Wikisource:Scriptorium/Archives/2011-01

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This is a discussion archive first created in , although the comments contained were likely posted before and after this date.
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Announcements

enws.org as short redirect to Wikisource

I've registered and set up http://enws.org to redirect to Wikisource in the same way that http://enwp.org redirects to Wikipedia; that is to say, the url http://enws.org/(whatever-is-here) redirects to http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/(whatever-is-here). - Htonl (talk) 15:15, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Proposals

Proposal to disable and hide the "Download as PDF" link

The download as PDF on the left hand side for our main namespace simply doesn't work with Wikisource:ProofreadPage and that is a severe disappointment, and presumably has to do with the order of the production of pages, and the generation of output. Requests to have the situation remedied have come to nought, as it seems that no developer has both the time and ability to get it fixed and the fix put into production. It seems a damn shame to have to ask, however, it seems ridiculous to have a link that misleads continue to be present.

Accordingly I would like to propose that the link be disable/removed from the left hand side panel. — billinghurst sDrewth 02:07, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

I agree; the button is increasingly less useful as more of our works use ProofreadPage and those that don't are usually widely available in pdf elsewhere. —Spangineer (háblame) 20:39, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

BOT approval requests

Help

Other discussions

General problem about licensing

Good day, and sorry for disturbing the water.

However I was in process of updating (and thus cross-checking) the licenses of Hungarian Wikisource when I stumbled upon the wikisource:about page, and its English - same-content - counterpart, which basically defines what materials can and cannot be included in wikisource.

It says, quote: "Wikisource is a Free Library of source texts which are in the public domain or legally available for free redistribution."

Yes, "free" is a link to wikipedia's "free content", which explains that it doesn't mean "free as a beer" but "libre" (free as freedom), but it's just a link after all, nobody is forced to follow it, and the text without this background information suggest something completely else: Wikisource is the library of freely redistributable materials.

It is not. All the materials shall meet the requirements of CC license, which includes not only free of charge redistribution but freedom of modification and other freedoms, as we all know it. So the text is extremely misleading, and seems to be a source of confusion for including material which is distributable free of charge by attributing the author but their derivative works are forbidden.

I will update the Hungarian version to reflect this, but I advise you to consider doing something about it here, and since the license of the site is pretty much given by the universal forces the only possible way seems to be to fix the About page. :-)

Thanks for listening. --Grin (talk) 09:34, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

I don't think that the introductory text in the About page should or would be considered a wholistic policy of inclusion or exclusion, it is simply introductory. I could not agree that the distinction that you are trying to exemplify is that crucial or integral to people's decision-making. All that said, if you have a suggestion to the changes to wording that would resolve the matter to your satisfaction, then please do venture forth with those words. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:16, 6 December 2010 (UTC)
Pleasure (since I already have worded huws), the smallest impact change could be:
Wikisource is a Free Library of source texts which are in the public domain or legally available for free redistribution and re-use.
Apart from possible misspelling. --grin ✐ 10:20, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

This is an important issue that recently came up in this deletion debate. People must accept that if things are posted here, others are free to do more or less whatever they like with them.--Longfellow (talk) 17:41, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

November 2010 is Validation month

A prompt to those who are not usually partaking in Proofread of the Month that this is the month when we try work to complete works through validation, that many across the site have worked to get to Proofread stage. If you could lend a few minutes each day during November we can get a whole range of works completed. A great memento for all those who participate — billinghurst sDrewth 03:15, 7 November 2010 (UTC)

I've taken two books off of the list, since they are done. But they are still showing up? - Tannertsf (talk) 20:58, 7 November 2010 (UTC)
Doesn't look like you modified the right page. The text on {{POTM}} is being generated from Wikisource:Proofread of the Month/Coding. Eight texts, a window of three per day, rotated on the hour. Make sure you change the bottom noincluded version too for consistency's sake. Prosody (talk) 02:46, 8 November 2010 (UTC)
Successfully completed with eight proofread works taken to completion, and progress on another few works. Looks like approximately a thousand pages were validated in that time. Thanks to 20 or so people who took part. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:38, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

TOCs on articles which have their own numbering system

Wikimedia's numbering system for tables of content can be quite useful for most content but has a rather unfortunate side-effect on documents which have their own numbering system. Articles on Wikisource like the Constitution of Ireland end up with a table of contents looking like: 

5.4 Legislation
    5.4.1 Article 20
    5.4.2 Money Bills
          5.4.2.1 Article 21
          5.4.2.2 Article 22
    5.4.3 Time for Consideration of Bills
          5.4.3.1 Article 23
          5.4.3.2 Article 24
    5.4.4 Signing and Promulgation of Laws
          5.4.4.1 Article 25
    5.4.5 Reference of Bills to the Supreme Court
          5.4.5.1 Article 26

The auto-generated numbers can be hidden using a bit of css and a template. I can create a template myself but I'll need an administrator to add the following line to MediaWiki:Common.css. 

#hideTOCnumbers .tocnumber { display: none; }

— Blue-Haired Lawyer 22:22, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Done — billinghurst sDrewth 12:52, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

Shakespeare's First Folio

Hi all,

I’ve taken the text from here, then used ThomasV’s match and split tool to put it into the pages; and then to adapt the text in the pages. I use a button which creates an old text from a modern one (this tool has been made by Marc on the French wikisource), it would be useful to have the same kind of button here too. My goal is to recover the exact music of the old text: rhythm punctuation, specific use of capital letters and so on, since we are lucky enough to have the First Folio reproduced. Can Shakespeare’s fans make templates for this kind of text (or do these templates exist on Wikisource?) Do you have ideas or hints about how to make editing this play by Shakespeare easier? Who’d like to participate? --Zyephyrus (talk) 18:47, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

I would love to participate...contact me on it. - Tannertsf (talk) 20:17, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Thank you Tannertsf, I will  :) --Zyephyrus (talk) 00:30, 25 November 2010 (UTC)
Sources and two different possible methods: see the Index talk page. --Zyephyrus (talk) 10:26, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

Wikileaks collection of cables

The following discussion is closed:

Clearly there is strong consensus amongst Wikisource contributors not to host the Wikileaks collection of leaked cables here at this time.

