User talk:Koavf

Welcome

welcome! TedErnst | talk 12:44, 7 August 2006 (EDT)

Message from my userpage

Welcome Justin!

We have a tradition of either redirecting this page to your namespace in the main article space, or leaving it. Two examples, my login is my name, so it shows in recent changes, and redirects to the main namespace or this example. This is a discussion in process, let me know what you think! Nice to have you here. Best, MarkDilley (oh, btw, I am a Hoosier by birth, Indianapolis also, although I moved to SE MI early on)

Your thoughts on upgrade and logo

Hi Justin, can you check out, contribute if you want - WikiIndex:Admin_Notes#October_2010_Upgrade_Thoughts - best, MarkDilley

message re: upgrade path & moves

Hello, please check out WikiIndex:NewLogoDecision and WikiIndex:Spring 2011 Upgrade Path. Also, I am moving some of your move edits back to the main namespace - a couple of them are WikiIdeas and I think fit with what WikiIndex was envisioned. Not a steadfast rule, please discuss if you would like. Best, MarkDilley

Congratulations

For your new admin access :) --YiFei | talk 10:43, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Thanks I hope that I can be an asset. I like the idea of fostering some community amongst wikis. Koavf (talk) 15:37, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Template:Wikivoyage, edit summaries and HotCat

Hi - I was just wondering the reason for this edit? I'm aware that removing spaces either side of hyphens/dashes is an American method, and is often found in Wikipedia - but it doesn;t reflect international English (and also makes it difficult, if not impossible for machine translators to correctly translate). I trust you are aware we don't have to follow the Wikipedia Manual of Style here on WikiIndex - we want to reach out to an international audience!

Can I also ask that you try to remember completing the edit summary before saving edits, please. Edit summaries are important for those who track the wiki activity via the Recent changes.

I also noticed you are using something called HotCat - is that a new extension installed somewhere? Can you link me to it so I can look at it please? Best regards Sean, aka Hoof Hearted • _Admin • talk2HH 02:50, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Dashes As I understand it, spaced ndashes/non-spaced mdashes is standard English. If you want a spaced ndash, that's up to you of course. I don't know anything about difficult with machine reading, but I believe you. As far as HotCat goes, it's from Wikimedia Commons. If you want it, see: User:Koavf/monobook.js. You can copy/paste it if you want. Koavf (talk) 03:36, 24 October 2013 (UTC)

Deleting Spam

Could you clear the deletion field ("Other/additional reason") before you delete a spam please?.....you are moving the spam from the main page to the logs where it will remain....forever!... (Original author of this message: Comets) (We don't have the ability to delete logs :() --YiFei | talk 11:37, 29 October 2013 (UTC)

WikiIndex:AbuseFilters

Could you take care of them later? --YiFei | talk 14:27, 25 November 2013 (UTC)

Ping? --YiFei | talk 08:42, 26 November 2013 (UTC)

I'm here It's an open tab in my browser. I've already made one small change and I'm still reading. Thanks, though... Koavf (talk) 10:21, 26 November 2013 (UTC)

You're welcome and thanks for fixing that spelling error. Actually I mean creating and fixing filters to disable any new kinds of spams (I have lost my ability to do so). :) --YiFei | talk 10:55, 26 November 2013 (UTC)

Right I figured as much. This is just going to take some time. Koavf (talk) 18:16, 26 November 2013 (UTC)

Thanks :) --YiFei | talk 10:08, 27 November 2013 (UTC)

I think Special:AbuseFilter/12 should be improved to match the ugg spamming with some other keywords such as "boots?" "store" "size" etc. --YiFei | talk 18:32, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

Thugz For some reason, this brand is aggressively spammed here and at two other wikis where I am an admin. It's preposterous. Koavf (talk) 18:39, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

Works :) See Special:AbuseLog --YiFei | talk 09:36, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Notability of users

"Are we going to make a page about every wiki user or just someone who has some notability...?" Category:Wiki People says "this is a list of people who consider themselves to be part of the wiki community and their associations to various Wiki sites". I would say that PeterKa probably considers himself part of the wiki community. Shall we change that page to say "this is a list of notable people . . ."?

Either way, another question is, are we going to actually make use of Template:Delete and invite discussion, or just have sysops delete pages summarily? Pages deleted in that manner can be undeleted, but then we have the classic problem that non-sysops are unable to view the page and therefore cannot give very well-informed input about whether undeletion would be a good idea. If we are going to use the template, then sysops will need to periodically close those discussions; that didn't happen with the last round of deletion proposals. They sat there for weeks, so I closed them myself as "keep" or "no consensus" since there was in fact no consensus to delete (hardly anyone saw fit to weigh in on those talk pages). Leucosticte (talk) 17:19, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

Deletion That's a fair question: it's hard to figure out what the community wants when it's too small but it's also hard to foster community if there are rogue admins. Do you want me to undelete? If so, I can move it to your userspace. I don't think that we want to make millions of profiles on wiki users—that sounds nonsensical. Koavf (talk) 17:23, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

You can userfy it if you want. Since the norm on this wiki is that userspace can be edited by people other than the user, it's not that much different from mainspace. However, those userspace pages would need to be dropped from any mainspace categories, which I guess is part of the point.

I don't see how it's nonsensical to host content on non-notable stuff. If we were to limit ourselves to covering notable wikis, wiki people, and wiki ideas, then our purpose would already be served by Wikipedia. The lower you set the notability standard, the more people are attracted to the wiki to write articles about non-notable stuff, and you end up with a larger community to keep these articles at a reasonably high standard of quality (in terms of criteria such as these or these). People google some obscure wiki, wiki person, or wiki idea, and find WikiIndex at the top of the search results and end up editing the article and perhaps exploring the rest of WikiIndex.

