Wikipedia talk:Welsh Wikipedians' notice board

Wikipedia talk:Welsh Wikipedians' notice board/Archive1 January - May 2006

Welsh topics template

I've created a Welsh topics template, copied from the Scottish one yet again! It's been attached to Wales and History of Wales so far - have a look, add, amend etc. Rhion 18:51, 29 May 2006 (UTC)

Added Welsh people to Template, and added template to Welsh people (does this sound like gibberish?). Nice work. Alun 11:57, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Template seems a good idea. I note that the list of lakes still points to the Scottish list! I would change it myself but I can't find the page with the list of Welsh lakes! Hogyn Lleol 15:27, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

It seems there isn't one, or at least I couldn't find one either. It's now a red link - maybe that will inspire somebody to create one. Rhion 16:41, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

I have created one and populated it initially from the List of reservoirs and dams in the United Kingdom - so its mostly reservoirs at present - but more to come. Please feel free to add ! Velela 17:22, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Wales

We're having some trouble with an apparent troll at Wales today - if anyone feels like mucking in with the reversions they would be welcome. Thanks. :) Vashti 14:21, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

I see the page has now been protected, with the current version the apparent troll's. Another glorious victory for trollhood! Rhion 16:52, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

He's just been blocked for 24 hours for vandalism, immediately after a particularly nasty personal attack at Talk:Wales. We'll get it sorted, the point of the protection is to let everyone talk it out. Unfortunately your average trollvandal won't want to talk it out. Vashti 16:53, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

The user concerned now has a message on his talk page User talk:Bazzajf asking for protection to be removed and promising not to put the POV tage on the section again. However there doesn't seem to be any actual request for unprotection made, so presumably nobody knows about this. Should we apply for unprotection on the basis of this message? Rhion 17:31, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure. We can put it back on again if there are problems, right? Vashti 17:34, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

Shouldn't be a problem I would think - maybe leave it until tomorrow? Rhion 18:26, 2 June 2006 (UTC)

If nobody objects, I shall ask for the protection to be removed this evening. Rhion 11:39, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

The page has now been unprotected, and I have removed the POV tag. Rhion 19:16, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Problems at Wales and Cardiff South and Penarth

Bazzajf is banging on the same old gong at Wales again, and someone at Cardiff South and Penarth is insisting on removing the Welsh translation "De Caerdydd a Phenarth", despite its common use by the Boundary Commission and the media. Help plz? Vashti 13:53, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Parliamentary constituencies only have a single name defined by law. There is no scope for a translation, which is why Anglesey was renamed to Ynys Môn. You will note that the Ynys Môn (UK Parliament constituency) page specifically states this. Owain (talk) 14:00, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

It's probably best to discuss this on the article's talk page. Vashti 14:07, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Anglo-Welsh

I recently found the Anglo-Welsh article. I've never heard the term Anglo-Welsh applied to people, only to Anglo-Welsh literature. Has anybody else? Should this article be put up for deletion or is it a valid usage that I am unaware of? Rhion 19:24, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

It's been there since January 2005, and it's still a stub with no references. 'Nuff said? Alun 19:33, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree. I don't think it's in common usage. Deb 12:02, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree with you all. To check, I spent about half an hour (I was bored :)) playing with Google and excluding "literature", "author" and so on from searches. There's the rugby cup, a narrow boating company, and a geological feature, but not people, particularly. Certainly not in a consistent form. The word isn't in my Shorter Oxford at all, strangely. Clearly I need a bigger dictionary :) Perhaps ask User:Calgacus where he came across the term, but I'd be inclined to redirect. Telsa (talk) 06:53, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Standard naming scheme

Please see the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Regional notice boards#A uniform naming scheme. Zocky | picture popups 00:52, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Fork of Welsh self-government

User:Normalmouth has created a fork of the Welsh self-government article under the title Welsh nationalism, which was previously a redirect. As far as I can see the content of the two articles remains identical apart from the first sentence. I changed "Welsh nationalism" back to a redirect and pointed Normalmouth to Wikipedia:Content forking; however he has immediately changed it back to a fork in clear violation of a basic Wikipedia policy. Assistance would be appreciated. I am leaving both articles in place for the moment so that other users can see what has been done.Rhion 05:51, 15 July 2006 (UTC)

What's this lang-cy template?