Is the collection of leaked diplomatic cables posted by Wikileaks suitable for hosting by Wikimedia Commons? Despite reports that the site is down, it can still be downloaded currently (I've described this at w:Wikileaks). I had the impression that new cables might still be being added over time, and I'm not sure whether this is a collection in final form. If it is to be hosted, how should it be hosted - should the individual cables be posted separately, like [1], or as a collection? Should they be trimmed down out of their HTML wrappers? The authorship of individual cables is somewhat cryptic - should the individual, embassy, or U.S. government be credited as the author? Wnt (talk) 20:07, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

I'd rather it be hosted by some respectable organization that's not under legal threat for doing so before we put them on here.--Prosfilaes (talk) 20:42, 1 December 2010 (UTC)
So far as I know no one has pointed to any particular law that Wikileaks is supposed to have violated. The Guardian maintains an archive of the cables ([2]), though I haven't verified its completeness.
To answer my own question, I'm starting to favor the idea that they should be archived according to the date of release, with each day constituting the "publication" and Wikileaks being the "author". This corresponds to one of the folder organizations of the original downloaded archives, and allows comprehensive treatment of any one day's releases independently of whatever happens with the others. As Wikileaks has censored both snippets of text and presumably whole cables, and we don't know that every one is purely authentic without other changes being made for some noble ? purpose, I think it's easier to think of them for our purposes as the author of a highly derivative work rather than as purely a publisher, especially since the people at the embassy weren't seeking to become authors of public documents.
I also have to favor processing them to strip the HTML wrappers, leaving perhaps one set for each day's "publication". I think that the HTML organization implies a separation between document and wrapper just as a book is separate from its jacket. Usually Wikisource is content to archive the contents of the book without worrying if this outer wrapping is lost, and the same applies here. Wnt (talk) 15:04, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
I'd like to inject a moment of political clarity into this discussion. In recent days I have been asked by many, many people whether Wikileaks is somehow connected to Wikipedia. My mother has asked, my coworkers have asked, friends, acquaintances, and distant relatives have asked. A few people I've spoken with have just assumed that Wikileaks is a Wikimedia project of some kind. Furthermore, many people, not necessarily in the same conversations, have expressed deep anger towards Wikileaks and its perceived attack on the United States through the release of confidential information. Wikimedia is suffering for having to constantly explain that we are not involved with Wikileaks. I urge, for the time being, that we avoid any steps that might further public misperception that Wikimedia is somehow blameworthy in this mess. We should wait at least for a few years - long enough for the controversy to remove to history - before posting up any of that material here. After all, it's not as though we are lacking for other things to post. Cheers! BD2412 T 15:17, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
At this point in time I don't favour their introduction to the site. Nothing to do with the (il)legality or whatever legal status. At this point in time I am not sure that they fall within Wikisource:What Wikisource includes — billinghurst sDrewth 16:53, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
I would say that "They are evidentiary in nature, and created in the course of events.". There is no shadow of a doubt in my mind that this is a major historical event, and the Wikileaks collection is the key document. Even though other presentations of the documents exist via various newspapers, the press coverage focuses on this Wikileaks site. Wnt (talk) 18:00, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
If this gains the consent of the wikimedia community, I'll recreate Template:Cablegate. cygnis insignis 21:14, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
Why, was something done to it? Note that community consensus isn't needed to start a new project, only to delete one. I made up a page for the 12-2 disclosures, but didn't post it yet on account of it being 853 kb in length (yikes!). The edit notice says 32 kb, but it looks like many documents here are substantially longer. What's the right length to make the parts for something like this? Wnt (talk) 21:19, 3 December 2010 (UTC)
I really think we should slow down and at least see what WMF has to say about this before we post anything. I see no reason to rush to do so at this time. BD2412 T 23:13, 3 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm opposed per both of BD2412's comments. Let's not add to the confusion. Hesperian 00:13, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

  • I believe the works are probably in the public domain after their release (at least I think many of them are {{PD-in-USGov}}), and probably do fall into our remit, since they are a matter of public record and an important political and perhaps historical event, depending on the eventual fall-out. However, I think we should not host them here for the time being. That is a lot of potentially risky hassle we'd be causing ourselves by hosting a mirror of the cables here. Given that Wikileaks has been under DDoS for a week, and we are a public wiki, I think that we'd be risking attracting our own DDoS and vandalism. At the scale of the Wikileaks reaction and with only a handful of admins, we couldn't cope with the strain.
  • We also should think a little of our reputation as a repository of public texts for educational purposes rather than a sensationalist re-publisher of controversial information. While it's true that many controversial texts are PD and that we have several, it doesn't mean we should go looking for them to make a feature of. Especially since:
  • At a quarter of a million strong, they outnumber all our existing works by 100,000, and it would be a logistical nightmare to double our database in one go. Since the cables are strongly in the public now and are unlikely to disappear any time soon, as BD2412 said, there's no rush.
  • If/when the time comes, we'd have to consider how to organise the works before we started importing them wholesale, think about naming, authors, linking, templates, categories and the possibility of automatic bot importing (probably best since they are in a pretty uniform format). This is a process that I would expect to take several weeks, given the size of the dataset. We'd have to be sure it was near-perfect before we present 251,287 new works to the system in any length of time, let alone the few days or weeks it could be done in. Inductiveload—talk/contribs 03:17, 4 December 2010 (UTC)
I should clarify that so far only about 600 cables have actually been released. I am not very confident that 1000 will really be released, let alone 250,000. Also note that newspapers such as The Guardian [3] have been hosting many of the cables without suffering DDOS attacks. While I can't rule out that Wikisource might be attacked in such a way, doing so would cross a conceptual Rubicon, emphasizing that the DDOS attackers are not "merely" trying to prevent journalists from breaking a news story, but declaring an open war of censorship by spam throughout the entire Internet.
I will say that after noticing that little 850 kb problem, I'm considering that maybe the cables should be posted one by one, with only index documents to define the larger collection. When posted one by one, the documents could carry a template that automatically sorts them by creation date and leak date and embassy. This also encourages the posting of some of the more publicized and historically significant leaks right away, independently of any other controversy. Wnt (talk) 14:45, 4 December 2010 (UTC)
No one is supposing that Wikileaks is somehow affiliated with or under the control of The Guardian. DDOS attacks and classification issues aside, we should for the time being discourage popular misconception conflating Wikileaks with Wikimedia. BD2412 T 16:58, 4 December 2010 (UTC)
You might try dispelling the misconception with a disclaimer. I for one don't find this particular objection to have any weight whatsoever. ButOnMethItIs (talk) 21:04, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

I am similarly against hosting these items at this time. As stated above, the belief that Wikileaks is associated with Wikimedia would make Wikisource a target for attacks, and would also make these beliefs post-facto rooted in reality. If Wikimedia is suffering in the public eye when there is no basis, I don't think creating a basis is the way to go. I would also like to point out that (as far as I know) Wikisource does not have a mandate to publish all public domain documents. We can certainly decide that it is not in Wikimedia's best interest not to host them at this time, of course retaining the option to reconsider at a later date. Our goals are very different from those of Wikileaks. --Eliyak T·C 01:26, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