I've never been persuaded by deletionist arguments such as that having too many articles causes categories to get clogged up with cruft. In that situation, we simply create more subcategories so that no category gets too big. E.g. if "Wikis created in 2014" gets too big, then we narrow it down to "Wikis created in May 2014". Also, although RecentChanges does get clogged up with edits to cruft articles when there aren't high notability standards, the alternative might be that (1) RecentChanges gets clogged up with deletion debates and/or (2) people get disgruntled over the outcome of debates over notability and leave the wiki, resulting in fewer people watching RecentChanges.

That's why I tend toward radical inclusionism. Well, that and the fact that I like to write about cruft. In the immortal words of Encyclopedia Dramatica, "Wikipedia deletes thousands of articles a day that they consider 'cruft'. People who use Wikipedia like to write a lot of 'cruft', from mentioning tours that musicians have gone on through to various characters in cartoon shows, computer games or tabletop roleplaying games, it is what Wikipedia does. Furthermore, it is what Wikipedia does best! But at the same time, Wikipedia hates that that is what they do best! They want to instead be known for making legitimate, real, articles, however they can never do this right and end up with totally inaccurate articles where they can't even get the dates right." Leucosticte (talk) 17:40, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

Notability I'm not suggesting that WikiIndex needs a notability requirement like Wikipedia but that there has to be some limit on the content that can be included here. Including every wiki is a somewhat difficult but not an impossible goal–there are tens of thousands. Including a profile of everyone who has used a wiki is impossible and meaningless. Are we going to have articles on everyone who has read Wikipedia...? Koavf (talk) 04:58, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

I think we could end up chasing our tails if we try to establish where we draw our line regarding notability. I suggest another test of weather we include people might be 'interesting' – do they have an interesting story or back story which others might like to read about?

However, I don't agree with summary deletions (apart from the obvious spam). If someone has taken the effort to create an article, we should at least give them the courtesy of discussing the merits or de-merits of said article; and therefore we should use Template:Delete as a matter of routine. Sean, aka Hoof Hearted • _{Admin / 'Crat} • talk2HH 20:50, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

"Interesting" is pretty subjective. But I'm not sure what other criterion we could use. Leucosticte (talk) 21:38, 18 May 2014 (UTC)

Interest Actually, I think that "interesting" is a completely appropriate criterion. No one wants to come here to read about the millions of wiki editors and readers who have ever existed or spam accounts. But they would be interested in controversial, ground-breaking, or otherwise fascinating biographies. This isn't to say that PeterKa isn't interesting in some way but how is he? Koavf (talk) 02:42, 19 May 2014 (UTC)

You are famous

There was a series of questions about you on tonights' University Challenge on BBC2. Don't know if you can get the BBC iPlayer in the US. Best, Sean, aka Hoof Hearted • _{Admin / 'Crat} • talk2HH 21:35, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

@Hoof Hearted Thanks! Someone beat you to the punch on en.wp but it's much appreciated! I haven't watched the clip yet but I hope he got it right. It was only yesterday that I was talking to a philosophy professor about editing Wikipedia on Orwell, actually. Koavf (talk) 05:42, 22 July 2014 (UTC)

Category: LETS

I saw You added categories. So, please add another: LETS for entries like http://www.tauschwiki.de/. Its the internationally known abbreviation of "Local Exchange and Trading Systems".--Manorainjan (talk) 18:58, 29 July 2014 (UTC)

Categories I'd be happy to add categories but this link is down. Is there an article on this here at WikiIndex? Koavf (talk) 15:09, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

Tauschwiki --Manorainjan (talk) 21:43, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

If there is just one wiki on that subject matter, then we don't usually create a category. How about Category:Finance, Category:Commerce, Category:Banking, Category:Trading? Sean, aka Hoof Hearted • _{Admin / 'Crat} • talk2HH 22:13, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

Agreed Using a more broad and general category is probably a good idea, only breaking it up into more specific ones if it would really be helpful for navigation. Koavf (talk) 23:19, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

OK, I added Category:Business. --Manorainjan (talk) 00:51, 31 July 2014 (UTC)

Category:Wiki Status

I was wondering how to find the entries which do not have any category. I saw that there are explicit markers like [Category:UnknownStatus] and [Category:YourWikiStatus] which essentially means the same. But this markers need to be set first. What if no marker is set at all, if in the template You find '|status = ' or not even this line? How to find such entries? --Manorainjan (talk) 21:50, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

The most prolific way is when articles are tagged with template:Add (I think that dumps them into Category:Wikis to add) – as these were generally how they were listed when the wiki was in its infancy. Another way is in Category:Stubs. HTH Sean, aka Hoof Hearted • _{Admin / 'Crat} • talk2HH 22:17, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

So You believe! I testet this with Worldcyclopedia and no cat was added.--Manorainjan (talk) 00:41, 31 July 2014 (UTC)

See also Special:UncategorizedPages This lists pages with no categories. Note that once a page has one category, it is removed from here, even if it could and should have more categories. Koavf (talk) 23:20, 30 July 2014 (UTC)

I knew that. What I'm looking for is template-related and most likely not yet existing.--Manorainjan (talk) 16:39, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

Category:Wiki License

What about a category 'unknown'? (actually in each of the chapters of the template). Simply that word so one always knows, what to enter when one does not know. --Manorainjan (talk) 16:42, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

Excellent idea There could be one that's a maintenance category for no license mentioned and another for no license listed by the site. Koavf (talk) 03:17, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

Bad idea – we already have an 'unknown' wiki licence category – Category:Wiki YourWiki'sLicense, which is the default from the boilerplate. If a licence is identified on the wiki, it will already be one of the existing sub-categories. We need to be careful, because wiki licences are a Semantic Property, which basically means we can't just make up categories on a whim. Sean, aka Hoof Hearted • _{Admin / 'Crat} • talk2HH 21:48, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Category:Adult content & Category:Adult

