Talk:Phineas Gage/Archive 2

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Archive 1 Archive 2

And another thing, dagnabbit!

Re [1]. Tfish, you seem to have these periodic AGF lapses, in which you imply that I'm just stringing you along, pretending to indulge your concerns, and so on. I think you know that's not true, so please think twice in future before saying such things.

In this particular case, I really did first think this information worked best as a note [2], then really did realize that it makes sense in the main-text passage on lateralization of damage [3]. The fact that I teased you a bit, in my edit summary, about your hostility to notes, shouldn't throw you off center.

As to the material itself, I periodically get inquiries about Gage's handedness, for reasons I don't need to explain to you, so yes, I do think it belongs in the article. It is specialized material which (as seen) I thought would do best as a note, but I realized later that since the damage lateralization question is somewhat technical, it might fit in there as well. But if you really don't think it should be in the article at all, I can live with that, though I'm still puzzled why an essentially limitless amount of specialty material can't be accommodated in notes, outside the main text. EEng (talk) 04:35, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

I've been thinking about what you've said. As you know, I watch this talk page and your user talk page, so I know that those inquiries about his handedness that you get are not being posted by Wikipedia readers on-Wiki. I'm pretty sure that I can accurately infer that these are people asking you in real life, because you are a person who knows an unusually large amount of information about Gage. And that's the thing, as I see it. Wikipedia is for a general readership. If it is also useful for academic specialists, that's great, but it is not intended to be, primarily, a resource for that purpose. Myself, in real life, I'm a person who knows an unusually large amount of information about certain areas of neuroscience. And in real life, people have asked me about those things, because I'm known as an expert. But I emphatically do not write content here in order to reflect my own research, or even to be comprehensive about the research areas in which I have expertise. We have neuroscience-related pages where I could easily write a ton of content about the intricacies of research on the topic, complete with detailed notes about the fine points of issues that are not resolved to my satisfaction and with every applicable source cited, and there would be some fellow neuroscientists who would actually find it interesting to read. But it would be undue weight and contrary to WP:NOT. And I don't do it. The fact that there are some people with specialized interests who ask a specialist certain questions in real life does not mean that Wikipedia serves its readers best by answering those questions here. It's the wrong criterion for inclusion of content. Wikipedia has defined itself as a tertiary source. Personally, stuff like hyphens are not particularly interesting to me. But what bothers me about both content and format (including sourcing) is that this page is set up like it's supposed to be a definitive place for specialists to look up current scholarship, instead of an encyclopedia page for general readers. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:08, 2 November 2014 (UTC)

By "periodically" I mean maybe a half-dozen inquiries in four years, mostly from highschoolers and undergrads -- apparently there's a much-copied assignment that requires them to find this out, or something. Anyway...

I think your idea about WP's audience is too narrow -- see WP:TECHNICAL#Audience, which in particular refers to three kinds of readers.

  • The general reader has no advanced education in the topic's field, is largely unfamiliar with the topic itself, and may even be unsure what the topic is before reading.
  • The knowledgeable reader has an education in the topic's field but wants to learn about the topic itself.
  • The expert reader knows the topic but wants to learn more or be reminded about some fact, or is curious about Wikipedia's coverage.

You gotta read the whole thing, of course. The general reader has priority, but to the extent we can also serve the other two types (without significantly compromising the article's appeal to the general reader) I see no reason not to do that as well. How exactly to do that needs discussion, but can we agree on this principle?

At least once before you've referred to WP:NOT, and specifically the following points:

  • 6. Textbooks and annotated texts. Wikipedia is an encyclopedic reference, not a textbook. The purpose of Wikipedia is to present facts, not to teach subject matter. It is not appropriate to create or edit articles that read as textbooks, with leading questions and systematic problem solutions as examples. ...
  • 7. Scientific journals and research papers. A Wikipedia article should not be presented on the assumption that the reader is well versed in the topic's field. Introductory language in the lead (and also maybe the initial sections) of the article should be written in plain terms and concepts that can be understood by any literate reader of Wikipedia without any knowledge in the given field before advancing to more detailed explanations of the topic. While wikilinks should be provided for advanced terms and concepts in that field, articles should be written on the assumption that the reader will not or cannot follow these links, instead attempting to infer their meaning from the text.
  • 8. Academic language. Texts should be written for everyday readers, not just for academics. ...

But how do these apply here? Does the article read like a textbook, use advanced terms and concepts or academic language? Is it just the presence of the notes? If not, what? One or two examples, please!

EEng (talk) 01:02, 3 November 2014 (UTC)

One example would be your strong opinion that the page absolutely must provide sourcing individually for every single misattributed behavior. Another would be the way the page keeps presenting information in terms of how Macmillan et al. have analyzed information and come up with newer interpretations. Note "a" gives much detail to analysis of images. Note "b" gives much detail about how to figure out Gage's date of birth and middle initial. You asked for one or two, and this is already four, but I could potentially go on like this for almost every note.
Since you are a self-professed acolyte of John Stuart Mill's endorsement of being open to the other side, let me say that I find it tedious that every suggestion that I make about improving the page leads to a wall of text. I have this unpleasant feeling that you are going, now, to argue with me about each of the four things I just pointed out, how I am partly wrong about them, how they differ in some way from your reading of WP:NOT, and on and on. I get the feeling that, when you said the other day that you are happy to be found wrong, you left out the part about you never actually being wrong. I suspect that you never will agree with me about the proper scope and audience, no matter what I say. Please understand, that I meant what I said about my view of the way the page is written too much for specialists, and if need be, I will open one or more RfCs to determine what other editors have to say about it. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:56, 3 November 2014 (UTC)
Sorry to disappoint you, but no wall of text will be forthcoming. Putting aside the sourcing for misattributed behaviors, and putting aside the bit about new interpretations -- am I correct that the remainder of your concerns about academic language (etc.) are only (or pretty much only) with respect to the notes, not the main text of the article? EEng (talk) 04:27, 6 November 2014 (UTC)
Putting my concerns aside, what are my concerns? Amongst other things, I would indeed be interested in de-froufrou-ing the notes. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:48, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

You're having one of those AGF failures again. You mentioned three concerns two posts back:

1. My "strong opinion that the page absolutely must provide sourcing individually for every single misattributed behavior"
2. "the way the page keeps presenting information in terms of how Macmillan et al. have analyzed information "
3. 'Note "a" gives [etc etc]. Note "b" gives [etc etc]'

I simply wanted to clarify whether, other than (1) and (2), your concerns about "proper scope and audience" etc. are limited to the notes, and not the article's main text. That's not (as you imply) dismissing your concerns, so stop implying that I am. Now can you answer the question? EEng (talk) 03:49, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

From where I sit, I've been extending a lot more AGF to you than have most of the other editors who have expressed concerns to you about this page. You are very good at expressing yourself, so if you don't want me to misunderstand your intentions, then please be careful about how you say things. Putting aside the I think I understand your concerns about sourcing for misattributed behaviors, and putting aside and I think I also understand the bit about new interpretations -- am I correct that... Now to answer that question, I would say that my concerns are much more about the notes than about the main text (and you can see my discussion about Note b below, where I try to make it specific), but I don't see it as an absolute distinction, more like a quantitative one. In fact, when I attempted yesterday to edit the note on the page itself, and got totally messed up in spite of the fact that I am very much an experienced editor, it made me start to think very seriously about how the formatting and templates, in both the notes and the main text, make it incredibly difficult for me and for most editors to edit this page. As a step-by-step process however, I would be quite happy to, for now, put more effort into the notes than into the main text. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:28, 7 November 2014 (UTC)

You've asked my on my talk page to reply here. I'm not really sure what the question is, several months later, but if there's something I'm missing please re-ask. I think the page is much-improved. I still think the whole notes, references, and more references section could be simplified further, but it's not a big deal to me as it is now. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:45, 19 July 2015 (UTC)

Honestly I don't remember either, but a skim of the above suggests it was something about who the target audience is. But if you're inclined to let sleeping dogs lie, I certainly am as well. EEng (talk) 02:03, 20 July 2015 (UTC)

Disposition of behavior citations

This was originally part of this subsection, but it looks as if this issue will be easier to follow in its own level-2 section.
Relating to this article section and its references: Phineas Gage#Exaggeration and distortion of mental changes
--Mirokado (talk) 19:03, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

... please organize the cites so that those related to Behavior A are grouped together, then those for Behavior B, etc., so that the reader only has to look one place to find out about a given behavior. This is "almost" easy, as follows. In the current version [4], sources [37]-[60] are only used for this behavior stuff, so to a first approximation we can just organize them like this

Wife and children:
  • {{cite book|author=Smith|year=1972}}
  • {{cite book|author=Jones|year=1982}}
Sexuality:
  • {{cite book|author=Anders|year=1999}}
  • {{cite book|author=Billson|year=1998}}

where those items are what used to be in [37]-[60]. The flies-in-the-ointment are that

  • [42], [49] are used in multiple behaviors, and
  • [42], [1], [M], [M1] are used outside the behaviors list as well in it.

The trick, as I see it, is how to present those along with the simple, one-time {{cite book}} refs, in as consistent and understandable a way as possible. Good luck EEng (talk) 03:31, 10 November 2014 (UTC)

I've placed the references in five groups each with a headline. I think the next step is to decide which references are not needed in order to support the list in the article body. It will be easier to decide how to present the final set of references once we have pruned them. --Mirokado (talk) 22:36, 10 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, and well done! My suggestion as to which references to delete would be to try to have one (or two) per asserted behavior, and to base it on two considerations: primacy and expediency. By primacy, I mean to keep whichever source said it first, while deleting sources that repeated what the first one said. By expediency, I mean that we can also be pragmatic about deleting the incomplete sources (like the book about Abnormal Behaviors, where we don't have all the citation information) or the ones using "sfn" (if EEng objects to using the sfn template in this way). There is room for some flexibility here; I don't mean that we have to be slavish about it. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:11, 10 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, Mirokado!

  • Mirokado's result (mentioned just above) is here [5].
  • Here [6] I've rearranged the cites to group them by behavior. What do you think?
  • Here [7] Each behavior gets its own callout.

Thoughts? EEng (talk) 16:31, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

This is looking better than I had expected. It deals with one of the concerns I was planning to mention, which was the WP:UNDUE emphasis on these basically unsubstantiated attributions resulting from the subheadings in the reference list. Although there are a lot of callouts in the sentence, they are now each just a single number, which is a familiar idiom which someone can read through relatively comfortably. I'm quite happy to leave things more-or-less-as-they-are with that paragraph. We now have some patterns which can perhaps also help elsewhere in the article. --Mirokado (talk) 22:50, 11 November 2014 (UTC)
Yes, our work in recent weeks (the three of us) has been of immense benefit, I think. The cite/sourcing organization and presentation is really great! My aim is for the article to work on different levels for different readers -- casual, serious, and advanced -- without the content/features serving one level detracting from the experience of readers at the other levels. And I think we've now achieved that in the sourcing and citations. Thanks for fixing the cite letter thing! When you catch your breath can you take a look at #Bump? EEng (talk) 05:36, 14 November 2014 (UTC)
Tfish -- you okay with this approach to the "ascribed behaviors" cites? EEng (talk) 00:33, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
<bumpity-bump-bump> EEng (talk) 08:07, 27 December 2014 (UTC)
Monthly bump. EEng (talk) 03:18, 26 January 2015 (UTC)
Oh, I remember this now! And it's a painful memory, thinking back to all those long hours I spent trying to rearrange the cites. I hereby nominate Mirokado for the Nobel Prize in EEng-wrangling. Beautiful work! This part of the page now looks the way I recommended. Yipee! --Tryptofish (talk) 20:37, 19 July 2015 (UTC)
It really is a thing of beauty. Mirokado is by far my favorite collaborator where there's any king of technical issue present in editorial questions. EEng (talk) 02:08, 20 July 2015 (UTC) ... even though he does still owe me a modified version of the phrenology diagram!
Danke für die Blumen! I have not forgotten about the arrows, I just keep on getting distracted. --Mirokado (talk) 02:16, 20 July 2015 (UTC)

WP:LQ

Discussion transferred from User talk:EEng

I have no strong feelings either way regarding where the quotation marks belong. I was taught all through school (in the U.S.), that, most of the time, the close quotation marks belong outside a comma or a final period. However, I have learned that WP style is to use logical quotation marks, so that's the style I follow as I edit articles. I'm not sure you read MOS:LQ carefully. Your edit summary accompanying your revert of my edit to Phineas Gage, at [8], is not quite the same as what is written at MOS:LQ.

You wrote:

  • What LQ (nonsense though it is) says is that if the punctuation in the quoted material coincides with that needed in the quoting sentence, then leave the punct inside the quote marks.

The second paragraph of MOS:LQ is:

  • Where a quotation is a sentence and coincides with the end of the sentence containing it, terminal punctuation should normally be placed inside the closing quotation mark. Where the quotation is a single word or fragment, terminal punctuation should be placed outside. [italics added]]

and the two examples right after this illustrate the difference. The other examples are all about quotes that are broken up, and thus do not apply here.

(I have had discussions with other editors regarding the meaning of "fragment". Some editors believe this means any part of a sentence that is not a complete sentence: a grammatical sentence fragment. A few other editors believe "a fragment" means anything less than the full sentence in the original text, even if, by itself, it is a grammatically complete sentence (thus, in order to decide where the quotation marks belong, one has to find the original text from which the quote was taken). I'm in the former camp; I believe "fragment" means a grammatically incomplete sentence. It makes more sense; it kind of goes with "a single word".)

At first I found it difficult to get used to putting a comma or period outside of the close-quotation marks (only when it is a single word or sentence fragment), but I'm getting used to it. It really makes sense. The comma, or period, really belongs to the entire sentence, not the single word or phrase. I'm not going to argue with you. I only wanted to show you how you are not following WP's style guideline. It's up to you if you want to keep reverting.

CorinneSD (talk) 00:46, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

I didn't see your most recent edit to Phineas Gage until after I had saved this.
CorinneSD (talk) 00:48, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
That's OK. As you've discovered in my edit to which you refer [9] I may be abrasive [10] but it's an intellectually honest abrasiveness. I actually do appreciate your attention to the LQ issue because, though LQ is completely idiotic‍—‌punctuation not being a programming language syntax nor good writing a set of rigid rules, and LQ in general making things look awful‍—‌as a practical matter I believe in adherence to MOS even where it's dumb (as long as the dumb doesn't impair comprehensibility) so LQ needed addressing sooner or later. I think in some cases you were wrong, however, but maybe I'm wrong about that so, please speak up. (I also "LQed" a few places I think you missed, but frankly it's such a blinding process I'm not sure that I had any idea what I was doing by the end.)
Beyond LQ, with all due respect you shouldn't be changing the internal whitespace of article source, where it follows a consistent plan, without discussion. The article follows WP:NLAR, and beyond that usually places a newline at the end of every sentence, and sometimes between clauses of logically complex sentences. Article source isn't meant to be read the way the rendered page is, and newlines at logical breaks makes it much easier to find the wanted spot in the source when making changes.
EEng (talk) 03:35, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for your reply. I kind of agree that LQ is silly, but I try to follow the guidelines. Regarding my edits in which you said I removed "the internal whitespace of article source", I didn't realize I was doing that. Actually, I've made over 14,000 edits on WP, and the article on Phineas Gage is the first article I've seen that used this kind of citation style. I found it very confusing. It wasn't even like the normal, comparatively new, in-line citation style of some other articles. I've have WikEd enabled for quite a while, and it highlights references in lavender, images and captions in lime green, and hidden notes to editors in salmon, while article text is in regular black on white. So I don't have any trouble distinguishing references from text. In most articles, I can delete a space or two to put text right after the reference, and it doesn't remove whitespace in the article. A real space between paragraphs (or after a table, etc.) is clearly visible as two lines of white space, so I wouldn't close that up. I promise you I won't touch the Phineas Gage article again. I thought the referencing system was unnecessarily messy-looking in Edit Mode, and I hope editors don't use that system when writing new articles. I even think the references (with numbers and letters) is distracting when reading the article. But that's just my opinion. CorinneSD (talk) 16:00, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
I'm glad you took my comments in the spirit in which they're meant, and also glad you're here. By "internal whitespace" I mean linebreaks visible only in the raw "source" of the article -- what you edit -- that affect what editors see, but doesn't make any difference to the formatted page readers see; an example is seen in this edit [11].
Please don't feel you can't edit the article. I'd appreciate fresh eyes, just so long as they're not the kind of eyes that obsess over nonexistent "rules" taught them by Mrs. Snodgrass in the 7th grade, with no regard for flow, comprehensibility, and the reader's pleasure in reading. I do have an unusual style, and a lot of things are the way they are for reasons that aren't obvious, but (to repeat) I'd love others to participate, particularly on subtle stylistic or grammar issues. For example, here [12] the intended sense is "The first time P worked with explosives may have been on his family's farms", not "Before [some other thing] he may have work with explosives on his family's farms", so I think "may have first worked" is right. But it's subtle, and I'd be happy to discuss that and other similar things. The article's in a high state of development and it's time to sweat the little details.
The way cites are identified is unusual, but we really wanted to be able to give the reader a clear roadmap to the small subset of sources which could act as further reading (depending on the type of reader) and this is the only way we could see to do it. EEng (talk) 17:32, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

"First worked"

Thank you for your polite reply. I think you can be sure that I am the kind of editor who doesn't "obsess over nonexistent rules with no regard for flow, etc." Regarding "may first have worked" and "may have first worked", I have noticed that British English editors tend to put the adverb before "have" or "has" + past participle while American English editors tend to put an adverb between "have/has" and the past participle. To my ears, "may have first worked" sounds odd. I see what you mean, and "may first have worked" is probably slightly more accurate than "may have first worked", but to me "may first have worked" and "may have first worked" mean, or can mean, the same thing, so I would not use a modal ("may" or "might") for the meaning you want to convey. I would use "probably": "Gage probably first worked with explosives..." or maybe "It is likely that Gage first worked..." In this particular case, I think "may" is too tentative. It is so tentative that it could apply to almost anybody. He was a young man in a rural state. He pretty much had to have first worked with explosives either on his own family's property or at a nearby mine or quarry. Well, that's all. CorinneSD (talk) 19:45, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
I had meant to include a parenthetical "(You don't seem like that kind of editor!)" but got distracted.
You may not realize the extent to which everything about Gage has been researched to the "nth degree". (Note use of LQ!) Many 19th c New Hampshire farmers used explosives personally, but it required significant skill so others relied on neighbors. Thus may really has the right sense‍—‌Gage certainly could have learned to work with explosives on the farm etc., but there's no way to know. What do you think about this wording [13]? EEng (talk) 20:44, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
End of discussion transferred from User talk:EEng
Well, it does sound better. I'm just curious. Did his family own more than one farm? That would have been unusual at that time. CorinneSD (talk) 22:00, 8 August 2015 (UTC) Even if they did, "on his family's farms" sounds odd. How about "on the family farm", which would apply even if it were more than one farm? CorinneSD (talk) 22:02, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
<rubs hands>Oh goody, someone who likes to sweat the details. There was (and still is) a large extended family of Gages in NH, Vt., and Massachusetts, working farms which they usually owned themselves. In the case of Gage his grandfather and uncles all had farms near his own father's farm, and it looks like he may have lived on these other farms at times. (It's a bit murky.) If think farms (plural) phrasing was an attempt to give a nod to those facts, but you're absolutely right that it sounds odd and might mislead (makes them sound rich or something). So I think your suggestion is just right.
This kind of close reading is very much what I hanker for. Please keep it up. EEng (talk) 23:08, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
I'm glad to find someone else who finds the details interesting and worth discussing. I'm wondering whether it is necessary to mention "family" in connection with "farm". When I see "the family farm", I think of: "he sold the family farm", or "he inherited the family farm". I don't think it is important here. I think the sentence would sound fine, and be accurate enough, if it read:
  • Gage's first work with explosives may have been on local farms or in nearby mines and quarries.
But I'll leave the choice up to you. CorinneSD (talk) 23:17, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
I like family farm because it connotes ownership, and on local farms sounds kind of itinerant. EEng (talk) 23:31, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
I suggest "on the Gage family farm", because, without the modifier, "on the family farm" just sounds kind of aristocratic. (Don't ask me to explain that, because it's not entirely rational.) --Tryptofish (talk) 00:33, 9 August 2015 (UTC)
That does, of course, sound elegant. The only problem (if it is a problem) is that, as EEng pointed out, above, it could have been on any one of his or his relatives' farms, so there wasn't just one "Gage family farm", there were several. But, of course, if the relatives were all named Gage, then each one is a "Gage family farm", so I guess this phrase would be accurate. What do you think, EEng? CorinneSD (talk) 00:48, 9 August 2015 (UTC)
You are correct, quite clearly. On the other hand, the same issue arises if we just say "family farm", in that there were multiple family farms for that family. However, if these various farms were not too far separated geographically from one another, we may not actually know whether or not Gage had ever had experience at more than one of them. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:52, 9 August 2015 (UTC)
I still like "on a local farm" or "on local farms". I don't think it's important on which farm he first used explosives. What is important is that he learned how to use explosives at an early age, probably even before he held a formal job. The sentence is just an introduction to his career. CorinneSD (talk) 00:57, 9 August 2015 (UTC)
Actually, now that you remind me of it, I think that "on local farms" is by far the best option. (After all, we are dealing with something that requires some speculation.) Another issue that I just noticed, however, is that EEng's recent edit changing the verb structure of the sentence moved it into the passive voice, and it might be better to use the active voice instead. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:04, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

Crikey! The only reason farms are in there at all is that I wanted to communicate he was a farmboy. How about this [14] -- it's "whose-farm-agnostic". (BTW, Tfish, "Gage's first work with explosives may have been on the family farm" is active voice, and anyway I hope you're not one of those people who actively hates the passive voice i.e. an active passive-voice hater.) EEng (talk) 02:22, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

A minor triumph complete disaster

Mirokado, remember when I moved all the {efn}s to {notelist|refs = } only to find out it somehow made a lot of the refns blow up, so I had to move them all back? Well I found a solution! I was riding my bike and it suddenly came to me. [15]

Tfish, look at the diff. I think you'll like what it does to the source text. EEng (talk) 05:58, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

That is pretty neat! I must look at {{trunc}} when I have time. Well done! --Mirokado (talk) 09:25, 18 August 2015 (UTC)
OK, I did, and I need a lot of explanation, because there's a lot that I don't understand. If I read it correctly, your change has taken some of the markup that was in the main text, and has moved it into the Notes section. To the extent that it reduces some of the complexity of what one sees in the edit window, when editing the main text, I say: Bravo! I gather from one of your edit summaries that you are "in ecstasy", which leads me to believe that you are easier to make happy than I had realized, so that's a good thing too. Do I understand correctly, so far? Now, if so, then I have some remaining issues. I'm pretty sure that, when I compare page versions before-and-after, that there is no change in the actual content of the Notes, but that there are fewer times in the main text when any given Note is invoked (ie, fewer of those superscripts at the beginning of each Note). If so, that's helpful, too. Correct? But you haven't yet done anything to revise the Notes, per #Notes above, and this doesn't do anything to address my concerns about the References. If I'm correct about that, then I'm not so ecstatic myself, but your mileage may vary. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:57, 18 August 2015 (UTC)
Well, there's good news and bad news. The good news: The point of this was simply so that, in the markup source, as you're reading along minding your own business, you don't suddenly get interrupted by a footnote. In other words, here's the old way:
The earth's travel around the sun{{efn|A long time ago, people thought the sun went around the earth. Starting with Copernicus, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah}} is part of the reason we have seasons.
Here's the new way:
The earth's travel around the sun{{efn|name=inquisition}} is part of the reason we have seasons.
See how nice? And then way down at the bottom, in a separate section just for footnotes, you have the body of the note:
{{efn|name=inquisition|A long time ago, people thought the sun went around the earth. Starting with Copernicus, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah}}
So the markup source is simpler to navigate, but the formatted article looks exactly the same. That's the theory, anyways.
The bad news is that the moment I read your post I remembered why this doesn't work. See, you were looking at the before and after versions of the page backwards--in the new version there are more of "those superscripts at the beginning of each Note" (I call them "backlinks"), exactly one more on each note, and it's always the last one in the list. Now, if you pick any note and click that last backlink, nothing happens, because it's only there as an accidental side effect of this move-notes-to-the-end technique--it doesn't actually point anywhere. And there's no way to fix that--it's an inevitable side effect of the technique.
It's all coming back to me now. About 2 yrs ago I asked at VP is anyone could think of a way around this, and everyone agreed there's no fix. So (assuming we're not going to tolerate this spurious backlink on each note) I've reverted. <sniff><cry> EEng (talk) 02:36, 19 August 2015 (UTC) And to address one of your points, No, this had nothing to do with trimming the notes in any way that the reader would see, not that we can't discuss that in the future--it was just about streamlining the markup that editors see.
Yes, I also only remembered about that too late to check it last night. Thanks for correcting again so quickly. --Mirokado (talk) 09:51, 19 August 2015 (UTC)
EEng, I'm so sorry (and I was even looking at it backwards!). From the ecstasy to the agony. I actually wouldn't feel too badly if we had those spurious backlinks, but that's OK. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:18, 19 August 2015 (UTC)
Oh, how I wish we'd had this discussion back in early 2014, so that you could have joined me on the receiving end of one of you-know-who's insane rants. Among his complaints for many months was that the article carried "40 false references" [16]. As usual he refused to explain what that meant until, finally, he revealed them to be simply these spurious backlinks. Even the normally unflappable Mirokado was prompted to ask, "If that is what you are worrying about, why not just say '[this formatting technique] resulted in one spurious backlink for each reference', which we already know anyway. You are wasting everybody's time by implying that the references themselves are incorrect." [17] EEng (talk) 03:39, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
Actually, I'm not a big fan of being on the receiving end of anyone's rants, including yours in which you complain to me about how mean other editors have been to you. End of sermon, now on to a more useful discussion above. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:09, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
It wasn't meanness, it was self-certain cluelessness. EEng (talk) 02:51, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
→including yours in which you complain to me about how self-certainly clueless other editors have been. --Tryptofish (talk) 02:58, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
Odd that someone who isn't a fan of being on the receiving end of rants is so cavalier about another editor being on the receiving end. EEng (talk) 02:25, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
I guess you cannot take yes for an answer. In this talk section, I began by asking some questions. It then turned out that you changed your mind about the "triumph", and I responded by telling you that I didn't want you to feel bad about it. You could have left it there, but instead you needlessly called up past disagreements with other editors. I'm not being cavalier. I told you repeatedly that I did not want to come back to this talk page, but you repeatedly asked me to come back here. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:10, 22 August 2015 (UTC)

Archiving

The discussions here are not amenable to bot archiving right now, but I suggest manually archiving #Disposition of behavior citations and #WP:LQ. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:26, 22 August 2015 (UTC)

Done. EEng (talk) 23:27, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
Thanks EEng. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:55, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
Actually, we are also done with #A minor triumph complete disaster, so that could be archived too. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:00, 23 August 2015 (UTC)

Archiving this page

This page is currently 214,045 bytes long; and so some people will be unable to edit it.

I therefore recently changed the setting for archiving discussions so that they will be archived 30 days after they are last edited, instead of the prior setting of 360 days.

I have twice been reverted; the first time because "discussions are ongoing", and the second, most bizarrely, because "you don't understand what the discussions here are, I do." It is ludicrous to suggest that nothing on this over-long page be archived for another year; especially while more is being added all the time.

The settings should be changed back to 30 days - nothing "ongoing" will be archived. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 21:55, 22 August 2015 (UTC)

It appears that you did not look carefully enough to see what is just above, so I changed the header level. I'm sorry that there is some tl;dr, but anyone who wants to edit this talk can, and it is simply the case that there are unresolved issues being discussed. For example, #Notes raises issues that are re-raised in more recent discussions. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:02, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
It appears you have not looked carefully at what I've written: "nothing 'ongoing' will be archived". And we can edit it subject to your approval, not to mention your imaginings about their understanding, it seems. As of your edit, this page was 215,457 bytes long. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 22:11, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
Please take a closer look at the example that I gave, about #Notes. Look at the last two lines of comments there (which are only a few days away from being 30 days old). And then note that it is referred back to in #Reference suggestion, and probably subsequently. It's more important for editors who are actually working on a page to be able to discuss what is needed to be discussed, than for the talk page to be modified by someone uninvolved in those discussions, to conform to some arbitrary metric. I'm not opposed to archiving, and I said so at the top of this discussion, but let's please not do it according to some algorithm. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:26, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
Andy, please, when someone intimately involved tells you what you're doing isn't a good idea, could you just let it drop? Tfish is correct. EEng (talk) 23:27, 22 August 2015 (UTC) Well, Tfish, just when things were getting awkward, we can join forces and turn our wrath on this hapless outsider. But there is a lesson here about trying to make every page look like all other pages...
Tryptofish: I'd be happy to introduce you to the concept of web links, It is not necessary to keep everything on one page, that's why Wikipedia has ~5-milion articles, not one very long one. HTH. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 23:35, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
Andy, Tfish understands about links. It's just this is a long discussion where we really do refer to various parts over and over. But instead of spending time on such trivia, why don't you help us break our current logjam? You could start with the most recent discussion, #More_thoughts? EEng (talk) 23:48, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
And thanks again, in part for giving me an edit conflict that prevented me from posting a reply that was not as good as yours. I'd welcome more discussion of the substantive issues, and I'd have no objection to archiving this. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:55, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
See? Even my conflicts improve things! EEng (talk) 23:56, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
I'm tempted to make a joke that includes the phrase "twice a day". --Tryptofish (talk) 00:01, 23 August 2015 (UTC)
And I'm tempted to make a joke that includes goldfish and three seconds. On the hope that Andy might eventually see the invite above, I'll wait a few days before archiving this thread. EEng (talk) 18:23, 23 August 2015 (UTC)
Maybe this could be archived now. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:56, 25 August 2015 (UTC)

Notes

Using Note b as an example, I'll try to illustrate what I have in mind. Here is the note as it is now:

Macmillan[M]:14-17,31n5,490-1 discusses Gage's ancestry and what is and isn't known about his birth and early life. His parents were married April 27, 1823.

The birthdate July 9, 1823 (the only definite date given in any source) is from a Gage family genealogy;[4] Macmillan[M]:16 notes that though the genealogy gives no source, this date is consistent with agreement among contemporary sources[H1]:389[5][B1]:13[H]:4 that Gage was 25 years old on the date of his accident, as well as with his age (36 years) as given in undertaker's records after his death in May 1860.[M]:108-9

Possible homes in childhood and youth are Lebanon or nearby East Lebanon, Enfield, and/or Grafton (all in Grafton County, New Hampshire), though Harlow refers to Lebanon in particular as Gage's "native place"‍[H]:10 and "his home"‍[H]:12 (probably that of his parents),[M]:30 to which he returned ten weeks[M3]:C after his accident.

There is no doubt Gage's middle initial was P‍[H1]:389[B1]:13[H]:4[M]:490[M1]:839fig but there is nothing to indicate what the P stood for (though his paternal grandfather was also a Phineas and his brother Dexter's middle name was Pritchard).[M]:490 Gage's mother's first and middle names are variously given as Hannah or Hanna and Trussell, Trusel, or Trussel; her maiden name is variously spelled Swetland, Sweatland, or Sweetland.[M]:490

Here is a modest step in what I would consider to be the right direction:

There are gaps in what is known about Gage's birth and early life. His parents were married April 27, 1823.[M]:14-17,31n5,490-1

The birthdate July 9, 1823 is from a Gage family genealogy.[4]

Possible homes in childhood and youth are Lebanon or nearby East Lebanon, Enfield, and/or Grafton (all in Grafton County, New Hampshire).

Gage's middle initial was P‍[H1]:389[B1]:13[H]:4[M]:490[M1]:839fig but there is nothing to indicate what the P stood for. Gage's mother's first and middle names are variously given as Hannah or Hanna and Trussell, Trusel, or Trussel; her maiden name is variously spelled Swetland, Sweatland, or Sweetland.[M]:490

Here is a more extensive revision:

There are gaps in what is known about Gage's birth and early life.[M]:14-17,31n5,490-1

The birthdate July 9, 1823 is from a Gage family genealogy.[4]

Possible homes in childhood and youth are all in Grafton County, New Hampshire.

Gage's middle initial was P‍[H1]:389[B1]:13[H]:4[M]:490[M1]:839fig but there is nothing to indicate what the P stood for.

One could even delete the note in its entirety. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:25, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

You have asked me at my talk to comment about this, saying in part "the ball's in your court, and I'm not sure you still care about them." I'd say yes, I still think that you should do this. I've just looked at the present-day note b, and it's not much changed. I think that, as of today, this is where you and I still have the most disagreement. There's a limit to how much stomach I have for arguing further over it, but I still very much feel that there's a lot of further pruning that you could do, but you haven't done yet. As I said below, the page has improved a lot, and that's very nice indeed. And it could be improved further. Any page can always be improved further. For note b, start with how you say that "Macmillan discusses Gage's ancestry and early life." That's a throwaway sentence. Give information about Gage's ancestry and early life, and cite it. I think my advice above, in those boxes, remains useful. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:53, 19 July 2015 (UTC)

My philosophy about notes, as I think you know, is that since they are outside the main text they don't "bother" the casual reader, no matter how detailed they are, and since NOTPAPER there's no argument along those lines for leaving out reasonably useful material, especially where a small phrase ("Macmillan[M]:14-17,31n5,490-1 discusses Gage's ancestry...") opens the door for the interested reader to complete information on a given point, should he want it. Other information is there for reasons not obvious just by looking at this note alone e.g. date of parents' marriage supports the fact that Gage was conceived out of wedlock, mentioned elsewhere. And I think e.g. when we mention that there's a break in the chain of support for Gage DOB, it's useful for the reader to know that it can't be too far off, give his know ages on certain dates.
Anyway, I don't want to take advantage of your lack of gastric fortitude, but if you don't want to press this then I'm certainly not going to either. So can we call this closed for now? I'll certainly be happy to resume the discussion some other time, should later you find your gastric fortitude fortified. EEng (talk) 02:24, 20 July 2015 (UTC)
It would somehow seem right for me to belch loudly here, but... None of this is a fighting issue for me, but I am trying to give you helpful advice about page improvement. I take your point about many readers not being bothered by stuff down in the notes. But I also think that many readers fall in a middle range, where they do not want to get complete information, but they do want to look a bit further at the source material. And this page makes them go through multiple layers of sections to get all the source information. In this example, the reader who actually does want complete information needs the citation of Macmillan, so as to be able to look up the source for themselves, but, really, they don't need you/Wikipedia to tell them that Macmillan discusses this and that. If the inline citation is at the end of a sentence, that reader already knows that the source discusses what the sentence is about. And the serious reader will want to read the source itself, instead of being told by some Wikipedia editor what to think about the source. Given the context of our discussion now, where you asked on my user talk to have me evaluate whether or not my and other editors' concerns have been fixed, we can conclude that you disagree with me, which is fine, but that my concerns are partly fixed, but not entirely, so let the record show. Anyway, I've gotten an alternative idea, and I'll make a new section on this talk page, to suggest it. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:16, 20 July 2015 (UTC)
  • I've been archiving old discussions, but this one I'll leave for further consideration. EEng (talk) 00:52, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
Thanks, I appreciate that. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:34, 28 July 2015 (UTC)

Reference suggestion

Looking again at this page, another idea came to me, so please let me make this suggestion. I continue to be concerned about making all the source information at the bottom of the page as reader-friendly as possible. So we have the Notes section, and the References section; the latter is subdivided into "For general audiences" (Gage and portraits), "For middle-school students" (oh, not "for children", but I digress), "For researchers and specialists", and then an "other sources" section that resembles the "typical" references section of most Wikipedia pages, to which inline citations most typically point.

As I said sometime before, I really like explaining to our readers which sources are for generalists and which for researchers, etc. I think that's very helpful information for readers, so I don't want to lose it. On the other hand, I'm trying to think how we can have two fairly accessible page sections: the existing Notes, and what would look like the "other sources" section.

Here's my suggestion. I suspect that Mirokado can help with the implementation – or at least that I'm less equipped to help with it. Keep the Notes as the section that they are. Make a References section just after the Notes, with the usual citations, formatted as the "other sources" section is now, but containing all of the citations. Then, after, have a page section called either Further reading or Bibliography, that would contain the various categories of sources, identified as general etc., as they are now. The change would be that this Further reading or Bibliography section would not be linked to from the main text, just as Further reading sections typically are not linked from the text as citations. Instead, all of the citations to these sources would be relocated to a now longer version of "other sources" comprising a complete References section. This way, we save the useful information about who the sources are "for", but we also simplify how readers get from the main text to the sources cited. We only need two kinds of inline citation links in the main text: those going to Notes, and those going to References. There will, of course, be a lot of entries in the References in the form of Jones, page 23, and another for Jones, page 68, etc. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:37, 20 July 2015 (UTC)

Clarifications, please:
  • Each item in the new References section will be a complete citation -- author, year, publisher, volume-page (for journals) etc etc -- right?
  • Further Reading (or Bibliography) would have the same full citations, but listing only the select subset of the sources, in alphabetical bullet form, subdivided into General Audiences and so on -- right?
  • I don't understand your mention of the References having e.g. "Jones, p. 23". The specific pages being cited are superscripted in main text, as seen here [18].
EEng (talk) 04:08, 21 July 2015 (UTC)
Correct, correct, and I stand corrected. I also would have no objections to other (minor) variations in format. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:43, 21 July 2015 (UTC)
OK, now that I'm sure (or think I'm sure) that I understand the proposal, I have to ask... why? We went to an enormous (ENORMOUS -- see #A6b_Complex_callouts, #Disposition_of_behavior_citations, Talk:Phineas_Gage/Archive_7#Together_again!) amount of trouble to work through various options and design and implement the current layout, callout format, and details (your request in particular) of how cites are called out within notes. What advantage is there in first jumbling together (in no order) all the "recommended" sources with the not-"recommended" sources (in your proposed References section) and then giving a duplicate second presentation of just the "recommendeds"? The current layout gives an integrated presentation that serves both purposes (WP:V as well as recommended reading) without, AFAICS, giving up anything on either score. Am I missing something, or possibly misunderstanding the proposal? EEng (talk) 00:45, 22 July 2015 (UTC)
I think it is most likely that you understand my suggestion, as opposed to missing something, but that you just disagree with me regarding the reasons why I made the suggestion. I'll explain, but first please let me say that it really is just a suggestion, and not something where I will get worked up if you prefer not to implement it. I recognize the amount of work you have put into the page, whereas at the same time I also recognize that other editors show up from time to time and complain about the page formatting, and I see my role in editing the page as one of trying to help you (and them) find ways where things can be amicable. If you want to postpone this suggestion for now, much as you seem to prefer to postpone my advice about the #Notes, I'm not going to take it personally, but I do want you to please keep in mind that the likelihood increases that, sometime later, other editors will criticize you for the stuff you have heard so many times before – but I think that if you do the things I suggest, proactively, you will reduce the opportunities for others to complain.
OK, that said, here are what I see as the pluses and minuses. As you correctly point out, a disadvantage of my suggestion is that sources will be repeated, both in my suggested References and again in my suggested Further reading or Bibliography. That's true, I concede.
But here are what I see as the advantages. First, it will simplify what editors will see in the edit window when they come here to edit the page. As familiar as you are with this page, for the rest of us it really is an effort to deal with it, and that's a big part of what sets other editors off. Second, I see it as more helpful to our readers. Right now, when a reader looks at the page, there are three kinds of inline citations: lowercase letters that go to the Notes, uppercase letters that go to the "recommended" sources, and numbers that go to the rest of the sources. My suggestion simplifies that from three to two, because there would just be Notes and References, and only a single class of references at that. It's not only simpler in terms of how the main text is displayed, but also simpler in terms of the page layout below, where the references are found. I do not perceive them as "jumbled together". Instead, I perceive them as they are at the overwhelming majority of Wikipedia pages: all the references in one place, listed in the order in which they are cited in the text. In my opinion, there's nothing "jumbled" about it. It's just some Notes, where we provide information that's a bit more detailed than what is in the main text, followed by a single, uniform source list. Following that would be a service for the subset of readers who want to read more, and it gives them helpful pointers about which sources are aimed for which audiences, a high-quality version of the Further reading sections that are described in MOS. When I read the page as it is now, trying to see it as a reader instead of as an editor, I really do find it rather complicated to keep track of all the places on the page that I am directed to go to for source material. I think my suggestion makes the page easier to read. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:43, 22 July 2015 (UTC)

(By jumbled I just meant not in any order, but of course that's the ordinary way in typical ref sections.) All other things being equal, sure, it helps to do things in the most common, conventional way -- all other things being equal. But where, in any significant way, the "coventional" way isn't the way that best serves the reader, then I don't want it; and I don't care how many gnomes show up to whine about it, as long as what the page does is indeed allowable under MOS and other applicable guidelines. Without deviation from the norm, progress isn't possible, and conventionality should be a tiebreaker consideration only.

However, if you do care about what the gnomes will say, one potential problem with your proposal is that "further reading" isn't supposed to repeat what's in the references: WP:Further_reading#Relation_to_reference_sections. Long ago I had a structure much like you're suggesting and got well and good smacked for it, and that was one of the considerations in setting up things the way they are now.

Beyond that, I just don't see the advantage. I like the callout scheme we have now: it's mnemonic and it keeps the callouts short -- all the most-used sources are at most two characters, and the very most used source are all a single character, thus reducing clutter in the text (though only slightly, admittedly).

You mention simplifying what editors see in the edit window -- I guess you're referring to the {ranchor} syntax? Yes, it's unusual (unique, actually) but it's very straightforward and easily learned -- and if you're not sure, just find another cite elsewhere in the article, to the same source you're citing, and copy the invocation (maybe changing the page #). It's certainly way easier than the Template:Harvard_citation_no_brackets labyrinth ({sfn} / {harvnb} / {harvthisandthat}) you see now and then. Oy vey!

Anyone adding a new source uses the usual < ref>< /ref> syntax everyone knows, and that works exactly as expected.

So really, I don't see any advantage at all. Mirokado, your thoughts? EEng (talk) 01:29, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

I'll reply this evening, if possible, and on Saturday in any case. --Mirokado (talk) 12:08, 24 July 2015 (UTC)
EEng, as I'm sure you'll recognize, I'm making suggestions because you've asked me, repeatedly and with numerous "bumps", for advice, so please take my suggestions in that light, and as I said before, merely as suggestions. But a few replies to the specifics of what you said. You raise a good point about Further reading in relation to references; perhaps that's a good reason to call it Bibliography instead. About the edit window, for me it hasn't been a single thing, but rather that it is very complex indeed, in many ways, to read what the edit window displays, and to keep track of all of it. Sufficiently so that I find it unpleasant to edit this page. I'm telling you that in a friendly spirit, and I hope that you will take seriously how I describe my experience of it (and I'm not simply a gnome, I hope you'll agree). The fact that other editors are gnomes does not make them wrong, nor make their opinions less valid, nor make their concerns "whining". I fully agree that you do not have to do anything that they or I suggest, but this isn't about what the page is required to do, so much as what might be better for the page. I really do think that my suggestion would be better for readers, and I also think that what is conventional on Wikipedia reflects a tremendous amount of trial, error, and learning, and the fact that unconventional formats are unconventional does not automatically mean that they are better. There's nothing intrinsically different about this page subject, compared to so many other pages. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:05, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Reference usages

These tables show the usages of the {{ranchor}} (categorised citations) and {{r}} (other citations) templates in the article:

  • callouts is the number of times the template appears with a particlar tag (number of backlinks if page ranges are excluded)
  • distinct shows how many different page range specifications for each tag (number of backlinks for each note if page ranges are included

These tables show the usages of the {{ranchor}} (categorised citations) and {{r}} (other citations) templates in the article:

  • callouts is the number of times the template appears with a particlar tag (number of backlinks if page ranges are excluded)
  • distinct shows how many different page range specifications for each tag (number of backlinks for each note if page ranges are included

I'm presenting this table in an edit without further comments, which will follow later. (updated) --Mirokado (talk) 15:59, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

References continued

The tables in the previous section show that we need to manage nearly four hundred callouts which would involve nearly three hundred distinct short notes (including page numbers etc) or about one hundred short notes (excluding page numbers), and about one hundred citations. Some comments:

  • doing this using sfn and friends would be a bit problematical, page load times could be sluggish
  • replacing "r" etc by "sfn" would not particularly simplify the article source, for example: {{r|campbell}} would become {{sfn|Campbell|1851}}
  • the handling of references is disciplined and consistent. The "ranchor" and "r" templates are isomorphous and "r" is in common use
  • of the 77 "r" tags, some such as "bullying", "drifting" are themselves topical collections, others are single citations

It would certainly be beneficial to have the "other" citations in alphabetical order. I agree we should avoid duplicate citations. A disadvantage of the short note intermediary section is that it means an extra click to go from article to citation, but we are quite used to doing that, so I think we should consider having short notes linking callouts to the "other" citations in an alphabetical list. I think we can do that without losing the current usages of "r" and there is no need to add intermediate notes for the "ranchor" citations.

