User talk:Robin Patterson/archive 2015-01 to 2016-12

Royal descent
You may be able to add something useful to Talk:Famous_Descendants_of_William_the_Conqueror_of_England: this is outside my comfort-zone. Thurstan (talk) 00:56, January 9, 2015 (UTC)

Joan Tudor
You might like to have a go at cleaning up Joan Tudor and connected pages, lest I declare them illiterate drivel and delete them. Thurstan (talk) 21:25, January 31, 2015 (UTC)


 * Ooh, you're a hard man to please. (-D - see http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/User_talk:85.210.83.19#Person_pages. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 00:14, February 1, 2015 (UTC)


 * Thank you for taking that on: you'll note that anon has her mother wrong. Thurstan (talk) 00:27, February 1, 2015 (UTC)

Alan la Zouche
Looking at parents, it seems to me that Alan la Zouche (c1157-1190) and Alan la Zouche (c1093-1150) are supposed to be the same person. What do you think? Thurstan (talk) 00:55, February 10, 2015 (UTC)

Another upgrade
We seem to have had another upgrade, around about 20 Feb. Now when the "sources" and "notes" properties are retrieved, the line-breaks and the "new note" tags have ben removed, so that the formatting no longer works. Would you please ask your SMW contacts what we can do about it? Thurstan (talk) 21:07, March 9, 2015 (UTC)

Subcategories of Category:Deaths by country
I have just noticed that the Wikipedia categories "Deaths in countryname" are not at all equivalent to our "Died in countryname". There are at least two problems:


 * (1) not every page in a subcategory of such a category is a page for a person
 * (2) even if it is a page for a person, the person did not necessarily die in the nominated country

So examples: gives:

so 2 localities, a county and a war as well as some people, not all of whom died in the US. It is interesting to trace how Margaret Thatcher got here!

gives:

so one person who didn't die in Canada. A similar case: gives:

These are not really errors, just the fact that Wikipedia categories are not designed to work like this. This is the same reason that we don't put the "Counties of" categories into the "Valid name" categories, and the reason you hacked a subcat of the "Monarchs" category. Thurstan (talk) 05:09, March 30, 2015 (UTC)

Non-standard license for image
Hello, You've taken one of my images from wikipedia, without providing proper attribution on your site: wikia.com Please delete the image unless you are willing to provide proper copyright as per wikipedia page. http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/Niagara_Falls,_New_York http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ed/Niagara_Falls_before_a_rain_storm_%282007%29.jpg

Same goes for any other pictures you are using from Dmitri Markine without proper authorization or permission.

Best Regards, Dmitri


 * OK, attributed on our page - though I don't see anything similar on the Wikipedia page. Images on Wikipedia pages that we copy are transcluded automatically from Wikimedia Commons with no indication that there may be a non-standard license. Please see whether the attribution I have given is OK and give us a list of your other images that we may have. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 03:37, April 4, 2015 (UTC)

Achievements
Could you add Acheivments?


 * We could, but it would send wrong signals and encourage undesirable addition of category links. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:10, June 5, 2015 (UTC)

Munsell/Munsil, etc
How do I add my gedcom of over 7700 folks?

EoGuy (talk) 00:37, June 5, 2015 (UTC)


 * (answered on his talk page)

Infobox Updates
Please consider Forum:Infobox_Updates. Thurstan (talk) 07:02, July 29, 2015 (UTC)

Properties
Yes, Wikia wiped all property values again. It takes time to restore the chain to Charlemagne, particularly for later descendants. It also takes time to restore the properties birth & death nation when these are taken from the location pages. rtol (talk) 05:59, August 2, 2015 (UTC)

Vandal
He is. Thanks man! :). — Jr Mime  ( talk ) [ VSTF  ] 01:23, August 5, 2015 (UTC)
 * Found 4 more accounts :L. — Jr Mime  ( talk ) [ VSTF  ] 01:26, August 5, 2015 (UTC)

Forms and page names
When we first implemented forms with SMW, I thought "Wouldn't it be nice if contributors could just click a Create Person button, and fill in the details on the form, and have the page name calculated automatically, since that seems to be a source of difficulty". Now browsing through the SMW documentation I discover that this is possible (see "The one-step process" on that page). I have created Form:Create Person to test this: it generates the page name from the short_name, birth_date-approx, birth_year, death_date-approx and death_year properties. I can see two things going wrong: I have tested the form by creating John Blair Smith (1756-1799) and a couple of his sons. You might like to have a play with it too.
 * 1) contributors seem to misunderstand "short name", so we will probably get a crop of pages called "Bessie (-)"
 * 2) the implementation seems to have a weakness: if there is already a page with that name, it will just get overwritten. To fix this, I have added the "unique number" parameter to the end, so we will get "John Blair Smith (1756-1799) 2" if we try to create another copy.

