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Wiktionary:Information desk/2019/December

Hieroglyphics hain't HTML
After dinner discussions, you know?

Starting from Category:English terms derived from Egyptian I kept encountering glitches on mobile views of etymologies. Strange vertical spacing and missing content, with examples
 * sphinx is okay, then mobile view is borken
 * uraeus is okay, then mobile view

But then something else from the list like ammonia is fine on mobile because it doesn't attempt hieroglyphics.

sphinx has and uraeus has , whereas ammonia lacks any use of  produces unfortunate effects under mobile.

So, :  , I can find the wavy line as "U+13216: EGYPTIAN HIEROGLYPH N035" and the lined circle as "U+1340D: EGYPTIAN HIEROGLYPH AA001" aka &#x13216; &#x1340D; , and thus:
 * 𓈖 𓐍
 * At least these appear under Chrome on a Win10 box. Perhaps part of the review of hiero revamp could be whether general support has advanced enough that hieroglyphic display can depend (rely is not the right word) on OS-hosted Unicode fonts? Thus hosting own images could be done away with?
 * Though in comparing mw:Extension:WikiHiero/Syntax with Egyptian_Hieroglyphs_(Unicode_block) I am seeing extras under Unicode but then possible missing items seen in the extension's list. It may be that scholarship has advanced beyond the point that produced the older list used by the extension? (whoa, 2004?) I'd tend towards assuming the Unicode list was agreed upon only after some rigor. (2009) And continued development in Unicode (2016) (More Unicode Egyptian Hieroglyph Format Controls (2019) )
 * Oh blech. I suppose fixing what we've got is first. Finding out if better implementations are possible is later. Shenme (talk) 06:10, 9 December 2019 (UTC)

Pronunciation of μαγειρική
The pronunciation of Modern is given as, added by a native Greek speaker. But shouldn’t that be ? BTW, I’m not a big fan of giving narrow transcriptions unless there is a specific reason, such as to distinguish dialects or to draw attention to an irregular phenomenon. --Lambiam 22:52, 17 December 2019 (UTC)

mapuchizar conjugation
Can anyone help me fix the conjugation for this one? I discovered this nugget my español-Mapudungun dictionary.Ndołkah (talk) 11:01, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * What did you have in mind? I'm pretty decent at Spanish but I've never encountered this verb before: it seems pretty straightforward and correct as a regular verb. I do see it used on a quick Internet search but it's not in the RAE's dictionary. Are you requesting that someone help you make entries for all the conjugations? —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 17:45, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I think it means “to ‘mapuchify’ ”, that is, “to make ”, a neologism that may be regional – almost all hits are from Chilean sources. --Lambiam 00:33, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Not necessarily for all the conjugations, that's not essential for a Spanish dictionary if you know what the endings mean, I meant the blow out chart of the conjugations oh and I didn't put in a definition but someone was bold and came out with a great one how grandNdołkah (talk) 00:19, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Purpose and usage of the "Descendants" section
First, a bit of context. Having encountered the word, I promptly came to Wiktionary. Then from a bit of surfing around here I discovered that both it and butter trace back to, the latter by way of. Doubting that I am the only person on Earth who would find these relationships interesting, I thought about how to document them.

The good news is that the descendancy of butter from βούτῡρον is already documented in the latter's entry. But I feel that when users are reading about τυρός itself, they would likely be interested in its being an ancestor—though indirect—of butter. After all, exactly that connection, in the temporally reversed direction, shows up under the etymology of butter, and I don't see that the retrospective (pedigree) explanation is any more important or interesting than the prospective (progeny) presentation of that exact same information.

Of course, everything I've said about τυρός with respect to butter applies equally to. And that brings me to my next question: is it considered kosher in Wiktionary to list among a word's descendants not only simple words, but also compounds? Because what I'd like to do is highlight the relationship to butter in the entries for βοῦς and τυρός, and the relationship to turophile at least in the entry for τυρός (it's already documented in Category:English_words_suffixed_with_-phile). And, apart from my previous question about the intermediate word βούτῡρον, those relationships are perfectly analogous to the relationship to that is currently reported in the entry for.

How to proceed? Or, stated differently, Mother may I?—PaulTanenbaum (talk)

 * No, it isn’t kosher. If one were to tolerate it, soon it would be with any derived term and we would have 🇨🇬 as descendant under the Latin prefix, or something similar. Fay Freak (talk) 21:10, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

 * Well, I guess your reply does get to my question about butter. But not to my proposed pointer from τυρός to turophile, unless you think someone should police up what would have to be the faux pas over at μέρος. And by the way, is there anything in a style guide or the like that captures your sense of the treyf (from :-) )? I never did find it, which is why I posted here.—PaulTanenbaum (talk) 22:31, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

 * It hurts my sensibilities; the term should be tyrophile, which is how Oxford Reference spells it, just like, and .  --Lambiam 01:07, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

north Andean deer
How do I make it singular and plural?Ndołkah (talk) 00:17, 21 December 2019 (UTC)
 * ✅. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 01:58, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

 * For future reference: just enter the plural of the term as the first (and only) parameter of en-noun. In this case it is identical to the term. --Lambiam 02:02, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Translingual derived or descended?
Would a translingual scientific name be considered a derived or descended term of the New Latin components? For example, see araucanus. I wasn't sure which section title to use. -Mike (talk) 00:33, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

 * Derived terms are supposed to be terms in the same language that are morphological derivatives, so this is not applicable in this context. Descendants are terms in other languages that have borrowed or inherited the term. If D is listed as a descendant of E, then the etymology of D should show E as a (possibly partial) ancestor. --Lambiam 01:53, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

 * To be clear, "derived terms" is not consistently used throughout Wiktionary. You're right if you're talking about the L3 section (and therefore for Mike's question), but not if you're talking about the use of . Which reminds me that we could use a new template for that... —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 01:56, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Hiding languages on Wiktionary pages
Is there a way of hiding certain languages or at least collapse them for better overview? Even better, is there a way to hide/collapse all but some selected languages? It would make navigation a lot easier. Sometimes even the navigation toolbox is utterly cluttered and it takes some time to get to the right language. --Fytcha (talk) 16:45, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Request for edit to protected page Wiktionary:Entry_layout
Hi, I would like to request that the line:

be added to the top of the section Entry_layout. Mihia (talk) 17:48, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

For hábeas corpus
How do I make it so it shows that it is singular only?Ndołkah (talk) 07:31, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

 * According to the RAE the plural is the same as the singular, which is different from being singular only. I do find uses of los hábeas corpus and los habeas corpus without accent – according to the the spelling with an accent was used until 2010, but I don’t know what this statement is based on and have not further investigated it.  --Lambiam 08:22, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Arabic Script for Esperanto (Araba Skripto/ارابا سکریپٹو)
Hey can we work upon an Arabic script for Esperanto
 * We can if Esperanto is written with that script already, which I think it's not. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 19:45, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

 * This would be an undertaking outside the purview of Wiktionary. Perhaps some people who see this here may be interested, in which case they should by all means contact you to see what can be done, but it will not be a Wiktionary effort. --Lambiam 00:15, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Links to Hebrew Wikipedia
Hey all- I'm very familiar with how to use Template:wikipedia and Template:zh-wp to link to English and various Chinese Wikipedias. But how should I link to Hebrew Wikipedia? I used Template:wikipedia to link אלוהים  &יהוה  to Hebrew Wikipedia, but it looks really wonky. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 02:13, 25 December 2019 (UTC)
 * ✅. Try checking the template documentation next time. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 02:27, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

How to create a list of synonyms (or antonyms)
Hi, guys. Merry Xmas.

I'd like to know how could I create a list of a synonyms vertically or horizontally with that formatting

#:

so that it looks like

Synonyms: 1. x (trad) 2. y (trad) 3. z (trad)

or

Synonyms: x (trad); y (trad); z (trad)

I tried a lot of ways and couldn't achieve that. In the vertical form, I got something but always with "synonym" in each line, which seems rather polluted. As for horizontal, I got nothing, with a lot of errors... Is it possible to do that with such specific formatting? Thanks in advance.