As long as other editors will be happy in principle to consider such a change, I can work it up in a sandbox for further consideration. The changes would be fairly systematic. --Mirokado (talk) 16:27, 25 July 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for such a thoughtful discussion. As someone who is less fluent than you are in the intricacies of page formatting, I'm having difficulty visualizing how the page would look after doing what you propose, but I would definitely be interested in seeing a sandbox version for that very purpose. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:30, 25 July 2015 (UTC)
I add my thanks, but I'll omit for once my gushing admiration for Mirokado's amazing efficiency and alacrity. But Mirokado, do you imagine that Tfish is proposing what I call "intermediate short notes" as seen here [[19]]? 'Cause I don't think that's what he's got in mind. Am I right, Tfish? (For the record, I absolutely hate those -- I think they look awful, and they require two hops of clicking to get to that actual source.) EEng (talk) 00:36, 26 July 2015 (UTC)
Har. Basically, yes he is! I am proposing limited use of intermediate short notes just for the "other sources" citations, without spoiling the direct links to the categorised citations and leaving page ranges as they are at present with the callouts. That should result in a fairly tidy intermediate list and citations in alphabetical order (need to see what we can do for those with no author). It will be much tidier than Genie is at present, poor dear. Clearly more of the citations there need to go into the citation list and the harvard errors must be corrected. I think I should have a look at her too when I have time. --Mirokado (talk) 03:16, 26 July 2015 (UTC)
So, for the "other sources", intermediate short notes will replace the current {r|jones|page=117}-type syntax, so that [5]:117 will become just [5], with the intermediate short note "5. Jones 1994, p. 117."? EEng (talk) 05:58, 26 July 2015 (UTC) You are forbidden to attend to Genie until Phineas Gage is done with you.
No, we should keep all the page ranges as they are at present, so all the callouts have consistent presentation,[5]:117 with intermediate short note "5. Jones 1994." I will prepare a brief example... --Mirokado (talk) 12:38, 26 July 2015 (UTC)
OK, I think I see. So for every "other" source, there will be exactly one intermediate short note, in the < ref> system's random order, linking forward to a manual alpha list of those same sources...? If it's easy for you to mock up, go ahead, but I fear it will introduce substantial inconsistency, both in what the reader sees and how the source is coded . But maybe you have one of your tricks up your sleeve. EEng (talk) 13:17, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Please have a look at User:Mirokado/sandbox. I haven't yet sorted the citations in the list but I think you can see the general idea without that. --Mirokado (talk) 19:36, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Actually, EEng was right about the concern he expressed. Mirokado, what I see in your sandbox version is not at all what I was suggesting. It's something else entirely, now that I see what it looks like. I proposed having: (1) Phineas Gage#Notes, pretty much as it is now, (2) a References section, and (3) a Bibliography section, in that order. The Bibliography would contain what, in your sandbox, is now the "For general audiences (Gage)" and "For researchers and specialists" sections, but there would be no blue linking between them and the main text. As for the References section, the numbering of the sources would be like what you have at the top of the sandbox References section, whereas the formatting of the sources would be like what you have in the sandbox under "Other sources cited". That numbering and formatting would be consistent and continuous throughout the "References" section, and the "References" section would not be subdivided into subsections. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:10, 26 July 2015 (UTC)
Tryptofish, you broke him! Mirokado, Mirokado, wake up! Reboot! EEng (talk) 01:16, 28 July 2015 (UTC)
Sorry been very busy this week, I'll respond on Friday evening or Saturday. --Mirokado (talk) 21:42, 29 July 2015 (UTC)
I'm afraid I could not agree to duplicating citations in two sections and I could also not agree to losing the current categorisation of the most-used citations. Having looked at Genie I also do not think that systematic use of sfn and friends throughout would be an improvement, there are too many callouts for that to be a good solution. I'm happy with the current schema which has direct links to sorted, categorised citations for the most-used references and the often-used unsorted list of citations for others. It would, though, probably be an improvement to have the other citations also in a sorted list and I have suggested how to do that without altering the callout schema in the body of the article (which uses the familiar r template for callouts to the "other" citations).
EEng, you don't like the double click needed to get from callout to citation with sfn and friends, but readers are used to that so it is not a major problem. The fact that some refs have a direct link and others would need two clicks is of course a disadvantage, but in my opinion this would be outweighed by the sorted citation list which is a win.
If we can agree to try something like what I have suggested, I'll be happy to start the ball rolling with that. If we agree to leave the reference schema more or less as it is now, I will also be happy with that. Otherwise the search for consensus must continue. --Mirokado (talk) 00:12, 2 August 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for your work on this. It looks to me like we have three editors with three different first choices about how to go about this – so that probably means that it is best to leave the references as they are on the page now, while keeping open minds all around in the event that the issue gets raised by a fourth editor in the future. For me, I prefer the status quo over the version at Mirokado's sandbox. If I had to choose between duplicating citations in two sections and the current categorization of the most-used ones, my choice would be to forgo entirely the Further reading/Bibliography section that I proposed. That would eliminate duplication, and it would permit a simple, uniform reference list to follow the Notes. It would also eliminate the reference categorization, which I would regret losing, but I would not mind that much, and I would prefer the simplification of the references that would result. As for page numbers, I'm pretty much neutral between having the page numbers inline after the callouts, as we do now, versus having a lot of sfn entries in the reference list, but I'm happy to defer to EEng's preference against a lot of sfn. (Even though I will note my own membership in the sfn – joke.) Anyway, I hope EEng will keep an open mind about my suggestion in the event that consensus changes in the future. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:37, 2 August 2015 (UTC)
(Silly me -- I thought sfn was "So-called Fish Names"). I don't quite understand this bit:
If I had to choose between duplicating citations in two sections and the current categorization of the most-used ones, my choice would be to forgo entirely the Further reading/Bibliography section that I proposed. That would eliminate duplication, and it would permit a simple, uniform reference list to follow the Notes. It would also eliminate the reference categorization, which I would regret losing, but I would not mind that much, and I would prefer the simplification of the references that would result.
Specifically, what would be the "simplification of the references"?
Meanwhile, I think the elephant is the room is that we yearn for a way to control the order of the usual default reference pile (created with < ref> or {r} -- alternative syntax for the same thing), and this is something almost every experienced editor has wished for, yet the powers that be have never deigned to do anything about it. If we had that, wouldn't that pretty much answer all your desiderata, Tfish? EEng (talk) 04:15, 2 August 2015 (UTC)
I laughed repeatedly while reading that! (As for what satisfies my desiderata, that's entirely a private matter, blush, blush!) To answer your first question, what I said rather clumsily was that I do recognize that some editors, including Mirokado, have quite reasonable objections to my idea of having a Further reading/Bibliography section that would repeat citations that also would have appeared in the References section – not good form to have that redundancy. So that creates a problem with what I had proposed: in order to fix that redundancy, one could delete the proposed Further reading/Bibliography. That eliminates the redundancy. But it creates a different problem: the loss of the helpful characterization of sources (as for researchers, or for general readers, and so forth). As Mirokado said, we should avoid the redundancy, but also continue to provide that characterization. Mirokado would prefer to keep the characterization as part of the References section, as subsections within it. We could do that as the page is now, or we could do it as in Mirokado's sandbox draft. What I was trying to say was that, even though I, too, like the characterization of the sources (for researchers, etc.), I would be willing to give it up in exchange for having no subsections within the References section. In a perfect world, I'd be happiest with both a Reference section sans subsections and a way of characterizing the sources. But with the limitations of what we can work with, my suggestion would lead to redundancy, which appears to be a deal-breaker. So, in order to solve the redundancy problem, I would rather forgo the characterization, but still have a References section without subdivisions.
Thus, my desired "simplification of references" was referring to having a References section without any subsections. Just a single References section, after the Notes section, that would have all the references in numbered order. Period. Full stop. Nothing more.
As for your last question, the answer may be "I guess so". I've always been a happy fish with < ref >, but it's true that we cannot tell it to designate one source for general readers and another source for middle school students. I guess where I'm really going is that, absent some new Wiki-code that I would have to see in action, in order to fully understand, my first choice for this page would be just to do everything with < ref > and just have a vanilla-flavored "reflist". A Notes section (with a bit of pruning that we discussed before), followed by that simple "reflist". --Tryptofish (talk) 19:51, 2 August 2015 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

Agree with Tryptofish here - very cumbersome referencing style, has there been a discussion of this elsewhere?. Also note that in the Phineas_Gage#Factors_favoring_Gage.27s_survival section the references for the quotes overlap the preceding text due to the odd hanging indent|text=1st.. stuff. Vsmith (talk) 14:49, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
There's nothing odd about hanging indent; the overlap problem is new and sudden -- it's even showing up in the righthand column of Mirokado's table higher up in this thread, so something deep down somewhere has been messed up which affects the whole project. I'm sure the template/Wikimedia wizards are working on it right now. (I removed the {hanging indent}s before I realized the problem was wiki-wide, and I guess I'll just leave it that way until that underlying problem is fixed.)
The referencing layout was extensively discussed at Talk:Phineas_Gage/Archive_7#Together_again.21. Do you have any suggestions? EEng (talk) 15:40, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
  • Just want to say that this is the first article I've seen with this referencing style, and I don't like it. I think there is an advantage for copy-editors to be able to see paragraphs clearly in Edit Mode, and with this style, it is not easy to see where one paragraph ends and another begins. It's even difficult to see where one sentence ends and the next begins. If one has WikEd enabled, references, images and captions, templates and notes to editors, and article text are all different colors so are easily distinguishable, and thus there is no need to put separate sentences on different lines. Also, I think the combination of numbers and letters for references in the text is distracting. Numbers alone are less distracting. I really hope this referencing style does not gain acceptance. CorinneSD (talk) 16:18, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
You're talking about two different things but calling them both "referencing style".
  • What referencing style properly means, I think, is the machinery seen by the reader on the formatted page which ties the main text to supporting citations, explanatory notes, and so on at the bottom of the page‍—‌the superscript "callouts" in the main text, the organization and formatting of the citations, and so on. As mentioned earlier in this thread, there was extensive discussion and experimentation before settling on the current system. Except that the superscript callouts use both letters and numbers, what the reader sees in the text is no different from any other article. At the bottom of the page, the sources are grouped to make it easier for readers wanting to learn more to find appropriate material; we've talked about ways to streamline that but haven't been able to come up with anything more satisfactory due to technical limitations.
  • You're also talking about the markup or source code seen only by editors, and to be honest I can't understand what you're seeing. Paragraphs end/begin the same way as in any article -- with a "skipped line". Most sentences begin on a new line, exactly to make it easy to find them without having to search through the clutter of references at the end of the prior sentence. Perhaps most important, linebreaking before each new sentence makes diffs much cleaner and more compact. There's nothing worse than trying to find what was really changed in a giant block paragraph of several sentences with refs, compared set next to another giant block paragraph of several sentences with refs.
I had forgotten about WikEd because for many years I was constrained to use IE (long story), but now that I'm on Chrome I've enabled it, and (so far at least) it seems nifty. I can also see how it makes it easier to find the next sentence when it's on the same line as the ref for the prior sentence, but it's easier still when using WikEd and each sentence starts on a new line. Remember also that many (like me when I was on IE) can't use WikEd.
EEng (talk) 18:55, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
Well, I'm sorry I used "referencing style" for two different things, but from your comments I believe you understand what I was talking about. I understand your point about people unable to enable WikEd, but an equally strong reason for keeping sentences in paragraph form (even in Edit Mode) is to be able to see the overall organization of a paragraph. You appreciate the finer points of writing, so you ought to appreciate the value of seeing sentences one right after another so that one can see the flow of the sentences, the transitional words and phrases, how they pick up a word, phrase or thought from a previous sentence and carry it over to the next, which sentences are main points, which are examples and illustrations, etc. That is made much more difficult if the sentences appear in a kind of list, one below the other. I know WP articles are generally not essays, but articles would be really boring to read if they were merely compilations of unrelated facts with no organization. I may be wrong, but it seems that this article's referencing style helps the reader find further reading; the more usual WP style helps the editor who wants to improve the writing in the article so it is more comprehensible to all readers. CorinneSD (talk) 20:01, 8 August 2015 (UTC)
I think I see what's going on here. I gave up long ago on doing any but rough copyediting looking just at the edit window -- the clutter of refs and so on makes it impossible to imagine the reader's experience of reading. So I Preview, tinker, Preview again. I agree the article's markup optimizes the reader's experience over editors' convenience, but I think that's the right priority. — Preceding unsigned comment added by EEng (talk • contribs) 20:44, August 8, 2015‎

I first want to say a very warm welcome to both Vsmith and CorinneSD, and I second want to remind EEng how I predicted very shortly before the arbitrary break that he might find it useful to keep an open mind in case new editors show up. I've also read the discussion between EEng and CorinneSD at EEng's talk page (as well as checking the current version of MOS:LQ, where I am pleased to see that they say that fish are friends). Anyway, I agree with everything that Vsmith and CorinneSD have said. In particular, I am much less inclined than EEng to downplay the importance of markup. Wikipedia calls itself the encyclopedia that anyone can edit, as opposed to the encyclopedia that anyone can edit so long as they learn how to adapt to EEng's markup idiosyncrasies. I'd support simplifying the markup, and I'd support simplifying the references. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:21, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

References: a new idea!

I got hit by a stroke of inspiration (and hopefully neither an iron rod nor a dope-slap). As I said earlier, I am in favor of simplifying the page's treatment of sourcing to, simply, the following:

  1. A Notes section, much as we have it now, but maybe with some editing as per #Notes, above.
  2. Then, a simple References section, with all the references in a single listing.

As discussed above, #2 runs into the following problems: we want to continue to indicate page numbers inline, as opposed to having extensive usage of something such as the sfn template; we want to be able to tell readers about sources that are appropriate for researchers or experts, or for middle-school students, because this is useful information; and we want to do the latter without redundant listing of sources in multiple page sections. We thought that this might not be feasible with existing Wikipedia markup.

But it is possible, just using < ref > and reflist, and a few simple tweaks! Please see User:Tryptofish/sandbox. At the top is a sentence from this page, reproduced as it is now. (I selected the sentence because it cites the middle-school source.) Below it is my suggested new way of doing it. I think it's very simple, and it retains all the information of the present page. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:20, 9 August 2015 (UTC)

I'm new to this discussion, and I'm not well-versed in adding references, but upon looking at the two formats at Tryptofish's sandbox, I much prefer the second. I find the superscript letters in the first version distracting. Regarding the second:
(a) How does this differ from what I've seen all along in most WP articles?
(b) Just curious: why do you feel it is necessary to indicate the level ("For middle school students", "For the general reader")? I'm not opposed to it; I just wondered what your reasoning was and how you would determine the category of reader for a particular work. I think, if the category of reader is given, it should be unobtrusive, as it is in the second version.
(c) I think I've seen a number of articles that have a "Notes" section and a "References" section. Tryptofish, what is new about the second version in your sandbox?
I also want to add that sometimes I'll make a copy-edit here and there as I'm reading an article. In that case, I read the article mainly as it appears and only go into Edit Mode briefly to make the edit. Other times, I am reading an article primarily to copy-edit the article. In that case, I usually read the article mainly in Edit Mode. That's why I am arguing for the need to see paragraphs clearly in Edit Mode, and it is easier to do this with the usual format that simply encloses refs in the ref template than it is with the format in Phineas Gage and Lionel de Jersey Harvard. I don't see it so much in either version in Tryptofish's sandbox, but in Phineas Gage I was struck (appalled, almost) that each sentence seemed to be on a new line (in edit mode). CorinneSD (talk) 00:19, 10 August 2015 (UTC)
Thanks once more for your very helpful input. A lot of the answers to your questions really have to await EEng getting back here, but I'll say the following:
(a) The second version in my sandbox does not differ much at all from what you see elsewhere on Wikipedia (the main difference being what you ask about in (b)). For me, that's the point: I am in favor of making this page more like most WP pages.
(b) Obviously, it's really not necessary. The information is something that EEng, who cares deeply about this page and has worked on it to an immense extent, had added. In my opinion, it's kind of nice to provide the information to those readers who are interested, and, in #References continued just above, Mirokado gave a third opinion expressing strong support for continuing to offer the information.
(c) Once again, I'm not proposing something "new", so much as proposing that this page be made more typical, relative to other WP pages. (Let me hasten to note here that EEng can point to some featured articles that have formatting similar to this page, and that he differs with me about the appropriateness of making this page more "typical".)
Now more broadly, much of what almost-appalls you also almost-appalls me, so you will find that I agree with you very much. And here, we get into some politics where I want to give EEng equal time. My version: EEng is very close to this page and cares about it deeply. Other editors have come to this talk in the past, and raised many of the same issues that you raise, albeit not always as courteously as you have done. It has gone as far as dispute resolution noticeboards and EEng has even been blocked a few times over it. And there are also some editors who agree strongly with EEng. I've come into this trying to make peace, as it were. You can look back over archived talk here as much or as little as you would like, and you will see this, many times over. What you see on the not-archived talk here is largely me trying in a friendly way to encourage EEng to agree to modify page markup that, in my opinion, is idiosyncratic and annoying. Again, please understand that EEng needs to have equal time after I said that.
Anyway, I'm happy that you see some usefulness in what I proposed in my sandbox, and I hope that all of us at this page can make some good use of it. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:57, 10 August 2015 (UTC)
Thank you for your well-written, thorough and cordial comment. I always appreciate the efforts of a peace-maker. I look forward to EEng's reply. I just want EEng to know that I am not advocating for him/her to change the formatting in articles s/he has already worked on and brought to a certain degree of completion. I'm just pleading for that kind of reference formatting to be either not used at all in the future or modified in some way. I'm actually curious as to what, exactly, are the important things that EEng feels are accomplished with his/her method of reference formatting (that cannot be accomplished with the usual method). Is it only so that works can be categorized in notes or a reference list at the bottom of the article into two or more levels of readership, or is it something else? I'm sorry to learn that there has been some contentiousness. CorinneSD (talk) 01:11, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
Personally I hate peacemakers on general principle, but I put up with Tfish because he has so many other good qualities.
  • For the record: I got blocked (once, not several times) for referring to a tagteam gang of editors‍—‌entirely accurately‍—‌as "self-satisfied roving enforcers"; the blocking admin was himself one of the editors in question. A former member of Arbcom called the block "outrageous", and I'm proud to have been blocked by such a thin-skinned bully.
  • If editors who have shown an actual interest in editing the article find they would be convenienced by a different style of markup, I have no objection to its being changed. But I very much object to people appearing out of nowhere to change legal markup to other markup they happen to personally prefer‍—‌changes that are strictly internal and visible to editors only, with no effect at all on what the reader sees on the formatted page! This is the breed of editor well-described here [20]:
editors who come to an article with a particular agenda, make the changes they want to the page according to their preconceived notions of what should be, and then flit off to their next victim, without ever considering whether the page really needed the change they made, or whether the change improved the article at all ... Their editing is an off-the-rack, one-size-fits-all proposition, premised on the idea that what improves one article, or one type of article, will automatically improve every other article or type of article
And like it says at the top of every MOS page,
Style and formatting should be consistent within an article, though not necessarily throughout Wikipedia. Where more than one style is acceptable, editors should not change an article from one of those styles to another without a good reason.
I'm not talking about you, Corinne, because you don't share the bull-in-a-china-shop attitude of this gang. If after a reasonable amount of time working on the page, you really think it would help you if all the extra newlines were removed, I would object not at all. But on behalf of all the other targets of the self-satisfied roving enforcers, I refuse be bullied.
  • Beyond that I'm still not sure what you mean by my "method of reference formatting". (I'm a "he", BTW.) The only thing different about the markup, to support the categorization of sources into "General audiences" etc., is the use of {{ranchor}} for the "categorized" sources, with {{r}} used (as usual) for the "Other sources cited". (An editor who doesn't know anything about this, and wants to add a new source, can use {{r}} or < ref> as usual, and it will go into the "Other sources" automatically.)
  • Finally, I'm afraid I can't endorse Tfish's sandboxed proposal. The article gets about 1/4-million views per year and has about 120 sources; the goal is to give readers who want to learn more a convenient list (including somewhat different kinds of sources in different formats‍—‌e.g. online vs. print) they can puruse. To scatter the recommended sources among the other 100, with only a tag appended (e.g. "For general readers") to identify them, makes such identification almost impossibly inconvenient to use. Most readers won't even realize those tags are there.
EEng (talk) 06:34, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
EEng, I don't mind at all that you raised the header level (per your edit summary). But I'm very disappointed by your reply. I get the feeling that, faced with a new idea about this page, but one that you did not think of, you just stick your fingers in your ears and say no!. I'm sorry that that's harsh, but I'm just being honest about it. (And frankly, there's nothing enjoyable about being not only a "peacemaker" but one that you, EEng, keep asking to come back to this page and comment.) Responding specifically to your last two bullet points:
  • It's obvious what CorinneSD meant about "your" method of formatting: the use of the various markups that you mention, in order to achieve the categorizing to which you refer. CorinneSD said of it: "I find the superscript letters in the first version distracting." And I agree with her. And so have quite a few other editors over time. It's not enough, not nearly enough, to say that another editor who comes along and uses the typical markup can have their sources put into the "other sources". On the other hand, I'm not sure what you mean when you ask CorinneSD to wait until she has edited here "a reasonable amount of time" before you will regard these comments as "I would not object at all". Wikipedia is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit, not the encyclopedia that anyone can edit so long as EEng determines that they have done so for long enough.
  • There's nothing unique about the number of readers who view this page, relative to other pages. And there is nothing unique about the need to group the references into categories. The information about sources is there for the readers who actually look down at the sources, and that is likely to be a small minority, albeit the most interested one. As it is now, such an interested reader has to go through multiple, frankly baffling, sections to get to a given reference. Under my proposal, they will always go straight to it. As it is now, as all readers read the main text, they encounter a complex array of superscripts indicating sources, in a very non-intuitive way. Under my proposal, it's as simple as at the vast majority of Wikipedia pages. And there is zero loss of information! If someone cares enough to find out about a given source, they will easily find it, and they will see whatever we say about its intended audience. After seeing that, they need only skim through the reference list to find other sources that we label for such an audience. So what you criticize about my proposal comes down – entirely! – to this: we would be trading the ability to find sources that an editor recommends for a given audience in groups – at the cost of a baroque and non-intuitive main text – for the ability to find those source descriptions by skimming through the reference list – with the benefit of easy navigation through the page. Skimming instead of seeing groups is not a big loss, and I would argue that it is really trivial. And the categorization for audiences is not of such paramount importance that it mandates that we prioritize it above all other considerations.
And that's just looking at it from our readers' point of view. But we would also be making the page easier for more editors to edit. I'd be receptive to having an RfC about this. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:04, 11 August 2015 (UTC)
  • I get the feeling that, faced with a new idea about this page, but one that you did not think of, you just stick your fingers in your ears and say no!. I'm sorry that that's harsh, but I'm just being honest about it.
Yeah, it is harsh, and uncalled for. My lack of enthusiasm, Tfish, has nothing to do with it not being my idea: it's a frankly completely obvious idea (sorry), but one that negates the whole point of a further-reading list, as discussed below.
  • It's obvious what CorinneSD meant about "your" method of formatting
No, it's not obvious. You think she's talking about the fact that the callouts (which readers see) aren't all-numeric; I thought she was talking about the markup (which editors see).
  • And so have quite a few other editors over time.
Source categorization has been in the article only since November, and no one but present company has said anything about it (plus Vsmith, who said "very cumbersome referencing style" but didn't follow up to explain what he meant -- as with Corinne, is he/she talking about the markup or the callouts or what?).
  • It's not enough, not nearly enough, to say that another editor who comes along and uses the typical markup can have their sources put into the "other sources".
You make it sound like I'm relegating "other people's sources" to a junkheap. I'm simply saying that an editor need not understand that categorization system in order to add a source to the article -- new sources can be added just the way they're added to any article; but a new source has to go somewhere by default, and the default is "other sources", which is where 80% of the sources belong. (It can be moved to another category later, if appropriate.) What's wrong with that?
  • On the other hand, I'm not sure what you mean when you ask CorinneSD to wait until she has edited here "a reasonable amount of time" before you will regard these comments as "I would not object at all". Wikipedia is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit, not the encyclopedia that anyone can edit so long as EEng determines that they have done so for long enough.
You've twisted my words (though unintentionally, I think, because you misunderstood.) I didn't ask Corinne to wait to do anything, except the thing MOS specifically forbids:
Style and formatting should be consistent within an article, though not necessarily throughout Wikipedia. Where more than one style is acceptable, editors should not change an article from one of those styles to another without a good reason.
This was only about the question of removing the linebreak after each reference (in the internal markup, not affecting what the reader sees). What I said, and meant, is that if even one single good-faith editor (like Corinne), after a bit of experience of editing with the linebreaks in there, says she really thinks it would be easier for her to work with them gone, then that's all it would take to convince me they should be gone. (She can edit all she wants before or after that happens.) What I don't accept is people who don't edit the article swooping in solely and only to micromanage where the linebreaks should be. And MOS backs me up on that.
  • As it is now, such an interested reader has to go through multiple, frankly baffling, sections to get to a given reference. Under my proposal, they will always go straight to it.
Huh? Your system is no different from the current one: the reader clicks the superscript callout, and is taken straight to the reference.
  • As it is now, as all readers read the main text, they encounter a complex array of superscripts indicating sources, in a very non-intuitive way.
The typical article with footnotes has numeric callouts for refs, alphas for notes; and many (including, as Tfish has mentioned, some FAs) have more complicated systems, because there's more going on in what the article presents to the reader. There's nothing non-intuitive about any of this: whatever the form of the callout, click and you're taken there. The reader who does that a few times will quickly realize: Capitals (or capital+number) for futher reading, numbers-only for other sources, small letters for notes. Most readers won't notice this, and shouldn't care. (I actually wonder, Corinne, whether what you're really talking about as being distracting is the page numbers that come after the source callout i.e. the 123 in [A]:123.)
  • If someone cares enough to find out about a given source, they will easily find it, and they will see whatever we say about its intended audience. ... Skimming instead of seeing groups is not a big loss, and I would argue that it is really trivial.
I think this is the heart of the matter. The purpose of the source categorizations isn't so that a reader, interested in source X, can find out if source X is for general readers; it's so that someone who's looking for further reading can see immediately that sources X, Y, Z, W are available (and that X and Y are online, and W is really for kids). Skimming through the 120 sources to find the six for general readers (or the one for middle-school students) makes no sense at all, if for no other reason than that essentially zero readers will even realize the little categorization tags are there on 20 out of the 120 sources.

Mirokado, your wise counsel will be appreciated by all, I am sure. EEng (talk) 01:55, 12 August 2015 (UTC)

I can't respond in detail until Thursday evening (Europe). --Mirokado (talk) 10:20, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
All I'm getting today since logging in is people wanting to dispute with me – is there something in the drinking water? EEng, you earlier said to CorinneSD "I may be abrasive but it's an intellectually honest abrasiveness." That's what I was doing, in turn, to you. You are responding badly to my proposal. I'm not going to coddle you by saying it's OK.
We agree about what the heart of the matter is. We disagree about which way is the best to resolve it. You pinged Mirokado, which is fine, and I'll ping Vsmith. Maybe we should do away with the categorization entirely, as it's really just editor opinion. But I'm still in favor of getting more opinions that just who is here, via an RfC. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:23, 12 August 2015 (UTC)
Gah - I have no interest in reading vast growing walls of text. The article has problems. The referencing style is absurd, the layout in edit mode is absurd, the categorization of references looks like a WP:OR vio and it appears WP:OWN is involved. Sorry 'bout that. Vsmith (talk) 00:09, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
Thanks. I think that your answer actually shows a good understanding of what I wanted to know, following the wall of text. I'm going to preemptively request of EEng that you not respond to the OWN part of that, but that you recognize that the rest of it is an agreement with CorinneSD and me. And please don't dismiss it as a drive-by comment on the grounds of the comment about the walls of text, because the comment shows a clear opinion about the major themes of this discussion. I've been wondering myself whether the reference categorization violates WP:OR. A case can be made that it does, because the categorization is, itself, not sourced and is a matter of editor opinion. And a case can also be made to the contrary, because it is an editorial service to readers and does not really refer to content. But I think that it is difficult to justify the position that the categorization is of such importance to the page that we are required to give it the prominence that comes with grouping the sources. I can envision an RfC with 3 options to consider: the 2 options in my sandbox, and third that is like the second one, but completely without the categories. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:28, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
Responding to your post point by point to make factual corrections and ensure my positions aren't misunderstood is not "wanting to dispute" with you. EEng (talk) 04:01, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
Gah - I have no interest in reading vast growing walls of text. The article has problems. The referencing style is absurd, the layout in edit mode is absurd, the categorization of references looks like a WP:OR vio and it appears WP:OWN is involved. Sorry 'bout that. Vsmith (talk) 00:09, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
Thanks. I think that your answer actually shows a good understanding of what I wanted to know, following the wall of text. I'm going to preemptively request of EEng that you not respond to the OWN part of that, but that you recognize that the rest of it is an agreement with CorinneSD and me. And please don't dismiss it as a drive-by comment on the grounds of the comment about the walls of text, because the comment shows a clear opinion about the major themes of this discussion. I've been wondering myself whether the reference categorization violates WP:OR. A case can be made that it does, because the categorization is, itself, not sourced and is a matter of editor opinion. And a case can also be made to the contrary, because it is an editorial service to readers and does not really refer to content. But I think that it is difficult to justify the position that the categorization is of such importance to the page that we are required to give it the prominence that comes with grouping the sources. I can envision an RfC with 3 options to consider: the 2 options in my sandbox, and third that is like the second one, but completely without the categories. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:28, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
Sorry, but Vsmith's post really is worthless IDONTLIKEIT drive-by. He doesn't have to read any of the discussion (the length of which he complains about) to say what about the referencing, or the layout in editing mode, he considers "absurd". And please let Corinne speak for herself‍—‌you and I don't even agree what she's concerned about, much less can anyone say that Vsmith's completely nonspecific denunciation is in "agreement" with her.
Wow :) my worthless IDONTLIKEIT drive-by (you are so kind) was in part a comment on the vast wall of text here. It seems some folks will use a thousand words to say what twenty or so would more clearly accomplish. And I do understand and agree with Corinne's comments - thanks for addressing that problem. As for the referencing, I see no advantage over what has been available with Harvard style and it just adds to the confusing technobable for new editors trying to work here. As to WP:Further below - yes, WP:Other stuff exists and those brief annotations are likely still WP:OR. But no interest in arguing that here. Cheers, Vsmith (talk) 15:15, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
WP:FURTHER explicitly contemplates that "Editors may include brief annotations" to sources‍—‌saying what kind of audience each source might benefit is perhaps the most basic annotation possible, and no more OR than choosing a further-reading list in the first place. See this FA (which groups "Further reading" into introductory and advanced) and this one and this one and this one and this one, all of which categorize and group "Further reading" in various ways. The idea that categorizing sources is OR, or that grouping them lends some kind of unusual "prominence", is a nonstarter. EEng (talk) 04:01, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
  • EEng, I haven't commented here for a while because I was trying to understand the issues better, but also because you seem so invested in your reference style that you are uninterested in others' opinions and concerns. I told you that I was not pushing for you to change articles that you had already written; I was expressing a wish that your referencing style not be used for future articles; I prefer a reference style that is closer to the way most WP articles are now. I was surprised that you were not clear on what my concerns were; I thought I had expressed them fairly clearly (and I felt that you did not respond to them). To reiterate: the proliferation of letters and quite a few numbers as superscript in the text is distracting (in regular article main space), and the layout in edit mode makes it difficult to read and to copyedit. When I read an article primarily to copy-edit it, I usually read most of the article in edit mode. I need to see sentences arranged in paragraphs in order to do a good job. Also, while in theory your idea of organizing sources in categories depending upon the educational level of readers may sound like a good idea, in practice there are concerns: 1) Who is to decide in what category a particular work may belong? As Tryptofish suggested, that choice may end up being made according to an editor's opinion, so what ends up in the various categories would vary from article to article. 2) A reader may fall between two categories, such as general readership or capable of handling more in-depth material; in that case, the categories may be unnecessary. 3) You mentioned "middle school" as a category. However, "middle school" is a stage in the educational system in the U.S. The phrase may mean very little to readers from other countries, so would not be helpful as a category. I don't know the answers; I'm just suggesting that some thought needs to be given to this. I do look forward, however, to future editing exchanges with you. CorinneSD (talk) 02:19, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
Corinne:
  • It's not "my" reference style‍—‌it's a style I and another editor developed so that sources and further readering could be elegantly integrated without redundancy.
  • Thanks for clarifying what your concerns are, specifically.
  • I have always understood that you would prefer that there not be a linebreaks after each reference in the source text, and I've said several times now that, if you still hold that opinion after a reasonable amount of experience with the source text as it is, I'll accept that as conclusive that the extra linebreaks are best removed. My only request is, and has been, that you suspend judgment until you've given yourself the opportunity to get used to something new.[see below]
  • However, I'm sorry, but I'm still not clear what you mean by "proliferation of letters and quite a few numbers as superscript in the text". In an earlier post I asked whether what you were talking about, specifically, was (for example) the 123 in [A]:123. Is that correct?
  • As seen in my response to Tfish (above), there is nothing unusual about dividing "Further reading" into groups, including introductory vs. advanced and so on, and that this is seen, in particular, in many featured articles. This is done, just like everything else, according to the judgment of editors, just like the selection of the "Further reading" list in the first place is done according to the judgment of editors. You have a good point about "middle school" (which is based on the publisher's recommendation of "Grades 5-7") not being internationally understandable. I've changed it for the moment to "Juvenile works" to avoid this problem -- or should we just say, "For children", or maybe "For older pre-teens" (specific, but kind of weird-sounging!)?
EEng (talk) 04:01, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
[Later] Corinne, I realized overnight that I'm being silly about the linebreaks. They're in there from a time when the text was being extensively revised, and I found the extra linebreaks helped navigate the very dense forest of citations. That time is gone, so their purpose is gone, and since you say feel it will make things easier for you to remove them, they can be gone? Not sure what my schedule is today, but somewhere in the next few hours I'll start taking care of it. Stay tuned. EEng (talk) 13:55, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
EEng: thank you very much for what you just described as thinking about it overnight! I appreciate that very much indeed.
A clarification: the suggestion at User:Tryptofish/sandbox is not about whether or not to divide the "Further reading" section, but rather about the "References" section. That's because you and Mirokado objected to having a "Further reading" section that repeated sources that are also found in the "References" section.
As it stands now, CorinneSD, Vsmith, and I seem to be in favor of changing the references format, EEng has reservations about changing it, and we are waiting to hear back from Mirokado. I continue to be interested in holding an RfC in order to get advice from more editors. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:28, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Arbitrary break (2)

Thank you, EEng for your clear reply. This is what I was referring to:

====New England and New York (1849–1852)====
In November 1849 Henry Jacob Bigelow, the Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, brought Gage to Boston "at very considerable expense [and after having] satisfied himself that the bar had actually passed through the man's head",[1]: 149  presented him to a meeting of the Boston Society for Medical Improvement and (possibly) to a Medical School class.[B1]: 20 [M]: 43,95 [2]
(This may have been one of the earliest cases of a patient entering a hospital primarily to further medical research, rather than for treatment.) [3]
Unable to return to his railroad work (see § Early observations)
Gage appeared for a time, with his iron, at Barnum's American Museum in New York City
(not the later Barnum's circus‍—‌there is no evidence Gage ever exhibited with a troupe or circus, or on a fairground).[B2][H]: 14 [M]: 14,98-9 [M8]: 3-4 
Advertisements have also been found for public appearances by Gage‍—‌which he may have arranged and promoted himself‍—‌in New Hampshire and Vermont,[M8]: 3-4 
supporting Harlow's statement that Gage made public appearances in "most of the larger New England towns".[H]: 14 [M1]: 829 
(Years later Bigelow wrote that Gage had been "a shrewd and intelligent man and quite disposed to do anything of that sort to turn an honest penny", but had given up such efforts because "[that] sort of thing has not much interest for the general public".[B2][4]: 28 [M8]: 3-4 )
For about eighteen months he worked for the owner of a livery and coach service in Hanover, New Hampshire.[H]: 14 [M]: 101 
  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference jackson1870 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference bsmi was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference yakovlev was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference bennett was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

The jumble of letters and numbers after "Medical School class", "on a fairground", "New England towns", and "the general public". Also, just now, I was trying to offset (by indentation) the entire section I copied from the article. Why do I have to indent almost every line with a colon? That is weird. Usually I can just indent the first line of a paragraph and the whole paragraph will be indented. CorinneSD (talk) 19:13, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

I just did a little gnomish cleanup of the talk section, and found some more indent issues, and it looks like the answer to your last question is that whenever there is an "r" or "ranchor" template, that gets interpreted by the markup as a paragraph break. I, too, find that those jumbles of letters and numbers make the page needlessly difficult for me (and presumably our readers) to read, and I think that the approach at User:Tryptofish/sandbox would help a lot with that. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:47, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
Actually, I just looked some more, and I'm starting to realize that the line-break issue depends on the display width of whoever is reading it, such that the "corrections" I made may look "wrong" on CorinneSD's computer, and the indents she made create some breaking up of paragraphs on mine. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:53, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
And, for clarity, please let me note that there are two inter-related but distinct issues that we are discussing here:
1. How the markup handles line breaks, and how that affects what editors see in the edit window, and, separately, what readers see on the page
2. How the sources are formatted, in terms of the superscript numbers and letters in the main text, and the grouping of sources in the reference list
--Tryptofish (talk) 19:57, 13 August 2015 (UTC)
This has nothing to do with display widths, or {r} or {ranchor} being interpreted as a paragraph break, or anything exotic like that. It's simply that Corinne inserted a colon at the beginning of every line, turning each into a mini-paragraph.
In general, it's not possible to import any large block of article text into a talk page without giving attention to closing up linebreaks, removing section headings (which should never be imported, because they screw up the TOC of the talk page), fixing undefined references, and so on. This has nothing to do with this article or the way it's formatted, except to the extent that, because it used linebreaks so freely (until I removed them over the last few hours), there are many, many obvious stray linebreaks in the result, instead of just the few stray linebreaks (that might have gone unnoticed) that you would usually get with text copied from some other article and didn't attend to the things I just mentioned.
Anyway, I said this morning that I'd remove all the extra linebreaks after sources, as requested, and I've done that, so I don't know why we're even talking about this; in other words, #1 in Tfish's list above is moot. Nor, contrary to what Tfish says, do #1 and #2 on his list have anything at all to do with each other.
EEng (talk) 22:33, 13 August 2015 (UTC) I hope to get to Corinne's original question, re the "jumble", in a bit, but I may get delayed.
EEng, again, thank you very much! Indeed, as soon as I had made the comments above, I began to see that you were assiduously editing the page to address those line-breaks. As for what I called #2, ie the "jumble", I do hope that you will keep an open mind about what I have suggested at User:Tryptofish/sandbox. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:43, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

Hello. (ec with the two preceding posts) I think the removal of line breaks within paragraphs is an improvement, so thanks to EEng for that. --Mirokado (talk) 00:36, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

@Tryptofish: Both WP:MOS (third paragraph of the lead) andWP:CITEVAR are quite clear that an existing stylistic choice should be retained in the absence of consensus for a change. An RFC in this sort of context would effectively be a proposal to overturn the provisions of our guidelines for this article. If it were successful, we would have the highly undesirable result that you, or somebody quite possibly with no interest in the article itself, would have to reformat it against the explicit wishes of those working on it. Do you really think that would be workable? MOS, CITEVAR and ENGVAR emphasise article stability with respect to arbitrary choices for very good reasons. --Mirokado (talk) 00:36, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
@CorinneSD: Greetings! For the background of the superscript page numbers, please see the {{rp}} documentation, which details the problems the template is intended to resolve, as well as mentioning the problem you see. We are using {{r}} with page numbers specified, which calls rp internally. These templates are used on thousands of pages so they are among the many templates a wide-ranging editor at least needs to be able to cope with. Their use in this article fits the documentation in that we avoid the over-long lists of backlinks that you can see in Genie and get from callout to citation with one click. Although {{ranchor}} is only used in one or two articles, the parameters are like those in r, so the usage is familiar. --Mirokado (talk) 00:36, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
To both of you: there are lots of different citation systems and which to use is largely an arbitrary choice. This article will stretch the limits of whatever system we might choose and some tradeoffs are necessary, because there are lots of citations, lots of callouts, lots of page ranges and a variety of established sources catering to the wide audience gathered by this unusual subject. What we currently have is the result of detailed design and various trials which you can see here and in the archives. All this does not mean it cannot be changed, but it reasonable to expect that any alternative retain the current key features of reader experience and any improvements substantially outweigh new disadvantages. I don't think that the current suggestions meet this expectation. --Mirokado (talk) 00:36, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
Mirokado, what you are saying boils down to the claim that, once someone creates a particular way of formatting a page (so long as it does not outright violate an existing policy or guideline), there can be no consensus to change it. "An RFC in this sort of context would effectively be a proposal to overturn the provisions of our guidelines for this article." There is no such thing as immutable guidelines that apply to this article. And you seem to be making a sort of veiled threat that, in the face of an RfC that might, perhaps, yield a clear consensus for change, you and/or EEng might refuse to comply with that consensus. We can certainly disagree in good faith on the merits of any proposal, but as a matter of procedure and policy, you appear to have an incorrect understanding of how WP:Consensus works on the English Wikipedia.
On those merits, I disagree with you on several points: I don't think that the proposed changes are arbitrary, because they are based upon a desire to make the page more accessible for our readers and easily edited by other editors. You call the page subject "unusual" in a way that somehow mandates a formatting that "will stretch the limits of whatever system we might choose". That seems to me to be presupposing the correctness of the status quo. There is no reason why the approach shown at User:Tryptofish/sandbox should be considered incompatible with the page subject. All it would do is to change how readers view the categorization of sources, a categorization that may perhaps violate WP:OR. You do not believe that the proposal would accomplish enough good to be worth implementing. So we disagree.
So here is where we stand in this discussion: three editors (CorinneSD, Vsmith, and myself) leaning in favor of changing the referencing format, and two (EEng and Mirokado) leaning against. We need an RfC, and I'm going to leave a day or so more for comments amongst us first, but then I'm going to start it. If anyone seriously thinks that starting an RfC would violate MOS or anything else, WP:ANI is that-a-way. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:14, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
And if anyone is wondering about implementing a change, in the event of a clear consensus to have such a change, that's why we have Wikipedia:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:23, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

The "jumble"

CorinneSD, I want to get back to your concern about the "jumble". Here's the passage you pointed to above:

In November 1849 Henry Jacob Bigelow, the Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, brought Gage to Boston "at very considerable expense [and after having] satisfied himself that the bar had actually passed through the man's head",[20]:149 presented him to a meeting of the Boston Society for Medical Improvement and (possibly) to a Medical School class.[B1]:20[M]:43,95[21] (This may have been one of the earliest cases of a patient entering a hospital primarily to further medical research, rather than for treatment.)[22]

Unable to return to his railroad work Gage appeared for a time, with his iron, at Barnum's American Museum in New York City (not the later Barnum's circus—​there is no evidence Gage ever exhibited with a troupe or circus, or on a fairground).[B2][H]:14[M]:14,98-9[M8]:3-4 Advertisements have also been found for public appearances by Gage—​which he may have arranged and promoted himself—​in New Hampshire and Vermont,[M8]:3-4 supporting Harlow's statement that Gage made public appearances in "most of the larger New England towns".[H]:14[M1]:829 (Years later Bigelow wrote that Gage had been "a shrewd and intelligent man and quite disposed to do anything of that sort to turn an honest penny", but had given up such efforts because "[that] sort of thing has not much interest for the general public".)[B2][23]:28[M8]:3-4

For about eighteen months he worked for the owner of a livery and coach service in Hanover, New Hampshire.[H]:14[M]:101

As Mirokado has explained, the numbers after the colon e.g. : 123  are page numbers, and have nothing to do with the way sources are categorized, grouped or designated. Under Tfish's proposal, here's what the passage would look like:

In November 1849 Henry Jacob Bigelow, the Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, brought Gage to Boston "at very considerable expense [and after having] satisfied himself that the bar had actually passed through the man's head",[36]:149 presented him to a meeting of the Boston Society for Medical Improvement and (possibly) to a Medical School class.[38]:20[11]:43,95[37] (This may have been one of the earliest cases of a patient entering a hospital primarily to further medical research, rather than for treatment.)[38]

Unable to return to his railroad work Gage appeared for a time, with his iron, at Barnum's American Museum in New York City (not the later Barnum's circus—​there is no evidence Gage ever exhibited with a troupe or circus, or on a fairground).[39][4]:14[11]:14,98-9[16]:3-4 Advertisements have also been found for public appearances by Gage—​which he may have arranged and promoted himself—​in New Hampshire and Vermont,[16]:3-4 supporting Harlow's statement that Gage made public appearances in "most of the larger New England towns".[4]:14[40]:829 (Years later Bigelow wrote that Gage had been "a shrewd and intelligent man and quite disposed to do anything of that sort to turn an honest penny", but had given up such efforts because "[that] sort of thing has not much interest for the general public".)[39][41]:28[16]:3-4

For about eighteen months he worked for the owner of a livery and coach service in Hanover, New Hampshire.[4]:14[11]:101

In other words, nothing would change at all, except [B1]:20 would become [38]:20 and so on. Would I be right in assuming that what you've called the jumble is still a jumble either way?

A ways back you asked:

what, exactly, are the important things [accomplished by the article's] method of reference formatting (that cannot be accomplished with the usual method). Is it only so that works can be categorized in notes or a reference list at the bottom of the article into two or more levels of readership, or is it something else?

To the extent you were talking about the use of the : 123 -type page numbers, the answer is: there's no relationship at all between them and the categorization of sources for levels of readers. They have nothing to do with each other. As explained by Mirokado, superscript page numbers are common, and their use here is an independent decision having nothing to do with what Tfish is proposing, and would not be affected by it.

In fact, if anything Tfish's proposal will make the jumbles worse. In the current design the most-used sources are represented by a single character e.g. [M] or [H], and no source requires more than two characters e.g. [B1] or [23] but never [120]. This was an intentional design feature to keep the inline superscripts as compact as possible. Under Tfish's proposal, the vast majority of sources will require two digits, and many will require three digits, making the jumbles bigger.