The belief that Wikia is associated with Wikimedia makes Wikimedia projects a target for attacks, so by this logic, it is not in Wikimedia's best interest to host links to Wikia (or to host Jimmy Wales) at this time. -- Thekohser (talk) 20:39, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

To begin with, are all the cables written by US Fed employees? I don't think they are, which means we can't archive them all, and shouldn't attempt to provide a gutted archive. John Vandenberg (chat) 22:26, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

In fact they were all written by bona fide US federal government employees in the course of the performance of their official duties, and are therefore in the public domain because they have been inadvertently released. Government employees are allowed to ask that they be destroyed and returned, but there is no constitutional way for them to compel anyone to do so unless they can first convince a judge that there's a national security interest. 71.198.176.22 11:54, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
Except that a lot of it is documented from contractors and not federal employees, and classified intelligence is not "official" business of the Federal Government. Ottava Rima (talk) 23:03, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
I don't know how much is from contractors, but classified intelligence surely is official business of the Federal Government. Use of the diplomatic cables for anything but official business of the Federal Government is surely criminal Misuse of Official Resources.--Prosfilaes (talk) 02:52, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
Just because you call it "official business" does not make it legally so, otherwise we wouldn't have "classified" documents. And there is no such thing as "criminal Misuse of Official Resources" regarding cables because that is laughable. That is like saying anyone with a government cell phone should have all calls online or cars tracked online. "Official business" means to be working on documents for publication regarding the government. It requires some sort of publication. Just like you can't steal an author's manuscript before he publishes and put it out yourself, you can't take these matters. Ottava Rima (talk) 03:36, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
No. Published or unpublished is irrelevant copyright-wise for works produced since 2002. These works were produced for the US government by employees thereof, so they're PD. As we note from the Pentagon Papers, the issue of copyright was never brought up, so it's pretty clear copyright does not bar us from publishing these papers.--Prosfilaes (talk) 05:20, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

Jimbo Wales has suggested hosting them on Wikisource. I am not sure whether this is a good idea at present because of the political pressure. I don't want to cause any headaches for Foundation employees until the British courts have had a chance to rule on the irregularities of the Assange extradition request. 71.198.176.22 11:54, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

It seems like the goal for posting them on Wikisource is to provided mirrored access to materials that are available (and under attack) in other locations. Wikisource is a repository not a battle ground, if Wikileaks was not under attack I doubt anyone would be trying to post them here. If there is a real desire to actually post them at WIkisource. load them on a CD and bring them back to post when they are not part of a political battle. JeepdaySock (talk) 12:06, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
We don't bow to political pressure. If you're talking about possible legal problems, that's something that should be left up to WMF to consider. ButOnMethItIs (talk) 16:15, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
I have to admit, it's very hard for me to figure out authorship for some of the cables. There is at least a plausible risk that some copyrighted content is incorporated somewhere, which will need to be taken seriously. This adds to the impetus to change my mind from my first idea of collating them as "books" compiled by Wikisource, and treat the cables instead as individual publications as I mentioned above.
The impulse to post them on Wikisource is not simply as a mirror. Mostly, it is the desire to see them Wikilinked to relevant material on Wikipedia and occasionally Wikisource or Commons. I've recently started w:Critical Foreign Dependencies Initiative for this reason (in that case, my desire was a more encyclopedic article and not strictly a quote). The whole world has access to the list of crucial resources - Americans should too. The next time there's an argument about whether we should support Kurdistan and screw Turkey, we should be able to consult this document and see if there's anything on that list we miss. We should be able to look it over and see if there are monopolies over certain commodities which an enterprising individual could try to crack. We should be able to use its redlinks as clear evidence where Wikipedia is lacking articles about incredibly important corporations - so important that a foreign country calls their operations critical. So this is a hard core encyclopedic purpose, not merely a political position, though of course, it would be a lie to say that the would-be censors haven't provoked more effort where less might have been made. Wnt (talk) 18:53, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
Then maybe the talk should not be about the collection per se, rather it should be about specific works. Our perspective on historical documents has always been to support evidence base for our own site, and sister sites. Though it is somewhat implicit rather than explicit, published works are here as by being published they have reach a notability and acceptability of peer-review, historic documents need to have some level of notability and relevance and that is they are used to link to an article at Wikisource, or at one of the sister sites (otherwise nothing to stop the upload of 1 000 000 wills of nonentities). So a particular historic document (be it Wikileaks or anywhere) I could see would have relevance to be introduced as a source if it meets our inclusion guidelines and demonstrated as source for an article. The collection in its totality for being a collection, doesn't meet that criteria IMNSHO., however individual documents are assessed on their merits, and similarly, each document could be proposed for deletion through normal processes. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:38, 9 December 2010 (UTC)
  • Not in Public Domain, not acceptable in any regards. Top Secret classification related matters have to be released through official FOIA requests before they can be deemed acceptable. Ottava Rima (talk) 22:58, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
I don't think we should be on the leading edge of stuff like this, nor do I particularly think we need the complete dump here--perhaps we should demand pen-and-paper publication. But it is public domain, and once it's out there in the public eye, it's out there, and there's no point in waiting for an official FOIA request to host it.--Prosfilaes (talk) 02:52, 9 December 2010 (UTC)

WikiLeaks is linking to us

See any of the cables;

If you click the "structure of a cable" links, a help paragraph is revealed that includes a link to:

It certainly bears watching. Cheers, Jack Merridew 16:41, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

I know this is an old discussion, but I think the arguments against including the cables (the threat of DDoS attacks and that people will mistakenly believe Wikileaks to be part of the Wikimedia Foundation) hold very little water. They are not valid reasons not to include certain content. Unless the office prohibits it, then I say go for it. --Ixfd64 (talk) 07:04, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

Related discussion at EN-WP

I found the above discussion very interesting, along with several other related discussions around the project. I recently tried to write up a consensus decision for the English Wikipedia project, which is at WP:AN#On linking to classified documents. Since folks here have already discussed the matter, feel free to c'mon over and participate there as well! --Elonka (talk) 00:06, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

How to centre-align in table cells?