Cpt.Guapo (talk) 20:04, 25 December 2019 (UTC)
 * gives . — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 17:22, 26 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks a lot, my friend! That one did the trick! I wonder if there is a vertical version too... Cpt.Guapo (talk) 05:13, 27 December 2019 (UTC)


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Wiktionary:Information desk/2019/January

Images of words
Dear Editors: Would you be interested in the images of words? I am cutting up manuscripts into single words. I will have many representations of each word as my sources will come from different writers and from different time periods and styles of writing. David Kaminski (talk) 14:32, 6 January 2019 (UTC)

 * English, I assume? Is this a captcha project? Can you tell us more? Equinox ◑ 15:53, 6 January 2019 (UTC)
 * No, I'm not interested. I already have all the pictures of words that I could ever want. DTLHS (talk) 18:20, 6 January 2019 (UTC)
 * No, I don't think Wiktionary is the right place for that. See Wikimedia Commons instead. KevinUp (talk) 14:34, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
 * The project covers American handwriting--to study the styles and variations, and to aid people in reading old cursive handwriting from colonial times through the early 1900s. The variations are staggering, in my opinion. If you have pictures of single words in cursive American handwriting I would certainly appreciate access to your resources; those would be very useful to me. Please advise if you still believe this project is better for Wikimedia Commons. David Kaminski (talk) 23:08, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Rather than for entire words (except for lexical exceptions) some paleographic notes (for example to help read the original U.S. constitution) would really be useful if added to the letters of the alphabet and their surroundings in text --Backinstadiums (talk) 18:58, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I found David Kaminski's website for handwriting collections: I think the present site is good enough. Images of words are not very useful, as every writer has his own style of writing. KevinUp (talk) 02:22, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm new. But I am going to risk participating anyway, just to chime in and say this: Images from actual historical script of ancient dead languages is useful. It seems to me the standard scripts used in reconstructions are different to historical ones, which seem typically more varied. So people might be interested in seeing original orthography samples. This would help people to learn to read original documents, and perhaps even suggest potential error when the writing of the original sources actually isńt very clear. Additionally, it helps people to learn to date documents by writing styles etc.

Extracting list of words from category pages
In Category:Chinese lemmas, there are almost 157,500 lemmas listed under this category. Rather than using the "next page" function, is there a way for me to obtain a list of all lemmas in a particular language? I'm making a list of Chinese, Japanese, Korean compounds (hanzi/kanji/hanja) that are not yet listed under the "compounds" section of the single-character CJKV entries. KevinUp (talk) 14:34, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
 * There is no way to retrieve all of them in one go, because the wiki software itself limits how many items you can get at once. You'll need to write a program using pywikibot to retrieve a list quickly. —Rua (mew) 14:49, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I found the script I need to use. KevinUp (talk) 15:49, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
 * please share it --Backinstadiums (talk) 18:53, 11 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Here it is: KevinUp (talk) 02:22, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

"amagnetic" is an absolute adjective so cannot have a comparative or superlative form
I wanted to edit the entry for "amagnetic", as this is an absolute adjective, involving the absence of a physical property. (Absence is by nature total. Something cannot be more absent than something else.) However, the editing options proposed did not include the possibility of removing the comparative and superlative forms given for the word.
 * If absence is total by nature, we should declare the adjective to be not comparable. But no attainable physical property is absolute, not even absolute zero, although some properties are more absolute than others.  --Lambiam 13:33, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Did it for you. SemperBlotto (talk) 11:33, 8 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Not always true: something can be more asymmetrical than something else, for example. Equinox ◑ 19:12, 11 January 2019 (UTC)

 * In this paper we can read, “Barite was chosen for the off‐centered mass because it is almost amagnetic and heavy”, and, “Indeed, barite is not completely amagnetic, although its magnetic susceptibility value is close to zero.” I gather from this that barite is more amagnetic than, say, ferrite. --Lambiam 13:13, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Requested entries (French)
Why is there a list of requested entries at Requested entries (French) and also 26 separate lists at Requested entries (French)/a, Requested entries (French)/b, Requested entries (French)/c and so on? Which list are we supposed to add requested entries to? – Arms & Hearts (talk) 00:12, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Better to add requested entries to the main list (manual list). I think the 26 separate lists were an early attempt at alphabetizing the list of requests. It's easier to just use the main list at Requested entries (French). —Stephen (Talk) 00:44, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Because the page would be too big otherwise. WT:REE also has some subpages. These are usually drawn from word lists. Equinox ◑ 13:38, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

pronunciation of "anaerobe" and many, very many, other words
I arrived here very upset and was just about to use unseemly, nay, downright profane, words. I counted patiently to one hundred and a half and now I can ask your courteously: How the fuck (oops!) does one pronounce the goddam (oops!) "anaerobe"? Or "bacteroides" for that matter? Or...
 * You can find pronunciations for most English words in online dictionaries. This page gives two pronunciations for and a button by which you can listen to what I think is the most common American-English pronunciation. This page gives a pronunciation for for ; in IPA that would be something like .  --Lambiam 19:33, 12 January 2019 (UTC)
 * When you need the pronunciation and the page does not have it, you can just mention it here and we will add it for you, as in anaerobe. —Stephen (Talk) 23:25, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Technical issue with Swedish noun declension templates
Hello, I don't know if this is the best place to put this, but I would like to draw attention to an issue with the templates used for Swedish declension, for example in poäng. The "sv-noun-irreg-c" template has a defined "definition" field while the "sv-infl-noun-c-er" does not, leading to only the first box showing which definitions it is showing the declensions for, while the second having a "definition=2, 3" argument that isn't used. I have no idea how to go about fixing this or who to mention this to but hopefully highlighting it here will bring it to the attention of somebody who does. 2A02:C7D:1B8:5B00:A5EC:68DF:45A3:3E98 00:06, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Yeah, this is an issue that was at least partly caused by, who has decided not to clean up after herself (see discussion here concerning one of the other templates). Ideally, the template shouldn't have this parameter, and the format at is what we should switch over to. In the mean time, it's an annoying cleanup task — maybe one of our more hardworking editors like  will want to deal with it. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 20:44, 18 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I think you can ask for my help without insulting other editors. And no, I really think this should be done by hand by someone who knows Swedish. DTLHS (talk) 20:54, 18 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I wasn't trying to be insulting, but I do find it annoying when people break things and don't care. The work doesn't really require much knowledge of Swedish. I suppose I'd better get around to doing it. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 06:15, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

Requested edit
Hello, please add an "(archaic)" label to verily. Source:. Thank you. Opencooper (talk) 04:44, 17 January 2019 (UTC)

 * ✅ Equinox ◑ 05:03, 17 January 2019 (UTC)

Nearly blank page on m.wiktionary
The parsimony page does not show up properly via m.wiktionary.org. The only part that appears is the word and the header for the English section. All of the page's source is intact if I go into edit. Issue happening in Chrome and Safari on iPhone. The desktop server doesn't have this issue. Zephalis (talk) 16:25, 18 January 2019 (UTC)
 * You have to click the header “English” to see the content. Sometimes that seems not to work (for all pages, not only ). After waiting some time, it loads though, at least for me. --Lambiam 17:26, 18 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Is that something new? I'm used to it opening to English right away, now there's an extra step. Also, it no longer can be closed once opened. I don't like it. Zephalis (talk) 01:01, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Not only opening English section, even adding a page to watchlist requires an additional step now. However not every page is affected; for example, aggiuntivo is all right. It looks like something is wrong behind the scene.--3knolls (talk) 09:37, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Collapsible headings in the mobile version of the site are a MediaWiki feature, so I would guess that the problem is not in a JavaScript file here on English Wiktionary. — Eru·tuon 05:29, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

How to add a case variant of a Russian word so search will find it
The word влажной is one of the variants of the word влажный (damp). влажный is the "dictionary" (masculine nominative) form of the adjective, and влажной is the feminine genitive, dative, instrumental, or prepositional. Usually, when I search via the "Search Wiktionary" field for an adjective in a variant other than the dictionary form, the entry for the dictionary form comes up, which is what I want. But perhaps ten percent of the time, nothing is found, even though the dictionary form has an entry and its declension table contains the form I'm looking for. My workaround is to start erasing letters from the end until autocompletion finds the dictionary form and shows it in the prepopulated list. However, this is not entirely satisfactory. When I see an instance like this, I'd like to fix it. What do I need to do to make sure that a search for влажной finds the entry for влажный? Thanks.

--AlanUS (talk) 15:03, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
 * You mean you want to see влажной directly in the search bar, without actually making the search? There would have to be an entry for that, but nobody has created it yet. Per utramque cavernam 15:08, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Yes, I want to see it directly in the search bar. How would I create an entry? I've looked through the help, but the English-language help is mostly about adding English-language entries. Thanks. AlanUS (talk) 15:16, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

 * I decided to look at a pair for which both items do show up in the search bar: сладкий (dictionary form) and сладкое (neuter nominative). Based on that pair, I figured out how to create a new entry. So I guess I'm a little closer to understanding how it works, but would appreciate a link to more instructions as to which symbols are available and what they mean. Currently, I'm using guesswork (for example, guessing that the symbol for "genitive" is "gen", and trying it out). Also, how do I get Russian to appear in the list of languages on the search results for a page that doesn't exist? Currently, my list only contains English, American Sign Language, Spanish, and Swedish. I have no idea how this list got populated. AlanUS (talk) 15:30, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

 * "I decided to look at a pair [...]. Based on that pair, I figured out how to create a new entry." > that's exactly the right way to proceed. Your entry looks good, thank you! If you plan on creating more inflected forms, Template:inflection of/documentation might be of interest to you.
 * I'm sorry, but I don't understand what you mean by "the list of languages on the search results for a page that doesn't exist". Coud you clarify what you mean by that? Per utramque cavernam 18:39, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Please see highlighted area of embedded screenshot.