I think the Category:Adult is surplus. --Manorainjan (talk) 19:17, 3 August 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Mark for deletion and for indirectly showing me the Cat-Trick with '['[:cat:xyz']'] on the talk pages. I was looking for that ;-)

You are welcome, thanks for doing some WikiGnoming - and I thought it was pretty direct ;-) ~~ MarkDilley

Category:Game

No such Category. How can that be? Manorainjan (talk) 18:04, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

Naming conventions Generally, categories are pluralized, so Category:Games and Category:Video Games. Koavf (talk) 06:22, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Computer // Computers

moved to -> http://wikiindex.org/WikiIndex_talk:Community_portal#Computer_.2F.2F_Computers Manorainjan (talk) 22:03, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Policy discussions

Hi. There seems to be a lot of fresh policy discussions cropping up on your talk page, my talk page, Mark's talk page, and no doubt a few others. Can we please ensure these are discussed in more appropriate places. Either Category talk:Active administrators of this wiki if it just concerns issues which only sysops can deal with, or WikiIndex talk:Community portal for all other wiki-wide discussions. I'll add this same message on other appropriate users talk pages. Sean, aka Hoof Hearted • _{Admin / 'Crat} • talk2HH 21:11, 5 August 2014 (UTC)

Support MarkDilley

Support Manorainjan (talk) 15:31, 6 August 2014 (UTC)

Please be nice Wiki

Why didn't You use the template to create this page?Manorainjan (talk) 08:12, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

No reason I was just in a hurry is all. I wanted to note that the wiki existed before I forgot to include it but didn't have the patience to figure out its logo's URI. Thanks! Koavf (talk) 15:18, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, whilst in an ideal world, we'd always use the template -- it's perfectly ok to just dump the url of a new wiki article. just make sure to include the Add template. (typing on my fone, pain in the rear to add wikilinks!). Sean, aka Hoof Hearted • _{Admin / 'Crat} • talk2HH 16:19, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

Templates That's true--I was essentially using the stub template for that purpose. Koavf (talk) 16:37, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

Founder

Could you expand the above article like you did with Leader, please? :) Sweetie Belle (talk) 15:01, 24 August 2014 (UTC)

Should we have alternative infoboxes besides Template:Wiki?

Discussion here. --MarvelZuvembie (talk) 19:51, 27 August 2014 (UTC)

LogoLinking

Do You have an opinion on that? Please place Your vote on this. Manorainjan (talk) 15:29, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

MeatballWiki

You once edited it as Locked. Do You know any details about that? I changed it to Dormant/ReadOnly, because the EditMode was OpenEdit and Locked is an EditMode basically but no status of any catagory. Manorainjan (talk) 00:55, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Locking I actually recently e-mailed SunirShah about this and he said that there was a spam problem that he couldn't resolve, so he just locked the site to stop it. Koavf (talk) 01:22, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

I also emailed him and did not get any answer. I pointed out that the Join-functionality described on the homepage does not work. He really should place a big not on the homepage to explain the situation. That should not be so difficult.

From my opinion, Locked belongs to the EditMode. Maybe not historically but logically. Dormant means, nothing happens there. And that is the case. that is the status. Manorainjan (talk) 02:20, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Status Some wikis are dormant simply because no one cares, some are dormant because they are locked from editing. That's a meaningful distinction to me. Koavf (talk) 02:24, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Sure it is. But it is called Status and not Reason4Status. Just Like NeedsLove which is not a status but an opinion, it does not belong in Status. Specifics can always be edited into the description. Otherwise we would blow up the Category:Status with numerous special stati. I could invent meaningful new stati by the minute. There is always a reason and it always makes a difference. Shall I? Manorainjan (talk)

Reasons Statuses exist just as helpful guides. If you can think of more categories that would be useful, that's fine. If a community stops editing because it peters out, that's one thing--someone else can come along and begin editing. If a community stops editing because of a technical restriction, that's quite another. Koavf (talk) 03:51, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Consensus To edit one article in the BRD style is one thing, to ignore discussion of community another: Category talk:Wiki Status. If You think there should be 'Locked' as Status, why don't You bring it in the discussion? I had proposed "Halted" long ago. So, let us continue there. Manorainjan (talk) 10:53, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Consensus I didn't create Category:Locked. Koavf (talk) 15:51, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Yes, You did not create that page. But You assigned it {{WikiStatus}} and made it member of Category:Wiki Status which has the same effect as creating a new WikiStatus. You added another Status to WikiStatus. Manorainjan (talk) 19:28, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Status It already was a status of a sort: it just wasn't categorized as one. As long as it exists, it should be categorized properly for navigation. Koavf (talk) 19:36, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

2010 this category was created without asking anybody or even trying to introduce it to the community or giving it a definition and only for the purpose to mark a very limited set of 8 wikis of the WikiMedia foundation. This was already a mistake. It was ignoring the requirements of well functioning database and ignoring the community of this wiki. You did not correct this mistake, You engraved it. The definition which You created aligned the use on MeatballWiki and ignored the original use for which it was created. So You created more confusion and contradiction. And now You are doing Your very best to defend that rather than trying to understand that it should be coordinated with the rest of us. You also made no attempt at all to introduce Your change to the community. On 17 October 2013 You assigned the not defined status Locked and did not care that it was no member of WikiStatus. In August we had this discussion Category talk:Wiki Status which You took part in shortly about another aspect. You know pretty well that it was not finalised. You also did not contribute in a fashion to finalize it, did not make a suggestion that could have helped to solve the puzzle. You saw my Invitation2Invitations which is pointing to this unfinished discussion and actively went on to ignore this discussion for doing YOUR own thing in spite of it. If I would do such things and mess up WikiStatus matters just according to my discretion I think I would get blocked again. Your mission statement "I like the idea of fostering community between wikis and the larger movement for free and open culture..." is not reflected in Your edits here. Or should that be translated as: "I like the idea but will not actively contribute to it." ?

