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Wiktionary:Information desk/2020/January

Split Hebrew entries into Modern Hebrew and Biblical Hebrew
Hi all! I'm new here. (I've used Wiktionary for quite some time, but haven't really done much editing before.) Anyways, I was wondering: what do people here think of splitting Hebrew entries into Modern Hebrew and Biblical Hebrew entries? The pronunciation has of Hebrew words has changed quite a bit over time, so I think it might be useful to have separate pronunciations for Modern and Biblical entries. And the sense of some words has probably shifted some over time. I hope this was the right place to post this suggestion. If not, I'll be happy to re-post in a more appropriate place. Thanks for reading! :) JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 00:56, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I and others think that a split at that level does not pay. It is still the same language, especially as written. After all it died out in the Middle Ages and was resurrected later. Thus the pronunciation has not even “changed” either. If an editor knows that a word is only Biblical or only Modern or only Medieval he can write it, but editors leave out information they aren’t sure about and that’s the result. Fay Freak (talk) 01:24, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't have thoughts about the main question, but I wanted to say that having separate pronunciations for Modern and Biblical Hebrew is not dependent on their entries being split.--Urszag (talk) 21:25, 2 January 2020 (UTC)
 * For an example how different pronunciations can be presented, see . Very likely there was no unique standard pronunciation also in the times when ancient Hebrew was still a living language – neither diachronically, nor synchronically. There is little recorded information to go by, but surely and  were not homophones in some major dialects.  --Lambiam 09:14, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi again! Thanks for your replies. What I think would be nice is to expand the etymology section of more Hebrew words to show their development from Proto-Semitic (and ideally, trace the Proto-Semitic roots to Proto-Afro-Asiatic). I don't know if that would require separating entries into Modern Hebrew and Biblical Hebrew or not. I assumed it did, which is actually the reason I posted that suggestion. Also, in general, how do you go about adding such reconstructions? Does Wiktionary have any go-to sources for Proto-Semitic etymologies? And more generally, do you have suggestions on how I can contribute more to Wiktionary in general? I'm a complete amateur but I really love seeing detailed etymologies, so I've always wanted to contribute to Wiktionary somehow. Thanks for reading again! :) JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 06:45, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Usually it is too hard or or uncertain to trace to Proto-Semitic words, save for the commonest words, and even for those it is a tough job to create Reconstruction pages (I think I have created the most), because of the scripts of descendants and we like to respect the original script to deliver top-quality, and also the understanding of Proto-Semitic is low if one does not know multiple Semitic languages, all of which are hard. I have not decided yet either how Proto-Semitic pages should be formatted if there isn’t a word to be reconstructed but a root – there is no guidance beyond the basic vocabulary which has been treated most thoroughly for body parts and animal names by Militarev and Kogan 2000/2005, to answer your question about whether there are go-to sources, unlike for Proto-Indo-European, and I am not sure about all the morphological forms that existed in Proto-Semitic by reason of not being read into the obscurely spread treatises about Proto-Semitic morphology nor some necessary Semitic languages which is also a reason to desist. Technically one must be a cuneiform scholar to really get a picture of Proto-Semitic. Also note that if reconstructions are not uncertain – when a consonant has changed and you do not know the original –, then one can reconstruct originals but it is too easy, one can just check three consonants in the dictionaries of diverse Semitic languages to see if a verb or root is Proto-Semitic. So it is either too hard or too boring. Proto-Afro-Asiatic you can forget, it won’t happen in this century, the material to be known for an image of it is Augean; after all it is the farthest-back language we can discern, displayed by the hardest languages one can learn. The Hamito-Semitic Etymological Dictionary you might have discovered is unheeding and to be avoided. Fay Freak (talk) 02:18, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your very in depth reply! So it seems that in general, it is very difficult to reconstruct Proto Semitic roots/words. But the book by Militarev and Kogan is a good source. And the Hamito-Semitic etymological dictionary is a bad source and should be avoided. Right? Also, do you happen to know of a list of good sources for Proto-Semitic that are generally accepted on Wiktionary? Particularly electronic ones that are available for free? (I'm new to doing research, and right now it seems that finding and accessing good sources might be almost as hard as actually using them to write good etymologies. :P) Thanks a ton for your help again! :) JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 03:25, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * At your age you can do best by learning a Semitic language or more thoroughly, so you can contribute with missing definitions and quotes. This is also more easily possible electronically, or with little material investment. And if you are versed in one then more might come by themselves. Fay Freak (talk) 20:52, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * My native language is Hebrew, which is probably the main reason I enjoy reading more about it. :)
 * In that case, . I look forward to your additions here and please make sure to sign your posts. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 22:13, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks! I hope I will be able to contribute using my knowledge of Hebrew. :) Question: Is there a way for me to easily find Hebrew words that need an English translation? Or the other way around? When I do find words to translate, should I make up my own translation? Or should I find a reputable dictionary and quote a translation from it (and cite the dictionary?) And sorry for forgetting to sign my last comment; I'll try to remember that in the future. :) JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 22:32, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Category:Requests for translations into Hebrew. And yes, you do have to come up with original definitions: usually, a definition is a copyrighted work and we cannot reproduce them here. As far as a one-word translation goes, that is something that cannot be copyrighted, so when simply reads "hunger" and links to our entry at, the Spanish translation is a single word that leads to a new, unique definition at our English-language entry. You can have more complicated translations or other entries in different languages that should be unique (e.g. at ) but for a single word, that's fine. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:29, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Also, I'm not sure if this is the right place to mention this, but I noticed that the Hebrew entry ספר states that the word is "From Biblical Hebrew 𐤎𐤐𐤓 (spr)". Is it considered good practice to distinguish Biblical Hebrew from later stages of Hebrew as this entry does, even though Biblical Hebrew words don't get their own entries? JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 08:01, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * No, it is weird and not good practice. Imma put it into an alternative forms section like on . Fay Freak (talk) 02:18, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Awesome! Thanks for fixing it. :) JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 02:54, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