I am trying to format the table on page 39 of Miscellaneous Papers on Mechanical Subjects, but I cannot find any table style (in common.css or the MediaWiki stylesheets) that centres all table cells (i.e. not just headers). I've checked Wikisource:Style guide/Tables, but there's not much there. Can anyone suggest how I may do this? Should I propose the addition of a new style to common.css (something like table.centre-all-cells td { text-align:center })? Thanks! — Sam Wilson ( Talk • Contribs ) … 02:06, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

There may be a better solution than this, but you can add |-align=center to each row. cygnis insignis 03:35, 5 December 2010 (UTC)
You don't need to feel constrained by the css classes. Table styles vary from book to book, and you can use whatever styles are appropriate (see my edit to that page). --Eliyak T·C 05:40, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

Thank you both! It looks much better now. — Sam Wilson ( Talk • Contribs ) … 06:24, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

It is rare for all cells of our tables to be centred, which is probably why no one has bothered. For reasons of ease I created {{t/ac}} & {{t/ar}} ages ago. — billinghurst sDrewth 07:17, 5 December 2010 (UTC)
merged into {{table style}} — billinghurst sDrewth 04:21, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Help requested to recover lost page text

Due to an unexpected interruption, I pasted the contents of the wrong page into Page:A Study of Mexico.djvu/203. Since I created the page initially, I cannot revert to an earlier version. Could someone help to recover the original? Many thanks. - Ineuw (talk) 20:12, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

I deleted the page, and now you should have the original OCR available again. --Eliyak T·C 20:24, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

Many thanks. Everything is there. - Ineuw (talk) 20:54, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

Transclusion problem due to ignorance

I would like to transclude the four pages of the Table of contents in to the Index:A Study of Mexico.djvu. The pages are Page:A Study of Mexico.djvu/19 to Page:A Study of Mexico.djvu/22 inclusive and they are pasted on the Index: page for reference. Could someone take a look at it and advise? Thanks. - Ineuw (talk) 23:21, 5 December 2010 (UTC)

Just change [[ brackets to {{ braces. Done it for you on the index page.--Xxagile (talk) 01:11, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. Tried everything except that. :-) - Ineuw (talk) 01:38, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Text alignment in a table vs natural Page: justification.

I am currently working on this table and noticed that in the Page: namespace, the text columns of a table are also justified, when they should be naturally left aligned. I assume that this is an effect of the default justification of the namespace, and I am wondering whether I must specify each line to be left aligned? - Ineuw (talk) 07:50, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

I am pretty sure you have to do it....its not automatically done for you. If you go check out this page it has good examples of left alignment and how to do it. - Tannertsf (talk) 11:14, 7 December 2010 (UTC) 

/* Justify */
body.ns-104
{
 text-align: justify;
}

It's coming from the above in MediaWiki:Common.css, which you seem to see; I've just added text-align: center; to the whole table, which fixes all the cells. We could add a rule such as: 

/* left align tables in page namespace */
body.ns-104 table
{
 text-align: left;
}

to make this automatic, but it would have wide impact. Any tables relying on the current behaviour would suddenly break. I do expect these are few, but it would have to be hashed-out. Cheers, Jack Merridew 12:57, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

As a measure for flexibility, it may be worth looking to create a class in common.css that simply does it, and we can hash it out in time. I would think that we would make it work that way for both main and page ns. — billinghurst sDrewth 14:03, 7 December 2010 (UTC)
That would be:
/* left align tables in page namespace */
body.ns-104 table.tblLeftAlign
{
 text-align: left;
}
with the name 'tblLeftAlign' discussable. Conversely, we could ditch 'justify' altogether; I don't know when that was introduced or why, but it seems just an arbitrary choice of look that prolly match a lot of works. I'm not seeing any issue in mainspace, as it's not getting an ambient justify rule. There is class="lefttext", which would need addressing... Cheers, Jack Merridew 08:26, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Please don’t consider changing or adding to the CSS. The "text-align:left;" is sufficient to give the proper alignment of the text by not stretching it out to justify. Now, it looks good in both namespaces. Luckily, in this particular table, the number columns are left aligned as well. Otherwise, I know that numbers must be aligned in each column/row when it differs from the global table alignment spec. Thanks for all the help. - Ineuw (talk) 15:47, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

Convert to DJVU?

I've been working on the documents of the Webster-Hayne debate but I recently discovered a better source edition on Google. Unfortunately I can't find it on IA, and since my DJVU converter would turn this 88 MB pdf file into an even bigger djvu, I'm hoping that some one else would be kind enough to do the conversion. Thanks! —Spangineer (háblame) 17:57, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

One thing you could try is upload it to IA. I believe it will not only convert it to DJVU but also add a text layer to the file, thereby killing two birds with one stone. I could convert it, but it would likely take longer than IA to do so, and I don't have the knowhow to figure out how to add a text layer.—Zhaladshar (Talk) 18:12, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
I did put it on IA ([4]) but it doesn't seem to be doing anything. —Spangineer (háblame) 18:32, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
You can derive files, if you go in via Patron Info and look at "Your Uploads and item changes", from there you can look at complete and pending jobs, and derive files. My guess is that the size of the file has meant that the generation of the jp2 file has pushed it over 2GB and it has stalled and is "waiting for admin". If it just didn't derive, then go into the complete tasks, find the file and click on the MGR link and from there you can DERIVE the other parts. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:52, 8 December 2010 (UTC)
and it has failed and and awaiting admin ... http://www.archive.org/catalog.php?identifier=RegisterOfDebatesInCongressVolume6 — billinghurst sDrewth 23:54, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Public Domain texts marked with "no source" tags

I have noticed that some public domain texts have been tagged with a "no source" template, e.g. The Black Arrow. Presumably the source of that text and many of the others is the Project Gutenberg electronic books. Why would there be a need to have a source for a public domain entry? How would one go about supplying such a "source indicator"? Would it be necessary to reenter the document in a sandbox. Please respond.--Drboisclair (talk) 02:21, 11 December 2010 (UTC)

If the source is known, or can be demonstrated to be known, then on the item's talk page add {{textinfo}} and complete the source field. We would generally then add {{edition}} to the notes field in work's header. Source is considered important in a number of perspectives: so we can known editions of work, and a test of the veracity of the added edition, also if we get an image copy, then we know whether we can match it to an image. So we know whether the work may be copyright or not, especially important with translations. — billinghurst sDrewth 07:26, 11 December 2010 (UTC)

Brace design help is asked for

Could I impose on someone to look at this attempt to design a top brace in a table HERE? I am missing something and can’t figure what I am doing wrong. The page link to the actual table is on the top of the same page. Thanks. - Ineuw (talk) 06:20, 11 December 2010 (UTC)

Something wrong with the graphic forms available? Call me lazy, however, that is where I would be going. — billinghurst sDrewth 07:28, 11 December 2010 (UTC)
Matt has rotated the existing gull braces, and we now have a version that points up File:GullBraceUp.svg — billinghurst sDrewth

Thanks billinghurst, it seems that the image rotation in the template doesn’t work(?). I will try to create the missing segments from Inductiveload’s existing gallery and add them. - Ineuw (talk) 16:09, 11 December 2010 (UTC)