AlanUS (talk) 19:15, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

 * For each of those blue buttons someone had to create a new-entry template specific to that language and to that part of speech. In order for Russian to appear on that menu, someone who knows both Russian and the technical details of such templates would have to create templates for all the parts of speech in that language. I notice that the languages in question have relatively simple inflection systems. Russian is relatively complex in that regard, so there may be subtleties and intricacies that may be hard to cover with such a simple new-entry-template system. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:30, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

Why is my talk page post tagged unconstructive?
Tagalog speaker chiming in, only Cebuano people are called Bisaya, see examples below:

often it is used equivalent to a hillbilly in the US, see 29 second mark for the word used offensively

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGv9Qj0am78

a Waray is a Visayan person but they're not called Bisaya in Tagalog but Waray, below's a Tagalog song about a Waray

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2AE24_ozME

the news below uses Ilonggo for Ilonggo not Bisaya

https://www.philstar.com/pang-masa/pang-movies/2018/07/02/1829855/marian-dingdong-pinakilig-ang-mga-ilonggo

the second definition is made up, we don't call people who don't use 'po' north of Manila or south of Cebu a Bisaya

 * Can you indicate which edit was tagged unconstructive? You stated on the talk page of Bisaya that your post there was tagged unconstructive, but thus far the only edit to that page is your making that statement, thereby creating the page. --Lambiam 22:41, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Abuse filter log: —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 22:47, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

 * The reason you got the message you did was at least partly because you were a new user adding links for commercial websites to a talk page. The vast majority of such cases are spambots, and most of the rest are people who don't know our rules and practices for linking to other websites, and tend to violate them. Links to YouTube are a particular focus of the abuse filters, since people are always trying to promote their own videos.

 * Sorry that your good-faith post triggered the abuse filters, but there's not much we can do to avoid that kind of thing without having to constantly remove lots and lots of spam from talk pages. Chuck Entz (talk) 01:44, 22 January 2019 (UTC)

I understand. Would it have triggered the filter the same way if I used it as an outgoing link instead of the bare URL?

The Century Dictionary and Encyclopedia
I want to add an entymological definition of the word irrorate because I am working on an article on Bycombia on Wikipedia and want to link to the definition. The book is in public domain but has this note attached to it

 * "Public Domain or Public Domain in the United States, Google-digitized: In addition to the terms for works that are in the Public Domain or in the Public Domain in the United States above, the following statement applies: The digital images and OCR of this work were produced by Google, Inc. (indicated by a watermark on each page in the PageTurner). Google requests that the images and OCR not be re-hosted, redistributed or used commercially. The images are provided for educational, scholarly, non-commercial purposes.

 * Note: There are no restrictions on use of text transcribed from the images, or paraphrased or translated using the images."

Can I use the definition in this book? Do I add a reference for this? I see on the irrorate page that the first definition is taken from Webster's, also in public domain, and there is a template for it. Is there a template for The Century Dictionary as well? There is an article on Wikipedia about the book. Aurornisxui (talk) 16:40, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Just a piece of advice: the fact that you need to link to a definition is a sign that you're doing something wrong. A taxonomic publication is aimed at taxonomists, and uses very precise, but specialized terminology. An encyclopedia is aimed at the general public, and should use terminology that the general public will understand. If you don't understand it well enough to explain without linking to definitions, how are readers supposed to understand it?
 * Yes, you should get your facts from the sources, but the presentation should be yours, not theirs.
 * Besides, the full details of the taxonomic description are of minimal interest to encyclopedia readers: this is (or was) a living organism that lives somewhere, feeds on certain things, has larvae with their own description, has other interactions with the world around it and there are many other details of interest. I realize that there's not a lot of information easily available, but going into such detail on the taxonomic description gives it undue weight and makes non-entomologists sorry they ever clicked on the link to your article. Chuck Entz (talk) 19:26, 21 January 2019 (UTC)

Term for a verb, derived from an adjective, that indicates "to make (more) adjective"
Is there a term for such a verb? It should be distinguished from the related deadjectival verb that means "to become (more) adjective". In other words, these verbs are transitive. —Rua (mew) 14:11, 22 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I find sentences like “In English, the causative suffix -en on an adjective yields the meaning ‘cause to become ...’, e.g. blacken, straighten.” If there is a term for verbs that mean “make (more) ⟨adjective⟩”, scholarly authors seem to be unaware of it, or studiously avoiding it. --Lambiam 22:49, 22 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I've seen them labelled "causative", but I think of that as a verb derived from another verb, not a verb derived from an adjective. —Rua (mew) 16:39, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Several authors call verbs like blacken and humidify causative verbs, but then they may also classify kill (“make dead”) and set (“make sit”), which are not derived from adjectives, as causative verbs. And other authors use the term for generic verbs like make and let. --Lambiam 22:28, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Kroonen seems to call them "factitive". —Rua (mew) 22:32, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Factitive was the term that came to my mind as well and is what I'd use for the purpose you describe, but Wikipedia redirects factitive to causative so I'm not sure now if they can be differentiated. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 22:36, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
 * In Language Typology and Language Universals (2008, ISBN 3110194260) it is said that "The term factitive used to be employed in nearly the same sense as causative, particularly often to refer to causatives meaning 'make Q' ('make red', 'make angry', etc.). Nowadays it occurs rarely, except perhaps in the French and Semiticist traditions (cf., for instance, a detailed discussion of the causative/factitive distinction in Kouwenberg 1997: 237ff.), although some grammars still use it to denote denominal causatives." In the referred-to Semiticist tradition, I find that e.g. Williams' Hebrew Syntax (2007, ISBN 0802094295) saying that "whereas 'factitive' refers to causing a state, 'causative' refers to causing an action'." (A footnote explains that most stative verbs are intransitive and that some other grammars like "IBHS and JM [...directly] define 'factitive' in terms of the Qal being intransitive", i.e. "he glorified" is given as a factitive verb because it "causes the direct object to enter the state described by that verb in the Qal, [...] 'he was glorious'".) - -sche (discuss) 21:21, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Verbs that end in -ify (e.g. humidify - to make more humid) seem to qualify. SemperBlotto (talk) 06:41, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

 * Is there a particular language that this is in reference to, that has verbs such as these? DTLHS (talk) 18:49, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
 * No, I'm looking for a general term. —Rua (mew) 22:32, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Some authors use the term “causative deadjectival verb” or “deadjectival causative verb”. --Lambiam 20:58, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Entries for Basque combining noun forms with variant forms before vowels
I created an entry for hara(t)- the combining form of the Basque word haragi, "meat". I think I made a mistake by listing the form this way. Should I have split it into two entries, hara-, used when the second element of the compound starts with a consonant (and which can also trigger initial consonant mutations in the second element), and harat-, used when the second element starts with a vowel?

Note: Combining forms that behave this way are very common in this language. This is the only entry I've made for a combining form that acts like this, and only two other entries link to it. I wanted to check here before I created any more. If the hara(t)- entry needs to be deleted, I'd appreciate it if an admin would do that for me. Thanks. Namnagar (talk) 20:38, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

 * A problem with your approach is that users searching for or  will not find the entry. Therefore I think it is better to have two entries, one for each form – which can cross-reference each other as alternative forms, with a usage note on when which form is used. To cater for the unlikely but not impossible contingency that a user searches for, it may be better to make that redirect to  than to delete it altogether. (These are just my personal reflections as an editor, not some kind of official response.)  --Lambiam 21:15, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I think that, in line with our existing practices, they should not cross-reference each other but instead refer to the main lemma. We don't have alternative forms for non-lemmas normally. —Rua (mew) 23:02, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
 * OK. I made a new entry for the Basque combining form . The two entries whose etymologies reference this combining form are and . If this looks OK, I'll use this as a model for other combining forms that behave this way. Thanks to DTLHS for moving my explanation to a "Usage notes" section. (I didn't make an entry for  because I don't know any compounds of  where the second element starts with a vowel or sybilant. That's certainly not true of other Basque combining forms like this, though.) Namnagar (talk) 03:38, 26 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Haratustel? --Lambiam 02:17, 27 January 2019 (UTC)
 * I didn't know that word! OK, I'll add it. Namnagar (talk) 13:05, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Category Cleanup
The following page needs either a thorough cleanup, or a rename. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_words_not_following_the_I_before_E_except_after_C_rule In addition to many articles which are not technically 'English words,' it also includes 'Bloemfontein' which is an Afrikaans city name.
 * This is automatically added by Module:en-headword, but maybe it shouldn't be. "Bloemfontein" has an English entry and is therefore considered to be as English a word as any other by our criteria. DTLHS (talk) 19:09, 28 January 2019 (UTC)
 * Poor Einstein is also in that category. --Lambiam 00:08, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Please add the word "Meulah" as used in this site below.
Some time ago I asked for help determining the English meaning of the Hebrew term "Meulah", as used in this below site.