This is actually set up by adding a tag to the form, so there is no reason that we can't make this change to the existing form, even if we do not offer it for general use. Thurstan (talk) 01:38, August 5, 2015 (UTC)


 * Good, I hope. (When we started SMW, that page wasn't there: https://www.mediawiki.org/w/index.php?title=Extension:Semantic_Forms/Linking_to_forms&oldid=431671 )
 * We will also get "Bessie Marriedname", which someone will have to move.
 * Using the short name will also inspire a desired move for anyone with three or more names, not all of which are in the short name. (I've not looked at John Blair Smith yet.)
 * The unique number thing will have us looking more like WeRelate; but is it perhaps the key to automated GEDCOM upload? A program like Yewenyi's could create pages more easily if it didn't have to devise a pagename. A bot can run around the namespace once a month finding pagenames that end in a number greater than 1 and sending a message about possible duplication to every editor of each version. Downside could be that a renaming of just one of the duplicates could leave the bot with nothing to find (unless it was instructed to treat redirects as investigable pages). Tell me if this is hopeless uninformed speculation!
 * I don't see how we can add a tag to a form but not offer it for general use. Maybe you mean we have a parallel form that is reachable only with deliberate clicking of options.
 * -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:33, August 5, 2015 (UTC)


 * You ask if I had more to say about this: we don't seem to a solution to what I see as the problem: newcomers will create a page for "Bill Brown" with parents "John" and "Mary", and then create those pages from the red-links, etc. It is still not obvious to the novice how even the pages links work, as shown by some recent queries. Thurstan (talk) 05:23, July 19, 2016 (UTC)

Category Salva, Bistrița-Năsăud
You are right. Sorry about the error and thank you for sending me the remark. I corrected the error. All the best, Andrei. 17:46, August 8, 2015 (UTC)

Template documentation (and non-documentation)
I have recently noticed that the template gremlins have included Notable ancestors, Migration and Locations into Showfacts biography, and that these templates set properties which cascade from parent to child. This means that Showfacts biography is now a standard part of a person page, not an optional extra. You might like to check documentation where you describe it as optional. Thurstan (talk) 01:37, August 11, 2015 (UTC)
 * Migration has been part of biog for about 5 years; I haven't checked on the introduction-dates of the others (though I've glanced at Locations and wonder how it affects biog - and wondered which of many possible locations it gives the spouse!). But I don't see why their inclusion makes biog a standard part of a page. Highly desirable but not essential, surely? I usually add it if it's missing (e.g. from an infopage-conversion). But some less prolific contributors have grumbled about aspects of it. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 05:00, August 11, 2015 (UTC)
 * Well, it is essential in the sense that if you leave it out of one person in a line of descent, it breaks the chain. And if everyone is descended from the big-C, then everyone is part of such a chain. (1st spouse gets place-of-birth) Thurstan (talk) 05:04, August 11, 2015 (UTC)


 * I thought that some parts of that sort of chaining used the sensor pages. Either our documentation is not yet up to date or I haven't looked in the right places. Admittedly I've had a dearth of replies from a migrant from The Netherlands to Ireland (then England) when asking for explanations, but someone must know how to explain clever things they have been working on. You usually do. I guess my above-requested checking should extend to seeing whether there are adequate explanations, in appropriate places, of some of your above paragraphs. Then you might like to check my work for accuracy, as usual. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 01:09, November 5, 2015 (UTC)

OK, I started my search in the obvious place, Showfacts biography/doc, created by User:Phlox. Significant part of it when he last edited: "When no biography narrative is provided, please use it if the alternative is nothing. You can probably do much better, so please replace it if you can with original text, ...". I merely paraphrased that while expanding it a little. The people who changed the base template should have been the ones to change that, as soon as it became invalid. I will continue searching. Robin Patterson (Talk) 01:19, November 5, 2015 (UTC)

Next I checked minibio history, and have reported main finding at http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/Template_talk:Showfacts_biography#Where_does_page_.22pull.22_Ancestor_information_.3F.3F.3F.3F - please check that it's a fair summary then maybe you can ask rtol to comment. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 01:55, November 5, 2015 (UTC)

Now I've added a paragraph there, with more history and a suggestion for the future. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 04:47, November 5, 2015 (UTC)

Reflexivity
On a different note, you may have noticed that I have refined Reflexivity test, and I am finding that Familypedia:Diagnostics is now showing lots of cases of people with the wrong parents, wrong links from parents to child etc etc. Thurstan (talk) 01:37, August 11, 2015 (UTC)
 * Amazing software you and rtol develop! I guess the recent refining was a success. Would some of those cases be merely from renaming without redirects? -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 05:00, August 11, 2015 (UTC)


 * Some have been simple mistakes (grandmother instead of mother etc), others have been duplicate pages. I haven't seen much evidence for the renames as the problem. You might like to analyse William Herbert (1696-1757), a page you created, who was not linked to from his father. Thurstan (talk) 05:09, August 11, 2015 (UTC)


 * And another source of problem is the fact that the /info page upgrade dropped kids off the end sometimes. Thurstan (talk) 05:28, August 11, 2015 (UTC)

Herberts
First version of Thomas shows William as the only child. Third revision, still in 2010, also by me, adds five other children with Margaret and one with Barbara. Fourth revision, in 2012, by Thurstan, changes child William to "c1696-1757" - still blue link, so presumably a redirect somewhere in the system. Last three versions, all by Thurstan, leave him with the "c". It redirects happily (though we both know that for perfect SMW operation it should match, and one of us should try to find out whether the "c" is the best prefix).

(William had his death year changed, fairly early in the process, before his father's page was created: http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/William_Herbert_%281696-1757%29?diff=509872&oldid=509871 - but he has never been changed to add a "c".)

At what stage(s) was William "not linked to from his father"?

