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Licence PD manifesto - how to handle it?

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The licence PD-manifesto, see e.g. the English wikisource en:Help:Copyright and Wikisource#Uncopyrightable works, seems to be OK for the use on the opages of Wikisources. My question is: is it OK, and the second one if yes, how should we handle it if there is no similar licence in other countries. Also, what can be recognized as pd-manifesto. For example, there is a speach of a president of a country to celebrate the new year; it is not possible to use a licence like PD-German-Gov, as the president is not a part of the government; could the licence PD-Manifesto be used here?. -jkb- 18:09, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, we're having a crisis on en:ws about this very thing. Our policy says that PD-manifesto is valid, but we are seriously discussing whether that's true or not. The way we are leaning, however, is that manifestos are not inherently copyright-free, and so might be incompatible with WS (at least on a policy level, if not even on a legal level). If that's the case, we will have to change that part of our policy, of course.—Zhaladshar (Talk) 21:23, 9 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Can you give me a link to the discussion on en:ws? I would like to follow. Especially, on cs:ws there are some documents like the Manifesto of Charter 77 or other manifestos, produced by the oppositional groups or persons under the communist regime, then semi-government speaches etc., where we use this licence, but... -jkb- 08:29, 10 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

s:en:Template:PD-manifesto does not have a discussion page in use. You may want to try the scriptorium there.--Jusjih 09:31, 12 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think you refer to http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Wikisource:Possible_copyright_violations#Public_speeches_in_general. Aleator 19:43, 26 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Cascade protecting for main page?

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I have just deleted the 13th vandalism on Talk:Main Page/. There is a new feature for protecting pages, the cascade protecting, but I am not sure how it works and if it would help here. Anybody knows? -jkb- 10:04, 25 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I actually thought I had already done it; it's done on all important main pages. Dovi 11:09, 25 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I had indeed. See protection log. Dovi 11:10, 25 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes I see there... But I understood this feature in that way, that by blocking of the main page all semi pages are blocked as well - but it is obviously possible to create Main Page/ rurther on. -jkb- 11:49, 25 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Cascade protection protects pages that are used as templates on a page (in this case the templates on the Main Page). It does not protect talk pages, subpages, or similarly named pages (unless they are used as templates on the cascade protected page). /82.212.68.183 12:19, 26 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I see. Thanks. So we shall have to delete this several times a week in the future:-)... -jkb- 12:40, 26 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

1100 uncategorized pages

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See please this category. There are 1100 uncategorized pages. Some of them have been moved, some of them can be specified by language. But not all. When I am sure I delete them, but the most ones are pages where I am not sure what language it is. And a language category should be the minimum of categorisation. I ask some users like Smeira to have a look there, but it will not help profoundly. What shall we do with those pages?. -jkb- 14:43, 1 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

They are generally not in English. I cannot identify their languages.--Jusjih 18:46, 8 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Well, some 4 weeks later there is a good balance: from 1100 uncategorized pages to some 460 now. I would like to thank here to all those who helped - and still are helping - to in this case. Nice to see that this domain still works somehow. Thanks, -jkb- 14:41, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

As of today, all remaining pages in Devanagari are in Sanskrit. These could be categorized with a bot. Any way, I think that there won't be a Sanskrit subdomain any time soon. Yann 08:39, 5 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Fine. Sure, it should be done by a bot. I think Seira hat something like that, and I could ask him. But, to keep the RC clean it should have the bot flag, which can be granted by a bureaucrat only, I can do nothing (see also User talk:ThomasV#Bot). -jkb- 09:05, 5 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hints, remarks etc

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I checked some pages; I could at 90% be sure of how to categorize them because they were linked somewhere else from some Main Page, or have an article in some Wikipedia I can read, or themselves claim to be in some language. I am also 90% sure of the language for the following pages that either have their own wikisource subdomain or have no language category, yet:
--Achillu 21:01, 8 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Kimi Ga Yo is a transliteration of Japanese (ja. subdomain) and a translation into English (en. subdomain)
Korea's Nation Archery Game Rule is bilingual English (en. subdomain) and Korean (ko. subdomain)
List of Hangeul syllables is Korean (ko. subdomain)
Luettelo Stalinin vainoissa kuolleista Vuolelaisista is Finnish and already exists that page on the fi. subdomain
Lỡ Bước Sang Ngang is Vietnamese and already exists that page on the vi. subdomain
Moscow agreement is English (en. subdomain)
notice in en.source made, -jkb- 14:52, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Omelia della Messa di Insediamento di Papa Benedetto XVI is Italian (it. subdomain)
Osa I and Osa II are Finnish (fi. subdomain)
--Achillu 14:43, 9 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
List of Hangeul syllables should probably be moved to Wikipedia, but I do not know if importing to Wikipedia is possible.--Jusjih 17:59, 9 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Transwiki from xx.source to xx.wikipedia is the default preference as far as I know. -jkb- 15:06, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Wikisource:รัฐธรรมนูญ and รัฐธรรมนูญแห่งราชอาณาจักรไทย พุทธศักราช ๒๕๔๐ are in Thai (th. subdomain).
--Achillu 16:56, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

category multilingual

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I have just created the Category:Multilingual (two examples: see there), as I have seen some more pages here with translations in more languages. But, I do not know if we want to have them in this way. Soon or later everybody will publish here texts of something translated into more languages. What shall we do with this??? -jkb- 15:48, 1 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

