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On your mark, get set...

I ran across two geography bee champions, which gave me a bright idea...

I challenged each against the other.

Take a look at my threads on User talk:Highfields and User talk:Blackadam2.

(If Blackadam2 doesn't step up within 24 hours, feel free to jump in ahead of me, starting at the end of the list.)

Would you be interested in future races with Highfield?

That is, are you up to it?  :)

The Transhumanist 03:19, 2 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Happy Holidays!

Joy
Joy

 Marlith (Talk)  has given you a kitten! Gifts of kittens promote Wikilove and holiday spirt. Hopefully this one has made your day better. Share the WikiLove and civility with everyone and raise the holiday spirit! Send kittens to others by adding {{subst:User:Marlith/Joy Message}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

 Marlith (Talk)  00:23, 5 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

House

I was wondering if you could set the record straight on List of House Episodes, seeing as though anon users keep reverting the consensus and edits of administrators and if I revert it again I'm in violation of 3RR. It's getting really out of hand almost, because people are either refusing to follow what was discussed or they don't read it at all and then make major edits to it. Thanks in advance. Cheers!--EmperorofBlackPeopleEverywhere (talk) 22:17, 6 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Happy Holidays!

~~~ is wishing you a Merry Christmas! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Don't eat yellow snow!

Spread the holiday cheer by adding {{subst:User:Flaming/MC2008}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

Vltava 68 10:21, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Edit count

Hi, I was wondering if there was a template that I could use to display my current number of edits on my users page. Please respond if you know. Thanks a lot. 71.176.90.237 (talk) 14:50, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Cheers

intraining Jack In has smiled at you! Smiles promote WikiLove and hopefully this one has made your day better. Spread the WikiLove by smiling at someone else, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past or a good friend. Cheers, and Happy editing!
Smile at others by adding {{subst:Smile}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

Thanks for helping out on my talk page.--intraining Jack In 15:17, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Re: Happy Holidays!

Thanks! Happy holidays to you, too. –Juliancolton Tropical Cyclone 15:33, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks very much, same to you. :) · AndonicO Engage. 15:36, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Best wishes.--intraining Jack In 15:40, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
/me looks to the end of his signature...errr...Happy Holidays to you to. ayematthew ✡ 15:42, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was just going through your user page and noticed the wiki link to the definition of a Doppelgänger account has changed to the following Wikipedia:Sock puppetry#Doppelg.C3.A4nger accounts. I will fix it now for you.--intraining Jack In 16:06, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Account creation tool

Hi Helpful One, my confirmation: I did request the tool, and have subscribed to the mailing list. Thanks for such a quick reaction! I'm impressed ;-) Maedin\talk 16:31, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you! Maedin\talk 17:12, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merry Christmas

Chergles (talk) is wishing you a Merry Christmas! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person.
Chergles (talk) 19:25, 7 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

How you can help...

I notice that on User:Thehelpfulone, the browser title instead reads "Thehelpfulone's User Page - How can I help?" How do you change that? --Dylan620 Contribs Sign! 02:01, 8 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I know it's a late reply, but thanks for living up to your username. I'm not so sure if it was the most appropriate way to do so, but I tested the template here. BTW, I've seen that you have doppelganger accounts used to prevent impersonation of you by vandals. How do you create doppelganger accounts? --Dylan620 Contribs Sign! 21:55, 9 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Orphaned non-free media (Image:Faerie Wars.JPG)

Thanks for uploading Image:Faerie Wars.JPG. The media description page currently specifies that it is non-free and may only be used on Wikipedia under a claim of fair use. However, it is currently orphaned, meaning that it is not used in any articles on Wikipedia. If the media was previously in an article, please go to the article and see why it was removed. You may add it back if you think that that will be useful. However, please note that media for which a replacement could be created are not acceptable for use on Wikipedia (see our policy for non-free media).

If you have uploaded other unlicensed media, please check whether they're used in any articles or not. You can find a list of 'image' pages you have edited by clicking on the "my contributions" link (it is located at the very top of any Wikipedia page when you are logged in), and then selecting "Image" from the dropdown box. Note that all non-free media not used in any articles will be deleted after seven days, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. Thank you. BJBot (talk) 06:41, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Back to demographics