Does this clarify things? EEng (talk) 04:21, 14 August 2015 (UTC)

You all know so much more than I do about references (I hardly know anything), so I probably shouldn't even be involved in this discussion, but if you wouldn't mind humoring me, would you mind explaining these terms to me? - a callout, a tag, an intermediate note? I looked at the two versions of the passage that you provided, just above, and I guess there is not much difference between them. The collection of letters and numbers in one is just as long as the collection of numbers in the other. (I do find the letters more distracting than the numbers, though.) I don't understand why there have to be so many letters and numbers (or just numbers, in Tryptofish's version) in a row, every few sentences or so. Those long strings are what are distracting. They break up the visual flow of sentences. Isn't there a way to cut down on the number of letters and numbers (or just numbers)? I wonder about something. Of course, you know I don't understand the reference formatting at all, so forgive me if I'm way off. I don't know whether some of those letters and numbers (superscripts) are designed to create, or lead directly to, the categories you want to have at the end of the article. If they are, couldn't you just create two or three lists of sources organized by reading level at the end of the article? Do the individual references have to lead to those categories? If you could remove a few letter or number superscripts that are specifically designed to lead to categories, that would be a way to cut down on the number of letter/number superscripts. CorinneSD (talk) 16:54, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
Looking at this example, I can see 5 places where one might, subjectively, call it a jumble:
  • [B1]:20[M]:43,95[21]
  • [B2][H]:14[M]:14,98-9[M8]:3-4
  • [H]:14[M1]:829
  • [B2][23]:28[M8]:3-4
  • [H]:14[M]:101
It happens that in this example, each cited source is one of the categorized sources, and consequently, we have those letters (such as [M]) and letter-number combinations (such as [B1]). If the passage also cited a source from the "other sources" section of References, it would have been designated by a number (such as [14]). The numbers that are not in brackets refer to page numbers within each source, so that [B1]:20 means page 20 of source B1. The alternative to having those page numbers, where they are, can be seen at [21], where the reference list includes a lot of entries such as Curtiss 1977, pp. 23–27, and Curtiss 1977, pp. 40–41. EEng has previously expressed a strong preference for doing the page numbers as we do here, as opposed to what one sees at that link, and I'm fine with agreeing with him about that. Either way is permissible, and we need to indicate specific page numbers in any case. For me, the page numbers are not perplexing, but I tend to get perplexed by figuring out whether there's a difference between [M]:43 versus [M1]:829 versus [14]:25 – as well as [a], [b], and [c] (note the lower case), which refer to Notes instead of to References. In my suggestion, letters would always go to Notes, and numbers would always go to References. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:35, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
I went back and looked again at the page, because previously to CorinneSD's observations, I hadn't really been concerned about the length of the citation strings (which I think, correct me, is what EEng refers to as callouts), but rather by their complexity. Those 5 examples that I bullet-listed just above tend to be rather lengthy in this way. But when I look at the page as a whole, they are not particularly representative. There are a lot of instances that are simply something like [H]:14, nothing longer. (Doing away with the page numbers inline would shorten that to just [H], but then we would have a very long reference section as at Genie.) The quoted example is a bit unrepresentative in terms of its lengthy "jumbles". --Tryptofish (talk) 19:53, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
CorinneSD requested some definitions of terms. EEng, please correct me if I make a mistake.
  • "callout": the superscript citation in the main text, aka an inline citation.
  • "tag": commonly on Wikipedia means a template, but EEng used it earlier to refer to where, in my sandbox draft, I put phrases such as "For young readers" at the end of references.
  • "intermediate note": take a look at the References section of the page, under "Other sources cited", and find number 4. You'll see that this citation of a source leads, in turn, to other source citations. That's what makes it intermediate.
--Tryptofish (talk) 20:07, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
Tryptofish Thank you for all the explanations. I understand a little better now. When I asked you about the word "tag", it was because I saw it as a heading in a table farther up on this page. In that column are seemingly random words like "aggressive" and names. I wondered what those were. I looked at the Genie list of references, and I see what you mean. It's long. May I ask something else? Why do the capital letters have to be in brackets? Why couldn't it just be the letter, followed directly by the necessary numbers? That might clear up some of the clutter. CorinneSD (talk) 20:23, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
Sure, my pleasure. OK, that table was drawn up by Mirokado, and there, "tag" meant whatever we currently call a source, so [B] would be an example of a "tag". That's an idiosyncratic use of the word. One could also call it a "source name" or something like that. Where the tag is something like "aggressive", that's referring to the sources that say that Gage displayed aggression as a result of his brain damage. In that table, "callouts" refers to the number of times the given "tag" is used as a citation, so [B] is used 13 times (and in 9 different combinations of page numbers). Now about those brackets, I'm pretty sure that we are stuck with them no matter what. As far as I know, the Wikipedia software always displays superscript inline citations that way. Look at most any page, and you'll see those brackets (but often without page numbers). --Tryptofish (talk) 20:35, 14 August 2015 (UTC)
The headings in Mirokado's table are a bit misleading, so to clarify...
  • The "tag" is what you use in edit mode at the point you want to cite the article. For technical reasons some sources have letter or letter-digit tags, and are invoked like this: {{ranchor|B}} or {{rachnor|H1}} {{ranchor|H1}}. Other sources have tags which are words, and are invoked like this: {{r|aggressiveness}}
  • The "callout" is how the source is shown to the reader, in superscript, in the formatted article. Sources invoked like {{ranchor|B}} or {{rachnor|H1}} {{ranchor|H1}} are called out in the article by their tags, for example [B] or [H1]. Sources invoked like {{r|aggressiveness}} are called out as superscript numbers assigned automatically, like [77].
  • We are indeed stuck with the brackets.
EEng (talk) 01:00, 15 August 2015 (UTC)

Continuing...

Thanks, EEng. Did you really mean "rachnor"? What does using a word like "aggressiveness" yield, or accomplish? CorinneSD (talk) 15:21, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Template:ranchor was named by combining "r" (from Template:r) with "anchor". (It is intended to "anchor" an "intermediate note" to a reference citation that was created with the r template, instead of a citation created with < ref >.) On the other hand, I hope that we all can avoid rancor here! As I tried to say above, words like "aggressiveness" simply refer to things that are talked about in the sources – in this case, when some authors wrote that they thought that Phineas Gage became aggressive as a result of his brain injuries. All it "accomplishes", from a reader's point of view, is a callout in the form of a number, instead of in the form of a letter. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:34, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
And my proposal at User:Tryptofish/sandbox would eliminate all of that. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:40, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Thank you, EEng. Might I persuade you to take another look at what you wrote above enclosed in no-wiki templates? I don't see how r + anchor becomes rachnor. Hence, my question, did you really mean "rachnor"? Also, with regard to picking out words such as "aggressive" and linking it to a reference, doesn't that involve a rather subjective selection process, or am I just not understanding something? CorinneSD (talk) 23:45, 15 August 2015 (UTC)
Um, well, that was Tryptofish, not me. I see the confusion, though‍—‌I misspelled ranchor as rachnor at one point above‍—‌now fixed.
As for aggressiveness and so on, hmmmm... how to explain this... Look, open the article in Edit mode, as if you wanted to edit it. Now search for the word aggressiveness. You'll find it twice. One place is where someone says Gage was aggressive; at that point you'll find {{r|aggressiveness}}, and in the formatted page that is called out as [51]. Then, down near the bottom, you'll find {{refn |name=aggressiveness and a lot of other junk, and in the formatted page that turns into
51. ^ Dimond, Stuart J. (1980). Neuropsychology: A Textbook of Systems and Psychological Functions of the Human Brain. London: Butterworths.
The word aggressiveness simply ties the one to the other, so that when the software puts [51] in the article text, it knows to give the Dimond citation the same number (becasue Dimond is the source mentioning Gage's alleged aggressiveness). The reader never sees the word aggressiveness‍—‌it's just arbitrary, and could just as well have been abracadabra. EEng (talk) 00:54, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

(OK, now, commenting on Tfish's explanation above.) Not quite. {{r}} is just another form of < ref>< /ref>, which is the most common way of invoking references, and calls them out in the article text with a superscript number e.g. [77]. These numbers are automatically assigned‍—‌there is no way to control what sources get what numbers, and no way of controlling the order the sources are listed at the end of the article.

{{ranchor}} means "reference to an anchor". An anchor is [insert explanation here], but the important point is that with {{ranchor}} we can control the superscript callout to be whatever we want it to be, like [H] for Harlow's 1868 paper or [M1] for Macmillan's 2008 paper.

Since, using {{ranchor}}, we can control the letters assigned to the 30 most important sources, we can put them in alphabetical order in the "further reading" groups ("For general audiences", "For young readers", "For researchers", etc.) like you see at Phineas_Gage#References.

The sources in the last section, "Other sources cited", do not use {{ranchor}}; instead, they use {{r}}. So, as explained a minute ago, with {{ranchor}} we can't control what the superscript callouts are‍—‌they just come out [1][2][3] etc.‍—‌and we can't control the order they get listed in the "Other sources cited" section‍—‌they just come out in random order.

So, the {{ranchor}} system lets us take selected sources, pull them out of the unordered pile of "Other sources cited" created by {{r}}, and construct them in the alphabetical: "General readers", etc. This way they do double-duty: they are sources used in the article, and also a list of further reading that the reader see at a glance to select something appropriate.

Tfish's proposal is not use {{ranchor}} and do everything with {{r}}, so that everything is in one big "Sources cited" group, with the random [1][2][3] callouts and no alphabetical order. Since there would no longer be the "General readers", "For young readers" groups, he proposes that certain of the sources have a little note at the end, saying "For general readers" and so on. You'll see those notes in the sources at the bottom of User:Tryptofish/sandbox.

However, what's not apparent in Tfish's sandbox version is that the 30 sources tagged "For general readers" and so on will be buried among 90 other unlabeled sources. The reader would have to search through the 120 sources to find the few that are noted "For general readers" or whatever, and really, I think almost no readers would even realize those notes are there. Thus I think Tfish's proposal would completely destroy the whole idea of showing readers where they can learn more.
EEng (talk) 00:54, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

Thank you both for being so cordial and patient regarding this. Thank you, EEng for explaining things so thoroughly. I guess I understand a little more. Can I ask you something? I am slowly being persuaded that, at least for articles that have a lot of sources, it might be a good idea to include a list of sources organized into those three groups (for younger readers, for general reading, for research, etc.). But is it necessary to link a source in the text to that list? Couldn't the list just be compiled separately at the end of the article? If that were done, would that cut down on the number of letters and/or numbers in the reference superscripts? I don't think a reader necessarily needs to know whether one statement in the article comes from a general reader source and another comes from a more advanced source. If they want to do some further reading, just consulting the list at the end of the article would help them make their decision about what to look for in the library. If that set of links is eliminated, would there still be a useful difference between your system and the usual system? (Please remember that I'm not advocating your changing articles you've already pretty much completed. I'm just thinking about future articles.) I do see that the length of the string of superscript numbers/letters is not much different between your system and Tryptofish's system. Thanks for showing those. I'm also being persuaded that adding a little note at the end of a source in the references list like "For general readers" (or whatever it was) may not be noticed and thus may not be very helpful, and the many added phrases may add to clutter in the reference list. If no one objects that the categories and selection process are not OR, a list with three separate categories is probably more helpful to readers. Wouldn't you agree with that, Tryptofish? CorinneSD (talk) 15:59, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
Sorry, but no, I disagree. (Welcome to Wikipedia, aka "herding cats" – or in my case, fish!) But it's not as big a disagreement as that response from me makes it sound. I'm going to offer some new ideas responding to EEng, below. However, where you suggest having sources grouped at the end, but not having that grouped listing link to the main text, I proposed the same thing above (see, for example #References continued), and EEng and Mirokado strongly objected to having two sections that are redundant in the references they list. I don't see a way to make that fly. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:49, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

Corinne, regarding this comment of yours: "But is it necessary to link a source in the text to that list? Couldn't the list just be compiled separately at the end of the article? If that were done, would that cut down on the number of letters and/or numbers in the reference superscripts? I don't think a reader necessarily needs to know whether one statement in the article comes from a general reader source and another comes from a more advanced source."
Right now there are 30 "For general readers", "Young readers" (and so on) sources, and 90 "Other sources" (in random order). Each source is listed only once. Some superscripts are letters (the 30 sources) and some hare numbers (the 90 "Other sources"). Either way, when you click a superscript, it takes you to that source, wherever it is. The purpose of grouping the 30 sources isn't to tell the reader, when clicking, what kind of source (general, young) he's clicked on, but so that the reader wanting further reading can scroll down to the bottom of the article and see them all listed together.
Under Tfish's proposal, To do something like what you're saying (which in fact is an old proposal of Tfish's) all 120 of the sources would have to be listed in one big "Sources" section (in random order). When you click a superscript, that's where you'll go. In addition, thirty of those 120 would also be listed again‍—‌duplicated‍—‌in a further-reading list, separate from the giant pile of 120.
So yes, the further-reading list could be compiled separately at the end of the article, but that would have no effect on the callouts (what you call the reference superscripts) except that instead of being a mixture of letters and numbers, they'd be all numbers. There'd be the same number of callouts, of more or less the same length. And the "compiled separately" list would duplicate entries already in the 120 "Sources".
EEng (talk) 00:02, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
Please EEng, I'm doing everything that I can to listen to what you say and to try to be responsive to it, so please represent what I, in turn, have said, accurately. I long-ago stopped proposing a further reading list that would duplicate those references, so please do not make it sound like I am still proposing it. In fact, I was just explaining to Corinne why such duplication would not be desirable. And in the mean time, please take a serious look at what I said in the next talk section, and what I have come up with, newly, at my sandbox. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:39, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
Keep your shirt on. My brain short-circuited. Corrected above. EEng (talk) 01:25, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
Thank you for correcting that! (And I was just about to flash you – joke.) --Tryptofish (talk) 21:24, 17 August 2015 (UTC)

I'll jump in here, since it is fairly close to "please take a look at my sandbox". The general idea of a list at the top of the references section is a good one. It needs a bit more work to move the affected citations into the reflist with the "other citations" and to link to them from each list item. I'm probably too busy at work to do anything myself for the next couple of days, but I can offer to do more over the weekend unless either of you want to take this further yourselves in the meantime... --Mirokado (talk) 18:29, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Taking stock

Thanks EEng for explaining it better than I did. Obviously, we are dealing with arcana that I, even after a lot of experience with this page, still have not mastered. As I look over the recent discussions, it seems to me that we have several issues that may concern different editors to different extents:
  1. The value of having categories for what EEng just called "the 30 most important sources", versus any concerns about WP:OR in making the categories (or even in declaring some sources more "important" than others). One fish's opinion is that it is not really OR, but it comes close, and that it is somewhat helpful to readers to provide this categorization, but that it's not the most important thing to determine what we do.
  2. Assuming that we continue to have the categories, the importance of grouping the sources that way in the References list, so that readers can quickly see those groups. My opinion is that the grouping is a mixed bag, somewhat helpful, but only as important as the categorizations themselves are, which is not that important. EEng believes strongly that my suggestion of putting them at the ends of the reference citations "would completely destroy the whole idea", whereas I see it as a trade-off.
  3. The question of how we display the callouts in the main text. EEng supports the present approach, in which Notes are designated by lowercase letters, the categorized sources are designated by uppercase letters or uppercase letters with a number, and the uncategorized sources are designated by numbers. I prefer that we designate the Notes by letters and all References by numbers, because this would simplify what readers see in the main text and would make the page considerably easier for more editors to edit.
  4. The question of how we tell readers about page numbers within sources. EEng says that it is better to accomplish this by having the page numbers in the superscripts in the main text, than to have a much longer references section. I agree.
  5. The question of whether the superscript callouts in the main text are sometimes too long, such that they visually interrupt the text in a way that makes it harder to read. It's never struck me as an issue, and it doesn't bother me, but CorinneSD pointed it out. In the present system, these callouts are mixtures of letters and numbers, whereas my proposal would make them all numbers. EEng correctly points out that some numbers would have three digits in my proposal, while now there is a two-character maximum. I've looked at the page with this issue in mind, and my opinion is that there would be relatively few places where we have lengthy callouts that would become appreciatively longer with some 3-digit numbers.
--Tryptofish (talk) 01:26, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
There's nothing arcane here. As I've mentioned before, {{ranchor}} has only been in the article since last November, and since then you've made only a dozen edits to the page, none of which involved adding or changing references, so it's not surprising you haven't become familiar. (See also the last bulletpoint in the list below i.e. there's not really anything to become familiar with anyway.)
Other than that quibble, yours is a fair summary. I'll only amplify my earlier comments (i.e. droningly repeat myself):
1, 4. No issues, thank God!
5. We already use a scheme for "bundling" unsightly strings of several callouts; an example of such a "bundle" is here. This was developed primarily for the "attributed behaviors" passage that was so cite-heavy, but can be used anywhere we want. As a demo, I just bundled up one of the ones troubling Corinne [22] and I think I'll do a few more unusually long ones throughout the article, now that I'm at it.
2, 3. These rise or fall together, and they're the only actual issue (right?) so I'll discuss them together.
  • Adding "For general readers" and so on at the end of 7 sources scattered among 120 will go completely unnoticed by 99.99% of readers, and will therefore be worthless. Further, even if a reader realizes he/she can search for the string "For general readers", having them scattered all over makes it harder for the reader to get an overview of the different sources being suggested, and pick the one(s) he/she wants. (And we could offer a $500 prize to the first reader noticing that one, and only one, source has the note "For young readers" appended to it somewhere among the 120 sources, and we'd never have to pay out that prize.)
BTW, since you value a page looking like other pages: I don't know of any other page that tags sources the way you're proposing (by adding a note at the end of the usual citation information); in contrast, the current scheme on this page looks exactly like the further-reading list at Evolution#Further_reading and the other FAs I pointed to in an earlier post.
  • You're right that callouts for sources are now a combination of letters and numbers, and under your proposal would be just numbers. But callouts aren't just for sources‍—‌they're for notes too, so in fact right now callouts combine uppercase letters, lowercase letters, and numbers; and under your system there would be uppercase letters and numbers (not, as you say, just numbers). Anyway, lots of articles (including FAs) use all kinds of combinations of arabic numerals, roman numerals, roman alphas, and even (yikes!) greek alphas, and I can't believe that a callout looking like [12]:34[H]:67[a] (current) versus [12]:34[90]:67[A] (proposed) is anything other than a trivial difference. Most readers don't look at the superscripts at all; if they do look, they don't have to understand the "system" to know that if they click, they'll be taken to something supporting or explaining what they just read; and those who care will easily figure it out. I believe (and, CorinneSD, please comment here) that Corinne's negative reaction to the callouts was primarily due to the : 34  page number components (which no one's suggesting changing); and while she has expressed a preference for numbers-only in callouts, we're never gonna get that anyway since letters will always by needed for notes.
  • I completely disagree that your proposal would make the page "considerably easier to edit". Unless what you want to do is move a source either into or out of the "further reading" list, there's nothing at all to understand‍—‌a source can be added any time, anywhere using the usual < ref> syntax, and using an existing source in a new place (whether it's called out with {{ranchor}} or {{r}}) is easily done just by copying the syntax from wherever it's used already.
EEng (talk) 05:23, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
Hey, EEng, I don't think that you were callous here [23] at all! --Tryptofish (talk) 19:58, 16 August 2015 (UTC)

Continuing more

OK, seriously now, thanks for the numerous places where you and I agree. It may not feel like it, but we are making progress. First of all, for the places in your comment where you say that you and I agree, I agree that we agree. (Did I really write that sentence?)
About what I numbered with number 5, I have a small suggestion. There are many places on the page where spacing templates, such as Template:Px1, are used as part of the callouts. My understanding is that EEng added these so that characters would not be too close together, which is reasonable on the face of it. But it occurs to me that taking these spaces out would, well, remove a wee bit of space from within the citations. (EEng just made an edit that did a bit of this, already.) It would not make a large difference, but it might make a small one. As I said earlier, this seems to be more of an issue for CorinneSD than for me, and I don't care about it personally, that much.
Yes, 2 and 3 are sort of like the opposite ends of a see-saw, for purposes of this discussion, and it's where we need to do the most work now. Please let me correct something you said: I've said all along that, under what I propose, the Notes would be designated by letters, and the References would be designated by numbers.
Let's talk seriously, and please bear with me, about this issue of the page being easy or difficult to edit. You said to me above "since then you've made only a dozen edits to the page, none of which involved adding or changing references, so it's not surprising you haven't become familiar." You are saying that an editor would need to "become familiar" to be able to do what I say I find difficult to do. And, just for what I have worked on in my sandbox, I have found it very difficult, much more difficult than most pages. I think we agree that I'm not exactly a slow learner, and that I'm an experienced editor – and that I'm in this talk not because I want to be, but because you have repeatedly requested my input. I'm telling you that for any editor coming fresh to this page, it's a very hard page to edit. No one should have to get "familiar" before being able to edit, and (not that you said so) no one should have to request on the talk page before editing. Open an edit window, and it's a steep learning curve. Please believe me on this, because I'm saying it sincerely and in good faith – and with a view towards trying to head off the future appearance of editors who want to pick fights with you at this page.
And an editor coming new to this page, with a good-faith and high-quality edit to make, isn't necessarily just dealing with adding a new source within < ref >. Maybe they want to cite, again, one of the categorized sources. Or part of one of the bundled sources. Or maybe they want to move a source from one category to another. They should be able to do those things, without having to ask how. Please, please, hear me on this.
As I continue to try to assess where we stand, I continue to see differing opinions amongst different editors. At this point, CorinneSD seems still to be concerned about what I numbered as #5, whereas I don't feel it's a problem. Conversely, I continue to feel that the 2/3 seesaw is a big deal, even though CorinneSD now says she's not as concerned about it as she was before. So I still see value in having an RfC, to get more input.
But, before that, I want to offer a new idea. It's not complete, and still needs some tinkering. But please take a new look at User:Tryptofish/sandbox, and specifically at a new, third section, at User:Tryptofish/sandbox#An alternative strategy. I've been listening sincerely to what you, and now CorinneSD, have been saying about not liking the idea of just having the categories (for general readers, etc.) at the end of each reference listing, and I've been racking my little brain for a way that we could simultaneously (1) combine all the References into a single, numbered list, and (2) present our readers with the categories right at the top of the References section in a way that they could follow links to all the sources within any given category. And I've (almost!) got it. By using your "ranchor" template in a bulleted list at the top of the References, and adding a "ref=" parameter within the reference citations, what it does is, you can click on any of the bulleted listings at the top (try it for "For young readers"), and you get taken to the source in the category, which becomes highlighted. As I said, it still needs some tweaking from those of you who are more markup-adept than I am, but I think (hope) it's responsive to what you've been saying. (The main issues I see are the font format and bracketing of the bullet list, so maybe a variation of "ranchor" could be created for that, and that it seems to have trouble highlighting multiple sources simultaneously. But I think those things are solvable.)
Let's see if we can work with that. Thanks. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:37, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
That's quite clever, and very neat. It's brilliant, in fact. EEng, I agree with everything Tryptofish said about the need for editing to be easy for anyone who wants to edit. That, actually, was my most important concern. Tryptofish, I may have said I'm becoming persuaded re #2 and #3 only because EEng was so persuasive and because I know so little about referencing that I will probably not make any referencing edits to any article, at least for a while, until I learn more, so you can probably discount my opinion in that regard. I also wanted to tell you that I just received approval to change my user name, which you'll see when I sign this. Thank you both for tolerating my involvement in this discussion even though I know so little. Corinne (talk) 22:05, 16 August 2015 (UTC)
Thanks! And congrats on the user name. Having an unmodified first name as a user name is quite a rare commodity around here. I'm glad to hear what you just said about your thoughts for this page, and I look forward to finding out what EEng thinks. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:49, 17 August 2015 (UTC)

  • I use {px} when a callout comes immediately after a quote mark, because (on all of the several browsers I checked out) without it the bracket comes so close to the quote that they visually clash. It's a small point, but I happen to believe that presenting text attractively is part of good writing. What you interpret as my removing some of the {px1}s was simply cases where, because of moving stuff around, the ref no longer came directly after the quote. (Looks like there were a few stray {px1}s as well, which I did just remove.) This adds 1 pixel of space, which is minescule when you consider that e.g. my laptop screen is 1600 pixels wide, but absolutely does fix the visual clash.
  • You've taken my words out of context. What I said is,
{ranchor} has only been in the article since last November, and since then you've made only a dozen edits to the page, none of which involved adding or changing references, so it's not surprising you haven't become familiar. (See also the last bulletpoint in the list below i.e. there's not really anything to become familiar with anyway.)
Note the parenthetical. Probably what I should have said is,
{ranchor} has only been in the article since last November, and since then you've made only a dozen edits to the page, none of which involved adding or changing references, so if indeed there's something or other unusual editors need to become familiar with, it's not surprising you haven't become familiar given that small amount of editing.. (See also the last bulletpoint in the list below i.e. there's not really anything to become familiar with anyway.)
I'm sorry, but I don't buy this trope about the article having arcane markup making it hard to edit. The article does take more attention to edit than most articles, but that's because it has the kinds of things very well-developed articles have (but most articles lack) which, yes, make the markup look daunting: meticulous sourcing, plenty of images, careful footnotes, adjustments to formatting usually made only when the article has been relatively stable for a long time. Here, for example, is a typical paragraph from the FA Evolution:
Fasten seatbelt before unhiding
{{Further|Genetic drift|Effective population size}}
[[File:Allele-frequency.png|thumb|Simulation of [[genetic drift]] of 20 unlinked alleles in populations of 10 (top) and 100 (bottom). Drift to [[Fixation (population genetics)|fixation]] is more rapid in the smaller population.]] Genetic drift is the change in [[allele frequency]] from one generation to the next that occurs because alleles are subject to [[sampling error]].<ref name="Masel 2011">{{cite journal |last=Masel |first=Joanna |date=October 25, 2011 |title=Genetic drift |journal=Current Biology |location=Cambridge, MA |publisher=Cell Press |volume=21 |issue=20 |pages=R837–R838 |doi=10.1016/j.cub.2011.08.007 |issn=0960-9822 |pmid=22032182}}</ref> As a result, when selective forces are absent or relatively weak, allele frequencies tend to "drift" upward or downward randomly (in a [[random walk]]). This drift halts when an allele eventually becomes [[Fixation (population genetics)|fixed]], either by disappearing from the population, or replacing the other alleles entirely. Genetic drift may therefore eliminate some alleles from a population due to chance alone. Even in the absence of selective forces, genetic drift can cause two separate populations that began with the same genetic structure to drift apart into two divergent populations with different sets of alleles.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Lande |first=Russell |year=1989 |title=Fisherian and Wrightian theories of speciation |journal=Genome |location=Ottawa |publisher=[[National Research Council (Canada)|National Research Council of Canada]] |volume=31 |issue=1 |pages=221–227 |doi=10.1139/g89-037 |issn=0831-2796 |pmid=2687093}}</ref>

It is usually difficult to measure the relative importance of selection and neutral processes, including drift.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Mitchell-Olds |first1=Thomas |last2=Willis |first2=John H. |last3=Goldstein |first3=David B. |authorlink3=David B. Goldstein (geneticist) |date=November 2007 |title=Which evolutionary processes influence natural genetic variation for phenotypic traits? |journal=Nature Reviews Genetics |location=London |publisher=Nature Publishing Group |volume=8 |issue=11 |pages=845–856 |doi=10.1038/nrg2207 |issn=1471-0056 |pmid=17943192}}</ref> The comparative importance of adaptive and non-adaptive forces in driving evolutionary change is an area of [[Evolutionary biology|current research]].<ref>{{cite journal |last=Nei |first=Masatoshi |authorlink=Masatoshi Nei |date=December 2005 |title=Selectionism and Neutralism in Molecular Evolution |journal=[[Molecular Biology and Evolution]] |location=Oxford |publisher=Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution |volume=22 |issue=12 |pages=2318–2342 |doi=10.1093/molbev/msi242 |issn=0737-4038 |pmc=1513187 |pmid=16120807}} *{{cite journal |last=Nei |first=Masatoshi |date=May 2006 |title=Selectionism and Neutralism in Molecular Evolution |journal=Molecular Biology and Evolution |type=Erratum |location=Oxford |publisher=Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution |volume=23 |issue=5 |page=1095 |doi=10.1093/molbev/msk009 |issn=0737-4038}}</ref>

The [[neutral theory of molecular evolution]] proposed that most evolutionary changes are the result of the fixation of [[neutral mutation]]s by genetic drift.<ref name="Kimura M 1991 367–86" /> Hence, in this model, most genetic changes in a population are the result of constant mutation pressure and genetic drift.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Kimura |first=Motoo |year=1989 |title=The neutral theory of molecular evolution and the world view of the neutralists |journal=Genome |location=Ottawa |publisher=National Research Council of Canada |volume=31 |issue=1 |pages=24–31 |doi=10.1139/g89-009 |issn=0831-2796 |pmid=2687096}}</ref> This form of the neutral theory is now largely abandoned, since it does not seem to fit the genetic variation seen in nature.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Kreitman |first=Martin |authorlink=Martin Kreitman |date=August 1996 |title=The neutral theory is dead. Long live the neutral theory |journal=BioEssays |location=Hoboken, NJ |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |volume=18 |issue=8 |pages=678–683; discussion 683 |doi=10.1002/bies.950180812 |issn=0265-9247 |pmid=8760341}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last=Leigh |first=E. G., Jr. |date=November 2007 |title=Neutral theory: a historical perspective |journal=[[Journal of Evolutionary Biology]] |location=Hoboken, NJ |publisher=Wiley-Blackwell on behalf of the [[European Society for Evolutionary Biology]] |volume=20 |issue=6 |pages=2075–2091 |doi=10.1111/j.1420-9101.2007.01410.x |issn=1010-061X |pmid=17956380}}</ref> However, a more recent and better-supported version of this model is the [[nearly neutral theory of molecular evolution|nearly neutral theory]], where a mutation that would be effectively neutral in a small population is not necessarily neutral in a large population.<ref name="Hurst" /> Other alternative theories propose that genetic drift is dwarfed by other stochastic forces in evolution, such as genetic hitchhiking, also known as genetic draft.<ref name="Masel 2011" /><ref name="gillespie 2001">{{cite journal |last=Gillespie |first=John H. |authorlink=John H. Gillespie |date=November 2001 |title=Is the population size of a species relevant to its evolution? |journal=Evolution |location=Hoboken, NJ |publisher=John Wiley & Sons on behalf of the Society for the Study of Evolution |volume=55 |issue=11 |pages=2161–2169 |doi=10.1111/j.0014-3820.2001.tb00732.x |issn=0014-3820 |pmid=11794777}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Neher |first1=Richard A. |last2=Shraiman |first2=Boris I. |date=August 2011 |title=Genetic Draft and Quasi-Neutrality in Large Facultatively Sexual Populations |journal=Genetics |location=Bethesda, MD |publisher=Genetics Society of America |volume=188 |issue=4 |pages=975–996 |doi=10.1534/genetics.111.128876 |issn=0016-6731 |pmc=3176096 |pmid=21625002}}</ref>

Corinne, I'd be interested to know whether you think Phineas Gage is more or less difficult to edit than the above.
Tfish, if you want to "cite, again, one of the categorized sources", you just copy the way you see it cited somewhere else. If you want to cite, again, one of the uncategorized sources, you'd do the same thing i.e. copy the way you see it cited somewhere else. (In the first case that would be a {ranchor}, in the second an {r}, but so what? You copy what you see. Good terminology there, BTW, for us to use -- categorized vs. uncategorized.) There are several complicated citation systems in use (harvard/sfn comes to mind) and when I run into one of them, I do exactly what I just said{{mdashb}]copy citations from one place to the other. As in all programming (which is what markup really is) the paste-pot is mightier than the pen.
Everything (with a minor exception) in the bundled cites is cited elsewhere as well, so again one can just copy what you see elsewhere. The exception is that some of the bundles do contain one-off sources not cited elsewhere. These are sources specifically there for their unreliability‍—‌they are cited for the content of what they say, not for the truth of that content‍—‌and there's zero chance they would be cited elsewhere in the article.
As far as I know you've never wanted to actually do any of these things, but if you did I have no doubt you'd see immediately how to do it. I believe (of course) that you mean what you say about markup complexity in good faith, and let's discuss any other aspects of this concern after we're done with the referencing, but I absolutely believe it's wrong. EEng (talk) 03:09, 17 August 2015 (UTC) That's enough for now, I'll look at your sandbox later. Gotta go.
EEng, I'm surprised you would say that to Tryptofish: "As far as I know you've never wanted to actually do any of these things." Tryptofish may not have wanted to make changes to the Phineas Gage article, but she would not be participating in this discussion if she were not interested in making edits in the future. I'm not sure whether Tryptofish is interested in changing the entire reference system for the Phineas Gage article or not, but I'm sure she is interested in having some influence over the reference system used in future, or other, WP articles.
In order to compare the difficulty of editing an article like Evolution and an article like Phineas Gage, I had to go to the Evolution article and look at it in edit mode. Since I have WikEd enabled, it is easy to see the difference between article text and references. References are highlighted in gray, external links in blue, image files and captions in green, and most templates and hidden notes in salmon. The text is black type on a white background, so it stands out, and paragraphs stand out clearly. When I looked at Phineas Gage in edit mode, text is for the most part black letters on a white background, image files and captions are in green, and hidden notes are in salmon. I saw one "paragraph" highlighted in gray. It starts "nowrap", then - Long known as "the... shy (pipe) American Crowbar Case...", then mdashb (what's mdashb?), etc. I don't know what that entire gray-hightlighted "paragraph" is and whether I should expect to be able to edit that just as I would edit regular text (black letters on white background), ie., for grammar, spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and what others might edit for content. When I looked at that same "paragraph" in the lead of the article, I didn't see any superscripts until the end of the paragraph. So what is that gray-highlighted "paragraph"? I see that within the gray, wiki-links are highlighted in blue. Why is it highlighted in gray? Why is it different from regular text? If I understand what that is, I can answer your question as to which is easier to edit. Right now, the article on Evolution looks more familiar so appears easier to edit.
I still don't understand the reasoning behind linking a word such as "aggressive" or "shy" in the article to a source. In normal academic writing, single words are not given a footnote or endnote unless the word is in quotation marks and is being attributed to a writer or researcher.
I also think that for an editor to be able to really edit an article like Phineas Gage, s/he would need to take a tutorial course first. It's not enough to say s/he could just copy and paste. I hate to say this because I can see how much this system means to you, but my general impression is that you are promoting a whole new way of formatting sources in WP articles. In order to make that system generally accepted and used widely in WP, I think you would have to gain consensus. Otherwise, it's just the project of a few people being pushed on other editors. That may be why you have gotten some negative reactions before this. Here you have Tryptofish, who has some knowledge of referencing, kind of telling you that the system is a bit too complicated, and suggesting some simplification, and me, as a copyeditor, urging more thought on this, and you continue to defend it. I urge you to to be open to modification and compromise. I said I would go along with long strings of letter- and/or number-superscripts (partly because you showed that the "strings" would not be so different, and partly because I know very little about referencing), but you haven't yet assured me that I would see paragraphs in edit mode, not one sentence below the other, and I would still like to know what those gray "paragraphs" are and whether I can edit them just as I edit regular text, and why words like "shy" and "aggressive" appear with pipes and what the point of that is. You also didn't answer my question as to why you have to link something in the article to a categorized source, and why you couldn't just supply a list of sources organized into reading-level categories at the end of the article. That extra linking may be adding to the complication. I would really appreciate it if you would explain these things to me. Thanks. Corinne (talk) 15:56, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
Corinne:
  • I'm sorry, but I don't use WikEd and I don't know why it colors things the way it does. Text, wherever it appears and in whatever color, is text, so if you think it should be worded some other way, then change it. (Then I'll tell you why I liked it better the other way. Then we'll look in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then...)
{{nowrap}} means that a piece of text will always appear on a single line. As the note in the markup says, it's there to "force text below img when window is very narrow". Try narrowing your window little by little, and watch that point in the text (between two images--one on the left, one of the right) to see how this works. You can learn about {mdashb} by clicking right here: {{mdashb}}.
  • Everything a WP article says needs to be cited to a source ("attributed to a writer or researcher", as you say) because Wikipedia, unlike an academic paper, doesn't have any opinions of its own. And this is true whether the material is directly quoted, or paraphrased. The article says that
Behaviors ascribed to the post-accident Gage which are either unsupported by, or in contra­dic­tion to, the known facts include ... aggres­sive­ness and violence
But WP can't just say that, it has to say who said it. Thus the citation.
  • The particular format doesn't mean a lot to me (or to Mirokado‍—‌we worked together on it). But he and I are both very familiar with advanced features of the markup, and we used them to put present things as best possible. That's the way it's supposed to be when an article has become very stable. We (and I hope he'll pardon me for speaking for the both of us) tire of people showing up out of nowhere and saying that a hypothetical editor who hypothetically might want to edit might hypothetically have difficulty, just because this isn't like the vast majority of articles that haven't received such attention.
How about if someone actually edits and actually reports the experience of doing so? You edited with no apparent problem, after which we had some nice discussions about LQ and "first worked with explosives" and so on. Why aren't you continuing? I think it's because you've become convinced you'll break some of the delicate furniture or knock over one of the rare Ming vases. Be bold! Edit! You'll see what to do! If you make a mistake, I'll be there to fix it and explain! You don't have to understand all the markup. The words are the words. If you want to change the words, change the words.
  • Perhaps you missed it among all the verbiage, but I took out all the extra linebreaks a while back, exactly because you, an average everyday editor, told me it would make it easier for you, and that convinced me. Nonetheless, if you have trouble visualizing the flow of text in the edit window, you may have to do your reading in the "Preview" part of the window, and jump down to the edit window when you want to make changes.
  • The pipes show the browser where it can break up a long word with a hyphen, if need be.
  • Re "why you have to link something in the article to a categorized source", actually I did answer it, but you may certainly be forgiven if you missed it in this long, long, long, long, long thread. Click here to be taken directly to it.
17:40, 17 August 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by EEng (talk • contribs)
Corinne, thanks all around, and I agree with all of what you said. EEng, I hope that you will take your time, and give some thought to that last section of my sandbox. I looked very carefully at the markup from Evolution, and I didn't need a seatbelt at all. It looked to me to be exactly like most well-sourced pages that I edit. I wouldn't have any difficulty editing that page (and I happen not to use WikiEd, just the plain vanilla edit window). But I'll say it again: I would have difficulty editing this page, and I have had that difficulty. I've many times opened the edit window of this page, to try test edits without saving them, and I really am speaking from a position of knowledge. I can understand, and be sympathetic to, your feeling of not seeing why I would say that, because you have put so much time and thought into this page that you are, indeed, fluent with it. But there is no reason for other editors who are here in good faith to be telling you these things, if we did not sincerely believe them. I continue to plan to open an RfA unless we are able to get consensus amongst ourselves. And if I do, it will bring more eyes here, and it's very likely that most of those editors will disagree with you. I'd actually much prefer that we focus, for the moment, on the referencing, as opposed to all of the page markup, and that we find a way to get to consensus about that referencing – and thereby make an RfC unnecessary. But the ball's in your court there. Please remember that I'm here in a spirit of good will, and please think about it carefully. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:46, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
"Seatbelt" referred only to the volume of text. EEng (talk) 04:35, 18 August 2015 (UTC)
EEng, thank you very much for taking the time to explain all those things to me. I know you had put some sentences together in edit mode so they would appear as paragraphs, but I didn't know you did that for the whole article (I guess I would have seen that if I had looked). I'm glad to know I can copy-edit even the paragraphs highlighted in gray, and that you'll be there to fix anything that goes wrong. I believe I had already gone through the whole article even before I joined the discussion, so there is nothing more for me to do. With regard to the reason for the links that go directly to a categorized list, I can certainly understand the benefit of not duplicating lists of sources unnecessarily. I think I will leave further discussion of reference mark-up to Tryptofish and other editors, but I will follow the discussion with interest. Corinne (talk) 23:05, 17 August 2015 (UTC)
No, don't go Corinne! You're like an Iowa voter -- everyone wants to win you over! (BTW, are you from S.D.? My brother lives there.) EEng (talk) 04:35, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

I'm not going anywhere! Thanks! No, I'm not from S.D. (I should say, regarding our long discussion, I'm quite impressed with anyone who can understand, use, and especially develop, any reference system.) Why did you add the "outdent" template with all those colons? Corinne (talk) 23:14, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Kicking sandbox in their faces

You don't need to keep assuring me of your good faith. I've never questioned it.

I've now looked at your sandbox. I'm not quite sure where you're going with this, but there's a fundamental problem, unless what I'm seeing was unintentional on your part: there are two sources that carry ref=For general audiences (Gage). If that's intentional, and meant to be part of the scheme, then you're dead in the water right there, because the effect of that is to generate the exact same anchor at two different points in the page, and that can never work‍—‌ the browser sees only the first instance of the anchor.

I think what you're trying to do is make it so that when the reader clicks "For general audiences", that will jump to the first (?) or maybe all (?) of the sources in that category, and "light it/them up". But there's no way that can work, because of the duplicate-anchor problem just mentioned. (In your sandbox, it works great, but only for the first of the two sources you have there in the "general" category.) At least, the way you're trying to do it can't work, and I can't think of any other way to do it either. Or am I misunderstanding what you're trying to do?

Also, I added a fourth demonstration, modifying your third. What it's meant to show is that there's nothing magic about (for example)

<sub>{{ranchor|For general audiences (Gage)}}</sub>

It does exactly the same thing as

[[#For general audiences (Gage)|For general audiences (Gage)]]

except that {ranchor} puts the link text in brackets, and in superscript, so that it looks like any other cite callout. That's why it's called "r anchor = reference to an anchor". (I'm assuming you know that code>[[#foo]] is a link to an anchor on the same page.)

It can actually jump to any anchor that happens to be on the page. For example, here's what you get if you code <sub>{{ranchor|Kicking sandbox in their faces}}</sub>: [Kicking sandbox in their faces]. Try clicking on it. EEng (talk) 04:35, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

  • [Post moved from elsewhere on page] I'll jump in here, since it is fairly close to "please take a look at my sandbox". The general idea of a list at the top of the references section is a good one. It needs a bit more work to move the affected citations into the reflist with the "other citations" and to link to them from each list item. I'm probably too busy at work to do anything myself for the next couple of days, but I can offer to do more over the weekend unless either of you want to take this further yourselves in the meantime... --Mirokado (talk) 18:29, 18 August 2015 (UTC)
Hey, Mirokado, thanks for joining us. Can you just clarify which of the sandbox mockups you're looking at, and (if you have the time) see if there's something you think I'm misunderstanding in my post just above? Otherwise, Tfish and I will press on until you can rejoin us. EEng (talk) 19:05, 18 August 2015 (UTC)
EEng, you are always welcome to play in my sandbox, any time at all, so thanks! (But please no kicking of sand in my face, boo-hoo.) And I'm glad that you don't question my good faith, and Corinne's, so the next step is for you to find a way to agree with us about our concerns about how difficult it can be to edit this page.
Now about the ways of formatting the references, yes I'm certainly familiar with using # and anchors (and see #Tryptofish for where I already pointed out that issue of multiple references!), and it certainly helps with the appearance of the bullet list at the top of the sandbox References sections. What that leaves us with is the problem that we both have noted: the difficulty of highlighting multiple references, as opposed to just the first one that one comes to. I cannot think of any way of doing that with # and anchors. But I'm made optimistic by what Mirokado has said. Now, I'll dive in way above my head: If I understand correctly (and I probably don't know what I'm talking about), the inner workings of ranchor are:
<sup class="reference nowrap">[[#{{{1}}}|[{{{1}}}]]]{{#if:{{{page|}}}|:{{{page}}}}}</sup>
I'm guessing that changing "sup" and "reference" to something else could accomplish much the same thing as the use of # in the bullet list does. Is there something to work with there? And I wonder whether there might be a clever way to modify those "1" numbers to something else and/or change some of those brackets, in such a way as to be able to highlight multiple sources simultaneously, and maybe even be able to click from the first highlighted source to the next one, successively. (And we wouldn't need anything about if:page.) Or maybe there's an alternative to putting ref="anchor name" into the Cite templates of the references. But I'll need someone more experienced with this stuff than I am, to figure out how to do it. Perhaps EEng or Mirokado can, and if so, that would be wonderful! Alternatively, I'd be happy to ask at Village Pump/Technical. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:25, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

All those inner workings of {rancher} are really the wrong end of things to be looking at‍—‌all that stuff is only about how the callout is formatted at the point the cite is made in the article text. reference nowrap makes it superscript, surrounded by brackets, etc.; #if optionally adds a : 123 -type page number, etc. Buried in there is the #, and that's really where the rubber meets the road: all this really is is a [[#foo]] link-to-anchor dressed up in fancy formatting.

So re "in such a way as to be able to highlight multiple sources simultaneously", the question isn't on the {rancher} or [[#foo]] end‍—‌these being the place where you jump from‍—‌it's on the anchor end, where you jump to. And here again we come to the problem I mentioned earlier. See, in any use of {cite} you can include a |ref= parameter, and that generates an anchor. (It really should have been called |anchor= ). But each {cite} is its own hermetically sealed capsule‍—‌one |ref=, one source. And that, in turn, leads to a fundamental failing of the {r}/{refn}/{reflist} machinery, which is that it gives you no way to control the order in which sources are listed at the end of the article‍—‌they just come out in the order they happened to be first used in the article. If there was a way to do that, then we would tell {reflist} to list them in the order of the categories we want, insert little headers ("For general readers") between the groups, and we'd be done.

But in fact there isn't a way to control the order (I've asked at VP for this feature to be added, and got shrugs) and thus Mirokado and I took a different approach: we invented our own {rancher} machinery that does let us control the order the sources are listed, and used that for the further-reading soruces, and left everything else ("Other sources cited") to be handled by the old {r}/{refn}/{reflist} machinery. That's why the further reading is in a fixed order (grouped the way we want them, and alphabetical within that). "Inventing our own machinery" sounds more radical than it is, because the {rancher} machinery was designed to be very much parallel to the {r}/{refn}/{reflist} machinery in terms of syntax.

Other than the ability to control the order in which the sources are listed, the major difference between {r}/{refn}/{reflist} and {ranchor} is that with {r}/{refn}/{reflist}, the callouts (the superscript [22] and so on) are automatically assigned, while with {ranchor} they are manually assigned i.e. [M2] or whatever. That's either an advantage or a disadvantage, depending on how you look at it. Automatic assignment is nice, but it means you have no control; manual assignment is more trouble, but you have control.

In summary:

{r}/{refn}/{reflist} {ranchor}
Can't control order in which sources are listed at end of article‍—‌accidental "random" order according to when first used in article Sources listed in order editors lay them out in special section of markup (can be grouped or alphabetized)
Superscript callouts e.g. [22] assigned automatically‍—‌convenient, but can't control callout assigned to each source Superscript callouts assigned manually e.g. [M2]‍—‌more trouble, but can be assigned e.g. to follow grouping of sources and their alpha order
Used for "Other sources cited" Used for "General readers, Young readers, Researchers"
Familiar to editors Frightens editors who have led sheltered lives‍—‌see below
Editor menaced by unfamiliar citation markup
This markup be witchcraft!

Maybe I've drifted off the topic, which was what you're trying to do in your sandbox, but maybe this will help you understand the technical milieu we're working in. Perhaps Mirokado sees something in your sandbox I'm missing, which will point toward a way to develop it further. EEng (talk) 03:42, 19 August 2015 (UTC) Mirokado, feel free to modify/fix/edit/expand the above to improve the exposition.