We still have some of that left on en.ws when the mass import happened. What we do is make sure that what does not belong on en.ws exists in the proper subdomain or else here and then delete it leaving the english. Perhaps you should do the same. If there are multiple languages that belong here, then create seperate pages in the native title.--BirgitteSB 21:11, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In fact the category:multilingual is a nonsence and I created it as a temporary solution only, as I didn't know what to do with such pages. In some cases they are bilingual only (in language xx and original in latin just to compare it), in some cases they content some 10 languages of one text. Anyway, what ever we decide about it, the category multiligual keeps those pages one one place so that we find them later - to move them, to divide them or to delete them. -jkb- 09:05, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

what happened to my previous user account??

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why was my user account apprarently deleted? I just had to re-register to be sm8900. Appreciate your help with this. --Sm8900 16:14, 5 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

probably you want something else, see explanation in User talk:Sm8900, -jkb- 17:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Is a parchment fragment eligible to be a notable source?

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I put the transcription of a parchment fragment here: Indovineło Veronéxe (info).

The notability of this fragment is stated here (there links to Italian, Spanish and Venetian versions of the article).

I think I correctly followed the steps of Wikisource:Text quality, but now I wonder if this can be a "notable source".

--Achillu 23:22, 8 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

PS: Is the Wikisource:Protection requests page still working? The last request dates 9 July 2005 15:45...

Yes, sure. You can even put the image of the parchment to illustrate the text. Regards, Yann 11:22, 9 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks! Unfortunately there are lots of copies of that image on the Internet, but none of them is PD or GFDL. More: the image is property of Biblioteca Capitolare di Verona; according to Italian laws, one can ask permission to publish but one is not allowed to republish elsewhere. I already faced that problem on it.wikipedia, and this was the answer of Italian admins: if Biblioteca Capitolare di Verona gives permission I can upload that image but I have to mark it as "copyrighted".
--Achillu 13:18, 9 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Multilingual text templates

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What do you think of making/converting multilingual templates (for example, Template:Scriptorium-side) to similar ones to this one from meta: meta:Template:Uptodate? It would avoid pages full of text, BUT it would be a bit confusing for update. Aleator 19:24, 17 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Transwiki - Importing data

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I found some valuable sources in Venetian on it.wikisource. I was suggested to ask for a Special:Import for that source into "oldwikisource" in order to put those sources in the correct place.

First question: is this job reasonably feasible?

Second question: what do you exactly need to know? I mean: should I tell you just which is the "cover page" for each book to import or should I tell you the complete report of all the pages that compose each book to import?

Third question: is it possible to automatically add the Category:Vèneto categorization while importing the pages, or should the pages be categorized subsequently by handcoding?

Thank you in advance for answering. Regards, --Achillu 16:12, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

OK, so here the answer: we shall need the names of the pages which are to be imported - I assume, that the pages will be imported comletely, i.e. incluseve history and inclusive the talk page. You can make the content here.
But, first I have to love a problem: every admin can use this so called transwiki, but first I have to apply/request somewhere that we can import from the Italian Wikisource. I ask somewhere where I have to request and then we can make it.
Answer here, I will follow this page more frequently... :-), -jkb- 13:20, 28 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, should I wait your "start" anyway?
If I misunderstood your post, here is my first request for transwiki, just in order to see what happens:
  1. an easy import:
  2. a complex import:
This list does not include templates and categories used by these pages. Is it ok this way? Can it be made simpler (i.e.: please import it:I pettegolezzi delle donne and all subpages)? Should it be made more complex (i.e.: list and/or import templates and categories, too)? I hope that my questions are clearer now, with an example.
Regards, --Achillu 12:22, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]