-- Robin Patterson (Talk) 06:08, August 11, 2015 (UTC)


 * (Wikipedia has the "c"): he wasn't linked until I created the redirect (with the "c") this morning, so maybe I broke it in 2012. Thurstan (talk) 06:15, August 11, 2015 (UTC)
 * Indeed it does. Both authors of Parliamentary history have "c." - so I've renamed him. Guess what: no double names. Pagemove bug dead? But the first "Edit with form" wouldn't show the "Create/update sensor page". I tweaked the address bar for that. Republishing sensor shows tabs, and his article shows them now that I've edited it twice (once to add the "c", once to add the sibs}. Could the weekend java raid responses have affected some of our stuff? -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 06:51, August 11, 2015 (UTC)


 * Thanks for fixing William. Maybe the bug is dead: I will try a test when I get a chance. I notice that the "collapsible section" of the Person form is neither collapsed nor collapsible this morning, and the same is true on the Monopoly wiki, so that must depend on whatever has been switched off. Thurstan (talk) 06:59, August 11, 2015 (UTC)
 * Bug still alive: I got it with move to Margaret Ferch Llywelyn (c1202-aft1268) on the sensor. Thurstan (talk) 07:17, August 11, 2015 (UTC)

Can you untangle?
It seems to me that Ivy Smith (1904-) is the same person as Ivy Maria Smith (1904-2000), and her daughter Betty Dunn is the same person as Betty M Turner (1931). Can you sort this out? Thurstan (talk) 08:50, August 17, 2015 (UTC)
 * Father name differs a little. I'll see if the various contributors can put their heads together. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 10:11, August 17, 2015 (UTC)

Bonvolu - in Esperanto
I spend most of my time on the alternate history wiki where I'm in second place in number of edits.

I have been awarded Best Editor the last four years in a row.

I have also made spelling and grammar corrections on Disney, Star Trek and others.

I tell folks I'm like the English professor in the men's room - I don't write on the walls. I just correct the spelling and grammar.

Bil EoGuy (talk) 18:46, August 17, 2015 (UTC)

Santa
To see why kids sometimes call me Santa go to the ham radio website qrz.com and enter my call sign K1ATV.

Bil

PS - Bonvolu means please.

Hello is Saluton. Good morning is Bonan Tagon. Good night is Bonan Nokton.

I think I entered a GEDCOM or two many years ago. EoGuy (talk) 15:48, August 18, 2015 (UTC)

Hello
Can I ask you for something?--AlexHoskins (talk) 20:26, September 2, 2015 (UTC)

Re: Hello
Could you send the PNG photos from Naruto in the Heroes Wiki? Here's the link for the Heroes Wiki: hero.wikia.com.--AlexHoskins (talk) 03:36, September 3, 2015 (UTC)


 * 1) Send them where?
 * 2) Which ones?
 * 3) Why can't you do it?
 * -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 05:01, September 3, 2015 (UTC)

Non-transitive categories
Please don't put Wikipedia categories like Category:De Clare family into our categories (such as surname categories) which our contributors expect to be transitive: it will break Familypedia:Reports at least. Thurstan (talk) 06:55, October 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * I respect your judgment and I see how "Reports" can be mucked up. (But this contributor does not recall ever thinking that a category could be transitive!) If there isn't a clear instruction somewhere about that, there should be. I'll poke around in top families and surname categories to see whether there's a guide. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 11:03, October 21, 2015 (UTC)

Gage
I am working on the uncategorized articles. If I remember correctly Gage was not an article it was a simple phrase not linked and not categorized. Afil (talk) 20:28, October 21, 2015 (UTC)


 * It was a person (with a Wikipedia-type name) and it was linked, though it might have a better future as a redirect to a standard person-page name with years of birth and/or death. Deletion is not a good solution for a lack of categories. And deleting an admin's creation without giving any reason is bad etiquette. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 05:48, October 22, 2015 (UTC)

Article names
For naming articles, you said to include years of birth and death in the article title. Where does that go into the template? Into the "short name" section?Dlx210 (talk) 01:25, November 16, 2015 (UTC)

(Answered on that contributor's talk page)

Moriori link
Kia ora Robin

I would be interested to know about your Moriori hokopapa. can you please direct me to that forum? Kind regards, susan (


 * Not exactly a hokopapa, Susan: not a blood relationship. I think the page you may want to look at is User:Robin Patterson/Moriori. You're most welcome to add details of descendants of Tame and of his ancestors and cousins. (|:-) -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:07, November 18, 2015 (UTC)

Sortable table
Hi Robin,

Thanks for the info! I have a question: I would like to automatically create a page with a sortable table listing people. Is that possible? Thanks Alberto


 * We produce several types of those (though the "automatically" may not be the same as what you have in mind). See the bottom of our main page for examples. Tell us how you want to select the people, and one of us can probably help you work out the coding. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:54, November 18, 2015 (UTC)

Tables or categories
Hi Robin,

Thanks for your help the bdm page is cool. Is there any way to create something like that for other categories, like "Members of Irish Parliament pre-1801"? Thanks, Alberto


 * That could well be a simple category - and if the person is on Wikipedia it will probably be in place. More generally, though, the creation of pages like the bdm or the front page listings needs the creation of a Property using Semantic MediaWiki. I'm a mere beginner with that stuff, so I'll copy this discussion to the Forum:Help desk and we can try to get an expert involved. There are sure to be other contributors interested in the answers. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 21:27, November 18, 2015 (UTC)

William Manson (1852-1940)
William Manson (1852-1940) page name doesn't match his YoD. Would you like to fix him? Thurstan (talk) 04:22, November 20, 2015 (UTC)


 * I wouldn't, of course, but I checked him out and found Geni was wrong again and I bravely renamed him. Hey - where's the bug? A duplicate descendants page hardly counts. Is he just lucky or is the bug dying? -- Robin Patterson (Talk)


