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Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dogs/Archive B4

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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Quill (talk | contribs) at 22:19, 13 December 2004 (→Missing Images). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Latest comment: 21 years ago by Sannse in topic "No image yet" photo link

See also: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dog breeds/Categories

Color of breed tables

It has come to my attention that this WikiProject uses the same color as animals in the Wikipedia:WikiProject Tree of Life taxobox. I would like to suggest changing it (even to a different shade of pink) so that each color is used in only one table. Since there are undoubtedly many more animal tables than dog breed ones, it would be easier to change these than those. I will do the change myself if no one else wants to (though tell me what color you want, or I'll just pick one). See Wikipedia:Taxobox. Tuf-Kat 03:38, Feb 5, 2004 (UTC)

That was a deliberate choice. mav suggested we use the same colour for dogs as animals in the Tree of Life project (dogs being animals an' all) and that seemed like a good idea. The discussion is on User talk:Maveric149/archive 10. We were originally using bright green and considered using 11 different colours, one for each FIC class and one for uncategorized. I don't particularly object to a change, although linking the colours did work well for Dingo, where the taxobox and the breed infobox were linked up. What do you think? -- sannse 11:38, 5 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Well, I'm now inclined to think that the colors don't matter. There's already a lot of repetition, and that will likely only grow worse over time. Tuf-Kat 17:51, Feb 5, 2004 (UTC)
Then perhaps we can leave it as pink for now and see how things go. Let me know if you think differently as things progress over at Wikipedia talk:Infobox ;) -- sannse 18:26, 5 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Sample dog article for projects project

Template:SampleWikiProject

Anyone got a preferred article from List of dog breeds? I think it should be one with a photo, but other than that I'm easy - I'll have a look through some tomorrow to see what goodies we have. -- sannse 23:46, 18 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Afghan Hound isn't bad although it's still a wee bit POV I think, but it does use the new thumbnail image format. Newfoundland is nice because it has more than one image and the text is a little better, but neither image uses the thumbnail format. Elf 03:34, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)
What about Alaskan Malamute, it's short but covers all the points asked for by the WikiProject. It's also very neutral. I've changed the image to a the thumbnail format. If not, either of those you mentioned looks good -- sannse (talk) 11:06, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)
That works for me. Elf 20:28, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Done -- sannse (talk) 00:06, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Just noticed that it doesn't use the new table markup but instead uses HTML tbl markup. Ditto with the template on this project's meta page. Which way to we want to go? Your latest sample in your sandbox uses the new markup, and that's what I've been assuming we'd go with--? Elf 17:52, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Yes, I think we should change over - it's purely a matter of getting round to it. I think that's what I'll work on this evening, I've only got an hour or so though so won't get that far tonight. I'll do the template and Alaskan Malamute first then see how far I get down the list, feel free to do any you want to of course. -- sannse (talk) 18:51, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)


More than just dog breeds

There have been discussions in other areas about having main category pages that provide an index into related articles. While trying to find something earlier, I was thinking that an index/category page of dog-related articles would be a good thing to have. (We'd reference List of dog breeds in that index, not the individual breed pages.) It could have subcategories like descriptions, activities, history, biology, sociology (I dunno, what would you call Dog adoption, animal shelter, and the like?). Does anyone know if such a thing exists? If not, who understands Wikipedia well enough to suggest an appropriate title and/or a sample index page from some other topic area? Elf 03:30, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Hmm, I found List of biology topics, but it's so huge they've arranged it alphabetically rather than by category. List of production topics is by category. Elf 05:14, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)

OK, being the impatient sort, I'm already answering my own question and starting List of dog topics. :-) Elf 05:38, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC) Whew! Did a google search on everything with the word "dog" in it; gave up after the references started to be few & far between. And, as usual, google list is out of date, so more recent entries didn't show up. Suggestions, additions, organization welcome. Elf 06:10, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Looks good! I can think of a couple of additions, although it looks pretty comprehensive, I'll add some later -- sannse (talk) 11:06, 24 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Heh! That "couple" I mentioned - you already found them. Good work -- sannse (talk) 00:08, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)
Dang! You mean I could've taken the afternoon off? Elf 00:20, 25 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Review Spaniel article

For anyone interested, I just put up an article on Spaniels that gives some background on what a spaniel is and then lists breeds that are probably classifiable as Spaniels. If anyone knows more about what makes a spaniel and what doesn't (and it's not just whethe the name includes the word "spaniel" ;-) ), I'd be delighted if you'd review the article and even add more info. Elf 17:42, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Request for photo

Latest comment: 21 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

Hi, can we have a photo of a couple of different dogs of different breeds together to put onto artificial selection please? preferably one big one and one little fluffy one? Duncharris 15:12, May 6, 2004 (UTC)

I'll see whether I can arrange that some weekend while I'm surrounded by canine-type beast things. Mostly I do dog agility, which doesn't work well for really big breeds, so largest I'm likely to see are German Shepherd Dogs or maybe a Briard. Other challenge is that dogs who don't know each other might not want to stand comfortably next to each other for a photo, and most dog owners tend to have only large or only small dogs. I might be able to get a Border Collie and a Jack Russell Terrier together. Elf | Talk 00:59, 7 May 2004 (UTC)
I might have better luck if I go to a show this year - I'm not sure yet if I will, but if I do I'll look out for a good combination too. A similar photo that would be useful is the three types of poodle together, and other images of similar situations (and I want a pony...) -- sannse (talk) 07:49, 7 May 2004 (UTC)
I just added Image:IMG013biglittledogFX wb.jpg. Elf | Talk 06:59, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Excellent Elf, that really does the job -- sannse (talk) 09:23, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Sorry, no pony, though. :-) Wish I had a photo--last year at Agility Camp, for the costume contest, one of the attendees said she was tired of people asking whether her Great Dane was some kind of pony, so she did a completely professional job of dressing the Dane *as* a pony--matching tail and mane and a litle saddle, and that's all it took! It was hysterical. And I don't often get hysterical-- Elf | Talk 15:59, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC) Oh, wait--I found a photo online: Great Dane pony!
Heh, wonderful -- sannse (talk) 16:14, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Common Nickname

I added a "Common nickname" section to the table. Seems that almost every breed has one or maybe 2 that dog people in-the-know would recognize but that outsiders wouldn't. Have been finding or putting many of those in the article. I think it belongs in the table. Thoughts? Elf | Talk 20:09, 30 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Looks good to me -- sannse (talk) 21:49, 30 Apr 2004 (UTC)

moved to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dog breeds/Categories Elf | Talk 03:46, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Latest comment: 21 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

My latest wiki discovery is this very-seldom-used page: File:No image yet. It suggests (as does the Wikipedia:Requested pictures page) using a link to it from any page where we know a photo is wanted. This seems like it might be an excellent idea on the dog breed pages where there is no photo for the infobox. To see what it looks like, I implemented it at American Water Spaniel. It might encourage folks to provide photos. Thoughts? Elf | Talk 16:37, 17 May 2004 (UTC)

Sorry to sound discouraging again - but it just looks like a broken image to me. Maybe if it were some sort of image in itself? -- sannse (talk) 18:09, 22 May 2004 (UTC)
i have uploaded sannse's idea: Image:NO IMAGE YET.png,  . Badanedwa 22:22, Jun 16, 2004 (UTC)
or this version, Image:NO IMAGE YET square.png,  . Badanedwa 22:44, Jun 16, 2004 (UTC)

Categories

moved to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dog breeds/Categories Elf | Talk 03:46, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Help! Emergency! I've messed up the DOG article!