Meulah Factor

For the life of me I cannot work out how to add the word to the list of new English words on this site. Can anyone please renew the translation of the term (meaning), and also add the term to the English meanings, for future help.

Many thanks.....

OzSanta (Brian Christmas)

How this request came about...
 * You asked back in 2016, and it was explained to you. Please see the entry for the Hebrew word, מעולה. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 06:11, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Wiktionary:Information desk/2019/February

Medieval Latin dictionary
A long time ago I had a collection of bookmarks on my harddrive to various linguistic websites, one of which was a dictionary that was about Medieval Latin and maybe written in French (or Middle French). Somebody on Wiktionary directed me to it years ago, but unfortunately I lost it due to an accident and now I have no idea what it was called.

Can somebody help me retrieve the link? — (((Romanophile))) ♞ (contributions) 23:30, 2 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Already answered on Discord. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 19:06, 3 February 2019 (UTC)
 * (For those who aren't on Discord, this was the answer: http://logeion.uchicago.edu/gens) — Mnemosientje (t · c) 19:19, 3 February 2019 (UTC)
 * We have a discord?! What's the invite? GabeMoore (talk) 16:58, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
 * See Discord server. — surjection ⟨?⟩ 17:04, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Coal not created by lack of fungi, say 4 scientists
Three years ago Stanford scientists published a paper refuting the popular idea that lack of organisms to decompose lignin was responsible for coal deposited during the Carboniferous Period. Three weeks ago I added details and reference citations at the bottom of the appropriate Talk page here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Carboniferous but I'm thinking that nobody has seen it, and may never see it, which is why I mention it here. I suspect the page should be updated to deal with the old/incorrect view and incorporate the new/corrected view but I don't have the expertise to do it. 209.239.1.216 03:00, 3 February 2019 (UTC)

 * This is Wiktionary, not Wikipedia. You could try a general discussion page on Wikipedia rather than the talk page for that specific article. Equinox ◑ 04:14, 3 February 2019 (UTC)
 * An appropriate page for flagging the issue would be . --Lambiam 13:24, 3 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Equinox: D'oh! Thanks, I don't know how that happened. Lambiam: Thanks, I did as you suggested just now. 209.239.1.216 06:38, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Audio Gender
I remember seeing some words having audio for pronunciation by men and women, but have been unable to find an example to use as a basis for replication, so I was wondering, what are the standard practices when it comes to marking the gender of audio? —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 01:37, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I have never noticed such a distinction being made. It would be nice I guess, but in practice we have so few people that record audio that we take what we can get. There's no need to specifically note it on an entry however. DTLHS (talk) 03:39, 11 February 2019 (UTC)

 * I'm not familiar with any language that has different pronunciations for the same word depending on the gender of the speaker (I'm sure there must be some, somewhere), so I don't see the point of marking gender- it's not like the mommy audios and the daddy audios are going to go off and have little baby audios... Seriously, though, it doesn't seem like a good idea. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:49, 11 February 2019 (UTC)
 * The Japanese first-person pronoun 私 has two pronunciations, watakushi (very formal) and watashi (rather formal). The sound difference is not as pronounced (no pun intended) as it may seem: the syllable ku is unstressed and its vowel, already rather indistinct, is unvoiced, so to Western ears the more formal version may sound like watakshi. Until a couple of decades ago, the less formal use of watashi by men would be considered feminine. But a shift has set in, in which younger men – now including the middle-aged – also started to use the watashi pronunciation in circumstances where they would have used watakushi in earlier times. Funny enough, among older women there is a contrary tendency in which they stick to watakushi in formal situations where their male age mates are moving to watashi. --Lambiam 23:55, 11 February 2019 (UTC)

 * That's actually really interesting, thank you for saying something, I would have never known otherwise! If audio files were to exist for each of the different pronunciations spoken by their respective groups, do you think it would make sense to note that the speaker for the file is a member of that group? Conversely, if one person who was not part of all the relevant groups were to do audio pronunciation files each of the pronunciations would it male sense to note that? If notes where added, what way would it make the most sense to include the note? —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 04:29, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * These are a lot of good questions that I have not thought about and have no ready answers to. In sociolinguistics several gender-related issues are studied (see e.g. on Wikipedia the articles and  and the article section ). Gender-related differences are often subtle and may become only detectable (statistically significant) with larger sample sizes, so it may not be possible to describe them succinctly.  --Lambiam 11:32, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Now I really want to record a baby saying some words... :P (Also... I guess if one considers some of the things in Category:Women's speech terms by language and their counterpart inflected/variant forms, etc in men's speech to be the same words, like ypék and nypék, they have gender-specific pronunciations...) - -sche (discuss) 04:57, 11 February 2019 (UTC)

 * I'm odviously no expert, but I would consider those to be gender-specific words rather than gender-specific pronunciations.—The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 06:11, 11 February 2019 (UTC)

 * What about differences in phonology? —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 03:42, 12 February 2019 (UTC)

 * Okay, thanks! —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 04:14, 11 February 2019 (UTC)

 * I think this is a really interesting issue. Ideally we would tag pronunciations in whatever kind of way, it might be age, locale, gender, etc. but it opens 50 cans of worms: the whole current gender thing where people are whatever they decide to be (not perfect for linguistics where we might want to know about the shape of their vocal tract), and all the politics of whether a Serbian speaker is Croatian and god knows what. I do think this is stuff we should care about. On the other hand I suspect that when we finally make it cheap and easy to record voice samples, the early brave pioneers will be deleted in hours. Perhaps we should wait for the tech to catch up with the politics, huh. Equinox ◑ 13:57, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

Spanish parts-of-speech
Hi, Thanks for the Bilingual Dictionaries for Offline Use!

Is there a list of what the part-of-speech tag abbreviations mean for the Spanish-English entries? Below is the set of the abbreviations.

set(['art'	 'suffix'	 'vi'	 'affix'	 'vp'	 'vr'	 'num'	 'vt'	 'interj'	 'phrase'	 'conj'	 'adv'	 'vit'	 'vitr'	 'vtp'	 'vti'	 'prop'	 'pron'	 'vtr'	 'vtir'	 'initialism'	 'adj'	 'prep'	 'fp'	 'vrt'	 'acronym'	 'symbol'	 'abbr'	 'letter'	 'proverb'	 'contraction'	 'vir'	 'mf'	 'vtrp'	 'determiner'	 'particle'	 'f'	 'm'	 'prefix'	 'n'	 'mp'	 'v'])
 * Those dictionaries are a project by rather than part of the dictionary proper. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 22:01, 11 February 2019 (UTC)

OK, thanks. How do I contact him to decode the list?

Reusing audio of homophones
Currently lute has audio pronunciation files but loot does not, is it allowable to or is there policy surrounding reusing the audio file for lute on loot's page? —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 02:03, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I can’t think of a rule against it, but I suggest that you then copy File:En-US pronunciation of "lute".ogg to File:En-US pronunciation of "loot".ogg (with, of course, proper acknowledgement of its provenance) and link to that copy. --Lambiam 14:10, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Why do you suggest that the audio be copyed? —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 04:20, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm against it. You don't know (and possibly won't even notice) if words are homophones in one dialect of English but not in another. When the word was recorded the speaker was specifically intending to produce the sounds for that word and not another. "Homophone" is an incredibly loose term. DTLHS (talk) 16:05, 12 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I assume that TEA is competent to judge if the sound of that file presents an apt US pronunciation of lute. Moreover, I assumed that they exercised that judgement before posing this question here. --Lambiam 00:12, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * "Competence" has nothing to do with it. Speakers of one dialect of a language can have sound changes that are imperceptible to other speakers. DTLHS (talk) 00:40, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Would equal IPA transcriptions be enough to justify reuse? —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 04:20, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Definitely not. Two words can have the same phonemic transcriptions, but that doesn't mean they will have the same by two different speakers. IPA transcriptions are an abstraction. DTLHS (talk) 04:31, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm not completely sure I understand what you mean by realization in this context, but I think what it means is the actual sonic audio produced by a two speaker may be subtly different, in comparision to their IPA transcriptions which are tbe same because, as you said, IPA is an abstraction and involves broad-ish categories and information loss, and because of this possible difference the audio should not be reused? —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 04:47, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * That's basically my point, yes. Others may disagree. But also basically I don't think we are in such desperate need of audio that we have to reuse files on multiple pages. Others may disagree. DTLHS (talk) 04:53, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

