about Blagdon - better if this were in the Blagdon article instead maybe?

I created Cheddar Reservoir a while back - I'd be very pleased if you wanted to expand that to bring it up to the same quality as your Chew article.

All the best SP-KP 20:58, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

English names / scientific names presentation

Hi again. I would suggest that where you have a list of plant names with both English and scientific names as in the Chew article, that the English ones are wikilinked (the whole name) and the scientific ones are not, but italicised (some people also add brackets) - e.g. Daisy (Bellis perennis). Possible problems to watch for (i) are that the English name might point to a disambiguation page (but that's easily fixed e.g. if the above does then something like [ [ Daisy (flower) | Daisy ] ] is what you need (ii) that the English name used is too generic and so the wikilink takes you to a family page - fixable by using the more specific name, or (iii) that a page exists but it is titled by the scientific name. My preference then is to move the page. If the article genuinely doesn't exist, my view is that a redlink is better than plain text, as it might encourage someone to start the article. With birds you have much the same issues. Btw Wikipedia standard with bird names is initial capitals e.g. Lesser Black-backed Gull. Give me a shout if there are any specific problem cases you want my opinion on.

One other suggestion that occurred to me - if you get the page to the point where you're happy you've done all you can with it, you could consider putting it forward as a featured article. This involves a peer review, and from experience theses generate lots more useful feedback. SP-KP 22:28, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley Lake invertebrates

Hi - how about Chironomidae and Corixidae? Cheers SP-KP 18:27, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi again - sorry, I should have been clearer in the above comment - chironomids are flies, but corixids aren't, they're water bugs - I wasn't sure where the corixids came into the picture - when I checked the article earlier, I could find the former, but not the latter. SP-KP 20:10, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Copyright

Hi Rod, you've done an impressive amount of work on CVL. I certainly don't consider that I'm an expert on copyright, but the main thing to make clear is that the map must be released under either public domain, which abandons all rights, or more commonly the GNU Free Documentation License, which allows commercial and non-commercial use with some restrictions on how it is used. The full text is here. I take the view with my images and text that I am effectively giving them to the world, since the restrictions on use are so limited. jimfbleak 07:16, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

I've gone through the fauna and flora bits. Only genus and species are italicised, higher levels are Roman. Individual species English names are capitalised (eg Common Tern), but not groups (terns). I've changed the lapwing link, since it can only refer to Northern, and commented on snipe on the CVL talk page, since this is ambiguous, hope this is OK, jimfbleak 09:18, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Grid Ref issues

Hi. Sorry, don't know how to fix that! I was only thinking that, presentationally within the article, a 10 fig was too much; I didn't think about what OS (or other map providers) would show - you are right, it would be better if the link to their site was to a page showing the whole site. Not sure what to suggest. SP-KP 19:56, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley Lake

Hi. I notice that the Chew Valley Lake article has failed its Featured Article nomination, although to me it's not totally obvious why, from reading the comments at the nomination page. It might be worth checking with the editor who marked it as a failed nomination whether this was simply due to the nomination running out of time - if so, I'd be happy to renominate - there doesn't appear to be much in the way of outstanding issues. SP-KP 11:07, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Encouraging comments from violetriga. Once any outstanding issues are dealt with, it sounds like we just need to round up a few people prepared to support it! SP-KP 18:28, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
Hi. The only thing I could spot is that the footnotes list appears unfinished. I think when that's done, a renominate is in order. SP-KP 18:40, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
Hi. Re: footnotes - there are 23 numbered references in the text, but only 15 actual notes. SP-KP 22:57, 18 February 2006 (UTC)
I think it would be less confusing to have each reference to the footnote using the same footnote number - otherwise people will look for footnote 23 and not find it. There is some guidance on how to do this at Wikipedia:Footnote3 - good luck with it, though, as it looks a bit fiddly. SP-KP 10:09, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
Hi again. Sorry - I'm still seeing 23 numbered refs, rather than 15, although the notes themselves look OK now (a,b,c etc). If we can work out how to get notes & refs to tie up numbering-wise, I think we're there. I'll see if I can work out what the problem is by playing with footnotes in my user space SP-KP 15:05, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
Cracked it, I think. Take a look at User:SP-KP/CVL where I've amended footnote 6, to see the solution. SP-KP 15:17, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
OK, will do. But not today. SP-KP 15:37, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
Hi. Chew is looking good. I'm stumped by the remaining footnote problem though - you might want to raise this with the Wiki software developers. Blagdon's coming along nicely too I notice - when you get to the stage where you want some peer review comments, let me know and I'll happily oblige. SP-KP 23:35, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Re: FAHD