I didn't mean to. I was edited the bottom section and adding to it and every time I tried to do a preview and save it kept freezing on me.

Finally it worked, but to my horror my ammended section has REPLACE the entire article! Can somebody reverse this FAST? Quill 01:30, 17 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Categories, Cont'd....

moved to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dog breeds/Categories Elf | Talk 03:46, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Kennel Club or 'kennel club'

BTW, you don't have to capitalize text that's linked unless it's a proper name; for example, dog breeding. Wikipedia automatically looks for a matching article whose first letter is capitalized. Pretty clever of them, huh? (Quote from a Wikipedian who shall remain nameless)

  • Yeah, I thought so, until I realized that titles of articles are case sensitive. Here's a for instance: for weeks I've been thinking that we had no article for 'kennel club' and we really need one. Have a few minutes, and I'm ready to write, and typed 'kennel club', lower case, which led to 'Kennel Club' (upper case), which is a 'disambig' page. Didn't remember seeing that before. Was about to start, but something was nagging at the back of my brain saying I was sure that links showed no kennel club article--don't get ahead of me, folks--you guessed it--the links in our articles go to 'kennel club', lower case. So...I'm going to put my stub at 'kennel club', because that's what I mean, and anyone with an objection or a better idea can move it...change it...etc. Quill 09:22, 2 Jul 2004 (UTC)
It's a bit more complicated than that I'm afraid. The first word of a link to an article title is not case sensitive (This link and this link are the same) but further words are (This Link and This link are not the same). Article titles have to have first word capitalised, which is why the "iMac" article is at "IMAC", and the convention is to have other words in lower case unless it is a proper noun.
On the kennel club articles, I think the title you used is correct. The disambiguation article at "Kennel Club" refers to the organisation titles (and so properly capitalised) while your new article refers to the concept of kennel clubs. So if we are using the word as a title we capitalise both words: "This was agreed by the Kennel Club in 1872". And if the general concept then we don't: "Most kennel clubs are privately funded". But, in the first example we would always be better to link to the specific club article anyway. So it seems easier to make "Kennel Club" into a redirect to "Kennel club". So I've done so. Sorry to be so long-winded bout it though :) -- sannse (talk) 12:37, 3 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Thanks Sannse. Long-winded? Not a bit of it; take your time, I need it.... Quill 09:11, 4 Jul 2004 (UTC)

More about Categories

moved to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dog breeds/Categories Elf | Talk 03:46, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

dog trouble

Hi all--Wikipedia is behaving very strangely for me today.

For one thing, kennel club keeps taking me into the edit this page rather than the article.

I tried to add two new articles, and for some reason the system wasn't letting me do it; now 'my contributions' looks like I've added the same article three times.

Do you see articles on conformation point and fault (dog)? I've also got one on breed standard but for now I'm giving up in frustration.

Thanks--Quill 00:39, 9 Jul 2004 (UTC)

You must not have made your offerings to the proper wiki gods this morning! Indeed, I get articles for kennel club, conformationpoint, and fault (dog).Elf | Talk 03:52, 9 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Sigh--The Gods Must be CRAZY!! Quill 22:08, 9 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Hey! I didn't link that title (above)--how did that happen?? This is getting Twilight Zone-ish!! Quill 23:22, 9 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Non-list lists

moved to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dog breeds/Categories Elf | Talk 03:46, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Dog Registries

I noticed this while reviewing recent edits to the goldendoodle article. The United Kennel Club Int'l has been listed in the breed table.

The Continental Kennel Club and the United Kennel Club Int'l are, at best, minor registries. The website of the CKC does not even describe its organization. According to the website of the UKCI, it is a private family business. I am therefore questioning the inclusion of minor registries in the breed tables. In essence, that would mean that the breed table points to an outside link to a small business, and I thought that Wikipedia didn't do that? This is not meant to cast aspersions, as there is nothing wrong with small family businesses, just to point out that as far as I can tell, our other outside links point to breed or kennel clubs.

Quill 00:23, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I was intending to ask your opinion on this Quill, so I'm glad you've raised the issue. I spent some time yesterday reading the UKCI website and various criticisms of them. It seems to me that these registries (and I refrain from adding quotes there) are more about advertising puppies than anything else. And links to such adverts are generally considered a bad thing on Wikipedia. Certainly I am not convinced they have a place in the table, even if they are the only registry available. I think we should stick to the breed and kennel clubs we have been using -- sannse (talk) 16:46, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)
It seems from recent edits at goldendoodle and terrier that we will probably need to discuss this and come to a consensus. Can we have some opinions from other project members? Quill 00:29, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)


BTW, let's not confuse the United Kennel Club (UKC) [1] with the Universal Kennel Club International (UKCI) [2]. The former is listed on the Kennel Club article, the latter is (rightfully) not. I mention this because you twice referred to the UKCI as "United Kennel Club Int'l".
Yep, duly noted. Quill 23:45, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I agree that the links to the CKC and UKCI should be removed (I suspect many of the UKCI "breeders" are puppy mills), but, if you think the larger, older kennel clubs aren't businesses, you're fooling yourselves <grin>.Wcrowe 17:01, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I don't think anyone here is so deluded. Some of us may even have issues with the major registries; I'll be the first one to say that I have. I just think that there are dog welfare components at work in the biggies that are missing from the johnnie-come-latelies. Quill 23:45, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Glad we got that cleared up. Now, as someone else pointed out (don't know what happened to that edit), the UKCI seems to be nothing more than a clearing house for, um, "breeders" to sell dogs. I think they'll register anything that breathes. Really, when you get right down to it, there is nothing to prevent anyone from starting a kennel club and registering litters.Wcrowe 15:25, 30 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I got sent over this way after posting some comments on the Jack Russell entries. The question is how or where to discuss the individual breed registries - and particularly those that oppose recognition by the all-breed registries, and why.

In the case of the JRT, to treat the AKC as the authority on the breed when the AKC recognized the JRT in direct opposition to the wishes of the overwhelming majority of the JRT owners and breeders, and when far more JRTs are bred and registered under JRTCA auspices than AKC, is simply not going to leave the reader with a correct impression of the breed.

And the JRT is not the only breed that's been hijacked by the AKC - a similar fight is ongoing with Border Collies and a number of other popular working breeds.

The simple truth is that the AKC's standards are poorly suited for maintaining the working qualities of a breed. And the owners of working dogs know this. There's a reason that agility competitions are dominated by JRTs in the lower height classes and by Border Collies in the taller - neither breed has been crippled by decades of breeding to AKC standards.