I have vaguely noticed a couple of people changing mark-up from [[Welsh language|Welsh]]:''gair'' to ''{{lang-cy|gair}}'' (example) or to ''{{lang|cy|gair}}'' (example). It doesn't seem to happen very often. But obviously some people are incorporating -- or experimenting with? -- Template:Lang, which allows you to mark up sections of text so that people can tell their stylesheets how to portray text in specific languages.

I understand the potential use of the template: I use the lang attribute and stylesheets to get different languages to appear in different colours, fonts, or so on on my personal webpages, and have done for a couple of years. But I haven't seen much discussion or use of this template on Wikipedia apart from on Template talk:Lang. So.. well. Should we really be using it everywhere? When should we? When shouldn't we? And wouldn't it be simpler to get a bot to change them all? (Ugh, yet another round of bot-action on my watchlist.)

I am sure it must have been discussed elsewhere, but whether that would be the Village Pump, the Linguistics wikiproject, the Languages wikiproject or what, I don't know. I can't find any discussion on those pages, but the search system baffles me at times. Since it will certainly affect nearly every article to do with Wales, I brought it up here. Thoughts?

Telsa (talk) 07:50, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Categories for deletion:Welsh-speaking people - the saga continues

Further to the above (way, way above), this category's deletion is now under review, and there seems to be a consensus for it being re-listed for deletion. I know not everyone agrees with its existence, but I would ask you bear in mind the following when you decide whether to vote:

1. Minority languages are not the same as major languages in this context.
2. The category had been in existence since April and was well-populated.
3. Almost all the articles in the category specifically mention that the subject is/was a Welsh speaker. This suggests that being Welsh-speaking is as valid as a category as, for example, being born in 1955.
4. The purpose of the category is not anything sinister or political. It is simply to enable users to find all articles about Welsh-speaking people easily. I can think of many circumstances in which people might find this information useful.

Deb 17:53, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

Anyone who wants to vote on the above can now do so HERE

Help with translations

I'm currently working on a script intended to create short articles on political parties on a variety of wikipedias simultaneously. However, in order for the technique to work I need help with translations to various languages. If you know any of the languages listed at User:Soman/Lang-Help , then please help by filling in the blanks. For example I need help with Welsh. Thanks, --Soman 12:14, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

An excellent historic resource

The good folks at British History Online have just put A Topographical Dictionary of Wales (Samuel Lewis, 1849) online here. I haven't examined the Welsh one, but the Scottish one Lewis did was excellent - some villages were just a couple of lines of bare factual information, but some (especially parishes near large cities got decent articles. The level of coverage for large towns was good, and the cities went into great detail. This will probably be about the same level of detail, I suspect.

It's a hundred and sixty years old, of course, so not something to base an article on - but it looks excellent for fleshing out "history of..." sections in articles on towns and villages. Thought people might like to know about it. Shimgray | talk | 01:36, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

Welsh industrial history

We seem to be very thin on the representation of Welsh industrial history both in Wales and History of Wales. Industrialisation seems to be begin with the development of the coal fields and the iron works at Gyfartha. In reality there were very significant pockets of industrialsaition both before, during and after this in many other parts of what is now rural Wales, Shipbuilding on the western coat such as the high level of industrialised ship-building in the River Mawddah estuary being one example. Much more significvant was metal extraction and working with the hugh mining complexes in the valleys of the River Ystwyth and River Rheidol with outposts in the headwaters of the River Severn and River Teifi not of course forgetting Parys mountain and the smelting activities in the lower Swansea valley (where we do have the start of an artcle). Then there was Slate and its depradations in north Wales. I only know of these things adventitiously but they do indicate that we somehow need to represent a much more balanced picture that the rather simplistic one of industrialised south and pastoral north and west. Mrs Trellis 08:46, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

True, but the Wales and History of Wales articles would get too long if you put in more than a brief mention there. What is really needed is either an Industrial history of Wales article or (for example) History of Wales in the 19th century, which would give space to cover all these industries. "Wales" and "History of Wales" could then refer to these articles. I have been thinking of doing a History of the North Wales slate industry, but can't decide whether that is the best title for it. Rhion 17:30, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Oh, and Shipbuilding at Porthmadog which is a particular interest of mine. Rhion 17:32, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I suppose "History of the slate industry" would be too wide. What about "History of the slate industry in Wales", which would avoid any problems with deciding whether something is in the north - or is that not likely to be an issue? Deb 18:51, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I'd be really interested in both your suggested titles, Rhion! Hogyn Lleol 20:32, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I have started a Metal mining in Wales article which would welcome additions. Mrs Trellis 13:48, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree that we need an article on the Welsh slate industry. Does it make sense to restrict this to just the history of the industry? There is still some active industry, notably at Penrhyn and Blaenau Ffestiniog. How about calling it "Slate industry in Wales" or similar? I started a related category a while ago called Category:Slate quarries which doesn't have much in it (and its not all Welsh) but should probably be linked. In fact perhaps the category is misnamed and should be Category:Slate industry? Thoughts? Gwernol 17:17, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