anceps and forceps
How come the plural of anceps is ancipites but that of forceps is forcipes (not forcipites)? Or is there an error? Equinox ◑ 04:10, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Well is an adjective and  is a noun. The plural form "ancepites" also seems extremely rare. It could be an error. DTLHS (talk) 05:43, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Occurrences of anc e pites (of which I find only one, in the taxonomic description of Calamus steenisii Furtado) are almost certainly spelling errors for, which is not particularly rare. --Lambiam 09:38, 4 January 2020 (UTC)
 * The part of  comes from, while that of forceps comes from the root of . anceps: "double-headed"; forceps: "warm-grabber". So there's a hidden -it- in anceps (from -ut in caput) that surfaces in the plural, but none in forceps. — Eru·tuon 06:26, 4 January 2020 (UTC)

Hebrew Transliteration
Hi all! I just wanted to check whether Wiktionary has a standard transliteration system for Hebrew. Or perhaps different transliteration standards for different accents of Hebrew? I ask because I saw two Hebrew quotes transliterated in seemingly different ways. The entry בית has this quotation: וְרִבִּי יוֹחָנָן חִבַּר הַתַּלְמוּד הַיְּרוּשְׁלְמִי בְּאֶרֶץ יִשְׂרָאֵל אַחַר חָרְבַּן הַבַּיִת בְּקֵרוּב מִשְּׁלוֹשׁ מֵאוֹת שָׁנָה It transliterates it as "veribi yoḥanan ḥibar hatalmuḏ hayerushlemi beʾereṣ yisraʾel aḥar ḥorban habayiṯ beqeruv mishlosh meʾoṯ shana" The entry חבר has this quotation: הֶחָבֵר שֶׁלִּי וַאֲנִי הָלַכְנוּ לְסֶרֶט אֶתְמוֹל It transliterates it as "Hekhavér shelí va'aní halákhnu l'séret etmól" The most noticeable difference for me is that the first uses diacritics and special characters, while the second one doesn't. I personally don't have a strong opinion, but I wanted to check if there is a standard. Thanks for reading! JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 09:00, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * See WT:HE TR. You might also benefit from reading the entry diacritic. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 16:40, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your quick reply! So it looks like there's a "regular" Romanization and a "scholarly" Romanization. That makes sense. Is there a way to link a Romanization to an explanation of how the Romanization should be read? Perhaps adding IPA to clarify pronunciations? Most of the plain letters are pretty self-explanatory to English readers, but the modified letters might need an explanation. JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 20:14, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * The headword line has an interpunct that links to the above standard. IPA goes in the Pronunciation section. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 22:08, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your quick reply again! :) What you said makes sense. I didn't notice the interpunct, thanks for pointing it out! Do you think it might be a good idea to replace the interpunct with something more noticeable for future readers? Maybe link the transliterated word to the transliteration standard? JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 23:47, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * People always say "wow I didn't know that that dot was a link" and it's hilarious(ly sad). We need to rethink that thing. —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 23:57, 5 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your reply! I'm glad to know I wasn't the only one to miss that the dot is a link. :) What do you think of linking the transliteration itself to the transliteration page? Also, is the dot the usual method for linking to transliteration standards across various languages? Or do other languages which use transliterations use other methods to do this, which could be used for inspiration? JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 01:13, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * The interpunct is almost universal, because it's generated by Module:headword (search for ), which is ultimately used by most headword-line templates. For instance, in,  uses Module:he-headword, which in turn uses Module:headword. — Eru·tuon 08:42, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for replying again! Does that mean that you could change the