But where should a discussion of these issues belong? Where should the JRTCA be referenced?

I've looked around, and I'd say that the breed club entry is where this might best go. Currently, it suggests that these fall into two categories only - those that maintain their own registries while lobbying for the acceptance of a breed by the all-breed clubs and those that act as social clubs for the owners while letting the all-breed clubs run the registry.

An additional paragraph pointing out that some breed clubs are adamantly opposed to recognition by all-breed clubs - and are fighting against involuntary takeovers of the breeds by the all-breed clubs - would certainly seem apropos.

--jdege 21:26, 2004 Dec 1 (UTC)

Good question where the matter(s) are best addressed. You're right, breed club could be one; breed registry (hmm, doesn't exist yet--thought it did--someone better create it cuz there are a lot of pages pointing to it! and more in a minute when I get done disambig'ing) could be another; somewhere out there there's a discussion about open vs closed stud books (selective breeding? Yup, there it is.). Some parts of the discussion might go in all places, or maybe all the related discussions should be gathered in one place--I don't have a perfect answer for ya. So you're probably safe in any of those places. As we often say on Wikipedia, Be bold! Elf | Talk 02:29, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Oh, and just found more at purebred and dog breeding.

Collection of dog photos

Someone started, and I've been adding to, a page with all free-distribution (e.g., GFDL), public ___domain, etc. dog photos: Wikipedia:List of images/Nature/Animals/Dogs. I added the photos that User:Sannse and [[User:Elf|I] took and have been working my way through all of the breed articles, slowly, checking the photos to see whether they're GFDL or similar and then either adding them to the photo album page or attempting to contact the contributor and leaving a note on the album's talk page.

This is just a request that, if you see anyone add a dog photo, to check whether its source and copyright/license status are identified; if not, attempt to contact the user (nicely) to get the info; and if it is free distr/public, add it to the album page? Or at least let me know that it's there so I can follow up. Hopefully I'll see any photos that are added because all the breed pages are on my watchlist, but ya never know. Thanks! Elf | Talk 00:11, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)

See also Wikipedia:Requested_pictures#Dog_breeds.

Schnauzer naming

Please give your thoughts on the Talk:Schnauzer page. Thanks. Elf | Talk 02:05, 10 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Veterinarians

I just added a couple of stubs to the List of dog topics, plus linked James Herriot. Is this all right with everyone? Quill 01:44, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Categories (part 23)

moved to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dog breeds/Categories Elf | Talk 03:46, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Format of images in tables

Any thoughts on this? Personally I much prefer the "thumb" version - partly for the aesthetics of the thing, but mostly because readers are not likely to know that there is a larger version of the image available. The expand icon is vital for the full effect of the images to be appreciated -- sannse (talk) 16:28, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Do you mean a smaller version of the picture that when you move the cursor over it it's obvious that you can click to enlarge? I like this too. Overly-large pictures dominate the article and take ages to load. Quill 07:06, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)

It's the difference between:

 
This
 and
 
This
This

Recently all the images in the dog infoboxes has been changed to the latter; still the same size image, but without the border or the expand icon. It also makes it more difficult to add a caption (without using more complicated tables as I did above). I think it's an all round bad idea, but wanted to see if others felt the same -- sannse (talk) 11:46, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I agree. I like the pictures with the border and expand icon better. I'm going to leave ChicXulub a message on their talk page to see why they changed all of our images (they apparently did it in other categories too). [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 13:58, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Huh. I got back after 3 days off, checked my watchlist in chronological order, and just went to work fixing most of the images before I ever went to Chic's talk page or looked here--I figured that if he/she had looked here, the changes wouldn't have been made. So... see *my* note on User talk:ChicXulub. Elf | Talk 06:23, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Heh, I probably should have been bold and done the same. Thanks Elf -- sannse (talk) 17:24, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Show dogs and dog shows

Found articles on Crufts and (misnamed/misdescribed but now fixed) Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show. Created a stub for show dog because was on Wikipedia:Most wanted articles list. Those of you with interest/knowledge in these areas, have at. Elf | Talk 07:34, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Category subproject page

I have created a subproject page, Wikipedia:WikiProject Dog breeds/Categories to discuss the ongoing categorization of dog-related articles. Please take a look and throw in your two bits on its talk page. Thanks. (And you might want to add it to your watchlist; I don't think subpages go there automagically.) Elf | Talk 03:55, 10 Sep 2004 (UTC)

you guys might be interested...

I happened upon this page while working on recategorizing cat-related pages (there wasn't much organization, and it's proving to be quite a task). Wikipedia:Wikipedians_by_pet I just thought some of you might want to take a look. [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 18:01, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)

No fooling! That's why I left a zillion messages on all the talk pages of places where cat-interested people might notice them, referring to my discussion on organization. It's taking me many hours just to work my way slowly through all the dog articles! Thanks for the new pointer. Elf | Talk
You should check out Category:Cats and Category:Felines. I've done a lot of work on this stuff today. It makes me wonder if dog-people aren't a bit more fanatical about their pets than cat-people, considering how much thought and work is being put into the dog categories, and the lack thereof in the cats'... [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 19:55, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Wouldn't surprise me--after all, dog people tend to be very involved in their dogs' lives & activities & vice-versa. Cats? They just hang out--  ;-) You *have* done a lot of category work! Good job. Elf | Talk 20:20, 11 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Yo! Lay off cats!  ;)
Actually, I think it's because of the difference of time in the development of dog fancy (much older) and cat fancy. Many more dog breeds and dog organizations, many more purebred dogs are pets than purebred cats, etc. Certainly, the difference in dog-human vs. cat-human interaction plays a large part as well (cat flyball races??!!)
I came across a person asking questions on categorization (no puns!) on one of the Cat talk pages (Lord knows where) and I recommended that s/he get in touch with Sannse or Elf for help (no, you don't have to thank me  ;) Quill 21:54, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

need support

Category:Cat breeds and Category:Cat types have both been marked for deletion, b/c someone thinks they should be merged. We all know they are two very different things. Could you guys please put in some votes for them not to be? Thanks. [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 20:39, 16 Sep 2004 (UTC)