Well, this is pretty OK for the first time. I requested for me the possibility to import from other Wikisources, but in the moment I cannot say how long time it will take. There are some communication problems at present, I guess.
After that, I will import the listed pages, and I will do it completelly, i.e. including the history and including the talk pages (if any). But, if I should import subpages as well, then indeed, they must be listed. If also categories or templates should be imported, so you should list them as well, but in this case we should be sure that there are no categories or templates like this here in the multilingual wikisource.
After I have transwikied (=imported) the pages (I hope my request will be fullfilled), you will just have to categorize the pages here (normally, the category tags are imported together with the page, but normally they are different from the categories here).
So, this for now, I hope it will happen soon. -jkb- 14:23, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Do you mind if I ask why you wish to not work on Venetian texts at it.ws? Since wikisources texts are static it is very useful to keep related languages together. It is not like wikipedia where one person will start an article in Venetian and another will want add more in Italian.--BirgitteSB 21:06, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The answer is simple: Venetan is related to Italian exactly as French is related to Italian: they are "brother" languages ("cognate" or whatever). More, Venetan language is not even related to Italy: Venetan speakers span more countries in a similar way as Catalan speakers do.
Apart from that, Venetan literature is most separate from Italian literature, and according to an admin of it.ws it was a mistake to start Venetan texts there; he is actually encouraging me to go on here.
--Achillu 09:19, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. I should have done a little research before asking, because after looking I see they are only related as far as "Romance."--BirgitteSB 13:35, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ehm! Hello -jkb-, nice to meet you, Birgitte, Ciao Achillu! I'm the admin of it.ws who talked to Achillu! I can assure that it.wikisource hosts texts in furlan, sardu, nnapulitano, emilian and in other dialects (obviously including veneto). I don't consider an error if we host dialectal texts on it.source, but I understand that Veneto (I don't write "Venetian" because we are discussing about texts from Veneto, not only Venice and I don't know if a correct adjective exists in English) has a vast literature and a good potential to fork a wikisource of its own (I live in Verona, and I know what I'm saying); on the other hand what lacks until now is a core team of contributors to take care of such small wikisources, so we are using it.ws like a sort of incubator until some shrewd user decides to move and try to rise a new wikisource: that's what's happening with vec.source, and I'm quite happy of it. The process is undergoing the right steps (oldwikisource --> gathering of texts --> advertising on vec.wikipedia and it.wiki* --> request for subdomain), is there anything wrong with that? I don't think anyone is in haste. εΔω
No I do not think anything is wrong with that. Honestly I don't think that there is a wrong answer to this kind of thing but a neccessity to balance between the pros and cons. I asked to be certain this had been thought out. The comment about put those sources in the correct place made me wonder.--BirgitteSB 19:45, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry I don't understand if there is any final decision about importing that data. I've been waiting for either a "no" or an "import" but it seems to me that neither of the two happened.
I suspended any activity on the project because I am still waiting. If I understand well, you should decide if the "correct place" for a "Venetan incubator" is here or on it.ws, right?
--Achillu 08:37, 25 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I have a very great news. I just tested adding myself importing right here through Meta and importing function would be expanded to allow importing from any Wiki site through local disks. We should select a place to allow users, especially admins, to request expanded importing rights here. Then requests approved here will be sent to Meta for activation. Thanks to those who supported my steward election with 73-1-4-99%.--Jusjih 04:31, 24 December 2007 (UTC) (admin here and new Meta steward)[reply]

How much articles would be enough for a separate domen?

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I see here that test Wikisources with 500 and 700 articles are still not open. Belorussians like to work very much, and if they will understand necessity of Wikisource, they will put thousands of articles here. But we must have some goal - so, how much articles would be suposingly enough for opening of separate domen - 1000, 1500, maybe 3000? Are there some precedents? --Yaroslav Zolotaryov 16:15, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Normally, we prefer quality to quantity. If you upload here 1000 pages in one week and then do nothing, so it is bad. If three users upload here 10 pages a week but they do this every week, so they could have a better chance. But in the moment, as you probably can see, there is a discussion on meta on how to create new subdomains. So any answer on your question could be wrong. Be a bit patient please. -jkb- 14:27, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Quality is more important than quantity. If sufficient users want a subdomain, it can start with less than 100 articles, but prolonged inactivity may trigger site closing proposal. After Old English Wikisource opened, it is not so active, so Proposals for closing projects/Closure of Old English Wikisource is going on to get the contents to regular English Wikisource.--Jusjih 16:24, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, after a discussion on foundation-l, I received the answer that the current requests made on the Wikisource:Language domain requests aren't 100% ok to the current policy to create new wikis. See above:

Because it, I think that te best to do is:

  1. Archive all current requests on Wikisource:Language domain requests as unsuccessful and re-open these requests at m:Requests for new languages using a very basic structure (a simply stub request form to make the life more easy for these users and a central place to all type of language requests).
  2. Send a invite to the Wikipedians of affected languages to expand these requests, to arguing instead of voting etc.
  3. Replace the current text on Wikisource:Language domain requests to a general warning of maintaning the source-texts here versus requesting a new wiki and pointing to make new requests on Meta-Wiki in a way 100% ok to the m:Meta:Language proposal policy and 100% ok to the current policies "texts on this wiki versus a specific wiki for one language" (I don't have intention to do this step due to my poor English).

In other words: this wiki continues accepting new texts for languages that don't have yet a wiki and continues serving as a coordination wiki, but new requests may need to be placed at the Meta-Wiki and fully following the m:Meta:Language proposal policy.