 * Thanks for the fix. I am not sure what is happening with the bug, though I just found that if I rename twice I can get three descendants tabs! Thurstan (talk) 05:04, November 20, 2015 (UTC)


 * Deleting new sensor page and restoring kills the duplicate descendants. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 05:18, November 20, 2015 (UTC)

Minor edits
A few days ago you left me a message asking me to specify the cases when I make minor edits. I have since ticked the square of minor edit, though I might have missed some cases. However I tried to see if there is any difference in how they are recorded in the Recent Wiki Activity records and did not notice any. Am I doing something wrong or were the minor changes dutifully recorded so as not to give you any more trouble? Afil (talk) 06:41, November 20, 2015 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much for making the effort. It can make a huge difference. One of the options for viewing Recent Changes is "Hide minor edits", which at least two of us do in most of our trawls through that page. I'm not sure whether Recent Wiki Activity takes any notice, but it's not the best page for detailed checking and I seldom look at it and wasn't referring to it. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 07:16, December 25, 2015 (UTC)

Adoptive parents
I have tried to identify the rules on how to record adoptive and natural parents in the Showfacts person template. I can use either one (but am not sure how to specify) but not both, and if I make a note I cannot link them in a tree. Are there any such rules? There must have been other users who have encountered the same problem. Thank you for your help. Afil (talk) 06:41, November 20, 2015 (UTC)


 * I'm one of those myself. It has been covered in at least one forum. Try a search. I'm off to dinner now! -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 06:46, November 20, 2015 (UTC)

Bishops Bridge (near Cessnock)
Would you have any objection if I changed the name to Bishops Bridge, New South Wales which would be consistent with the names of other settlement in Northumberland County of NSW both in Wikipedia and in Familypedia? I would also include a small text indicating the coordinates of the village of Bishops Bridge and other information. Afil (talk) 21:45, December 3, 2015 (UTC)
 * I tried but (with computer in for repairs) too late - the Aussie expert had covered it. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 07:11, December 25, 2015 (UTC)

Threston, Twysden, and, Lewkenor
Dear Robin, I understand your objections and I don't want to touch articles to which you have participated. Please look at the article Threston, Twysden, and, Lewkenor and include the categories you consider adequate. Regards 22:39, December 24, 2015 (UTC)
 * Thank you. Categories added. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 07:09, December 25, 2015 (UTC)

Categories with names that start with "Wikia"
Thank you for your message.

What I am doing now is to look at the list of uncategorized pages and to include categories. This exercise could be useful for people who are looking for information in Familypedia and who might have difficulties in identifying the articles they are interested in if these are only indicated by the title. In doing this I am trying, as much as possible to follow the structure of Wikipedia categories. I think this exercise has some utility in improving Familypedia, even if it is not very much fun.

You are right that the categories starting with Wikia should be looked into, especially as some Wikipedia categories are introduced automatically by templates. I will try to be more careful.

Merry Christmas

Andrei

Henrich II
I got a message about Henrich II von Hoya being deleted.

I find him still in Familypedia.

I extracted the information from the German Wikipedia, which I use for mauch information

Not a major concern for me, since I maintail a lare widerhold geneaology seperatly, see

http://i.stanford.edu/pub/gio/personal/ancestors/index.html

But if there is an error, let me know, and maybe update wikiperdia as well.

Best wishes

Gio GioWiederhold (talk) 18:07, January 11, 2016 (UTC)

Thanks!!
Can't understand why I found Familypedia only a few days ago. Celareklaw (talk) 07:59, January 17, 2016 (UTC)

Help
That would be nice if you helped me with the tables and tree/descendants pages! Thanks! May 2016

Spencer William von Sturmer
Do you know about Spencer William von Sturmer, from your neck of the woods? He sounds notable, though no Wikipedia article. He married Rebecca Jane Madeline Kable (1870-1952) as his second wife. Thurstan (talk) 01:01, June 4, 2016 (UTC)


 * One of my mother's cousins married a von Sturmer but we've lost contact. I'll look him up and maybe create an article unless you beat me to it. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 03:32, June 4, 2016 (UTC)
 * Done. He seems to be a cousin of "my" one. Ancestry back to 16th century and prominent judicial role in NZ before moving to Oz. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:43, June 5, 2016 (UTC)

Milner Mixup?
There is a mix up in Robert Oilver Milner page. His brother Carl's info is there also. Plus it said add a photo. I did but I don't see it one his page.

Thanks

Bob Milner Jr

kelbrit1@yahoo.com

Place names and correct fields
Sorry for my brusque response to your recent message, part of my excuse is that I am laid low with head cold. But my main problem is that I feel that the whole of our standard for intermediate-level place names has failed to achieve any consensus. If we look at "Born in France", for example:

we have a mixture of departments and regions. This is why I code the BDM pages for departments with the template that picks up both "county" and "nation-subdiv1". If we can reach agreement, then remediation will be needed too. Thurstan (talk) 01:34, June 6, 2016 (UTC)