Okay You need to calm down. I was busy in August and didn't get around to those discussions except (as you pointed out) briefly as an aside. This site is an informal repository of wikis: sometimes, a strict definition is not possible or useful or necessary. If you want one here, fine. I respect that you're trying to bring more structure here but you're frankly being rude to me and it's not going to accomplish anything positive. Take a minute and think about how you want to act toward me: I haven't done anything disrespectful to you. Koavf (talk) 21:08, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

I can pay back with the same false coin: "Do You think I'm an idiot? You try to evade the point of playing a lone hand in 'creating' the Category:Locked by the hair-splitting statement You did not create it. Why are You treating my like I'm an idiot who cant even view the history of pages? You actually where disrespectful to me in this futile defence and in the initial act towards the whole of community" Manorainjan (talk)

Okay I honestly have no clue what you're going on about. If you want something changed, please feel free to change it: this is an open wiki. Koavf (talk) 21:25, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

I may be more direct in my style of discussion than many people like. But I do not want to engage in an edit war with anybody, admin or not. Regarding the Category:Locked I would prefer to remove it completely and replace the status of the 8-10 Wikis by C:Dormant for now. And the discussion about the status question should continue. If You think Locked is a good term for any status You could bring it in this discussion with supporting arguments. Manorainjan (talk) 21:34, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Done Category_talk:Wiki_Status#Category:Locked. Koavf (talk) 21:47, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Request for ServerMove concerns

Hi Koavf. Since you are one of the most active contributors here I wanted to be sure to draw your attention to the upcoming ServerMove and solicit your help in making the transition a positive rather than negative experience. Please take a moment to visit ServerMove and curate the list of concerns. Thanks! -- BrandonCsSanders (talk) 22:38, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

delete

You like deleting pages? Here:

Manorainjan (talk) 22:13, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

Deletion I don't like deletion as much as I want to strengthen the content here. Koavf (talk) 05:20, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

Junk or content?

I'm making there edits in order to help You to see what work lies ahead of You.

I do not consider chunks of data dumped on pages in the main space as a constructive contribution to this wiki. I consider such dumps as junk. It is something that should be tolerated only very temporarily. And the one who dumps it, should clean it up as himself and not expect others to do anything about it.

What do You think?

Do You consider these chunks as contribution?
Who do You think should and would turn it into a useful page?
What kind of impression do You think those pages create on visitors?

Manorainjan (talk) 20:25, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

The Template

What a short memory You have! Look above! User_talk:Koavf#Please_be_nice_Wiki The Template like The Wiki like in the purpose of this wiki.

You always get enough time to tidy up Your user page by nicely adding the new entry of the newly created page, never allow any untidy entry on Your space but have no time to tidy the wiki pages. So it would be by far better to create a sub-page to Your user space to note down the wiki URL or what have you in a format as messy as You like and come back to create a wiki page with structured data with "The Template" when You got the time to do real work.

You can not any more rely on Sean to clean up after You. He is gone, possibly because too much janitor work and not enough appreciation for it. Now everybody washes their dirty socks themselves, ok?Manorainjan (talk) 20:38, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

"Junk" As pointed out above by Sean: these edits are perfectly fine. Why would I care if you don't like them? Why would you change this page to imply that I am planning on adding more content to them? You're being an exceptionally rude person right now.

Do You consider these chunks as contribution?
- Yes. If we have no information about something, then adding some information about it is a step in the right direction.
Who do You think should and would turn it into a useful page?
- Anyone. This is a wiki, so anyone can edit it.
What kind of impression do You think those pages create on visitors?
- Probably "there's a lot of work to do" and hopefully "...so I'll join and add my time".

You're just making patently untrue allegations as I've done plenty of clean-up work here. All of which is voluntary and none of which obliges me to edit in a way that you find preferable. When you talk to me like this, it actually dissuades me from doing what you want because I don't want to teach you that sociopathy and rudeness are ways of getting something other than rebuke.

I'm glad that you want to help out around here and you've done lots of good work. You've also been an outrageous irritant at times and I've told you to stop being so abrasive before. Wikis are collaborative by their nature so it's inevitable that you'll have to learn to play nice with others or not play at all. Koavf (talk) 05:55, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

It could be worse. At least he's not trying to impose censorship on the wiki. Leucosticte (talk) 07:02, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Censorship How is that better? Koavf (talk) 07:03, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

I assume Leucosticte is still unhappy with Your recent deletions of wiki pages.

There are other ways to deal with junk as I did. I shall show You one. Manorainjan (talk) 10:58, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Junk I know why he's upset: you didn't answer my question. Your post was not helpful. Koavf (talk) 17:37, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Anyone with thick skin can ignore rude behavior. Deletion poses more of a problem, because it interferes with collaborative production. Leucosticte (talk) 19:48, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Collaboration Actually, someone being harassing is much worse than censorship. The former makes it impossible to work with someone and the latter can just be a product of editorial oversight. There is nothing wrong with self-imposed guidelines and inclusion criteria and there is something wrong with being abusive and churlish. Koavf (talk) 20:56, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

"There is nothing wrong with self-imposed guidelines and inclusion criteria" Oh good, maybe you or someone else will be drafting some soon? I tried, but they got deleted. Leucosticte (talk) 23:24, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Policies Talk about policies in a collaborative venue rather than draft them yourself--it appears like they are consensus when they are in the WikiIndex namespace. Koavf (talk) 01:13, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Pages I need to work on in order to turn them into usable and findable entries with structured data

That was in a way my comment by creating this subdivision on Your user page.