Someone agree/disagree? 555 23:36, 1 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]


I have just sent a short comment to the m-list. I think it should be discussed here, but anyway, I would like to guarantee that new subdomains will work - not like some of the new ones created last summer without any reason. The experience with the languages - do they work or do they not work - can be made here only. -jkb- 08:41, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I also replied on the m-list. I am very hesistant to support 555's proposal at this time. I would first like to see them work out the kinks in their process and also see how they will treat a new wikisource request differently from any other new wiki requests. So we don't end up with more like ang.ws, which was created without the support of experienced editors here. If you all think tamil is ready for a subdomain, I suggest several of you leave a comment at the bug request pointing out you are a admin here and the request is supported. I imagine the developers are hesitant to judge a request approved on their own after the ang.ws incident. I will say that I really do not participate here and if you all would rather hand off the process because you do not want to maintain it; I will support you. But if your think is that handing off the process will give better results regarding things like ang.ws, I must disagree.--BirgitteSB 21:00, 2 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It is not only to avoid something like ang.ws, but many more unhappy creations. We discussed it here last summer after 19 subdomains have been created without a klnowledge of the admins here. See the table and see the statistics from today - in some cases there is no difference. Therefore, I think, this multilingual Wikisource is the best place to let new languages work and to see if they are capable to have their own subdomain. We can - or we should - discus the rules for it, see e.g. Wikisource:Language domain requests/New rules proposal. I am sure, that Wikisource is not Wikipedia - I am working here since August 2004, and I am sure, that if you move the wikisource languages from here to a general incubator, you will have sooner or later 10 or 20 different wikisources, not different by language, but different by rules, self-evidence, copy-violations etc. Then it is fully different to work in a wikipedia and a wikisource - and it is necessary to learn the rules and goals etc. of Wikisource, not the rules and goals of this or that Wikipedia (e.g. in the question of copyright/licensing still different one to each other). Therefore I think that the multilingual wikisource.org has still a huge significance. We should talk about what to improve here. -jkb- 09:32, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Do these things mean that we can no longer require bureaucrats in new Wikisource subdomains? Wiki sites without bureaucrats can ask Meta to grant adminship.--Jusjih 07:08, 6 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I totally agree with -jkb- here. And IMO, nothing changed regarding the creation of bureaucrats. Yann 16:57, 6 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

time out

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I'm like to take a time out, see my page. I hope somebody else will look after the vandals, requests etc. Thx. -jkb- 19:30, 2 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hello,
Don't worry. I will keep an eye after the vandals. See you later. Yann 21:37, 2 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Zip Codes

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Hello, I was wondering if a zip codes section, some of which is very detailed, would be included in WikiSource. It is right now up for deletion on English Wikipedia and there is a idea to move it here (if allowed by WikiSource rules) and I was wondering if that would be acceptable. Please that a look here [1]. There were state-by-state pages (I figure those can be brought back up to be moved here (I also have them saved on my computer). You may contact me here or on my Wikipedia page (same name)[2] Thanks....

Hello,
Sorry no. Wikisource doesn't accept raw data like zip codes. Regards, Yann 21:45, 2 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Common action of Non-US Wikisource chapters needed

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No deletion of works published after 1922 and from authors who are died between 1927 and 1936!

Discussions in local Wikisources

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--84.60.240.164 17:00, 6 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

It would be possible here?

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I want to organize a transcription from a radio interview appeared in a local station (http://www.kiss108.com/main.html). Since the wiki features allows several people collaboration, I think WikiSource would be a good site to hold it. Is it allowed to create articles of such kind in WikiSource? --Annm 14:48, 1 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

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How to link here from another language wikipedia? The construct [[Wikisource:XXXX]] takes to the en.wikisource. [[Wikisource:??:XXXX]]

--Urdutext 01:36, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Use [[oldwikisource:XXXX]]. - Teak 05:59, 2 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
But unfortunately it will not show on the left bar in subdomains.--Jusjih 08:52, 7 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Election Committee announces Wikimedia Election

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On behalf of the Election Committee, I post the following announcement. Please consider to forward this message and bring to the language projects you take part in, thanks! --Aphaia 16:03, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

______________________

Dear all,

We, the election committee, hereby announce the opening of a new election for members of the Wikimedia Foundation's Board of Trustees. At least three positions will be filled from this election, with the elected members serving a two year term.

It is important to note that election processes are slightly different this year than in previous years: all candidates should be certain to thoroughly read the FAQ at: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2007/en

From today, June 10th, we're accepting candidates for the Board of Trustees. If you're interested, you must make a candidate statement and list yourself on http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2007/Candidates/en

We also need the help or translators for the elections, so if you're fluent in any language other than English, and willing to help, please list yourself here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2007/Translations

If you have any questions, please first read the FAQ, then list your questions to the talk page: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2007/FAQ/en

The official announcement is available on Meta: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Board_elections/2007/en


We are confident that this election will draw very qualified candidates, and we wish them the best of luck.

Regards,

Kizu Naoko (Aphaia) Newyorkbrad Philippe Beaudette Jon Harald Søby

Should we discontinue uploading new files right here and divert to Commons?