 * 1) Get well soon!
 * 2) The mixture of regions and departments is probably because :
 * 3) Our documentation isn't obvious enough - I forget whether our France article has any FP-oriented guidelines like what I've very recently added near the top of United Kingdom, but it should have, and so should every nation-subdiv1 article (after we devise a suitable template to shorten the task!); and we could add a little more to the form-field labels, e.g replace "County" with "County/district/dept" to cover more cases
 * 4) "Counties" in France are not called counties, as most are in UK and USA
 * 5) Even some of us who studied France or its language or literature for a couple of hundred hours a year for eight years (plus homework) can be a bit fuzzy on what is a region and what is a department; so the rest of you can be excused; incidentally I notice that Normandy is like Sussex and Ayrshire - it's now split!
 * 6) There could be a good case for using your double-banger bdm (perhaps more simply named, e.g. bdmx) more often, because of the long history of the above-mentioned "errors" and the unlikelihood of getting full remediation done by our small band, but probably not in UK or USA where counties are mostly called counties and therefore more clearly belong in a "County" field
 * 7) Any move towards remediation could include the creation of dynamic pages listing incorrect placements, where those of us who are keen could skim through and do corrections for rare events but use the double-banger for places that have been frequently misplaced; could SMW produce a complete list of nation-subdiv1 names with counts?
 * 8) Maybe more ideas in the morning
 * 9) -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 13:17, June 6, 2016 (UTC)

Redirects
I did not know you were involved in the issue. Before deleting the redirects I sent a message to Main Tour indicating that something was wrong. He never answered the message indicating what he intended to to. If we don't communicate about such issues we will obviously get into conflicts. I am trying to keep the categories of Familypedia under control. Eliminating all the cases in which categories were not in order took efforts. But keeping this under control and avoiding the situation of over one year ago when we had thousands of such situation needs permanent monitoring of what is going on. And if questions and objections are not answered, we will again get into thousands of unsolved cases. The redirects which you are mentioning have been deleted ONLY because their author did not raise any kind of objections to my comment, which made me understand that he had no objection to my comments. Afil (talk) 22:52, June 16, 2016 (UTC)


 * You did not say you were thinking of deleting the pages. After very helpfully explaining how to make proper redirects, you said (ambiguously) "There does not seem to be any reason why the name without birth/death dates would be redirected...". That is directly contrary to what has been our practice for some time now, as indicated on Help:Copying from Wikipedia. Then you didn't apparently check to see whether there was a reply on his talk page (or even an indication that he had read your message), which is one of the acceptable places to reply to messages. And you did not know I was involved in the issue? My name was on at least some of the page histories. Er - "permanent monitoring of what is going on" - yes, please! Kind regards. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 23:09, June 16, 2016 (UTC)

Replies from two relatively new contributors
Thank you for that notice. And I am really sorry for not adding the person's birthyear on the title. Please forgive me.Kyu kang (talk) 12:01, June 26, 2016 (UTC)
 * Resoundingly forgiven. Replied on Kyu talk page. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:42, June 30, 2016 (UTC)

Rudi
Hello. I'm not sure how or even if it's possible to reply directly to your comments on my talk section. I tried fixing Lillian Rudi's birthday through her husband's page, Johan Chistensen. That didn't work. Her correct death year is 1973. I'm sure I saw a post directing how to fix this somewhere, but I can't recall. Also, I was unable to remember how to link her to her Mother's page. Thanks! Ethan 13:30, June 29, 2016 (UTC)
 * Edit your talk page the same way as you edit mine. Specific response now on your talk page. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:42, June 30, 2016 (UTC)

ifmarried-g1=Yes
When you are editing old pages, please check that the "ifmarried-g1=" is set to true when it should be (pages in Category:Person articles requiring maintenance). This would save me a second edit. Thurstan (talk) 02:28, June 30, 2016 (UTC)


 * Oh, dear! I had fondly hoped that you and a friendly bot had fixed them all in half a day. I'll try to remember to look at that detail too. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:36, June 30, 2016 (UTC)

And don't forget to add footer to converted pages which lack it, such as Hannah Rogers (1668-1754). It would be nice to be able to flag these pages too. Thurstan (talk) 03:12, June 30, 2016 (UTC)


 * Some smart fellow should be able to work out how a bot can fix them too - but maybe our inability to do string searches is the problem there? -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 04:47, June 30, 2016 (UTC)

I've checked Ifmarried-g4 and upwards - no "Yes". I've added a note to 1, 2, and 3, since I didn't feel like running through their lists. R

Progress?
Now can we use to check progress?

Yes, we can!

-- Robin Patterson (Talk) 04:47, June 30, 2016 (UTC)

Troxel
I just wanted to improve the titles and also to enable links between the names mentioned in the articles with the corresponding titles. But I agree that it was not wise to ignore redirects. Will be more careful in the future. Regards, AndreiAfil (talk) 20:19, July 12, 2016 (UTC)

"Page move" bug
I have created Category:Person articles affected by the page move bug in an effort to track these pages. Thurstan (talk) 22:26, July 12, 2016 (UTC)
 * I had noticed. Good work (I presume). -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 23:12, July 12, 2016 (UTC)

Just to prove that nothing is perfect, the latest version of SMW, which fixes the "Page move" bug, seems to err in the opposite direction: if you create a redirect to an existing page, it wipes out all the properties of the target page (until you do a refresh). I am not sure that general redirect handling isn't broken: I will have to do some more testing. Thurstan (talk) 03:30, March 31, 2017 (UTC)

Forbes in Jamaica
Super! Thanks for your help in trying to find my real Forbes family. I'm trying to find the correct Alexander Forbes (my great,great grandfather) as I am not convinced that a certain other website has connected the correct Alexander Forbes to my family.I believe I have found the right one, but I am still working on it. There are numerous "Alexander Forbeses"! My Forbeses, as far as I know are only connected to Jamaica and Scotland. Kind regards, JoannaFM (talk) 15:15, July 15, 2016 (UTC)

Hello Robin,

Please could you correct my great, great grandmother's name to show on her profile as Georgianna, not Georgina.