The CIA demographics data has been wikified on many of the "Demographics of" articles, but still needs to be fixed on the rest.

We need someone to keep making passes with AWB on these until they are all fixed. Don't worry about combining passes - it is more important that these be fixed right away.

AWB's skip feature can be used to skip the articles that have already been fixed (key off of the population subheading name ("===Population==="), which has been standardized for the fixed articles).

I've been adding a standard lead for those articles which lack a lead section. All of these articles (even those that have been "fixed") need to be checked for a missing lead, and the standard one added in if no lead exists. To insert a lead paragraph, I've been using {{subst:User:The Transhumanist/sandbox23}}. Some of those with a missing lead have a tag pointing that problem out - be sure to remove it.

Have you gotten up to speed with Regex yet? That feature is needed to convert some of the data type names to subheadings. The data is on the same line for some of those, and needs to be moved to the next line. Searching/replacing with Regex can do this.

The heading I've been standardizing the data section with is "CIA World Factbook demographic statistics".

When the section lacks a section lead (not to be confused with the article's lead), I've been adding this line: "The following demographic statistics are from the CIA World Factbook."

To insert both of the above, you can use {{subst:User:The Transhumanist/sandbox26}}.

Some of the articles don't even have the CIA data. To avoid making search/replace changes in those by mistake, it would be best to add the above mentioned heading first. Then you can key off of the heading and skip the articles that don't have it.

An example of the proper formatting for the CIA data can be found at Demographics of Comoros#CIA World Factbook demographic statistics. Be careful, in some of the articles, this data will be placed under a subheading instead (such as level 3 - h3) such as in the article Demographics of Denmark.

The list of country demographics articles is located at Wikipedia:WikiProject Demographics#Country demographics pages.

I wish I had access to a computer that can run AWB, because this assignment will likely rack up several thousand edits by the time it is done.  :) You'll be getting those instead of me.  :(

Have fun.

The Transhumanist 02:47, 12 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]


P.S.: once this data is all standardized with the same formatting, it will be easy for others to adjust it all as needed.

Hi there,
I'm still not 100% on Regex, but I'm sure that I could find a user to help me with the task, but I'm not exactly sure what I need to do! Sorry, but you've confused me with talk about what you have done, what do you need my help with? ;)
Regards,
The Helpful One 19:46, 12 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Fix them all. That is, I need you to wikify all the country demographics articles that haven't been wikified yet! Use AWB (you're good enough to configure each pass yourself, but if you don't know how to do a specific task, feel free to ask me and I'll be happy to help you get up to speed). I've made a convenient list you can use with AWB at User:Thehelpfulone/Country demographics articles (change the list however you need to in order to complete your task. In general, what needs to be done to these articles is:
  1. Add a lead section to all the articles that are missing a lead section. One way to do this is by inserting {{subst:User:The Transhumanist/sandbox23}} and then saving. For more information about substitution, see Wikipedia:Template substitution.-  Done for all the articles. The Helpful One 19:28, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Standardize the demographics statistics section headings
  1. Standardize the heading for the CIA demographics section to "CIA World Factbook demographic statistics". You can use {{subst:User:The Transhumanist/sandbox26}}, which inserts this heading and a section lead. Note that this heading only works in those situations where the CIA data hasn't been mixed with material from other sources!
  2. For a demographics data section that has CIA and other sources mixed together, use the heading "Demographic statistics".
  3. Some articles have neatly organized data from several sources in their own subsections. In such cases, use the standard CIA heading, but be careful that it has the appropriate level (controlled by how many equals signs you place before and after the heading name)
  1. Add a section-lead to the "CIA World Factbook demographic statistics" section in articles that don't have a section-lead for it. A simple section lead is available in sandbox26, mentioned above. Note that it won't fit all situations. For those which it doesn't fit, you'll have to customize or improvise.
After all the articles with CIA data have the standard heading, you can use that heading in AWB to skip all the others that don't have it. That will make it easier to focus on reformatting the data in these articles.
  1. Reformat the data so that the data-type names are subheadings, and the data is presented below it.