This is a whole new ballgame :-). Rather not wade into it and get distracted. Will wait until I understand more about it. - Ineuw (talk) 16:27, 11 December 2010 (UTC)

The image points up, however, I would say that it is too thick for the task. Might be more appropriate to get someone to rotate this thinner gull brace and/or get it converted to .svg too. — billinghurst sDrewth 01:28, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for finding this thin brace. If you were referring to Matt’s brace as being too thick, I already tried it :-). I will try to flip this File:GullBrace.png, but my morning’s efforts with Inkscape were fruitless. I only know Irfanview just to prepare the existing images for the commons upload. - Ineuw (talk) 03:02, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Yep. Ditto. — billinghurst sDrewth 09:47, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

I consider this kind of approach to be a reasonable option. Hesperian 10:26, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Hesperian, I will leave the matter for now as you suggest. Nevertheless, it’s a challenge and User:Inductiveload’s segmented idea is the best idea so far. - Ineuw (talk) 19:59, 12 December 2010 (UTC)
I created File:ThinBraceUp.svg not sure if it is helpful or not. Just thought I would mention it. --Mattwj2002 (talk) 10:38, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

Black images

Hi!

I'm experiencing trouble to see the content of this djvu page. When I edit the page, it shows a black image, no matter what browser I use (I've tried Firefox 3.6.13, Chrome 8.0.552.215 and also IE 8).

The page is displayed correctly when I'm not editing and also here.

What could be the cause of this? Helder (talk) 18:07, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

I untranslated the links, Page: -> Página and so on.
I get the same thing, the image doesn't load. I don't know why, but it is possible that the file is corrupted. The file had a page inserted (p. 160) by User:Alex brollo, talk with that user. You could revert the change and see if that helps, maybe ask Alex to recompile the djvu. cygnis insignis 19:21, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
This crops up every now and then. When it happens you just need to go to the Commons file and purge the file's cache on the server (and possibly your own browser cache at the same time). I tried that and it is now working for me.—Zhaladshar (Talk) 19:25, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
Ah. Me too, when I cleared my browser (shift-reload) cygnis insignis 19:30, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
It works for me too (even whithout shift reload). Thanks! Helder (talk) 16:36, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

DjVu text layer present, but not appearing when I edit a new Page

File:EB1922 - Volume 31.djvu has a text layer (confirmed with djvutxt), but when I create a new page from it (this is the index; choose any random red-linked page) the edit box is not filled from the text layer. Anyone know why this might happen? It's not a huge deal, because I can extract the text manually, but it's a little irritating. - Htonl (talk) 12:20, 15 December 2010 (UTC) Oh, to add, the other two volumes (30 and 32) have text layers that work fine. - Htonl (talk) 12:21, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

There was a caching problem, I believe. I purged the cache on the file over at Commons, and now the text layer shows up. (If it doesn't for you, also purge your browser's cache).—Zhaladshar (Talk) 15:22, 15 December 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. It is indeed working now. - Htonl (talk) 11:57, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Search with transcluded text

archived discussion

I've noticed a seeming bug that prevents a potentially useful feature. The issue is this: transcluded text will not show up in search results. This means that we could not put an {{engine}} at the top of a work to allow searching within said work when it is transcluded from page-space. This would be extremely useful for dictionaries, encyclopedias, and other works as well. Someone has tried using it at Popular Science Monthly, but it only finds text which is actually on the main-space pages. I wanted to see if this is something the Wikisource community has a demand for, so that we could ask for an appropriate programming fix as a community. --Eliyak T·C 15:06, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

A more robust search engine is something I've wanted for years. You can put me on that list, but I fear we'll be waiting forever for it to happen.—Zhaladshar (Talk) 15:25, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

The first archive link contains a suggestion to make searches include the Page:ns as default; a workaround that is problematic, but an substantial improvement on the current situation. I have this checked as a preference because I know this a problem. Another proposal was to subst the pages, which creates a whole new set of problems, but still better than this situation.

I have the idea that the ability to search main has worked (imperfectly and intermittently) since querying the situation last year, but that it no longer does. I have also had main-space hits in google results, and suspect that this changed, there may be other factors at work here. The proposal to change the default search is not without problems, we want a user to be directed to main, not the construction and verification namespace. There have also been proposals to give a link from Page to main, to the regular presentation, the marginal advantage to workers becomes very important to readers who would be given Page hits in search results. (This would work by detection of the only main transclusion, or offer a choice if the page is split) This would be manipulation of the site's architecture to fit our inelegant work-around, and this is why I hoped the problem would simple be resolved. Perhaps the best first step is to ask the question,

Is this problem likely to be resolvable, or do we focus on finding another way? —cygnis insignis 08:40, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Bugzilla:18861 is what I believe is the issue. I wonder if we can get any attention at Wikitech-L? — billinghurst sDrewth 12:27, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
Thanks for locating that bug, I was not able to find it. It seems to me that it may be an easy fix, since wiki does seem to maintain transcluded versions of each page. On the other hand, I don't really have any deep understanding of mediawiki.
Good news, though: I have found a possible workaround using Google's cache of WS. For example, a search for Germany site:en.wikisource.org/wiki/1911_Encyclopædia_Britannica gives the desired results, as does Palestine site:en.wikisource.org/wiki/A_Jewish_State_(1917_translation). One small downside is that we must wait for Google to index the page. Another is that we must go outside of WS to display search results. And, I'm not sure how to set up a wiki search box for a given work.
Also, it won't do what I originally wanted, which is to take a non-vowelized Hebrew word and return any results of the vowelized version. (Wiki search does this). Too bad for me, but good enough for everyone else. --Eliyak T·C 14:51, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations

I would like to ask the community if we can make a project of getting Index:Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922).djvu done. Hoyt's is the last great book of quotations in the public domain. Because it is a reference book, it may be a particularly useful resource for Wikisource to host, and it provides a double benefit because entire sections from this work can be copied directly into the corresponding theme article on Wikiquote, or used to create such a theme (as with q:Grapes). I intend to focus the next few weeks, maybe months, getting this work done, and would appreciate the help of anyone wishing to dive in and work on a page here or there. Cheers! BD2412 T 16:44, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Public Domain Day 2011

Hi all. Last year, Wikimedia UK put out a press release celebrating Public Domain Day and the release of Yeat's and Freud's works into the public domain in the UK (70 years after their death). You can find a copy of the release at wmuk:Press releases/Public domain day. This press release was criticised here, as we were saying that the works could now be made available here. However, Wikisource generally follows US copyright law, ignoring the location of the author's birth/where the work was written/published first (probably not the correct interpretation of copyright, but let's not go into that). On the flip side, I believe it did see an increase in the number of new accounts here. From a personal perspective, putting together the press release was what started me editing here.