I'm no longer involved with that project. I suspect it died when I left Wikipedia on a break at the end of November last year. Rob Church (talk) 18:20, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

FAHD response

Unfortunately, I'm not actively editing Wikipedia anymore. Sorry. - A Link to the Past (talk) 19:22, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley Lake FAC

I have just done a few small edits. I will look at the nomination later. Looks very good, congratulations on what you have done so far. I would also be grateful if you would vote for my new bot application. Thanks. bobblewik 23:01, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
I'll take a look and respond on the nomination page when I go through all the FACs again. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 01:10, 27 February 2006 (UTC)
Unfortunately, I don't know much about the history of the Chew Valley area (and live in the US, so it'd be hard for me to brush up without some major research), but given the amount of archaeological material they seem to have removed before the reservoir was filled, it seems that this place must have some pretty significant history. Maybe worth a separate article? My comment wasn't intended to object to the nomination---just that the history section seems weak compared with some of the other sections. –Ryan McDaniel 15:43, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Re: Chew Valley Lake FAC

Rodw wrote:

Hi, I've resubmitted Chew Valley Lake as a featured article candidate, because it didn't receive enough support last time. As you have edited this page in the past I wondered if you would be willing to visit and comment/support on the nomination? Rodw 20:11, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Hi. Just thought I should point out that my edit to the article was only a one-word spelling change, made as part of my spelling correction project. I didn't particularly notice this article at the time. However, since I have visited the lake before, and live in the general area, I guess I do have an interest. I've read through the article and it looks reasonable, so I will participate in the FA discussion. My compliments to you also for the effort you have put into expanding this article – keep up the good work! – Gurch 08:59, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

CV Gazette article

Hi. Congratulations on reaching FA status. I'm going to pass up your offer of a credit in your CV Gazette article - I'm not really here for that reason - but thanks anyway. Steve. SP-KP 18:22, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Chew valley

Hi. I've posted a query over at Talk:Chew Valley. Interested to hear your view SP-KP 10:03, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley

Suggest litres, perhaps. I think everyone understands those, but it will be a big number! Rich Farmbrough 14:49 5 March 2006 (UTC). P.S. Bobblewik is the units expert.

I thought you might be interested in ...

I've just come across Category:Authors of Featured Articles ... I think you can justifiably add your user page to it! SP-KP 21:28, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley

I've made a first attempt at revising the Chew Valley template. It's at Template:Chew Valley/Proposed revision. Comments please! SP-KP 19:39, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Hi. Thanks for the reply. Litton Reservoirs are "in" as water from there flows into the Chew - the boundary of the catchment area runs to the east of them, due south from Hinton Blewitt for a mile or so, then sweepnig west in a big loop to encompass Chewton Mendip. I take your point about Folly Farm - I guess I was envisaging that we'd add other "other locations" over time - what should we do with it in the meantime so its less lonely? SP-KP 11:04, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

I wonder if it would be visible on nasa's satellite program world wind. just asking because I downloaded it the other day and the shots from it are public domain. cant find a map of it on google, other than [1] -- Astrokey44|talk 08:34, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I got this image Image:Chew valley area satellite.png using worldwind, not sure how much of it is chew valley -- Astrokey44|talk 23:38, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
Its from NASA's World Wind program - so yes it is public domain as US govt images can not be copyrighted -- Astrokey44|talk 23:11, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

