User talk:John Dvorak

Tasks: start a new article • add basic, wanted or requested articles • add definitions • add metadata • edit new pages

Welcome to the Citizendium! We hope you will contribute boldly and well. Here are pointers for a quick start. You'll probably want to know how to get started as an author. Just look at Getting Started for other helpful "startup" links, our help system and CZ:Home for the top menu of community pages. Be sure to stay abreast of events via Twitter. You can test out editing in the sandbox if you'd like. If you need help to get going, the forum is one option. That's also where we discuss policy and proposals. You can ask any administrator for help, too. Just put a note on their "talk" page. Again, welcome and have fun! Kjetil Ree 17:19, 12 December 2007 (CST)

Double Redirects

Yes, I went on a double redirect fixing spree. I made sure to stay away from those still in discussion on the title, or recent changes. There are still some left, which I'll probably do tomorrow. If you have a problem with any of my changes, please mention it here. As I am learning, I do appreciate constructive criticism. John Dvorak 21:50, 13 February 2008 (CST)

Hi, is there a reason (hidden to me) behind the following edit: [1]? -- Alexander Wiebel 11:25, 18 February 2008 (CST)

Why, yes. At the time, I thought I was doing good. If I recall correctly, the page's actual name was Computers. I assume since then the page's name was changed. Though I guess it's possible that I was mistaken. But thank you for being a Concerned Citizen :) John Dvorak 11:58, 18 February 2008 (CST)

Indeed, there was a move. But it seems the page has already been moved in spring 2007 ([2]). :-) Thanks for your immediate answer. -- Alexander Wiebel 12:05, 18 February 2008 (CST)

No problem. John Dvorak 12:08, 18 February 2008 (CST)

Creating subpages

Hi, I see from the above that you're probably already worked this out, but there are some pages where I'm waiting on a potential rename before creating the /Approval, etc subpages (so we won't have to move them too). This note is more just a suggestion that when you go to create subpages, first ask yourself 'is this the name we really want for this page'; if not, drop a note on the talk: page, and forego (for now) creating the subpages. (I suppose if we want to get fancy, we could create a Category:Name questioned or somesuch category, and drop that tag on all such talk: pages...) I assume you're finding pages with missing subpages by simply process of going through the entire namespace? (Some, like missing approval pages, there's a cat for, but I don't think there are cats for missing /Biblio etc pages.) J. Noel Chiappa 15:47, 25 March 2008 (CDT)

Yes, I just happen to stumble upon some pages that don't have any subpages atop the page. If I have any doubts about how constant the article title will be, I'll be sure to hold back. Thanks for the note. Also, I think you may have some knowledge in this category, it is right for me to be splitting up the bibliography, related articles, and such on large pages, correct? I've taken it upon myself as a little mini-project, but want to verify that it's the current standard. I don't mind breaking up the walls of text into clusters, personally :) John Dvorak 15:52, 25 March 2008 (CDT)

I think you're generally OK, and yes, those long lists do need to get moved out to subpages. I wouldn't bother with 'External Links'/'Related Articles' and things like that where there's only an entry or two (not worth an extra subpage just to hide two lines), but yeah, the long lists can definitely migrate. I'll post a note on the Forum about the Category:Rename suggested (probably a better name, now that I think about it) idea. J. Noel Chiappa 16:06, 25 March 2008 (CDT)

good work

you're doing very useful work for CZ-- every page you touch is improved. keep it up!Richard Jensen 18:19, 25 March 2008 (CDT)

Well, thank you very much! I know I'm not very helpful content-wise, but I do hope to keep up with the more repetitive technical side of CZ :) John Dvorak 18:49, 25 March 2008 (CDT)

Forums thread on further reading, etc...

Did you see the thread on the forums recently were people were saying they wanted a few of the best books (and maybe some links) on the main article page? J. Noel Chiappa 21:10, 19 April 2008 (CDT)

No, I don't browse the forum all that much, but I'm not that knowledgeable on Lebanon. I'm not quite sure what you mean (maybe because it's late and I need to sleep), but you may want to ask some other Editors (or Authors) to get more accurate results. John Dvorak 22:10, 19 April 2008 (CDT)

Ah, sorry, I was referring to this edit; my point was that it may have been deliberate that there were links there too.

I didn't get the reference to Lebanon? By "main article page" I just meant 'the basic page of each article', i.e. as opposed to the various subpages. (I.e. I didn't mean Main Page.

It's not urgent; go for the sleep! J. Noel Chiappa 22:32, 19 April 2008 (CDT)

Ah, I see. It's all so clear now :). No, I hadn't heard of that, and will keep that in mind in the future. Thanks for the comment. It interrupts the monotony of editing all these awesome articles. _{Disclaimer: I don't evern know what I meant by that. Do not take too much meaning out of it.} John Dvorak 10:21, 20 April 2008 (CDT)

PS: This is the thread I was referring to. It's probably a good idea to at least read the Forums; there's a Recent Posts link you can use to see what's been discussed recently. J. Noel Chiappa 15:45, 20 April 2008 (CDT)

Redirects. Lots of redirects.

Yes! J. Noel Chiappa 15:41, 20 April 2008 (CDT)

I hoped somebody would approve :) I'm just wondering where you get all the articles to start redirecting to. I guess it's just seeing a random one, but I can do that. John Dvorak 16:44, 20 April 2008 (CDT)

I keep an eye on Special:Recentchanges. J. Noel Chiappa 19:36, 20 April 2008 (CDT)

Scientology

You have no idea how big that anthill was! The double redir on Talk:Scientology (theory)‎ was just scratching the surface. It took me quite a while to clean up... J. Noel Chiappa 21:34, 20 April 2008 (CDT)

Yeah, I was wondering about that. Also, I don't know why that didn't show up on the Special:DoubleRedirects page. Could it be broken? I don't know much about wiki technicalities, but I'd like to learn. John Dvorak 16:49, 21 April 2008 (CDT)

English spellings

Thanks for your offer of help with the formatting. I've left some notes on the talk page & in the history. Have fun (!?!) Ro Thorpe 12:18, 24 April 2008 (CDT)

Thanks: that's great. I left a note in the hsitory, but in case you didn't see it: you don't need to put three apostrophes if you are paragraphing. Look: just

like

this

OK? Ro Thorpe 17:49, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

OK. I assume I need to put the ending ones on when there is an explanation? John Dvorak 17:54, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

Exactly. Plus, please don't put in unnecessary dashes: in most cases, the 'explanation word' follows immediately: word association word, OK? Ro Thorpe 18:18, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

Also, an asterisk always means that what follows is *rong, so you'll never have to put apostrophes after one - you just did, it may have been an oversight... Ro Thorpe 18:23, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

Oh, I guess I missed that. Duly noted. This isn't so bad, A is already done. I hope to have it finished by the end of the week. (not the end of this week, as in 6 hours from now, but the end of the next week :) )John Dvorak 18:27, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

Thanks a lot, yes I saw you'd finished A. Another thing I must explain is that bolding is always and only used for correct spelling, so when it comes to bits of words... There are a couple of examples at the end of A. Ro Thorpe 18:33, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

i've left a note there - thanxx - Ro Thorpe 11:41, 1 May 2008 (CDT)

Cool

Someone else working in the 'Computers Workgroup'! Thanks for the help, it's much appreciated Eric M Gearhart 22:17, 26 April 2008 (CDT)

Yeah, no problem. I'm not officially in the Computers workgroup, but I am interested in computers, and like to help with the technical aspect of CZ. To all the work of yours I've seen, I say good job and hope that you keep it up! John Dvorak 23:14, 26 April 2008 (CDT)