  2. After you've finished wikifying these, you can use AWB to skip these so you can work on all the rest. All the demographics articles need to be checked for wikification, and especially those with CIA data mixed in.
Don't panic. Take your time. Use linky to go over the articles and get a feel for them. If you work on some of them by hand in Firefox/WikiEd, you'll start to get a feel for what you can use AWB for to speed things up. You'll need regex to do any search/replaces that require carriage returns. For example, when you want to split one line into two lines.
I'm on a Linky machine today, and I'm about to look over these articles to see which ones are done already, so I can point those out to you as examples. I'll indicate the completed ones on the list, as I come across them.
Have fun.
The Transhumanist 22:52, 12 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

What should I do about the dead links at User:Thehelpfulone/Country demographics articles? The Helpful One 22:58, 12 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Most of those don't have CIA data. Here are links for the data for the redlinks that are covered. It's in the people section of each country, and you can simply copy and paste it in to the Wikipedia article. (Then you'll understand where the formatting problem came from). Note that you'll need to add 2 statistics sections to Demographics of Akrotiri and Dhekelia because CIA covers those separately.
If you want to create articles for the remaining redlinks, feel free to research their demographics on google and at the library.  :) But right now, our main concern is fixing (wikifying) existing articles.
The Transhumanist 23:21, 12 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Missing the data

Some countries are missing the CIA statistics. When you come across those (like Mexico), please add it in (and format it).  :) The Transhumanist 23:58, 12 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Beware of mixed sections

Some editors have mixed other statistics with the CIA statistics. For those, we either need to separate them, or we need to change the heading and section lead so that they aren't erroneous (they can't say it's CIA statistics when not all of it is). The Transhumanist 00:39, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Familiarize yourself with the World Factbook people statistics

Be sure to browse the countries on the World Factbook, and look at the people statistics until you can recognize in Wikipedia articles if stats from other sources have been added. Because I didn't do this, some of the sections I titled as being CIA were erroneously named (due to not being able to tell what was CIA and what wasn't).

For example, I fixed the Demographics of Benin article by moving non-CIA material from the CIA section to its own section.

The Transhumanist 00:43, 13 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Automatic lead in "Demographics of" articles

The word you want to use in the standard plug-in you are inserting automatically in all "Demographics of" articles is "populace" (noun), not "populous" (adjective). Please fix. Also please reflect if this kind of an identical bland lead across all countries is really helpful to anyone. --Zlerman (talk) 03:12, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the heads up - I've changed the template. The boilerplate lead is merely a starting point - it would not hurt our feelings if editors replaced them (any or all of them) with something better. The temporary standard lead THO has inserted is helpful in that it explains what the article is about, which allows the reader to decide whether or not he or she has found the right article without having to delve into the article itself (which can be time-consuming). A lead talking specifically about the country's demographics would be preferred, but is much more time-consuming. Right now, we're just trying to wikify the existing articles. It's a clean up effort. Developing the content would be much more time consuming, and this is a side-track for us as it is - we've got to get back to our main project (the country outlines). The reason we got involved with these is that because their links are so prominently presented in the outlines (in more than one way), so they almost directly affect the quality of the outlines. I figured by cleaning these up, it would improve further development by providing editors with a stronger (standardized) base to start from.
By the way, I'm glad you two have met. You are both important members of the team. I look forward to seeing you work together. I expect you will be highly synergistic.
The Transhumanist 03:45, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A "guestbook benchmark" award

The Special Barnstar
I have a little "guestbook benchmark award" thing for my guestbook; abiding by it, you deserve this for being the tenth person to sign it. Congrats! --Dylan620 Contribs Sign! 18:31, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You're welcome! :D If you're interested, here are the following benchmarks (ones that have already been reached are bold and link to the person who reached the benchmark):
--Dylan620 Contribs Sign! 18:48, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merry Christmas!

·Add§hore· Talk/Cont is wishing you a Merry Christmas! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Don't eat yellow snow!