Many Thanks.JoannaFM (talk) 10:49, July 16, 2016 (UTC)


 * Done. Now did her daughter-in-law really have child Edna at age about 14? -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 11:13, July 16, 2016 (UTC)

Living persons
Dear Robin,

I am a bit confused and though I have been trying to find out what is correct I did not find an answer regarding living persons. In a forum regarding living persons, a very old discussion but which has not been corrected states that for a living person the name should be followed by the birth date in brackets - i.e. John Doe (1930) - and if the person is known as dead but with no death year as John Doe (1930-). There are many articles in Familypedia with follow this rule.

Also there is a category of Living persons which according to the instructions should be amended after 123 years following the birth year with several additional recommendations.

I now see that you have posted articles for persons of the Forbes family in which the name is followed by (living). This also refers to other persons in the articles (parents, children etc) for which there may or may not be links.

I have no preference for one or the other but would simply like to know which is correct (or if both are acceptable) and where the guidelines are to be found (I might also miss other recommendations if I do not find them).

Regards

AndreiAfil (talk) 00:38, July 17, 2016 (UTC)


 * Thank you for checking. Did you search for "living people"? The category has, at the top, a link to our policy page. I see that our policy was a few years out of date, so I've updated it; comments welcome. I'll have a look for that forum you found, because the year of birth is not always the best option (but must be presumed OK if the year was published on some other site, as were those Forbeses you mention). -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 04:02, July 17, 2016 (UTC)

Migrants
Dear Robin,

The template you are looking for is Template:Category Migrants from country to country. I did make some minor corrections but I don't want to take unmerited credit. The template was designed by Thurstan. Optionally you can also include the continents if the two countries are located in different continents.

I don't know if there is any page which explains how the template is to be used. This might be necessary as users might not guess how the continent option is to be activated. Also, there seem to be no clear rules if in the case of the United States or Canada the component states should be used or not; at present both alternatives have been applied by different users. You may want to decide if any action is to be taken on these issues or not.

Regards

AndreiAfil (talk) 19:33, July 19, 2016 (UTC)


 * Thank you. I've made notes on its talk page and created the outline of its documentation page. We have numerous categories for migrants from a state to a state or other country or vice versa, so I'm sure that option should be easily available. See familypedia.wikia.com/index.php?title=Special%3AAllPages&from=Migrants+from. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 23:17, July 19, 2016 (UTC)

Now further comment at http://familypedia.wikia.com/wiki/Forum:International_migration?diff=1238839&oldid=976030 -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 05:23, July 21, 2016 (UTC)

Category surnames
Dear Robin,

In your recent article Moses (c1400 BC-c1201 BC) you indicated surname = -. The template showfacts person automatically triggers the template surname which includes a category with the surname indicated in the article, even if it is blank or, as in your case, -. I checked this with the article Abraham ben Terah which has no surname but triggered the creation of a Category: (surname).

I therefore modified the template, so that it does not create a category with blank surnames. This has been verified in the Abraham article, where the blank surname category is not created any more. It would create a category: - (surname) if surname = - was included.

I left your articles unchanged. It you do not want a surname category for those articles, the solution which is active at present is to simply not include a surname or to leave the surname blank.

I hope this does not disturb you as it does not change anything in your articles on biblical figures.

Regards

Andrei Afil (talk) 00:34, July 20, 2016 (UTC)


 * I have found that creation of a new page cannot be done if the surname field (or given name or short name) is blank. Maybe that does not apply to editing articles. I'll keep an eye out for ways to minimize difficulties. Your modification of the template is probably a great idea if it works. We should probably change some of our guidance pages if the amendment is really working in all cases. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 01:23, July 20, 2016 (UTC)


 * The change probably just duplicates the logic in surname, which attempts to map blank to "Unknown". Thurstan (talk) 02:55, July 20, 2016 (UTC)


 * I've raised the subject more publicly at Forum:Surname absence. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 05:25, July 21, 2016 (UTC)

Kalternkirchen
Kalternkirchen is northern Germany.79.64.173.193 14:11, July 24, 2016 (UTC)
 * OK, that narrows the search slightly. But not enough to create a useful article. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 21:28, July 24, 2016 (UTC)

Unknown
Dear Robin,

I would like your advice on the issue you raised. In older generations, many married women were mostly known by their husband's last name and, except for aristocracy, in many cases the maiden names have been forgotten. Instead of including these persons with last name "Unknown", would it not be preferable to include them with their married last name, which is actually the name they used for most of their life? Maybe we should think of a way of indicating that the last name is the married name. I would prefer this solution to the unknown or NN alternative. I am sure that I am not the only person who finds women whose maiden last names have been forgotten,

Regards

Andrei


 * Discussion moving to Forum:Surname absence.

s or z
You are right about the inconsistencies in the spelling of organization (and related words) in Wikipedia. In the article you mentioned I was trying to do something completely different, i.e to have the same structures for the same categories related to Italy and Romania and maybe did not give the word too much thought.