 * Fair enough. I'll probably record the audio at some point. —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 05:19, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

Where is Wiktionary stated to be descriptionist?
I often hear that people that Wiktionary is deacriptionist, but I can't seem to find the policy article that says so, can someone tell which policy does? —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 04:17, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Probably WT:CFI. DTLHS (talk) 04:28, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

 * I don't find the word descriptionist nor prescriptionist on the page. —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 04:36, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
 * You'll have to read between the lines. Saying "We are descriptionist" is not a useful policy statement on its own. DTLHS (talk) 04:38, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

 * Fair enough, I guess the part about attestment is the most relevant. Thanks! —The Editor's Apprentice (Talk•Edits) 04:49, 13 February 2019 (UTC)

Obsolete local units
Is there any convention regarding entries such as the pair / and whether they are considered sums of parts? Local units of the type L U are basically bound to have a value somewhere around the range of U and would have been used in locale L, even though the specific quantity cannot be inferred from the name. ←₰-→ Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  14:51, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
 * The obsolescence of such units should not enter into the considerations. For the one might equally argue that it is SOP since it is a unit with a length around a mile used in a nautical context. And why should it matter that we are dealing with units?  is SOP because it is a kind of numeral used by the Romans. The point is not that the specific quantity cannot be inferred from the name, but that the term has a specific meaning that cannot be inferred from the name. For example, I think it is defensible to include an entry  even though we have only informed guesses about the specific quantity; nevertheless, the term has a specific meaning and is attestable.  --Lambiam 10:58, 16 February 2019 (UTC)

Corazón / corazoncito
I left this message about the diminutive of Spanish "corazón". Regards. --188.76.240.193 19:40, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
 * We don't include diminutives in the headword line for Spanish, unlike Polish. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 20:12, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
 * ¿? Not sure why; especially in cases like this, which contains a connecting -c-. Sad, anyway. Regards. --188.76.240.193 03:02, 19 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I see there's a link in corazoncito to corazón. Why not, at least, a link somewhere in corazón to corazoncito? Not sure how to do it and, after the previous comment, if it would be reverted; so I'll just comment. Regards. --188.76.240.193 03:08, 19 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I added it as a derived term. I believe the reason we do not link them as we do in Polish is because they are completely predictable. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 03:41, 19 February 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks a lot, Μετάknowledge! Kind regards. --188.76.240.193 11:53, 21 February 2019 (UTC)

Tag questions in other languages
Some languages have a generic word or particle that makes a statement into a yes/no question, a bit like 'innit' in London English or est-ce que in French. Is there a way to find these using Wiktionary? For example I know there's a Persian one but I forgot it. Vices Theme (talk) 16:38, 23 February 2019 (UTC)
 * You mean, the sole inhabitant of Category:Persian interrogative particles? --Lambiam 22:49, 23 February 2019 (UTC)

Having Difficulty with an Entry
We're new here and currently without a term to describe a class of objects for which a Wiktionary term currently exists pertaining to a specific application of the term. Our secondary entry hoped to shed light on both the class of object in addition to the term itself which under the existing description while suitable to the application, may fail to do justice to the term.

Our entry was left for verification and subsequently removed entirely which may make little difference to our use of the term but may be of greater concern to those aiming to uphold the standards of the platform since the current Wiktionary entry may be questionable.

Thank you for your attention in this matter. /UFC (see Metacube)
 * You made up a meaning for the word. Wiktionary does not host things that you just make up one day; they have to follow our criteria for inclusion. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 04:39, 1 March 2019 (UTC)


text:
Wiktionary:Information desk/2019/March

About the pronunciation of Japanese "kumo"
I'm curious about these two Japanese words:

My questions:

 * Are they pronounced exactly the same?
 * The pronunciation section of both entries already has the same IPA, so it looks like the answer is "yes". I'm just checking.
 * Are these words likely to be confused with each other if the context doesn't help?
 * Suppose someone says a sentence along these lines in Japanese: "Please draw a 'kumo' for me." I'd like to know if it would be likely to sound ambiguous.

Thanks in advance. --Daniel Carrero (talk) 13:54, 2 March 2019 (UTC)
 * This Reddit thread includes (besides a bunch of unhelpful stuff) evidence that Japanese speakers would just say sora no kumo (and presumably mushi no kumo) to disambiguate if the interlocutor didn't understand by context alone. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 14:40, 2 March 2019 (UTC)
 * My dictionary (Kenkyusha pocket) also gives the same tonal pattern (a downstep in pitch) for both. --Lambiam 16:27, 2 March 2019 (UTC)
 * In the standard Japanese accent, both of them are pronounced as /kúmò/, but in the Kansai dialect, 雲 /kúmò/ and 蜘蛛 /kùmô/ respectively. Those are one of the rare exceptional minimal pairs not following the rules of correspondence between the dialects in Tokyo and the Kansai region.--荒巻モロゾフ (talk) 16:27, 6 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Could you please add the Kansai to these two entries? —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 21:21, 6 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I would very much like to add them, but is totally messed up for expressing Japanese dialectal phonological structures. It can't express accent system of Kansai dialect (there are fall and rise accents and no voiceless vowels in Kansai dialect) and can't handle the difference of the vowel and consonant between Japanese dialects (Western Japanese /u/ is not [ɯ] like Tokyo dialect, but [u]). We should change the template.--荒巻モロゾフ (talk) 15:07, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

How to give definitions for prefixes
I'm working on uploading a lot of Tocharian B words, many of which are prefixed with. The issue is, that particular prefix appears to have two uses, both as an intensifier and a negator, which are largely opposites. I was going to use the || used for definitions, but the usage of the prefix is different from the definition, so I feel it wouldn't fit there. How would I specify the usage of the prefix?

Here's an example of what I'm talking about:. The e(n)- prefix is used as an intensifier here, but I have no way of neatly denoting that as opposed to the negator usage. GabeMoore (talk) 17:07, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
 * I assume that this is about the template affix. You could use . --Lambiam 18:00, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

 * You should use the "id" parameter, as in . DTLHS (talk) 18:03, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Doing that didn't change anything. What I'm looking for is a way to show the meaning of the prefix right after it is written. For example: Latin.
 * (This is kind of difficult to explain via writing, so bear with me.) GabeMoore (talk) 18:47, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
 * You can see all the parameters and their documentation at Template:affix. DTLHS (talk) 19:56, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
 * The best I can do with the template in its current form is . However, that produces a gloss that looks like (“a negating prefix”); I think we’d like to see (a negating prefix) in italics, instead of between quote signs. --Lambiam 21:21, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
 * You shouldn't use section links inside terms like that. Sections may change as entries change, so they are not reliable. Moreover, they only link to the first section with that name on the page, which may change as well. —Rua (mew) 22:28, 5 March 2019 (UTC)
 * To display a non-gloss definition, what I usually do is use a  parameter. For instance, in, . — Eru·tuon 21:46, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

Modern translations
One of the quotations for bedlock is from Goethe, who was of course an 18th Century poet, but the date of the text it is taken from (a modern translation) is 2005. But this implies the original quotation is from 2005. Is this intentional? Is this dating issue a common problem with translations and other secondary reference texts that quotations are taken from? --185.61.90.64 12:13, 5 March 2019 (UTC)
 * The year is fine, but what was not fine in this quotation is giving Goethe as the author, instead of the translator. ✅ I have modified the attribution in the quotation. --Lambiam 22:24, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

Period (full stop) inside IPA string
So I was looking at the entries for demon and daemon and came to believe they were (probably) pronounced the same. The problem is that the IPA string in the two entries differ in that there seems to be a period in one and not the other. Demon has and the other has. Is one of these in error? If so, which? If both are okay, why do they differ, etc.? Thanks. --R. S. Shaw (talk) 19:36, 6 March 2019 (UTC)
 * It's a syllable break, and not always marked. See International Phonetic Alphabet or International Phonetic Alphabet. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 21:19, 6 March 2019 (UTC)

Designing Wiktionary Task for Students
Hello!