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I would like to seek comments if we should discontinue uploading new files right here and divert to Commons. As I administer so many Wiki sites, I see more of them diverting all new uploads to Commons, though older files are not automatically deleted.--Jusjih 16:36, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Should WS's redirect uploading to Commons? I think this is the best option, so other (even future) projects will be capable of using more resources, and avoid duplications. Should we saturate Commons with thousands of pages? (why not?) I think that the first pages or those with images are extremely suitable for Commons, and in a lesser way all 'just-text' images. In short, Commons for all files. Aleator 17:05, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I am not familiar with MediaWiki, so I have to know which one to make "Upload file" in the toolbox direct to Commons.--Jusjih 17:02, 10 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Do you mean which MediaWiki (MediaWiki:Uploadtext) is the one that appears in the Special:Upload page?? Aleator 17:25, 10 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I would suggest only allowing upload to Commons. I don't see any advantage to upload files locally here. Yann 18:16, 10 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As there are approximately the same licence conditions here and at commons, and as many of the languages here will get own subdomains later (with the necessity to move everything), so uploading to commons only is the best solution. -jkb- 09:20, 11 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
MediaWiki:Uploadtext shows important uploading message. We have at least hundreds of images that are unused, uncategorized, or both. Shall we notify their uploaders before deleting them?--Jusjih 16:18, 13 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. Eventually using a category "to be moved to Commons" would be useful. Yann 22:55, 13 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

This is a really great idea! See also commons:Category:De Wikisource book. We've been doing this for over a year now. Jonathan Groß 19:04, 19 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I feel reluctant to upload thousands of scanned book pages to commons. These images would probably only be used on one specific wikisource. I am not against this solution, I am just making sure that this is really the concensus. Can someone give me some good arguments why we should upload to commons and not wikisource and I would feel more confortabe with uploading there! // Wellparp 22:36, 10 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Uploading to Commons allows sharing with other Wiki sites, but if you have a good reason to upload to Wikisource, please specify the copyright status. For example, if you want to upload to English Wikisource, please use . Otherwise, there are so many untagged images.--Jusjih 02:48, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I know. I mean that it is very unlikely that scanned english language texts will be useful for other wikimedia projects. // Wellparp 12:08, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed closure of ht.wikisource

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Hello,

I have proposed to close the Haitian Creole wikisource, my motivations are exposed in this link. Please give your opinion on this page. This isn't anything against Wikisourcies (I love your work, guys !), but basically this Wikisource has no content (I mean, actually nothing !) and no activity but spam.

Thank you, w:ht:User:Korrigan (86.155.96.15) 19:58, 5 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The huge leap

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Dear co-workers at Wikisource!

In order to create a reliable database for texts which are in the public domain, we have a responsibility to present our content in a most appropriate and professional way. This includes:

  1. making the content easily accessible via categories, portals, and in-wiki links
  2. thoroughly providing bibliographic data to each site
  3. presenting all sources in a scholarly way, such as
    1. carefully choosing the base of the text: not any edition, but the student‘s reference edition or a last hand edition
    2. if possible, add scans from the original source of the text, in order to
    3. responsibly proofreading it, given that
    4. appropriate edition guidelines are set

Inspired by German librarian Elmar Mittler at the Wikipedia Academy at Mainz in August 2007, who asked if Wikisource – a possible partner for libraries concerning digitalisation – had the same standards in every language. I thought about how we could manage to provide the standards above in all language editions of Wikisource. I have a few propositions about how to establish them:

  1. introduce a sophisticated sorting system
  2. creating and implementing a template such as s:de:Vorlage:Textdaten
    1. starting retro-digitalisation, as described in s:de:Hilfe:Laden von Büchern nach Commons, or adding existent online sources
    2. implementing software functions for proofreading (as introduced at German Wikisource)
    3. establish state-of-the-art edition guidelines.

Please comment my appeal: State your ideas of how and at what scope to apply them at the single language editions. Discuss the subject on large scale and in detail. Tell what part of the suggestions above is already provided.

Becoming professional and reliable is our greatest chance. It‘s our future.

Jonathan Groß 18:34, 19 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. Wikisource:Wikisource and Project Gutenberg just came to my attention and might find its ultimate answer in this thread.