CVL on the main page

Hi. It looks as though CVL hasn't been chosen as the main page article for April 17, as you suggested - Mini got in there first. However, it might not be too late to get this changed - User:Raul654 is in charge of these decisions. Anyway, regardless of the date, one other thing I wanted to mention is that when pages get featured on the main page, they get heavily edited a) by real editors and b) by vandals. The vandalism is usually reverted pretty quickly, and the overall result at the end of the stay is an even better article. However, you might want to check the article on the day after it is featured, to make sure nothing key has gone astray. CHeers. SP-KP 17:28, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Info boxes for Chew Valley villages

Hi, The infobox that I changed it to on the Chew Stoke etc pages is the standard English town/village one for places in unitary authorities, it's infobox England place with map UA. There's also a one for place not in UA's (infobox England place with map) which has fields for both district and county. I like it because it gives all the facts like ceremonial county and european parliament seat etc. And it's quick to do as you simply add in the info and it does all the layout etc. I tend to just copy the whole box from one article to the next and then edit the fields that are different getting info like grid coordinates and area codes from yell.com and multimap.com. At the moment I'm trying to work my way round England by county adding it to all the towns to begin with but if you're concentrating on villages around one area then it'd be pretty simple for you to add the infobox to them all as I'd guess most of the facts are the same for them all. ta-ta, --Achmelvic 19:58, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

Congratulations!

Hey, well done Rod. You got the Chew Valley Lake article featured on the main page!! My only claim to fame was creating the article in the first place :-)

Jolly good show, old chap, and all that excellent British tosh - what! I'm proud of you. Chris Jefferies 11:40, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Also congrats. Rich Farmbrough 13:41 4 May 2006 (UTC).

Re:Map expertise

Hi - nice article there! I am sure I can come up with something appealing and useful for the page. I am on a quick (late) lunch break just now, but I will have a good look at the situation tonight and see what can be done. Cheers, SFC9394 13:15, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Image:Chew map test1.png
General Area
Image:Chew map false colour.png
False colour
I have thrown together a quick view of the area - I am guessing that the valley is roughly bounded by my red line. The process of my map making is entirely down to what you require, so you are welcome to fire off details on what you do/don't want in the map, scale, colour, features etc etc. I should hopefully be able to add road/rail/river details as well as settlements to give a fully detailed map. The other map I have created is a false colour to give an idea of the basin limits, this colour set could be used in addition to a general map of the area to give a clearer view of the watersheds etc. Your comments and guidance on what is required are welcomed. SFC9394 21:29, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Hi, just thought I would let you know the map creating is ticking over. I hopefully should have a completed draft ready sometime in the next few days/week. Once that draft is complete you can let me know if there any things that can be added/taken away and general polishing points before I create a final version. SFC9394 18:29, 28 May 2006 (UTC)
Just another quick update. Unfortunately I got a big pile of work dumped on my desk on Monday that has taken up most of my time over the past week! I should hopefully have a quieter desk this week and so get the map mostly finished up! Regards, SFC9394 22:09, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley

Looked good, but I had a little fiddle with the residents. Is Lord George Sanger doable ? I made Mogadon Man a former resident as his article says so. I don't believe I've ever been in the area. I'll have to have a look next time I'm passing. Cheers ! Angus McLellan (Talk) 13:20, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Lord George was apparently John Sanger's brother, so probably another Chew Magna man. I wondered if you knew anything about him. Angus McLellan (Talk) 13:58, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Hi: Your Chew Valley and Chew Valley Lake articles both have ref numbering problems. It's caused by the way the ref/note system uses the same ref multiple times. Note in Chew Valley, the ref sections lists 34 refs but only 32 numbers show up in the text. The new cite php system handles these multiple refs better. My FA History of merit badges (Boy Scouts of America) used ref/note, while one we're working toward listing as FAC (Eagle Scout (Boy Scouts of America)) uses cite php. While I don't like having refs directly in the text, cite php does work better; but while ref/note is easier to read (to me), it doesn't handles things as well. If you have trouble figuring out cite php, I will help you. Rlevse 18:21, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

  • PS: I like the way you did the History section now. Rlevse 18:23, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