In fact there's already a nascent article on the slate industry at Slate mine. Its currently mainly about the Welsh slate industry, and is rather misnamed. How about renaming "Slate mine" to "Slate industry" and creating a "Slate industry in Wales" article that is a sub-article of "Slate Industry"? There could also be articles on "Slate industry in America", "Slate industry in England" etc. Gwernol 17:55, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I've made a start on an article on the Welsh slate industry in my sandbox (and found out some information about my great-grandfather in the process). I'll put it out in a day or two. So far, I have followed Deb's suggestion and called it "History of the slate industry in Wales", since sadly it is mainly historical despite the small scale activity at Penrhyn. Are they still working at the Oakley in Blaenau? I think Category:Slate industry would be better for the category. Rhion 17:54, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

The beginnings of the article is at User:Rhion/History of the slate industry in Wales at the moment. Rhion 18:03, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Ooh, great stuff, Rhion. I agree with.. well, practically everyone seems to be in agreement that there is loads that could be done, so I agree with everyone. I did start a History of Swansea article which is really quite awfully-written now that I read it again, but I'll see if there is anything that can be done to/with it. (Actually, as well as general "putting into context", what that one lacks is the non-industrial side. The area was agricultural for a long time, and even at the height of the copper industry there were local farmers complaining about the effect of the copper-smoke on their animals.) Mrs Trellis, I think I can dig out some references for your Metal mining in Wales article. I'll see whether they are where I think they are. Telsa (talk) 16:14, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I believe Oakley is still worked sporadically. There is also some activity at Aberllefenni though mining there has ceased and its just the mill working Chinese slate stocks now. There is also some recovery of slate waste at Glanafron and talk of a major operation to reuse some of the tipped material at Blaenau. So there is still a little of the industry left. I've already changed the category name: Slate Industry is definitely the better term. What do you think of repurposing the current Slate mine article to Slate industry? Gwernol 16:47, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I have now put the article out as Slate industry in Wales. It still needs work, but I think it could be put forward as a Featured Article candidate in a while. I think it would be a good idea to have a Slate industry article, and the current Slate mine article would give a good basis. I suppose it would be possible to also have a short "Slate mine" article, concentrating specifically on mines as opposed to quarries, differences in methods of working etc. Rhion 13:40, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Great work, Rhion. You've already improved our coverage of the Welsh slate industry by an order of magnitude or two. I'm going to rename Slate mine to Slate Industry. My library is currently in storage, but I should have access to most of it later this week, so I can hopefully contribute directly to this effort. Best, Gwernol 14:04, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

After doing a bit more work on it, I have put Slate industry in Wales forward as a Featured Article candidate. It should really have gone to Peer Review first, but it doesn't fall under any of the projects and the main Peer Review is pretty moribund at the moment - it could well sit there for three weeks without comments. I have time to deal with any objections or suggestions at the moment, but probably won't in three weeks' time. Any comments here please. Rhion 13:33, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Opinions sought on naming conventions

This is a request for your opinion on place names (before I post RfC)

I have discussed this problem with an admin and neither of us were able to find guidance on: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (places) or Wikipedia:Naming conventions (subnational entities)

The problem arises following attempts by a Wikipedia user to seek out references to "England", "Scotland" and "Wales" and replace them with "United Kingdom".

One example of this can be seen at Atlantic Ocean where User:Owain recently made changes including changing text:

from "Aberdeen, Scotland" to "Aberdeen, United Kingdom"; from "Liverpool, England" to "Liverpool, United Kingdom"; and from "Newport, Wales" to "Newport, United Kingdom".

I came across this change while using VP and had made no contribution to this particular article myself but reverted on the grounds that there was no problem with the original text and that the changes reflected a minority POV, and certainly did not conform to "common usage". My revert was immediately reverted by User:Owain so I issued a warning to him using VP, which he chose to delete from his home page. I therefore requested that VP admins protected the disputed page.