(Bad) Shih Tzu picture

When I saw that Shih Tzu didn't have any picture, I took a picture of my pet Shih Tzu and uploaded it to wikipedia, Image:Shih Tzu.JPG. However, it's not a very good picture at all quality-wise, the dog isn't standing, it was taken in my living room, the picture needs to be shrunk (its 2048x1536) and my Shih Tzu recently had a haircut so she doesn't have the long hair look Shih Tzus are supposed to. But, if you want to put it in the Shih Tzu article go ahead, I released it into the Public Domain, I just didn't want to put it in without consulting somebody due to it's many flaws. If you think something is better than nothing though, you got your wish :) p.s. I will try to get a better picture up but we'll see... - biggins | talk 22:48, 24 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I'm going to go ahead and edit the picture some, and re-upload it over the original image (if that's ok) and put it in the Shih Tzu article... still haven't decided if I will put it in the breed table or not.... [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 23:08, 24 Sep 2004 (UTC)
If you're talking about Wikipedia:List of images/Nature/Animals/Dogs, all free-distribution dog photos go here whether we use them or not. Any that aren't free (e.g., copyrighted w/no rleease, unlabeled, etc.) go on that page's Talk page with an explanation. It's the only way of keeping track of all dog photos. I just added the current shih tzu photo; if you upload over it, of course it will automatically redraw once you refresh the screen or clear your cache. Or kick the computer and spill coke down its motherboard, whatever it takes. Elf | Talk 23:21, 24 Sep 2004 (UTC)
I uploading the image under a different file name, and added it to the Shih Tzu's breed table, with a caption saying that it had a "summer-friendly haircut". [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 23:35, 24 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Dog article

The dog article is currently 37Kb, exceeding the suggested 32Kb limit for articles. I'm thinking we should split off one or more of the longer sections into their own articles, with a briefer description on the main article. The one section I'm thinking of is attributes. This would be fairly easy to split off. If no one objects, I'd be willing to do it. Let me know. [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 22:48, 3 Oct 2004 (UTC)

We need to leave a good hunk of description of what a dog looks like & how it's built and why in the main article. I could see chomping off maybe Dog coat? Dog ear? Maybe even some of the details into Dog social skills (or a better title than that)? Coat especially, because I was thinking in terms of a table, with columns for the term, the definition, example breeds, and a close-up photo-- (ditto for ears, tails). Elf | Talk 02:06, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Yes, you're both right. It needs to be a thoughtful choice. That's a problem running through the article: the seemingly arbitrary attention to detail in some areas. There's a good reason for that, of course: everyone writes about what they know. What I'm saying, though, is that we need an objective decision about section type and length. i.e., why cut 'coat' but leave 'diseases and ailments' or 'interaction with humans'? Elf spoke before of a separate dog health article, e.g. Am I making sense? I'm not suggesting that cuts not be done, but that it's time for some serious thought as to WHICH cuts and WHY...Quill
Oh, my, *serious* thought? I'll have to put the screws to my brain and see whether it survives. Or else I'll go pull some weeds. Elf | Talk 23:52, 4 Oct 2004 (UTC)

linking to Wikipedias in other languages

  • Dear friends, Category:Dog breeds and List of dog breeds contains now links to Wikipedias in other languages. It was diffucult for me to pay attention
    • not to link a list from one language to a categry of another language;
    • find "island (isolated)" articles / stubs in some languages to insert links to existing "chains" of articles;
    • not to link to a {{disambiguation}};
  • I looked at some of the lists and could find some of such isolated articles. Not all lists are checked so far because of lack of time. I got some help from Japan too. Maybe it would be a good idea to find people interested in dog breeding trough the Wikipedia:Embassy as well in order to involve more people in the project, to compare (, add ...) informations between languages, find a requested picture and so on. Regards Gangleri 01:45, 2004 Oct 5 (UTC)
I must admit that you started me thinking, and last week I spent a few hours in the French wikipedia trying to straighten out Dog (Chien) and any dog-related articles I could find--not many at all, really. You're right, it will really take people familiar with dogs in the other languages to get that going; there are a couple of breeds posted there that I have no idea what the English version is, and also I wonder whether, for example, "Flatcoated Retriever" is in fact what the French call that breed (although it might well be, since we call many breeds by non-English names). Anyway, it was interesting and I might go back again with my VERY limited vocabulary--mostly formatting, organizing, and adding interlanguage links, as I can't really write or edit the content. Elf | Talk 04:57, 5 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Halló Elf! I have seen the list at fr:Liste des races de chiens. Great job! It is linked now to the whole list chain. Hope to get some feedback from contributors to those and other languages. Regards Gangleri 02:31, 2004 Oct 8 (UTC)
Pretty exciting, huh? It needs a lot more "frenchification"; I can find French breed names on the FCI list for many breeds, but the challenge is that I don't know by what name they're most commonly called by French dog fanciers--for example, there are a lot of breeds with perfectly fine English names but that most English-speaking dog people still refer to using their native names in another language. So I'll try to tackle some more of it eventually, but it might still be out of line. We don't always even get the English list correct! (Plus my french is so miserably awful that I don't dare try to write any actual sentences.) Elf | Talk 04:00, 8 Oct 2004 (UTC)

linking to Wikipedias in other languages 2

  • At the moment the articles show (only) the FCI group and section. It would be a great, great help if the FCI number would be there too.
  • Talk:Italian Greyhound shows a section Talk:Italian Greyhound#InterWiki's and links. I would go trough the FCI list and look for thouse links. They should be at the articles and will help to grow the number of French and Spanish dog articles. Maybe the FCI webmasters would add HTML Label names / Anchors to the site in order to reference it easier.
  • For each dog people from the Wikipedias related to the concerning country could / should be contacted in order to have articeles these languages too. In Italian for the Italian Greyhound and so on.
I doubt that would be viewed well in general (if I understand what you are proposing)- imagine if every Wikiproject spamed all the village pumps in this way -- sannse (talk) 19:46, 23 Oct 2004 (UTC)
There is still the oportunity to contact embassies linked to Wikipedia:Embassy or administrators at other Wikipedias to find initial atricles. At one of the nordic wikipedias I have seen an omnibus (made with a template) guiding you from one article of that subject to another. It was impressive. I need to find it ... Regards Gangleri 22:51, 2004 Oct 23 (UTC)
An example of Minibus navugation is shown at da:Pattedyr. Gangleri 00:50, 2004 Oct 24 (UTC)
Avoiding spaming: With minimal effort a template can be inserted in the user pages at en.wikipedia and at other languages too. (Note: To my knowledge templates can not be shared between languages, they have to be rebuild every time.) If you look at User:Gangleri/templates/accounts you can see where I am walking around. Wenn I edit in other languages I insert allways [[:en:User:Gangleri]] ... in the Edit summary: field. Then edits are not anonimuos and people can contact me if they have questions. This brings them to the user page where the project / the projects are mentioned. Gangleri 12:46, 2004 Oct 26 (UTC)