NHS stubs

Hi there! After a lot of rattling sround, my attempt to validate the use of {{NHS-stubs}} and reclaim Category:NHS stubs from the name 'UK medical organisation stubs' (given to it when hardly anyone was looking' has now reached the subs proposal list, here. One contributor has suggested it ought to be named Category:National Health Service stubs, which is fine by me. If you are in favour of either version, which would give us a clear 'dedicated' list of stubs which the WikiProject could attack, please go to the proposal article and vote accordingly. All best regards - --Smerus 04:52, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley map

Image:Chew valley map draft.png
400px

I have uploaded the draft version at a near complete stage. Red = trunk road, green = primary route, b = secondary route, blue/grey = minor road. All that is required is settlement markers and text (and a key/scale + some polishing). You comments on the area covered, size, colour etc etc are welcomed. The source for all of the roads, rivers etc are derived from OS 1890 mapping (the only OS mapping that is old enough to be public domain) and so some of the details on the map might be wrong/old and incorrect, any mistakes that need corrected let me know! I was lucky enough that the lake was big enough to be shown on the topographical data, otherwise I wouldn't have known where to put it as it is still just fields on the 1890 maps!). I have uploaded the full res version (2.4mb) - I don't know if the high resolution is immediately useful for anything, but if in doubt I always make it at a higher resolution! I will experiment with a few different methods of valley basin marking to see what stands out without overpowering the rest of the map. Part of the reason this map has taken so long is my experimentation with Inkscape for drawing on the map details rather than The Gimp, the new software is now much quicker but it took a bit of experimentation time to get used to! SFC9394 20:54, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Good point about the minor roads - I will lighten them up a bit to try and make them more differentiable from the rivers. I will spend the next couple of days getting all the text and location markers put in - any bit of the map details is changeable at any time, so there is no great rush on any other comments you have. SFC9394 10:22, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

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Chew Map final draft

Finally got things finished up with the map! There are a few bits of polish (scale, key, compass etc) to add, but I thought I would upload the final version first in case there is anything that needs to be changed. I have also uploaded a test low-res version of the "basin" marking - I can upload final versions with and without, but I thought I would upload one to give you an idea what it looks like and so you can decide whether it is a useful marking to have or not. SFC9394 22:46, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Sure I can increase the text size - at the moment there are 3 sizes, I can increase the village font size to the mid level size (or I can make it just a bit smaller than that). I will add in the valley marking to the map. Are there any other details which would be useful to add to the map? If there are some things then I will slot them in, if not then I will get all the final details finished up and we should have a completed map easily before the articles front page appearance. SFC9394 15:12, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
Good point on the upland names, I will add them in (as well as having a browse about the old 1890 OS map for any other specific hill names and spot heights). For the name to be used on the title plate of the map do you want "Chew Valley", or "Chew Valley, Somerset", or another title? SFC9394 18:12, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
Unfortunately ST499568 & ST595503 are just outside the map boundaries, ST546537 is fine though, I can add a Trig and transmitter marker to it. SFC9394 22:03, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
  • I have uploaded the finished draft (shown above) to the commons, I hope everything is fine with it, if there are any changes needed then let me know. Also, if you want any specific maps of smaller areas, locating specific things then just let me know as all the legwork on the area has now been done, so creating derivative maps pointing out specific things etc can be done in a jiffy. The closest to the area I have been was to the Cheddar Gorge on a holiday many many years ago, but I now feel that I know the area well after having cast my eye over every mile! SFC9394 15:51, 2 July 2006 (UTC)
Mistake fixed - that was a "I was reading it too fast" error! No problem on creating the map, it has actually been a useful exercise on familiarising myself with new methods of map making! Feel free to cleanup/merge all this map discussion, I have speedy tagged all the other test maps on the commons, so they should dissapear shortly. SFC9394 20:53, 2 July 2006 (UTC)

Re: RCN

I will have a look, but might take a while... Panthro 00:14, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Dougald Baird

I have removed Sir from the article name as it is against Wikipedia conventions to have Sir in the title of a page (with exceptions for baronets if you need to disambiguate). I'm not saying he isn't a knight. --Berks105 13:04, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