There is no insult in it. But You call me names.
It is a reminder of work to be done. That is what You term harassment.

So, who shows rude and "abrasive" behaviour?

And then, who is starting all this?
- Who drops this chunks of data into the main space like unwashed socks?
- Who deletes wiki entries against policy? See http://wikiindex.org/WikiIndex_talk:Deleting_pages for that!

Manorainjan (talk) 22:50, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Manoranjan, I suggest that you take a little WikiVacation. ~~ MarkDilley

I'm not tiered. I was not the one deleting wiki pages haltingly on account of aroused emotions. You are barking up the wrong tree here. Manorainjan (talk) 23:31, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

(ec) In Koavf's defense, I'll say that this wiki seems to be suffering from the lack of a strong leader to settle disputes and create policy. Wikis without such leadership usually tend to devolve into either a situation like RationalWiki's, in which the herd stampedes and tramples dissidents; or like enwiki's (or to some extent, RW), in which the ArbCom or mods operates as an oligarchy with little accountability or oversight; or like MediaWiki.org's, in which any sysop can pretty much do whatever he wants, and no one ever gets de-sysoped. We don't have a lot of clear policy on what is or isn't appropriate behavior for users or sysops, which again is the result of a lack of a strong leader.

Say what you will about places like Conservapedia, at least they do have a place where the buck stops. When the final authority says something, you know that no one is acting outside of what is appropriate. Manoranjan I don't think believes in wikivacations, and the most recent attempts to force him into one failed. Leucosticte (talk) 23:15, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

This is not the place to discuss something like my vacation. I do not believe in vacations anyway. But again (already the 3rd, getting tired of it ;-) I have to second Birdy: Lack of leadership. I shall pick up on this. Manorainjan (talk) 23:37, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

It was due WikiIndex talk:Leader Manorainjan (talk) 23:47, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Conflict

I regret that it has been necessary for me to comment on you past and the situation with Leucosticte. If you back up and let go of so much control, you will come to find that Leucosticte is generally a cooperative user, when given clear guidance. He will stay within what the community sets as policy. If he doesn't like it, he goes away. Usually!

However, there is a far more difficult user active, Manorainjan. I'm seeing that his incivility may have led Hoof Hearted to abandon WikiIndex. Difficult users can lead administrators into errors, or what will look like errors, and so when MarkDilley did not support Hoof Hearted, it may have blown his fuses. I hope that WikiIndex can get Hoof Hearted back.

Meanwhile, handling problem users tests the capacity of a wiki and a wiki community to handle conflict. Manorainjan is not always wrong, but is tendentious and tenacious, and easily falls into incivility. Such users can be handled with firm clarity. Because of their condition, they may eventually pick some fight with all the active administrators, leading to a problem with recusal policies (whether those policies are explicit or only implied, they are what users expect.) Under those conditions, any administrator may take emergency action, and what I'm here today for is to advise on that, if you care to receive advice. First of all, before taking an emergency action, make sure it is actually an emergency! That is, there will be harm from delay. Second, make your action minimal, just enough to postpone harm. Third, immediately consult the community, do not wait for someone else to complain. Disclose the conflict of interest that might otherwise prohibit the action.

Manorainjan should be warned about incivility. When incivility is allowed to continue, wikis die. I have just pinged him about an abusive sequence, and I've seen a lot more in looking around today. Manorainjan can be a useful contributor, but civility is fundamental to the function of any sound wiki community, so ... if he is warned and disregards the warnings, then he should be blocked. For a user like this, his talk page should remain open, let him rant on that page, and the blocking admin shouldn't take further action. He should not be "banned." Carrot and stick. I have long experience in dealing with problem users. Some, it may be hopeless, but others can be successfully encouraged to cooperate and collaborate.

I do have some question about block length. Wikipedia practice is to block progressively, for short periods, extending into long periods. However, my first real block on Wikipedia, by Iridescent, was indef. However, Iridescent was explicit, "indef until a shift," not "indef as in forever." On a small wiki, if a user is indeffed, the user page should be carefully monitored for unblock request and the user should be given full opportunity to show an understanding of the block reason, and to undertake to not continue the cause of the block. It is also possible to unblock a user for the purpose of participating in a community discussion of the block. If unblocked for that reason, the unblocking admin may always, without raising any recusal issue, undo their own action, the unblock.

Care with this can establish for the community that administrators have the privilege in order to serve the community, not merely their own opinion. It can help to build community. Thanks. --Abd (talk) 23:22, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Conflict For what it's worth, your points are well-taken. I don't want to seem like I'm ignoring you. I disagree with some of what you said and agree with some parts wholeheartedly. Manorainjan has clearly been causing problems and I've warned him about his behavior. Your posts are thoughtful and well-spoken but at the risk of seeming aloof, I don't want to go too far down the rabbit hole on this without more input from other members or at least more time so that someone else can respond. Koavf (talk) 06:27, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Sure. We did not allow L. to create whatever he wanted on Wikiversity, because his recent-favorite topics can be very hot, and we don't need the disruption. We pointed to how he could actually accomplish some of what he wanted -- participating in the creation of ethical guidelines -- but he decided on one issue, the suicide material, to go to Wikibooks, which had already decided as a community to allow such material (and so has Wikipedia.) On the other main problem issue, we'll call it CP (to be clear, none of his sites have been "Child Pornography," but some contain material that can be construed as advocacy for personal sexual freedom, and that, in the WMF wikis, can raise issues of "Child Protection." He has apparently abandoned that issue on WMF wikis.

Many people explode when this topic is around. I am a parent myself.... That happened on RationalWiki, which previously had a defacto policy that anything could be discussed. He stopped when warned, but people then pursued him. We saw that lead to disruption here. WikiIndex is absolutely not set up to discuss these issues and handle what will arise.