List of dog breeds

  • Dear friends, I want to attract your attention about the German equivalent for List of dog breeds de:Liste der Hunderassen. Sorry that I did not pay enough attention to this important information so far.
  • The lists begins with an explanation about the notes used beside the breed names:
    • Erklärung: "Rasse" (a/b/c)(B)
    • Explanation: "Breed" (a/b/c)(P) where a = group / b = section / c = number / P article with picture.
  • The list shows alternative names too and it should be possible to see if all redirects are available.
  • It is mentioned at the Talk page that this is the only way to have an unique identification for the breeds.
  • Before reworking the page please let me explore
    • the impact of multiple redirects (from article a to article b to article c ...) to visitors of the Wikipedia sites.
    • how notes to non FCI breeds as Elo are made. Regards Gangleri 01:34, 2004 Oct 9 (UTC)
;-) Gangleri 02:37, 2004 Oct 9 (UTC)
I don't agree that we should match our page to this format. The information on the FCI breed categories is only part of the important category/group information needed. In the context of an English language encyclopaedia the groupings chosen by the various breed associations outside of the FCI are just as important (the Kennel Club (UK) and the US kennel clubs are not FCI affiliated remember). It would not be possible or appropriate to add the information on all breed associations to this list, and this information is better left in the articles.
I also prefer our format for handling alternative names. Listing them within the body of the list, unlinked but with a "see [[article]]" helps a reader to find the article they are looking for with ease. We have a lot of these alternative names missing at the moment - but the most important ones are being added as we go along. This is particularly important where different English speaking countries have different names for the same breed (American Cocker Spaniel is the example that springs to mind). There is never just one way to format an article, and what works for one language doesn't always work for another. I think in this case we should not make major changes to a format that works well for us. Regards -- sannse (talk) 20:07, 9 Oct 2004 (UTC)
p.s. multiple redirects go only to the first link. So if [[article 1]] redirects to [[article 2]] which redirects to [[article 3]] - then clicking a link to 1 will take you to 2, and the redirect at 2 will do nothing. Hope that makes sense :) -- sannse (talk)

fr:Liste des races de chiens

  • Regarding fr:Liste des races de chiens I just realised an issue common to many xx.wikipedia. See also fr:Discuter:Liste des races de chiens.
    • First is that some in xx.wikipedia races are referenced without capitals (or with postponed definitic articles as in Icelandic). Please see history to see the change(s). Who should make / verify the existens of all REDIRECT's for existing articles?
    • Another question is what form to use for disambiguations? Should Alsatian (referenced as [[Alsatian (chien)|Alsatian]]) be used or Alsatian (chien)? Regards Gangleri 19:02, 2004 Oct 14 (UTC)
  • P.S.: What about people not familiar with the differences to capital use writing Dog Breed or Dog Breeds? Gangleri 19:46, 2004 Oct 14 (UTC)
  • Questions about foreign-language wikis are best asked on that language, not here; I am not familiar enough with the language & culture in general nor with the dog-related language and culture to be able to provide any useful input on something like whether the breed names (breed = race in French) should be capitalized. Likewise, calls for help (such as adding REDIRECTs in the fr wiki) should go in the language wiki, not here.
  • I'm not quite sure what you mean by "postponed definite articles" even after rereading your earlier post at Talk:Icelandic Sheepdog. Again, this looks like a foreign-language issue, not an English issue. The use of articles in English is confusing enough without asking whether the Icelandic language uses articles in the same way. (E.g., British English apprently uses "go to hospital" but American English uses "go to the hospital"... although in most places their uses of articles is the same.)
  • In most places, we want the text to look like part of the normal reading language and not like a more complex markup. For example, on the List of dog breeds page, we use [[Chihuahua (dog)|Chihuahua]]. It's not always done that way, though, for various reasons. In Chihuahua (disambiguation), all of the disambig items just use the [[Chihuahua (dog)]] form because that way it's clear that they're all different articles--but one other way to make the differences clear would be something like [[Chihuahua (dog)|Chihuahua dog]], which is how it's done in Bobcat (disambiguation); yet many disambigs completely hide the disambig'ing part, as in Brittany (disambiguation) where "Brittany" is the linked text in each definiton. (There are better examples of the latter somewhere because I know, I've worked on some, but I can't find 'em at the moment.)
  • Redirecting all forms of plurals and capitalizations... It might be a good idea to have a redirect for the plural of common terms (as there is for Dogs). When I put in a new breed, I usually check to see whether upper & lowercase versions of the breed name typed in the search box bring up the new page and then decide whether to make appropriate redirects. I don't think that we need redirects for common english terms or phrases, which are pretty much never capitalized (as in "dog breed"); we'd have to have redirs for every entry in wikipedia, which I don't think makes much sense. I don't think that most users will capitalize common English words.
Elf | Talk 21:21, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Thanks for your answer. What I was traying to say is that in Romanian, Iclandic and some other languages you would not say "the dog" or "those races", you will say somthing like "dogthe" and "racesthose". I have also seen that "Wikipedia articles" are used together with "gramatical articles". I found "sagasthe" and so on. But this is up to the decision of the other Wikipedias. It is only important to know this, if you search the "Wikipedia articles" equivalents in order to find them faster. Regards Gangleri 02:55, 2004 Oct 15 (UTC)

JRTs and Dogs Actor Conventions and Stuff

Someone has recently edited the Jack Russell Terrier article, leading to some questions:

  1. What are the numbers and & for? What do they do?
  2. What is our convention for dog actors? What I mean is, do we write
  • Eddie, played by Moose, in the sitcom Frasier
  • Eddie, played by Moose, in the....
  • "Eddie", played by Moose,...
  • "Eddie", played by "Moose"...
  • Eddie, played by Moose

etc., etc, and repeated for Lassie, Rex, Maximillian, Wishbone, Asta and a whole lotta dogs I love

Quill 00:03, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)

  1. The &numbers; are unicode. Usually they are deliberate, such as the Chinese characters at the beginning of the Shih Tzu article, but they also sometimes appear as a browser foible when someone doesn't use plain text (for example, if they paste from Word and the text contains "smart quotes"). Personally - I usually remove them in this case and replace with the equivalent standard character. They just make the text more difficult to read during editing IMO (that's also the suggestion in the Manual of Style).
  2. I would say:
The Manual of Style says that TV program names should be in italics so that bit's clear. We don't use any special formatting for human actors names or their characters, so I don't think we need to for animals. I'll go ahead and make these changes in the article - let me know if you disagree anyone (or just revert me of course :) -- sannse (talk) 10:04, 17 Oct 2004 (UTC)

reorganisation

votes?
    • requested translations, requested pictures, ...
  • It should be easyly to find a place for input from other languages. Example: nl:Stabyhoun is available with a picture and linked to de:Stabyhound. It is missing in en.wikipedia. Same would apply with special local breeds from Japan etc.
  • For newcomers it should be transparent who is skilled about what. Some have large knowledge about many of the pages of the project. How many are actualy so far? Others can just take care of technical issues (see below), some have sysop rights and so on.
Project follows standard strategy for WikiProjects. We can add additional subcategories under General Strategy, like we added /Categories; for example, you could certainly add a /Languages subtopic. Think of the project pages as being like articles: they're supposed to represent what we do or what we know; the talk pages for each are where we're supposed to develop ideas about what we do or how. For example, the /Categories page should state what we DO do about categories--that is, agreed-upon strategies (although it was originally phrased as "hey, how about this?"); its talk page should be where people say, um, no, that's not right, I think we do abc--or I think we should do xyz, and then we discuss it, and then when consensus occurs, it goes ontothe /Categories page.
Certainly we could add descriptions to each of the links for the subtopics on the main project page. I'll do that now...
Oh, wow, I see what you mean. These pages are rife with discussion when they shouldn't be. Maybe they need some cleanup. Maybe I'll do that. Argh.
Elf | Talk 00:55, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)
    • /Sister projects talk as the work of user de:Caronna at de:, pl:AndrzejzHelu at pl:, startup help provided Dogfather at it:, es:, Elf at fr: ... My opinion is that working on the other Wikipedias is not a waste of time but an improuvment both to the knowledge about, diversity and quality of articles and contributions. Gangleri 12:29, 2004 Oct 26 (UTC)
    • P.S.: The availability of local templates can be mentioned here. Gangleri 12:52, 2004 Oct 26 (UTC)
    • /What's new talk to have a central place of the "headers" of new topics ...