EEng, I've been giving this situation a lot of thought, probably way more than it deserves, but I think that I have to agree with what you are saying about the technical editing aspects of this. On the other hand, although your two images are amusing, and I understand that you are presenting them in a spirit of good humor, I want to point something out to you. Earlier, I asked you to recognize that I (and Corinne) are talking to you in good faith when we talk about the difficulty of editing the page, and you replied by reassuring me that you have never questioned my good faith. Well, images caricaturing editors who find the page difficult to edit may not be questioning good faith, but they do seem to be caricatures. You are not hearing me, if you do not understand that the concerns you are hearing on this talk page are not reducible to caricature. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:44, 19 August 2015 (UTC)

Oh, lighten up‍—‌this from the man who made this edit? EEng (talk) 03:46, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
There's a place for humor, and a place where it is inappropriate. I'm capable of keeping two different ideas in my head simultaneously: that you and I can edit together as Wiki-friends, and that you show bad judgment when you caricature editors who disagree with you. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:06, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
Also, I'm a fish, not a man. I'm enjoying watching you call me a man, and Corinne calling me she, and I'm not telling. There's an oozer-boxen on my user page for anyone who cares, and beyond that, I've got nothing more to say about it. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:15, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
Where did I call you a "she"? I may have used "s/he", which is "she" and "he" combined, as in "either-or". Anyway, I see you've made a lot of progress since I left. Well, it looks like it anyway. I really like the color idea. I like the soft colors that Tryptofish used, below. I think that is so attractive that it may catch on for all of Wikipedia's articles. Corinne (talk) 23:46, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
[24]. No big deal to me, either way. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:50, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Version 4.0 (color tags for categorization of sources)

I'm not going to tell anyone to fasten their seatbelts, but I would like editors to take a look at a new idea in my sandbox, at User:Tryptofish/sandbox#Fourth version. Insofar as I can tell, EEng is correct that it's a losing battle to try to get the numbering of references to change, or to try to use anchors to highlight all of the references in a given category. So I've tried to come up with an alternative approach to categorizing the sources, that would be immediately visible to readers at the top of the References section, and would visibly highlight every source within each category, but that would also allow us to have a single list of references without any fancy numbering. I came up with using template:fontcolor with the default value for the font itself, but with specified background colors. We have four source categories, and per Help:Using colours#Wikipedia, the four colors I selected are the four that are agreed to for use on the Main Page – so I'm working within some well-established boundaries of consensus for which colors to use. (The codes for the four colors are listed at the top of my sandbox.)

I don't know how the rest of you feel about the colors, but you'll tell me. What is in my sandbox looks more rainbow-y than it will look on the page, because on the page, the categorized sources will be interspersed amongst the uncategorized ones. I simply made the bullet list at the top of the References in plain font (no linking or anchoring), but with the backgrounds as a key. Any reader who looks at the References on the page will see it right away. Then for each source, I enclosed the "cite book", or whatever sourcing template was used, with the fontcolor template corresponding to the category. This makes it possible to use < ref > for all of the sources in the reference list. And any editor wanting to add a new uncategorized source can just add it, and it will have the default background like all the other uncategorized ones (and it isn't too difficult for someone to copy and past the fontcolors if they want to do more categorizing). --Tryptofish (talk) 00:00, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

PS: If we decide that we don't like background colors, then colored borders would be an alternative. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:15, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

PPS: Or, just apply the background to the beginning of the reference, such as just to "Macmillan, Malcolm B. (September 2008)", instead of encasing the entire reference with it. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:50, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Now this is a really promising idea. Here are two more extensive mockups (in two difference color schemes), combining text tags and color, since information must never be transmitted through color only (WP:COLOR):

Version 4.1

Extended content

Blah[1] blah[2] blah[3] blah[4] blah[5] blah[6] blah[7] blah[8] blah[9] blahCite error: There are <ref> tags on this page without content in them (see the help page)..

Sources
Certain references are designated as further reading:
 · For general audiences (Gage)
 · For general audiences (portraits)
 · For young readers
 · For researchers and specialists

References

  1. ^ American Medical Association (1850). Report of the Standing Committee on Surgery. p. 345. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help) Open access icon
  2. ^ Harlow, John Martyn (1868). "Recovery from the Passage of an Iron Bar through the Head" (PDF). Publications of the Massachusetts Medical Society. 2: 327–47. Reprinted as Recovery from the Passage of an Iron Bar through the Head (David Clapp & Son, 1869). 22 pages.
    Open access icon For general audiences (Gage)
  3. ^ Benderly, Beryl Lieff (September 2012). "Psychology's tall tales". gradPSYCH. American Psychological Association: 20. Open access icon
  4. ^ Fleischman, J. (2002). Phineas Gage: A Gruesome but True Story About Brain Science. ISBN 0-618-05252-6.
    Open access icon For young readers
  5. ^ "A most remarkable case". American Phrenological Journal and Repository of Science, Literature, and General Intelligence. 13 (4). Fowler & Wells. p. 89, col. 3. April 1851. Open access icon
  6. ^ Twomey, S. (January 2010). "Finding Phineas". Smithsonian. 40 (10): 8–10.
    Open access icon For general audiences (portraits)
  7. ^ Volume 3: Lone Mountain register, 1850–1862, Halsted N. Gray – Carew & English Funeral Home Records (SFH 38), San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library. p. 285.
  8. ^ Barker, F. G. II (1995). "Phineas among the phrenologists: the American crowbar case and nineteenth-century theories of cerebral localization" (PDF). Journal of Neurosurgery. 82 (4): 672–82. doi:10.3171/jns.1995.82.4.0672. PMID 7897537.
    Open access icon For researchers and specialists
  9. ^ "Bibliographical Notice". Boston Medical & Surgical Journal. 3 n.s. (7): 116–7. March 18, 1869.

Version 4.2

Extended content

Blah[1] blah[2] blah[3] blah[4] blah[5] blah[6] blah[7] blah[8] blah[9] blahCite error: There are <ref> tags on this page without content in them (see the help page)..

Sources
Certain references are designated as further reading:
 · For general audiences (Gage)
 · For general audiences (portraits)
 · For young readers
 · For researchers and specialists

References

  1. ^ American Medical Association (1850). Report of the Standing Committee on Surgery. p. 345. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help) Open access icon
  2. ^ Harlow, John Martyn (1868). "Recovery from the Passage of an Iron Bar through the Head" (PDF). Publications of the Massachusetts Medical Society. 2: 327–47. Reprinted as Recovery from the Passage of an Iron Bar through the Head (David Clapp & Son, 1869). 22 pages.
    Open access icon For general audiences (Gage)
  3. ^ Benderly, Beryl Lieff (September 2012). "Psychology's tall tales". gradPSYCH. American Psychological Association: 20. Open access icon
  4. ^ Fleischman, J. (2002). Phineas Gage: A Gruesome but True Story About Brain Science. ISBN 0-618-05252-6.
    Open access icon For young readers
  5. ^ "A most remarkable case". American Phrenological Journal and Repository of Science, Literature, and General Intelligence. 13 (4). Fowler & Wells. p. 89, col. 3. April 1851. Open access icon
  6. ^ Twomey, S. (January 2010). "Finding Phineas". Smithsonian. 40 (10): 8–10.
    Open access icon For general audiences (portraits)
  7. ^ Volume 3: Lone Mountain register, 1850–1862, Halsted N. Gray – Carew & English Funeral Home Records (SFH 38), San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library. p. 285.
  8. ^ Barker, F. G. II (1995). "Phineas among the phrenologists: the American crowbar case and nineteenth-century theories of cerebral localization" (PDF). Journal of Neurosurgery. 82 (4): 672–82. doi:10.3171/jns.1995.82.4.0672. PMID 7897537.
    Open access icon For researchers and specialists
  9. ^ "Bibliographical Notice". Boston Medical & Surgical Journal. 3 n.s. (7): 116–7. March 18, 1869.

Since there's just a strip of color in each entry (not the whole entry) V4.2 uses more stark colors, and I've forced that strip to always be on its own line so they all line up down the column.

Much as I'd hate to mothball {ranchor}, this might do it. But I think it will depend on how it looks with all 120 sources, when the colored entries are more scattered. EEng (talk) 03:35, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

You actually said it is "a really promising idea"! Whoopee! Mothballing ranchor or not, at least we can mothball rancor. Now I'm probably not going to have to drag you through an RfC after all. Tryptofish does an obnoxious victory dance. Oh, and "blah, blah, blah" is a very good paraphrase of the page. (OK, now that's just giddy.)
Your point about accessibility, and using text along with color, is a very good one, and I agree. It also lends itself very well to being used by other editors who come new to the page. So I agree that doing it with tags at the end of each reference is a better way to go. Let's continue to work with that.
I have some concerns about using the more saturated colors, as in 4.2, relative to 4.1. With the darker colors, there is less contrast of the text, making it more difficult to read. On the other hand, we don't have to go all the way as pastel as 4.1. Below, I'm showing how it looks when one shade darker than 4.1, and that should make references easy to find within the list. Also, I'll continue to put in a plug for basing the color choices on those at the Main Page. It will tend to ward off complaints from drive-by editors: tell them it's based on the Main Page, and it becomes awkward for them to complain.
As I've been thinking further about it, I'd like to tweak the order in which the colors are used. Also, I'm not seeing a reason to create a Sources section, with a References section within it. So my current preference for the top of the section would look like:
Extended content
References
Some references are designated as further reading:
  • For general audiences (Gage)
  • For general audiences (portraits)
  • For young readers
  • For researchers and specialists
--Tryptofish (talk) 21:51, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
These are the colors I like. Very, very good. By the way, when you say "portraits", do you mean actual paintings? Because a portrait can be formed with words, too. Corinne (talk) 23:49, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
It's EEng's terms, not mine, but Phineas Gage#Portraits. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:53, 20 August 2015 (UTC)
Oh, yes, now I remember that section. I'm curious as to why the references for that section have to have their own section in the categorized list. Corinne (talk) 00:30, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
That's a very good point. I imagine that, under the existing page format, it made sense not to have an overly long section of For general audiences, so it was subdivided into two groups. But if we implement this new approach, that issue becomes moot. In that regard, I'll modify what I just said as:
References
Some references are designated as further reading:
  • For general audiences
  • For young readers
  • For researchers and specialists
--Tryptofish (talk) 00:44, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
I'm happy with three groups. EEng (talk) 02:39, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
And I'm happy that you're happy. --Tryptofish (talk) 02:59, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

Version 4.3

Using Tfish's "one shade darker". Also removed References, which was an accident.

Extended content

Blah[1] blah[2] blah[3] blah[4] blah[5] blah[6] blah[7] blah[8] blah[9] blahCite error: There are <ref> tags on this page without content in them (see the help page)..

Sources
Certain sources are designated as further reading:
 · For general audiences
 · For young readers
 · For researchers and specialists
  1. ^ American Medical Association (1850). Report of the Standing Committee on Surgery. p. 345. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help) Open access icon
  2. ^ Harlow, John Martyn (1868). "Recovery from the Passage of an Iron Bar through the Head" (PDF). Publications of the Massachusetts Medical Society. 2: 327–47. Reprinted as Recovery from the Passage of an Iron Bar through the Head (David Clapp & Son, 1869). 22 pages.
    Open access icon For general audiences
  3. ^ Benderly, Beryl Lieff (September 2012). "Psychology's tall tales". gradPSYCH. American Psychological Association: 20. Open access icon
  4. ^ Fleischman, J. (2002). Phineas Gage: A Gruesome but True Story About Brain Science. ISBN 0-618-05252-6.
    Open access icon For young readers
  5. ^ "A most remarkable case". American Phrenological Journal and Repository of Science, Literature, and General Intelligence. 13 (4). Fowler & Wells. p. 89, col. 3. April 1851. Open access icon
  6. ^ Twomey, S. (January 2010). "Finding Phineas". Smithsonian. 40 (10): 8–10.
    Open access icon For general audiences
  7. ^ Volume 3: Lone Mountain register, 1850–1862, Halsted N. Gray – Carew & English Funeral Home Records (SFH 38), San Francisco History Center, San Francisco Public Library. p. 285.
  8. ^ Barker, F. G. II (1995). "Phineas among the phrenologists: the American crowbar case and nineteenth-century theories of cerebral localization" (PDF). Journal of Neurosurgery. 82 (4): 672–82. doi:10.3171/jns.1995.82.4.0672. PMID 7897537.
    Open access icon For researchers and specialists
  9. ^ "Bibliographical Notice". Boston Medical & Surgical Journal. 3 n.s. (7): 116–7. March 18, 1869.

At this point the exact colors aren't the central issue--we can always adjust those. (There's a thingamajig somewhere for checking the readability of text color C1 against background C2. I'd bet Mirokado is an expert on that.) I think the next step is to mock up the whole ref section. I'd also like to see what it looks like with some kind of bordering (left and right only, I think, not all four sides -- so essentially it will be a "bar" down the left and right -- or maybe just the left?); but I fear that will involve some ugly markup. EEng (talk) 02:39, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

This is looking very good to me. But I'm curious why "Sources" and not "References"? It's References on the page now. Also, please: "Certain Some sources are designated as further reading:". One way to do those left and/or right borders without too much complication is to use the character | from the Special characters→Symbols menu, or ǁ or ǀ from Special characters→IPA, and fontcolor it as desired. --Tryptofish (talk) 03:12, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
PS: About those borders, it would probably be best to stick with the Main Page colors, and thus use Help:Using colours#Wikipedia, the colors given for borders on the right-hand side. --Tryptofish (talk) 03:16, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
Sources, references, whatever. Probably References. (Astonishingly, MOS doesn't care: 'Editors may use any section title that they choose. The most frequent choice is "References"; other articles use "Notes", "Footnotes", or "Works cited"...' Can't use | for the borders because there's no way to know where the linewraps will be. I think this would require one of the zillions of box or quote templates, or maybe a fake table, with various parameters set to color the border on certain sides. As always Mirokado would be the man for that. Meanwhile I"m gathering inspiration to implement V4.3 on the full article. EEng (talk) 03:27, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
Yes, you are right. Maybe it's best to just forgo the borders. Please don't forget Certain Some. I wish you abundant inspiration! --Tryptofish (talk) 03:36, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
Certain some what? EEng (talk) 03:43, 21 August 2015 (UTC)
"Certain Some sources are designated as further reading:". --Tryptofish (talk) 20:30, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

More thoughts

👍 Like Thank you! I think that the new References section looks great! I made a minor tweak in the sandbox version, by adding a small indent. It seems to me that readers will have no problem finding the sources they want to find. At some point, as this version moves onto the page, I would request that the main-text citations of these references be converted entirely to < ref >, and consequently that all the reference markup in the References section be removed. Thus, the References section would consist of the "key" at the top, and then "reflist|30em", and nothing more. Within the main text, you can use "ref name=" for the selected references, because they are cited repeatedly: for example, the current reference M1 would be cited as "< ref name=M1 >". --Tryptofish (talk) 23:00, 21 August 2015 (UTC)

I'm sorry, let me make sure I understand. You want to change
Code example E1
Gage was strong{{r|H|p=5}} according to his doctor.
to
Code example E2
Gage was strong<ref name=H/>{{rp|5}} according to his doctor.
(in the case of sources used repeatedly), or change
Code example E3
Some said Gage was a nice guy.{{r|nice|p=62}} Others said he was a mean{{r|mean|p=73}} and nasty{{r|nasty|p=238}} person.
to
Code example E4
Some said Gage was a nice guy.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|last=Moffat |first=Gregory K. |year=2012 |page=44 |title=Fundamentals of Aggression|editor-last=Browne-Miller |editor-first=Angela |work=Violence and Abuse in Society: Understanding a Global Crisis|publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-0-313-38276-5 |url=http://books.google.com/books?id=A-GXM9MFaB4C&pg=PA44}}</ref>{{rp|62}} Others said he was a mean<ref>{{cite book|last=Tow |first=Peter Macdonald |year=1955 |location=London, New York |publisher=Oxford University Press|title=Personality changes following frontal leucotomy: a clinical and experimental study of the functions of the frontal lobes in man. With a foreword by Sir Russell Brain}}</ref>{{rp|73}} and nasty<ref>{{refn |name=yakovlev |{{cite journal|title=The "Crowbar Skull" and Mementoes of "Phrenological Hours"|pages=19{{ndash}}24 |work=Harvard Medical Alumni Bulletin|volume=33 |date=October 1958 |number=1 |last=Yakovlev |first=Paul I.|url=http://archive.org/stream/harvardmedicalal33harv/harvardmedicalal33harv_djvu.txt}}</ref>{{rp|238}} person.
in the case of sources used just once? Isn't your goal to make the article easier to edit? EEng (talk) 00:16, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
I guess I spoke too soon, when I thanked you at your user talk for working with me to find a good outcome. I think I've been saying all along what I propose here, so there is no reason for you to act like you have to ask me. Nor should you be caricaturing what I said, by presenting misleading representations of what the edit windows would look like. The first example, with "Gage was strong according to his doctor", is correct. Now, let me present correctly what I actually said, about the second example:
Change:
Code example T3
Some said Gage was a nice guy.{{r|nice|p=62}} Others said he was a mean{{r|mean|p=73}} and nasty{{r|nasty|p=238}} person.
References
{{Reflist |30em |refs=
{{refn|name=nice|{{cite encyclopedia|last=Moffat |first=Gregory K. |year=2012 |page=44 |title=Fundamentals of Aggression|editor-last=Browne-Miller |editor-first=Angela |work=Violence and Abuse in Society: Understanding a Global Crisis|publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-0-313-38276-5 |url=http://books.google.com/books?id=A-GXM9MFaB4C&pg=PA44}}}}
{{refn|name=mean|{{cite book|last=Tow |first=Peter Macdonald |year=1955 |location=London, New York |publisher=Oxford University Press|title=Personality changes following frontal leucotomy: a clinical and experimental study of the functions of the frontal lobes in man. With a foreword by Sir Russell Brain}}}}
{{refn|name=nasty|{{cite journal|title=The "Crowbar Skull" and Mementoes of "Phrenological Hours"|pages=19{{ndash}}24 |work=Harvard Medical Alumni Bulletin|volume=33 |date=October 1958 |number=1 |last=Yakovlev |first=Paul I.|url=http://archive.org/stream/harvardmedicalal33harv/harvardmedicalal33harv_djvu.txt}}}}
to:
Code example T4
Some said Gage was a nice guy.<ref name=nice>
{{cite encyclopedia|last=Moffat |first=Gregory K. |year=2012 |page=44 |title=Fundamentals of Aggression|editor-last=Browne-Miller |editor-first=Angela |work=Violence and Abuse in Society: Understanding a Global Crisis|publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-0-313-38276-5 |url=http://books.google.com/books?id=A-GXM9MFaB4C&pg=PA44}}</ref>{{rp|62}} Others said he was a mean<ref name=mean>
{{cite book|last=Tow |first=Peter Macdonald |year=1955 |location=London, New York |publisher=Oxford University Press|title=Personality changes following frontal leucotomy: a clinical and experimental study of the functions of the frontal lobes in man. With a foreword by Sir Russell Brain}}</ref>{{rp|73}} and nasty<ref name=nasty>
{{cite journal|title=The "Crowbar Skull" and Mementoes of "Phrenological Hours"|pages=19{{ndash}}24 |work=Harvard Medical Alumni Bulletin|volume=33 |date=October 1958 |number=1 |last=Yakovlev |first=Paul I.|url=http://archive.org/stream/harvardmedicalal33harv/harvardmedicalal33harv_djvu.txt}}</ref>{{rp|238}} person.
References
{{Reflist|30em}}
And, importantly, the reference section is no more than that, much unlike the unchanged version above. I remember when you made the "seatbelt" comment about the passage from Evolution, but I hope that you, in turn, remember what Corinne and I said to you in response. Even though those citations take up space in the main text in the edit window, and the display on this talk page draws attention to the space that they take up, particularly because you chose an unrepresentative example that is a single sentence with three callouts interspersed through it, this is something that happens on well-sourced pages all over Wikipedia, and editors are well-accustomed to it. And if you don't want to take my word on it, I would still be happy to have an RfC about it.
Then, when a new editor wants to add more material, all they have to add is:
Code example T5
Various authors have analyzed Gage's personality, and found that he had a hole in his head.<ref name=nice/><ref name=mean/><ref name=nasty/>
--Tryptofish (talk) 20:03, 22 August 2015 (UTC)

You didn't speak too soon, but as so often before you've flashed to anger just because I'm trying to clarify what you seem to think is obvious, when in fact what you're saying has contradictions and vagaries of which you're not even aware. This conversation has turned suddenly bizarre, in so many ways:

  • I had no idea you wanted anything like this; how would I?
  • There's nothing misleading about my examples. The idea is to make the article easier to edit, which 90% of the time means minor changes to wording and so on (what Corinne was most concerned about, BTW) and so I focused on what the edit window looks like when doing that. My point was simply that with WP:LDRHOW ("list-defined references"), article text isn't interrupted by bulky cites, but corralled separately elsewhere. You, I, and everyone else knows that the cites have to be somewhere; do you really think I was trying to "mislead" by not actually showing them in their corral? And it doesn't matter whether the text is long or short: full-cites-with-templates-and-all drown out text wherever they appear, and that's worth avoiding no matter how often or seldom it happens.
  • "And, importantly, the reference section is no more than that, much unlike the unchanged version above." Why is that important, or even desirable? Like it says at WP:LDRHOW, list-defined references were "implemented in September 2009 as a way to make referencing articles easier and with less clutter"; old ways change slowly, so it's not surprising you don't see them used much. So what? For extensive articles it clearly makes the markup less cluttered. (And though they ease things for later editors‍—‌which I thought was your goal‍—‌they're more trouble for the initial editor, and that's another reason you don't see them much.)
Do you really worship the tyranny of the majority over what should be the true order of priorities: first and foremoest, what the reader sees; second, editor convenience; and (distant) third, what happens to exist in the vast majority of underdeveloped, half-baked articles?
  • The only difference between my E4 and your T4 is that you've put back some of the internal, non-reader-visible linebreaks which Corinne wanted me to take out, and which you thanked me for taking out! Will you make up your mind?
  • As for your T5, your code omits the page numbers; it should read:
Code example T5X
Various authors have analyzed Gage's personality, and found that he had a hole in his head.<ref name=nice/>{{rp|62}}<ref name=mean/>{{rp|73}}<ref name=nasty/>{{rp|238}}
Or one could code:
Code example E5
Various authors have analyzed Gage's personality, and found that he had a hole in his head.{{r|nice|p=62}}{{r|mean|p=73}}{{r|nasty|p=238}}
Anyway, I don't get your statement that under your proposal "when a new editor wants to add more material, all they have to add is" T5T5x, since both T5x and E5 work under the current system (list-defined references), and both T5x and E5 work under your proposal (non-list-defined references).
Mirokado, can you lend a hand here, please? EEng (talk) 23:21, 22 August 2015 (UTC)
If I appear angry (and it's not so much anger as exhaustion and exasperation), it's because you keep asking for my advice and then arguing with me over every last detail of it. Please let me draw your attention to what Corinne and I already told you at #seatbelt. I'll make this very simple: I'm in favor of using <ref></ref> to cite sources, consistently throughout this page. Period. The need to do anything different went away when we, apparently, reached consensus about a way to no longer divide the References section into subsections. And I'll be happy to have an RfC over it. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:13, 23 August 2015 (UTC)
Side discussion between EEng and me, more about editors than about the content of the page. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:43, 25 August 2015 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Tfish, years ago I asked for your help in dealing with an editor-on-a-mission who felt it his calling to rework the article according to his crackpot ideas. I feel you were way too indulgent of his nonsensical self-certainty, but your participation was essential nonetheless to bringing that insanity under control. Since then, you've continued to participate, which is of course fine, but I don't recall specifically asking you to, other than the general encouragement and thanks all good editors give to others. And your presence has been appreciated; there have been many small items on which we've worked together to find good solutions‍—‌wording, layout and image placement, all the little unglamorous things that need to be attended to for an article to improve. But no, I haven't been asking you here over and over, and even if I had been, it would be canvassing if I invited someone I knew would agree with me all the time. EEng (talk) 02:18, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
No, that's rewriting history, just as you did when you claimed utter surprise at my being interested in < ref >. You posted numerous "bumps" on this talk. And within days of my return to Wikipedia after my mother's death you came to my talk page and asked me to return here. I don't think I was any more indulgent of that other editor than I am indulgent of you, which means that I've been pretty indulgent of you both. Now, that said, I'm glad to hear you say that my "presence has been appreciated". I thank you for that, and I ask you to please continue to keep that in mind. I, in turn, respect you too. And a big part of what keeps me from taking this whole stinking mess off of my watchlist is that I care about you not getting sanctioned again. I worry that you will anger another editor (not me) and get topic banned from this page. Whether you believe it or not, it is a real danger. I'm trying to prevent that from happening. And you are not making it easy for me. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:23, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
  • Well, since you insist on the point, the entirety of my messages to you after your bereavement (and it pains me to even remind you of it again) was this [26]:
Not to press, but if you'll give your assent to the resolutions of issues #A4, A5, A6a, and A7, plus the discussion at [link] (which should be easy) then the only things left will be [link]. For both of those the ball's in your court, and I'm not sure you still care about them. After that we're done!
So yes, I asked you to come back (and hesitated to do even that, given your situation) but only because I wanted a definitive close to the issues I listed, lest you-know-who claim I took advantage of your absence to close them myself, or whatever might pop into his WP:CIR head. That you stayed on for new issues was your own choice. Again, I wouldn't be saying this except that you said I "keep asking for [your] advice". Your advice is valued, even if I often disagree, but if you don't like giving it anymore, I'm not begging for it.
  • I got sanctioned? Nuh-uh. I got blocked because a self-satisfied roving enforcer of his personal preferences, who happened to be an admin, didn't like being called a self-satisfied roving enforcer of his personal preferences. That's not being sanctioned, it's becoming the target of an abusive admin anguished by being confronted by the following description of himself:
One area the hit and run editor gets involved in is the formatting ... The quality of work has increased in some areas, which makes it harder to contribute without good knowledge in the subject matter and sources. Fiddling with the formatting seems to be a suitable alternative passtime. [27]
I wish you'd stop bringing this up, because every time you do I have to explain it all over again lest passeersby think I actually got "sanctioned" for doing something wrong, which I didn't.
  • Please don't feel you need to stick around to keep me out of trouble. If you're worried about me getting topic-banned (which can happen to just about anyone not prepared to cower on demand, WP being full of people trying to prove something) then please just promise me the following: if called to testify about what you've seen here over the years, answer fully and honestly. (I'd expect nothing less from you, so this is just to make clear I don't feel I need more.) Except where one sees, now and then, the occasional retraction or apology, I stand by everything I've done here and elsewhere, and fear no scrutiny as long as its full and fair. I then have no doubt that level heads such as these will prevail:
[28] [many other editors] have acted like bulls running through this china-shop, doing mass-/automated-'cleanups', without first discussing the issue on the talk page, or doing so in an aggressive fait accompli manner.
[29] Their sole contribution appears to be undoing EEng's formatting style to substitute their own preference and its really for no benefit to the article. I dunno guys, there are plenty of really badly formatted articles out there but this isn't one of them. It may be idiosyncratic but it works and it works well - the article looks fantastic in WikiWand. I think some people are forgetting that wikipedia is first and foremost an exercise in writing an encyclopedia. So if your only interest is in formatting it "differently" I would suggest you find something better to do - like writing.
[30] If this edit be at all typical, we have substantial violations of WP:CITEVAR going on, among other things — people attempting to take the article away from the standardised citation style used by its major author. Let me remind you that not all citation standards use the {{ndash}}, among other things (example), and that the placement of {{shy}} permits the article to be formatted like a professional print publication. In real life, when amateurs tell professionals that they're right and that the professionals are wrong, without solid factual evidence, they get ignored and forced out of the way if necessary. Kindly step aside and stop preventing this professional from permitting this article to be written to a professional standard.
Tfish, I am not lumping you with the amateurs‍—‌far from it. But you worry too much about placating them. (The last quote above is precisely mirrored by Mirokado's post below).
EEng (talk) 05:50, 25 August 2015 (UTC)
OK, so be it. But based upon what I'm seeing here, please let me tell you honestly what "if called to testify about what you've seen here over the years, answer fully and honestly" means to me. I'd have to say that you have shown more WP:OWN and WP:IDHT than I would like. I've spent more effort placating you than I have "placating" the other editors. And I don't see it as me staying on for new issues. You asked me here to make sure that the complaints by Chris had been adequately addressed, so that others in the future would not be concerned that you had failed to consider them. Although issues that I've raised subsequently have not actually come off of the list of things Chris said explicitly, I believe that they are logical consequences of the complaints that he and others have made. As long as you continue to resist what I have suggested, you remain vulnerable to criticisms of OWNership. I think your characterization of your block history would boomerang if you said it publicly. Sorry, but that's me being full and honest. I'm hatting this out of consideration for you, but please feel free to reply inside the "hat" or at my user talk. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:43, 25 August 2015 (UTC)
  • Being blocked by an admin who can't stomach criticism of his own immaturity, or for labeling a chronic liar a liar, is no shame.
  • I'm afraid I must insist on distinguishing between the actual intelligible content of you-know-who's word salads, and anything you might kindly have read into them in order to give them intelligibility. We've dealt with and closed the former, which was a critical goal in my mind, to get that nonsense off the talk page. Your concerns, though possibly inspired during your reading of his LSD trips (though this in no way prejudices them in my mind) are separate.
  • When people like this [31] show up to make OWN and IDHT accusations, I'm not worried.
  • You I'm happy to work with, but when I (and Mirokado too, don't forget) resist your suggestions because we think they reduce the quality of the article, that's not OWN or IDHT.

EEng (talk) 06:27, 26 August 2015 (UTC)

And I'm happy to work with you (and Mirokado) too – and I both like you and respect you, which, were it not the case, I would have been outa here long ago. Despite what you say you think, I really have not been placating or indulging the other editors who have come to this page. I've just listened to them civily, and agreed with them some of the time. But I really am placating and indulging you, to great lengths that will come abruptly to an end in the event that a new dispute emerges in the future. I will put the best interests of this page ahead of your best interests when that day arrives. As much as I like editing with you, I find that you have an odd lack of self-awareness. Perhaps my efforts to try to get you to recognize that is a lost cause. I fully agree that when you and Mirokado have different opinions than mine (and Corinne, and Vsmith), that's not OWN or IDHT. But when it gets to be a rigid disagreement, and when you revise history to make it fit a nice picture of what has happened, it gets to feel like you are standing at the "door" of this page like a guard, not merely like an editor with high standards. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:18, 26 August 2015 (UTC)
Now can we get back to talking about what's best for the article, please? EEng (talk) 03:46, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
What I see here goes beyond stewardship. And if you want me to stop placating, so I will. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:39, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
Tryptofish, you appear now to be requesting that the referencing style be changed so that the citations are embedded in the source instead of defined in the reference list. You also again say you will start an RFC unless you get your way. This change has as far as I know never been mentioned before and I certainly will not agree to it (of course if a change is forced on us by the community as a whole I will, as you correctly point out, have no choice). The community decided long ago not to support contested arbitrary changes to referencing style since that would lead to substantial article instability. We have sfn-lovers and sfn-haters and there have been edit wars and ill-natured talk-page spats over that issue. We have people who prefer cs1 to cs2, or cs2 to cs1, for various reasons. We have no-citation-templates-at-all-they-are-too-confusing supporters and always-use-citation-templates-for-the-metadata supporters, and heaven knows what other kind of Wikipedia-would-be-much-better-if-only-everyone-did-it-my-way editors. Using list-defined references or not is another of those arbitrary preference things where there are arguments both for and against and it is well known that people won't agree about the relative merits of the arguments. In cases where the active editors don't agree to a change (and of course sometimes they do) the decision is likely to be to leave the article as it is. So I am confident that an RFC to move citations from the list to the article body would fail.
In this particular case, an awful lot of the half-a-megabyte or whatever of dicussion over the past year or so has been about removing clutter from the article source. It is obvious from the example you give above that we would clutter the source further by embedding the full citation definitions in the body of the article. --Mirokado (talk) 20:43, 23 August 2015 (UTC)
This isn't about me "getting my way". Please look carefully, both of you actually, at what I have been saying all along as we have discussed the "color" idea, and previous suggestions that I have made, about referencing. I've been saying that a big part of the reason that I wanted to do away with the division of the References section into subsections based on categories was that I felt that it would be good for the page to switch to "ref" referencing. And I understand what Corinne and Vsmith have been saying as agreeing with me about it. No one who has been paying attention should be acting surprised now because I am continuing to recommend it. But, that said, I'm about to suggest a possible way of peacemaking. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:53, 23 August 2015 (UTC)
Looking back, I do see that you said "If we do X, all referencing could be via < ref>". But that was always in the context of junking the {ranchor} system so that all referencing could the done via the normal, default referencing system. However (and here's the rub is) you seem to think "normal default referencing" has to mean use of < ref>; to me and to Mirokado (and anyone else who's seen a wide variety of reference formats and syntaxes) it could mean use of < ref> or {r} or any of several other trivially different (syntactically) ways of getting the same result: one big unordered pile of refs with [23]-type callouts, making no use of the {ranchor} system of manual ordering (reader-level groups etc.) with manually-assigned [M1]-type callouts. It would never have occurred to us that you literally were insisting on < ref>, to the exclusion of {r} or other syntax.
And why would it? It's one thing to junk {ranchor} and go to the colors and so on, which could be done just as well using {r} or < ref>. It's quite a different thing, and a completely independent question, to change the very compact and easy (to read, to type...) {{r|smith|p=55}} to the visually intrusive and keyboard-acrobatic <ref name=smith/>{{rp|55}}.
You don't seem to have absorbed, or at least acknowledged, that the {{rp|55}} will need to be tacked on to each < ref> under your proposal‍—‌or will you now be urging the elimination of the page numbers, too, in the name of project-wide markup consistency? This is exactly the sort of thing I meant when I talked earlier of "what you seem to think is obvious, when in fact what you're saying has contradictions and vagaries of which you're not even aware."
Apparently, since only 5000 (0.1%) of English WP articles use {r}, it shouldn't be used because it's unfamiliar to a lot of editors. OK, so we switch to < ref>. But < ref> has no way of showing the : 55 -style page numbers, so for that we'll tack {rp} onto each < ref>, as already mentioned. But only 0.4% of articles use {rp}, so that's too unfamiliar too. OK, then I guess we'll not use < ref> after all, and switch to {sfn} for everything‍—‌everyone knows about {sfn}, right? Well, actually, only about 1% of articles use {sfn} either, so that's a no-go too? Well, we'll just go back to plain < ref>, like 99% of articles, and forget the page numbers, like 99% of articles...
Above you say, "...a big part of the reason that I wanted to do away with the division of the References section into subsections based on categories was that I felt that it would be good for the page to switch to 'ref' referencing." Apparently, no matter what might be best for readers of a given article, you're willing to select what the reader sees by the principle that the markup of all articles should look the same. I consider that crazy. Your priorities are mixed up. What the readers sees comes first.
EEng (talk) 02:18, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
I'm going to try to respond point by point.
Well, at least I'm glad that I don't have to show you diffs of all the previous times that I talked about < ref >. Yes, I said that over and over, indeed. Apparently, you and maybe Mirokado read what I plainly said, and understood it to mean something other than what I intended, because you saw it through the lens of your own experiences with this page. Please think about what that means. It follows that there are a lot of editors who see it through the lens that I use, and not all of us are drive-by cranks. Yes, part of what I was thinking was about removing the need for ranchor, but I also made it very clear that ranchor was one part of a much larger sum of what I see as complications that I recommend simplifying.
Where you contrast {{r|smith|p=55}} with <ref name=smith/>{{rp|55}}, I honestly disagree. I don't think that the latter is more difficult to read in the edit window or to type. I'm just fine with rp for the page numbers. I'm unpleasantly surprised to see anyone regard the difference as a contentious matter.
Instead of speculating about what I have or have not absorbed or will or will not decide to raise as issues in the future, I'd like to say it, as clearly as I can. (And if you are worried about what I might advocate in the future, please just ask me. I'm not here with some kind of evil hidden agenda.) I strongly support this page's provision of specific page numbers. It's a feature, not a bug. I see many other pages where editors add a "page number needed" tag after a citation, and I consider the sourcing here to be very good in this regard. I cannot imagine me advocating for removal of page numbers. I cannot imagine me agreeing with some proposal by a future editor to remove them. I expect to be a consistent defender of page numbers. I'm fine with the rp template, as I already said just above. About sfn, it's not a fighting issue for me, but I agree with you that sfn would be less desirable than what we get with either r and p= or with rp, so I am not going to suddenly turn into an advocate for sfn. So: you can now rest assured that I support having the page numbers appear as superscripts in the main text, and that I am neither Dr. Jekyll nor Mr. Hyde. Please don't dream up some future horror that I will inflict on you; just ask. (I feel more strongly about getting all of the references into a single list than I do about retaining the categories, so I am likely to advocate loss of the categories if the "color" plan or some alternative solution are rejected.)
So again, I will say what I recommend for this page: < ref >, with use of rp to indicate page numbers. If we go to the "colors" idea, which I strongly recommend, then we no longer need ranchor and its colleagues. If we go to < ref > and rp, we continue to provide page numbers, and I'm pretty sure that what our readers will see will look pretty much the same as with r and p=. And please understand that I'm telling you the truth when I say that I edit a lot of pages around here, and I find < ref > and rp quite familiar, quite unsurprising, and I'm pretty sure that a large majority of other editors do too. This has nothing to do with "tyranny of the majority". It's about working with other people on a collaborative Wiki. As I said above, I respect the work you have done on this page, and I am worried about the next time other editors show up shouting about WP:OWN. What I'm advocating for is not going to harm what our readers will see, and it won't harm you, either. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:56, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
I've never suggested you're here with a hidden agenda; I was merely showing where your "unfamiliar markup" logic might lead.
That you object to {r} but accept {rp} shows the extent to which one's ideas of what's familiar and conventional depends on accidents of editing experience. The figures I gave earlier were real: {r} and {rp} are used in about 0.1% and 0.4% of articles, respectively [32][33]. There's no way you can say that {rp} is familiar to editors and {r} other isn't‍—‌they're qualitatively indistinguishable, so if that's your impression it's just because you happen to have worked on articles that use {rp}.
EEng (talk) 05:50, 25 August 2015 (UTC)
Oh, I don't doubt the numbers on r versus rp. But that's because there are so many pages that fail to provide page numbers, and I consider the page numbers on this page to be a very good thing. But I think the numbers on r versus ref would be another matter altogether (and rp is just an add-on for ref). As far as I can tell (and please correct me if I'm wrong), once one eliminates the subdivision of the Reference section into subsections, then there is no difference between r and ref with respect to what our readers would see. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:50, 25 August 2015 (UTC)
Well, yes, there is something you seem to misunderstand here -- you seem to think that eliminating the subdivision/categorization is a prerequisite for changing {r} to < ref>, and that's not true.
(A) Any time we want, every instance of {r|smith|p=22} could be turned into < ref name=smith/>{rp=22}, with no effect on the subdivision/categorization of sources. This change does nothing to what the reader sees, either.
(B) Completely independently, any time we want we could eliminate the subdivision/categorization by changing every {ranchor|H|p=22} into {r|H|p=22} or into < ref name=H/>{rp|22} (whichever we like -- they do exactly the same thing -- though of course we'd pick the one which matches whatever's going on in (A) ). Of course, this does change what the reader sees.
EEng (talk) 06:27, 26 August 2015 (UTC)
Actually, I understand a lot better than you are giving me credit for. Yes, what you said here is correct, about the effects of those potential changes, and the ways that they are each independent of the other. We agree that a change from r to ref-plus-rp would have no effect on what readers see. And we agree about two things concerning the categorization: that it would be a simple matter to eliminate it entirely, and that (although you didn't mention it just now) we would both prefer not to eliminate it entirely. Now if we were to agree to use the color plan, as it is now in your sandbox, we could go entirely to ref-plus-rp, with no adverse side-effects. We would not be forced to, but we could. Insofar as I am aware, if we were to keep the subdivision of the Reference section, based on categories, as the page is now, we would continue to need ranchor or something like it. And it sounds to me like you do not have a rebuttal to what I said above: that the numbers for Wikipedia pages using them are quite different for r versus ref. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:33, 26 August 2015 (UTC)
All correct, except at the end re "no rebuttal". The rebuttal is that it doesn't matter that the overwhelming majority of pages use < ref> and very few use {r}, because there's no requirement, or even preference (except when all other things are equal) for the more common markup to be used. (And anyway, if that were an argument for dispensing with {r}, then it would also be an argument for dispensing with {rp}, which you have no problem with.) EEng (talk) 03:56, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
If the use of the present formatting were to discourage other editors from editing this page, leading (intentionally or not) to a de facto "ownership" of the page, then it most certainly would matter. (And that's a testable hypothesis.) My point is not to arbitrarily restrict this page only to the most widely-used formats for some arbitrary reason having to do with a count of the page usage. The reason for preferring widely-used formats is to make page editing easier for a wider population of editors, so long as it does not interfere with the quality of what our readers see – thus, there is nothing illogical with endorsing the use of rp, because ref+rp is just as good for our readers (identical, in fact), and much better for editing. I am glad that we agree that ref is overwhelmingly more familiar than r. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:48, 27 August 2015 (UTC)

Back to the colors

I have a suggestion. We have consensus for what is at User:EEng/sandbox, where the reference "tags" are marked by colors. I hope that, for now, we can implement that into this page. Then, I suggest that we all take a bit of time to look at it, see how it looks, and evaluate how we each feel about where things are at. Only after that, I would like to come back to what we have started to discuss here. Peace! --Tryptofish (talk) 21:58, 23 August 2015 (UTC)

I hope you're sitting down, Tfish, but there's no such consensus. I said it was a promising idea, did a series of mockups, then said "I think the next step is to mock up the whole ref section", and then did that. I don't know what I think of it yet. I'm still trying to convince myself it serves the reader as well as the current system. EEng (talk) 02:18, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
Then take as much time as you need to think about that, first. I'm not in a hurry here. But you are making it sound as though, after being friendly with the colors idea (you certainly did not tell me that you had doubts about the colors when I thanked you at your talk page), you may now be holding it hostage to the r-versus-ref issue. Please don't do that. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:01, 24 August 2015 (UTC)
Tryptofish, really! "You may now be holding it hostage to the r-versus-ref issue"‍—‌will you please stop it? As usual, I'd like to hear what the redoubtable Mirokado thinks. (In case he's gotten lost, we're talking about this mockup [34], with the "further reading" items tagged by colored notes rather than being gathered into special sections of their own.
(Please note, everyone, that per our discussion somewhere above, in the live article I eliminated the "General readers (portraits)" section, moving one of those sources into "General readers" -- now renamed from "General readers (Gage)" -- and the rest to "Researchers & Specialists".) EEng (talk) 14:57, 25 August 2015 (UTC)
Well you've heard already what Corinne and I think about it. I appreciate what you did with the General readers consolidation, thanks. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:55, 25 August 2015 (UTC)
@Mirokado: I too am eager to find out your answer to EEng's question (about the color-based idea displayed in EEng's sandbox). --Tryptofish (talk) 21:36, 26 August 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for the pings, and thanks to EEng for implementing that thoroughly so we can see it realistically. While this indicates the target readership of these sources it offers a rather less convenient experience to the reader. By "less convenient" I mean that the reader cannot see all the general reading references together at a glance, for example (the scattering is clearer in the full sandbox that in a brief example). There are also the very long backlink lists for a few of the citations. Thus I prefer the status quo and see no motivation for the change to colours. --Mirokado (talk) 23:33, 26 August 2015 (UTC)
I was really, truly hoping Mirokado would come up with some reason the color system is better, but unfortunately he didn't. And that means his assessment is exactly what I would have said. For the reader to be able to say, "I see,mhere's an online source I can look at right now, but if I want the full treatment here's a big book on the subject that I'd have to get at the library (but can preview a bit online), and ..." is key. EEng (talk) 04:04, 27 August 2015 (UTC)

Thanks. Following up on that, per the section that EEng started immediately below, how would you feel about the following two options (for the moment not including the status quo): either the color scheme at EEng's sandbox, or what I think EEng is asking about below, which is to use a lot of sfn as at Genie (feral child), but to have a Sources and further reading section that would be divided into the categories of sources? As an alternative to the status quo, which of those two would be your second choice, and which your third? --Tryptofish (talk) 23:46, 26 August 2015 (UTC)

My order would be (1) current presentation, (2) Genie system (clarified below in a second), (3) colors. EEng (talk) 04:04, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
I would also go with that order: (1) current presentation, (2) Genie system (but see the next section and how that discussion continues), (3) colors. --Mirokado (talk) 06:35, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
Thank you both for those very helpful answers. And that order, at least with respect to ranking (2) and (3), is fine with me. So for now, I'm happy to put the color idea on the back burner, and focus on a comparison between the current presentation and some sort of variation of the Genie system. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:51, 27 August 2015 (UTC)

I dream of Genie

Tryptofish, suppose we were to switch to exactly the system seen in Genie (feral child) except that "Sources and further reading" would be divided into General, Young, Specialists, and Other, how would you feel about that. This would use {{sfn}} in the article text, and {{cite book}}, {{cite journal}} and so on in "Sources and futher reading", nothing else. How would you feel about that? I'm not proposing this right now, because I'm not sure I can stomach the prospect of 500 little notes like Harlow (1868), p. 12 over and over and over and over and over and over, but I'm interested in your reaction. EEng (talk) 06:27, 26 August 2015 (UTC)

That's a good question, and I'm happy to discuss it. It's fine to feel things out about various alternatives without actually being ready to support them, because it's a good way to find new paths to consensus. Thanks!
First, I have a question. Do I understand your question correctly, in that the References section here (corresponding to the Citations section at Genie) would not be subdivided – instead, this page (Gage) would have a Sources and Further reading section, and that's where the subdivision would be? If so, I'd be fine with that. I don't have a problem with having those full citation listings in the Sources and Further reading, to which the brief citations in the References section would link.
Now setting that question aside, here is what I think. I agree with you that it's not particularly desirable to have such a very large number of Harlow (1868), p. 12 cites resulting from sfn. It would not be a deal-breaker for me, but I'd express a mild preference for ref-plus-rp, instead of sfn. Aside from that, I like the way it is at Genie. I tried opening the edit window for various sections of that page, to see what editing would look like, and I strongly prefer it over what I see when I open the edit window here at Gage. So I would definitely see that as a significant step in the right direction. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:57, 26 August 2015 (UTC)
Come to think of it, regarding I don't have a problem with having those full citation listings in the Sources and Further reading, to which the brief citations in the References section would link, that could be a very nice solution to what we were trying to solve with the "color" scheme, and I would be happy to support that in lieu of "colors". --Tryptofish (talk) 23:12, 26 August 2015 (UTC)
Oh, but is the problem then that doing that would require sfn (in order to indicate page numbers of the sources that are in Sources and Further reading) and preclude rp? --Tryptofish (talk) 23:26, 26 August 2015 (UTC)

You hit the nail on the head with your followup post. Follow along with me...