So: is there a way that we can celebrate Public Domain Day 2011 in the UK by putting out another press release/organising editing activity here? I know that works by Author:Neville Chamberlain and Author:Leon Trotsky will be coming out of copyright in the UK (are there also very notable/famous others?). Should we be making the point that UK contributors can now upload and work on these texts? Or do we need to bemoan the US copyright system, saying that although these works are now in the public domain in the UK, we can't have them on Wikisource as the US doesn't recognise them as PD? Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 19:41, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

I think this could cause problems. For example, William Henry Davies died in 1940 so his works come out of UK copyright. However, under US law his earlier works are already PD, and many are on WS already, whereas his later works probably remain in copyright. We don't want new people to come along and upload all his later works.--Longfellow (talk) 21:17, 15 December 2010 (UTC)
Those that cannot be hosted here I believe may be hosted at Wikilivres under the 70 year rule. I would see that as long as there was a clear differentiation based on publications pre 1923, and post 1923, then they can be hosted accordingly. It doesn't make it as easy or as fortunate for enWS, however, we will survive the blow. That said, I would have thought that the restriction affects all the WMF sites in that none can host 1923-1940 works.— billinghurst sDrewth 06:30, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
The copyright issue is due to the Wikimedia servers sitting in Florida (in Tampa, I think). That means that all Wikimedia Foundation sites are covered by the laws of Florida and the United States. If Wikimedia UK had their own server in the UK then UK copyright laws would apply to it but that's probably a little too expensive. Wikilivres is probably a good alternative though, its computers are in Canada and Canadian copyright laws are similar to British copyright laws. I have looked for a British wikisource/wikilivres equivalent in the past but couldn't find anything. United States copyright law is complicated and involves renewals (the files are all on the internet but, from experience, they can be time consuming to check); renewed works are also often only in the public domain after 95 years, regardless of the death of the author. You could link to this Cornell University page if you wanted to explain the US laws. I don't know if the situation is too complicated or not to explain in a press release (maybe just a brief editorial note). - AdamBMorgan (talk) 12:37, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
Incidentally: If you want to solve this in the future, you may have to create a Europe-based physical sister site in some way. I don't know how philosphically, financially and (especially) technically feasible this is but the combined European chapters might be able to accomplish it. A standalone system (say, eurosource.org and eurocommons.org) might be easier but something integrated into the rest of the WMF (say, eu.wikisource.org etc) would be better. Without something on that scale, there will be no Public Domain Day at the WMF as the US public domain is frozen for the forseeable future. - AdamBMorgan (talk) 13:24, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
eu.wikisource.org would be a Basque-language Wikisource if it existed. Angr 13:51, 18 December 2010 (UTC)
There's no point in putting up a British wikisource/wikilivres, given that the UK is life+70 and Canada is life+50. I can't think of any case where a UK Wikisource would let you do things a Canadian one wouldn't. The US public domain is not frozen for the forseeable future; it will start moving again in January 1, 2019.--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:59, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
It would be a bit extreme, yes, and I don't expect it to happen. I have seen it suggested elsewhere, at Commons I believe, to create something like a European site based in Amsterdam. I don't expect that to happen either but it applies to this situation so I thought it worth mentioning. Incidently, by "forseeable future" I meant most of the next decade. From the point of view of annual press releases, that's a significant period a time. - AdamBMorgan (talk) 13:08, 20 December 2010 (UTC)
The restriction does in theory affect all the WMF sites, but at least in Commons there is willful denial of that fact; Commons:Template:Not-PD-US-URAA exists and gets added to new images. I've argued the case, but there's refusal to delete the files or openly (on Commons:COM:L) acknowledge that they're being kept. I suspect some of the smaller projects are simply unaware that there is anything but life+70.--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:59, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
Separate from the copyright issue, I think a press release might be a good idea but not one that claims Public Domain Day affects Wikisource. Anyone coming here under that impression may get severely disillusioned at the project when it turns out to be false (possibly having their contributions undone or deleted). Of course, that means that any press release would lack a strong statement and may not have any effect. The best I can think of is along the lines of "Today is Public Domain Day. That doesn't apply to Wikisource but there's still a lot you can do." (Which, I admit, isn't very good.) - AdamBMorgan (talk) 13:08, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

OK, following from this (& thanks for everyone's comments), I think there are three points I should make.

1) UK/EU life+70 does apply to this site, for works that were only published in the UK/EU and not the US. Unfortunately, the US doesn't seem to recognise when works become PD outside of the US anymore. Perhaps that's the point we should be pushing.

2) I also don't think that a UK/EU Wikilivres would work, given the presence of the Canadian death+50 rule. And believe me: I wish that wasn't the case, as I'd love to see/support such a site (and WMUK now has the capabilities/capacity to set such a site up if it were to be useful).

3) I would be more than happy to foster and help publish any press release in the UK that helps Wikisource. Unfortunately, outside of Public Domain Day I don't see a way to get the UK press interested. Even something like "Public domain day: fantastic, wish that helped us" wouldn't really get very far. I'd welcome any suggestions here. Perhaps one might be asking for the current copyright owners of the works that just became PD to release their rights under CC-BY-SA for the rest of the world? Could this work?

Thanks. Mike Peel (talk) 21:51, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Misalignment of contents in the main namespace

In the Index page, the sources are Pages 265 to 271. Page 267 and page 269 are offset by 5 pixels to the left, (or possibly the other pages are offset to the right), and I can't find the cause. Could someone shed light on what I've done wrong? Ineuw 03:02, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Each page is an independently centred table. If you want the entire index to be centred as a single block, you need to put the opening and closing table syntax into the headers and footers respectively, so that the tables aggregate into one big table when transcluded together. Hesperian 03:44, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks Hesperian, I understand. Just for my knowledge since I’ve only done this once before and without a problem on these pages, where someone told me to use <noinclude></noinclude>. Was this a similar idea? Ineuw 04:40, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

I had no choice but use <noinclude></noinclude> as in the PSM project indexes. Hiding the table headers and footers in the page headers and footers didn’t work for me. Thanks again for your quick reply.Ineuw 05:10, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
Yes, the same thing. The headers and footers are just permanently segregrated <noinclude> zones. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:32, 16 December 2010 (UTC)
I began to use as largely as I can "well-formed templates", t.i. templates splitted into a "start" and "end". The big advantage is that often the text modified by the template rests outside from the template code, and this is a very good idea! It's much simpler to manage such "external" text by automated scripts! Splitted templates are a great step towards any kind of any kind of automation. As a side effect, the habit to use splitted templates makes very simple to understand exotic issues as that one discussed here. Take a look to it:Template:Centrato; there's a trick that allows "usual" use of the template (for back compatibility) but allows "splitted" use too, simply avoiding to pass text as parameter 1. --Alex brollo (talk) 14:39, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