moved to Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Dog_breeds/Categories#WDP feature request: *I think we should start a feature request about displaying the content of a category in the same manner as "My contributions". I mean as a list with newest changes displayed first. It should be possible also to display the content of (some) special pages (as categories and so on) with a Startig from and Until input mask. This would save both database resources and user resources as well. What is your opinion about this? Regards Gangleri 05:25, 2004 Oct 24 (UTC)

Wow! he:Category:כלבים

  • Halló! I have seen an InterWiki link and hope to find some people interested to come here. Regards Gangleri 20:26, 2004 Oct 30 (UTC)
  • List available at he:גזעי כלבים. Gangleri 20:31, 2004 Oct 30 (UTC)

Bichons

While making a minor edit to the Bichon Frise article, I noticed that the interwiki link to fi was actually for the Havanese, so I moved it over to that article. Then I decided to take a look at the foreign language article. The picture over there of a "bichon havannese" looks more like a Coton de Tulear to me. Does anyone understand any of this language (I don't even know what it is)? And is that a Havanese, or a Coton? [[User:Lachatdelarue|Lachatdelarue (talk)]] 12:52, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I have e-mailed user fi:Käyttäjä:Ljeskola (found in the history of that article). It seams, that he / she has not made recent contributions and hope that the e-mail address is still valid and he / she understands English.


fi:Käyttäjä:Jean d'Arc making the categories added the links to fi:. I appologise, that I have not verified the links. Now both all links to Havanese and all links to Bichon Frisé are adjusted. Regards Gangleri 02:47, 2004 Nov 2 (UTC)

is: List of dog breeds

  • Dear friends, I made an equivalent for the List of dog breeds in Icelandic. At the moment (03:12, 2004 Nov 2 (UTC)) it exists as a draft at is:Notandi:Gangleri/drafts/list of dog breeds.
  • As has be seen in the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Dog breeds#Bichons example errors can occur and I would like to reformat some of the lists to include additional information.
  • To my oppinion there would be a greather help if beside the name of the breed in the language of that Wikipedia, the original (if available) should be mentioned as well together with the indication of the FCI catalogisation because it is used both in different countries and by different alphabets.
  • The indication (P) picture would help editors to identify articles with pictures more easy.
  • The indication about the talk page could show that information, as links to breeding standards, kennel clubs etc., ISBN's and so on are available already.
  • I would be happy if I am allowed to insert to the English articles beside the Group and Section also the number. For Basset Hound it would be: Group 6 Section 1.3 (not only 1) N°163.
  • Please let me know your opinion about this because I would like to rework the lists in the ofiicial languages of FCI: fr:, en:, de:, es: . Doing this I would like to put the links to existing FCI breeding standards to the talk pages. Regards Gangleri 03:12, 2004 Nov 2 (UTC)
  • Mixed feelings about including all possible language variants of a breed's name on the breed's page in Alternative Names. Since this is an English wiki, having the names used (and spelled) by English speakers makes the most sense. Although I see that sometimes for example Chinese character representations of dog names are appearing in some articles. I haven' t been removing those even though those are *clearly* not from english-speaking dog people! But I don't think you can say "use the original name" because there are going to be disputes about what the "original" name was, especially when the breed is older & is hard to pinpoint to a specific ___location. So it would be hard to draw the line as to where to stop listing alternative names. Maybe we shouldn't even try to--and just list all variants that we come across anyway. I dunno.
  • But if you're talking about doing stuff like this on List of dog breeds:
  • Afganhundur _ (Afghan Hound) (FCI 10/1/228) (M) Afghanistan
Uh-uh, I don't like it, it's way too cluttered. The FCI # and other club designators are on the breed pages, as is the likely country of origin. And it would be impossible to decide which alternative breed names to list here. Reader should be able to simply scan for the name of the breed they're looking for in a vertical list, not wade through all that extra info. That's why we've got alternative names often listed in the proper alphabetical place in the list (e.g., Alsation and German Shepher Dog). Maybe if it was in a table so it was easier to ignore the extra stuff...but then you're maintaining all of that data *twice*, onece on the breed page & once on the list. I don't much like that idea--everything we already have it a lot of work.
In any event, our main target audience is *not* you and me who are editors and trying to maintain a lot of complex info--it's the casual user who knows the name of a breed and wants to find out more about it. They probably don't even know what FCI is, let alone a bunch of obscure numbers. I mean, that line looks like gobbledygook to me when I scan it, even thought when I put on my thinking cap and read it slowly I think I can parse what it is that it's trying to say.
  • I think that putting the FCI number is fine. Maybe format as:
Group 1 Section 1.3 #294 (let's not use any weird/special characters like you used for No).
  • I'm still having trouble understanding why an article would link to the talk page--talk page isn't part of the article name space, it's for discussions about the article. And the FCI links should link to the breed standards, as they do now, not to some other ___location within wikipedia, IMHO. But maybe i'm misunderstanding what you're asking.
  • I'm not sure about a picture indicator. You're saying put something like:
  • Affenpinscher (P)
  • Afghan Hound (P)
  • Aidi
? I'm not convinced. I don't think "P" would be the right thing--it's too nebulous an indicator. ("What the heck does 'P' mean anyway, Marsha?") But I don't know what else could be used. They could always just go to the Wikipedia:List of images/Nature/Animals/Dogs to see what images exist.
Elf | Talk 05:35, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)


Thank you for the detailed answer. I realised that the the de:, da:, is: maight be overloaded with information. It is hard to have a balance between all the different needs. I also tray to find out what could be learned from the dog breed project for other Wikipedias and what information would be helpfull for English visitors for example in an Italian, Spanish and so on Wikipedia. I started two weeks ago with non latin Wikipedias as Japanease and Hebrew. Belive me it is tricky to realise that articles about Griffin, Boxer, Pointer, Afgan are only disambiguations and to pay attention that you see a redirect from an old list and to fix it.
Listening to many / all alternative names for any of the Wikipedias is not a good idea either. But I think it would be a great help to recognise somthing in a foreign list, also for visitors from outside en.wikipedia. I know only two Finnish words and would be lost without help. Listening the FCI name is a help which is there without beeng forced to ask sombody or to open tens of articles. This is why the is: list shows the original FCI names when for the main aricle an Icelandic word is used as Bendir for Pointer.
At de: we are thinking to show also the disambiguations as Chihuahua (dog). It is up to the visitor to choose what he wants to see.
(P) from picture was introduced by user de:Caronna to track his own work over two months. It is / was only an indication and these schould be used carefully. If only 20 pictures are missing it is fine to have a known central place to list them and to strike those solved in common. But again information should be found quickly without opening the list with all pictures and search there.
The indication to the talk page is olso a working help intended for the other Wikipedias. I do not know any efficient way to have an overview about talks for 200 articles. This is difficult to remember and if you make a two, three day brake you will probably not know where to start.
Group 1 Section 1.3 #294 . Thanks! Can we abbreviate it in some way?
A final remark: The list (the lists if we think about a list by countries) can not compete with database implementations as done on many dog breed sites. To find a compromise beteween simple enumerations and sofisticated representations is not easy and I am convinced that we can agree on some basic roles. It would be nice to have these basic features in the in other Wikipedia lists to. This only preserves the common look and feel of the Wikipedias. Regards Gangleri 10:42, 2004 Nov 2 (UTC)