I believe that:

• the edit was non-sensical, totally unnecessary and politically-motivated.
• the edit made the article imprecise in not giving sufficient detail to pinpoint a place by omitting the obvious (i.e. the country), and gave less information than the original edit
• to deliberately ignore the country is to disrespect the people, culture and traditions of those nations
• there have been a large number of edits to this page by many other Wikepedians, all of whom saw no problem with the identification of the country

User:Owain recently made changes the article on Lisvane by changing the text:

from "For the village in Conwy, see Llysfaen" to "For the village in north Wales, see Llysfaen"

as before leaving out the obvious and replacing it with that ill-defined region of "north Wales"!

Again I had made no contributions to this article but believed the edit presented a biased POV, expressed by a small number of users involved with County Watch and Association of British Counties who attempt to wipe out, or depreciate, any references to the counties of England, Wales and Scotland which were formed following local government reorganisation in 1974 and again in 1996.

Finally User:Owain recently made several changes to the article on Aberdyfi by changing the name of the town to the anglicised version of "Aberdovey" throughout. Again I must point out that I had made no previous contributions to this article. Despite being presented with several 'reference' articles, all using the spelling "Aberdyfi", he continued to revert to the out-of-date spelling, thus flaunting the "common usage" policy. The comment he makes on his talk page "I attach absolutely no authority to the 'National Assembly'" (the elected parliament of Wales) reveals his political motives.

I believe that what we are witnessing is an attempt a small group of people to use Wikepedia to put forward a heavily biased, right-wing, "British Nationalist" agenda, views which are rejected by the vast majority of the population as being out-of-date. I am informed by other Wikipedians that these antics have been going on since before I began contributing to Wikipedia.

If Wikepedia is to be accepted as a serious source of information then this cannot be allowed to continue and must be stopped at the highest level. Should an investigative journalist attempt to compare Wikipedia to other conventional encyclopaedias I believe that we would be totally discredited on the grounds of neutrality.

I am not a member of any political party and have no political axe to grind, in fact I treat all politicians with equal contempt!

Can we please have some views on the convention to be used when referring to Britsih place names?

-- Maelor  15:37, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I believe that the test to be applied here is what serves the interests of an unbiased encyclopaedia best rather than what any one editor regards as his or her personal crusade. I would therfore strongly prefer a convention thatprovides the right level of geographic distinction to give maximum information to the reader. In the case cited I would opt strongly for Aberdeen, Scotland (because that tells us more precisely where Aberdeen is) and similalrly Llysfaen, Conwy. For the record I would also very strongly opt for Aberdyfi for the simple reason that is the name of the village in question. So I guess that you have my support. Mrs Trellis 16:01, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Likewise from me. "Newport, United Kingdom" is so vague as to be useless. This is an encyclopædia, and anyone who gets confused by terms like "Scotland" and "Wales" instead of "United Kingdom" can look them up and find out the difference. --Stemonitis 16:08, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Naturally you mean the one in Pembrokeshire. Agathoclea 16:18, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Apologies for the second comment - but Agathoclea's comment hits the nail on the head. How useful would Newport, United Kingdom be ?! Even Newport, South Wales wouldn't make the grade.Mrs Trellis 16:34, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Ditto. I agree with your comments, Maelor. Any politics aside, "Wales", "Scotland", etc. are far more informative than just "UK". However, in the case of Llysfaen I'd prefer to see "Conwy, North Wales". To those who don't know where Conwy is, that is clearly usefully informative. Hogyn Lleol 16:26, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

In principle, I agree with the points made above. There have been two recent major controversies of which I'm aware, both of which I think are relevant. One was the furore over what to call the Newport article. Personally, I would have favoured a proper disambiguation page rather than the assumption that the Newport in Monmouthshire is the one most users are most likely to be looking for. T seemed to be in the minority on this. The other is the current debate on the use of Gaelic names for Kings of Scotland, in clear defiance of the Naming conventions. We ought to remember that this is the English wikipedia, and the conventions that apply are meant to make it easier to use by English speakers, not just in England or even the UK, but worldwide. We ought also to avoid slipping into the same tendency towards parochialism that the English generally show. I would like anyone who feels passionate about their nationality and language to take a trip over to the Welsh-language wikipedia, which is still struggling to build up a basic stock of articles and can always do with more help. Deb 16:37, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me that it is normal practice to use British English on pages related to the UK and American English on pages related to America. In this regard it is normal practice for Americans to name places thus City, State as in Los Angeles, California or New York, New York, often they impose this convention on places in Europe, like Paris, France or London, England and it just sounds daft to me, I don't think it is normal in British English to do this. I would neither use Aberdeen, Scotland nor Aberdeen, United Kingdom, rather I would use Aberdeen is a city in Scotland in the United Kingdom, this way both Scotland and the UK are mentioned. I don't know if the reason for the change from Aberdeen, Scotland to Aberdeen, United Kingdom is due nationalistic reasons or simply due to pedantry, but I don't like the inference that one way is based on a form of nationalism and the other isn't, both stlyes have nationalistic overtones, is any form of nationalism acceptable? Both are in a literal sense correct and both display a stylistic POV. Alun 17:13, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I am with Mrs Trellis and Hogyn Lleol here. We need the right level of detail, and I think that we need at least Wales and very often where in Wales included. When it gets to "where in Wales", I think that sometimes the valley is much more important than the county (whatever sort of county), but that is probably a separate issue. (Ie, "in the Dysynni valley, north Wales", or "in the Rhondda valley of south Wales".) Telsa (talk) 16:29, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