I am teaching Lexicography to junior university students this semester. What are ways I can incorporate Wiktionary in the syllabus? I am thinking of getting the students on board by designing a project task in which the students add words/translations to Wiktionary. The students native language is Arabic and they are majoring in translation between Arabic and English. So far, the students have good knowledge of the types of dictionaries, the macro- and micro-structures, and the best practices in writing definitions. I think this could potentially be a real asset to Wiktionary and to the students. Your opinions and ideas are highly appreciated.--Reem Al-Kashif (talk) 16:10, 9 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Hello. Off the top of my head, given the topic your students are majoring in, I think the most valuable contributions your students can make is correcting or adding Arabic terms at the English Wiktionary, and likewise for English terms at the Arabic Wiktionary. I don’t know anything about the situation at the Arabic Wiktionary, so the following applies mainly to the English Wiktionary. I assume all student contributions will be supervised and checked – at Wikipedia they have had some bad experiences with student projects that in the end cost the regular editors more pain, effort and time than it was worth.
 * For starters, the students should be well aware of (1) our criteria for inclusion, (2) our formatting conventions for entries (for beginners it helps to look at analogous existing entries and follow the format found there, but this should never be done blindly), and (3) our conventions that are specific to Arabic. They should study these and discuss what they do not immediately find clear until they are reasonably comfortable with these rules. If done right, this will save them a lot of wasted effort and us a lot of tears.
 * I assume that the students know, or are savvy enough to check if they are not sure, when a term or expression is specifically Egyptian Arabic. We welcome Egyptian Arabic entries, but they should be marked with the language code arz instead of the code ar for general Arabic.
 * Here are two lists of known tasks specific for Arabic:
 * Requests for verification in Arabic entries (only a few requests).
 * Requested entries (quite a few; giving some consideration to which terms are the most important ones may be helpful).
 * You can try to enlist the assistance of some of the editors who are native Arabic speakers – but I cannot speak for them; several of the editors on that list are not currently active or may have only very limited time available.
 * I hope that others will add their ideas and comments. Best of luck. --Lambiam 21:17, 9 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Did you mean "Wiktionary" rather than "Wikipedia" in that first paragraph? Andrew Sheedy (talk) 19:41, 10 March 2019 (UTC)
 * D’oh! Yes, of course. Corrected. Thanks. --Lambiam 20:00, 10 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Well if they are majoring in translation, Category:Requests for translations into Arabic and Category:Requests for review of Arabic translations and English translation tables in general would be an appropriate puzzle for them, I guess. Otherwise people are only occasionally eager to add many technical terms. On the other hand they can just create well-defined entries with well-found usage examples or quotes from occasional literature they read. Regard an entry like . It is a super-basic word but one has to define well and give proper usages examples to get over all the nuances, which also means one needs to have a proper capability of abstraction to group senses; the cherries on top are quotes from all kinds of texts.
 * No one in the category “editors who are native speakers of Arabic” has been active in Arabic the last two years. Aspiring editors just have to see to use correct formatting and make nothing unreasonable. There are some other editors that know how it should look like and will look onto occurring edits here and there so no misfits are maintained. Fay Freak (talk) 00:45, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Looking at Category:Arabic terms with quotations could be interesting: what makes a good quotation? Category:Arabic usage examples with the translation missing could also be relevant. —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 09:10, 13 March 2019 (UTC)

Bullets in etymology
Several entries, like abdominothoracic, have bullets before the etymology, but many don’t. Several entries of words with multiple possible etymologies have bullets for each possible etymology, but many don’t. What exactly is the consensus for such formatting? Tamınɢsari ( 談話)  09:01, 13 March 2019 (UTC)
 * If there is just a single etymology, as for, putting a bullet in front serves no purpose. If there are several possible etymologies, I’d rather see a treatment in running sentences, like e.g. for and , which makes it easier to express judgements regarding plausibility (if warranted), like seen at . So then also no bullets are needed.  --Lambiam 17:31, 13 March 2019 (UTC)

 * I think the bullets can be visually useful where there are multiple unrelated ety theories. Equinox ◑ 01:13, 14 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Even then I prefer an unbulleted intro to the bulleted list, even if it just says:
 * Unknown. There are several, unrelated theories:
 * a calque of ;
 * by metathesis from ;
 * a wordplay on the name -.
 * --Lambiam 09:58, 14 March 2019 (UTC)

adding columns to tables
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Help:Wikitext_quick_reference#Images,_tables,_video,_and_sounds

This does not explain how one can add a blank column to a table. I don't have time to add hundreds of "||" to each line.

Ref. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:List_of_German_cognates_with_English

Thanks.

--77.189.46.111 16:09, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

Is there a way to easily list new words?
I can see how to list recent edits and so on, but what I'd really like to do is just find (for example) English words or phrases added to Wiktionary in the last year. Even better might be some way to know that the word is actually a new word rather than an old word that has taken a while to get into Wiktionary but I expect that is impossible (I guess there are other places on the web to find such lists?). Basically I'd like to keep abreast of new words (perhaps also new meanings to old words, so long as they aren't only found in some small group's jargon/slang). Any thoughts how to do something like this? Thanks, Maitchy (talk) 22:32, 27 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Special:NewPages. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 01:02, 28 March 2019 (UTC)
 * It sounds like that's definitely not what Maitchy is looking for. Category:Hot words is probably a better bet. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 03:43, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

Yes, solved - Hot words was exactly what I was after. Thank you heaps! Maitchy (talk) 03:54, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

 * Note that new coinages don't have to go into "hot words". We usually do that if the word doesn't meet our usual attestation standards yet (see WT:CFI) but we are confident it will do so later. Equinox ◑ 19:11, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

You can get new English lemmas with the following code:

 category            = English lemmas count               = 50 order               = descending addfirstcategorydate = true

DTLHS (talk) 03:55, 28 March 2019 (UTC)

brazen copyright infringement
The entry foist has been an exact copy of https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/foist since its creation 13 years ago. Since this easily detectable copyright infringement wasn't noticed despite about 100 edits by at least 30 different editors, including edits by well-known editors and many edits by bots, it seems we need an automated detection process. --Espoo (talk) 15:02, 30 March 2019 (UTC)
 * "easily detectable" is very different than "easily verifiable" (see NP), if you have suggestions for how to reasonably detect copyright infringement without the assistance of the publishers of all of the various dictionaries which may be infringed, please elaborate. This does seem like one which ought to have been caught, but after the first few modifications it becomes increasingly difficult to tell which edits were good-faith and which were not. - TheDaveRoss  15:42, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

title: Wiktionary:Information desk/2019/March


text:
Wiktionary:Information desk/2019/April

ads blocked by AdBlock
Hi,

The above page has been blocked by adblock - This was discussed on the #wikimedia-tech IRC Channel (see https://wm-bot.wmflabs.org/logs/%23wikimedia-tech/20190404.txt). Adblock have also been made aware via https://help.getadblock.com/support/tickets/62765.

Pinging who was invloved in the discussion

Thanks, RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 13:50, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * uBlock Origin seems to block it too by setting  to whatever is a top display element, which hides all of the page. Chrome calls it an "injected stylesheet" in the Developer Console. It seems to be caused by EasyList rules, and based on those, it should also happen to advert and ad, and indeed the former is blocked, while bizarrely enough the latter is not. — surjection ⟨?⟩ 14:02, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Confirming the above is same for me. RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 14:03, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * - https://github.com/easylist/easylist/issues/3188 filed. RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 14:21, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * ✅ RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 14:49, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Whitelisted by whom? Adblock? I still see an all-white page, also after clearing the cache. The source is fine. Neither can I edit the page; https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=ads&action=edit shows an equally blank page. --Lambiam 18:15, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

I've asked for action to be taken to prevent a simmilar issue in future affecting any wiki at https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikitech-l/2019-April/091887.html RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 16:29, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

Why would anyone using AdBlock (Plus)/uOrigin/Privacy Badger/etc. run them on WMF sites? I have them all whitelisted on all my ad blockers. I guess that's a bit rhetorical: another way to put it is that I recommend whitelisting. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 19:11, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * People who just pass every so often might not think to. RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 19:40, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

I'm going to start a incident report at some point. RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 21:16, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Incident report @ https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Tech/20190404-Adblock-issue RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 21:34, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

 * FWIW this is a known issue and has come up often enough that I documented it in the WT:FAQ/Help:FAQ a while ago; I just expanded the Q a bit to also cover "ads". The issue seems to be something for the adblockers to fix, not us. - -sche (discuss) 01:59, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

, Part of the response to this will prevent future incidents involving and blockers. Wiktionary is already whitelisted so should face no further issues. RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 06:10, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
 * FWIW (regarding this being due to a "rule matching the pages on the 4th September 2018"), this issue or a similar one has been reported since at least 2014/2015, so there may be more to fix. - -sche (discuss) 07:22, 5 April 2019 (UTC)
 * , All Wiktionary domains are whitelisted against all rules on easylist not just that specific one. RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 11:00, 5 April 2019 (UTC)