I agree with Elf on all this. To be more specific:

  • I don't think we need to add all the information about image availability, FCI category and so on - that's what the articles are for. The dog breed list should be as simple and as useable for the reader as possible.
  • As Elf says, the talk pages are simply for discussing aspects of the articles as needed, they not part of the article and shouldn't be linked to from the article (except as the usual link) or from the main breed list.
  • I am not sure if the suggestion for adding the FCI number is to the individual articles or to the dog breeds list - if it's to the articles, then I think that's a good idea.

The important thing to remember, as Elf says, is that we are writing for our readers - not for people making interwiki links. I think cooperation between Wikipedias is important, so I don't want to discourage you, but each is also an individual encyclopaedia - which shouldn't try to be exactly the same (articles are not usually direct translations of each other for example, although sometimes that's a good starting point). Perhaps one way of gathering the information you are looking for is to make a page in your user space or on a sub page of the wikiproject and keep a list there. You could link to it from this talk page and from the talk page of the list of dog breeds - perhaps right at the top so it doesn't get lost in the conversation. -- sannse (talk) 19:56, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Yes, I want to make clear that I meant that I felt that the FCI number could go in the breed table, not on the list of dog breeds page. Elf | Talk 20:46, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Another thing--you said you were considering doing disambigs like this: Chihuahua (dog)--I find that *very* confusing. If we're talking about a dog, I'd expect Chihuaha to go to the chihuahua-the-dog link; if "dog" were a separate word, I'd expect it to go to the "dog" article. I would never, ever expect to go to the city in Mexico in that context. If you really want to let them go to the city or the breed, the reader will likely be much less confused with "Chihuahua (city) or Chihuahua (dog)". Elf | Talk 21:44, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Anchors

This is probably better than linking by subsection name, because if an editor changes the subsection name (which often happens) then the link just goes back to the top of the article, whereas having an explicit link name coded in place would more likely ensure that the link remains good. But I don't know how often we really want to be linking to things that aren't subhead-level. Elf | Talk 05:51, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Breeds by countries

I have thought from time to time about whether a list of breeds by country would be of interest to the general public. I think it would be, actually. I haven't done anything about it because it would be so hard to do. For example, the various serbian/balkan dogs--where would you put them without upsetting someone? "Balkans" isn't really the name of a country, it's a region. Likewise with Bichons--"Mediterranean area" would have to be the country of origin, esp. since there are some citations of origins in France or Spain or Italy--or would we list it in all places just to be safe?

And would you use the *current* country name or the name at the estimated time of origin? We could go by the FCI's country selections whenever a breed is recognized by them, but there are whole trainloads of dogs not recognized by the FCI. In other words, it would be a hard list to come up with, but it might be interesting.

I'm also not sure what the article name would be--perhaps we could do it by having a different Category for each country (sort of like there are for Writers by Country and such)--and, heck, surely there have got to be getting on close to 1000 breeds out there, so some of the categories might be lightly populated, but others would be quite full. Just sort of thinking out loud now, and it might also addresss some of what Gangleri's trying to do, too. Elf | Talk 05:48, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Personaly I think searching for dogs by countries / regions could be done having both categories for countries where more then n dogs come from and a list where the others are listed and the categories mentioned. This keeps the list small enough. It is also a good starting point to check for dogs in Wikipedias for that language.
Akita Inu could be in Category:Japan same as Icelandic Sheepdog is in Category:Iceland. If other people decide about the category system for animals from that country they can move them. Regards Gangleri 12:35, 2004 Nov 2 (UTC)
I actually started this in October; meant to speak to it but maybe I never did? Just did a quick check and I have three lists written, List of Spanish, Japanese and Korean dog breeds. I started with those because it was clear that there were breeds developed in those countries but without worldwide recognition. Quill 23:25, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

New dog care wikibook

Much to my horror (because of how much time I already spend in wikiP ;-) ), there is a new Wikibook: Dog care. I filled in the article on obesity and used a couple of my & sannse's breed photos as good examples--now we need examples of pathetic overweight dogs (none every show up at my agility trials, so I'll have to sneak up on my unsuspecting friends' dogs)! Elf | Talk 18:34, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I'm pathetically overweight. Perhaps I could photoshop a dog's head on my body. Imagine this man were a dog. Don't do this.The Dogfather 22:15, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Now *that* idea is pathetic. :-) Elf | Talk 01:30, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Ha, ha, ha! That is funny! On a serious note, I have never explored Wikibooks and I'm staying right away, I spend too much time here as it is. Quill 02:54, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Janus lists of dog breeds

    • Interesting. What we really would want in an ideal world is something like the little arrows or plus/minus signs next to lists in more robust user interfaces (such as Windows or Mac OS) where you click on it and it provides an expanded view of the thing you're looking at and click again to rehide the detail. We're not asking for a lot--  ;-) Elf | Talk 16:42, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)
You're not kidding ' very complex'! My brain couldn't take that second list all in. Quill 20:56, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)
  • User:Gangleri/tests/list (maintenance) IMSoP is getting closer to my ideas about a 'complex' maintenance list. Descrtiption:
    • "h" = History
    • "l" = What links here
    • "r" = Related changes
    • "e" = Edit
    • "T" = Talk
    • "c" = Purges the cache while reloading the page. This allows updating of the page without changing / editing it. You can use "action=purge" if you change a template or if you define a category used in some pages (articles, categiries ...) without having the category defined. Normaly the link to that category would show in read unless you edit the article / the articles again.
  • Hope that this descrtiption helps. (I could not find a better word for de:Legende (Karte).)
  • Because the "appropriate" google links would not work anyway, I placed some sample links at the top of the list. Normaly I have up to 15 Internet Explorer windows open. One for the list, one for Google, some for the articles I link together, some for my "stack", one navigation file from my local PC and so on. Regards Gangleri 01:35, 2004 Nov 9 (UTC)

KEYWORDS

  • Dear friends, I submitted bugzilla:846 named: feature request: control of meta name="KEYWORDS" content="...". This is an issue discused in the past. Hope that somebody from the developers would do somthing about it. My question here is about your opinion concerning the maximal number of keywords which should be supported. Regards Gangleri 18:05, 2004 Nov 9 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Shortcut for this project

"WP:WPdogs" sounds good to me -- sannse (talk) 12:37, 11 Nov 2004 (UTC)
yeppers--me too Quill 00:56, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)
ditto. Elf | Talk 00:00, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I am happy about your answers and posted User talk:Ram-Man#Shortcuts for WikiProjects. Regards Gangleri | Th | T 16:27, 2004 Nov 16 (UTC)

Quality Control transitioning quickly into Poodle hybrids discussion

Tech Central Station yesterday published an article written by Robert McHenry, Former Editor in Chief of Encyclopædia Britannica, with his views on Wikipedia.