interpunct to something more noticeable across a lot of languages just by editing Module:Headword? If so, do you think that sounds like a good idea? (Right now I'm not sure what exactly it should be changed to; User:-sche had some good suggestions though! JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 19:17, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Well, yes, if people agreed on it. It could also be marked up so that a user script or gadget could change it. — Eru·tuon 23:50, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm glad you think it's a good idea! Where should this idea be posted if we want people to see it and check that people agree on it? JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 23:59, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I didn't notice that you'd asked two questions – I was answering the first one, whether it could be changed. I don't know if it should be. You can discuss what it could be changed to in WT:BP though. — Eru·tuon 00:06, 7 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Hel, I myself forget that it is a link... maybe if it were more visible and visibly blue, by being a larger symbol, and/or one that doesn't look like it's only there as a divider / punctuation? Or if it had a little dotted underline and some hover-reveal text like some of the symbols used to mark obsolesence in Chinese entries? (Am I wrong that the reason it's so unobtrusive is that it was originally just punctuation and the use of it as the place to link to the transliteration pages came later?) - -sche (discuss) 10:50, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Appendix:Unicode/Cuneiform is missing images
Hi all! I just noticed that Appendix:Unicode/Cuneiform is not showing any images when I view it on my laptop. Is this likely a technical issue on my end? Or have the appropriate images just not been uploaded yet? If it is a technical issue on my end, what information could I provide that might be useful for debugging? Thanks for reading! :) JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 05:23, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I just checked all of the Unicode blocks from Basic Latin to Myanmar Extended-A, and none of the code points had an associated image. I also noticed that some of the blocks displayed tofu instead of actual characters in the "character" slots; I think that might mean I don't have the appropriate fonts installed? Some blocks had all blue tofu, others had all red tofu, and others had both blue and red tofu. I'm not sure why that's the case. I hope this might info might be useful! JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 06:06, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Oh, yeah, there should definitely be images on some of the Unicode appendixes. Fixed. There aren't many images for cuneiform characters though. See Module:Unicode data/images/012 for the full list. — Eru·tuon 07:02, 6 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Awesome! Thanks for fixing it. :) JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 16:41, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

Question about Category: Hebrew Roots
Hi all! I noticed that most Hebrew roots are sub-categorized based on the number of letters of the root, and don't show up directly in Category: Hebrew Roots. However, some roots do show up directly in Category: Hebrew Roots, in addition to being sub-categorized by number of letters. For example, the root alef-bet-dalet is part of Category: Hebrew lemmas and Category: Hebrew roots but is not part of Category: Hebrew 3-letter roots. However, Category:Hebrew terms belonging to the root א־ב־ד is part of that category. I wanted to check if this is how everything should be categorized, or if something is mis-categorized. If something is mis-categorized, what should be changed? And how can I move things to the proper category? Or can someone else fix it? Thanks for reading! :) JonathanHopeThisIsUnique (talk) 19:44, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

modus tollendo ponens
The definition of modus tollendo ponens on that wiki page is incorrect. The identification of modus tollendo ponens as a disjunctive syllogism is correct. The example and definition given is that of Modus ponens, a conditional form and not a disjunctive form. The form given on that page is as follows:

1. If non-P, then Q.   2. non-P. 3. Therefore, Q.

The above is an example of modus ponens

The correct form of modus tollendo ponens would be as follows:

1. Either A or not A

2. A is false

3. Therefore, not A is true.

Negating the truth of either leg of the disjunct infers the truth of the other leg. You can check this in any introductory logic text book.
 * Thanks. When I got my philosophy degree, the only class where I didn't get an A+ was logic, so I'll have to brush up before I feel confident to fix it. Note that you can also edit Wiktionary directly. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:10, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

Possibility of a list?
I am seeking a comprehensive list of all words entered and verified thus far into the english portion of Wiktionary. This is merely for personal use and I will not at all use it for monetization or anything that may violate this forum's rules.
 * Category:English lemmas DTLHS (talk) 19:04, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

Is there a template for Liddell and Scott's Greek-English Lexicon?
A Greek-English Lexicon by Liddell and Scott is available online. It seems generally useful for ancient Greek entries. Is there a template that generates links to it?

Example: I just added πέλωρος. It would be nice to have a link to confirm that the word is not just made up by some guy on the Internet. It was added on the authority of some guy who died before the Internet was invented, as confirmed at and. But manually generating links that might rot is too much trouble. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 19:07, 8 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Template:R:LSJ DTLHS (talk) 19:09, 8 January 2020 (UTC)

What words have the most homophones?
Someone suggested this could make a good category for the Hall of Fame. It's probably worthwhile to look at non-Chinese words, and then separately at Chinese words. If TemplateTiger still works (it doesn't for me right now), some could be found by checking for homophones with unusually many parameters. - -sche (discuss) 09:46, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Here are homophone templates with 8 consecutive parameters or more, meaning 7 or more homophones.
 * I hadn't seen TemplateTiger before. Based on the database layout it seems to only log individual template parameters, not whole template instances, so it might be hard to use for this purpose. Anyway, the results are from my template dumps, which contain parsed templates (name and parameters) and their text. They are available at TemplateHoard on Toolforge, though unfortunately they're not easy to use. — Eru·tuon 10:47, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I had to do 7 homophones or more because there are so many templates with 6 homophones that the page would time out! It would be ~700,000 bytes long as opposed to ~23,000. — Eru·tuon 10:58, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you! And: ah, I should have suspected French would have a lot... - -sche (discuss) 11:31, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

Creating page
Which type of page should create in this wiki?
 * Well, you presumably know Bengali, so you could create entries for Bengali words we are missing. See CAT:Bengali lemmas to see how to format those words. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 18:16, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Welcome. You could also have a look at Requested entries (Bengali) and Category:Requests for verification in Bengali entries. --Lambiam 16:07, 12 January 2020 (UTC)

Repeated borrowings by one language of the same word
Anyone know of other cases where one language repeatedly borrowed a word from another language in different ways, like some English speakers borrowed Narragansett mishcùp as mishcup while others borrowed it as scup, others as paugie, and others as scuppaug (from the plural). (It may be difficult to distinguish cases where a word may have been shortened "in-language", e.g. is blitz from or ? And if the difference in form is less extreme than in the mishchup case, it may be difficult to distinguish repeat borrowings from mere variations in spelling upon borrowing.) I'm especially interested in repeated direct borrowings, but indirect borrowings like the many indirect borrowings of  or  (tea, chai, cha, lahpet, ...) are also interesting. (I suppose it would be theoretically possible, but probably too exceedingly tedious to attempt, to search a database dump for this information, e.g. by making a list of all words A,B,C,..., in each language which are said to derive from another word X,Y,Z,..., and then seeing which Xs have the most descendants in the same language.) - -sche (discuss) 20:27, 11 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Some incomplete approaches to get you part-way there (assuming English as the ultimate destination):