Spread the holiday cheer by adding {{subst:User:Flaming/MC2008}} to their talk page with a friendly message. ·Add§hore· Talk/Cont 19:27, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merry Christmas

DavidWS (contribs) is wishing you a Merry Christmas! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Don't eat yellow snow!

Spread the holiday cheer by adding {{subst:User:Flaming/MC2008}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

Happy holidays! DavidWS (contribs) 19:46, 14 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

RfA thankspam

Thank you for your participation in my recent RfA, which failed with 61/52/7; whether you supported, opposed or remained neutral.

Special thanks go out to Wizardman and Malinaccier for nominating me, and I will try to take everyone's comments on board.

Thanks again for the trust the community has placed in me. A special Christmas song for you all can be found at the right hand side of this message!

Apologies if you don't like RfA thankspam, this message was delivered by a bot which can't tell whether you want it or not. Feel free to remove it. Dendodge TalkContribs, 17:40, 15 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to you!
Have a very merry Christmas, and a great new year! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Regards (and Season's Greetings!) from Stwalkerster [ talk ] 21:03, 16 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Coaching

I have a RL friend of mine, Jazzmaster12 (talk · contribs), who is interested in contributing to Wikipedia. I thought that the best way was through coaching/adoption, so since we are real-life friends, I was able to talk the matter over with him. So, I advised that he accept you as a mentor (I would have coached/adopted him myself, but I think I need a lot more experience before being a coach/adopter). I advised you because...

  • ...you are an administrator, and are therefore highly experienced...
  • ...your RfA had over 100 supporters...
  • ...you are willing to adopt other users...
  • ...and your username speaks for itself :-).

Drop a note on my talk page if you are willing to accept Jazzmaster12 as an adoptee. I'll tell him your decision afterward. --Dylan620 Contribs Sign! 19:18, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It seems you have excellent taste in choosing admin coaches. User:Juliancolton/Faces –Juliancolton Happy Holidays 19:23, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, Julian. :-) Meanwhile, THO, regarding whether or not Jazzmaster12 would like to learn first... I think that should be your call. Give a list of things you can help with, and let Jazzmaster12 choose what he would like to learn to learn first. I'll tell him the news tomorrow morning. I need to entrust you to have an adoption process set up before 19:00 UTC on Thursday. That way, he can answer anything you dish out ASAP. --Dylan620 Contribs Sign! 00:23, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Darn it. :-( As far as I'm concerned, the coaching could take as late as Monday ;_; – I don't know if he's available on weekends, but I'll ask him, just to make sure. --Dylan620 Contribs Sign! 00:29, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Search/replace in the "Demographics of" articles

I got your message.

Please use AWB to change "health of the populous" to "health of the populace".

(Using longer phrases like this for search/replace strings helps reduce erroneous replacements. The more specific target, the better).

I look forward to seeing your results.

The Transhumanist 22:14, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

RE: Search/replace

Hi there,

I was looking at this message and realised that completing these find/replaces takes a long time, and it seems that there are going to be a lot more of these little tasks for Demographic of articles. Therefore, what do you think of a bot request to use for AWB to automatically run these tasks?

The Helpful One 22:19, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Bot requests are for industrial-sized chores that are precisely defined. This little set of pages doesn't warrant a bot. Besides, the edits need to be supervised by a human to make sure there aren't any errors.
But going for a bot that you can use AWB for simple search/replaces would really helpful. I'm not sure what they will say to your request, but you'll probably have to prove that you won't do any erroneous replaces with it.
In the meantime, for simple search and replaces you could place the tasks up at Wikipedia:AutoWikiBrowser/Tasks. Complex tasks tend to be ignored on that list (but not always). There are lots of AWB'ers who love to do the easy ones. By the way, you have a volunteer there willing to help out on the CIA statistics on the "Demographics of" pages! You might want to contact him. :) (He's under "Here's a juicy one"). The Transhumanist 22:47, 17 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merry Christmas, THO!

If you are either a firm friend of mine, have signed my autograph book, are a member of WPTC, or are someone I simply like or admire:

Dylan620 Contribs Sign! is wishing you a Merry Christmas! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Don't eat yellow snow!

Spread the holiday cheer by adding {{subst:User:Flaming/MC2008}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

  • A cookie to promote WikiLove!
    A cookie to promote WikiLove!
  • A glass of milk, to wash down that cookie, and to promote more WikiLove!