However, Wikiindex has a mission, and the mission is clear, and there are no exceptions stated. It's an index of all wikis, past and present, and this has been explicit. Historically, it's mostly been up to wiki users to set up their own pages. Now, how much detail is present in the index listing is another issue. L., at some points, went way overboard. But as I mentioned, he's collaborative. He doesn't explode when nudged and warned. He doesn't sock disruptively.

I assume that WikiIndex would index a wiki on terrorism. It would index porn wikis. WikiIndex can and should develop guidelines to cover matters like content warnings. Sites reported as hosting malware should be flagged. Sites with material not suitable for children should be flagged. (Would Wikipedia be flagged? How about Commons?)

Thanks, in any case. --Abd (talk) 16:23, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

Template:W

Is there a reason why it's necessary to delete Template:W, which has a number of transclusions? If so, a deletion summary would have made it unnecessary to ask the reason. Thanks, Leucosticte (talk) 20:20, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Undeleted That was an error and I have no idea how I made it: I checked all of the unused templates from the report and somehow ended up deleting that... Good eye. My apologies. Koavf (talk) 20:22, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

BoyWiki

Koavf, you deleted BoyWiki. So that we can see the content and edit history, I request that you undelete. It would be fine if you blanked it or replaced it with a warning about the content. I can read it in history, then. I did spend a fair amount of time yesterday reviewing that wiki and it appears that it has been misunderstood. It does not advocate illegal activity. It may have some users who do or who have, but I found only one user there who even appeared to personally support illegal activity, and that is our user Leudosticte, who always presents that appearance, it is his specialty. He is not admin there and began fairly minor contributions in March 2014. It is a very long-standing wiki. Thanks! --Abd (talk) 20:13, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Undeletion I could do that or e-mail you the contents of the page if you want. Koavf (talk) 20:14, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

I prefer undeletion because then anyone can read the content, if there is to be a discussion, which may occur. Because of controversy over this page, if it's undeleted, it could be blanked, as I suggested, or it could be moved into my user space, another possibility. It could be no-indexed. Whatever is necessary to address concerns.

For email, I would prefer a full XML export with page history, because it can be relevant. Thanks. --Abd (talk) 20:39, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Both Jason and Arcane approved the deletion as well. Noindex isn't going to achieve the goal that Koavf was concerned about, which was eliminating the reason for RationalWiki users to badmouth WikiIndex. The page will still be visible to RationalWikians, and therefore they'll still have something to say about it. Leucosticte (talk) 23:25, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Fascinating. Elsewhere in the wikisphere, Leucosticte has complained about the deletion as one more proof of how abusive so many wikis are. He made a point to tell the major active BoyWiki user about the deletion here. Here, he complained about it and about the practice that deleted it. He then suggested a bet. [1][2] I declined to bet. However, I had been thinking of seeing if the page could be restored. That would start by looking at it. Nathan doesn't want the page restored, he's much happier as the outcast, the champion of the rejected scapegoats. (And he's busy attempting to stir them up.) He doesn't want consensus on the matter, he wants dispute, which is why he's telling you, now, that two other sysops "approved" the deletion.

I asked you, Koavf, for a very simple reason: wiki tradition: you deleted, so I asked you. You accepted, but have not undeleted yet. No rush. It was just a request. I can ask someone else or create a discussion, and I can wait. It is *always* less disruptive to ask a deleting sysop to undelete, first, and I did this on Wikipedia, saving articles that way. The more disruptive way on Wikipedia is to start a Deletion Review, which pulls every deletionist or inclusionist troll out of the woodwork. If there is a good reason for undeletion, most admins will look at it. Deleting with blanking is a way to find a temporary consensus, here, and then to allow deeper consideration. On Wikipedia with an article, I might request it be restored to my user space, I did that many times. However, discussing whether or not BoyWiki is offensive is very likely itself to create disruption, I've seen this kind of discussion explode many times. Frankly, I think we should avoid the whole problem by setting guidelines, which is happening with WikiIndex:Prohibited content. In my view, Boywiki does not meet the guidelines for prohibition, except as Leuscosticte attempted to write them. He's become entirely transparent. His motives I can guess, but, in the end, he knows himself best.

BoyWiki has been around a long time. I wanted to see the history of the page. All this controversy around listing wikis started with Leucosticte.

The argument about RationalWiki takes the cake. The complaints from RationalWiki were not about that page, they were about Leucosticte. Here is the page. They are not going to complain if the BoyWiki page is restored and blanked. They are not complete idiots. By the way, Leucosticte claims they ban anyone who disagrees with them. Huh! I'm still a sysop there. I found it useless, but I an not banned. I got no flack for that commentary, which was very mild by RatWiki standards. RatWiki runs on flames. --Abd (talk) 00:59, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

The RationalWikians' complaint is, specifically, that I dominate WikiIndex. If sysops are observed to be overriding my decisions, then the RWians have no grounds for that complaint. Leucosticte (talk) 01:48, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

XML I have no problem sending you a copy. I have e-mailed you via WikiIndex. I was simply walking out the door when you posted to my talk. Koavf (talk) 04:49, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Okay, one step at a time. Thanks. --Abd (talk) 16:28, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Deletion study

User:Abd/Deletion questions collects deletions from the deletion log that had no apparent reason or where there might be some question about the reason. As it happens, all were done by you. This is not a demand that you do anything, nor is it an accusation of error. However, if you choose to do so, you could comment there. I have not decided how to proceed on the issue of deletion policy, though I do have some ideas. Your input is invited and welcome. Thanks for all your work for WikiIndex. --Abd (talk) 01:09, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Hello!