Reference Tooltips
I find the reference tooltips option on Wikipedia much more convenient than clicking back and forth to the citations list, on articles with many inline citations. After a bit of clicking back and forth in a Wiktionary article, I went to adjust my Wiktionary preferences to enable the option, and haven't found it. Is there not some way I may use reference tooltips on Wiktionary? Phillip Alan Gulley (talk) 02:20, 6 April 2019 (UTC)
 * , The files are missing on Wiktionary. It could be added but we'd need a user with the permission to edit the MediaWiki area. I'll try to raise it on IRC as well. RhinosF1 (Public) (talk) 07:41, 6 April 2019 (UTC)

ndołkah
How do I format the pronunciation of ndołkah for the IPA?Ndołkah (talk) 18:32, 6 April 2019 (UTC)
 * You would use . I removed the pronunciation you gave, because it didn't seem to be IPA, but rather some kind of other transcription. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 01:21, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
 * it was ipa, ipa for western apacheNdołkah (talk) 17:39, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
 * No, it wasn't. If you don't know IPA, you shouldn't add it. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 18:33, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
 * For the benefit of those who haven't looked at the edit history, the alleged IPA is "ndołkʰh". Apparently Western Apache has prenasalized consonants, and "nd" is one way to represent that. I'm skeptical, though, about "h" directly following "kʰ" without an intervening vowel. There are some languages, such as Persian, that have "h" after vowels, but I've never seen a language with syllabic "h", and it seems even stranger to have it following an aspirated consonant, since "h" is itself pure aspiration. Still, I'm not an expert on phonology, so it's possible I'm missing something. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:48, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * In the spelling of Western Apache lemmas we use ⟨ł⟩ (e.g. ł óg), ⟨ɫ⟩ (e.g.  ɫ igai), and ⟨ɬ⟩ (e.g. ika ɬ ), next to a plain ⟨l⟩, as in diʼi l . Are these all meant to be different letters? The Omniglot site recognizes only ⟨l⟩ and ⟨ł⟩, the latter representing .  --Lambiam 23:17, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I think   ɫ    is a mistake for    ł    : note . The difference is fairly subtle, and it's easy to miss if you don't know to look for it. The pronunciation is quite different, though: the first one is a velarized voiced lateral approximant, as in the Polish dark l, and the other one is a voiceless lateral fricative, as in Welsh ll. Now that you mention it, the "IPA" discussed above does use the orthographic    ł    rather than the phonetic    ɬ   , which is a definite problem. Chuck Entz (talk) 04:24, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I've moved those two to the correct orthography., did you create any other Western Apache entries with nonstandard orthographies? —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 05:04, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * We still have aɬdóʼ, aɬkʼidą́ʼ, bijatɬane, ditɬid, diɫhiɫ, Dziɫtʼaadn, dzitɫ ndeʼyú, hishtɫish, iɬdíʼgee, ɫibaa, nadzeeɫ, naʼitɬʼíígí, tsinaʼeeɫí, tsʼaaɫ, tudiɫhiɫi, yiʼaaɫ, and yídiɫig. --Lambiam 09:18, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I've moved all of those., would you mind finding the remaining Western Apache entries you created with "someone who..." definitions? It seems that they should all be verbs, and you were confused by the lemma form for Western Apache, which is 3rd pers. sing. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 05:34, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Anything that shows up in this search should be looked over or deleted. I made them when I was fairly new to Wiktionary. They are not quality entries and I don't know anything about Western Apache; I just copied a wordlist. Anyways, the correct orthography can be found here:, which is from this study if you want a direct source. I'd rather an admin make moves because it doesn't leave a redirect, but I can provide a list if needed. For the corrections,  and   should be substituted with   and   respectively. I also found a bunch of vowels that have diacritics other than the ogonek. I don't know if this is wrong or just an alternate orthography. Julia ☺  ☆ 17:46, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, looking through the word lists in several languages, I see a good number that are in sort of a quasi-phonetic shorthand, so I wouldn't use those a guide for spelling. As for diacritics, the acute accent is used to mark high tone in Western Apache. Chuck Entz (talk) 05:10, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

 * I based it on what i found hereNdołkah (talk) 05:19, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Since ł is not one of the IPA symbols, that guide is incorrect. --Lambiam 21:28, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * maybe they didn't gave a way of inputting it on their device?Ndołkah (talk) 01:24, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Entering  in the HTML source would have done the trick.  --Lambiam 07:23, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

Construction of adjective without noun
In English, when you have a noun phrase that includes a adjective, but you want to leave out the noun, you have to replace it with, e.g. or. In other languages, you are often able to leave out the noun altogether and don't need something else in its place. The adjective then takes on the role of a noun to some degree, but there is still the implication that a noun belongs there, you just didn't specify it (to avoid repeating yourself or whatever). What is such a construction called? It's not, which is a derivational process that converts other words into nouns. In the case I am describing, the adjectives remain adjectives, the noun they modify has just gone missing. —Rua (mew) 17:19, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * metonymy? DTLHS (talk) 17:21, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * ellipsis? pronominalization? (I think Talk:le_mien has dealt a bit with this issue; see Wikitiki's posts) Chignon – Пучок 17:52, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

 * When a German says “” – which was a nickname for Chancellor Konrad Adenauer and also for a police detective in a popular German Krimi series – I don’t think they feel a noun was omitted. The common term for turning an adjective like into the noun  is nominalization; I do not see what makes you (Rua) think this is not covered by the term.  --Lambiam 20:25, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * It is clearly not nominalization, because the noun is still implied, just elided, as I said before. For more detail, I'm asking what is the proper term for the West Frisian adjective form described here. I want to include it in an inflection table, but that requires having a term to put in a table header cell. —Rua (mew) 20:35, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Do you have any evidence that a noun is implied, or is just your feeling it is? Is a noun implied in the sentence “the rich are getting richer by the day”? I can invent some noun, like “bastards”, to follow the word “rich”, but I don’t think there is a gap left by an omitted noun to put it in. --Lambiam 21:32, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Based on your Taalportaal link, maybe just label the cell "with nominal ellipsis", "with elided noun" or "with noun elided"? FWIW, I think you can also do this in English without "one", like: John Alessio, Social Problems and Inequality (2013, ISBN 1409494586): "Citizens [...] might entertain the dilemma of which of the two pills they want: the red or the blue." (I expect "...a red or a blue." is also possible, but searching is difficult.) I poked through and didn't spot anything particularly helpful. [//books.google.com/books?id=bjW0CTVXCFsC&pg=PA157 This book] refers to "stand-alone adjectives" in Hebrew where a noun can be inferred or implied. I also checked if it might be called "pseudo-nominalization" but apparently not: [//books.google.com/books?id=Du_uKN1yAqwC&pg=PA135&dq=%22pseudo-nominalization%22&hl=&cd=1&source=gbs_api#v=onepage&q=%22pseudo-nominalization%22&f=false this book] uses that word for "the red" (presumably as in "the red of her car is different from his" or something), and [//books.google.com/books?id=yEGmEGrA-w4C&pg=PA71&dq=%22pseudonominalization%22&hl=&cd=1&source=gbs_api#v=onepage&q=%22pseudonominalization%22&f=false this book] uses it for things like "das Ich" and "un autre moi". - -sche (discuss) 21:11, 8 April 2019 (UTC)

mit
Is used colloquially in England for hand but doesn't appear in Wiktionary.

 * We have it. It's spelled mitt. Equinox ◑ 08:01, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Automated references?
I'm trying to figure out how to reference a new dictionary. I see that major languages like Arabic have a code set up that references a common dictionary or glossary. I have virtually everything that's ever been published on Gulf Arabic, including a dictionary with about 8000 entries. Is there a way that I can set up a reference page for Gulf Arabic?

MarkDShockley (talk) 12:12, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

 * You can create your own templates. Look at Category:Arabic reference templates how such templates are coded, and you add your template under a convenient name, Template:R:afb:blabla. It is easy. (If there is something complicated in the templates, it is mostly because the template also links to online scans by page name.) Fay Freak (talk) 14:16, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

Pronunciation of
Is really pronounced as ? All sources I can find (which however appear to copy each other) suggest that the pair ⟨sh⟩ is pronounced like in English, that is, like, while is the realization of ⟨ch⟩. --Lambiam 13:47, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Doubtful; I've removed it., I've told you a few times now, you really have to stop adding IPA to entries that you're just copying from an unreliable source when you don't actually know any IPA. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 14:37, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I know IPA just fine sh is ʃ and ch is tʃ I made a mistake, I am moving slowly. I just wanted to include the Ndee biyátiʼ alphabet in here. I know how to say it in person just not in perfect IPA because the chart I used was wrong that's all.Ndołkah (talk) 07:20, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
 * – I believe it is better to use the “broad” (phonemic) notation than the “narrow” (phonetic) notation . The latter should be reserved for pronunciation nuances differentiating for instance Tonto from White Mountain.  --Lambiam 22:02, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
 * what's this? Please explain!Ndołkah (talk) 00:34, 17 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Study the article on Wikipedia, in particular the section . See also the article  on Wikipedia, in particular the section .  --Lambiam 07:46, 17 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm just using the table available on the article on Wikipedia I don't know how much more simple I can make it!2600:1700:94A0:2720:81B0:7554:65A3:F6A9 04:39, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

Abuse filter...
"This action has been automatically identified as harmful, and therefore disallowed.