To keep the discussion clear, let's say there's a "Citations" section and a "Sources and further reading" section. "Sources" would be divided into General, Young, Researchers, Other.

V5.0

So first imagine Gage V5.0, which is exactly like Genie in appearance and markup except that in Gage we divide Sources section into groups, which Genie does not do. Markup looks like this:

Gage was mean.{{sfn|smith|1992|pp=22-33}} Also rude.{{sfn|jones|1982|pp=44-55}} And horrid. {{sfn|smith|1992|pp=66-77}} And bad.{{sfn|smith|1992|pp=88-99}}

==Citations==

{{reflist}}

==Sources and further reading==

;General audiences

*{{cite book|ref=harv |author= Jones, Alice| title=A book on Gage |year=1982}}

*{{cite book|ref=harv |author=Smith, Bob|title=Psychology |year=1992}}

;Young readers

*{{cite book|ref=harv |author=Fleischman, X. |title=Gory Gage |year=2001 }}

Gage was mean.[1] Also rude.[2] And horrid.[3] And bad.[4]

Citations
1. ^ Smith 1992, pp. 22-33.
2. ^ Jones 1982, pp. 55-55.
3. ^ Smith 1992, pp. 66-77.
4. ^ Smith 1992, pp. 88-99.
Sources and further reading
General audiences
  • Jones, Alice (1982). A book on Gage.
  • Smith, Bob (1992). Psychology.
Young readers
  • Fleischman, X. (2001). Gory Gage.

Notice that {rp} is obviated because it's built in to {sfn}. Before we move on, imagine how this would scale up to the whole article: "Citations" would have 500 entries, one for Smith 22-33, one for Smith 66-77, one for Smith 88-99, one for Jones 44-55, etc.

V5.1

However, we actually could use {rp} to advantage, as follows:

Gage was mean.{{sfn|smith|1992}}{{rp|22-33}} Also rude.{{sfn|jones|1982}}{{rp|44-55}} And horrid.{{sfn|smith|1992}}{{rp|66-77}} And bad.{{sfn|smith|1992}}{{rp|88-99}}

==Citations==

{{reflist}}

==Sources and further reading==

;General audiences

*{{cite book|ref=harv |author= Jones, Alice| title=A book on Gage |year=1982}}

*{{cite book|ref=harv |author=Smith, Bob|title=Psychology |year=1992}}

;Young readers

*{{cite book|ref=harv |author=Fleischman, X. |title=Gory Gage |year=2001 }}

Gage was mean.[1]: 22–33  Also rude.[2]: 44–55  And horrid.[1]: 66–77  And bad.[1]: 88–99 

Citations
1. ^ a b c Smith 1992.
2. ^ Jones 1982.
Sources and further reading
General audiences
  • Jones, Alice (1982). A book on Gage.
  • Smith, Bob (1992). Psychology.
Young readers
  • Fleischman, X. (2001). Gory Gage.

Notice that the three Smith citations (in V5.0) have now collapsed together, because the page numbers are back in the text as : 22–33  and : 66–77 and : 88–99 , so there's only one kind of Smith in the Citations. In fact, no matter how many times Smith is cited, it will appear only once in Citations. Same for Jones, who will appear just once in Citations, no matter how many times it's cited in the article. In fact, in 5.1 Citations will have exactly the same number of entries as "Sources and further reading" (but in a different order‍—‌Citations will be in a random order).

When the user clicks on any of the Smith callous in the article text e.g. [1]: 22–22 , he's first taken to the Citations entry i.e.

1. ^ a b c Smith (1992)

Then he has to click again to get to the real bibliographic information in "Sources and further reading" i.e.

  • Smith, Bob (1992). Psychology.

Thus in 5.1 Citations have become a kind of lame steppingstone between the article proper and the "Sources and further reading": all three Smith callouts funnel into the single "intermediate" in Citations, which really has no function except to be something the reader clicks on to move down to the "real" Smith entry in "Sources and further reading". (Kind of like a maitre d': doesn't really do anything, but you have to go through him to get to a table, where the actual waiters are.)

With me so far? EEng (talk) 06:13, 27 August 2015 (UTC) Mirokado, feel free to debug the eye-crossing mockup above.

sfn by default prints author date with no parentheses and terminating full stop. Please just accept that rather than adding parameters to each callout to diddle the display format. With this method we would have the big advantage that the "other citations" list could be alphabetical too, which is what we have always really wanted. The need for a second click to arrive at the citation is not a big deal because readers will be (or become) used to doing that in lots of other articles too. I have also been thinking about this (completely independently from yourself) for some time. I hesitated to suggest it because it is yet another "creative" solution, and vulnerable to someone insisting that we are using sfn incorrectly by adding rp instead of the p= etc parameters, but we have good reasons for doing so in this case and can justify the decision if necessary. If you and Tryptofish can agree to take this further I will be happy to support it too. If either of you decides not to support it, then I would not want to push for it against your opposition. --Mirokado (talk) 07:07, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
I wasn't trying to diddle anything, just misremembered sfn's output format. (You and I have fixed it now, I hope.)
My purpose in the above wasn't to propose using such a scheme (at least not unless we think of some new ideas to fix its various drawbacks, or talk ourselves into accepting them) rather to show Tfish, step by step, how you and I ended up with the current scheme. Recall from Talk:Phineas_Gage/Archive_7#Continued_discussion that an explicit goal of our work last year was to eliminate those sfn "intermediates" seen in the V5.1 case, where they're one-or-one with the "real" entries below them in Sources. It's actually remarkable how thoroughly our discussion anticipated questions coming up again now e.g. you'll see in there...
  • "I've thought about having just one big alpha order with some kind of designator that tells you which group the source is in, but that sprinkles the seven 'For general readers (Gage)' sources among 100 other sources." (i.e. something like the color scheme)
  • "Other works cited ... just use the usual < ref> machinery for these -- they won't be in alpha order but this isn't a 'Suggested reading' list like the other groups, so it doesn't matter. Any new source added by a casual editor will end up in this group; if need be, it can be 'promoted' to one of the other groups, and given a custom tag." (Unhide the "Tag1 and Tag2B" box to see this comment‍—‌bottom of the box.)
Anyway, Tfish, you with me so far on what happens between 5.0 and 5.1, the intermediates collapsing together, etc.? EEng (talk) 15:38, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
Yes, I have gone through it very carefully, and I'm pretty confident that I am with you entirely. I consider 5.1 to be a good starting point from which we might be able to come up with something that I would be happy with. In fact, if purely hypothetically we were to change this page to 5.1 right away, I would see it as an improvement. I also see some advantages to 5.1 over 5.0, for much the same reasons that you have already explained.
Here is my take on some of the pluses and minuses raised just above. I get the point about the maitre d', and it does not bother me unless we were to modify the system so that all cited references were in the Sources and further reading. (Put it another way: if we consider some select sources to be "important" enough to be categorized, then a formal table service is appropriate for them, but the many riff-raff uncategorized sources can sit at the lunch counter.) I'm also not bothered by a second click to get from Citations to Sources and further reading. Nor am I bothered by the issue of it being "incorrect" to use sfn followed by rp.
A question that I see arising next is whether we would also use sfn for all of the sources in the "other" category, in order to be able to place that category in alphabetical order, just as the named categories would be in alphabetical order. I am inclined to oppose doing that, and here is why. On the page now, the categorized sources are, numerically, a small percentage of all the sources; the large majority of sources are the "others". If we were to use rp as in 5.1, that ratio would look/appear the same. Consequently, we have a choice: use sfn for all sources, so that the "others" can be alphabetical, or use sfn only for the characterized sources, and omit the "others" from the Sources and further reading (just as they are omitted from it at Genie). I think the latter is far preferable. If instead we have everything in the Sources and further reading, the maitre d' issue gets increasingly salient and the value of the Citations section diminishes to being just a matter of making Wikimedia happy. (In my mind, I'm actually thinking References and Sources, instead of Citations and Sources and further reading.) Also, something that I like at Genie is that, when I open the edit window there, I find it straightforward to envision editing – unlike the page here, as it is now. So I would want to do things somewhat similarly to Genie, in that we would use sfn-plus-rp for the categorized references that qualify for table service, and ref-plus-rp for the many "other" references that sit at the lunch counter. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:34, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
EEng, I keep seeing you use "klar" as an edit summary. I'm just curious: what does that mean? --Tryptofish (talk) 23:37, 27 August 2015 (UTC)
German for "clear" and (by some weird logic) therefore "clarify". I think there was one time I sort of slipped trying to type "clarify" and it came out that way, and for some weird reason I got in the habit of typing that when I mean "clarify". I realize that makes little sense. EEng (talk) 04:23, 28 August 2015 (UTC)
Okay, that makes it klear. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:53, 28 August 2015 (UTC)
  • Spent some time making the Genie conversion in my sandbox, almost but not quite done. Take a look if you want, but might be better to wait, some touchups still to do, gotta run. EEng (talk) 18:30, 28 August 2015 (UTC)
Thanks, take your time. I took a look, and what I saw reinforces my view about what I said above. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:55, 28 August 2015 (UTC)
I agree that alphabetizing the "Other sources" is of little value (and creates a maintenance headache whenever a new source is added).
I've created a Genie-like version (call if 5.1, permalinked here [35]) with the right side of the diff showing the markup changes. (Did this quick and dirty, so in "Citations" not all the old letter codes, or letter-number codes, have been converted to name + year e.g. M8 should be Macmillan 1996.) I think it looks awful, especially the useless "steppingstone" intermediates with their long lists of backlinks.
Feel free to tinker, please just use clear edit summaries. EEng (talk) 02:19, 29 August 2015 (UTC)
Thank you for the hard work you are putting into this! I haven't tried to analyze the diff of the changes, because to do so would give me a headache, but I have examined the resulting version in your sandbox. I like the direction in which this is going, but it still has a way to go, and I am cautiously hopeful that the things that look awful to me are the same ones that look awful to you. I'll neither tinker nor diddle, but I'll summarize what I think is the most needed, in order to go from 5.1 to 5.2:
  1. Get rid of the alphabetized "Other sources", per my comment above.
  2. No longer refer to sources by capital letters, so that, in "Citations", we see listings in the form of "Name and name, year", rather than "M1".
Those two things are what look awful to me, and they should be easily fixable. If they are fixed accordingly, I'm likely to be very supportive of the change. I also think that making those fixes will result in the backlinks for the most-cited sources look less conspicuous. I can also envision a few subsequent tweaks, but I'll leave them until subsequently. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:15, 29 August 2015 (UTC)

To your points 1. and 2.:

1. I don't understand. The "Other Sources" aren't alphabetized.
2. I mentioned this above. In this sandbox demonstration V5.1 permalinked above, in the Citations section, numbers "1." through "7.", and also "17.", look as they actually would should the article be converted to this scheme. The rest do not; for example
11. ^ a b c K.
should read
11. ^ a b c Kean 2014.
Fixing the rest of these would be a tremendous pain in the ass, so for the purposes of discussion we're just going to have to imagine what they'd look like in real life. (You can find out what each letter, or letter-digit, code stands for by clicking on it.)

Unfortunately I don't think we agree on what looks awful. Here's what I think looks awful:

1. The entire "Citations" section is a fifth wheel. If you click on [1] in the article you get taken to "Citations" 1. a b c d e f g h ... bz ca cb Macmillan 2000, and then you have to click on that to get down to the "For general readers" where you find the actual bibliographic information Macmillan, Malcolm B. (2000). An Odd Kind of Fame: Stories of Phineas Gage. MIT Press. [etc etc]. In the current article, the reader clicks on [M] and gets taken straight to the bibliographic information.
2. Because sfn insists on using the numeric callouts [1][2][3] etc., we're forced to assign the "Other sources" to uppercase alphas‍—‌running all the way from [A] to [CK]! Thus we still have one of the things you said you wanted to eliminate: a mixture of numbers and alphas in the callouts for sources.
3. The markup is way more complex than it was before‍—‌what Mirokado called the current article's "disciplined and efficient" syntax e.g.
{{ranchor|M|p=346-7}}{{r|fowler|p=6}}
has become
{{sfn|Macmillan 2000}}{{rp|346-7}}<ref group=upper-alpha name="fowler"/>{{rp|6}}

I'm sorry, but I see no advantage at all in any of this, though as mentioned before perhaps Mirokado sees some way to fix these problems. Barring that I'll be surpised if he doesn't agree with my evaluation.

EEng (talk) 04:12, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

V5.2

I am now realizing from what you said that I made some mistakes in what I said, so please bear with me as I clarify. I actually continue to agree with you about most of what you find objectionable, which is all the more reason for my thanks to you for working so hard at this.

Please strike what I said about the Other sources being alphabetized. My mistake. Rather, what I should have said is that the Other sources should be removed from the References section entirely. In other words, the References section should be subdivided into the following subsections: For general readers, For young readers, and For researchers and specialists. The end.

OK, this is done in V5.2, linked here [36] (the diff being versus the current article, not versus V5.1 -- as before, to show how the markup compares to the current article). EEng (talk) 23:32, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

Do that, and it is no longer necessary to use sfn for those Other sources. They would be absent from the References section, but would appear in full in the Citations section. They could be cited using ref, and there would be no problems when new editors show up and add new sources with ref. There would also be no reason to use capital letters (A–CK) to designate those Other sources.

That's also in V5.2, but not quite for the reason you think. The fundamental reason is changing <ref group=upper-alpha name=foo/> to <ref name=foo/> for all the citations to the "other sources", causing them to collapse into the Citations, where they join the "steppingstones" like
1. a b c d e f g h ... bz ca cb Macmillan 2000
i.e. in V5.1 there were 32 "Citations" (steppingstones) and 89 "Other sources" entries, and now there are 32+89=121 "Citations", and no "Other sources".
EEng (talk) 23:32, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

That is what I was getting at in my earlier comment, where I talked about "formal table service" and "sitting at the lunch counter". Please look at that again, and let me know whether or not I am explaining myself clearly enough.

Yes, I think that we both agree that, in the event of full implementation, designations like K would need to change to Kean 2014. You said this first, I agreed with you, and we still appear to agree.

Right. I'm just not going to invest the time doing this in a mockup -- way too much trouble. EEng (talk) 23:32, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

About what you call a fifth wheel, I hope that my clarification about the Other sources will help address that. For the Other sources, which are the large majority of all the sources cited on the page, it would be a single click from the main text to Citations. As for the smaller number of categorized sources, Mirkado said in his comment of 07:07, 27 August, that a second click "is not a big deal", and I agree with him entirely.

A smart editor like you should know by now that you can't quote the timestamps of edits, because editors in different timezones see different timestamps on edits -- for me Mirokado's edit was at 03:07. The best thing, always, is to give a permalink. EEng (talk) 23:32, 30 August 2015 (UTC)
And a smart editor like you should be able to simply read this talk page, where there are timestamps following every editor signature. See here. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:07, 31 August 2015 (UTC)
When I read this talk page, I don't see the same timestamps you do, because I'm in a different timezone from you‍—‌or, more precisely, my account settings specify a different timezone than do your account settings. If you see 07:07 on Mirokado's comment, then your account is set for UTC. Mine is set for US Eastern, so I see 03:07, because Wikimedia automatically adjusts the timestamp to my timezone. The only way I would see your 07:07 would be if I opened the page for editing and searched for that string. Thus my recommendation to smart editors such as yourself either to use a permalink, or to provide a unique search string. But referring to a time and date is a guaranteed source of trouble. (You actually did provide a search string, which is how I found the comment, but only because I'm such a smart editor. The timestamp was thus superfluous and, had you been dealing with a less-smart editor, confusion might have resulted. Thus, I repeat, a unique search string, without the timestamp, would have been better.) EEng (talk) 21:29, 31 August 2015 (UTC)
I just changed my user preferences to a different time zone, and then looked again at this talk page (refreshing the view). It still says 07:07. I'm not talking about diffs, and I'm not talking about edit history. I'm talking about the text that appears on the talk page. Beyond that, I don't know what you see, but perhaps we have different histories with mind-altering substances. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:36, 31 August 2015 (UTC)
Nothing so exotic. More likely you've got Change UTC-based times and dates, such as those used in signatures, to be relative to local time (on Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-gadgets) unchecked. (However, the timestamps in e.g. edit histories and watchlists are adjusted to you timezone no matter what.) Like I said, always use either a permalink or give a quick search string, or if you insist on copy-pasting the time, at least add UTC to put your readers on notice. EEng (talk) 01:07, 4 September 2015 (UTC)

I agree with your criticism of the sfn callouts for the Other sources, but I think I've explained how to fix that.

The Other sources never did use sfn. (See my interpolated comment above.) Only the categorized edits use sfn, which is what creates the steppingstones. EEng (talk) 23:32, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

In your point number 3, I again agree with you that the sandbox markup is awful. But, based on the Genie page, I would suggest doing it like this: In the References section, have the full citations of the categorized sources; at Genie, they are set up with "Citation"-type templates. Just put each full citation in its proper category: under the correct header, such as For general readers. Where you put it is where it will appear on the page, within the References section. Then, cite them in the main text, similarly to how Genie does it. At Genie, the first source is cited as: {{sfn|Reynolds|Fletcher-Janzen|2004|p=428}}. Here, you would do it instead as {{sfn|Reynolds|Fletcher-Janzen|2004}}{{rp|428}}. I'm pretty sure that that's all you need. You can cite these categorized sources anywhere on the page, using whatever page number applies. And the other sources can just be cited with ref. In either case, the citation links simply to the Citations section. And for the categorized sources, one further click goes directly to the References section, under the category header where you placed it. That's not complicated.

Yes, now that we've collapsed "Other sources" into "Citations" the markup is not as uglified as before, but it's still uglified (see below). EEng (talk) 23:32, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

--Tryptofish (talk) 21:03, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

OK, so here's what's different between the current article and V5.2 (linked in my interpolated comments above):
  • What used to be called "Other Sources" is now in Citations, mixed in with the 32 steppinstones, which weren't there before.
  • All citations have numeric callouts e.g. [22] instead of a mixture of numbers and letters e.g. [M] in the current article. Clicking on an "other" source takes you directly to the bibliographic info in Citations, whereas before it took you directly to the same info in "Other sources" (so there's no change here). Clicking on a "References/Further reading/Categorized" callout takes you to a steppingstone in Citations, on which you click again to get to References. You're right that's not complicated, at least not very complicated, but it's a definite detriment, however minor; in the current article, clicking on a Ref/Further/Categorized callout (indeed, any callout) takes you straight to the bibliographic information.
  • The markup, though not as awful as in V5.1, is still more complicated i.e.
{{ranchor|M|p=346-7}}{{r|fowler|p=6}}
in the current article is
{{sfn|Macmillan 2000}}{{rp|346-7}}<ref name="fowler"/>{{rp|6}}
in V5.2. (Because it made an easier conversion, my {sfn}s don't have the little | pipes between the author and year, but that's a minor detail.)
You mention that in V5.2 "you can cite these categorized sources anywhere on the page, using whatever page number applies"; that was true in the current article too, using the syntax above. You say "And the other sources can just be cited with ref." That was also true in the current article too, since {r} and < ref> can be mixed freely. [Later: To illustrate this, I added a new paper on Gage in a way a random editor might do it, using the common < ref>< /ref> syntax [37]. ]
Honestly, if the article simply arrived from outer space in th first place with V5.2, I wouldn't know any better and wouldn't complain‍—‌there's nothing really bad here, though the whole steppingstone thing is so silly. But we do have the current article, with no steppingstones and simpler markup. (I gather you think the V5.2 markup is somehow less threatening, but IMHO it's as perplexing as the current article markup, and probably more.) I've gamely gone through this exercise because... well, because it's in my nature, but I'm still afraid I don't see at all what this change achieves, either for readers or for editors.
EEng (talk) 23:32, 30 August 2015 (UTC)
I've made two edits to rename the sections in the sandbox version: [38] and [39]. That should be pretty clear, I hope. More importantly, I can see that I still have not been clear enough in explaining what I meant, and perhaps that is why you still do not see what is in your sandbox as being an improvement. As it is now, I'd agree that it's not that much of an improvement, but that's because there are still fixable problems. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:22, 31 August 2015 (UTC)
(interjection) I have not abandoned this conversation but I certainly don't have the necessary time for careful contributions at present. I hope I will have more time again from later this week. (please carry on...) --Mirokado (talk) 20:51, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

V5.3

If we regard 5.2.1 as this: permalink (or diff versus current page, provided by EEng), then there are still some things that I actually attempted to communicate above, where I appear not to have been sufficiently clear, and I think that is why 5.2.1 continues to not look good enough. I again thank EEng for your hard work on this, and I ask you to please bear with me.

When I look at 5.2.1#References in the edit window, I see {{Reflist |30em. So far, so good. But then, where I want to see }} right after that 30em, I don't, and that's where a problem begins. Instead, I see |refs=, followed by a long list of refn templates. That is not what I was trying to tell you, and of course it works out badly. I'm saying the References section should consist of Reflist|30em and nothing more. The references should be cited in the main text using either sfn or ref, and should be compiled under the References section entirely by the reflist template.

(Although it's comparatively trivial, in the Sources section, one would eventually not need the "ref=CITEREF" parameters, once one does away with naming sources by upper-case letters. I think you already know this. I'm pretty sure that sfn will take care of linking "Name, year" from the References to the Sources.)

--Tryptofish (talk) 20:50, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

Also, one can see what I just said at Genie (feral child), where it is done in the way that I just suggested. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:18, 31 August 2015 (UTC)

  • You say that because {reflist} has a refs= parameter, "of course it works out badly", and you want the contents of the refs=‍—‌i.e. the various {refn}s‍—‌distributed into the article proper. You do realize, don't you, that this will have absolutely zero effect on what the reader sees? Just what is it that "works out badly" because the article uses refs= per WP:LDRHOW?
  • The presence of e.g. ref=CITEREFHarlow 1868 has nothing to do with the "naming sources by upper-case letters"‍—‌they'd still be there even if I went to the trouble of converting all those uppercase letters over to actual author+year. The ref=CITEREFs are there because the harvard/snf system has an extremely rigid and fragile way of concatenating bits and pieces of the citation template into anchor text, and it gets especially complicated when the same author(s) published more than one paper in the same year (requiring e.g. Ratiu 2004a etc.). Furthermore, because of the very specific ways you felt the bundled citations, and citations within footnotes, should be handled, we're stuck with a [[#CITEREFHarlow 1868|Harlow 1868]] syntax for those, and that can't ever by changed as long as you want sfn in the mix. ref=CITEREFHarlow 1868 simply makes explicit, and guesswork-proof, the anchor links that sfn would otherwise put together in its secret confusing way. It's got nothing to do with anything else.
Is there anything else you would want changed, because as it is all my comments in my last post still apply, plus moving the refs= material into the article proper would make the markup even more cluttered. Mirokado, the sooner you can rejoin us, the better. EEng (talk) 00:26, 1 September 2015 (UTC)
OK then, please set aside what I had said in parentheses in my previous comment. I said it was unimportant anyway, and I was just trying to be helpful.
The important part of what I said was about the References section, and what I am saying is to handle that aspect of it as it is done at the Genie page. You seem to have dismissed that as making "the markup even more cluttered". I don't find the markup at Genie difficult to edit. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:38, 1 September 2015 (UTC)
Re the References section and |refs= and so on, I can only imagine there's some serious miscommunication here. Maybe Mirokado will be able to bridge the gap.
In the meantime, since a new paper on Gage just appeared, I added it [40] in the way a "naive" editor might add it, using < ref>< /ref>, to illustrate that the techniques used in this article don't prevent anyone from diving in and adding material, and even sources, "the old-fashioned way". (I haven't been sure, Tfish, whether you think that the use of {reflist |refs= somehow prevents new sources from being inserted directly in the article text.)
(And just to be clear, at this point we don't have a V5.3, just some talk about what it might look like. The last version is V5.2.1, linked above in bold.)
EEng (talk) 16:22, 1 September 2015 (UTC)
Yes, I agree that 5.3 hasn't materialized yet. I was simply trying to designate that I was suggesting what should change after 5.2.
And I agree with you that it is entirely possible for a new editor to add a new source as you just did, by using ref, without breaking the page. Of course, that presupposes that the editor had no difficulty finding the place in the edit window where they wanted to make the edit, and were not confused about how to do it. I smiled when I looked over the edit history, and I saw that you, the undisputed world's champion of editing this page (no, that's not worth a gold metal, nor even a plastic one), had to make a corrective edit after adding that source. It is, indeed, a challenge to edit this page.
That's silly. In copy-pasting between edit windows I unthinkingly picked up the old version of something I had made a tiny adjustment to hours earlier i.e. I accidentally changed Nathanael West back to [[Nathanael West]]; the "corrective edit" was to drop the links again. It has absolutely nothing to do with anything, unless you now are claiming that wikilinking is one of the page's abstruse complexities.
EEng (talk) 23:45, 1 September 2015 (UTC)
Struck. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:37, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
Click here to get struck by lightning. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:04, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
Hitting solves nothing. EEng (talk) 23:14, 2 September 2015 (UTC)
Struck. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:31, 3 September 2015 (UTC)
[41] EEng (talk) 01:07, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
Struck
Struck
Struck
Struck
Struck
Three strikes and I'm out! --Tryptofish (talk) 19:04, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
But I do understand, and have understood all along, that the existing markup does not prevent additions using ref. My point isn't that it would break the page, but that it would give most editors (including me) a headache trying to sort through what appears in the edit window. Of course, the source citations are not the only eccentricity of this page that complicate the edit window, but they are one of the causes, and they are what we are discussing now.
And I also understand, and have understood all along, that the page will look the same to our readers, whether we use ref, or the markup currently in use. What I have said about |refs= and so on isn't about changing the look of the page. It's about making the page easier for more editors to edit, without damaging how the page looks.
What I'm trying to communicate is that I'd like this page to cite those sources that are not in the categories (like "For general readers", etc.), in other words, the "other sources", the same way that they are cited at the Genie page (except that, here, we could use rp for page numbers). The Genie page is much easier to edit, when one opens an edit window, than this page is.
What I'm talking about isn't a simple matter of using the briefest markup. I fully understand that something like {{r|nice|p=62}} involves many, many fewer characters to type in the main text, than does something like <ref>{{cite encyclopedia|last=Moffat |first=Gregory K. |year=2012 |page=44 |title=Fundamentals of Aggression|editor-last=Browne-Miller |editor-first=Angela |work=Violence and Abuse in Society: Understanding a Global Crisis|publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-0-313-38276-5 |url=http://books.google.com/books?id=A-GXM9MFaB4C&pg=PA44}}</ref>{{rp|62}}. I've understood that all along.
Like you, I'd welcome it if Mirokado (or any other editor who might show up) could help us sort this out. But it sounds to me that you, EEng, very clearly have the sincere belief that the existing page markup is acceptably easy to edit, and that the kinds of changes I suggest would if anything make it worse. And I trust that you, in turn, understand that I'm saying what I say in good faith too. Although we could continue to each state our views back and forth to each other, I think that we are reaching diminishing returns. Let's give this discussion a few more days, but then, I think I'll seek advice from a larger group of editors. But thanks again for your patience in discussing these things. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:06, 1 September 2015 (UTC)
I agree this is all Mirokado's fault. He'll probably say he had something to do at work or some other lame excuse. But while we're waiting for him to mosey on by (and may I suggest that he start with the 5.2.1 permalink above, which shows the markup change from the current article, and then peruse the discussion) why don't you do this: pick a paragraph from Gage, and one from Genie, which are comparable in content (do/don't have a footnote, do/don't have a blockquote, do/don't have a bundled cite, whatever) and which illustrate your contention that Genie's easier to edit. (You don't have to explain why you think that, just identify each paragraph by an opening phrase.) EEng (talk) 23:47, 1 September 2015 (UTC)
I already know that I will say one is easier than the other, and you will disagree. But that's an excellent question for an RfC. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:38, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

Yeah, sorry but I have had various real-life competitions for my time recently. I hope things start easing off now. I've looked at the v5.2.1 diff and permalink. Generally I agree with what EEng has been saying. If that (completed) were already the chosen citation style for the article it would be fine. But it isn't, and no argument I have seen above convinces me that there is the slightest point in putting in the considerable amount of work necessary to complete the changes. Mixing up the citations with the article content would be particularly pointless. --Mirokado (talk) 01:03, 4 September 2015 (UTC)

Thanks, both of you. That's a pity, not least because it was the two of you who first raised the possibility of doing things similarly to what is at the Genie page. I can understand how the thought of putting a lot of work into a change in formatting can be unattractive. However, the beauty of Wikipedia is that there is a potentially unlimited supply of editors who can help.
I've already agreed to EEng's request not to show him any special considerations. In the near future, I'm going to enlist the input of more editors, and when I do, I will be very serious about it. In that regard, I want to caution EEng against filibustering or refactoring. End of sermon, and thank you both again. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:10, 4 September 2015 (UTC)

An Odd Kind of Fame - open access?

An Odd Kind of Fame has an Open access icon symbol on it, but the link provided doesnt appear to be an open access edition. It is a Google Book preview, but that isnt 'open access'. Is there another version of it available that is really open access? John Vandenberg (chat) 13:40, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

It's a gbooks "limited preview", which means the notes and images are never visible, but the rest is visible, up to some limited # of pages per IP per day (or something like that). So while Open access icon overpromises, I thought it was better that the reader give it a try‍—‌he might get it, or might find he'll have to look elsewhere‍—‌than to put Closed access icon, which discourages him from even trying. There doesn't seem to be a "limited preview" icon.
There's no open-access version of the work. If people think Open access icon misleads, we could just have no symbol at all. EEng (talk) 18:46, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
I suspect that symbol is for the more strict interpretation of 'open access', so I have removed the {{open access}} template, and opened a discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Open Access/Signalling OA-ness#Google Books Preview. John Vandenberg (chat) 22:00, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
Yep, better to remove the OA symbol. See also Definition of open access. -- Daniel Mietchen (talk) 23:14, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
I agree. I also went to remove any other similar examples -- turned out there was just one. EEng (talk) 05:05, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

Photo by William Bell

A headshot daguerreotype by William Bell of an unidentified male presenting with ptosis of the eyelid in 1852. (Subject shown laterally reversed; his "bad" eye was actually his right.)
Phineas Gage, as seen in life; his "bad" eye was on his left.

I'm surprised it hasnt been discussed here yet, as far as I can see. As far as I can see, it would be undue weight to even mention this, but bringing to the talk page, just in case. This is the same year Phineas goes to Chile.

This page shows the similarity, with varied responses presented on a different webpage, but pretty uniformly rejecting the suggestion that it is Gage. A personal webpage on http://usi.ch doesnt seem very viable as a source, and I didnt find much else about this, so it seems no useful sources exist. But maybe I have missed something.

It is now held by the National Museum of Health and Medicine according to http://bottledmonsters.blogspot.com.au/2008/03/new-bell-daguerretoype-acquired-and.html and http://www.medicalmuseum.mil/assets/documents/collections/archives/bell_collection.pdf

John Vandenberg (chat) 00:56, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Nah, you didn't miss anything. The portrait was taken in a city (Philadelphia) there's no indication Gage ever visited, the subject looks as much like Gage as Buster Keaton looked like Charlie Chaplin, and the wrong eye is injured. Other than that there's no doubt it's Gage, but unfortunately without a source our hands are tied. (See here for an explanation of the left-right issue. The Bell image, as shown here, has not been re-reversed, so while it seems to show the left eye injured, it's actually the subject's right eye that's injured.) EEng (talk) 03:18, 5 October 2015 (UTC) JVDB is from Austrailia, where water goes the other way round the drain, so maybe eyes are reversed there too...

The search for a portrait

Is there a good source for people in recent years, before 2009, looking for a portrait of Gage. I've seen more than a few references indicating that finding one was a bit of a game-changer, but nothing clearly proving that people were seriously looking, and failing to find, a portrait before it appeared. Is this perhaps covered in Face to Face with Phineas Gage? If so, I'll grab a copy tomorrow.

Or, put another way, how could two photos have existed in the family and not been found if there was a concerted effort being put into finding one?

I feel the story about the Portraits isnt developed very well in the article. There is some useful titbits in the notes which could be pulled into that section, but there are a few gaps that need filling to turn it into the flowing interesting subplot that it is. John Vandenberg (chat) 11:21, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Public appearances being withheld

In the RFC above, ChrisGualtieri says "the actual advertisement for Gage's public appearance in NH is being withheld still".

What does that refer to? It sounds like something nefarious has been going on, and I missed it. It seems it hasn't been resolved.

I had a look through the archives, and the closest I could find was Talk:Phineas_Gage/Archive_7#Ready_for_GA? where Chris says "there is still an issue of the omission with his known appearances and return to New Hampshire." Was this aspect discussed in more detail on the talk pages somewhere?

I also found on Talk:Phineas_Gage/to_do that there is a note "report was discovered calling Gage mentally unimpaired during his last years in Chile ... and since then a description of what may have been his daily work routine there as a stagecoach driver, and advertisements for two previously unknown public appearances". Is that related? John Vandenberg (chat) 10:42, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

The article section 'New England and New York (1849–1852)' includes:
"Unable to return to his railroad work (see § Early observations, below) Gage appeared for a time, with his iron, at Barnum's American Museum in New York City (not the later Barnum's circus—​there is no evidence Gage ever exhibited with a troupe or circus, or on a fairground). Advertisements have also been found for public appearances by Gage—​which he may have arranged and promoted himself—​in New Hampshire and Vermont, supporting Harlow's statement that Gage made public appearances in "most of the larger New England towns". (Years later Bigelow wrote that Gage had been "a shrewd and intelligent man and quite disposed to do anything of that sort to turn an honest penny", but had given up such efforts because "[that] sort of thing has not much interest for the general public".)
But is there a specific advertisement of one of Gage's public appearances that is being "withheld"? John Vandenberg (chat) 01:53, 10 October 2015 (UTC)

RfC: What is it like to edit this page for the first time?

Contentious issue, and it has been that way for a long time. With arguments on both sides (some better than others), the general consensus here is simply, yes. It is difficult to edit this page for the first time, and apparently also for other times, with terms like "virtually incomprehensible" being used by highly seasoned editors. Not sure why we had discussion in eight parts, but it doesn't change the fact that there is great displeasure with the coding. Where this conclusion might lead, who knows. My personal suggestion is a copy and paste operation from the screen, not from an edit window, into Notepad, with EEng using Paint to redo some of the pictures. Kidding. Good luck. Drmies (talk) 03:08, 10 October 2015 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Is this page more difficult to edit than other Wikipedia pages, or not? If so, is that something that ought to be corrected, or not? Please open the edit window for any section of this page, of your choosing. You don't need to save an edit; the idea is just to take a look at what the edit window looks like. Please compare what you see with what you usually see when you are editing pages. (It would also be helpful if you compare edit windows at this page with edit windows at Genie (feral child).) --Tryptofish (talk) 20:06, 4 September 2015 (UTC)

In about two days, the bot will remove the RfC notice and the RfC will be over. After that happens, I'm going to request a close by someone completely uninvolved at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Requests for closure. I think that it's best if the close is not made by anyone who has edited this page or talk page in recent history. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:38, 2 October 2015 (UTC)
Request for close made: [42]. Thank you to everyone who participated in the RfC, which is now awaiting closure. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:12, 4 October 2015 (UTC)

This page is relatively difficult to edit, and that is a problem.

  1. Yes, the markup in the edit window is considerably more complicated and idiosyncratic than that at most Wikipedia pages. As such, it is discouraging to editors who are new to the page, to edit. Although not intended to be this way, the practical effect is similar to ownership, because it limits the number of editors who edit. I say this recognizing that the page is well-written and looks good, and that's what matters to our readers, but I also know that it is possible to maintain the quality of the page without such idiosyncratic markup. Editors have recently discussed whether the format for citing sources here is better or worse than the format at Genie (feral child), and I would suggest that the edit window at the Genie page is vastly easier to work with than this page is. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:06, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
  2. Yes, the markup on this page is so idiosyncratic that editors are effectively being asked to learn a new markup language to make any change to the page, and there's no particular advantage to the system in use that justifies such a departure from Wikipedia norms. Parts of it are also virtually incomprehensible in VisualEditor, which will increasingly become a problem as VE is now becoming the default for new editors. ‑ iridescent 20:33, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
  3. Yes, this has been a problem for a while. --John (talk) 22:40, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
  4. Yes, as I noted back on 13-14 August (somewhere in the vast walls of text above). Vsmith (talk) 23:46, 4 September 2015 (UTC)
  5. YES. Brought by bot. I couldn't edit this page if I wanted to and I've been around for a few years. I can't see the problems the excessive mark up solves but I'm sure even without knowing them that there are more elegant solutions. SPACKlick (talk) 10:13, 7 September 2015 (UTC)
  6. Yes I do felt that there is problem here. Rest of relevant comments I made below and I do think that this article needs clean-up and window view of this article should become normal like any other article.--Human3015TALK  14:19, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
  7. Yes.  And it's not just the wiki code that seems weird and unfamiliar; it's the article too. I don't understand what all those strange superscripts are (capital letters, colons, etc.). I'm talking about superscripts like: [B1]: 5 [M]: 25 .   I suppose it's probably all valid and legitimate; but I'll bet at least nine out of ten Wikipedia editors aren't familiar with it.
    Richard27182 (talk) 04:56, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
    Clicking on them will show you immediately what they do. EEng (talk) 09:43, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
  8. Yes. The section I looked at ended with {{'"}}{{px1}}{{r|accident_excerpts}}. I can guess what the final one does, and maybe the second one, but I have no clue about the first. I hope someone will be able to go through the article and translate it all into everyday markup. Maproom (talk) 06:57, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
    In all fairness {{'"}} is a quite common template currently in use in over 2000 articles—it's used when an apostrophe and quotation mark are side-by-side, to put a slight space between them so they don't blur together. ‑ iridescent 09:11, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
    ...as well as preventing a linebreak between them, which could happen if a simple space or {{thinsp}} is used to separate them. EEng (talk) 09:43, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
  9. Yes. I understand maybe 30% of the templates in use here and of the other 70%, 65% are unneeded or could be replaced with something more usable. It's not just off-putting to new editors, its off-putting to anyone that doesn't know every template in the history of WP. KieranTribe 09:35, 10 September 2015 (UTC)
  10. Yes. I've been around a while, and have never seen so many templates in use. MANY instances of adding 1 pixel, of {{shy}}, etc. Difficult to edit. Plus many html comments embedded.... I say {{sofixit}}.  Lingzhi ♦ (talk)
    ...and PS the referencing system is very, very intimidating. Intimidating excessive complexity is superabundant here. Chop. Please.  Lingzhi ♦ (talk) 03:22, 11 September 2015 (UTC)
  11. Yes - I remember that there was at least 60kb worth of markup that did not do a darn thing other than making it entirely uneditable. The "Shy" templates are grossly misused and much of it is to firmly hold what Eeng personally finds to work on his computer. More so, I still do not know why the actual advertisement for Gage's public appearance in NH is being withheld still, but I've since given up on the content and markup of this page after dealing with EEng. ChrisGualtieri (talk) 03:48, 11 September 2015 (UTC)
    Hi ChrisGualtieri , could we continue this at #Public appearances being withheld. Thanks. John Vandenberg (chat) 10:47, 3 October 2015 (UTC)
  12. Yes, I agree with Tryptofish on all counts and with Iridescent's first sentence. In particular, I think the reference format is contorted, unnecessary and unintuitive and should be adapted to one of the standard formats. Most if not all instances of {{shy}} should also be removed; from its documentation and use on other pages I gather than it is (and IMO should be) for very long words (like those listed in its documentation) and in captions, not for short words like "mistreatment" in prose. Also, re {{px1}}: iff references look sufficiently better spaced slightly away from quotation marks (and presumably anything else raised, like l or !) that it's necessary/desirable to bring about such spacing, surely it is desirable in general and should be adjusted by CSS, not by applying a hack to only 20 of Wikipedia's 4.9 million articles. -sche (talk) 02:13, 19 September 2015 (UTC)
    Hi -sche, wrt {{shy}}, you'll be pleased to know there has been only one {{shy}} for about a week, and I removed it only eight minutes before your edit to the wikitext. ;-) Did you encounter any problems editing the page with VisualEditor? (there is a discussion section below about VisualEditor, and it would be great to know if there are still problems to be fixed.) John Vandenberg (chat) 03:12, 19 September 2015 (UTC)
    It would help if you could explain a bit about what you find unintuitive in the referencing system. Also, which of the standard reference formats would you suggest? EEng (talk) 23:23, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

This is not a problem.

  1. If you like curly brackets it's a real hoot. Haven't had so much fun since I was lost for a week in Hampton Court Maze. "lol" When I summon up enough courage to actually make an edit, I'll report further. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:23, 7 September 2015 (UTC)
    Martinevans123, could you summarize your subsequent experience here, since the discussion is about to close? (And for once‍—‌just once‍—‌in your life, please don't speak in riddles.) EEng (talk) 06:55, 5 October 2015 (UTC)
    I'd say that to many inexperienced editors the markup for this article must look like a real riddle. But the article receives such a close level of attention, from at least one very dedicated editor, that's it's very unlikely that any edit or attempted edit will ever go unnoticed. I'm sure any request for help, from any newbie who struggles to edit here, would be met with a very positive response. (I also think the referencing scheme looks a little unwieldy. But so much has already been said on this subject above, that I feel even one more sentence from me would be like a strawberry for a donkey). Martinevans123 (talk) 21:14, 5 October 2015 (UTC) non-riddled version available here
    I don't know why I keep thinking the leopard will change his spots. EEng (talk) 21:42, 5 October 2015 (UTC)
    A fitting contribution to the ongoing debate over Gage's mental state in later life, I feel. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:59, 5 October 2015 (UTC)
  2. I don't see it as a major problem. Most editors will be content editing it using Visual Editor. Also, when using the Edit source function, it's clear to me that most of the unusual markup is used in the references. If they are reliable references (which can be checked by clicking on them), these don't need to be changed anyway. If a new editor comes in and needs to re-write or add a section, he/she will simply add the content in the same way they always do, either by using the VE or a more common markup. I would be concerned that a major overhaul of the markup in this article would result in lost or mangled content. --Iamozy (talk) 22:39, 12 September 2015 (UTC)
    I just edited the article to improve readability here and here and did not find the unusual formatting to be a hindrance in any way. --Iamozy (talk) 23:14, 12 September 2015 (UTC)
    (the subsequent discussion was moved to RfC discussion continued, Part 5 by User:Tryptofish). --Mirokado (talk) 22:06, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
  3. Brought here by bot. I had to look up some of the templates used because they're new to me but that's not something that I think makes the article especially difficult to edit. Whenever page numbers are involved in sourcing, markup gets complicated, and that's going to be true for this or any other similar page. In this case, there's the additional goal of separating sources by target audience (which I'm not convinced is the way to go but I understand why it's being done, given that there are so many sources of varying levels used), and with no easy way to separate out the references, markup gets even more complicated. Note that I did make a small edit to the text, I'm using WikiED, and I had no trouble. Also, I have a tech background, if that matters. Ca2james (talk) 01:46, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
    There is discussion higher on this talk page about how there are alternative ways to obtain the exact same results in terms of providing both the page numbers and the categorization of sources. In #V5.3, there's a possible way of doing that, where the page would look the same largely the same to readers, but the proposal was rejected because "no argument I have seen above convinces me that there is the slightest point in putting in the considerable amount of work necessary to complete the changes." --Tryptofish (talk) 22:01, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
    "The page would look the same to readers" -- Huh? That discussion culminated a series of changes you proposed which made the References section look like this (with the huge unusable strings of backlinks) not to mention significantly increasing the length and complexity of the markup at each point in the text where there's a cite. EEng (talk) 23:25, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
    I forgot about the backlinks, so you are correct about that – so much more of why this page gives me a headache. But it's pretty much just the backlinks as a change from the current page appearance, and though you clearly dislike them, they don't bother me. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:51, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
  4. Per WP:CITEVAR if consensus demands changes to the formatting of this page, then EEng and others need to accept it. However, I respect and appreciate the diversity of editing styles, so I am not bothered or troubled by the barrier to editing that this could present an editor who might be confused by this style, any more than an editor who might encounter citation template variations of one kind or another. Viriditas (talk) 23:35, 2 October 2015 (UTC)
  5. For experienced editors, this article's template use is certainly noticeably different from the usual dialect of WikiText. However, I just gave editing a try [43] and found that it was quite possible to get a decent idea of how the page works, especially once I figured out where the <ref></ref>s had gone. I actually think that an excerpt like
    irresponsibility and untrustworthiness;{{r|irresponsibility}} aggressiveness and violence;{{r|aggressiveness}} vagrancy and begging;{{r|vagrancy}} plus drifting,{{r|drifting}} drinking,{{r|drinking}} bragging,{{r|bragging}} lying,{{r|lying}} brawling,{{r|brawling}} bullying,{{r|bullying}} [[psychopathy]],{{r|psychopathy}} inability to make ethical decisions, loss of all respect for social conventions, acting "like an idiot",{{r|idiot}} and dying "due to a [[wiktionary:debauch#Noun|debauch]]".{{r|northcarolina}}
    is easier to navigate in sourcetext than usual practice. I would have a hard time adding a source to the page at this point, at least if I cared about making is match the current formatting, but given the apparently exhaustive content I'd want to raise major additions on the talk page first anyway.
    Overall, it's not what I'm used to, but in all probability reasonable, or even easier, for somebody who didn't know wikitext very well. I can see significant benefits for readers, and I don't think it's unreasonable to ask editors to understand {{ran}} before making big changes. FourViolas (talk) 01:50, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
  6. Hmm. Viriditas's comment made me realise that this RFC could have been designed to be a 'WP:CITEVAR style change consensus' discussion. If so, this RFC has been very bad designed to provide that consensus. As noted in a section below, I have felt that I have no standing to participate in an RFC titled "What is it like to edit this page for the first time?", as I have been editing it on and off since 2007, way before the introduction of the wikitext style some have campaigned to be rid of for years, making me the oldest editor of this article who is still regularly editing the article. However several of the people participating in this RFC calling for change also have no standing for that question, as their first edits were bot/bot-like edits and/or editwarring, so I doubt the style has limited their ability to degrade the article with their first edits, so I guess I had also participate in this RFC.
    I have never had a problem editing this page. Neither have the silent majority of anon/newbie editors who have edited this page over the years. When I am lazy, which is pretty common, I drop in a ref using the incorrect citation style and a gnome magically makes it beautiful. I find it a pleasure to engage in discussions about finer details on this article, either on the talk page or through edit summaries, and the result is always better than I could have achieved on my own. I respect the effort put into making this page useful for the reader, as it achieves that result in spades and not typically found on Wikipedia - the Genie article is not a similar pleasure to read, and is insufficiently supported by citations to be a GA IMO, so I don't understand why it is being used as an example to follow. Also the Genie article has not seen many constructive anon/newbie edits as Gage. Btw a big thank you to user:Mirokado for their assistance in making the citations in this article so well organised. John Vandenberg (chat) 02:48, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
    There are a couple of issues that I'd like to reply to. Somewhat similarly to what I said in #RfC discussion continued, Part 7, below, just as this discussion can, in principle, arrive at a reasoned consensus to change per MOS, it could likewise do so per CITEVAR. However, I intentionally did not frame the discussion narrowly in terms of citation style, although I was aware that I could have, because I wanted to determine editor opinion about all aspects of the page – including citation, but not limited to citation. Consequently, I find it a bit unfair to say that the RfC was badly designed. Rather it was designed for the purpose that I intended, rather than for the unintended purpose of exclusively examining citation format.
    As for the issue of "for the first time", I credit experienced editors with enough good faith to be able to assess what it is like to edit this page, even if that means remembering back to the first time that they did so. And I specifically wanted input from editors who are new to the page, which is the point of the RfC system anyway. Of course there have been editors who have successfully edited for the first time, as you have noted. But that misses the point. What about editors who might have attempted to edit this page (or in contrast Genie), and gave up? I think that's a serious concern, and a difficult one to measure accurately, but the RfC responses do, I believe, give some evidence to work with – even if it's a problem for some editors, but not for all.
    Also, there is something I want to point out to whoever closes this. I'm someone who hangs out a lot at EEng's talk page for the very funny stuff there, and I'm there in a (usually) friendly position. Martinevans123 and FourViolas are regular talk page friends there, too, for whatever that may be worth. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:44, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
    This is true (w/r/t myself). Further notes about my perspective: I have very little coding experience, but work with symbolic abstract math a lot, so I'm comfortable with confusing notation. I was trying to remember my newbie experience, and I thought some of this would be less confusing than more common practice; that said, I answered most WT questions for myself by comparing confusing bits to other pages, and that wouldn't work here. FourViolas (talk) 18:46, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
    The RFC was brilliant in getting new editors to edit the page ;-) And if one of the goals was removing {{shy}}, that alone would be an admirable goal, well achieved. The wikitext page is generally much cleaner now as a result, and works well with VisualEditor now. But if the goal was to change the citation style, and I didnt believe that was a possible goal until Viriditas suggested it, I don't think CITEVAR is meet by the opinions gathered thus far, of people complaining about varied syntax issues (many now resolved) who are unlikely to be sustained contributors to the article, along with a few people with various grudges. John Vandenberg (chat) 21:20, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
    I'll take "brilliant" however it may be posed, so thank you. And now, I think it's time for an uninvolved closer to ascertain what conclusions may or may not be indicated. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:26, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
    "regular talk page friends"?! How very dare you. As if I'd ever wish to be seen consorting with such a scurrilous editor. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:33, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
    I don't even want to consort with myself! --Tryptofish (talk) 21:49, 4 October 2015 (UTC)
  7. Tryptofish worries about "editors who might have attempted to edit this page (or in contrast Genie), and gave up" but as John Vandenberg points out, in fact this article gets more edits (excluding, of course, edits by their respective primary contributors), by more different editors, than does the Genie article Tryptofish holds up as a paragon. And this despite the fact that Genie is 4X as long, and gets about 30% more page views, then does this article.