I have just joined WikiIndex! I do not have anything important to say, but I saw a message from you on my talk page, so I decided to respond. Goodbye, and have a great day! --Mélodilous (talk) 16:05, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Saying hi A friendly hello is one of the most important things you can say. I hope you decide to stick around here and help us document the Wikisphere. Koavf (talk) 17:03, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Shoot first, ask later?

I'm being called rude sometimes, because I instantly revert edits that reverted mine without asking.

But: The one who needlessly reverts my edits without asking me first, why I did it or misses the chance to tell me in the first place what he THINKS I would have done wrong, that actually is the rude guy!

Now, in case of Y. my edit was:

{{language|en|N}} Summary: Please adjust and add as appropriate, see and.

His user page started English. If that is not his first language, he can change that himself. There is not need whatsoever for You to do anything there. And there is no danger ahead that forces You to take immediate action. But You go over it like fire patrol! The result is, that edit-war like comments are on his user page. This is what You invited without consideration. So, don't call me rude now, accept that You are trigger happy. It's not the first time. It is a consistent pattern of Your behaviour. Manorainjan (talk) 10:55, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

What? How am I any less invited to his userpage than you...? If you really want to know what languages he speaks, rather than make up guesses, you could: 1.) ask him, 2.) leave it be as it's his userpage, or 3.) look here. And even if I'm rude (how?) that doesn't stop you from being rude as well... This post is just bewildering nonsense. Koavf (talk) 11:20, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

You are getting it wrong on purpose to evade the argument I actually made. Bad move! Shall I add stubborn and malevolent to the list? I did in no way altogether compare You and me regarding being invited to his user page. If You had done the same thing as I did, just from Your perspective, that You assume his first language is French, and if You therefore added {{language|fr|N}}to his user page, I would have let it be and trusted Y. to set it right if he sees reason to do so even if You would have not supplied "Please adjust and add as appropriate, see Category:FrenchSpeakers and Category:Language" in the summary field. I do not see that anybody was "invited" to his user page and therefore anybody who edits it is kind of trespassing. For this reason I'm always adding the comment to make clear it is up to the (mostly new) user, he/she is free to edit it. You can see from this, if You got eyes to see, that I'm not rude there, I'm educative and attentive.Manorainjan (talk) 14:41, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Wrong I'm not getting it wrong on purpose: I just have no idea what you're talking about. Yann isn't a new user and has used #babel before. He can edit his userpage just fine so I don't know why anyone else feels the need to edit it for him. Welcoming a new user is one thing but this is another: it's pointless. I didn't claim you were rude for this action (but I have before for several others and stand behind it)--I don't think it's rude; I think it's confusing and unnecessary. I'll let him decide if he wants to apply #babel to his userpage and I don't see why we should fight over it. Koavf (talk) 18:26, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Also As a point of order, I'm not assuming anything about the languages he understands: he points them out himself. If you had made a click or two, you would know. Koavf (talk) 18:27, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

For a man who has no idea what I'm talking about You are quite unerringly evading that point I'm making. From this I can safely assume that You understood very well but are reluctant to admit that You are at fault. Did You really think You could fool me like that? No need to answer, the question was rhetorically. And no need for me to continue this, because I saw You got the point even though that would no mean You would be able to learn from that. But that's Your problem not mine. Manorainjan (talk) 08:46, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

What? I honestly have no clue what you're talking about nor why you posted this. Koavf (talk) 05:55, 2 February 2015 (UTC)

Shoot first, do not even ask?

So, again something which You do not understand But the lack of understanding was, as usual, not keeping You from acting. that means, You don not know what You are doing. No surprise for me. Manorainjan (talk) 14:08, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Edit war Explain yourself. There is no reason for edit-warring on this page. Koavf (talk) 14:10, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Need Help

Please help me or guide me , about What I can do/contribute here. Sailesh Patnaik (talk) 09:53, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Contributions There are lots of pages which have been started but could be expanded as well as many which need to be added in the first place. That kind of work isn't necessarily exciting but it's helpful. Thanks for joining! Koavf (talk) 03:52, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

Still no idea what is the right thing to do?

First You locked WikiWikiWeb because You knew no what was going on, now You unprotected it without reason. What are You thinking You are doing there? Manorainjan (talk) 15:49, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Locking You said on the talk page that no further edits were needed. Then I unlocked it and you started reverting again. Koavf (talk) 03:49, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

You unprotected the page 11-2-15 8:02. Thereafter 4 Edits where made by Dave Voorhis, 3 Edits where made by Yi Fei and only then I edited it again at 13:03 that day. Therefore Your statement lacks any argumentative value. Are You too lazy to check the history of that page before You talk, or are You to biased? Manorainjan (talk) 10:46, 12 February 2015 (UTC)

Belligerence If you think that being rude will get you what you want, you are mistaken. Feel free to post to the talk page and maybe you and Dave and Zhuyifei can figure out something. Either way, I won't let an edit war happen on the page. Koavf (talk) 05:07, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

The edit war has happened already several times. Manorainjan (talk) 14:12, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Your efforts have closed the original WikiWikiWeb (they have moved it to the new Smallest Federated Wiki) and I request you stop editing the page going forward. ~~ MarkDilley

Blocking Between what Mark wrote above and what I'm telling you now, I'll unprotect the page with the understanding that you are not to edit it. Koavf (talk) 20:26, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

There is no logic or authority in such a request.Manorainjan (talk) 21:19, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

Edit warring There is logic to it: edit-warring serves no purpose and you clearly have some stake in fighting about this entry. Koavf (talk) 20:36, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

You are wrong again. Everything people do serves a purpose. That's why they do it. To say that something does not serve a purpose, means nothing else than either one dislikes the purpose (and does not want to admit this directly) or doesn't know what it is. Manorainjan (talk) 23:26, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