I have since checked with the Oxford dictionary (which recommends Organization) and the Webster (which also uses organization, but states that Organisation is an English version. As far as my preferences are concerned, I generally tend to apply the recommendations of the Oxford Dictionary. I do not think that I am a linguist and that I am competent to decide which is correct. But I consider that in Familypedia we should try to be consistent and, as far as possible follow a single rule. The Oxford dictionary is a respected authority, which I was told I had to follow since I started learning how to read and write, nearly a century ago. Actually, we should use the same rule for all controversial spellings - using different authorities for different words would be totally confusing.

So, in the case of Organization, I suggest we use this version, which is recommended by the Oxford Dictionary, as a general rule. To enable users who use another spelling, we should use redirects or categoryredirects. After you decide on the Familypedia policy please let me know so that I can try to implement this policy, making the required changes, which would inevitably take some time.

Regards Afil (talk) 21:43, August 10, 2016 (UTC)


 * Thank you! I see that my 10th edition of the C.O.D. still treats "ize" as normal, citing Latin and Greek origins that have "z". Wikia management and staff have preferred "organization". We would be departing from Wikipedia category names at times; but it may be hoped that WP will eventually remove those inconsistencies. Maybe I'll add a note to our manual of style (if I can find it!). -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:15, August 11, 2016 (UTC)

Gadri
Hi, Robin, i think wikipedia:User:Robin Patterson is your account and also Robin Patterson is an admin there. If its really you account, then please copy and paste the content of wikipedia's deleted article Gadri (clan), which is accepted by wikipedia due to many sources/references, i have given as anyonomous user. But was then deleted by Bbb23 because it was created by a blocked user. I have given a lot of sources there and im requesting you to copy these sources and paste here. Thank you, robin.--Muhammad Mujtaba Gadri (talk) 10:57, September 2, 2016 (UTC)


 * Yes, that's me there too. I think I looked at the deleted Gadri article and didn't notice anything that's not on what you have here - now at Gadri (surname) - which seems to be based more on the other (Hindu) site you linked to. I'll have another look. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 20:42, September 2, 2016 (UTC)

Blockquote
When did "blockquote" become bolded and a bigger font? It really stands out now. To my eye it distracts. --Richard Arthur Norton (talk) 21:03, September 5, 2016 (UTC)


 * Sorry, I've no idea. I never use it. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 05:46, September 7, 2016 (UTC)

East Church
Dear Robin,

I was attempting to work on the categories of your article East Church. I agree that there was a parish, as indicated in your article,. However the list of present day parishes in Perth does not include this parish any more. Are you sure that we are not talking about former parishes in Perth, which, for some reason, have been changed since 1868?

Regards

Andrei Afil (talk) 21:40, September 8, 2016 (UTC)


 * Agreed. See Andrei's talk page. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 21:56, September 18, 2016 (UTC)

Ashworth, Patterson, Hill, et al
Hi Robin 👋-

Thank you for the applause on R.C. Ashworth's page. I noticed a Patterson among the children. Are we kin? If so, I'd love to know what you know. I've gotten a rather large tree done on another site (I don't know if I'm allowed to say the site here). I've been so busy scouring my memory and researching, that I've not had the time to read the user/contributor rules, much less add the tons I've learned here, unfortunately. I've hit a dead end with great-great-grandad James, even though I've been perusing UK Census. My mother's side is going nowhere fast. 😡 The same can be said with the Hill side of Dad's branch, nothing to be had of my great-grandparents and only a few of the rumored 8 great-uncles & aunts.

Again, thanks for the praise and I'd love to learn what you know, if anything.

NewEngland27 (talk) 20:00, September 18, 2016 (UTC)NewEngland27


 * (Replying here because there are several points) No need to type your username before or after your "signature" because the 4 tildes include it, as you can see above. Patterson probably unconnected; mine are nearly all Angus or New Zealand and the early ones were "Paterson"; check link to my WorldConnect file on my user page. No problem mentioning other genealogy websites here; we have a page for each of the major sites. Add what you know of your "brick walls" here and there's a chance some web searcher who knows more will make contact, because search engines pick up nearly everything from here. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 21:56, September 18, 2016 (UTC)

Thanks
Adding any more pages is going to take me a while. I have to take the time to learn how to use these pages. I didn't know how to write back to you on my talk page for instance. I might add myself with limited location info. I was kinda hoping that you were kin, bummer. On my geni.com tree (have no idea how to link), one of my remote cousins and I merged our trees. Also, I contacted my cousin tonight that you'd linked on James' talk page. It's exciting to find new people.

You say that I can list people where I'm dead in the water here and people will answer? Is that on my page or yours or a general asking page? Wouldn't people have to be searching specifically for my people for them to know I'm looking?

Naively yours,

NewEngland27 (talk) 00:16, September 19, 2016 (UTC)


 * You can reply on your own talk page just by editing it. Can you see a link at the top for editing the whole page or a link beside each section where you can edit just that section?
 * You don't need any location info on your own biography page. Example at Anita Carolyn Taylor (living). We don't encourage identifying detail on pages of living people, though people who are happy to add it to their own pages are welcome to. There's quite a bit on mine. And from my user page you can probably find my geni.com page and let Geni show you a zigzag relationship path between us. Possibly no traceable cousin relationship, but you never know! Then add the URL for your Geni page on your user page here so that we can compare and I may be able to help fill gaps. Just the full URL from your address bar without any brackets will do.
 * I didn't say you could list people to get responses, but even listing them may lead to a contact. Individual pages are more likely to be noticed in a search engine list. Put "James Edward Ashworth" into your favourite search engine and see how high on the list his Familypedia page comes! Richard Charles was harder to find, probably because his page is only a few weeks old and therefore possibly not indexed on Yahoo yet, but when I searched for him I found James's page, which lists Richard Charles.