    The vague question posed by this RfC generated mostly vague complaints (often on topics, e.g. the citation system, outside the scope of the question) in which it's impossible to discern what's being complained of. Repeated requests for specifics went unanswered. [44][45]

    A far better approach would have been to list the unusual techniques used here, with an explanation of why they're used, and asked for opinions on whether each is or is not worth the trouble. Tryptofish himself, who initiated this RfC, refuses to say what he would like to see changed to make the article easier to edit. [46]

    Even where complaints are concrete, many are about things recommended or even required by MOS e.g. {{' "}}; or are standard WP practice e.g. indicating page numbers with a colon, as in [22]: 123 ; or don't actually exist in the article [47]. Statements such as "I can't see the problems the excessive mark up solves but I'm sure even without knowing them that..." are obviously self-indicting‍—‌certainty combined with unembarassed incomprehension rarely results in wise counsel.

    In the one case in which concerns were expressed that could actually be acted on, they were, so that the article is far different now than it was when the RfC started. Unfortunatley, the complaining editor has refused to say whether his concerns were resolved [48]. Almost all negative comments were made before these and other improvements‍—‌see #Advanced_editor_tools‍—‌were made.

    EEng (talk) 06:53, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

    EEng, I really do hope that you will accept the close decision, whatever it may be. About Genie, I'm not "hold[ing] it up as a paragon", so much as referring to a page that you first drew to my attention in this talk as a comparison with this page's format. --Tryptofish (talk) 14:26, 5 October 2015 (UTC)
    I also want to note again that I asked October 4, after the bot removed the RfC template, for an uninvolved close, so I think that the time has come to await that closing decision, rather than to extend the RfC discussion. --Tryptofish (talk) 14:48, 5 October 2015 (UTC)
    Closes aren't "decisions". I drew your attention to Genie in hopes it would help you understand why this article uses the citation system it does (though entertaining the vague hope that the discussion might lead to some new and even better system than we have now). My words were:
    Suppose we were to switch to exactly the system seen in Genie ... I'm not proposing this right now, because [reason] but I'm interested in your reaction.
    And while we might argue the connotations of the word paragon, you clearly were referring to it with approval when you formulated this RfC question:
    Is this page more difficult to edit than other Wikipedia pages, or not? ... Please compare what you see [here] with what you usually see when you are editing pages. (It would also be helpful if you compare edit windows at this page with edit windows at Genie.)
    EEng (talk) 05:13, 6 October 2015 (UTC)
  8. There clearly was a problem with excessive markup in the original state of this article, but that seems now to be corrected, so I am placing my answer in the "This is not a problem" section now. I had a look at the Convalescence section of the article in the edit window and it looks perfectly clean. This rfc question was clearly designed to address such excessive formatting and not to address directly the above extended discussion about changing the citation style. However, since this has been mentioned: The citations are called out by a template whose usage is basically identical in form to {{r}} which is clearly accepted by the community. {{sfn}} has been suggested as an alternative, but the usage of sfn is far more tricky for newcomers than {{r}} or {{ran}} (the template used here), to the extent that some respected contributors to featured articles refuse to accept it, so using sfn is presumably excluded by the very concerns that are the headline of this rfc. Mixing up the full citation sources with the article text would clearly make the text itself more difficult to comprehend or edit in the editing window, so is also not an acceptable option within the terms of this rfc. None of the suggested changes would retain the current reader experience which I regard as excellent. Apart from all that, a change of citation style falls clearly within the scope of WP:CITEVAR. We would certainly need an explicit rfc about imposing a change to citation format, if anyone still wishes to persue that. My opposition to any change in citation style (as so far suggested) is very clearly stated above. --Mirokado (talk) 00:52, 6 October 2015 (UTC)

Other

Discussion

Not now. I opened edit window and I found everything normal with this page. Rather I'm curious to know how it was earlier. Is there another page with complicated window?--Human3015TALK  00:35, 8 September 2015 (UTC) struck comment as I realized problem now--Human3015TALK  14:19, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
I guess people could just use Visual Editor? Any alleged mark-up horrors are then completely hidden? Martinevans123 (talk) 07:34, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
@Human3015: Really?
Code sample

{{nowrap|Long known as "the}}<!--<<force text below img when window is very narrow--> {{shy|American Crowbar Case"{{mdashb}}once termed "the case which more than all others is calcu|lat|ed to excite our wonder, impair the value of prog|no|sis, and even to subvert our [[physiology|physiolog{{shy}}ical]] doctrines"{{nowrap|{{px1}}{{r|campbell}}{{mdash}}}}{{zwsp}}Phineas Gage influenced nineteenth-century discussion about the mind and brain, partic|u|lar|ly debate on [[cerebral localization|cerebral locali{{shy}}za{{shy}}tion]],{{ranchor|M|p=ch7-9}}{{ranchor|B}} and was perhaps the first case to suggest that damage to specific parts of the brain might induce specific person|al|i|ty changes. }}<!--<<end SHY-->{{ranchor|M|p=1}}{{ranchor|M3|p=C}}

(the wikicode for a single sentence of the lead) doesn't seem potentially confusing or off-putting to new editors to you? ‑ iridescent 09:49, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
Well, don't you think this (the wikicode for the lead paragraph of Genie) isn't potentially confusing or off-putting to new editors as well?
Code sample

'''Genie''' (born 1957) is the pseudonym of a [[feral child]] who was a victim of severe [[Child abuse|abuse]], [[Child neglect|neglect]] and [[social isolation]]. Her circumstances are prominently recorded in the annals of abnormal child psychology.{{sfn|Reynolds|Fletcher-Janzen|2004|p=428}}<ref name=Waltz>{{cite book|last=Waltz | first=Mitzi | authorlink=Mitzi Waltz | title=Autism: A Social and Medical History | chapter=Bedlam, Behaviouralism, and Beyond | page=96 | location=Basingstoke, Hampshire, United Kingdom | publisher=Palgrave Macmillan | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EC0RYUtuXgsC&pg=PA96 | year=2013 | isbn=978-0-230-52750-8 | oclc=821693777}}</ref> When Genie was a baby her father decided that she was severely [[Intellectual disability|mentally retarded]], causing him to dislike her and withhold care and attention. At approximately the time she reached the age of 20 months Genie's father decided to keep her as [[social isolation|socially isolated]] as possible, so from that time until she reached 13 years, 7 months, he kept her locked alone in a room. During this time he almost always strapped her to a child's toilet or bound her in a crib with her arms and legs completely immobilized, forbade anyone from interacting with her, provided her with almost no stimulation of any kind, and left her severely malnourished.<ref name=abcnews/><ref name=nova/>{{sfn|Curtiss|1977|pp=1–6}} The extent of Genie's isolation prevented her from being exposed to any significant amount of speech, and as a result she did not acquire [[language]] during childhood. Her abuse came to the attention of [[Los Angeles]] child welfare authorities on November 4, 1970.{{sfn|Reynolds|Fletcher-Janzen|2004|p=428}}<ref name=abcnews>{{cite web | url=http://6abc.com/archive/6130233/ | archiveurl=http://web.archive.org/web/20130423023727/http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/national_world&id=6130233 | archivedate=April 23, 2013 | deadurl=no | title=Wild Child 'Genie': A Tortured Life | last=James | first=Susan Donaldson| date=May 7, 2008 | accessdate=March 4, 2013 | publisher=ABC News}}</ref><ref name=nova>{{cite episode | title=Secret of the Wild Child | publisher=PBS | accessdate=February 12, 2009 | series=[[Nova (TV series)|NOVA]] | network=PBS (United States), [[BBC]] (United Kingdom) | airdate=March 4, 1997 | season=22 | number=2 | url=http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/2112gchild.html | archiveurl=http://web.archive.org/web/20121109103309/http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/transcripts/2112gchild.html | archivedate=November 9, 2012 | deadurl=no | oclc=57894649}}</ref>

EEng (talk) 10:22, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
New editors editing the lede? That's the last thing you want! Martinevans123 (talk) 10:29, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
@Martinevans123 Well, Iridescent said parts are "virtually incomprehensible" in visual editor, so to look into that I made my last dozen edits in VE -- no problems. (They've really pulled VE together in the last year. It's pretty good now.) Since you've made edits to the article the old-fashioned way, and that seems to be Tryptofish's complaint, it would be helpful if you would report whether you had any problems doing that. EEng (talk) 10:08, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
Ah, yes the old fashioned way. But I edited so long ago that Gage hadn't even had his accident. Martinevans123 (talk) 10:14, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
Apparently you didn't get the memo [49]‍—‌no humor allowed in this discussion. EEng (talk) 10:28, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
I think Iridescent is right, I didn't see it carefully earlier time. I think article needs clean-up if it is getting difficult to edit this article. We can remove all unnecessary markups or codes. Or can we find out who exactly done this by observing edit history?--Human3015TALK  10:35, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
The question is, what constitutes "unnecessary". If a particular piece of markup isn't worth the trouble it should be removed, but what I find weird is that no one seems to be talking about what this does. EEng (talk) 10:49, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
I have seen so many featured and good articles, but never seen such type of thing yet. If any featured article can live without such codes and markups then this article can also live without it, so I think all codes in this article are "unnecessary". We can simply make it simple to edit. I think those who are regular watchers or editors of this article should take up this responsibility because they are well aware about this subject, I came here via bot. Obviously I will also help to clean because article is too long, we all can take responsibility of cleaning up "one section each". --Human3015TALK  11:10, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
Yes. Who exactly done this? I think we should be told. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:14, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
"Can live without it" is not an appropriate criterion. The purpose of Wikipedia is, first and foremost, to produce comprehensive, accurate, and attractive articles. "Simple to edit", while desirable, is not a goal in and of itself. Just because you haven't seen it before doesn't mean it's not appropriate in some cases. Furthermore, everything you see now in many articles was once a new idea in one article; without deviation from the norm there is no progress.
So let's start with Iridescent's example. Do you see understand what it does? EEng (talk) 11:22, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
@Human3015: do your later comments indicate that you changed your mind? If so, would you want to change where your RfC comment is? --Tryptofish (talk) 13:56, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
@Tryptofish: Yes I changed my comment now. I also want to say that claim by User:EEng that "everything you see now in many articles was once a new idea in one article; without deviation from the norm there is no progress" is really just trying to make some situation emotional. This is not really good rationale to keep such type of window, I have nearly 9,600 edits as of now but I'm also feeling it difficult to edit this article then forget about IPs and new users. Wikipedia is for everyone including IPs, it should be simple and clear, it is not for some specialized editors.--Human3015TALK  14:19, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
So do you want to discuss what should be changed, or not? EEng (talk) 14:34, 8 September 2015 (UTC)

I moved the discussion above from #This is not a problem. to here. --Tryptofish (talk) 14:51, 8 September 2015 (UTC)

RfC discussion continued, Part 1

@EEng: I don't know what any of it does, or why you feel you need it to produce good looking and reliable wiki. What is the advantage of the piping, the bizarre referencing style, the use of template mdashb rather than a hyphen. The endless shy templates? Why use

Long known as "the American Crowbar Case"‍—‌once termed "the case which more than all others is calcu­lat­ed to excite our wonder, impair the value of prog­no­sis, and even to subvert our physiolog­ical doctrines" [1]—​Phineas Gage influenced nineteenth-century discussion about the mind and brain, partic­u­lar­ly debate on cerebral locali­za­tion,[M]: ch7-9 [B] and was perhaps the first case to suggest that damage to specific parts of the brain might induce specific person­al­i­ty changes.[M]: 1 [M3]: C 

over

Long known as "the American Crowbar Case" – once termed "the case which more than all others is calculated to excite our wonder, impair the value of prognosis, and even to subvert our physiological doctrines"[2] – Phineas Gage influenced nineteenth-century discussion about the mind and brain, particularly debate on cerebral localization,[3][4] and was perhaps the first case to suggest that damage to specific parts of the brain might induce specific personality changes.[3][4]

Yes I know I didn't put some of the references in there's only so much effort I'll expend on this. SPACKlick (talk) 16:09, 8 September 2015 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference campbell was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference Campbell was invoked but never defined (see the help page).


  • Per WP:SHY, {{shy}} (soft hyphen) is used in image captions and footnotes to break up large words, plus in one particular passage (not a caption/footnote) which is dense with very long words. In addition, they're used (also per WP:SHY) in three places where the layout is narrow due to two images being opposite each other, one on the right and one on the left.
  • Also in those three places (i.e. where there's two images right and left, with text between) {{nowrap}} is used so that, if the window is very narrow and there's only a little room for text between the images, the text is forced below the images. (This is what the comment "<!--<<force text below img when window is very narrow-->" tries to explain, but perhaps you missed that.) You can see this in the lead if you make the window narrower and narrower until the text between the two images suddenly jumps below them. If you and other editors think this isn't worth the trouble we can take it out.
  • The referencing was carefully discussed and agreed upon at Talk:Phineas_Gage/Archive_7#Together_again.21.
EEng (talk) 17:36, 8 September 2015 (UTC)
I know what Shy is for and I saw your note about nowrap. That said, most pages work fine, even on narrow screens, without the excessive number of nowraps and shy's. Why does this page need so many? Is it because the images are misused?
I don't have strong feelings either way on the references but if that discussion was re-opened I'd argue that "the encyclopedia that anyone can edit" would lead to preferring consistent referencing, where possible, across the wiki. Which would lean in the direction of <ref /> style rather than template style. The actual page looks cluttered in the way it's currently referenced as well. SPACKlick (talk) 00:45, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
  • If you know what it all does, why did your comment open, "I don't know what any of it does"? If you do understand, please explain why you think a particular technique is or is not worth the trouble in the context in which it's used.
  • Your desire that all articles use the same referencing style runs directly counter to the dictum given at the top of every page of MOS ("style and formatting should be consistent within an article, though not necessarily throughout Wikipedia") as well as to WP:CITEVAR: "Editors should not attempt to change an article's established citation style merely ... to make it match other articles..."
EEng (talk) 09:43, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
EEng, I know what the templates physically do, I know what they are for. I don't know why they are used here. This page looks like it could be marked up relatively simply without the riduclous excess of templates and odd mark up styles. On references, I'm again aware that there isn't a call for consistency across articles and were this article not so riddled with excess templates already I wouldn't lean towards changing them, except maybe to make them less cluttered in plaintext. SPACKlick (talk) 11:13, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

RfC discussion continued, Part 2

(edit conflict)@EEng: We can discuss that what should be kept in article. I think reference template <ref>source</ref>, links to other articles like [[XYZ]] and some notes like [[Note]] should be kept and rest of all markup thing or codes should be removed , specially things written using {{ }}, also those references written using {{ }} should converted to <ref>source</ref>. There is no need of using words like [[physiology|physiolog{{shy}}ical]]. And I sincerely don't know what is this thing {{nowrap|{{px1}}{{r|campbell}}{{mdash}}}}{{zwsp}} and what is significance of it writing in article. As I said earlier only <ref>source</ref>, [[XYZ]], [[Note]] should be kept. Thank you. --Human3015TALK  16:19, 8 September 2015 (UTC)

  • I don't know what you mean by "notes like [[Note]]"
  • You're going to have to be more openminded about the referencing. There's no way this article can be effectively referenced using only < ref>< /ref>; some combination of {ranchor}, {r}, {rp}, {sfn} is unavoidable. (Tryptofish will back me up on this, I think.)
  • [[physiology|physiolog{{shy}}ical]] appears (as mentioned above in the discussion with SPACKlick) per SP:SHY at a point where there's limited text width. Anyway, it's in a direct quote‍—‌do you really think someone's going to want to edit it?
  • The {{nowrap}} and {{zwsp}} in {{nowrap|{{px1}}{{r|campbell}}{{mdash}}}}{{zwsp}} solves a stupid problem in which the text sometimes comes out like this:
Phineas Gage‍—‌long known as "the American Crowbar Case"[10]
—is blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.
which looks awful. The problem comes up in that particular place because of the narrow width available. (The {px} has nothing to do with it and is explained at #px.)
Again, we should discuss which techniques to use and which aren't worth it, but just saying that only markup you've seen before is acceptable is a nonstarter. EEng (talk) 17:36, 8 September 2015 (UTC) P.S. I may be without internet access from sometime today until sometime tomorrow.
No, not accepting that other people's opinion's count is what's a non-starter. You're dangerously close to WP:OWN territory in this discussion. SPACKlick (talk) 00:45, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
I have ready answers to people's concerns because I've thought about these issues carefully already. See WP:OAS. Fresh eyes are valuable, but only if they're willing to discuss issues in the context of the needs of the particular article, and in light of policy/guidelines. EEng (talk) 09:43, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
Fresh eyes, indeed. We wouldn't want you to do anything foolish, EEng. Martinevans123 (talk) 09:53, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
Well, better than a thumb in your eye, saith the Philistines. EEng (talk) 10:06, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
Hey, who are you calling a Philistine, buddy? Martinevans123 (talk) 10:14, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

RfC discussion continued, Part 3

I'm perfectly willing to accept an explanation, if you have one, but you need to explain why "the needs of the particular article" are so unique that they require both markup coding and displayed-page formatting markedly different to every other article on Wikipedia. If you want particular issues, some from me to start with would be (a) why the ridiculously excessive use of the {{shy}} template (currently used 39 times on this article; to put that in context, it's used on 221 articles at the time of writing, and on a dip-sample none of them use it more than once or twice and almost exclusively for the special case of long words in the captions of narrow images)?; (b) why the use of 10 separate invocations of {{zwsp}}, a template with virtually no legitimate uses outside a few specialised cases to do with caption and cell formatting (currently only used in 29 articles on the whole of Wikipedia)?; (c) Why the need for a references section sorted by reading level, which would probably be excessive on genuine general-interest articles like Sea or Animal and is certainly inappropriate on a low-traffic specialist article like this, and in any case constitutes original research unless you actually have sources that a given source is "for young readers", "for specialists" etc? (d) Why the truly bizarre image formatting, with images apparently each at a different random size and placed along both sides of the page with text running between them?

As has been said above by virtually everyone except you, whatever your good intentions this has the effect of making a page whose format is so different to every other Wikipedia article, and whose markup is so convoluted and idiosyncratic as to be virtually incomprehensible to even the most experienced editors, that you've effectively erected a huge barrier to entry to anyone but yourself ever editing the page. This may be justifiable if there is a genuine reason why this provides a benefit either to readers, but as best as I can tell (I haven't read the talkpage archives) you've yet to demonstrate any benefit from doing it this way that outweighs the obvious negatives. (To put the "too many templates" issue in perspective, this article currently uses 121kb of markup to produce 36kb of text. A dip-sample from articles in User:The ed17/Featured articles by prose size with a similar prose length gives Rosetta Stone (77kb markup), Rambles in Germany and Italy (52kb markup), Introduction to general relativity (70kb markup), Talyllyn Railway (56kb markup)—in terms of total wiki markup, this page is roughly the same size as whoppers like John Lennon or Charles Darwin.) ‑ iridescent 10:55, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

Until my lawyer comes to bail me out I'm stuck with only my iPhone, so I'll respond later tonight (assuming the judge grants bail). EEng (talk) 16:32, 9 September 2015 (UTC) Just kidding about the bail. I'm actually babysitting my 5-y.o. nephew for the day. Exhausted already.
Now then... Using your letter designations above:
  • (a) Most people don't know about {shy}, so no surprise it's little used. But that doesn't mean it shouldn't be used, and as mentioned already it's used in the places MOS recommends. But just to see I've removed them. Perhaps after taking a look you could tell me where you think they could be usefully restored.
  • (b) You're wrong about places where {zwsp} is useful. Many/most browsers won't put a linebreak between a citation callout (e.g. [22] and the preceding text. Usually that's desirable, but in an image caption it's not. Again, just to see I've removed them.
  • (c) MOS (WP:FURTHER) specifies that "Editors may include brief annotations" to sources, and indicating which sources are appropriate for which audiences is no more OR than is selecting a list of "Further reading" in the first place. However, this is independent of the markup and I'd like to suggest that, in the interests of keeping the conversation focused, we take this up later.
  • (d) The images are sized according to the amount of detail they contain, and in three places images are opposite each other (left and right) to keep them near related text. But as with (c) this isn't related to the markup.
  • Your comparison of source sizes is misleading, because "prose size" excludes block quotes, captions, notes, and everything in the References (or Bibliography, or whatever) sections. To get an apples-to-apples comparison, I removed all that stuff from both Gage and Rambles in Germany and Italy (originally 121k and 52k, resp.), which drops them to 51k and 42k. In addition, Gage has 504 in-text citations to sources, while Rambles has only 103; deleting 3/4 of the cites from Gage drops it further to 44k i.e. the difference disappears entirely.
Please take a look at the current version [50] updated as mentioned in (a) and (b), and let me know what you think. EEng (talk) 19:19, 10 September 2015 (UTC)
<bump> EEng (talk) 00:07, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
<bump> Any chance of telling us whether your concerns have been addressed? EEng (talk) 22:14, 18 September 2015 (UTC)
<bump> Again, it would be very helpful if you could say whether changes since you commented have addressed your concerns. EEng (talk) 14:25, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

RfC discussion continued, Part 4

I'm well aware of WP:OAS EEng and I'm making the comment that your refusal to elaborate on the benefits to the wiki or its readers of your idiosyncracies in both mark up and plain text are moving you, imho, towards ownership. I'll note that to all the items people have mentioned you've said "this is what the template does" not "why this template is beneficial enough here to outweigh the cost of idiosyncracy". SPACKlick (talk) 11:10, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

  • Ok, I am also busy in real life little bit, but anyway, I will check edit history of the article, we should find out who done all this mess in article, if that editor is active then we can ask for explaination from him/her, we can check his/her contribution to see how many other articles are affected by him. We should discourage such editing, we can ask for sanctions on that editor. Even without any such markups editing wikipedia is tough job for new users. I remember when I was new, I was not able do many simple things in editing which now we do routinely. Editing article even with normal markups is really challenging for new editors then markups in this article will not only discourage new editors but also discourage experienced editors too. --Human3015TALK  13:04, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
I'm familiar with the page history, and the way that it is written and formatted is in very large part the work of EEng, assisted with some technical aspects by Mirokado. In fairness, I want to point out my opinion that EEng has done an excellent job of researching and summarizing the subject, regardless of what editors may think about the formatting. --Tryptofish (talk) 15:43, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
For the avoidance of doubt I'd like to second Tryptofish's comment that from looking at the history it's clear EEng has done a job worthy of recognition in the crafting of the content and sourcing of this page. My only area of concern is the form/format of the markup and to a significantly smaller degree plaintext. SPACKlick (talk) 15:59, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

Side note, EEng, please stop refactoring the discussion, it makes points difficult to follow and link back to and in doing so you are editing the formatting of others comments, a policy violation. SPACKlick (talk) 17:08, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

Keep your pants on. I was just trying to make it easier to edit on my iPhone, and adding neutral arbitrary breaks and adjusting indenting is no violation of anything. Feel free to adjust as you see fit. EEng (talk) 17:57, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
It is ok if EEng made new sections here for ease of editing on his/her iPhone. That is not issue here, section breaks are common in long discussions. But our main issue is markups in article and it seems EEng is not willing to take even a single step back from his/her stand though so many editors are opposing him. According to Xtools EEng has record 1839 edits to this article and 600 comments on this talk page as of now. So it is obvious that this topic is very much near to EEng, when someone has so many edits to particular article then that person can't stop himself to make claims very near to WP:Ownership. Nearly 2,500 edits to one article (mainspace+talk, 1839+600) is amazing thing, many editors have 2,500 edits in their entire work on Wikipedia. We can see similar kind of markups in other articles mostly edited by EEng like Widener Library, Sacred Cod though it seems it is not big problem there as it is in this article. And yes I do appreciate EEng's contribution to this article for making this article more informative. But our only concern is about markups in articles, there is no doubt or question regarding content of the article from my side. If EEng thinks that some markups are really necessary then we can keep those but as per my experience so many markups are not necessary, maybe these markups are suitable for iPhone while editing, but most of people do not edit from mobile phone, and those who edit from mobile, not all of them have iPhone. --Human3015TALK  19:44, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
I would avoid condescension when your point boils down to "I was changing your work to make it easier for me and what you want be damned" particularly when this discussion is "In this article there is an idiosyncratic style that's good for EEng but everyone else be damned". I don't like direct replies to comments being separated from the comment I made them to because it changes the meaning which is directly against policy and I have now made my firm objection so I don't expect to see it happen again. I don't like following 4 tracks of discussion when it's all about the same thing because that means points relevant to several parts have to be cross-referred or repeated neither of which makes it easier for editors to follow the discussion. Also EEng, despite several edits you haven't responded as yet to any of the reasons people have given for not liking the current style. In particular the question of why it's necessary here. What benefits it provides that outweigh the cost. SPACKlick (talk) 20:45, 9 September 2015 (UTC)
No, the two papers I coauthored are cited 29 times, out of more than 500 citations total in the article‍—‌hardly "the principal cited source". EEng (talk) 13:25, 11 September 2015 (UTC)
@EEng: as a side note, may I ask why you have a strong preference for —, ‍—‌ and  – over "-" and " - "SPACKlick (talk) 13:36, 11 September 2015 (UTC)
You didn't add markup to your post that would allow people to understand what you're asking without looking at the source, so here is that source:
may I ask why you have a strong preference for {{mdash}}, {{mdashb}} and {{snd}} over "-" and " - "
On top of that, the characters in the quotes are both hyphens - even though the discussion is about endashes and emdashes. You didn't mean to do that, did you? I'm guessing you meant to write
may I ask why you have a strong preference for {{mdash}}, {{mdashb}} and {{snd}} over "—" and " – "
(where the first quoted character is an emdash, and the second quoted character is an endash with a space on either side). OK, assuming that's your question, here are the answers:
  • MOS:MARKUP recommends against literal em- and endashes because they're hard to distinguish in the edit window; thus {{mdash}} is preferred over —, so that you can see immediately that the right character is in use.
Click here ({{mdashb}}) to see the advantage of {{mdashb}}. I prefer it over {{mdash}} because of that advantage.
  • MOS:NDASH explains what {{snd}} is for. My use of it instead of <space>–<space> (by <space> I mean a literal, regular space) isn't a preference, because <space>–<space> should never be seen in an article‍—‌in a "spaced ndash" the lefthand space needs to be a hardspace, not a regular space. (The alternative would be to code {{nbsp}}{{ndash}}<space>. Note that here as with mdash, MOS prefers symbolics over literals so that it's clear when editing that the right dash is being used.)
EEng (talk) 04:19, 12 September 2015 (UTC)
<bump> EEng (talk) 00:07, 15 September 2015 (UTC)

RfC discussion continued, Part 5

I just edited the article to improve readability here and here and did not find the unusual formatting to be a hindrance in any way. --Iamozy (talk) 23:14, 12 September 2015 (UTC)

You have a goddam lot of nerve commenting on what it's like to edit the article after actually editing it. You're supposed to speculate on what it's like without actually trying it, and (ideally) with no interest in doing so.
Adding to this outrage, with a relatively modest 1100 edits [51] you resemble, far more than anyone else commenting here, the timid novice it's claimed is frightened and discouraged by any flavor not vanilla. EEng (talk) 03:31, 13 September 2015 (UTC)
Your response here is laughable for so many reasons. First, I don't need your permission to edit the article to make it more readable. Second, my edits have nothing to do with how the article is formatted. Third, your attempt to discredit my actions using the number of my edits is illegitimate and asinine. FOURTH, are you drunk when you're reading this talk page? I literally said that it isn't hard at all to edit. I'm not "frightened and discouraged" by the unusual markup, nor am I intimidated by your absurdly aggressive response to my comment on this RfC. --Iamozy (talk) 05:04, 13 September 2015 (UTC)
Um, I guess I should have enclosed my post in <irony></irony> tags. My point was that you're the only person commenting (other than Tryptofish) who has actually edited the article and yet‍—‌defying the predictions of those who haven't edited but are certain that to do so would be intimidating and confusing (see This page is relatively difficult to edit section)‍—‌you had no problems. That you are a relatively inexperienced editor (at least, as measured by your edit count compared to those of everyone else here) makes the contrast between the handwringing speculation about "intimidation of novice editors", and your actual experience in editing, even more striking. Apologies for any unintended offense. EEng (talk) 05:50, 13 September 2015 (UTC)
Okay, Jeez. You really threw me for a loop there. Not knowing what to expect, I guess I prepared for the worst. Probably my lack of experience showing through. Sorry for the misunderstanding! --Iamozy (talk) 06:21, 13 September 2015 (UTC)
Yes, you novice editors often get the wrong end of the stick. But hang around and you'll soon learn that I'm unfailingly gracious. Re "speculative editing", see "Have you tried it in the water, sir? EEng (talk) 06:40, 13 September 2015 (UTC)
".. the only person commenting (other than Tryptofish) who has actually edited the article"? How very dare you. I edited on 21 June (and without any problems at all, I might add). Martinevans123 (talk) 22:14, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
Shame on me for taking your for granted. EEng (talk) 22:55, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
Shame indeed. My eyes have obviously been opened by this discussion. Martinevans123 (talk) 07:33, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

EEng, please do not cast aspersions on the editors who have commented in the RfC section above. Implying that these editors "have no interest" in editing the page is inappropriate. Nothing in the way I wrote the RfC characterizes editors new to this page as "timid" or "frightened". Having already edited a page does not set an editor up as having a more valid opinion than other editors. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:48, 13 September 2015 (UTC)

Certainly it does. Presuming to answer "What is it like to edit this page?", without ever having edited it, is like answering "What is it like to read this page?" without ever having read it. EEng (talk) 05:04, 14 September 2015 (UTC)
You are overlooking the fact that the RfC specifically asks respondents to open edit windows. And that certainly does not justify "timid" or "frightened". (And you certainly do have an interesting way of finding fault with small things that other editors say, while feeling free to say comparatively large things in response, even if you say them intended as humor.) --Tryptofish (talk) 7:56 pm, Today (UTC−4)
No, I'm not overlooking that. Just opening the edit window and looking, without actually doing anything, is like looking at the water, but not getting in, and declaring the breaststroke really difficult. EEng (talk) 00:16, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
Then you are framing the issue as if responding editors had never before looked at Wikipedia editing windows. Experienced (or even relatively new) editors can indeed evaluate what the RfC asks, based on examining edit windows, without needing to actually go on to save the edit. I am concerned about what you are saying here, because it sounds to me like you are trying to lay the groundwork for claiming that the RfC is not valid, in the event that it does not go your way. Please understand that such an approach will not work out well for you. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:26, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
I'm not "framing the issue as if" blah blah blah. Just because swimmers have been in the water doing the crawl doesn't qualify them to comment on the breaststroke -- unless they get in the water and try it. The fact remains that the one person who has actually edited finds no problem, and this article has had more edits in the last year, by more different editors (including IPs), than the Genie article you hold up as a paragon, and this despite the fact that Genie is 4X as long and gets 30% more page views. (Obviosly here I'm excluding edit by me here, or by Genie's principal author there.)
Meanwhile, please cut out the highhanded, ominous advice about how things will work out for me. I'm really tired of it. Maybe things won't work out so well for you. The problem with this RfC is that it invites vague complaints which don't specify what the perceived problem actually is, or what should be done about it. My attempts to elicit specifics have met with silence, or where something specific has been said, my response to that has met with silence.
You, Mirokado, and I could easily have made a list of the unusual techniques used here, and invited comment on whether each is worth the trouble and complexity, or not. Instead you barreled forth with this meaningless question inviting vague drivebys.
EEng (talk) 03:15, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
If you seriously think that I did not spend enough time discussing things with you first, before opening this RfC, then you are incorrect. You do not own this page. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:27, 15 September 2015 (UTC)
Oh boy, here we go! About a year ago you complained [52] that the page is "overwhelmingly confusing to edit". Since then...
  • we've had a colloquy with an editor who finds linebreaks confusing, so I took them all out, and
  • you and I and Mirokado made a long exploration of your ideas for changing the referencing system, motivated by your desire "to make this page more like other pages", or to make it simpler to edit. When Mirokado and I opined that the former is not a valid desideratum (per WP:CITEREF) and that your changes would work against the latter goal, you suddenly opened this RfC.
To my recollection, other than the above you‍—‌like those complaining here, with minor and abortive exceptions‍—‌have never said what you don't like about the markup, or taken any initiative to discuss what to do. Where in the last year did you say, "I don't understand what Markup M is there for... I find it confusing... Do we need it?" (Or if you did, I suspect I responded and you dropped it.)
EEng (talk) 00:52, 16 September 2015 (UTC)
I'm sincerely sorry that you feel that way. Just above, you complained that other editors have stopped responding to you in this RfC discussion, and I would speculate that it is because there comes a point of diminishing returns when you refuse to take no for an answer. Let me suggest that you wait and see what the result of the RfC ends up being, and that you accept whatever consensus emerges, rather than fighting it. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:00, 16 September 2015 (UTC)
It's not how I "feel"‍—‌it's facts. I challenge you, now, to give diffs showing you making any concrete inquiry or suggestion about the markup, other than the two bullets above. EEng (talk) 01:28, 16 September 2015 (UTC)
Except EEng, I have tried to edit this page. Following the attraction from the RFC bot I spotted some formatting that looked like a simple fix. Tried to fix it, it didn't work because it was very difficult to work out which bits of the surrounding mark up were doing what. The page is intimidating to edit. Please have faith that when other editors say something seems difficult to edit they've taken the time to work that out. SPACKlick (talk) 08:35, 14 September 2015 (UTC)
Your original post opened "I couldn't edit this page if I wanted to", which very much implies you hadn't tried, so you'll pardon my misunderstanding. What were you trying to fix? EEng (talk) 13:37, 14 September 2015 (UTC)
It would be helpful to know what the formatting was that you say were stymied in fixing. For your convenience here's [53] the article at the time you first commented. EEng (talk) 22:14, 18 September 2015 (UTC)
Not that I would suggest such a thing myself, but if you can't be bothered to say what it is you were trying to fix, some observers might conclude it didn't actually exist. EEng (talk) 14:25, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

RfC discussion continued, Part 6

I will do another request to EEng that, this is your favorite topic, you edited it most, you inserted markups with which you are familiar or used to. But please don't insert such markups in any other article, specially in those articles in which many people have interest in editing. For example, don't put such markups in any city article, or sports or alcohol and other beverages articles. Also don't use it any film article. Keep this to your favorite article, and even here also many people seem to be against keeping this markups here, we can see it in this RFCs, still thanks for removing some of them. But again, please don't use it in any other article. I respect you as you are an author. Thank you. --Human3015TALK  02:29, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

At least one of EEng's other "favorite articles" has even attained WP:GA status. So somebody must have at least read it. You might want to have a look at Widener Library and see if you think the source mark-up is equally impenetrable. One kind reviewer even thought the mark-up was "interesting." I don't think anyone has really complained about it over there (yet)? Martinevans123 (talk) 22:08, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
I did the "edit window test" for a couple of sections there, and for me, that page is confusing too. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:54, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

RfC discussion continued, Part 7

Am I correct in thinking that the choice of wikimarkup used is never directly addressed in Wikipedia's guidelines? The WP:MOS does say that "Where more than one style is acceptable, editors should not change an article from one of those styles to another without a good reason." However, I believe that refers to the outward formatting of the article, not the unseen wiring/plumbing. If WP does not expressly state that the unusual markup shown here shouldn't be changed, I see no reason why any individual editor couldn't change it if they wanted to. --Iamozy (talk) 22:14, 12 September 2015 (UTC)

That's a very good question, and I've been half-expecting that quote from MOS to be asked about. Here is my read on it. I think that it does indeed apply to all style considerations, whether seen or unseen by non-editor readers. However, I think that the intended point is that some drive-by editor should not go changing a page from a well-settled consensus style to a personal preference whim. And I agree that such a change is unhelpful. However, I think that it is very important to understand that a drive-by change is vastly different than a careful discussion amongst editors that leads to a consensus that style should be changed. What MOS says should not be misrepresented to imply that ownership is acceptable, in which editors who have already edited a page set themselves up as the veto-ers of any further discussion. Indeed, my intention in opening this RfC was to establish whether or not any such consensus would result after a careful and considered discussion. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:41, 13 September 2015 (UTC)

RfC discussion continued, Part 8

It's now over two years since the last WP:GA/N. I wonder would an independent Good Article review help to settlement this matter? Or does GA/N consider only how the article appears to the reader? Martinevans123 (talk) 07:36, 23 September 2015 (UTC)

The GA criteria include nothing the reader can't see‍—‌and only a small part of that. A serious problem in the last GA nomination (which I didn't make, BTW) was the appearance of the self-appointed roving enforcers insisting on their personal stylistic and markup fetishes, calling them "MOS compliance", when (a) none of what they were doing had anything to do with MOS, and (b) general MOS compliance isn't a requirement of GA anyway‍—‌just a few sections of MOS which are enumerated in the criteria. EEng (talk) 14:06, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
Oh well, just a shot in the dark, Clutching at straws, really. I can see we've touched another nerve there. Never mind. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:19, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
You misunderstand. I think a GA would be great, after the current contretemps is over. In fact, you could do it, since you've made only scattered edits to the article. An unusual aspect of GA is that it's an intentionally lightweight process, to be carried out by one editor on his/her own‍—‌it's not a consensus process. EEng (talk) 14:52, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
"Quelle surprise". I'm busy arranging a long holiday, due to start just after "the current contretemps" is over. What a coincidence! Martinevans123 (talk) 15:04, 23 September 2015 (UTC) p.s. couldn't I fail it for havimg "an overly idiosyncratic referencing system"?
Nope. Wouldn't be part of your brief. If you want you could start your review now so you'd have it all ready when the formal nomination comes. I suggest you get started so as not to interfere with your long holiday. EEng (talk) 16:51, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
That's very considerate of you. But, as luck would have it, my travel agent has found a bargain last-minute deal to a intriguing resort in Arizona. So I'm actually packing already! I'm not sure the accommodation there has full internet access, but I'm sure just being there will remind me of this article. Maybe you could get a "ghost writer" in? Else I fear a GA review might get easily railroaded. Martinevans123 (talk) 17:47, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
Railroaded is right. But your remedy is backwards. To avoid railroading, I would have to be the ghost writer, with some other editor The Front. EEng (talk) 18:38, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
"Fellas... I don't recognize the right of this committee to ask me these kind of questions. And furthermore, you can all go fuck yourselves." - Howard Prince. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:47, 23 September 2015 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Advanced editor tools

Firstly let me sort of answer the RFC question by saying that the complexity of wikitext is a bit 'over-done', but it does have good results, and this is a general problem with all wikipages over time. I have a different perspective, as I have watched (and occasionally edited) this article since 2007, so I have seen it grow over time. I havent found it to be more off putting to other articles. When compared to articles which use {{cite .. }} blocks inside paragraphs, such as Genie (feral child), most parts of this article's wikitext is much better. My annoyance with this article is that a lot of the 'notes' could/should be incorporated into the prose of this article, or the prose of other related articles, and that would simplify the wikitext. And most of the inline comments should be moved to Talk:Phineas Gage/to do.

I use the WP:gadget User:Cacycle/wikEd, and IMO the wikitext looks quite nice in that editor.

However for shits and giggles I tried the gadget Syntax highlighter, which is 'lighter', and it gives up after 50 seconds. That isnt unusual - it doesnt work on many large articles, but it seems appropriate to use that tool as a yardstick for whether this articles wikitext is too complicated given its prose size.

I see user:Iridescent saying it is "virtually incomprehensible" in WP:VisualEditor, but I couldnt immediately see which part of the article renders that badly in VisualEditor. It could be VisualEditor appears worse in some browsers. For me, using Firefox, it loads quite quickly in VisualEditor, and it looks "ok", and I see some VisualEditor edits which didnt break the wikitext, but there is room for improvement. There are 'too many' new line characters and template icons in VE - they are distracting. I suspect that with a little effort we can find ways to make this better in VE, without degrading the rendered result. e.g. I have replaced et{{nbsp}}el.}} with {{nowrap|et al.}} in this edit, and it looks like VE handles {{nowrap}} nicely instead of showing a template icon, and I believe that the rendered page is identical. While using {{nowrap}} adds more curly brackets, my gut feeling is that nowrap is easier for a newbie to understand. John Vandenberg (chat) 01:49, 17 September 2015 (UTC)

You're right -- et{nbsp}al. is rendered in VE with the little puzzle icon, but {nowrap|et al.} is rendered silently in VE. However, &nbsp; is also "silent", so perhaps we should simply put that in place of all the {nbsp}s, instead of substituting {nowrap} as you suggest. (You may or may not be right about {nowrap} being more intuitive, but using it everywhere nbsp is currently used makes for some pretty awkward markup, and in the end I think we'd be worse off. On the other hand, VE allows you to unknowingly delete &nbsp; -- and most other special characters like that -- while on the other hand templates are harder to delete accidentally, but that's an unsolved problem in VE we'll just have to live with.) Thoughts?
Meanwhile, I think you're right that a number of <! -- comments are overdue to either be handled or moved to the todo list. (Some, of course, are meant to be in the source permanently.) I'll start taking a look now. In the meantime if we we can agree that changing {nbsp} to &nbsp; is the right approach, I'll go ahead and do that too. EEng (talk) 02:47, 17 September 2015 (UTC)
Doesnt MOS recommend using templates over HTML entites like  ? Or am I remembering incorrectly? I am guessing that VE fails on {{nbsp}} (which is used on a neat million pages?) because it uses Lua modules. I quickly looked in the bug tracker for any clues, but couldnt see anything. I like how VE handles {{nowrap}} for cases like et al., as it is a single unit of text and should be deleted as a single unit. But I dont object to &nbsp;, especially when only one is needed between two words. If there are too many in a row, the resulting never-ending-characters in the wikitext create a eye-sore. John Vandenberg (chat) 04:40, 17 September 2015 (UTC)
MOS is patchy on advice about markup. However, I'm pretty sure it never specifically prefers templates over html -- usually its examples use html only, or sometimes html and templates on an equal footing -- MOS:ELLIPSIS is typical, and WP:MOSNUM#Non-breaking_spaces tries to hint at the various possibilities, then links to a coupla pages giving conflicting and confusing advice about controlling linebreaks.
I think you're right about nbsp and Lua -- that would explain why VE doesn't fail on e.g. {mdash}. (It doesn't excuse it though -- it's amazing how completely mismanaged the VE effort has been.) I'll wait a bit more for comment from others before converting the {nbsp}s to &nbsp;.
EEng (talk) 07:51, 17 September 2015 (UTC)

I've moved the 'end <foo>' comments within the relevant template invocation to hide them from VisualEditor, and it is now starting to look quite good in VisualEditor.