SSSIs

Hi. This is part of a larger exercise to add content on SSSIs to WP. My starting point is to add a full list of SSSIs, but as there are thousands, this would mean a very large page, so I decided to split them up geographically. You'll no doubt know of the multitude of different geographical categorisation systems in use in Britain - traditional counties, current administrative counties and so on - things get even more complicated in the world of biodiversity conservation as there are specialist systems over & above the usual ones (e.g. hectads, vice-counties, natural areas). I thought the simplest thing to do would be to set up the lists here based on the concept which English Nature uses - this is called "Area of Search" - this is the area within which they review their SSSI selection for completeness etc, and is based on the 1974-1996 county system. Given that I'd like eventually to get one article per SSSI on here, I thought I might as well start setting up some categories into which they can all eventually fall, and used the same system to avoid confusion. I thought this might attract some comment, and am keen to discuss, as, although I think this solution is the least worst option, more heads on the problem might well be able to find a better way of doing this. Any thoughts? SP-KP 15:09, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

An explanatory note is a good idea - I'll add one (I'm sure I'll get the same queries with Humberside, Cleveland etc) SP-KP 16:18, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

I've added one to this page - let me know if you think this hits the right note, and I'll add something similar to all other relevant pages. SP-KP 16:31, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

OK. Cleveland done too now. Thanks for the offer to add these to Avon & Somerset, please go ahead - that frees me up to tackle Humberside etc. SP-KP 16:47, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Inspired by your linking of Newton St Loe, I've done a page on that SSSI btw. Comments appreciated. SP-KP 17:04, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi again - I notice that the Chew Valley template gives Stanton Drew as an SSSI - but I can't find it listed at EN's site. Which is correct - any idea? SP-KP 11:20, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley SSSIs

Hi. I thought you might like to know that Burledge Hill has been notified as an SSSI as of last November - see [2] SP-KP 17:48, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Infoboxes - no, I don't think there is one, but I think it's an excellent idea - see List of SSSIs in Avon for some ideas of the things that could go in it. Do you feel like creating one? SP-KP 20:18, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

SSSI Infobox

No probs - I'll give it a try - good learning opportunity! SP-KP 20:45, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, I've had a first stab at an infobox - see Aust Cliff. What do you think? SP-KP 21:24, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

All three of those seem like good ideas - I'll do some more work when I get time. The template is at { { Template Infobox SSSI } } SP-KP 21:39, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

More Chew Valley SSSIs

How about Barns Batch Spinney - I think this passes the "spilt glass of water" test - what do you reckon? SP-KP 22:10, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

And one more - Dundry Main Road South Quarry SP-KP 22:20, 9 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the message. Out of interest, what's at Nempnett? Biological or Geological? SP-KP 17:31, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Nempnett

Thanks for that - you learn all sorts of new things on here. I'm not an expert on the geology criteria (biological SSSIs are my thing), but I'm guessing the criteria only cover sites where geological features are natural, or where they have been revealed by human activity but are still in situ. I don't recall hearing about any SSSIs where the rocks are not in their original places, so I suspect that's the reason why Nempnett isn't, although maybe it just hasn't been considered yet; certainly the biological series is still far from complete, as the recent addition of Burledge shows. The Biological SSSI criteria are published in a nice thick volume, and the geological ones may well be too - JNCC would be the people to speak to. SP-KP 17:51, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Harptree Combe plants

Hi. I assume you're referring to:

  • Barbula reflexa - this is a moss, now known as Didymodon ferrugineus (English name Rusty Beard-moss)
  • Barbula spadicea - this is a moss, now known as Didymodon spadiceus (English name Brown Beard-moss)
  • Cystopteris fragilis - this is a fern, and it's scientific name hasn't changed, English name Brittle Bladder-fern

What a surprise that none of those have Wikipedia articles :-)

Hope that helps SP-KP 19:34, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

SSSIs - more

I like what you've done with the reasons/description text for the Chew Valley SSSIs. Much better than just quoting EN's text verbatim as I lazily did for Newton St Loe. SP-KP 09:38, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I must admit, I'm not sure of the copyright status of SSSI citations. If this was the USA they'd be public domain documents which could be freely reproduced, here I don't know. Quoting selected paragraphs, as you were doing, should be absolutely fine under copyright law but reproducing the whole text, don't know. Anyway, whatever, it looks much better incorporated into the main text.