Wikisource:Featured text candidates discussion and nominations

We are seeking further nominations and opinions on future featured texts for the Wikisource site. We would welcome if you have a validated work that you believe worthy of consideration, or you wish to come and share your opinion on the nominated works. — billinghurst sDrewth 13:12, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Galen's _On the Natural Faculties_, Book One

The edit that completed Book One of Galen's _On the Natural Faculties_ has been reversed because of the use of a "trigger word" (from the look of the edit, that word appears to be p*n*s.) The word is used in the context of a procedure Galen used to confirm the (largely) Hippocratic understanding of urology, not in any even remotely pornographic sense. As the ongoing contributor of this text, I respectfully ask that the edit be restored so that this important work of ancient medicine may appear complete.—70.112.178.180 AND 206.77.0.154, 18 December 2010

Done. Can I suggest the use of edit summary to assist clarify the additions and alterations to a work. Other means to help mitigate such errors is the use of a signed in account, as it becomes a means of recognition and where a user demonstrates the style guide we proactively assign autopatrol permissions. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:25, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

Page contains image

Hello. I marked some pages filled with just an image (e.g. Page:Nicaraguan_Antiquities_(1886).djvu/133) with {{Page contains image}} template, but I've read again the documentation and that template is only for pages still without any image. Is that right? (I think I'll have to undo my own edits :S). Perhaps it would be more intuitive something like {{Missing image}} (I mean the name of the template). It also applies to {{Page contains sheet music}} (one thing is contains and other needs to be filled with). Another question (I don't find the previous discussion) is, pages with only image (transclusible image), should be marked as "without text", or has to be first "proofread" and then "validated"? Thanks! -Aleator (talk) 02:12, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

Once the image is inserted, I mark the page as ’proofread’. It’s about content and this is how I learned from others, LIKE HERE. Then someone else checks it and if it’s OK, they mark it ’validated’. I hope it helps.Ineuw 03:04, 19 December 2010 (UTC)
As I am up to pages 12000-12999 of marked "Without text" converting non-blank pages to proofread, definitely what Ineuw said, any page that is to be transcluded is to go through the proofreading process. The combination of {{Page contains image}}/Problematic is to identify works that need more work, for whatever reason. For us, it is the "Problematic" is the key as something requires to be done, with the adding of the template is to just identify the task.

The reason we have taken that direction is that we are trying to configure the system so that one only needs to do one longitudinal transclusion, without of blank pages. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:55, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

OK, thanks for the explanations. -Aleator (talk) 17:00, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

Converting PDF to DjVU

Can someone try converting this PDF into DjVU? Strangely none of the text or graphics show up in the Commons thumbnails, but you can see it all if you load the actual PDF. The text is already OCRed and added into a text layer in the PDF. Let me know if I need to change anything about how the PDF is saved. Kaldari (talk) 05:49, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

Quite a few of us just upload PDF files to archive.org as they have a great system to derive works. If you don't have a login there, and okay with this happening, just let one of us know and we can do it for you. — billinghurst sDrewth 05:58, 19 December 2010 (UTC)
With Linux I use pdf2djvu: it works very well. --Zyephyrus (talk) 14:12, 19 December 2010 (UTC)
I tested nconvert (the prompt line version of XnView) on the pdf you linked, it runs (but I use a two steps procedure, pdf->jpg then jpg->djvu, I presume it's not so efficient... nevertheless in Italy there's a telling, ogni scarafone è bello a mamma sua that I can transate more or less as "any beatle is beautiful in the opinion of his mother" ;-) ) --Alex brollo (talk) 17:06, 19 December 2010 (UTC)
I tried uploading the file to archive.org: [5]. What do I do now? Kaldari (talk) 06:38, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
@Alex brollo: If you could try using your method, that would be great as well. It is currently scanned at 400dpi, if that is useful. Kaldari (talk) 06:38, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
You wait for it to derive the requisite files. You can see where you are at http://www.archive.org/catalog.php?whereami=1 and the other file types will show up at your details link when it is done. — billinghurst sDrewth 08:58, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
Internet Archive did an excellent "derivation". Now you have your djvu file, with an OCR layer; and if you like you have too the high-resolution jp2 images of every page. :-) --Alex brollo (talk) 20:56, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Serif font experiment

A notice: I changed the font family on Layout 2 to be serif. I feel that a serif font improves the feel of many of the texts at WS, and should be an option. If there is objection to this, it will of course be reverted. --Eliyak T·C 06:49, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

Sounds eminently sensible. If people protest about it being layout 2, then should be looking to make it the next layout option available, IMNSHO. — billinghurst sDrewth 09:54, 20 December 2010 (UTC)
I agree, I think serif would lend itself well to layout 2. Maybe a line of CSS to turn it off could be a gadget for those who hate it? Inductiveload—talk/contribs 16:24, 20 December 2010 (UTC)
Why bother to turn it off? As one can rotate through alternative layouts, just add another to toggle. If people hate it just toggle. — billinghurst sDrewth

Advice needed on converting text/image

What is the threshold for preserving an artists work versus digitization? I am working on this book and I am having a difficult time finding a way to crop the S in such a manner that would allow for the remainder of the text to be seated next to it. I am considering excluding the S altogether but am hesitant; does anyone have advice? - Theornamentalist (talk) 03:12, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

I consider the text an intrinsic part of the image. The only way to honour the intent of the original publication and capture the text, is to use an image of the entire plate, and include the text as |alt= text. Hesperian 05:11, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
Books like that are both delightful to view and problematic to reproduce. They are also something that I could see that we could say need a non-standard approach to page transclusion in that we have both image and text. I have no answer, and would feel that a solution that preserved the images and tastefully produced a searchable text version would be a great solution. — billinghurst sDrewth 06:17, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
You could get good scans and remove the background, then arrange the sequence of images - not sure I see an advantage in transclusion for that. You could transcribe the text as well, but it is probably going to turn up in other works; creating a {{versions}} page would sort any or all of these options. cygnis insignis 07:32, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
Just a couple of ideas.
  1. I found a someway similar problem into old engravings with some text inside (very difficult to read). I used ImageMap to solve the issue. But I don't know if an alternate text of a mapped image is searchable.
  2. I use sometimes display=hidden and display=none stiles. Is text inside a display=hidden dv searchable? If it is, this could be the solution; the trancsluded page could contain both the image, and the hidden text. --Alex brollo (talk) 10:44, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

Music!