I agree with some of his arguments, notably the danger of erroneous, barely legible, or overly detailed information creeping into the Wikipedia. While I think this is a bigger problem for articles of a controversial nature, even within our own project (dog breeds) I have seen some examples.

The problem is becoming evident on the Poodle page, specifically in the Hybrid section. Like many popular breeds, Poodles have been crossed with any number of other breeds, sometimes on purpose and sometimes accidentally. Is it really necessary to list every different combination which may be in existence?

Growing up, my canine friend was part Poodle, part Spitz. He was a great family pet, but apart from this mundane fact, his pedigree was hardly notable. Looking at the list, I see that we have a Cockapoo and a Spoodle, both of which are described as being Poodle/Cocker Spaniel crosses. Oh, what fun Mr. McHenry would have with this list. What’s next, the Labradobradoodle (Lab/Doberman/Poodle)? Or maybe the Puliwoolipoo (Puli/Wolfhound/Poodle)? How about the Spinonebaloneytollypoo (Spinone/Balognese/Toller/Poodle)?

Am I being too much of a curmudgeon?The Dogfather 20:30, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Are you? Not in my little opinion. This is one of my big Wikipeeves, articles ruined with minutia that render them unbalanced (i.e. one section suddenly contains incredible amounts of detail, another has just one 'bare bones' sentence), and articles in which the author has placed one or two examples suddenly added to so that there's a list where an article should be. I agree with you entirely when it comes to the poodle article, which was literate and well-written in its original form, or at least in its orginal form with a few tweaks, which I think is the Wikipedia's greatest strength. We should probably rethink why pudelpointer, which is a recognized breed is in the same list with scottiepoo, of which I've never heard?
Maybe we could have a dog show for a pomeranian/collie/Irish Wolfhound/Corgi/labradoodle/Bosanski Ostrodlaki Gonic Barak? It would be a ‘Polllie-woli-doodle-odla’ Day!
Thanks for the link to that article, which I'll read, and for the chuckle, which I can always use!
Quill 02:22, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I fear that I am probably guilty of adding minutiae from time to time. However, in my defense, I do try to add only that which I feel is important, and I try my best to get it to flow with the original article. Yet, I'm beginning to think that I would like to remove some of those edits, as they are probably not as important as I originally thought.The Dogfather 03:37, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I've thought for a while that we might actually want a "poodle hybrids" article, but haven't thought so so firmly that I've actually done it. I think we might want entries (or redirs) for many of these mixes because they so often appear in pets-for-sale listings and people might want to know what they are. Most other breed mixess don't cause the coining of names quite as much (e.g., "lab mix", "shepherd/chihuahua", etc.) so it hasn't been an issue.
I really enjoyed polllie-woli etc--thanks for the big laugh! Elf | Talk 05:16, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I went ahead and added a poodle hybrids page. I also edited the Poodle article, fixing some of the things that were bothering me. I hope the edits meet with everyone's approval, but if they don't, I'm not going to fight about it. Grace Hopper used to say that it was easier to ask forgiveness than to get permission, so there you have it.The Dogfather 16:31, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
As they say, be bold. Looks good. Elf | Talk 21:17, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Now here's a bit of a radical one... what about merging all the text from all the doodle/poo articles into the new Poodle hybrids page. Then making all the old pages redirects. On the plus side I think this would balance and clarify our coverage. On the down side, it would be unpopular with some contributors. What do you think? -- sannse (talk) 22:35, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC) (polllie-woli... heh!)
Hmmm, interesting thought. I'm going to ponder for a while before offering an opinion. Elf | Talk 22:45, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I like the idea of merging all the hybrids to one page, but as you say, it won't be popular.The Dogfather 00:55, 18 Nov 2004 (UTC)
I like the idea too. Would make the job of editing out unsubstantiated or biased material much easier for Dog Project contributors--or would it? We may have a lot of -oodle and -poo owners placing stubs or substubs at the Redirects. It might be all right if we make no judgements on the various SWFs and keep the sections really factual and neutral. We might consider leaving labradoodle as it is just because of the amount of hassle we'll get if we don't. Not sure, but would vote 'yea' at present. Quill 03:00, 18 Nov 2004 (UTC)
After discovering the Pooter article, I'm more & more in favor of a single article for the off-the-wall hybrids. But cockapoo & labradoodle seem to be so common (and have been for years) that they might still deserve their own. (E.g., "cockapoo" is actually in Webster's with an origin date of 1970; "labradoodle" isn't but it seems to be quite commonly used in the want ads around here.) Elf | Talk 20:48, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)
As you say, cockapoo is pretty common, and there are a lot of people trying to get the labradoodle to breed true, i.e., it is a serious breeding project. But listing every possible mix that exists is just ridiculous. Pooter? They must be joking.The Dogfather 22:12, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Just saw Pooter. This is out of control and must be stopped. I need a brandy....Quill 23:25, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Would that be a BRiard crossed with a NewfoundlAND and a huskY? Elf | Talk 00:11, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Hee, hee--good one, Elf. Quill 09:08, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
I took action on the Pooter thing. Somebody will probably get mad, but this is an encyclopedia people, not a blog.The Dogfather 03:56, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
(Edit)The more I think about it, the more I think we been had. It was probably someone's idea of a joke. Simple vandalism. How does one get a page deleted?The Dogfather 04:25, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Agreed. I 'googled' it too. I'm a sucker....Quill 09:08, 3 Dec 2004 (UTC)
How to get an article deleted. Elf | Talk 00:05, 4 Dec 2004 (UTC)

New breed registry article

I started this article. I'm not a real expert on this subject, so any corrections & additional information would be very helpful. Go to it! Elf | Talk 20:48, 2 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Missing Images

Er...do we really need that gigantic blue template that FirstPrinciples has felt the need to go adding to several dog TALK pages? Quill 21:31, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)

My question is: has there really been a request for more poodle pictures? And who is requesting them?The Dogfather 03:04, 13 Dec 2004 (UTC)
Made no sense and I deleted it. Quill 22:19, 13 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Pooter

Okay, Elf, I followed that votes for deletion thingy. Have no idea if I did it right. (Got lost on the VfD page, scrolled down and there's instruction after instruction...when it got to the part about putting the new date's section in...well, that was it for me....) Quill 23:36, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)

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