On the question of where we link to, I think I'd say we should do both. I can see benefit in linking to the higher-level page where additional information is available, and think we should do that (in "external links"). However, if we use a PDF doc as our source for info in the article, I'd say we ought to link directly to that PDF, rather than to a navigation page somewhere higher up - there are lots of documents linked from each of the main EN SSSI pages, and we ought to be unambiguous about which one we've used. I do see your point about potential for abuse of the info, but I can walk into my local library and access the SSSI citations without having to say that I won't abuse this information so ... not sure? A small additional point, I think it's Wikipedia standard to point out explicitly by suffixing the link with "(PDF)" when we link to a PDF. SP-KP 11:00, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Appleyard's Feather-moss

Hi. Yes, I saw that after adding the comment. As Harptree was the type locality for this moss, we should still mention that fact in the article even though the moss is no longer was it was thought to be, if the genetic study is correct (sometimes these things turn out not to be correct e.g. see User:Sabine's Sunbird's recent post on albatrosses on my talk page). A mention of the genetic study at the Harptree page would be sensible, I agree. At this stage perhaps we should say something like "... although doubt has been cast on the validity of the species as a result of a study by XXXXX" rather than wiping it from history just yet, in case some rival scientists come back with evidence that it is a good species after all. SP-KP 11:12, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

One more?

Lulsgate Quarry? SP-KP

Hi. I think the line is in the wrong place - take a look at [3] - I think that a north/south line through Oatfield Pool and Lulsgate Farm forms part of the Chew Valley boundary - anywhere east of there, doesn't the cup of water flow down through Lulsgate Bottom, east along the valley bottom towards Winford and on to the Chew? West of there the water runs down through Brockley Combe and onto the North Somerset Levels. So the quarry would be (just) in. SP-KP 21:21, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Bold on Fairy Toot (Nempnett)

Hi Rod. The reason that I deleted the bolding was that this was the second time in the article; it is already bolded in the introductory para so so that redirectees know they've come to the right place - I left that bolding in place and removed the second instance of bolding further down. So shouldn't it just be bolded the first time (i.e. in the intro)? Regards, Jenny Wong 10:28, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

And another...

Plaster's Green Meadows

Also, it strikes me that the Mendip Hills need a map. How did you go about getting your Chew Valley map done? SP-KP 14:29, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

SSSI & map

Hi - thanks for that advice, I'll give him/her a shout. The plant names all look OK - List of the vascular plants of Britain and Ireland will enable you to check them for yourself, but there's a huge amount of content at those pages, so no probs at all if you'd rather ask me for opinions on this kind of thing instead! SP-KP 14:54, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Mendip Hills

Tricky one. The simple answer is I don't know what I think about this. The AONB boundary is a nice clear-cut area, and if we can't find anything else I'd go for that. The only thing is I believe it was drawn up to recognise those areas which would fit well within an AONB on aesthetic / landscape conservation grounds (kind of makes sense I suppose) but excludes large areas of land which are definitely part of the Mendip Hills range i.e. the land east of the A37 and west of Frome. There's also the question of whether "the Mendips" just refers to the main hill range or extends northwards to include hills as far as Bath and Bristol. I'll see what I can find out regarding geographer's definitions and report back. SP-KP 15:41, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

How about we ask these people for a view? SP-KP 15:47, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Template looks good. If the folk in "East Mendip" or "North Mendip" feel left out they can always edit it themselves to expand its area of coverage. One small worry about having overlapping areas like this is that some pages are going to start accumulating these templates - this makes four for Chew Valley Lake, now, correct? I wonder if there are any guidelines out there for this kind of thing. SP-KP 16:07, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

SSSIs named after villages

Hi. I've come across quite a few of these - it would as you say be daft to title the SSSI article by the village name and then have to append (village) to the village article. What I've tended to do is rename the links in a manner similar to the one you suggested - e.g. "Rodney Stoke SSSI, Somerset". SP-KP 15:35, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