S4C programmes

Over on the S4C page, there is an ever-expanding list of "notable S4C programmes", all of which are acquiring their own pages. Many of these pages are going to need some clean up. Before it gets out of hand, perhaps we could come to some degree of consensus about what makes a programme notable on S4C? I have stuck some suggestions on Talk:S4C#The selection of notable programmes. Some more opinions (even if it is "Don't be stingy, of course S4C Closedown Screen should have its own page") would be great. Telsa (talk) 16:29, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree that there need to be some criteria for deciding what a notable S4C programme is. I'd add something about longevity to the list as well - but I'd also keep the Closedown Screen, as it is unique for being the only one left on a terrestrial channel. I'm a little worried about the list of children's programmes that was added today, though - shouldn't they be linked to by their Welsh names on the S4C page? ("Fireman Sam" instead of "Sam Tân", for instance). Vashti 17:33, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Audio

I had a go at uploading audio files for pronunciation of Cardiff and Caerdydd and have included them in the Cardiff article. I am not under the impression that these are any good, it's just me speaking into the microphone of my skype headset. I was inspired by the Jerusalem article. Is it worth including this medium in the articles? Should we try to include more audio (especially Welsh language pronunciation) in Welsh related articles? What's the consensus? Alun 17:27, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

DYK

The DYK section featured on the main page is always looking for interesting new and recently expanded stubs from different parts of the world. Please make a suggestion.--Peta 02:13, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Wales Labour Party

I have created an article on the Wales Labour Party. Comments and suggested improvements welcome. Normalmouth 20:32, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

A nice suitable-length article there. Do the other parties with Welsh variant names have separate articles? Sorry the comment is a bit late! :p Marbles 17:57, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. No, neither the Welsh Conservatives nor the Welsh Liberal Democrats have an article. Both should. Normalmouth 20:21, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Goodbye

I have decided to leave Wikipedia - I'm losing patience with the assorted vandals and POV-pushers on here. Basically it's just not worth the aggravation any more. Rhion 09:05, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Back momentarily to request that my user page be deleted and to thank everybody who left a message on my Talk Page. It's good to know that my work was appreciated. There is in fact another reason why I'm leaving, not just the vandals etc - I work in a fairly senior position in local government and I have heard of at least two people recently who have been forced to resign as a result of material they posted on the internet in their own time. It seems the spirit of the late Senator McCarthy has taken up residence in Wales, and while I have always done my best to avoid putting my own POV into articles, I'm aware that I have made certain comments on discussion pages which could be interpreted as being critical of the party currently in power. I'm concerned that there is material on here which would enable me to be identified - Wales is a small country after all. I may return in a few months, but it will be under a new user name and with no possible clues to my identity. Rhion 08:52, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Llanfair PG move request

It has been proposed that Llanfair PG be moved to Llanfairpwllgwyngyll or Llanfair Pwllgwyngyll. Please share your opinion at Talk:Llanfair PG. --Blisco 17:40, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Pembrokeshire and Welsh

The article "Little England beyond Wales" is a bit one sided, and I have added my own comments on the talk page of it. I would be grateful if some clued up Welsh language experts would look at this and the article on the Landsker Line.

Diolch yn fawr. --MacRusgail 20:49, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Cymru X

There's a proposal to merge this with Plaid Cymru. People may be interested in giving a view. Deb 17:53, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

If it was exanded, I'd oppose the merge. However as it stands it would be better to bulk up the Plaid Cymru article a bit. Marbles 18:17, 25 January 2007 (UTC)