If you believe your action was constructive, please inform an administrator of what you were trying to do. A brief description of the abuse rule which your action matched is: strips L3"

I was trying to edit 僵屍 until I tripped an abuse filter because many of the soft redirects do not have a level 3 (part of speech) header. So I made a workaround.

The abuse filter above does not apply to autopatrolled users (whitelist), so I have to wait for someone else until I am nominated as one. Eyesnore (talk) 21:34, 18 April 2019 (UTC)

"Requests for creation"?
I'm hardly a newbie, obviously (going to have been here for almost a decade soon), but where exactly ought I to go to discuss the potential creation of an entry?

I could hypothetically just go and create the entry that I wish to discuss the possibility of creating, but I really would rather not create an entry just for it to get RfDed fairly swiftly due to a lack of good attestations.

I've already found one possible citation for the phrase that I am suggesting have an entry, and perhaps I am being overly cautious and ought to just be bold and create the entry already. Nevertheless, even if in this case I am just being over-chary, it would still be good to know where to bring questionable entry suggestions in the future.

Would I take something like this to Requests for verification, perhaps? Tharthan (talk) 16:12, 19 April 2019 (UTC)
 * You may simply create a citations page with your citation. If you would like the page to be RFV'd you should create a full entry first. DTLHS (talk) 16:21, 19 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Done. Tharthan (talk) 20:05, 19 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Our rules are such that you don’t have to leap through hoops in order to create new entries, nor need you fear swift removal of your creations (unless patent nonsense or suchlike); they would need to go through rfv first. When torn by doubt concerning a potential entry, the Tea room would seem to be a cosy place for a friendly chat. --Lambiam 09:55, 21 April 2019 (UTC)

 * Yes, Tea Room! It's intended for discussing specific entries. Doesn't matter if they haven't been created yet. Equinox ◑ 23:50, 21 April 2019 (UTC)

genty
Is that quote of Burns really dialectal English, or is it Scots? --Xx Adeliza xX (talk) 07:23, 20 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I think it is Scottish English. --Lambiam 09:47, 21 April 2019 (UTC)

tako̱lo lakna'
I want to contribute more Chickasaw but the letter o (an o with a macron beneath it does not seem it exist here, how can I add the color orange then tak o lo lakna'?Ndołkah (talk) 05:09, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

 * Use, as found at Chickasaw language. It uses o + the "macron below" character, instead of HTML formatting. —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 05:12, 27 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Thankies, I had tried that but had thought it was going under the LNdołkah (talk) 05:16, 27 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Some fonts don't handle "strange" characters very well, sadly. It appears correctly in fonts like . —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 05:20, 27 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I see thankies.Ndołkah (talk) 06:53, 27 April 2019 (UTC)

reset "always translate this page" option
I went to Wiktionary home page: https://www.wiktionary.org/

Then I clicked on the Pycckiy (Russian language) button) which took me to here--https://ru.wiktionary.org/

On this page I opened the Translation options box and clicked on Always translate this page.

This was the beginning of my nightmare, for now I can never see any Russian page in Russian any more. How do I reset the always translate into English option? I tried every way I could think of to reset it, but nothing works, not even restarting my computer.

But what I really, really want to do, however, is to be able to move through all the Russian word entries in Russian alphabetic order (starting with a and going sequentially until I get to я, the last letter of the Russian alphabet. I was able to do this before I clicked on Always translate this page.  Now I can no longer find this index to all Russian language entries in ru.wiktionary.

I have searched all the help info I can find, and I cannot find any way to ask a question of anyone at Wikimedia except through the above email address.

I am a frequent donor (ca. $100/year for many years) and a frequent editor of Wikipedia and Wiktionary pages.

I am not sure that I am sending this request to the right people within Wikimedia, but I cannot find any way to ask any kind of question of anyone in Wikimedia except this method. Please forward this question to someone who can answer it if you are unable to answer it.

Thank you very much.

Bill Fairchild

Franklin, TN, USA

 * Isn't "always translate this page" a Google Chrome browser option, rather than part of wiki pages? Have you tried the Chrome settings in Chrome's menu (top-right of screen)? Equinox ◑ 21:46, 27 April 2019 (UTC)
 * The Chrome setting is on a language-by-language base. This Google support web page presents instructions for undoing “always translate“ in Chrome, but only for the Chrome app on an iPhone or iPad. On Chrome under macOS, when opening a page in a random language, I see a pop-up near the top that says “Translate this page? [Options] [Translate]”. The [Options] button gives rise to a dropdown menu with an option “Change Languages”. Clicking this, you get a box “Options / Page language: [    ] / Translation language: [    ] / [ ] Always Translate / [Translate] [Cancel]”. Selecting “Russian” for the page language, making sure the Always Translate button is unchecked and clicking [Translate] should undo a prior Always Translate.  --Lambiam 11:03, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

Sorry for the delayed feedback. Your response looks likely to be what I need to do. I'll try it out and get back to you with my results in a few more days. IMHO, I greatly dislike a software product (e.g., Chrome) that encapsulates another software product (e.g., Wiktionary) and changes the appearance of displays produced by the inner product silently, automatically, "helpfully", and with apparently no warning that it is doing so or info on how to undo the outer product's "helpfulness". This is not the only reason why I dislike Chrome. Grrrr...

Copyright
Today I have created the page durchleuchten, as one of the first of mine, and I have taken pretty much all English translations from my dictionary of choice Langenscheidt. I have quoted in a Sources section, which I think I have never seen used before. This led me to the question "Can we just copy from other dictionaries?". On the one hand, it could be considered compiling info from all sources, so that it is easily available on one website, on the other hand, those translations are still someone's mental property. The info page on Copyright talks about fair use but I have a feeling that is rather about quoting from authors or something. Can you help me? Anatol Rath (talk) 19:45, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Good question. Generally, no we cannot just copy and paste from other dictionaries (the big exceptions being others with a free license or those in the public domain); their content will be protected by copyright. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 20:26, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
 * That being said, I think it's probably fine to include information that two unrelated dictionaries have in common. Reduplicating translations is unavoidable, but it's best to include only what you can find in more than one source. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 00:17, 29 April 2019 (UTC)

How do I automatically add pages to a category?
It may seem like a newbie question, but I've never done such a thing in a wiki. I'm currently compiling the Category:English hybridisms and there are many pages that still need to be included. However, editing every single page, adding the code and saving is pretty tiresome. Is there a faster way to do this, perhaps with bots, scripts or something? - Alumnum (talk) 21:13, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, you could probably write a script to do it if you have an algorithm that can determine when a word is a "hybridism". DTLHS (talk) 21:20, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * BTW, I think "(etymological) hybrid" may be a more common word for these than "hybridism". Equinox ◑ 21:22, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I'm looking for a more simple tool, like one that could add a page to a category with one click (instead of having to open, edit and save the page) or categorize all pages in a written list. Is there anything like this? - Alumnum (talk) 22:49, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * DTLHS (talk) 22:52, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I'm gonna take a look on that. - Alumnum (talk) 23:39, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Since the term "hybridism" is defined as anything with different origins, I'm assuming that any term inherited from Middle English plus any term not inherited from Middle English already qualifies? That's an extremely broad category. I've added to demonstrate. —Rua (mew) 23:00, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I think the term refers to individual only. Phrases would indeed make the category extremely broad. - Alumnum (talk) 23:39, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I don't consider a phrase, but a simple noun-noun compound. —Rua (mew) 23:42, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
 * But it's still two separate words. At least according to the Wikipedia article it is limited to words. There is, though. - Alumnum (talk) 00:00, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Orthography has nothing to do with words. DTLHS (talk) 03:41, 30 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I wouldn‘t consider a hybrid, since it was formed as an English compound from English  + English . That these two English words have etymological origins in different languages is in my opinion not sufficient to warrant the “hybrid” label. For that, a word needs to have been forged from components taken from different languages at the time of coinage. Otherwise there is no end to it; for example,  goes back on  + . But  is an etymological hybrid, from the English calque  + a loan from .  --Lambiam 14:19, 30 April 2019 (UTC)

title: Wiktionary:Information desk/2019/April