I'm working on a robust template for musical notation on pages like this one. A sample can be seen here. Right now I just want to make sure that the spacing between notes looks good. Can someone who is familiar with musical scores take a look? A little research tells me that this template will also require rests, beams, ties, slurs, crescendos and diminuendos (whew!). I am looking for someone with whom I can keep in touch as I add these features, to make sure they look right to a trained eye. --Eliyak T·C 17:49, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

User:Angelprincess72 is the one knowledgeable about music. I also have some other pages from the same project tagged which require musical notes, however, I was not able to get to them since music is really way beyond me. Kindly let me know when the templates are completed. I would like to learn how to use them.Ineuw 18:43, 22 December 2010 (UTC)
Eliyak, do you realise just how big a task this is? What you are embarking on is essentially the biggest type-setting challenge left in all of WikiMedia. It must be able to cope with a very wide range of musical examples such as the simple one you reference above through to this page, which I've randomly picked from Category:Pages requiring musical examples. Not only that, it must look OK in multiple browsers. There is an open-source product (w:Lilypond) that does what we need it to, but it has a security problem that no-one seems to have the time to sort or solve. See this archived discussion for more details.
With respect to your question about spacing, etc. The spacing for music is not constant as it depends on what else is going on in the bar. However, for a simple ascending scale on crotchets the spacing is fine. Unfortunately, though, on my browser (IE6 - I know, but I've got other software that won't behave with anything else) the bottom line of the staves is missing and there is a white bar after all the tails. This means that for notes with a descending tail, the note head is mostly obliterated and I would have difficulty in playing from the score. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 07:46, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
Another way of explaining the same effect as above is that 'StemOfNote.svg' has about 4px of a white background to the right of the black line which should be trimmed from the image to avoid any artificial padding-right to be injected along with the stem image and/or, at the very least, the .svg should be made to have a transparent background - hopefully making the current whitespace to the right no longer an issue. View the svg on anything but a white background and you'll see the approx. 4px of "whitespace" [6] -- George Orwell III (talk) 08:31, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
Fashinating challenge. :-) I'll follow your bold try with deep interest! --Alex brollo (talk) 08:50, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
Hmm, yes - it seems IE6 does not work well with transparency. Even if the stem is fixed, the note-heads will create some white space as well. I guess things won't really display perfectly in IE6. (I will try to find some workaround) As far as complex examples like the one you showed, they will be made possible by the overlay abilities of this template. I think the template can be made with 2-300 components, most of which (the various notes) will be copied from each other with minor modification. --Eliyak T·C 14:05, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
It seems to behave OK in IE6 now, though it still looks better in e.g. Firefox, IE7. --Eliyak T·C 16:23, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
Yes the padding/whitespace issue is gone for IE6, 7 & 8. Something is still askew with the measure in the bottom line towards the end on your test page though -- George Orwell III (talk) 21:04, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
I did notice that. I am using http://ipinfo.info/netrenderer/ to make sure things work right in IE6, and that problem was just taken care of. --Eliyak T·C 21:34, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
Well that renderer sure seems to do the trick - problem is gone here too. i hope others take note and utilize that nifty tool!! -- George Orwell III (talk) 22:03, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Split

I see a "split" button in the top of this page. What would happen if I'd click on it? :-) --Alex brollo (talk) 06:46, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

If it has been page matched and they are on the page, then it will apply the text from the main namespace and put it onto the identified and labelled page namespace pages, then transclude the pages of the chapter/work back onto the page. — billinghurst sDrewth 10:14, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
The reason it appears on this particular page is that there is a section called Page:Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922).djvu/26. Apparently any page with a complete page link as a section title causes the split button to appear. As for what it would do, there's only one way to find out =) —Spangineer (háblame) 12:37, 23 December 2010 (UTC)
OK. The result is... nothing. ;-) --Alex brollo (talk) 19:29, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
Oh that was the reference, I thought it had been forgotten. Removing the hypertext link in the heading doesn't seem to have had an effect. — billinghurst sDrewth 01:15, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Librivox

I could not find this in past discussions, but I am wondering if we are allowed to truncate audio files from Librivox. One which I have found begins with mentioning the Librivox site, then the name of the reader and her personal site. I would prefer if none of this where in the recording. The file information could point to the source, and mention the name of the reader. - Theornamentalist (talk) 23:56, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

The files are not specifically hosted at Wikisource, so that is more a question for Commons and the licence that is applied to the Librivox contributions. I would think that it is less likely for much of the work that Wikisource hosts that we would be using Librivox as the basis for a contribution or a transcription, as would normally be looking to go back to the earlier and original source. Librivox would add value/sit beside a contribution that we have as text, alternatively it would be linked to from the Author: namespace page to the file at Commons. — billinghurst sDrewth 00:39, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
The work I have found (here) is for The Velveteen Rabbit; however, with the files released by Librivox as PD (in place of CC) I do not think I can modify them. - Theornamentalist (talk) 01:07, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
According to their website and wiki, they release the recordings into the public domain. As that is the case, you can do anything you want with them. As the wiki page I linked says, "LibriVox takes texts already in the public domain, asks volunteers to make audio recordings of that text, and then releases the resulting audio back into the public domain. This means that if you volunteer to record for LibriVox, you are agreeing to release the audio files you make into the public domain. This means that anyone can use those audio files however they wish.". - Htonl (talk) 01:25, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
Thank you for finding that. - Theornamentalist (talk) 01:37, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
I agree you can edit the Librivox recordings mercilessly. I think it would be nice however, if you added in any information removed from the recoding to the metadata on the Commons page for that file.--BirgitteSB 18:25, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

please undelete Robert Elise translation

we now have permission to use the translations from Robert Elise, can we please undelete the work? User_talk:Prosfilaes#Permissions thanks mike Mdupont (talk)

At this moment, I will allow the person who deleted the work the opportunity to undertake the undeletion. That said, we need to go through a permissions process to keep the works, and it is a process that is aligned with Commons process, especially relevant if you are planning/have uploaded files to Commons to transclude here. Have a look at Commons:OTRS. The differences that apply here reasonably obvious, you would need to state the urls where the works are located at enWikisource [[wikisource:en:(name of work in main namespace)]] and generally we would ask that you send the email to mailto:permissions-en@wikimedia.org . Noting that you can bundle a Commons and a Wikisource permission into the same email. The tag to use here is {{OTRS pending}}. — billinghurst sDrewth 23:01, 24 December 2010 (UTC)
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