Should its name be Dniepropetrovsk?
Redirect from Dnepropetrovsk is buggy. Also, what is the relation between Dnepropetrovsk and Kudak (mentioned in article about Stanislaw Koniecpolski? Is this an older name, or was Kudak just nearby? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 13:25, 28 Feb 2005 (UTC)
- I'd say just nearby. I guess Kodak (as far as I'm accustomed to name) was destroyed before the foundation of existing city.AlexPU
How the city name is spelled in English
I checked LexusNexus database on how the city name is spelled in major English media. The search for the last two years usage in major papers gives the following results:
- Dnepropetrovsk - used 66 times.
- Dnipropetrovs'k - used only once.
- Dnipropetrovsk - used 243 times. Also used by Britannica.
Therefore, I moving the article from Dnipropetrovs'k to Dnipropetrovsk. Irpen 00:14, Mar 29, 2005 (UTC)
- Please note that none of the spellings you mention are English names; they are different transliterations of the Russian and Ukrainian names of the city. Dnipropetrovs'k satisfies the suggested convention in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English), which says If there is no commonly-used English name, use an accepted transliteration of the name in the original language.
- We've been using the full formal National transliteration for geographic names in Ukraine, in article titles, and often in the text of articles (many articles on Russian Empire and Soviet-era topics use Russian names, and a notable exception is Kiev/Kyiv). It makes good sense to use a consistent transliteration scheme, and not the most popular transliteration scheme for each individual name. I think this is also consistent with most current atlases, Mapquest, MSN Maps, and Terraserver, and also with the observation at Wikipedia:Naming#Ukrainian_names.
- Lately I've been considering suggesting changing this to use the official simplified National form (see footnotes of the Romanization table), and retaining the formal transliteration next to an article's Cyrillic (Just the way this article looks, at the moment). But this should probably find consensus on Wikipedia:WikiProject Subdivisions of Ukraine, before starting to move individual articles. —Michael Z. 2005-03-29 01:00 Z
- Sorry, I did not know about the Subdivision of Ukraine Project. I will post proposed changed there for discussion in the future. As for this article, I appreciate if you don't move it back for now. Lets discuss this of course, but it seems that 246 mentions in major papers shows that there is a "commonly used English name". I specifically checked "major papers only" in my LexusNexus search because, unlike multitude of internet news sites, major papers do have the style policy and are staffed with editors who check for style consistency. Of course, this is a matter of debate whether accepted English usage is the same thing as "English name" and whether 246 mentions in two years in about 50 major papers establishes the English usage.
- BTW, if we use similar criteria, the second largest city in UA should be called "Kharkiv" in WP, rather than Khar'kov, Kharkov, Harkov, etc. I just noticed that you did this change and I agree with it. Perhaps, when referred to in connection with many historical events, the WP usage should be "[[Kharkiv|Kharkov]] (currently Kharkiv)". However, the current English usage favors Kharkiv over Kharkov with a similar margin as Dnipropetrovs over Dnepropetrovsk.
- Lets wait until other editors voice their opinions and decide on what this title should be. Of course, if someone feels too strong about this and can't wait, s/he can move the article back anytime. I will not do anything further with the title until we conclude this discussion. In the meantime, I will try to fill the section stubs in the city history with useful information and hope other editors will help. Cheers, Irpen 01:26, Mar 29, 2005 (UTC)