I guess what he meant was that it serves no purpose that those in charge of WikiIndex would consider useful. Leucosticte (talk) 00:14, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

those in charge of WikiIndex? Who could that be?Manorainjan (talk) 02:40, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

On purposes Of course everything that everyone does could serve some end but that doesn't make it worth doing. Edit-warring on that page is an example of something that is not constructive toward any end. Koavf (talk) 03:52, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Finally a job for Mr. Trigger-Happy ;-)

User:Diane Jahoda MD Manorainjan (talk) 23:52, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

Spam When I created that account, I did see that it had a bizarre request but it wasn't obviously spam: possibly just someone with poor English skills. Thanks for alerting me. Koavf (talk) 06:51, 7 March 2015 (UTC)

Please delete User:Koavf/SPAM Manorainjan (talk) 20:43, 21 March 2015 (UTC)

Wanna bet You got to delete User:Accountantinchicago soon? Manorainjan 07:57, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

What? I don't understand your question. Do you mean that the blank userpage should be deleted? If the user makes spam, then that will be easily deleted: I check the recent changes every day and that's how I saw the account request. Koavf (talk) 19:51, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

He's just making light of the whole situation. Pay him no mind. Leucosticte (talk) 21:25, 3 April 2015 (UTC)

q.e.d. ;-)

next shoot out. Manorainjan 01:13, 18 May 2015 (PDT)

Special:Contributions/122.168.92.99 IP to be blocked Manorainjan 01:46, 19 May 2015 (PDT)

Weigh in on WikiIndex:ServerName#Poll?

I wanted to be sure to draw your attention to a potential decision to change the domain of this wiki. I hope you'll weigh in with your opinion. Thanks! BrandonCsSanders (talk) 20:09, 13 March 2015 (UTC)

Did Your account get hacked?

Either someone hacked Your account, or You are out of Your mind. Check Your latest "Contributions"! --Manorainjan (talk) 11:29, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

I think the edits are perfectly valid. See Special:Tags --YiFei | talk 11:53, 19 March 2015 (UTC)

Malformed e-mails

Thanks for the note about the malformed urls. I've created and deployed a work-around. Let me know if you have any more issues with it. BrandonCsSanders (talk) 03:16, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

Block summary

Can you please reblock User:Sunil Kumar with a summary that explains that he's being blocked for being a spammer? That way, people don't need to look at his talk page or contributions to see why he's blocked. Thanks. Leucosticte (talk) 01:35, 16 April 2015 (UTC)

Deleting spam

Hello, please delete these spam articles: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9.

Best regards,

--Gabriele (talk) 09:31, 21 May 2015 (PDT)

Sysop rights

Hello, I am an active person here. Can I ask for sysop rights? --Gabriele (talk) 00:48, 1 June 2015 (PDT)

Sysop There aren't many formal rules around here, including how someone can become an admin/sysop. Being active and not causing conflicts is a good start. With MediaWiki software, someone has to be a bureaucrat in order to change someone else's rights but I am only an admin, so I cannot do it myself. Why are you interested in the new user rights? Koavf (talk) 07:14, 1 June 2015 (PDT)

Thanks for your response. I'm interested in these rights because I want to be representative of the Italian portal on this wiki, and to clean up when necessary. I'm going to contact a bureaucrat in order to ask for the rights. Best regards, --Gabriele (talk) 07:17, 1 June 2015 (PDT)

I've promoted Gabriele to admin status based on previous edits and assuming good faith. --Jason (talk) 07:50, 1 June 2015 (PDT)

User:Luis Anton Imperial

Please explain him, why You deleted his user page. --Manorainjan 03:34, 3 June 2015 (PDT)

unrequested deletion of structure

Why did You delete Category:Castilian? Do You want to prevent users with Castilian language capabilities to add this info to their user page? Manorainjan 03:08, 21 June 2015 (PDT)

Edit summaries I explained why in my edit summary here: Castilian and Spanish are the same language. There were no subcategories for users anyway, so I don't understand your point. If Castilian were its own language, then it could be recreated with the appropriate subcategories anyway. Koavf (talk) 07:38, 21 June 2015 (PDT)

What about keeping Castilian with a (commented with wp:Castilian_languages) redirect to Spanish? Manorainjan 08:30, 21 June 2015 (PDT)

Redirects If you redirect a category, there can still be content in it, which is exactly what would happen if someone used {{tag|Castilian}}. Redirecting in the main namespace is different than in categories. Koavf (talk) 09:59, 21 June 2015 (PDT)

I think, tat redirecting is the same in all namespaces. But, as You pointed out, it does not prevent anybody to fill a redirected category with content. On the other hand, a non-existent category can also be filled with content. Deleting this category does not prevent anybody from using those tags. It creates RedLinks. An those redlinks tempt others to re-create this category. Therefore I think it is better to keep it and comment the redirect. That preserves the argumentation which explains why this category is not to be used/filled. That would apply also to such notorious cases as Category:Computer vs. Category:Computers.Manorainjan 13:15, 21 June 2015 (PDT)

If one keeps unwanted categories as commented redirects and adds Category:Unwanted Categories to them, this would create a handy instrument for maintenance. But if one deletes unwanted categories, that would delete all knowledge/experience that led to the decision of this category to be unwanted. the wiki would not grow in experience. This would be another step towards a Sisyphean task.Manorainjan 13:20, 21 June 2015 (PDT)

unwarranted deletion of user pages

You deleted User:(censored)us user page for no reason at all.
Your comment: (Blank pages should be red links: content was: "Category:AccountUsedNot" (and the only contributor was "Manorainjan")
The page was not blank. I had added content to it. Therefore Your comment is contradictory and reveals that the deletion was unwarranted.
Ask me, before You delete my work!

Manorainjan 13:24, 21 June 2015 (PDT)