    A glass of milk, to wash down that cookie, and to promote more WikiLove!
  • Don't forget to put this on top of your Christmas tree...
    Don't forget to put this on top of your Christmas tree...

I'm giving this to everyone who satisfies at least one of the above criteria. --Dylan620 Contribs Sign! 10:33, 18 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

uhh

You put the tag on it, but you didn't protect The Game (Harvard-Yale). ViperSnake151 13:05, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

There's now an RFC on this topic. I think we should just keep it going and protect it until the RFC ends, this will decide once and for all on the dispute. ViperSnake151 14:14, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Barnstar!

The Admin's Barnstar
For your great use of the admin tools to keep the wiki clean. Keep it up.Ashbey ₮ 19:56, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Not a problem! It's an editnotice. To create one, add whatever you want it to say when you edit your user/user talkpage at User:Thehelpfulone/editnotice or User talk:Thehelpfulone/editnotice. You don't need to transclude it or anything, it will automatically appear when you edit your user talk or userpage. Currently, it is not possible to make an editnotice for your user subpages. Cheers and happy editing!--Ashbey ₮ 20:01, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

RFPP

Please note my comment here.—Kww(talk) 21:06, 19 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

article deleted

Hello,

I created my first article on wikipedia for Doina Leahu. It was deleted, and I can't figure why and what can I do about it. It was an article about a real person, a romanian painter. Should I add her biography in order for the article to be kept?

Thank you and Merry Christmas! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.97.163.75 (talk) 16:24, 20 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Happy holidays!

Juliancolton (talk) is wishing you happy holidays! This greeting promotes WikiLove and holiday wishes. Hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a season's greetings, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Spread the holiday cheer by adding {{subst:User:Juliancolton/Holidays}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

Merry christmas helpful one! Hope you have a fantastic 2009 :-) JS (chat) 21:51, 24 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!
Christmas medley
A chiptune medley to annoy Ironholds :D
Problems playing this file? See media help.
Thehelpfulone/Archive, here's hoping you're having a wonderful Christmas, and here's also hoping that all your family and friends are well. Lets all hope that the year coming will be a good one! If we've had disputes in the past, I hold no grudges, especially at such a time as this. If you don't know I am, I apologise, feel free to remove this from your page.
Come and say hi, I won't bite, I swear! It could even be good for me, you know - I'm feeling a little down at the moment with all of these snowmen giving me the cold shoulder :(
— neur ho ho ho(talk) 00:13, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merry Christmas

Hello Thehelpfulone! I just wanted to wish you and your family a merry Christmas! May this Christmas be full of great cheer and holiday spirit. Again, merry Christmas! Ashbey 00:58, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you don't celebrate Christmas, then happy holidays!

Merry Christmas

A NobodyMy talk is wishing you a Merry Christmas! This greeting (and season) promotes WikiLove and hopefully this note has made your day a little better. Spread the WikiLove by wishing another user a Merry Christmas, whether it be someone you have had disagreements with in the past, a good friend, or just some random person. Don't eat yellow snow!

Spread the holiday cheer by adding {{subst:User:Flaming/MC2008}} to their talk page with a friendly message.

--A NobodyMy talk 02:35, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas!
DiverseMentality is wishing you a Merry Christmas! Hope you have a great Christmas day and a happy holiday season. Stay safe! DiverseMentality 08:32, 25 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

re:

I follow your example, sir. ;) — neuro(talk) 00:16, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Please

Come on IRC, thanks. ayematthew ✡ 13:42, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Protection on template:Chemicals

Hi, helpful one, you applied admin-only protection on the {{chemicals}} template page, in such a way that the protection logo also shows up on all the talk pages that this template is used on. Probably the protection template here should be included in <noinclude> and </noinclude> or so. Can you please correct this. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Wim van Dorst (talk) 14:53, 26 December 2008 (UTC).[reply]

Rushing Rivers Instutute Page Deletion.

Previously the Rushing Rivers Institute Page was flagged for deletion by your for alleged copyright infringement. We have now updated our page with the GNU Free Documentation license and wish this page to be re-established. An e-mail has been sent to premissions@wikimedia. We request the page be re-established as quickly as possible.

Thank You Bhartt (talk) 15:37, 26 December 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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