-- Robin Patterson (Talk) 00:59, September 19, 2016 (UTC)

Elnaz Rezaei Ghalechi (1981-)
Dear Robin,

Somebody changed the page Elnaz Rezaei Ghalechi (1981-) you created. Maybe you have a look at it. If the name change is correct, then the title should also be changed, but I do not know what is correct.

Regards,

AndreiAfil (talk) 21:02, September 23, 2016 (UTC)


 * Thank you. Change didn't match Facebook page so I've reverted change. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 21:14, September 24, 2016 (UTC)

Æthelwulf Disambiguation
Hi Robin -

I think it is necessary to do disambiguation for the early Kings of England. My first attempt is this page : Æthelwulf - but it is not going well.

Regards, Bryce Hall MainTour (talk) 00:44, October 9, 2016 (UTC)


 * Well, removing some junk from that page, one is left with a puzzle - why doesn't he appear on it? His coding says "given_name=Æthelwulf".
 * What sort of disambiguation do you want apart from solving that puzzle? Would a list of names and reign-periods without all the details be helpful?
 * -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 01:07, October 9, 2016 (UTC)


 * Yeah - I guess the alternative is a hand built list to itemize all of these old English Kings with the same name. A good example would be King Henry and King William and King Louis.
 * MainTour (talk) 02:42, October 9, 2016 (UTC)


 * How about the category? Sorry, I haven't checked what order the likely categories are in. Or a manually-created Template:Disambig page as a last resort. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 09:50, October 9, 2016 (UTC)


 * There now - King Henry's done. See what other treats WP may turn up! -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 09:55, October 9, 2016 (UTC)

Cleveland, Arkansas
Cleveland is also a community in Conway County, Arkansas.Kjcreed (talk) 20:24, October 23, 2016 (UTC)Kathi Carlon Reed 10/23/2016


 * OK, Wikipedia must be deficient on that point. So all of those events were at Cleveland in Conway County, Arkansas? -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 20:31, October 23, 2016 (UTC)

Image deletion
How would I delete a picture? I didn't mean to add it yet.Kjcreed (talk) 01:19, October 24, 2016 (UTC)
 * I think that only admins can delete pages. Is there a reason why the picture should not be in public view? If you mean merely that you haven't got an article for it yet, don't worry; it can be added when a suitable article appears. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 06:14, October 24, 2016 (UTC)

IssuesEdit
(Originally at User_talk:Taurus82.) Hi Robin. I'm sorry for all of the different user names; I have been forgetting my paswords, but now I have one that I am sticking to. There are a few issues that I would like to bring up with that I have noticed lately.

Saving PagesEdit
For some reason I have not been able to save a pages when I want to edit a page the normal way. The save button is not highlighted for some reason.


 * Puzzling, Taurus! I've been away for a few days so may have missed something. I'll check. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 01:35, November 13, 2016 (UTC)


 * Well. I've just edited a person page with no problem. As I use the standard skin I see a green "Publish" button at the appropriate time. Are you using some less-than-standard approach? -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 01:50, November 13, 2016 (UTC)

Person PagesEdit
When I creat a person pages it will eithe save a page without anything really saved and/or when I click on a red link person page to create it, it a "Creat a new article" box will appear and only give me the option to "Add a Page," and will not give bring me to the 'Persons page."


 * Another puzzle as above. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 01:35, November 13, 2016 (UTC)


 * I can't see exactly what you say you are doing and what goes wrong. However, it may be related to an apparent software change that I and Thurstan have commented on in the latest section of Forum:SMW on Familypedia. See whether that looks like part of your problem. If not, try me again with a clearer set-out of what happens to you. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 02:00, November 13, 2016 (UTC)


 * PMFJI: are you struggling with the "VisualEditor"? You have to change the default on your preferences page. Thurstan (talk) 07:47, November 13, 2016 (UTC)

Renaming PagesEdit
When I rename a page it makes a duplicage of the persons "short name."


 * That one is easy. see Help:Renaming pages. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 01:35, November 13, 2016 (UTC)

Child Table Missing Years
Hi Robin - I notice for some time now that when calcuating a showfacts children table, it is dropping years prior to 1575. "year not a number" - example on Nicholas St Lawrence (1460-1526). It does okay with dates after about 1597. Any ideas on this? MainTour (talk) 02:55, December 5, 2016 (UTC)


 * The reason for the cut-off year (around 1590) is probably that that was when Pope Gregory revised the calendar (ignored until 1751 by Protestants). See Gregorian calendar. But why our software now has problems is something best answered by User:Thurstan, I expect. I'm copying this to a forum because numerous contributors will eventually be asking the same question unless we can fix it. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 03:32, December 6, 2016 (UTC)

Asking for advice regarding newbie
Dear Robin

I just want to draw your attention to some articles which have been uploaded by User:BS Murthy which you can identify on his contributions page. Basically they seem to be reproductions of pages from the Gutenberg Project where Mr. Murthy has uploaded some of his writings. I have no idea how they fit into the Familypedia project and, if they do, how to classify them. Maybe you could look into the matter and if you consider it appropriate, give some advice to the user on how to proceed.

Regards

Andrei


 * Indeed unusual, an apparently fictional article and many images. See my note at the bottom of my welcome on his talk page. If no genealogy forthcoming, we can suggest that he start his own wikia. -- Robin Patterson (Talk) 22:57, December 17, 2016 (UTC)