It still has some 'carriage return' icons, which IMO are worth removing if only to better support VisualEditor, so that editors scared by the wikitext have a flawless experience using VisualEditor. I havent touched those as they are not particularly annoying, and you may have other ideas.

Another problem is that VE shows the entire "Behaviors ascribed to the post-accident Gage.." paragraph as a single {shy} template block, which can be edited using the template editor, but .. yuk! Not sure what is the solution for that. John Vandenberg (chat) 01:03, 18 September 2015 (UTC)

I guess you saw that I went ahead with the {nbsp} --> &nbsp; replacement.
Moving the "end <foo>" comments into the templates was brilliant. The little carriage-return thingees are another mystery -- it makes no sense that VE does anything but treat them as a space, since their effect is exactly the same. In source editing these extra linebreaks are to help the eye find the end of {efn} and so on, but since we also have the hidden comments that do the same thing, and since they (i.e. the linebreaks) are causing this clutter in VE, I've removed them.
EEng (talk) 09:28, 18 September 2015 (UTC)
The carriage-return thingees are needed so that VE (and its users) dont unintentionally modify whitespace in an article, which may annoy source editors who use the line-based diffs to follow changes to the article. Thanks for removing the carriage-returns in the wikitext; I appreciate you compromising on that, at the expense of the wikitext being more 'dense' and some might argue the loss of whitespace makes the wikitext also more complicated. But I believe it is a good concession if it means real newbies can easily fiddle with the article prose using VisualEditor.
I've tested EEng's last revision with Syntax highlighter, and it works !! It looks like a few simple changes over the last few days have had a very good result on the complexity of the wikitext.
I have also removed the {shy} on the "Behaviors ascribed to the post-accident Gage.." paragraph. Feedback on that, or other alternatives?
John Vandenberg (chat) 01:01, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

As WikEd, syntax highlighter and VisualEditor all now work quite well, perhaps we can turn our attention two other editing gadgets available in the preferences: Wikipedia:RefToolbar & User:ProveIt GT. I have not tried either of them before, but have enabled them to become familiar with how they work on other articles. Has anyone else tried those tools on this article? John Vandenberg (chat) 01:02, 19 September 2015 (UTC)

I've never used those two tools (and am having trouble getting them to work on my browser) but if someone has comments on them in this context I'd be glad to hear it. EEng (talk) 01:52, 21 October 2015 (UTC) P.S. to Jvdb: Thanks for all your help improving the article in the past months!

Like a hole in the head

Resolved

Le Poisson de Trypto and I are trying to perfect the text describing the exit area, in laymen's terms. We've run through...

(a) Continuing upward outside the upper jaw and possibly fracturing the cheekbone, it passed behind the left eye, through the left side of the brain, and out the top of the head through the frontal bone of the skull.
(b) Continuing upward [etc etc] and out the top of the head
(c) Continuing upward [etc etc] and out the top of the head, leaving a hole in the frontal bone of the skull.

Before we do anything else, I'd like to suggest

(c') Continuing upward [etc etc] and out the top of the head, through the frontal bone of the skull.

because I think the reader's innate shrewdness will allow him to conclude, without being told, that a hole would result.

Now, in changing (b) to (c), Tfish's comment was "The problem is that the frontal bone is not the same thing as the top of the head". I don't think though, that it's critical that a link always be completely congruent to the text it's behind. In this case, I wonder if this might not be good:

(d) Continuing upward [etc etc] and out the forward top of the head.

(This is the same as (b) but changing "top" to "forward top".) This way, the last part of the sentence continues the structure of the earlier parts (laymen's language in text, technical link behind). And although it's true that "frontal bone" <> "top of head" (or even, as in (d), "forward top of head") I think that the reader will easily see what's meant by the combination of the text "forward top" with the adjacent image; the link allows the more technically minded reader to see the bone involved (even though that bone is much larger than the exit region -- I don't see any way to fix that).

I know this seems like a lot of fuss but my knowledge of anatomy is nil, and if I'm making some blunder I'd like to understand. What do you think, Mr. T? EEng (talk) 07:13, 23 December 2015 (UTC)

Well, whatever else, no one should ever accuse you of not being attentive to details! I admit to getting quite a smile out of reading this. At this point, I say "I pity the fool! In one fish's opinion, the best version is c':
Continuing upward outside the upper jaw and possibly fracturing the cheekbone, it passed behind the left eye, through the left side of the brain, and out the top of the head through the frontal bone of the skull.
That said, I'll confess that I'm pretty sure that it is also a, so maybe I'm a bit biased there. You are quite right that we don't need to tell the reader that there was a hole. (My thinking at the time of my c edit was that the page has several images in which the hole is prominent, so maybe it would be good to say that, but you are correct that it's wasting words on the obvious.) However, I dislike the phrase "forward top of the head", and it is only made worse by linking it Easter-egg style to frontal bone. A bone is not a surface of the head. And, given the prominence of that exit hole in the rest of the story, I really do like telling our readers which bone they are seeing in all those pictures of the skull. (This is what you get for asking for help, so now you know why I told you to be afraid! ) If we were in a med school anatomy class, one would say "frontal superior aspect of the head" (or, for extra credit, "rostro-frontal aspect of the head" or even "rostro-ventral aspect of the head"). Impressive! Tryptofish pats own back. But, as you say, we are writing, instead, for lay readers. But a "forward top" is kludgy language in any case (cf "backward top", which sounds like a children's toy spinning the wrong way). I suppose that we could belabor the point, along the lines of "top of the head, near the front", but that's probably too much. So my advice would be to go with a/c'. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:21, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
I'm sure no one wants a hole in the head Easter-egg style. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:50, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
I make one edit to the page, and I'm already fried. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:01, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
Lol, Tryppy, we're all rolling in the aisles. Martinevans123 (talk) 19:21, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
Making me a trippy egghead. --Poisson Tryppy (talk) 20:03, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
I didn't like to say anything... especially with that User:EEngRooster about. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:15, 23 December 2015 (UTC)
  • Oh wait, you're right -- (c') is (a), except for a comma I guess. The anatomy of the iron's path is one aspect of Gage I've always had a hard time getting my head around because of my lack of training in anatomy, which is why I've been so eager to solicit the opinions of my esteemed fellow editors. I defer to your judgment, agreeing that forward top (best I could think of) is awkward. But one other thing. Since we say out the top of the head, won't the reader know (via that innate shrewdness I mentioned earlier) that the skull is involved? So howzabout
(e) Continuing upward outside the upper jaw and possibly fracturing the cheekbone, it passed behind the left eye, through the left side of the brain, and out the top of the head through the frontal bone.
-- ? EEng (talk) 06:17, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
There might be another frontal bone somewhere else in the body. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:33, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
That sounds like a fraught situation. "No, nurse, I meant the other frontal bone!" More seriously, since we said "out the top of the head", wouldn't this problem come up only if there's another frontal bone in the head? EEng (talk) 22:56, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
Not sure why this is suddenly such a bone of contention. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:03, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
Me neither, Martin. I just changed it to "and out the top of the skull through the frontal bone", and I hope that puts this fraught discussion to rest. (I trust that our shrewd reader can figure out that going out of the skull also means going out of the head, unless they are out of their mind.) --Tryptofish (talk) 23:14, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
DYK ... that in many of the pubs of Newport and Cardiff "SA" is short for Skull Attack? Martinevans123 (talk) 23:19, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
Brains Brewery! I wish that I had called my lab that! --Tryptofish (talk) 23:22, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
  • Returning to Planet Earth, the fish's final version is perfect, IMO. EEng (talk) 02:18, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
Thanks so much! I'm glad. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:10, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
  • Postscript: With the addition of a new "rotating brain" image, further finishing touches have been put to the description of the path, and IMO we've really got something the reasonably informed reader can understand well -- a longstanding gap in the article finally addressed. Thanks to Le Trypto de Fishto, and of course Martin for bringing the coffee and doughnuts. EEng (talk) 13:42, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

Phrenology image

Resolved

I have just updated the arrows in the Phrenology image (it has only taken about six months and two reminders from EEng). You might have to refresh the page to see the change. I'll take this opportunity to wish EEng and all page watchers a Happy Christmas and good New Year. --Mirokado (talk) 23:10, 24 December 2015 (UTC)

And to you too! As for the image, I like the positioning of the arrows. However, on my display, the word "changes", as a label for the arrows, is not visible on the page. If I remove the "upright" parameter for the thumbnail (display the image at its "native" size), then I see it correctly. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:21, 24 December 2015 (UTC)
The word didn't show for me (though the curvy arrows did) until I clicked through to the description page, then back. But now it seems to be there permanently. Weird-weird-weird. And thanks, Mirokado. EEng (talk) 02:18, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
  • Wait a second... it happened again... the word wasn't there and then it was. Mirokado, what witchcraft be this??? If you need to rework something, I'd be just as happy if you simply omit the word and leave the arrows. The point is to help the reader find the three areas -- any comment can be in the caption. EEng (talk) 03:07, 25 December 2015 (UTC)

I've no idea what is going on, but don't worry: "Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose" (Alphonse Karr). I have purged every related page I can think of, perhaps that will stabilise things. --Mirokado (talk) 14:31, 25 December 2015 (UTC)

Fortunately, it looks fine for me today. If through some irrational process of phrenology it disappears again, I think that changing the "upright" parameter in the thumbnail might work. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:14, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
I'm pretty sure this was an issue of the caching of the various thumbnail sizeS. Fiddling with the upright probably forced a cache update as a side effect, but doesn't actuly have anything to do directly with the problem. EEng (talk) 19:50, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
Feeling the bumps on my head, I'm pretty sure that's correct. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:52, 25 December 2015 (UTC)
  • Been all fine since I purged my browser cache. Pretty clear this was just caching. Thanks once again to Mirokado. EEng (talk) 16:45, 13 January 2016 (UTC)

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Placement of "Factors favoring Gage's survival" section

This has probably been discussed before and I just don't remember, but just in case...

I'm wondering whether it would be a good idea to relocate the "Factors favoring Gage's survival", so that it wouldn't be a lone section at the end of the page. Perhaps it could be lowered one header level, and placed between "Extent of brain damage" and "First-hand reports of mental changes". To my way of thinking, it makes sense to discuss why Gage survived directly after discussing the extent of his injuries. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:42, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

The sections currently run like this:
  • 1-2. Life + Death/exhumation (2100 + 400 = 2500 words)
  • 3. Brain damage and mental changes (2000)
  • 4. Theoretical use and misuse (800)
  • 5. Portraits (300)
  • 6. Early medical attitudes (800)
  • 7. Factors favoring Gage's survival (1000)
If I understand, you propose inserting 7 as a new subsection of 3 (maybe renaming 3 Injuries and mental changes or Survival and mental changes etc.). I agree such a change gives a more logical order (it could also go just after Phineas_Gage#Convalescence) but I don't think it would best serves most of our readers. Here's why...
Sections 1 and 2 pretty much have to go first, because without them the rest of the sections make no sense. I put sections 3 and 4 next because they're by far the most prominent subtopics -- many sources mention this stuff even if they don't tell you anything at all about Gage himself or his life, and I think they're what most readers most want.
The rest (5,6,7) are standalones in the sense that nothing in them is needed by any of the other sections (including one another), so they can go in any order, and each is kind of a side topic. Right now they're in the order short, visual, and fun to long, wordy, and less fun.
Again, your proposed order is the most logical, and would make perfect sense for a textbook, where we expect the reader read and absorb all the material. But I think the current sequence is better because under it, if the reader quits at any point he's still got the most essential stuff. Section 7 is quite long, and inserting it into 3 would be a big interruption just at the the point, I think, where the reader would otherwise be getting to "the good part". This is my thinking, anyway.
BTW, at one point I considered breaking off the Phineas_Gage#Extent_of_brain_damage section into a section of its own (another "standalone") but it's so short (250 words) and so closely connected to mental changes that I thought it best to leave it. (It also has good visuals re path of iron.) EEng (talk) 16:42, 16 January 2016 (UTC) P.S. Thanks for you good wishes a few days ago. I had a CAT scan and -- good news -- no cats. For a more thorough workup they'll next do a more general PET scan, which of course can detect any puppies, gerbils, goldfish canaries and so on that may be present as well. EEng (talk) 16:42, 16 January 2016 (UTC)
Yeah, I see what you mean. It's not something where I feel strongly. I looked again at the page, trying to see if there could be another placement, that would retain some of the "logic", but with less interruption of "getting to the good part". One possibility would be simply to put it at the end of Section 3 (as 3.5). On the plus side, it would not be interrupting the rest of Section 3 that way. On the minus side, it would interrupt the transition from 3.4 (exaggeration) to Section 4 (misuse). If that minus side is a deal killer for you, that's OK with me. But I kind of like it, so please consider it seriously, because it really does fit better there, and the reader eager to get to the "good stuff" can be expected to skip over the last part of a section if it looks boring. The way it is now, I feel like, after finishing with Gage's medical treatment early on the page, we suddenly circle back to it at the end, and it just feels weird. Oh my goodness, you have really been going through the wringer! I predict that they'll find an iron rod. Actually, with all the strange invertebrates that I keep in my saltwater aquarium, I like to joke that I have some pet sponges, so maybe that's what they'll find. Anyway, good luck! --Tryptofish (talk) 20:21, 16 January 2016 (UTC)
Thanks for moving it! I just changed the header level to make it a subsection (revert if you disagree). I don't think that there is any problem with Section 3 remaining "Brain damage and mental changes", because injuries outside the brain and adjacent structures would have been unlikely to play that much of a role in survival, so the overall Section 3 header still applies. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:14, 16 January 2016 (UTC)
You're right about interrupting the transition from Exaggeration to Theoretical misuse, but (as you also say) there's a natural affinity between Brain damage and Survival. On the whole I think it will work better having Survival at ==-level section instead of ===-subsection, because when it's a === that one section becomes huge -- 3000 words, bigger than Life + Death combined (2500 words). But lets see how this feels for a few weeks. EEng (talk) 22:15, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

Luck-pushing section-swapping

OK, now I'm doubtless pushing my luck, but here goes! Looking at the page now, how about swapping the positions of 5. Portraits and 6. Early medical attitudes (so that Portraits would instead come after, at the end)? That way, there is a nice progression from theoretical use to medical attitudes, each of which is a different aspect of how "experts" formed opinions about it. And the portraits make for a rather nice note to end on. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:34, 16 January 2016 (UTC)

I'm off to my MRI (no kidding), talk to you later. EEng (talk) 22:15, 16 January 2016 (UTC)
Your suggestion would end the article
  • 4. Theoretical use and misuse
  • 5. Early medical attitudes
  • 6. Portraits.
But lying in the MRI (BANG! CLUNK! BZZZZZT! THWAP!) I had a brainwave, which luckily did not mess up the image. Anyway, my idea was
  • 4. Early medical attitudes
  • 5. Theoretical use and misuse
  • 6. Portraits.
This way, we have the natural transition from "Early" (mid-19th C) to "Theoretical" (mid-19th to 20th) to portraits (21st C). Take a look: [54].
EEng 09:39, 17 January 2016 (UTC)
You should have got the hospital staff to retarget the scan. The world has lost the opportunity to research brain activity while pondering Phineas' injuries. Would there be sympathetic activation of the damaged areas? Would they try to shut down in self-defence? --Mirokado (talk) 11:18, 17 January 2016 (UTC)
Thanks, EEng! I think the way that you did it was even better than my idea. (I had hesitated to suggest that, because I was concerned about that "good stuff" issue.) But I think this is great.
My goodness, you and I suddenly seem to be agreeing so much about this page! How nice. Perhaps they gave you some sort of "medication" to, umm, calm you down before the MRI? If so, do keep taking it! At least now you know that there are no iron rods in you, because, if there had been, the magnet in the MRI, well, squoosh! --Tryptofish (talk) 20:59, 17 January 2016 (UTC)
You seem surprised, but I've always felt we worked well together, putting aside (a) your markup Luddism and (b) that you take to extremes the precept, "Listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story".
I'm still inclined to promote 3.5 Factors favoring Gage's survival from === to ==, because as things are Section 3 is very, very long; though related to 3 Brain damage, 3.5 is really of a different kind; and if we promote 3.5 to == we'll have the full chronological sequence Survival then Early attitudes then Theoretical, then Portraits. But let's just leave it a while and see how the current format feels.
Before the MRI: "Any piercings? Tattoos? Artificial limbs? Penile implant? Breast implants?" I said, "Breast implants???". The technician said, "Since Caitlyn Jenner we ask everyone all the questions." No medication was involved; I found the entire experience most interesting and pleasant, and in fact I almost fell asleep.
EEng 07:43, 18 January 2016 (UTC)
Speaking of pushing one's luck, please do not be so quick to assume that I will not resume my Luddite tendencies. I intend to pursue them again, quite seriously, after your spine has regained its previous spiny-ness. You've had an unusually lengthy respite from my more dull and ignorant side, but that won't last forever.
Anyway, I don't think I've ever seen any rules or guidelines about the word counts of page sections, so I don't think that the length of Section 3 is a problem.
Tattoos? WTF?? Are tattoos magnetic? --Tryptofish (talk) 22:25, 18 January 2016 (UTC)
I fear you misunderstood me. I wasn't implying that you are dull and/or ignorant, merely that you overindulge the dull and ignorant, long past the point where it should be apparent they're unable to contribute usefully in a given situation. If your Luddism flairs up[citation needed] again, we'll get you the best treatment available‍—‌you're that important to us.
I suspect the concern about tattoos is that they sometimes incorporate a variety of materials (think: prison) which, metallic or not, could induce artifacts in the image.
EEng 01:09, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
No worries. I really did understand that you weren't saying that about me. I just extended it to myself, of my own fishy accord. For now, all that I want is Wiki-peace, so I don't expect any flair ups[citation needed] anytime soon. WP:There is no deadline, and happy editing! --Tryptofish (talk) 19:27, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Race to the bottom

Flare
Flair

See right and left. EEng 20:39, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

I got scared when I saw your edit summary! ;-) --Tryptofish (talk) 21:03, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
It's been happening more and more in my declining years -- substituting homonyms. EEng 21:28, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
I guess we are all declining! --Tryptofish (talk) 21:30, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
Requesting that Martinevans123 now drag this discussion to new depths. EEng 22:04, 19 January 2016 (UTC)
Just catching the sun before battle commences once again.....

You're not getting your hands on my flares! Scanner or no scanner! They're sacred to the memory of my troubled teenage years. A Van Sent MRI 123 (talk) 22:23, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Martinevans, "A Man Inverts"
You never disappoint, "A Man Inverts" (see left). EEng 00:17, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
This discussion hit bottom a long time ago! --Tryptofish (talk) 00:24, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
Not until I point out that the anagrams of Tryptofish, though starting promisingly with Trophy Fits, descends through Frothy Spit before reaching Prof. Shitty. EEng 00:55, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
Yikes, about that last one! I wonder if any of my students ever referred to me as that behind my back. (Oh, and grammatically, that's "descend", not "descends". shitty laughter) --Tryptofish (talk) 01:06, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
Sorry -- anagrammatical error. EEng 01:13, 20 January 2016 (UTC)
Not fair
Not fare
Not fare, not fair! Only four letters in your username. The only anagram I came up with is Gene, as in The Selfish Gene. (I, on the other hand, am the shellfish gene.) --Tryptofish (talk) 20:38, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

Section-opening quotations

An edit summary asked for comments about the boxed quotation at the top of the Skepticism section. On the one hand, I do like the use of such quotes "to draw the reader in". On the other hand, this particular instance looks unattractive to me, because the boxed quote is displayed to the right of another quote, that is indented in the text. Perhaps a solution would be for the boxed quote to be centered on the page, instead of aligned to the right. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:24, 21 January 2016 (UTC)

I'm glad you like the the general idea, though fear some will object -- MOS:BLOCKQUOTE says

Do not enclose block quotations in quotation marks (and especially avoid decorative quotation marks in normal use, such as those provided by the {{pull quote}} a.k.a. {{cquote}} template, which are reserved for pull quotes). Block quotations using a colored background are also discouraged.

(I used a colored background just to show my rebellious nature.) Now, I think the real reason for this discouragement is what's said at WP:LONGQUOTE:
As a matter of style, quote boxes should generally be avoided as they draw special attention to the opinion of one source, and present that opinion as though Wikipedia endorses it. Such emphasis on one quote violates NPOV. All quotes should be treated the same.
If that's the concern (and it's a valid one) that still shouldn't prevent boxing historic quotes having no controversy attached to them.
You'll notice that the captions of some of the article's images are designed for similar effect (usually by starting the caption with a quotation) and that's endorsed at WP:CAPTIONS#Drawing_the_reader_into_the_article:
The caption should lead the reader into the article. For example, in History of the Peerage, a caption for Image:William I of England.jpg might say "William of Normandy overthrew the Anglo-Saxon monarchs, bringing a new style of government." Then the reader gets curious about that new form of government and reads text to learn what it is.
I really don't see why a boxed quote (which is really no different from a caption, just without the image) shouldn't be used the same way.
Anyway, in the current version [55] two of the boxquotes (the "moral man" limerick, and the "very small amount" quote) are clearly OK, but one ("modern commen­ta­tors") is maybe borderline. (I'd argue that we're well past questioning that "many modern commentators exaggerate" etc., but I can see that this might not be obvious to the casual observer.) So I've moved "modern commentators" back into the text, and put a new quote (19th c) in its place in the box [56].
As to the layout, I completely agree with you -- the box looks bad when adjacent to a blockquote. I tried centering the quote at the top of the section but then it looks like a banner headline, though maybe this can be salvaged by tinkering with the width etc. Since you like the general idea of quote boxes, there are a couple more I want to add and maybe in the process of doing that some bright idea will occur to me.
EEng 08:11, 22 January 2016 (UTC)
This is getting way above my competency level, so I have zero advice (other than a facetious recommendation of Template:Quotefarm). --Tryptofish (talk) 21:50, 22 January 2016 (UTC)
Well, you're certainly competent to give your opinion of different formatting approaches. But if you've changed your mind about the quotes drawing the reader in etc., please say so now. Otherwise I'll add some more (probably too many) after which we can evaluate which ones are worth keeping. But I don't want to go ahead if you've changed your mind about their appropriateness. When some roving enforcer shows up to say all articles have to look alike, I want to be able to point to this discussion and say, "Hah! Even Frothy Spits[FBDB] likes them -- and you know how hard to please he is!". EEng 00:58, 23 January 2016 (UTC)
Then, facetiousness aside, I approve (in principle) of quotes at the beginnings of sections to draw readers in. But I disapprove of doing it in every section, or most sections. And I disapprove of having more quotes than text, or of having too many quotes. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:33, 23 January 2016 (UTC)

Bring Me the Head, belated response

I just took a quick look over the edit history, and realized that an edit summary had asked me what I thought about the cartoon showing the accident. Having just seen it now, I'm responding belatedly. I like the idea of including the image, because it vividly shows "in popular culture". But I disagree with its placement on the page, paired with the image about tamping. It makes the tamping image seem less serious and attention-worthy, and it's a peculiar stage in the reading of the page to encounter something humorous – after all, the injury itself was no laughing matter. So: my advice would be to relocate it to the section about "Exaggeration and distortion of mental changes". It fits well with the theme of how a lot of popular accounts got the facts wrong, and it would provide an image in a rather wordy section that does not yet have one. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:30, 22 August 2016 (UTC)

Hmmm. I don't see it as humorous, though certainly rather than being clinical it has what one might call a "light touch". The reason I put it in the accident section is that I actually think it's quite accurate on where the iron entered and exited. So I think it helps the reader understand, because there's nothing else available showing that, just the disembodied-fleshless-skull images from Ratiu's and van Horn's papers (seen here at left). The crew's reactions, and Gage being blown into the air, are of course fanciful, but that doesn't bother me.
You're right, though, that the Distortion/Exaggeration section is strangely bereft of images in this otherwise image-rich article. Just to see how it looks I've moved "Bring Me" there. Take a look. EEng 23:46, 22 August 2016 (UTC)
Thanks. I like the change. I understand your reasoning for the previous placement, but I suspect that the typical Wikipedia reader would assume that the image is not really reliable for the exact anatomy/trajectory, and thus would not take from it what you intended. It goes well with all the exaggerations, etc. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:52, 22 August 2016 (UTC)
It just crossed my mind that you could crop the image to just show his head, from the bottom to the top of the spike, and that could potentially illustrate the trajectory. I'm not really in favor of doing that, but I guess it's an option. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:56, 22 August 2016 (UTC)
Actually, maybe not. I just looked closely at the image, enlarging it as much as I could, and it sort of makes it look like the spike is passing under his facial skin, but not through the skull. It's subjective, in the eye of the beholder. I really think it's better in the realm of pop culture and exaggerations. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:01, 23 August 2016 (UTC)
Wow, we're really seeing this differently. I was just about to say that one thing I realize I don't like about the new placement is that it implies "Bring Me the Head" is an example of exaggeration/distortion. It's not -- it's far more accurate than any attempt at comprehensive presentation I can remember, other than Kean's. I'm even thinking about using it at an upcoming seminar for high school students.
I kind of see what you mean about close examination of the face. You're right one might see it as first as kind of burrowing under the dermis, but when you look at the depicted entry and exit points I think it's clear the path goes behind the eye. Back when it was next to the other, scientific, images, there could be no mistake about that and I think they complimented one another nicely. Anyway, let's sleep on it for a week or more, and maybe others will chime in. EEng 00:35, 23 August 2016 (UTC) P.S. Full disclosure: I was asked to review it just before publication for factual accuracy, and suggested a handful of minor changes, but even before that it was impressively accurate. I did miss one little thing though -- drat. I wish I could send you a copy but I promised to only send it to Macmillan, at least for now -- sorry. It was later that the idea struck me to use this panel in the article, and I got them to release it.
In any case, I think that pairing it with the tamping image has the unintended effect of distracting from the tamping image. You asked for my opinion, and (eventually) you got it. (I keep this page on my watchlist, but I don't pay close attention, so if you want my opinion on something, you'll likely get a quicker response by pinging me.) --Tryptofish (talk) 01:01, 23 August 2016 (UTC)
No deadline, so we can afford to stew on it awhile. What we have to balance is the misleading implication that we're deprecating the work (if it's in Distortion section), vs. the distraction/lack of anatomic precision (if it's in the Accident section). EEng 03:26, 23 August 2016 (UTC)

Inpopcult

I'd like to suggest an idea that occurred to me. Perhaps you could create a new page section, about how Gage and his accident were presented in popular culture. I'm sure there were various popularizations in the decades after his accident, and there have of course been accounts written for children. It might make an interesting addition to the page, and of course it would be an ideal location for the image. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:51, 27 August 2016 (UTC)

Yeah, I thought of that. The problem is that the idea of a popcult section has been on my mind for years but I just don't think there's enough material worth mentioning. 19th-c presentations of Gage outside medical/scientific literature were pretty much limited to phrenological writings (which the article already covers) and now and then something in an armchair musing on the brain, soul, mind, etc. e.g. [57]; but all were very limited and not much different from the scientific presentations -- distorted one way or another according to what doctrinal axe the author was grinding (exception: "The Man with a Hole in His Head" was neither phrenological nor short, grinds no axe, and is the only fictional work based on Gage I know of until maybe the 1970s or 1980s). The 20th c wasn't much different, except with the occasional Ripleys and a handful of appearances in books with titles like Yankee Yarns.
Thus the only serious discussion of Gage in popcult (which is, as usual, in Macmillan 2000) is pretty much just the foregoing, mention of the two rock bands named for Gage, and not much else. Since then, and especially since the portraits were discovered, there's been something of an explosion, but there's no RS commentary on that, and even if there was I think it could be pretty much handled in just one or two of my long multiclause sentences. It would make an embarrassingly short section, I fear. EEng 03:10, 28 August 2016 (UTC)

A popcult snippet

  • "Video as art" The Irish Times, Mar 6, 1989, p. 8 (describes a bizarre piece of installation art having nothing apparent to do with Gage, but "inspired" by him") EEng 05:02, 14 September 2016 (UTC)

I am not making this up

  • Phineas Gage – the haberdashery (check out their logo). I spoke with them today and suggested they consider a "Blowout Sale" with "Prices so low your head will explode!" EEng 08:29, 25 September 2016 (UTC)
I see from the bottom of their page that it is copyright 2016 Phineas Gage. I knew that he survived the accident, but this is amazing! Perhaps there is a little bit more of a rationale for a pop culture section. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:00, 25 September 2016 (UTC)
P.S. I knew you were going to put that "shy" into "phrenology"! I was waiting to see how long it would take. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:05, 25 September 2016 (UTC)

Additional video

Volume rendering of Gage's skull.

I think this video (right) could fit well into the article, but I did not find a good place to put it. -- Daniel Mietchen (talk) 23:48, 17 October 2016 (UTC)

I appreciate your bringing this up. However, to be honest it's not a very good rendering, apparently because it's not from Ratiu's raw CT scans, but rather derived from Ratiu's video (which in turn came from his CT scans). The fact is that this paper's not about Gage, but rather uses Gage as a vehicle to demonstrate a certain technique, and as I said the results aren't that good. And it's so short and fast! So I'm not sure how it would aid the reader's understanding of Gage, esp. given the three modern still images already displayed in the article, plus the "External video". I'm including those four items below to aid this discussion, and pinging Tryptofish and Mirokado for their thoughts. EEng 02:01, 18 October 2016 (UTC)
External videos
video icon Video reconstruction of tamping iron pass­ing through Gage's skull (Ratiu et al.)
I likewise find that video so short that I have trouble even seeing what it is supposed to show. I agree with EEng that the existing image files are better. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:40, 18 October 2016 (UTC)

Harvard copyedit

This:

In November 1849 Henry Jacob Bigelow, the Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, brought Gage to Boston and, after satisfying himself that the tamping iron had actually passed through Gage's head, presented him to a meeting of the Boston Society for Medical Improvement and (possibly) to a Harvard Medical School class.

has gotten a bit redundant. An earlier version has read "... to a Medical School class", which is not a style WP uses (the capitalization of a common-noun reference; similarly if someone worked for Santa Clara Community College and later the University of California at Berkeley, we would not write of her anything like "... after she left her Community College position for the University post").

The entire sentence could probably be redone, with further removal of unnecessary capitalization (per MOS:JOBTITLES, "professor of surgery" shouldn't be capitalized except when prefixed to the name):

In November 1849, Henry Jacob Bigelow, professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School, brought Gage to Boston and, after satisfying himself that the tamping iron had actually passed through Gage's head, presented Gage to a meeting of the Boston Society for Medical Improvement and (possibly) to his medical class.

This also removes the "the" before the job title, which indicates that HMS only had one surgery professor (possibly true at that time, but we don't know that from the source presented so far).  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  04:23, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

Well, how about...

In November 1849, Henry Jacob Bigelow, the professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School, brought Gage to Boston and, after satisfying himself that the tamping iron had actually passed through Gage's head, presented Gagehim to a meeting of the Boston Society for Medical Improvement and (possibly) to histhe medical school class.

It certainly wasn't "his" (Bigelow's) class, and the earlier "a medical school class" was also wrong. It was just "the" Harvard Med School class, simply meaning all the students at the school at the given time, there not being designated stages-of-study (first year, second year, etc.) as you would see today.

As to "the" professor of surgery, Bigelow certainly was the one and only, Harvard Med School being, like most medical schools at the time, a bit of a boutique operation. I'm actually having trouble finding an explicit source on this precise point; it's like trying to find a source explaining that George Washington was the President of the US, not one of many. Nonetheless I've found something that I think just barely passes muster, being from Harvard's own Center for the History of Medicine.

I've installed all this stuff so all can see the new cite, but of course comments from my esteemed fellow editors are most welcome. EEng 07:40, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

My gut reaction was that it should actually be "the Professor of Surgery", capitalized, although trips to MOS always make me cringe (because the issues are often so trivial). But I looked at MOS:JOBTITLES, and I actually do think that capitalization is correct in this case. MOS makes a distinction between "French kings" and the "King of France". Bigelow, here, is like the latter. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:10, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
I'm inclined to agree that Professor of Surgery is a title, and should be capitalized. SM registering no objection, I'll reinstall the capitals. EEng 13:37, 9 December 2016 (UTC)
...and now that I've done it, it looks a little strange. Whatever. EEng 13:39, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

The Wonderful World of Wikidata

Over at Gage's Wikidata entry I tried to add the Wikidata equivalent of [[Rock blasting|blaster]] as an occupation, but instead I seem to have added blaster (Q2481679) fictional type of personal laser weapon from Star Wars. Can anyone sort this out? I'm flummoxed. EEng 02:23, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Maybe just change it to "railroad construction"? --Tryptofish (talk) 03:02, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
It already lists railroad construction foreman and stagecoach driver; I was trying to add blaster as a third entry. Now that's I've inadvertently linked Gage to the Star Wars franchise, I'd be happy just to delete it, but I can't even get it to do that. EEng 03:12, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
Woops, I should have actually looked at the entry. Anyway, please check it now, because I think I was able to successfully remove it. At first, it did to me what it probably did to you, which is to refuse to carry out "remove", with an idiotic message about how it's better not to remove it. Then I tried adding a "qualifier", and while it was in that mode, the "remove" function seems to have worked without arguing with me. This was my first edit at Wikidata, and I hope that it will be my last. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:28, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
Thank you, kind sir. So much for my degree in computer science from you-know-where. I feel the same way about Wikidata. It's like a video game -- everything you click pops up with a secret power or Cloak of Secrecy or something. EEng 23:28, 3 February 2017 (UTC)
[FBDB]That would be "kind fish" to you! Yes, sometimes ignorance is bliss. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:35, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Reference formats

I've been trying to follow the still-in-progress edits about various strategies to improve on the displaying of references, and am quite interested. However, I noticed something odd in the page edit history (at least on my browser), that I figured I should point out. Although the current version of the page looks fine, every preceding edit displays the References section very oddly, as though templates cannot be properly parsed. Make a new revision, and the previous properly displaying version becomes improperly displayed. Baffling. --Tryptofish (talk) 01:32, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

Actually, nothing I've been doing changes the appearance of the (current) rendered page, rather I've just been redesigning the template to clean up its syntax and so on retrospectively. In other words, I've changed the order and names of the parameters the template expects, and at the same moment correspondingly changed the article to supply those changed parameters. I wouldn't dare do that except that, to my unutterable astonishment and no doubt yours and Mirokado's, this remains the only article using what is so obviously the best Wikipedia referencing system ever devised by the human mind (or any other mind for that matter) and thus this is the only article that needs to be changed. An unfortunate side effect of that is that earlier versions of the article won't display their ref sections properly, for the reason you gave -- the parms those old versions of the article supply to the templates don't match what the current template expects. (Wikimedia isn't smart enough to match up old versions of articles to the versions of templates in force at that point in time -- that sounds like something that should be easy to do, but in fact there are some theoretical problems with even deciding how that should work.) Maybe that was a bad decision, and as I try to explain it to you I have to admit I'm a little uncomfortable with it, but there it is. EEng 01:44, 14 March 2017 (UTC)
Thanks, and well-played. Yes, with each passing day I discover more ways in which Wikimedia isn't as smart as I would like it to be. (Come to think of it, with each passing day I discover more ways in which I am not as smart as I would like to be.) As for no doubt mine, I would not in fact give an award for the best referencing system ever devised by the human mind. But this is indeed an article that needs to be changed, which is why I was so interested, and still am. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:39, 14 March 2017 (UTC)
"As for no doubt mine"? EEng 23:53, 14 March 2017 (UTC)
You had said: "and no doubt yours and Mirokado's". That's what I referred to. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:42, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
Gotcha. I agree the award could be a bad idea -- could sow jealousy. EEng 21:46, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
I was more concerned about sowing hubris. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:58, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Removing "press box" related to irrelevant site-wide template vandalism

I'm reverting this [58] addition of a "press box" referring to a media mention [59] of the article. While I understand it's well-intentioned, it really has nothing to do with article per se. This was an incident of site-wide template vandalism that affected tens of thousands of articles (see Special:Diff/813822899#Background_Image_Vandalism). Nothing in the media piece has anything to do with Gage or the content of the Gage article, and it's a waste of time for editors to click on the box's link thinking they're going to learn something about how the article is viewed by the media. EEng 17:54, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

Fair enough. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 19:02, 5 December 2017 (UTC)
It's a shame, because for a minute there I was hoping we'd be subpoenaed for the Mueller investigation. EEng 23:03, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

Skull image in lead

The iron's path, per Harlow}

The image (to the right) moves the positioning of the TOC on largish screens. Here's what I see. Might it be a good idea to move it to it's relevant section in the article? (I didn't want to prance in here and start moving stuff around). Anarchyte (work | talk) 11:45, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

This is the relevant section: it's there to show the reader immediately what happened to the subject. Any article goes haywire when viewed in a window 60 words wide. We could add {clear left} just before the TOC but all that would do is create even more wasted whitespace. EEng 15:53, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

his desire to return to his family in New Hampshire being "uncontrollable by his friends ... got wet feet and a chill"

The following:

his desire to return to his family in New Hampshire being "uncontrollable by his friends ... got wet feet and a chill"

makes no grammatical sense. Somebody who understands what it's supposed to mean, please fix it. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 11:31, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

Yes, it does look a bit like some [joining text in square brackets] is missing there. I can guess at what is meant. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:54, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
As can we all, except one of us apparently. I'm sure you join me in eager anticipation of CT's answer below. EEng 12:14, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
Martinevans123: Can you fix it? It's gibberish as it stands. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 12:16, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
I'd really appreciate it if you'd answer my question below. EEng 12:23, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
To put things in context, let's give the whole more of the passage:

While Harlow was absent for a week Gage was "in the street every day except Sunday", his desire to return to his family in New Hampshire being "uncontrollable by his friends ... got wet feet and a chill". He soon developed a fever ...

Now, before we pass on to the question of whether the bit you quoted should be stiltedly recast to fit WP:MISSSNODGRASS' narrow ideas about what constitutes good writing, let me ask you one thing: do you really not "understand what it's supposed to mean"? Really? Be honest now. EEng 12:14, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
It's obvious - his desire got wet feet and a chill. Often happens, I suspect. Martinevans123 (talk) 13:23, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
Grrr. I've still got that nuclear button on my desk, A Man Inverts. I'd still like an answer from CT. EEng 14:49, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
Without looking at the sources I expect it has something to do with Netflix, no? Though I can't quite work out what sort of sexual activity is implied by "wet feet". ...I hope he clipped his toenails first. nagualdesign 22:52, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
"In June 2016, singer-songwriter Danah released a song titled "Phin and Chill" on GunpowderCloud. The track, produced by Ed Wippy Lion, a member of Vermont pop-transit group Rutland Crew... is a tongue-in-cheek representation of the use of the tamping iron in popular culture." Martinevans123 (talk) 23:06, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
Those things'll go right through you if you're not careful. I think that's why a lot of marital aids have vestigial organs. It's health and safety gone mad! nagualdesign 23:24, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
Martinevans123: I have been going through some the sources—that's how I determined there were commas in quotes that weren't in the sources[60][61]—but dealing with EEng's editwarring and constant attacks has sapped my motivation. Given that he's editwarring over the tag already,[62][63] I don't trust him to "allow" me to attempt to fix it anyways, and I'm not going to get dragged into an editwar. Unless one of the other editors here is willing to fix this mess, I suppose EEng "wins" by attrition, as he did at Sacred Cod (still unfixed). Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 23:09, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
Now there's an article that deserves some deep attention, I'm sure. But "chill thy beans", dear Curls, I'm sure someone will suggest a suitable compromise. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:14, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
I hope so. The best solution would probably be to forego the whole awkward WP:QUOTEFARM style entirely, which makes for tiresome reading. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 01:19, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
Yikes—I just took a stroll through the talkpage archives and edit history. There is no hope for "this mess of an article"[B1]:20[H]:4n[M]:43—one of "the least[M]:17,41,90[M10]:643 pleasant reading experiences"[B1]:13-14[H]:5​​[M]:25-29​​[17]​​[19] I've "had on Wikipedia".[M]:1,378[M2]:C​​[3]:1347​​[4]:56​​[K2]:abstr Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 04:13, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
I hear that now and then from people who write articles nobody reads. But opinions vary. EEng 04:31, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
Curious how EEng would characterize articles such as history of Japan, ukiyo-e, Maus, etc, as ones "nobody reads"—even more curious is that he would think pageviews justify poor editing. Maybe there's no more to this puzzling behaviour than an overwhelming desire to provoke other editors, which appears to be a motif in his editing history. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 04:57, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
OK, sorry, three of the literally 300 articles on your "Wikiresume" someone reads, though since you want to press the point, pageviews for those three articles together are roughly the same as this one alone. Pageviews don't "justify bad editing", but they do validate that many eyes are on the article, and that actual (not fanciful) issues are likely to be shaken out. I have no desire to provoke other editors, but I do have contempt for editors who want all articles refashioned according to their personal preferences – the "anodyne consistency" one editor referred to here. EEng 19:50, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm not sure why EEng is comparing the list of articles I've created to one he bagan to edit five years after it was created, or how EEng's penis-measuring contest is a logical defense of ugly prose. By that logic, Pornography—with seven times the pageviews over its lifetime—must have imerfectible, God-like prose. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 21:50, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

This isn't about "fixing" anything "wrong"; it's just a question of style. I forget the rhetorical term – it's something like an ellipsis, though there's some other more specific word for it – but this kind of switching horses midstream is an established technique, though little used because only occasionally does the opportunity arise to use it for what it's used for, which is to avoid stilted interpolations the reader will readily supply for himself. Sure, we could change it to say

While Harlow was absent for a week Gage was "in the street every day except Sunday", his desire to return to his family in New Hampshire being "uncontrollable by his friends ... [As a result he] got wet feet and a chill". He soon developed a fever ...

but that would dominate the quotation for no reason – the reader easily grasps what's going on without it. You would never do this in straight article text, but the ellipsis already in the quotation presents the opportunity. I did the same thing at Widener Library:

In 1910 a committee of architects termed Gore
unsafe [and] unsuitable for its object ... no amount of tinkering can make it really good ... hopelessly over­crowded ... leaks when there is a heavy rain ... intolerably hot in summer ... books are put in double rows and are not infrequently left lying on top of one another, or actually on the floor ...
With dormitory basements pressed into service as overflow storage for Harvard's 543,000 books, the committee drew up a proposal for replacement of Gore in stages.

Sure, this could be rewritten to read:

In 1910 a committee of architects termed Gore
unsafe [and] unsuitable for its object ... no amount of tinkering can make it really good ... hopelessly over­crowded [and] intolerably hot in summer ...
The committee also noted that Gore "leaks when there is a heavy rain" and that "books are put in double rows and are not infrequently left lying on top of one another, or actually on the floor". With dormitory basements pressed into service as overflow storage for Harvard's 543,000 books, the committee drew up a proposal for replacement of Gore in stages.

– but that would break up a nice passage for no purpose except to satisfy some WP:MISSSNODGRASSian compulsion. If my esteemed fellow editors really feel that a more conventional style will work better, fine, but the idea that the current text is somehow incomprehensible, or "wrong" is nonsense. EEng 00:49, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

And, as already noted but worth repeating, one should always avoid the possibility of breaking up a nice passage for no purpose except to satisfy. nagualdesign 01:26, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
  • Comment The missing text in square brackets should be added, as otherwise the sentence is ungrammatical, but guessing at what is meant would be inappropriate as a basis for doing so, even if readers can easily do so. EEng is being disingenuous and violating AGF by accusing CT of "pretending" not to understand. Yes, CT can guess at what is meant as well as the rest of us, but doing so in order to fill out a quotation would be inappropriate; he was not wrong to tag the sentence in question. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 08:52, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
Also, EEng, please drop the act with the citation of page view statistics as though each one of them is a separate person who has read through the entire article, noticed the grammatical error in the nineteenth paragraph, and decided it was not worth trying to fix -- I am probably five or six of the 7,000,000 people you refer to, and I never noticed the problem. Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 08:57, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Of course he's pretending not to understand. Whether one likes the style or not, it's perfectly obvious that it was Gage who "got wet feet and a chill". As to page views, let's suppose each person returns to the article five or six times, as you did – in fact, let's call it seven. That's 1,000,000 distinct readers. Then let's assume only 1/20 of them read as far as this paragraph. That's still 50,000 distinct readers insufficiently puzzled to inquire or complain.

Anyway, the trouble with all this Miss Snodgrassian hand-wringing is that Harlow, who's being quoted, does exactly the thing you're complaining about:

The atmosphere was cold and damp, the ground wet, and he went without an overcoat and with thin boots; got wet feet and a chill.