 * 1) Look through Category:English doublets, since these are doublets by definition.
 * 2) Look through Category:Learned borrowings by language, since those tend to get borrowed separately as normal borrowings and are more likely to be reborrowed in different contexts at different times.
 * 3) Look through "terms derived from" categories for languages involved in known contacts between radically different language/cultures: aside from American Indian languages, Ancient Greek, Arabic, English, Middle Chinese, Middle Low German, Persian, Portuguese, Sanskrit, and Spanish come to mind.
 * 4) Have someone compile a list of multiple instances of ... where the donor language code and the term are the same, with the names of the entries they appear in included in the list (this may be unwieldy for common Wanderworts such as ).
 * Just brainstorming. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:20, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

Word list
Hello, where can I find an alphabetical list of English words? K175 (talk) 13:54, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Category:English lemmas Chuck Entz (talk) 13:58, 14 January 2020 (UTC)
 * And if that's not comprehensive enough, you can download w:en:WP:AWB, make a category recursive list starting from Category:English language (or just Category:English lemmas and Category:English non-lemma forms), and sort alphabetically. A job that big will likely fail, tho. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 18:10, 14 January 2020 (UTC)

Tried to make a compass template for English, but the editor thinks it's vandalism
Like this: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Template:ca-compass but for english instead of catalan. Could someone else make this template on my behalf, or if it already exists and I somehow missed it, point me in that direction (pun not intended)? Thank you
 * Your edit tripped an abuse filter because some of its wording has been used by vandals in the past, but it's not vandalism so I created based on your edit. — Eru·tuon 21:58, 15 January 2020 (UTC)

What is the opposite of Allied?
I’ve been looking for an adjectival form of Axis. Axial would be the expected derivation, but I haven’t found any examples of that. (The closest that I can think of is Fascist.) — (((Romanophile))) ♞ (contributions) 05:10, 20 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I think it's just "Axis" ("Axis countries"). DTLHS (talk) 05:14, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

 * Also “”, “”, “”, “”, “”. These are of course attributive uses of the proper noun. --Lambiam 22:09, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

So, I deleted the whole definition from an article and no one objects?
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/symbol How does it work?

 * It may have escaped people's attention. We don't have as many editors as Wikipedia and there is a higher page-to-editor ratio, so we don't always notice right away. Ideally, you should follow due process and either RFV, RFD, or RFC a sense, or bring it up at the Tea Room, depending on the specific problem you see with the sense. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 06:19, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

 * Because you are not an established editor, your edit went into a "patrolling queue" for other editors to look at. I looked at it and I agreed with you and approved it. As Andrew says, we are a small community and sometimes patrolling takes time. Equinox ◑ 07:24, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