Very interesting proposals; I'm working at italian Wikisource and I can gladly notice that many of your ideas are going to be implemented at our Source. We have projects related to text types and subjects and also a strict policy about references of our sources; a scanning-proofreading project has been implemented, but it's only at the beginning...
Please, explain better what do you mean with point 3.1. with the sentence "not any edition, but the student‘s reference edition or a last hand edition": I think that this could be possible only for few, well-known texts, but for many others not so popular (but not less important!) it's pretty impossible to find a "modern" edition, particulary for what concerns translations (copyright matters, blah blah blah...). But maybe I have not understood well...
I'm sorry for not being able to understand how your retro-digitalization system works, but I don't speak german!
I think that we should consider to make some general policy for point 1 and 2 about _basics_ and _quality_ (for example: no texts without a reliable source) and only after trying to produce some guidelines for scanning, proofreading and sophisicated stuff like this ;-)
Torredibabele 00:26, 20 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, Here is my opinion: state-funded digital libraries do not provide any guarantee. When they do OCR (rarely), they do not correct errors. Here are the value-added quality of Wikisource: manual verification by people. The most important point is to specify for each text, if it was proofread or not, along with the source and the edition used. Yann 13:01, 20 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yann: Sometimes they do. :-) Jonathan Groß 13:46, 20 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
My two pence; I'm OrbiliusMagister from it.wikisource. I'd like to thank Jonathan for his concern about quality, and on it.source we are very sensitive about it, so I'm going to follow this thread. Torredibabele wrote exactly what we are thinking and doing about quality. Our important advantages are:
  • we are building an open free library without prejudice or POV; many sectorial or specific libraries are not that open and free.
    • On the other side we ar accepting texts or editions according to their freedom or avalaibility, not according to their quality. Since on it.wikisource we use a policy of et-et more than aut-aut when better editions of a particular text become avalaible we shall add them to the preesxistent, leaving to the reader the task to choose the better (excluding a "worse" edition in favour of a "better edition" may lead to a POV war or an unwanted censorship). This is wikistyle.
  • Until some time ago we had to rely on online publications (and only those with their printed source referenced) to have texts proofread, and I discovered that some of these online sources have a lot of typos and errors, so we began focusing on printed sources. The OCRed text-image edition are now beginning to take off, and we are releasing books never prevoiusly digitalized. On it.wikisource we are trying a bold approach, publishing the images without OCRing them and asking shamelessly the random navigator to donate a minute of transcription.
  • What Yann wrote is perfect, our collective proofreading sets us apart from many bigger projects.
To conclude I'll say some obvious (but not that obvious) statements:
  • The quality check must be everywhere on our sites.
  • Our point of weakness on it.wikisource is a lack of well written guidelines and policies: we are working them out taking the best from fr.wikisource, importing from Wikipedia proved less useful than writing from scratch,
  • Most important: time is on our side.
    • Maybe on 2010 will be invented a method to OCR and proofread a text with special "USB 10.0 eyeglasses connected via WI(ki)-Fi to our brain", I don't think that many digital libraries could keep their software updated as Mediawiki is now.
    • User from Pedia or other projects looking for a flameproof Wikimedia project, some serious and rewarding dirty work and more quality than quantity are coming. I'm not concerned about the newbies or the number of texts, I'm concerned about keeping our quality high and our texts well referenced. Some "I already know" Wikipedians sometimes proved more dangerous than many newbies... - εΔω 13:57, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
P.S. Sorry for some OT...

Digitization projects can either "think like a library" and allow any kind of book on its shelves, sometimes two different editions side by side, and let the user pick what she wants, or "think like a publisher", carefully selecting what to digitize, taking full responsibility that every item in the collection is of good quality. Many scholars (and curiously also librarians) who dream of starting a digitization project emphasize the importance of thinking like a publisher, even though they don't use these words. On the contrary, most people who successfully operate large digitization projects (including Project Gutenberg, Google, Internet Archive, University of Michigan) are clearly thinking like a library. One problem with thinking like a publisher is that even if you take responsibility for selecting the one true printed edition for your digitization, you cannot take responsibility for the contents of the work. For example, it might contain outdated and dangerous medical or legal advice. And some user might want to reference the 2nd or 3rd edition of a novel rather than the 1st edition or "last hand", in which case the effort to select the "best" edition is a lost cause. This is not to say you shouldn't care which edition you digitize. You should carefully document which one (or ones) you use, and the best documentation is the scanned images. But please don't get obsessed about the "purity" of the project. --LA2 07:59, 4 January 2008 (UTC) (meta)[reply]

Agree with LA2 and couldn't put it better myself. In my view we should aim to include the best editions possible, but this in no way precludes including complemntary editions as well; even an edition of "lower" quality may have its use at times. In addition I would add that Wikisource can even add value to the "best" editions, especially in cases where the "best" edition has never been fully proofread, lacks punctuation or references. This is true of a lot of old text in non-Western languages. Dovi 18:14, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I agree. There often is a confusion when we use the word 'quality'. Within this project, quality should refer to our ability to guarantee that the text we publish is correct with respect to a paper edition. It should not refer to the choice of a particular edition, and multiple choices are possible. ThomasV 19:02, 5 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Siberian Wikisource

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Siberian Wikipedia is closed, please remove "siberian" texts from Wikisource. Some of them are attack-texts. --217.77.53.13 13:28, 20 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Please could you make a list? Thanks, Yann 15:59, 20 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Would this do? Or maybe this? Note that none of this qualifies as a source, since there are no published original works in Siberian (the language is made-up), and the translations are self-made, mostly by Zolotaryov (i.e., again, not sources of previously published work). ― Teak 22:20, 24 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, I would like to second the call to delete the "Siberian" texts. They are in a private conlang and some of them are highly insulting, e.g. Москальска сволоч (appr. Muscovite scum/swines), a "poem" written and uploaded to wikisource, Yaroslav Zolotaryov, which contains quite strong insults against Russians. For more background about the "Siberian language" and Wikimedia, please have a look at m:Proposals for closing projects/Closure of Siberian Wikipedia and m:Proposals for closing projects/Deletion of Siberian Wikipedia. --Johannes Rohr 13:14, 28 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

ProofreadPage statistics

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Here is the number of pages using the ProofreadPage format, at various subdomains:

Ranking by number of validated pages on April 12, 2010. Logarithmic scale.
Ranking by number of validated pages on April 3, 2013. Logarithmic scale.
Ranking by number of validated pages on August 3, 2016. Logarithmic scale.