Like I said, it's a perfectly acceptable technique, even if a little-used one. (And before you ask, he was writing in The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal – what we now call The New England Journal of Medicine.) EEng 19:50, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

But that was in 1848, exactly 170 years ago? Fashions change, even in academic and professional journals? Martinevans123 (talk) 20:10, 10 January 2018 (UTC) (p.s. I wasn't going to ask)
Good point, but (a) on the whole usage becomes more flexible over time, not less; and (b) it's him I'm quoting. EEng 20:24, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
If it's that critical, could we include the whole sentence? But, I mean, "wet feet and a chill" isn't really medically knife-edge is it? Martinevans123 (talk) 20:56, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
I would say "on the whole usage becomes more flexible over time, not less" is an off-topic generality that had nothing to do with the present problem, as our article text ungrammatically distorts the quotation (the subject of "got" is clearly different), but it's not even true. Formal writing in 19th-century English had all sorts of conventions that were perfectly acceptable then but that any right-minded copy editor in 2017 would change. Ctrl+F this for "periodic style". Hijiri 88 (聖やや) 08:52, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Begin interlude

EEng accused me of bad faith over my edits at Sacred Cod, too—after lots of kicking and screaming, he had to issue a public apology at talk:MOS that I was right all along. Does EEng accuse everyone who disagrees with him of bad faith? He sure likes to fight with people on this talk page!
Someone forgot to add "one should be able to parse a sentence" to Miss Snodgrass's List of Lies. On second thought, leave it out—writing is so much easier when there's no rule binding the poor editor to make sense. The rule should be: the longer the penis, the less sense an editor is required to make. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 22:01, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
If only Sigmund was here. He'd have a field day? Martinevans123 (talk) 22:11, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
I wonder what he'd have to say about this obsession with "Miss Snodgrass".[M]:1,378[M2]:C​​[3]:1347​​[4]:56​​[K2]:abstr[M]:17,41,90[M10]:643[B1]:13-14[H]:5​​[M]:25-29​​[17]​​[19]
(check out that "large iron rod‍"![B2][31]:28[M10]:643-4[H]:14[M]:101​​[B1]:22n[36][M]:46-7) Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 22:58, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
Something to do with cranial trauma, I expect. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:04, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
  • CT, I've never accused you of bad faith, unless you count my post a bit above wherein I asserted that you had pretended not to understand what the passage under discussion was meant to say, which you obviously had been doing.
  • I did not "have to" issue an apology, but nonetheless I did, because that's what I do when I've sown confusion or caused inconvenience, even inadvertently. Good advice.
  • What I said in that apology, which you have so thoughtfully linked, is that
    (a) I had misread the guideline; and
    (b) I was glad to see that there was discussion ongoing to correct the poor presentation which had misled me (along with many other editors, who had many times reinforced my misreading).
I said nothing about you being right because
(1) no one cares about that; and
(2) since you press the point, you were wrong about the most important point, which is that many people do, in fact, misunderstand LQ because of its poor presentation.
But really, can you take your anger elsewhere? – because
(α) you've been fulminating on Talk:MOS, on my talk page, and now here for several days, and you're frightening the horses; and
(β) this is an article talk page, for discussing possible changes to the article; you said above that you didn't want to participate in that, so if you must keep bleating please do it on my talk page, though I'd rather you didn't do that either.
EEng 01:30, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
"CT, I've never accused you of bad faith, [except for when I did]".[B2][31]:28[M10]:643-4[H]:14[M]:101​​[B1]:22n[36][M]:46-7[M]:1,378[M2]:C​​[3]:1347​​[4]:56​​[K2]:abstr[M]:17,41,90[M10]:643[B1]:13-14[H]:5​​[M]:25-29​​[17]​​[19]
"... many people do, in fact, misunderstand LQ because of its poor presentation ..."—EEng has yet to demonstrate that this applies very widely at all (the discussion at talk:MoS was unanimous against his interpretation—but at least he's no longer asserting "most people"). But here we're talking about fixing this piece of garbage prose in Phineas Gage, which has nothing to do with LQ. Of course, EEng'll go off about LQ, pageviews, etc. again—anything but about how to fix the garbage prose. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 01:52, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
That discussion is below. This section is for you to rant and me to gently correct you. EEng 02:15, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Do I detect the very faintest suggestion of animosity between you two? I fear it may be getting in the way of finding a solution here. Perhaps you could both take a step back and let other "less involved" editors find a solution? Martinevans123 (talk) 10:42, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Scroll down and you'll see I've already disengaged; scroll up and you'll see I've been asking someone else to handle this all along. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 12:25, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
I applaud your sense of perspective. Perhaps this interlude could be hatted, lest folks think you or EEng bear some kind of slight grudge? Martinevans123 (talk) 12:31, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Resuming discussion

OK, Martin, where were we? Ah yes... Well, if we include the entire sentence we have

While Harlow was absent for a week Gage was "in the street every day except Sunday", his desire to return to his family in New Hampshire being "uncontrollable by his friends ... The atmosphere was cold and damp, the ground wet, and he went without an overcoat and with thin boots; got wet feet and a chill." He soon developed a fever ...

which would be just as "ungrammatical" (according to Miss Snodgrass) as before. EEng 01:30, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Just what the fuck did "Miss Snodgrass" do to EEng? If her "thing" is readable prose, then I'm afraid I have to take her side. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 01:57, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
You seem upset. EEng 02:15, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
You seem pleased. Why not just write prose that gets to the point? Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 02:23, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm pleased discussion is able to proceed despite your ranting. EEng 02:32, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
"despite [my] ranting [about some 'Miss Snodgrass']" <-- fixed that for you. The text, anyways—I wouldn't pretend to fix the underlying issues.
I hope Martin or someone else will be able to solve the problem, and I hope it takes fewer than another 14 archive pages of EEng sneering and kicking up drahmah over people trying to fix the mess of an article he constructed from other people's words.
I'm giving you the last word, EEng—apparently you have some idea of what that should mean. Just skip fucking with the indenting when you post your next witty comeback. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 04:09, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Anyway, Martin, you see what I mean about including the full sentence (aside from the fact that all that detail about the weather and the coat and the boots probably [oops, left this word out before: don't] help the reader much)? EEng 16:24, 11 January 2018 (UTC) Added missing word 18:50, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

I quite like the weather and the coat and the thin boots, as I think they make the meaning much clearer. Alternatively, I'd be happy to see the quote truncated after "uncontrollable by his friends...". But I'd also be happy to see suggestions from other editors. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:37, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
I concur with Martin that the details of the weather, coat and boots should be included; they put the chill in context and make it clear that his becoming ill was as a result of inappropriate clothing, not infection relating to his injury. On the broader WP:QUOTEFARM issue, I'd say this article is an exceptional case. Gage is noteworthy not so much for his injury, but for the manner in which he became a minor figure in popular culture, and as such it makes sense to include more reactions of his contemporaries, and descriptions of him by those who met him, to put the later semi-mythical literary construct of 20th-century pop-psych books in context. (The alternative approach with topics like this of separate articles for "verified facts about the person" and "popular perceptions of the person and how they came to be believed"—as we do with figures as varied as Vincent van Gogh, the Zodiac Killer, Nikola Tesla and Benjamin Franklin—would also be viable, although it has the unfortunate side-effect of tending to make the parent biography rather dry and boring.) ‑ Iridescent 16:58, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Thanks, Arid Desicant, you've put the situation very succinctly. I'm happy to better emphasize the cause of the fever, but in the interests of brevity I wonder if we can just add the apparel but let the reader realize for himself that the weather wasn't sunny and warm:
While Harlow was absent for a week Gage was "in the street every day except Sunday", his desire to return to his family in New Hampshire being "uncontrollable by his friends ... he went without an overcoat and with thin boots; got wet feet and a chill." He soon developed a fever [etc etc]
Thoughts? EEng 18:50, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
No objection. But let's see what "Erect Dis In" has to say. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:57, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Let's hope he brings some dry wit to bear. EEng 19:00, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
"cringe".... I now feel suitably cretinised. Martinevans123 (talk) 19:17, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Iridescent: while I obviously disagree about the nauseous QUOTEFARM style, as well as many other editorial choices that degrade the article's reading experience, the goal of the discussion—the only goal of the discussion—is to have a single broken passage fixed. All the drahmah has erupted from an attempt to obstruct fixing this single broken passage. Curly "JFC" Turkey 🍁 ¡gobble! 21:42, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
  • There being no further relevant comment, I'll go ahead and install that last proposal. EEng 16:06, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Initial treatment (oz to gm)

I'm not sure if the conversion comes from sources, but 1.0 oz is generally rounded to 28 g. Ward20 (talk) 05:42, 14 September 2018 (UTC)

The source says,
a portion of the brain, an ounce or more, which protruded, was removed
and this is rendered in the article as
removed ... an ounce [30 g] of protruding brain
The source is giving a very rough estimate, of course. Then there's fluid ounce vs. avoirdupois ounce; given that brain is mostly water, they're off by "only" about 5% under their modern US definitions (a fluid ounce, which is probably what the source means, would be about 29.5g of water) but historically they're all over the map. So it seems overprecise to convert to 28g, which is why I gave the round 30g. At the same time we don't want to confuse schoolchildren, I suppose, but I don't know what else to do.
I thought about saying simply "a small amount of brain" but, speaking for myself, I don't want even an ounce of my brain removed (that would be about 2-3%) so I'm not sure that's a good way to go either. Thoughts?
Glad to see you back, Ward20. Things have been so quiet around here lately. EEng 08:23, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
What? You thnk I'm loud? Just kidding. Maybe put it in quotes with (sic) to indicate it comes from the source but may be different than current convention? Ward20 (talk) 11:48, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
If by "it comes from the source" you mean the gram value comes from the source, no it doesn't -- the source is as quoted above; but perhaps I misunderstand you. In the meantime, how about this [64]? That way, it's clear everything's rough. I hesitated to suggest that because I've gotten flak about "too many quotes", but anyway what do you think? (I meant to propose it here first but while composing in situ I unthinkingly went ahead and saved.) EEng 14:14, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
If the source only says "an ounce or more", my advice would be to just say "approximately an ounce" on the page (or "about an ounce"). As long as it's approximate, then it doesn't have to matter whether it's fluid ounces or any other kind, and that passage from the source makes it sound like it wasn't measured precisely anyway. (And if you ever change your mind about having some of your brain removed, just let me know, and I'll change your mind.) --Tryptofish (talk) 18:46, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
There's no question of it being anything more than a very rough estimate, though for whatever reason Harlow (he's the source) makes clear it's on the high side of one ounce, so it seems to me using the source's original "an ounce or more" makes more sense than "approximately an ounce". (As noted, there's about a 5% difference between a fluid ounce of water and a "mass" ounce, modulo shifting definitions over time and geography -- but none of that matters given the roughness of the original "ounce or more".) That leaves us with the question of how to render it in grams. Since various interpretations of "ounce" give us 28g or 29.5g, I figure when we fold in the "or more" we arrive very comfortably at a round 30g. Thus, ""an ounce or more" (30 g). EEng 19:23, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
What I was trying to say is that there is no need for WP to say anything about grams. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:25, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
I'd agree that any kind of conversion here is being overprecise. Martinevans123 (talk) 19:30, 15 September 2018 (UTC) EEng, had you considered going DIY at all? ... you can always stop to check the scales.
Yep, I would agree that we can only be as precise as the original source. Anything else would veer into OR territory. I love this article! Simon Adler (talk) 19:39, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Concur using "an ounce or more" and removing the gram conversion seems best. Ward20 (talk) 19:51, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

Wait a second ... if we say anything at all using an English/US measurement, for metricated readers we have to give some indication of what that means; that's basic. However, we could sidestep the whole problem by saying a quantity of protruding brain (which also avoids the problem with "a small amount", discussed near the top of this thread). As the wise man said, an ounce of imprecision saves a ton of explanation. Readers hungry for more detail can consult the source. EEng 20:50, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

Perfect solution. A quantity. I'm for that. Simon Adler (talk) 20:56, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Years in the crucible have taught me reflexes for jumping out worthy of an Olympic gymnast. EEng 22:04, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Well I'm not that hungry for 170-year-old New Hampshire cortex, thanks. Chianti or no Chianti. But just "a quantity"?? That could be practically any amount?? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:03, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Yes, that's true. How about "a piece"? --Tryptofish (talk) 21:11, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
We don't know it was a single piece (and it probably wasn't). EEng 21:34, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Pity it wasn't a piece of mind. A portion? A small amount? Some? --Tryptofish (talk) 21:41, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
A dollop? [65] Simon Adler (talk) 21:46, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
An appetizer-sized portion? No, never mind. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:50, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Why do I get all the nuts? EEng 21:58, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
So tempting. Sigh, I'll be good. Ward20 (talk) 22:21, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Yes, if that will get EEng to go along with it, "a quantity" is a good solution. (But I have to be quarrelsome about the need to convert between metric and real measurements in every case. Wow, I looked over the page, and those conversions are all over the place. But you missed one: "30 miles away" in the Convalescence section. And I see two places where US currency is mentioned, "Admittance 12 1/2 cents" and "$1000 for a few pebbles", so I demand – demand! – conversion into Euros, and correction for inflation. [FBDB]) --Tryptofish (talk) 21:09, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
By default, in general we're supposed to provide a conversion every time (MOS:CONVERSIONS -- and this would not be considered a science-related article). Thanks for pointing out the 30 miles. I also inflated the 12-1/2 cents, which to my surprise comes out a very sensible $4 today; the $1000 isn't worth inflating, since the reader only needs to understand it as orders of magnitude more than a few pebbles would be worth, which he will without help. (I actually don't buy the significance Harlow places the on the story of Gage rejecting the $1000 offer. I could imagine someone rejecting the offer because it's so too-good-to-be-true high.) EEng 21:51, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
I'm impressed. I wasn't really serious about the money part of it, but that's nice. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:59, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
(e/c) Well it's true if they can be that arsed they can check the source. But you are bound to get drive-by taggers with [vague] or [clarification needed] and other distractions. We could put in an inline note I s'pose saying the source only gives this description. Fried brain sandwich Martin. I will raise you a spleen. Simon Adler (talk) 21:11, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
I dare not say that I see your spleen and raise you a... --Tryptofish (talk) 21:14, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
Let's just be grateful he didn't lose "about a pint of blood." Martinevans123 (talk) 21:15, 15 September 2018 (UTC) ...but cheers, Simon! mmmm.... women with brains!
They were a quid for four in sainsburys on special so I bought some last week. But they scare me. Simon Adler (talk) 21:33, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
If I understand correctly, because of different definitions of oz and "or more", the value might be more than 28g, so the 30g value is kind of rounding up to approximate. How about stating ("28g or more") which is accurate, descriptive, and doesn't make the conversion unusual? Ward20 (talk) 22:40, 15 September 2018 (UTC)
It still suggests a level of precision not appropriate. It's quite a perplexing situation, which is why I'm for sidestepping as mentioned #somewhere in the above nutso thread. EEng 22:52, 15 September 2018 (UTC)

A radical suggestion

A radical suggestion this, but could we not get away with "a portion of the brain, an ounce or more" in quotes? Martinevans123 (talk) 08:43, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

In other words, just let the linked article tell the reader that this is an ambiguous small unit? I like it. It avoids the problem of selecting a gram value, yet preserves the maximum information from the source. I'd word it like this:
Harlow shaved the scalp around the region of the tamping iron's exit, then removed coagulated blood, small bone fragments, and "an ounce or more" of protruding brain.
What think others of this radical idea? EEng 15:01, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
  • Yes that would be a great solution. Just an additional thought. We must avoid the conversion into grams thing, because further down the sources quote 'half a cupful' of pus. It is starting to sound like a recipe. We are getting into Great British Bake Off territory. Ohh errr. Simon Adler (talk) 15:41, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
Now that's where you should get all the nuts. --Tryptofish (talk) 19:57, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
[66]. EEng 20:10, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
Are those your buns? I really didn't need to see them. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:12, 16 September 2018 (UTC)
From the Department Of That Explains It: "We wanted to modernize the presentation of Chinese dim sum to ignite people's visual senses and attract younger generation to dine out with their grannies." Simon Adler (talk) 20:17, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

Similar case in 2019

On April 10, 2019, there was a similar accident in India: Indian construction worker impaled through the head by an iron rod. He survived.. --Phrontis (talk) 12:52, 17 April 2019 (UTC)

Strange to say, survival of transcranial penetrating injuries are no longer all that unusual, for example [67][68][69], though Gage is still at the top of the heap in terms of the diameter of the visitor and the gross amount of brain substance destroyed. But he'd be just one more name on a list if it weren't for the extensive (and mostly hyperbolic) reporting of his mental changes. EEng 14:32, 17 April 2019 (UTC)

Question about 2nd paragraph

Why the "—‌" after the first reference, and making the whole paragraph one long sentence? It's not unreadable by any means, but it make it more cumbersome, for me anyway. Ward20 (talk) 02:16, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

And no, I didn't read the discussion above before I posted this. LOL. Ward20 (talk) 02:22, 13 September 2020 (UTC)

Well Ward20! As I live and breathe! How the hell are you? For those playing along at home, the sentence in question is
Long known as the "American Crowbar Case"‍—‌once termed "the case which more than all others is cal­cu­lated to excite our wonder, impair the value of prognosis, and even to subvert our phys­i­o­log­i­cal doctrines"—‌Phineas Gage influenced 19th-century discussion about the mind and brain, par­tic­u­larly debate on cerebral local­i­za­tion,​​ and was perhaps the first case to suggest the brain's role in deter­min­ing per­son­al­ity, and that damage to specific parts of the brain might induce specific mental changes.
It's one sentence so that the first two ideas (Crowbar Case, case more than all others...) lead into the third (influenced 19th-century discussion) by showing how prominent the case was. We could write instead ...
Long known as the "American Crowbar Case"‍, and once termed "the case which more than all others is cal­cu­lated to excite our wonder, impair the value of prognosis, and even to subvert our phys­i­o­log­i­cal doctrines", Phineas Gage influenced 19th-century discussion about the mind and brain [etc etc].
... but then the two and s confuses things and the structure is obscured. EEng 12:02, 28 November 2020 (UTC)
Hi EEng, thanks for the explanation. I forgot to reply when I read it the first time, sorry. It is on my watchlist and I pop in to read the article now and then to see the progress. Looking good. Ward20 (talk) 21:05, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

Mobile accessibility problem

The in-line citation style here (using capital letters) does not seem to work on mobile view, as nothing happens when tapping on one. — Goszei (talk) 07:12, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

Weird, because if you click and hold, it opens the page again in a new window and jumps to the right place. Why it won't jump to the right place in the original window is a mystery. But of course the click-to-jump functionality is icing; the reader can easily scroll down and find the ref in the reflist (or use ctrl-F). EEng 08:45, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

Some thoughts about layout

I know EEng likes tweaking the details of page appearance, so I thought I'd pass this along, with the caveat that I don't know what I'm talking about, and may very well be getting it all wrong. Anyway, from discussions elsewhere (principally at Talk:Sissinghurst Castle Garden#Suggestions), I been starting to learn some things I didn't know before, about formatting page layout in order to improve accessibility on narrow-screen devices and for persons with visual disabilities. It might perhaps be of interest to apply some of that here (if it hasn't been done already, in which case please disregard this message!). --Tryptofish (talk) 19:42, 24 January 2021 (UTC)

Skimming that thread the two topics seem to be WP:LQ and WP:SANDWICH. LQ I have never understood and leave to others to adjust as needed. SANDWICH is interesting. Some people interpret the verboten SANDWICH as being two images opposite each other, with text in between them, at all ever. My interpretation is that SANDWICHing means two images opposite each other, with text in between them, where the column width available for text is overly narrow and so unsightly. So what constitutes overly narrow? Well, a little above SANDWICH is the recommendation that upright=1.8 should usually be the largest value for images floated beside text. Obviously that's to leave sufficient width for text. Now, it seems to me that if one image of width 1.8 leaves enough width, then two images of widths (say) 0.9 and 0.9 would also leave enough width. That's the general principle I've used, though in actual execution there are some additional details and at two or three points I think the article ends up with a sum of 2.0. I'd be interested to know if there's any particular point that looks unsightly to you. EEng 02:41, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
To answer your question, no, nothing looks unsightly to me. And I really don't have any strong feelings about any of it. My impression is that if one were to look at a page on a phone, rather than on a computer monitor, using the mobile view, one might encounter sandwiching issues that were never apparent on a wider screen. I figured I'd pass that along just in case you might be interested, but I'm certainly not looking to have you do anything in particular. (As for LQ, my posting here was motivated more by the image layout issues and not so much by that. In the event that you ever do get interested in LQ, I explain it brilliantly in the discussion that I linked. And you can logically quote me on that.) --Tryptofish (talk) 19:08, 25 January 2021 (UTC)
I actually do now and then check the mobile view, on a phone, and see no squeezes. I'm sorry, but LQ I will never understand. It seems to be congenital. EEng 16:15, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

World's longest sentence

Regarding the opening sentence of the lead (which is also the opening paragraph), which is:

Phineas P. Gage (1823–1860) was an American railroad construction foreman remembered for his improbable survival of an accident in which a large iron rod was driven completely through his head, destroying much of his brain's left frontal lobe, and for that injury's reported effects on his personality and behavior over the remaining 12 years of his life‍—‌effects sufficiently profound (for a time at least) that friends saw him as "no longer Gage."

This is an uncomfortably long sentence. I've now attempted two ways of splitting it into two shorter sentences, both reverted. My most recent proposal was:

Phineas P. Gage (1823–1860) was an American railroad construction foreman who improbably survived an accident in which a large iron rod was driven through his head, destroying much of his brain's left frontal lobe. The injury had reported effects on his personality and behavior over the remaining 12 years of his life‍—‌effects sufficiently profound (for a time at least) that friends saw him as "no longer Gage".

This contains all of the same information but in a more readable state. There's no downside!

Note that I removed the "remembered for..." detail because it's superfluous. Wikipedia subjects have to be notable (ie "remembered") by definition. If a detail is not notable, we don't include it. If a subject is not notable, they don't get an article at all.

This was reverted, with this edit summary:

What are you talking about? The fact that each article subject must be notable does not negate that the reader will want to know what the source of that notability is

Come on! That's not a problem that exists. Readers don't scour articles thinking "OK, I see here that Thriller is the bestselling album of all time, but there isn't a sentence literally saying it's notable so I'm confused". I think it's pretty clear from the paragraph what Gage is remembered for.

As for this:

per MOS:FIRST, "For topics notable for only one reason, this reason should usually be given in the first sentence"

This isn't license to create uncomfortably long sentences - there's nothing inherently noble about cramming as much information as possible into a single sentence for its own sake, especially when we can cover it in fewer words by splitting it. And besides, my first sentence does say he suffered a crazy brain injury, which is part of why he's notable. Popcornfud (talk) 19:07, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Measuring things to ensure they fit a universal law of acceptability is not always useful. The point about this sentence is that it reads well and is not confusing. It doesn't need fixing. Johnuniq (talk) 22:21, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
Johnuniq, I've always considered you a gentleman and a scholar. EEng 22:51, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
Johnuniq, I don't think it reads well. Popcornfud (talk) 22:25, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
You're skipping my earlier edit summary:
It's long because the source of his fame is complex. It's not just his survival that he's remembered for, but rather his survival AND the mental changes (in fact, primarily the mental changes). And in fact, it's not the mental changes per se, but rather the exaggerated reports of the mental changes. Your change loses that.
(And I've always considered you a gentleman and a scholar too, Pfud.) EEng 22:51, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
But my second edit - the one I quoted again above- should fix that concern, because it skips the need to say what he's "remembered for" entirely.
Unless you're sticking to "It's long because the source of his fame is complex." Really? It's our job, in writing an encyclopaedia, to explain complex things simply and concisely. I'm proposing that, if this idea is complicated to explain, we do it in two sentences instead of one, which is hardly radical. Popcornfud (talk) 23:01, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. EEng 23:34, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
And naturally my response is: this can be simpler.
I feel like you're not actually addressing any of my points here, EEng. Popcornfud (talk) 23:44, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
My edit summary above does address it. The first sentence is supposed to give the reason for notability, so we cannot (as you propose) skip the need to say what he's "remembered for" entirely ("remembered for" being a less stuffy way of saying "notable"). Unlike Thriller, Gage's notability doesn't stem from a whole pile of things (best seller, Grammys, Album of the Year, etc etc etc) but something very narrow: not from (a) his accident, not from (b) the facts of the sequelae of his accident, but from (c) the stories told about the sequelae of his accident (which are different from the facts). But there's no way to talk about (c) without talking about (b), which in turn requires describing (a) first. He is remembered for the reports, and there's no way out of saying that because if you simply state, flatly, that there were reports, the reader won't understand that that is the reason he's notable.
I realize you find this one sentence overlong, but that's a stylistic judgment – it's not somehow wrong (and in particular it is not, as you've said, a run-on). It's just unusually long, but then there's a lot that's unusual about this article -- I refer you to Talk:Phineas_Gage/Archive_2#Great_article!. EEng 03:11, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
Can't agree. As I said before, no one, with my version, will wonder "But I don't understand what he's notable for." No one. It is absolutely clear. I see no upside in making such a monstrously long sentence, and no downside in my version. Popcornfud (talk) 10:01, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
Oh but you were right, btw, that I didn't know what a run-on sentence is. That's something a copyeditor should know. Whoops. Popcornfud (talk) 11:28, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
Of course I'm right. (Click here.) In your version, how will the reader know that the "reported effects" are part of the source (indeed the primary source) of his notability, instead of just a summary fact about him? EEng 13:33, 31 March 2020 (UTC) P.S. If you don't like Phineas' lead, you will most certainly not enjoy those in Lionel_de_Jersey_Harvard, Widener_Library, Memorial_Hall_(Harvard_University), Sacred_Cod, and Eleanor_Elkins_Widener.
how will the reader know that the "reported effects" are part of the source (indeed the primary source) of his notability? You're optimising for a need that doesn't exist. The reader doesn't need to be literally told what is notable/memorable about a subject. They don't sort through facts thinking, but I must be told which one of these individual facts is the reason they are notable, I am lost without this.
If you must explain this, I urge you to find some other way to split the sentence, because it's a chore to read. You said "it's a complex sentence because this is a complex idea" - God knows how long the sentences at Nasa are, then. No - if it's a complex idea, maybe it should be covered in more than one sentence. There's no bonus multiplier triggered by cramming as much information into a single sentence as possible, and it's our job as encyclopaedia writers is to explain complex ideas plainly.
Anyway, it's clear this conversation is a dead end, so I'll leave it there to return to some other work I'm supposed to be finishing.
None of those other leads you linked to are pretty - the first one in particular is bizarre. Someone really loves dashes. Popcornfud (talk) 14:57, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
Me. Still friends? EEng 15:59, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
I'm taking that as a yes. EEng 02:37, 14 February 2021 (UTC)

(Mostly wretched) podcasts

I just can't let this get forgotten about:

"Poor Historians Podcast" and "Words R Hard" are kinda giveaways? Martinevans123 (talk) 15:45, 20 July 2021 (UTC)

Cite tag

User:Jonesey95 and User:EEng: according to https://www.w3.org/TR/2011/WD-html5-author-20110809/the-cite-element.html all Wikipedia citation templates are misusing the cite tag when they wrap a whole citation in it. The cite tag is intended to be used only for the title of a cited work and not for the rest of the citation. It seems to me pointless to define it in that way; why do we need a separate tag for that and not for any other component of a citation? But that's how they define it. In any case, this means that the problem is not in the rma template, and that attacking rma templates as if they are the problem is missing the point. Probably the correct fix is to change {{wikicite}} (where the cite tag in rma comes from), all the other citation templates, and all the templates that make links to citation templates, to use some html tag other than cite (difficulty: sometimes citation templates are used as block-level things and sometimes they are used as inline-text level things, so it's not clear which of span or div to use). But in the meantime, removing correct uses of rma is problematic because it breaks the links from the footnotes to those citations, and doesn't help much with the much-more-widespread use of the html cite tag on Wikipedia, so it seems to me to be the kind of gnomery that gives gnomes a bad name and should not be done. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:58, 29 October 2021 (UTC)

You took the words right out of my mouth. EEng 06:05, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
See User talk:EEng#Tag syntax problems at Phineas_Gage for an explanation. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:00, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
But let's keep the discussion here. You're not addressing my point there, and D.E.'s point above, which is that this isn't peculiar to {rma}, which simply calls {wikicite}. This appears to need to be fixed at a more fundamental level not related to this article and not related to {rma}. EEng 15:14, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
I think the discussion might be best to have at Template talk:Rma, since the problem is not with this article, but with that template (or with {{wikicite}}, which it calls, possibly contrary to that template's documentation). Let's try to fix it there. Sorry for so many forked discussions; we'll get it in the right place soon. – Jonesey95 (talk) 15:58, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
Jonesey95 you're not listening. The problem is NOT with rma. It is with webcite and with all the citation templates. Rma is merely one of many minor users of webcite, and webcite is only a small part of the non-spec usage of the cite tag. So moving the discussion to rma is not helpful. If you really think that the non-spec usage of the cite tag is a problem that is actually important to fix, I suggest that (1) you figure out a technical way of making everything work BEFORE bringing it to wider attention, and (2) you start at Help talk:Citation Style 1 where there is a much more centralized discussion of most of the affected citation templates. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:43, 29 October 2021 (UTC)

Redux

EEng, David Eppstein: I came to this page because it showed up with Stripped tags lint errors in Article namespace, and it also had missing end tags. Unaware of Jonesey95's good work (unfortunately reverted) to fix these lint errors, I fixed them myself in a slightly different way. Along came EEng, who reverted my fix with edit summary "Ridiculous gnoming. We've been through this before -- see Talk:Phineas_Gage#Cite_tag".

From the edit summary, EEng shows a lack of appreciation of the efforts of numerous Wikipedians in eradicating lint errors. This effort is not ridiculous gnoming. It serves to ensure that Wikipedia displays correctly now and in the future. Browsers can probably deal with stripped tags by ignoring them, but the existence of a stripped tag suggests the possibility of an intended but omitted opening tag ... who knows where, exactly. Browsers can sometimes deal with missing end tags by making rule-based guesses about where to place the end tag, but sometimes the browser can't guess or makes wrong guesses and we get pages with strange font size, color, or other enhancements that leak to the end of the page. So it is incumbent on Wikipedians to support efforts to eradicate lint errors, no matter how minor, and no matter how minimal they may affect the page appearance right now. Even if the missing end tags and stripped tags for <cite> on Phineas Gage are limited in appearance and scope and can't affect any other part of the page, it is good practice to fix them.

Looking back at Revision of 18:07, 27 October 2021 by Jonesey95 of Phineas Gage, which was the first revision to correct the lint errors, I see minor display changes in §References M2, L, and L2. To me those changes are of no importance whatsoever, and I don't understand why it was reverted. EEng, since you are defending lint errors, the burden is on you to explain why the minor display changes in §References M2, L, and L2 caused by Jonesey's edit of 18:07, 27 October 2021 are not acceptable. Or, if the problem is not in the display but in the markup, then explain why the markup is not OK. And if you have such an explanation, you also need to explain why Jonesey's second solution offered at 13:56, 28 October 2021‎, is also not acceptable, and why my solution, offered at 07:55, 18 November 2021‎, is not acceptable.

Please don't bring up irrelevant reasons:

  • "Wikipedia citation templates are misusing the cite tag": this is not about disagreements between Wikipedia and the rest of the world about how <cite> is supposed to work, it is about the much narrower issue that the linter detects lint errors that can be eliminated in any of at least 3 different ways.
  • "Ridiculous gnoming": Don't condemn the work of dedicated Wikipedians in bringing Wikipedia into compliance with HTML5.
  • "I don't like it"

Looking forward to your thoughts. —Anomalocaris (talk) 22:23, 18 November 2021 (UTC)

My thoughts are that you are reaching for false justifications for these reversions instead of paying any attention to the actual justification: the ran and rma templates work together to cause ran-footnotes in the article to be linked to rma-delimited content elsewhere, with the link causing the browser to scroll to the content and highlight it. Your "fixes" break this linking, by highlighting only a subset of the content that is supposed to be highlighted. And for what? Because a script somewhere is unhappy? Reader experience should take a much higher priority than that. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:10, 18 November 2021 (UTC)
I agree with David on this. A script will only show there's an issue because it met the criteria of the Lint error scripts. The more critical issue here is the rma and citing tags. The Lint issues would be dealt concurrent to this. – The Grid (talk) 23:56, 18 November 2021 (UTC)
David Eppstein: Thank you for your reply. When I click, for example, superscripted M2, what's highlighted in all versions (Jonesey's 2 versions, my version, and the linty versions) is (with external links stripped out)
—— (2012). "The Phineas Gage Information Page". The University of Akron. Retrieved 2016-05-16. Includes:
(In case it makes any difference, I am using Windows 10 and Mozilla Firefox, and my Skin is Monobook). So I don't see any difference there. However, when mousing over superscripted reference links M2, L, L2 in Jonesey95's 2 versions, the popup reference is smaller than in the linty version. But when mousing over those same superscripted reference links in the revision by Anomalocaris at 07:55, 18 November 2021, the popup references appear to be, except for minor formatting changes, the same as the linty version I was editing. Please explain what is not acceptable about my version. —Anomalocaris (talk) 06:50, 19 November 2021 (UTC)
Oh, I see, your fix is to make everything inside rma be a single paragraph with line breaks, rather than to move stuff outside the rma. It does link correctly. The difference is that now it isn't a bulleted list; it's just a paragraph. I don't have a strong opinion on that part, but probably EEng does. —David Eppstein (talk) 07:16, 19 November 2021 (UTC)
My strong opinion is that Jonesey95 has now fixed the problem by actually fixing the problem [70]. That's good gnoming. Rushing to compromise what our readers see because someone can't sleep at night knowing there's a lint error is the ridiculous gmoning referred to in my edit summary complained about by Anomalocaris. EEng 19:29, 19 November 2021 (UTC) P.S. Note for A.: you can't just paste timestamps from revision histories into a discussion post without including the UTC offset, because if you do those in other timezones will see the wrong timestamp and won't know what you're talking about.
I have been unfailingly polite in this discussion and I will continue in this manner. I encourage Wikipedians to avoid language such as "ridiculous gmoning" (or gnoming) in an edit summary of a reversion, or in this discussion, deprecating the tireless efforts of a body of Wikipedians in cleaning up Wikipedia. I came to Phineas Gage because it was listed at Stripped tags and as I have done in thousands of other articles, I made a good-faith lint fix, not anticipating any unfortunate side-effects. If a particular clean-up has unfortunate side-effects, I urge an edit summary something like, "Unfortunately lintfix messed up reference links; see discussion at Talk:Phineas Gage#Cite tag." At this point, thanks to User:Jonesey95's fix of {{Rma}}, I can't easily compare all the contending versions as they appeared before Jonesey95's fix. But I do believe that my revision was and still would be an improvement, because the L2 references are all unbulleted. The L2 references should be in parallel structure, either all bulleted or all unbulleted. —Anomalocaris (talk) 20:46, 19 November 2021 (UTC)
Polite wasting of people's time is still wasting people's time. I shudder to think what you've done to all those other thousands of articles where no one's watching, or where the watchers assume (mistakenly) that you'd only make this technical "fix" (introduced by an edit summary very few edits have the background to understand) if didn't mess up what the reader sees. You're churning watchlists wasting the time of productive editors, and – as we've seen – sometimes degrading articles, for miniscule (or, quite possibly, zero) benefit.
I challenge you to exhibit a single problem currently caused by these lint "errors". The problems you project are entirely speculative. Here would be a great approach: run the report, wait a year, run the report again, then give your attention only to those articles that are on both reports. There's so much constant change on Wikipedia that there's a good chance whatever was triggering the report isn't there after a year, or someone will have fixed an errant template (as Jonesy did here), or an asteroid might have struck earth and none of this will matter anymore. I'm serious. None of these errors is a problem now, and there's a good chance it will all sort itself out without your ministrations. You pretend to yourself you're doing something useful, but you're not.
It's bad enough that (I'll say it again) you're churning watchlists and wasting people's time for miniscule benefit, but when you're called on it you waste even more of others' time arguing about it. At User_talk:Anomalocaris#Deleting_comments_on_other_people's_talk_pages you invested huge effort, and (again) wasted others' time pretending that a Help: page is a policy or guideline, and (incorrectly) asserting that WP:TPO only applies to article talk pages, not user talk pages. You seem to lack judgment and perspective.
I wish L2 could have a fully consistent presentation of its members, but the first member presents a special problem: it can either be run in on the same line at the L2 itself (and thereby be somewhat different from the remaining items), or start on a separate line just like the rest, but leaving an big blank line of whitespace after the L2. After looking at both I judged the former looked better. Anyway, that's orthogonal to the issue at hand.
EEng 23:41, 19 November 2021 (UTC) P.S. That's the polite version. If you want me to switch to impolite mode just give the word and I'll be happy to oblige.
There are plenty of Linter errors that cause display differences, many of them larger than this example. Other Linter errors indicate problems that the current parser is covering up by hacking around them with some post-processing. Those workarounds have slowly been removed from the MediaWiki software, causing the syntax errors to result in undesirable rendering of pages. Unfortunately for us gnomes, most Linter fixes at present do not result in a change to the rendered page, so it can be challenging for non-technical editors to see any improvements; we are future-proofing pages so that they will not break when the workarounds for invalid syntax of various kinds are eventually removed. Think of us as vehicle safety inspectors, checking to make sure that all of a vehicle's safety equipment works; nobody sees the crashes we prevent, but they do exist in a parallel future where we haven't done this work. – Jonesey95 (talk) 23:54, 19 November 2021 (UTC)
I'm all for fixing lint that causes problems, but you're essentially predicting that sooner or later all lint errors will definitely cause a problem, and I'm afraid I'll need to see an expert opinion before I buy into that. David is a professor of computer science, and I started my engineering career before there there was such a thing as lint, so you can skip the explanations aimed at the non-technical. EEng 00:24, 20 November 2021 (UTC)

Straight talk about lint errors

Responding to some of EEng's points:

  • "I shudder to think what you've done to all those other thousands of articles where no one's watching ..."

As I said before, since Jonesey95 fixed {{Rma}}, I can't easily compare the revisions of Phineas Gage, but I'm under the impression that I didn't hurt it, because at 07:16, 19 November 2021 (UTC), David Eppstein acknowledged that my solution didn't mess up the intra-page linking, and this was before Jonesey95 fixed {{Rma}} at 14:28, 19 November 2021‎ (UTC). However, even if my edit did result in a bad change in that article, I am confident that very few of my edits elsewhere have bad side effects, and I believe that most of those edits that did have bad side-effects were caught quickly by myself or another editor.

  • "introduced by an edit summary very few edits have the background to understand"

My edit summary for my edit of Phineas Gage was {{Rma}} can't wrap multiple blocks, including bullet points; avoid {{cite}} postscript.

  1. {{Rma}} can't wrap multiple blocks, including bullet points For users who don't know the distinction between inline and block-level elements, I give the example of bullet points. At the time I made the edit, {{Rma}} could not wrap multiple blocks, including bullet points, without causing lint errors, and I came up with a workaround that solved the lint error.
  2. avoid {{cite}} postscript I took this article out of Category:CS1 maint: postscript. You reverted and put it back in.

If my edit caused any side-effect, I am sorry, but please don't allege that I write inscrutable edit summaries.

  • "You're churning watchlists wasting the time of productive editors"

I strongly believe that nearly all of my edits are beneficial, and my edit summaries are beneficial also, both because I detail what I did and because when editors see edit summaries like properly close table (|}) they may think, "I should be careful to make sure I always close tables; when I edit a table I shouldn't carelessly remove the closing markup." At least I hope they do. I consider edit summaries like advertising slogans. By repetition, I hope users learn to avoid the mistakes I'm fixing. For what it's worth, I receive about one notification per day thanking me for my edit of an article or other page. Much less often do I receive negative feedback.

  • "I challenge you to exhibit a single problem currently caused by these lint 'errors'.... None of these errors is a problem now."
  1. Table tag that should be deleted sometimes results in bizarre results, such as entire sections appearing nested inside a table.
  2. Multiline table in list usually results in an indent leak to the end of the page.
  3. Multiple unclosed formatting tags often results in a formatting tag extending way beyond the intended scope, sometimes to the end of the page. Markup such as <small>This is small<small> can result in everything after it appearing double small.
  4. Self-closed tags can also be associated with leaks; markup such as <small>This is small<small/> can result in everything after it appearing small.
  5. Unclosed quote in heading can result in the entire page displaying bold or italic.
  6. Fostered content usually results in something that is marked up somewhere between the open and close of a table displaying above the table. If this display is desired, the fostered content markup should be moved out of the table.
  7. Links in links never display well. A wikilink inside an external link aborts the external link. See what happens when you use [http://google.com This is [[Google]]'s search page].
  8. Missing end tag can cause leaks to the end of the page.

The above lint errors usually, or at least often, cause display problems. Even if a lint error doesn't cause a display problem, it is often a sign of markup in need of attention. For example, the stripped tag </small> might mean that an editor intended something to be small but carelessly omitted the opening tag. A bogus file option might be a misspelling (including capitalization), such as using Left for left, or leaving out the alt= of an alt tag.

I don't think it's fair, in a discussion about reversions to Phineas Gage that became a discussion on fixing lint errors, to go digging into my user talk page, look for disputes, find one, and then say, in effect, "you were involved in a dispute, and you wouldn't give up, so you're bad." (This isn't what you said, but that's the meaning I draw from it.)

  1. In that discussion, I disagree with your characterization that I pretended anything or that I incorrectly asserted anything, except that, in that discussion, I did learn that the Wikipedia definition of vandalism is narrower than I had understood before. We're not born knowing everything. When it was point out, I acknowledged my error.
  2. When editors have disputes, they are likely to put more effort into things they care about. I was shocked that any Wikipedian would think it is a good idea to edit another user's user talk page and delete a third party's comments, absent something truly harmful such as a threat or a BLP violation. When other editors defended the practice, I felt compelled to explain as strongly and clearly as possible why I think it's a bad idea. I still think it's a terrible idea, and I hope I never have to have that discussion again.
  3. Please don't continue this discussion by saying, "but you did pretend" or "but you did incorrectly assert".... Just drop it.
  4. I certainly will not go digging into your user page archives or contribution history to find eyebrow-raising behavior on your part. Let's stick to the topic and not go digging for evidence that other editors are bad.
  • "I started my engineering career before there there was such a thing as lint ..."

The C program Lint was written in 1978; lint as a concern of software developers is over 40 years old.

Two final points:

  1. Usually, when I edit a Wikipedia page for any reason, I give it a serious treatment. I may not catch everything, but I look for and fix a variety of things. So even if a lint fix doesn't actually change the display and the lint error didn't affect the display, in most cases I've made one or more other useful changes.
  2. We lint fixers go to Outstanding linter errors on enwiki to identify lint fixing tasks. Right now, there are just 23 bogus file options in the article space. That's because Jonesey95 led an effort to eliminate this type of error, and because this was done, this type of error is manageable and continues to stay small. Similarly, the number of stripped tags in the article namespace is getting close to zero, which gave me the incentive to fix Phineas Gage. If my fix caused problems, again I'm sorry, but please don't make me wrong for being part of a campaign to get rid of one of the last few lint errors of its type. Zeroing out this cell of lint errors will be a good thing.

Cheers, Anomalocaris (talk) 07:53, 24 November 2021 (UTC)

Blah blah blah blah. Blah. Blah blah blah.
  • You still haven't exhibited a single actual problem caused by wrapping multiple blocks. You're just conjecturing.
  • I didn't go "digging" in your talk page; your huge wall of text there (much like the one above) jumps right out. You did pretend that a Help: page is a guideline, and did assert (incorrectly) that WP:TPO doesn't apply to user talk pages (and based on the above you're still clinging to that). You have a severe IDHT problem.
  • It is very kind of you to inform me that the original Lint was written in 1978, but as it happens I was there. I really know what I'm talking about.
I'm sure much of what you do is useful, but in this case you're just wasting people's time to no benefit, and you need to learn to tell the difference. EEng 15:26, 24 November 2021 (UTC)

Straight talk about knowing your limitations

I've just about had it with you, Anomalocaris [71] [72]. This is what I meant when I said you lack judgement and waste others' time. What could possibly have made you think you could just fuck around with stuff you clearly know nothing about? Get a clue. EEng 07:22, 25 November 2021 (UTC)

Dear EEng: Thank you for asking me why I made my last edit. In my Preferences, I have checked the box for "Show hidden categories". Before my last edit, Phineas Gage was in two hidden categories of interest to me, viz: Category:CS1: long volume value and Category:CS1 maint: postscript. My edit of 00:31, 25 November 2021 had edit summary (avoid {{cite}} postscript, see Category:CS1 maint: postscript; |series=New Series; but I don't see any evidence that the refs from ''The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal'' are New Series. Breaking that down:
  1. Category:CS1 maint: postscript explains, "This is a tracking category for CS1 citation templates that use |postscript=....; for any cs1|2 template that uses |postscript= with an assigned value that is more than one character (keyword none in cs1 templates excepted). Help:Citation Style 1#Display options further explains, "postscript: Controls the closing punctuation for a citation; defaults to a period (.); for no terminating punctuation, specify |postscript=none.... Additional text or templates beyond the terminating punctuation may generate an error message." Because of these instructions, I routinely fix templated citations, moving postscripts longer than a single character out of the template. I've done this many times, and this is the first time I can recall that anyone has asked about it.
  2. Category:CS1: long volume value explains, "This is a tracking category for CS1 citations that use a value of |volume= longer than four characters and not wholly numeric or uppercase roman numerals. No error or maintenance message is displayed. No changes are required to remove pages from this category, but some values of |volume= may fit better in other parameters." I determined that Phineas Gage was in this category because of the markup |volume=20 n.s., |volume=1 n.s., and twice |volume=3 n.s.. I examined the source reference for the article by Henry Jacob Bigelow in American Journal of the Medical Sciences, and determined that n.s. stood for "New Series", so I removed n.s. from the volume and inserted |series=New Series. Then I examined the three references in The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal and didn't locate anything about New Series, so I removed the n.s. from the volume. However, I realized there was a significant possibility that these items might really be New Series, so I made a point of saying in the edit summary that I had removed the New Series indicators, so that another editor with more familiarity with The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal would put the New Series indications back in if they were needed. As it happens, that editor was you. Thank you for putting the New Series indicators back in.
This is the way Wikipedia is supposed to work. Sometimes editors make changes that are part right and part wrong, and other editors come along and fix things again. Thanks to my edit, |postscript=, |volume= and |series= are used correctly. Thanks to your correction of my edit, the New Series indicators I erroneously removed but flagged in the edit summary were put back, in the correct parameter. Cheers! —Anomalocaris (talk) 05:15, 28 November 2021 (UTC)
You changed three factually correct (if imperfectly formatted) citations into factually incorrect citations by dropping the n.s. [73], now pleading that you examined the three references in The Boston Medical and Surgical Journal and didn't locate anything about New Series. But your "examination" apparently did not include looking at the title page [74], which means you're not competent to be tampering with stuff like this. The fact that I happened to be watching to correct your screwup (and do some other stuff while I was at it) is irrelevant; it's not OK to make random changes to an article hoping someone else will fix what you break. Since David Eppstein participated in this thread earlier, I'm pinging him on the chance he has some advice on how you can be a better editor. EEng 06:49, 28 November 2021 (UTC)
I'm pretty sure that berating clueless editors about their cluelessness doesn't usually work to make them better, but it at least has the advantage of leaving a trail so that measures can be taken to stop it if necessary. Maybe it would help to be more positive. Anomalocaris: It was very thoughtful of you to try to clean up the references in the article; thanks! I am also impressed that you noticed that you were making a mistake by removing "New Series", and that you took the effort to make it easier for other editors to notice that your edit was bad and revert it by alerting them to the mistake you were making. However, asking other editors to revert all your edits in this way had the unfortunate side effect that the positive parts of your edits also got reverted alongside the mistakes. In future, you might make your edits even more constructive by putting the mistakes and the positive parts into separate edits so that, when you get reverted again, some of the work you have done might not be totally wasted. Wouldn't that be so much nicer? Or even, I hesitate to suggest this, but when you are making a mistake, and recognize that you are making a mistake, maybe save even more of other editors' time by not saving that edit and not making them take the time to revert it? —David Eppstein (talk) 07:20, 28 November 2021 (UTC)
Deaf ears, apparently. EEng 01:33, 6 December 2021 (UTC)
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