Cheddar

I was intending to stick pretty rigidly to one article per SSSI. One per important subdivision maybe eventually, but I've got my work cut out with just one per SSSI. The Cheddar Complex is there in my list, but filed under T. It (and anything else starting The) should be filed under their respective "real" initial letters, I think - do you agree? SP-KP 16:41, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

RCN fellows

Sorry I did not respond to your request for assistance earlier. I have just moved and have therefore had little time for Wikipedia recently. Having looked at the article it seems to be going well. However, I am a bit confused about the fellows, as the list on the RCN website seems to miss a number of names that appear in the annual report. Not sure whether this link will be of any help for building the fellows list further. --Vince 13:28, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

DYK

Updated DYK query On 20 July 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Crook Peak to Shute Shelve Hill, which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

-- Grue  14:33, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

Mendip template

Hi. Easton points to a disambig page - thought you might like to know. SP-KP 18:00, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

English Heritage

Thanks for your message. Just to expand on my category standardisation, the categories for Richmond Abbey, for example, are as follows.

  • 1132 establishments
  • Buildings and structures in North Yorkshire
  • Cistercian monasteries
  • English Heritage
  • History of North Yorkshire
  • Monasteries in England
  • Ruins
  • Visitor attractions in North Yorkshire

Should every article have as many categories as possible? I am tempted to add these to all of the EH articles as they are all applicable.

  • English Heritage
  • Ruins
  • Buildings and structures in insert county here
  • History of insert county here
  • Visitor attractions in insert county here

In addition, adding various castles, monasteries, Romans categories, depending on the property.

I have not used categories much (as a reader) so am I not sure if these is the right thing to do. (Tyhe unsigned message above was left by User:MortimerCat on 30th July 2006)

Hi - the Avon SSSI list didn't pass FLC, but not fatally so - I've decided to continue the discussion at Talk:List of Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Avon - any thoughts you have would be appreciated. SP-KP 12:43, 30 July 2006 (UTC)


I've renominated Avon at FLC. In theory it should fly through, but you never know - I'm going ahead and applying the changes to Wilts, Devon, Gloucs, Cleveland & IoW, the other pages I'm made a start on, so you could do the same to Somerset, or perhaps wait to see what FLC2 comes up with - your shout! SP-KP 19:26, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Copying Avon changes to Somerset

Yeah sure. Hopefully Avon will get through FLC so we dont have to change the format much more. Suicidalhamster 13:04, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Somerset SSSIs

Hi. Cheddar Complex is there but under "T" for "THE Cheddar Complex". Quants is a good SSSI (been there, very good in fact). Quantocks has, I would guess, lots of smaller sites, each notified separately. Don't know if that helps? SP-KP 19:14, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi again - I had a thought which I thought I should mention. Not sure if you're aware but one of the criteria at Wikipedia:What is a featured list? is that lists must be composed of a "large majority" of bluelinks. There's no definition anywhere of "large majority" but on past experience, I'd say people would expect about 75 of the 126 SSSIs in Somerset to have articles before granting it FLC status. They can be stubs though. I'm working my way through somewhat randomly, creating stubs (and the occasional slightly larger article), so we'll get there some time fairly soon (although I'm trying to tackle Wilts too). Something to bear in mind when deciding when to submit it to FLC. Cheers. SP-KP 21:04, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley satellite photo

Hi. Any advice on how I can go about getting one of these done for other areas? SP-KP 23:45, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

General NHS Stuff

Hi Rod

Happy to contribute to NHS stuff in general, but in line with the advice here, I probably shouldn't get too involved as I'm very close to most of the areas of interest I've added to.

Pimdip 10:06, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Greetings

A message to Nurse Wikipedians
Open the message.

Hectares and acres

Have a look at my comments over at Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of Sites of Special Scientific Interest in Cleveland. In essence, I don't think you should convert unless the data sheet doesn't give the acre and even then you can convert from their more accurate figures. See also my comment about people proof reading each others work. If you did the work in getting the hectare figures from the data sheets, then find someone else in the SSSI team to repeat this. They can double-check your hectares and at the same time get the acres. Note: I fixed a hectare in Avon, not an acre.

