Talk:Switcher

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[edit] Separate Page needed for (UK) Shunting Engine?

This article is very US-centric. Most of the terminology used, and the locomotive descriptions themselves, are alien to a UK audience (eg there is no concept of a 'slug' in the UK, and tender locos were never designed as shunting engines, even if they were occasionally used as such). I cannot comment for non- UK/US readers.

I think it would be worthwhile to create a separate Shunter page, to describe shunting (US - switching) using UK terminology and the locomotive designs from a UK-perspective. This would be clearer than attempting to describe both on the one page.

There is also the concept that in the UK a 'shunter' was also the railway employee whose job it was to couple/uncouple wagons in a shunting yard. (The locomotive should more correctly be called a 'shunting engine', but obviously 'shunter' is rather easier to say!)

Thoughts? EdJogg 01:11, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't like the Idea of having a separate page for every country... if you look at swiss shunters, there different again from the british and american ones, so we need yet another page and so forth. I would rather see a better structure in this article: Maybe a general paragraph about "shunters of the world", then sections that are specific to certain parts of the world. See Control Car (rail) for an example how this could look. If one of these sections grows too big (not likely to happen in the near future, I guess), we can still replace it by a short summary and put it on its own page. --Kabelleger 07:10, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Seems like a very good approach to me. (I'll put it on my 'ToDo' list, although this is rather long, so someone else might beat me to it!!) Will be much easier to highlight suitable examples. (Perhaps there's a need for a category of UK shunting engine types? Many were designed for the purpose. Anyone?).

For both pages it is very important to avoid country-specific terminology in the introductory section. I'm sure that most non-US readers can cope with the use of railroad instead of railway, for example, but reference to cars, switching, and (especially) classification yards means nothing to readers from countries where railways developed from British practice. Not trying to be antagonistic - just highlighting a need for careful choice of words. (Which is a Wikipedia guideline, although I can't quote which!)

EdJogg 09:14, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

re the statement "eg there is no concept of a 'slug' in the UK" - that's not quite true - Ok there aren't any now but previously the Class 13 0-6-0 + 0-6-0 master and slave units (essentially two Class 08s permanently coupled) used to shunt the hump at Tinsley Marshalling Yard nr Sheffield might be a case in point? I agree about the careful choice of words but this would work with the 'Shunters of the World' idea as you could use the appropriate terminology as appropriate to each country mentioned.

Andywebby 19:23, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

You know I'm not sure I actually read slug (railroad) before writing that first paragraph, but a genuine thank you for making me do so now – it has proved me right! Agreed, the British Rail Class 13 was a master-slave arrangement, and was (AFAIK) unique in Britain. But having read the relevant articles, the Class 13 was definitely NOT a 'slug'. Both units retained their engines, and thus the pairing was much nearer the American cow-calf arrangement. Interestingly, on that page, the Class 13 is the ONLY entry in the list of cow-calf types!

EdJogg 00:53, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

ah - thanks for adding this Ed - I'd missed the point about slugs not actually having their own engine/generator combination although they do have traction motors; so you are correct that the 'Master and Slave' Class 13s do appear to technically be 'Cow and Calf' units (in non UK parlance anyway!). I live and learn... Andywebby 00:57, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Disambiguation page required

Hi, I came here looking for an article about "Switcher" which was a pivotal early Apple Macintosh software program, as well as another program that allowed multiple System Folders on the same hard drive. However, I can't write the article stub because I don't know how to create a disambiguation page. Connectionfailure (talk) 09:38, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I thought about moving the present switcher page, but it is linked from hundreds of articles, so this is not a sensible course of action. Instead, you need to consult WP:DAB#Disambiguation pages and do the following:

1. Click on this redlink: Switcher (disambiguation) to create your DAB page
2. Write your list of terms (including the rail usage, and the video-related use currently linked at the top of the article)
   -- follow the formatting guidance in the WP:DAB page (also see road locomotive for ideas)
3. Include {{disambig}} at the bottom of your new page, preview and adjust, then save
4. In switcher, replace the first ('dab') line with {{Otheruses}}, to link to the new dab page.

And that's about it! -- EdJogg (talk) 12:26, 20 May 2008 (UTC)