The German Wikisource has adopted the extension recently, and they are responsible for much of the current growth.

ThomasV 12:35, 24 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Damn right we are :D Jonathan Groß 13:25, 24 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Closure of Volapük Wikipedia

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Hi everybody... Since some time ago some of you had suggested I try to get a Volapük version of Wikisource going (which didn't work...), I thought you might be interested in helping me in trying to keep the Volapük Wikipedia alive. There is now a proposal for closing it at meta. Would those of you who agree that a Volapük Wikipedia may be a sensible idea perhaps go there and cast a vote? Thanks! Smeira 16:32, 28 September 2007 (UTC).[reply]

Bengali wikisource now exists and fully imported

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Hi, don't know what the procedures are regarding this, but the Bengali Wikisource is now open and have fully imported the pages, so you may feel free to delete all of the Bengali pages that are hosted here. Bastique 19:04, 4 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Petition

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Do you know about this: http://www.petitiononline.com/wikirrst/ ? It's a petition to reclaim the rule of the shorter term in US. I think that really interest all of us. You know the problems related about this. Can we agree? Aubrey 21:20, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

While I certainly support the notion that the rule of the shorter term in the United States, and legislation would more quickly clarify this, it is still not clear that it does not apply. The major point where I disagree in the petition is in its reintroduction of registration as a condition for owning a copyright. I have no problem with the US provision that a work must be registered to sustain an infringement suit since this provision is evidentiary rather than substantive. The costs of registration should not be a factor, and introducing costs that are only nominal would increase the amount of work needed for processing these applications. If the costs of the additional work are less than the nominal fees it makes no administrative sense, and is fiscally irresponsible. Eclecticology 08:12, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I started that petition along with m:American non-acceptance of the rule of the shorter term, a Meta page. In response to Eclecticology's comment and extremely limited signatures, I may consider faxing whatever the signatures I have in early November and restarting the petition. I plan to drop that part about reintroduction of registration as a condition for owning a copyright, which is covered by a Reclaim the Public Domain Petition signed by more than 22000 signatories. As mine is the first public petition that I have started with no prior experience, I was trying to persuade more opinions, but when things are not so good, I will adjust.--Jusjih 03:38, 22 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Ancient languages main page

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I understand that those languages that do not have their own subdomain can have main pages such as Main Page:Kurdî. Now, there is a body of texts of philological interest that is accessed by people not fluent in the text's language. A mainpage in ang: is already humorous, but main pages in Akkadian, Ancient Egyptian, Sanskrit, Avestan, Ancient Greek, Gothic are (a) not feasible and (b) not desirable. I propose the creation of a "main page" that facilitates navigation between ancient texts. Perhaps at Main_Page:Ancient texts, or Main_Page:Philology or similar. The question of course arises what langauge such a page should be in, I opt for English for purely pragmatic reasons, it could also be Latin, or, of course, there could be such "Philology" main pages in several languages. Also, I realize that some random extinct/classical languages are already at individual subdomains (la, he, hy, grc apparently subsumed under el, goh under de, etc.) - there will be nothing for it but design the "Philology" page for navigation between subdomains: such a navigation aid is really needed to overcome the fragmentation along linguistic lines that was brought about by the introduction of subdomains. en:User:Dbachmann 16:20, 18 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

it makes sense. I fully support the idea ThomasV 19:01, 18 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. It would make a better coordination necessary, something like that. But the ancient languages are languages, where many important sources have been written. So we should think about this - I would support this. -jkb- 19:07, 18 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I also really like the idea. If and when it is implemented it should have a very prominent link from the Main Page portal.
The only theoretical detail I question is the (lack of) feasibility of ancient Greek, which with the attention of classicists could become something very nice along the lines of Latin Wikisource. In any case the point is mute, since the material will likely stay at Greek Wikisource.
You are correct that Hebrew Wikisource, like Greek, does indeed contain ancient Hebrew texts. The vast majority of them are part of a live literary tradition that continues to this day and we are working on numerous ways to link, categorize, and present them together.
Thus, in terms of overcoming fragmentation, the primary tool for many of the texts is simply interwiki links. Therefore, the question you correctly pose is most important for the class of ancient languages whose texts did not have a defining influence on western civilization's literary heritage (at least not until the dawn of modern archaeology). It is for those languages (e.g. Ugaritic or Akkadian) that an interface is hard to conceive and is undesirable. These are indeed the languages that the idea of subdomains did not provide a clear solution for. That being said, it would still be fine to use a "Philology" main page to navigate between texts at subdomains as well.
One final point: English Wikisource accepts bilingual texts where the target language of a translation is English. It also accepts annotated texts. Therefore, a critically annotated text in Ancient Egyptian where the critical apparatus (introduction, variants, notes, etc.) is in English could be at English Wikisource. If the critical apparatus is in German perhaps it could be at German Wikisource. Thus, the only kind of text that really has no home but here at wikisource.org is a direct transcription without any translation or scholarly apparatus. But regardless, no matter where the texts are held, here or at the subdomains, the idea of having a navigation page here is fantastic. Go ahead! Dovi 19:47, 18 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