If Somerset was a small list, then I might have had a quick look. But I really don't have the time for such a big one. Got to draw the line somewhere, and English SSSI's aren't really my focus of interest. Sorry. Colin°Talk 17:07, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Temple Church.

Thanks for doing the article. It looks okay to me, but I do not claim to be an expert in writing articles. I am just a keen English Heritage member, hoping that a lot of the stubs will be taken over by others. MortimerCat 09:32, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Re: SS Great Britain pic

Hello. Thanks for the comment on my talk page. A thumb covering part of the picture's an easy mistake to make - I do it all the time - and that was the only problem I saw with the picture I replaced, so you can't be as bad a photographer as you make out. :) Re the WP:Bristol competition: unfortunately I was only on holiday in Bristol for the balloon fiesta, so I won't be taking any more pictures there for a while. I've offered the rest of the pictures I took on the WP page, but I haven't entered the fiesta competition due to a lack of time at the moment (and by the time I have the time, the deadline will have passed). Mike Peel 20:47, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

ISBNs for Sutton Court

Thanks for pointing out the ISBN problems on Sutton Court. I think I've fixed tem all but would be grateful if yu'd check.— Rod talk 21:11, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

That was quick. I've hyphenated them. They look fine. Rich Farmbrough 21:21 22 August 2006 (GMT).
Nice to see Chew Valley will be on the main page. I'll hyphenate the ISBNs later. Rich Farmbrough 14:26 23 August 2006 (GMT).

Council House, Bristol

Updated DYK query On 22 August 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Council House, Bristol, which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

What a nice little article! Well written and well referenced. Thanks for the DYK contribution. Cheers -- Samir धर्म 22:09, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

DYK

Updated DYK query On 24 August 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article The Exchange, Bristol, which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

--Blnguyen | rant-line 06:38, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Pix of the Echange

Hi there Rod,

Thanks for the message. That was the first ever message I've recieved on Wikipedia!

As luck would have it, I'm going into Bristol tonight so I'll take my camera but I have other business so don't know if I'll get time to vist/photograph Exchange.

By the way, I'd love to meet another Wikipedian. Are there any local meets? Is there a way for me to tell you my email address/vice-versa without it being in the public domain?

Cheeers,

Michael (aka Wikikob)

Chew Valley & the front page

Hi, as you spotted Chew Valley is to be on the front page next week. I'm going to be away on holiday & will have no web access so will not be able to counter any vandalism etc - would you be able to keep an eye on the page for me before & during 31st August? — Rod talk 14:42, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Rod, I'll do what I can beforehand, but the main page FA is always closely watched anyway, so have a relaxing holiday. Rich Farmbrough 14:44 24 August 2006 (GMT).
Hi. I'll try too. Have a good holiday! SP-KP 17:00, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Re: harbour map

I'm still not totally happy with it, but how's this? Joe D (t) 20:25, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

DYK

Updated DYK query On 29 August 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Royal West of England Academy, which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.

Congratulations on behalf of User:Blnguyen! --Bravada, talk - 01:53, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Is this Pensford?

I took this pic because the viaduct caught my eye as I went over earlier this year, but I didn't know exactly where it was. Can you confirm that it is Pensford? I saw your own pic of Pensford Viaduct in the Chew Valley article. William Avery 15:54, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply. William Avery 16:53, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Somerset SSSIs list FLC

Somerset should pass easily, I'd have thought. Great work. SP-KP 09:07, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Chew Valley

My pleasure. Could you look at the "invalid ISBN's"., also for [[Chew Magma], Chew Lake and Chew, at some point? Thanks, Rich Farmbrough, 20:19 3 September 2006 (GMT).

Sorry, rushing too much! Chew Stoke is the third one. Thanks. Rich Farmbrough, 20:41 3 September 2006 (GMT).

DYK

Updated DYK query On 13 September 2006, Did you know? was updated with a fact from the article Dundas Aqueduct, which you created. If you know of another interesting fact from a recently created article, then please suggest it on the "Did you know?" talk page.