pkk vandal

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I do not think we can do something else as to delete his edits every time. It makes no sense to list the IP addresses on Wikisource:Protected titles - he will find something new every time. I tried to use the calculator, but it seems that we should block too many IP's. So, just to delete. -jkb- 18:02, 18 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Proofread Page Extension

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Hi there, Would it be possible to activate the Proofread Page Extension here at the oldwikisource? g.--kajk  08:48, 15 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I can ask for that. but if you want to translate hieroglyphs into English (or German), I would rather suggest that the translation be on the English (resp German) wikisources. For that you can use ProofreadPage. ThomasV 12:20, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. The main work is actually wikifying the hieroglyphs and make a transcription of it. The translation is actually just for practice and control... I'm actualy not totaly sure how this project is best build up... Thats why I started here to get some experience. Imho the proofred extension could also be useful for other languages, so I think it for sure wouldn't hurt ;-) g.--kajk  14:45, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
sure, we can file a bug to have it enabled here.
concerning your project, I was wondering what the best way is to render translations. I guess you want to keep the original stone layout.
maybe you want to edit this page for the English translation.
ThomasV 14:51, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I checked the other two wikisources (de and en) and saw, the German Wikisource supports sources in different languages with a translation (See de:Wikisource:Über_Wikisource#.C3.9Cbersetzungen, but the English Wikisource doesn't (See en:Help:Adding_texts)... I now could move my work to the German Wikisource and just translate it to german or stay here and translate it to both languages... (finally it doesn't matter to me). I actually just started here at the Old-Wikisource, so I'm not in depth familiar with the idea of wikisource (the borderline). So I'm ask you which of these two possibilities better matches the idea of the wikisources (or just the old-wikisource)? g.--kajk  09:13, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
the English wikisource will accept a text in English, even if it is a translation.
I think that the hiero text should be here, and translations should be in subdomains.
ThomasV 09:19, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, in this case I'll go on with wikifying&transcribing the hieroglyphs here at the old-wikisource and afterwards add translations to the according other wikisource. Thank you for the enlightenment ;-) In this case could we anyway enable the proofread page extension, I any way think this also could be usefull for other projects here at the old-wikisource... thx&g.--kajk  15:49, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I am currently making other requests to devs, and I do not want to overload them. you can request it yourself, just post a bug in bugzilla explaining why you need it. ThomasV 16:03, 20 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Anglo Saxon Wikisource

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I was on English Wikisource and I clicked on one of the lanuage links and ended up on Anglo Saxon Wikisource which has been closed. I suugest that the tets are transferred to English Wikisource if this has not alread been done and then the link is removed. It does not look good to users if one of the highest language links takes them to a closed project, with little content.

John Cross 17:23, 18 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

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Just a thought... I don't frequent Wikisource very often but something just struck me: the logo is simply impossible. Such an iceberg cannot stand this way, it would tip over. Now... maybe such scientific accuracy is not a priority for literary Wikisource, but I thought I should say it anyway. (64.86.28.244 01:21, 24 November 2007 (UTC))[reply]

You are the first one as I know to question our logo with an iceberg here. Whether to change it is up to the community. There were other different ideas, but they were not approved.--Jusjih 00:54, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Request for new subdomains

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I pointed to Wikisource:Language_domain_requests and I didn't understand whether that page is outdated or still active. If i's inactive (as i may infer) it'd be better for newcomers to put a big banner on top of the page pointing to meta. What's the current status of the page? - εΔω 00:59, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Delete Armenian texts

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Armenian texts have been imported into the newly created domain, see the import log. Please delete all the pages in the category Category:Armenian, and its subcategories, with the exception of Main Page:Armenian, on which a redirect note has been put up. Thanks Teak 02:22, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Bible in Shona

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Hi, the Shona Wikipedia currently hosts part of a bible in Shona, which should preferably be moved to oldwikisource. The pages to be imported are:

-- 84.178.250.7 18:38, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

If it is really so, then only Tim Starling could import the pages at the moment - see [3] (and I simply do not believe it), otherwise there must be made a request for general import from the domain. -jkb- 22:47, 6 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]