When to use "∴" in lists?
I see the ∴ symbol is being used in, for example, the Derived terms of light (presumably to indicate an entry in the list that is simply related to one above it). Is it new? It seems like a good, sensible idea, but I didn't know about it before. If I was creating or editing a page I wouldn't have known to use it, so I thought I'd better search the Help for any information about how/when to use it... but my problem: I cannot find anything about it. Maitchy (talk) 04:55, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I have never seen it before, and I would have no idea what it was supposed to mean. DTLHS (talk) 06:26, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
 * It was added by, and our entry at ∴ says it's the symbol for therefore, which Therefore sign says is used in proofs. It's no doubt confusing and mystifying for the vast majority of the population who don't work with higher mathematics or logic, but it's harmless enough. I find the sheer number of edits more annoying- 64 in all for one person on one entry. Even that, though, isn't exactly a Crime Against Humanity... Chuck Entz (talk) 06:57, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
 * The vast majority of people who work professionally with higher mathematics or logic never use this symbol either, although they may know its meaning. You expect to find it in a freshers’ introductory course to logic, but not in a research article. If it is confusing and mystifying, it is IMO not harmless. --Lambiam 13:47, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
 * At it seems to be being used to indicate a term that is derived from a derived term of the entry, rather than a term derived directly from the lemma, thus  and  are derived immediately from  and only indirectly from  itself. I would say (1) we shouldn't be listing such terms at all, as  and  can be listed in the Derived terms of  and should be omitted from the entry for ; and (2) if we do include such indirect derived terms, there are other symbols that would work better than ∴ for them, such as ↳. —Mahāgaja · talk 21:03, 25 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Light wasn't the first one I worked on. I think the first time I used it was on mountain. With that word I was looking at the help pages and available templates to see how all the word lists should be ordered, formatted, &c. I didn't see any mention of 2nd-level or 3rd-level derivatives but thought it would be useful to mark them in some manner to indicate they aren't directly derived. So I invented one. But I'm not wedded to it. As to whether indirectly derived words can be included, yes, absolutely. There is no harm in having a complete list as few words would have a list of any great enormity. Also for example in the list for finance (which I also worked on), a person looking for an adverb would have to look under the entry for financial if it wasn't included in the list for finance; there aren't any adverbs directly derived from finance. Doing it that way would not be user friendly. Finally, I will just add that a lot of these lists seem to be dumping grounds for words, and having taken up the task of cleaning and organizing I find that I rather enjoy putting in the effort. I am open to any suggestions that the community might have. -Mike (talk) 00:32, 26 January 2020 (UTC)
 * As Mahagaja, I don't think we should list / oppose listing 2nd-level or 3rd-level derivatives in those lists. Canonicalization (talk) 06:26, 27 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I didn't realize I made that number of edits, but I'm not entirely surprised. I was working through the lists of words under the various etymologies of light often just one word at a time. I added new terms that didn't have entries, cleaned up or improved some existing entries, or just found and added terms that hadn't been listed there. And upon completing a word I ensured it was in the proper list with the part of speech marked (completed as I went in part to help keep track of what I had looked at). I have hardly worked on the lists in Etymology 1 so they are still in need of attention. -Mike (talk) 00:32, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

 * I agree the symbol is opaque and shouldn't be used. Mahagaja's suggested alternative is better, but like him I don't know that any symbol needs to be used, since "second-level" derivations can be offloaded to the pages they're direct derivations of. - -sche (discuss) 21:40, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I sometimes add 2nd-level derivations to Arabic root pages; but so far only with double asterisk syntax. The reason is also that one might not want to offload them to the pages because there would be a derived terms sections with only one or two derived terms (its mostly only a nisba derivative; there are only two normally (excluding modern artificial formations like in chemistry) occurring derivational suffixes ( and ) and no prefixes in Arabic, everything else transfixes ( and  are also not prefixes because they come with a vowel after the second consonant, usually ). Compounds do not exist either in Arabic, although might form idiomatic terms.)
 * Then of course it might be that that page whither one would offload is not created yet. It might sound easy to do so but mind for example reconstruction pages where one would need to seek descendants together so it is not always that easy, so people end up adding derived terms under derived terms and descendants under them … Fay Freak (talk) 22:40, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
 * The cultural shift astounds me. By the time I was 16, '∴' was a very standard abbreviation in school mathematics.  This was at grammar school in England.  The one problem with it was that dots aren't always very legible.  The upside down version, meaning 'because', was less common. --RichardW57 (talk) 12:59, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Looking for someone to help me set up a Wiktionary page for a new language
I am Looking for someone to help me set up a Wiktionary page for the Chatino language, spoken in Oaxaca, Mexico. Send me a message if you know of someone willing to help.
 * We recognize seven distinct Chatino languages; see Category:Proto-Chatino language and click "Show" next to "Family tree" to see them. —Mahāgaja · talk 15:30, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Serbo-Croatian Cyrillic
On Wiktionary, I've noticed that often, when it comes to Serbo-Croatian words, the Cyrillic form is listed first. This is problematic, since Cyrillic is the less used and less understood writing system in Serbo-Croatian. Each and every Serbo-Croatian native speaker who attended school in the area of ex-Yugoslavia is literate in Latin, but only some are literate in Cyrillic. I have trouble even imagining a situation where a Serbo-Croatian speaker is literate in Cyrillic and not in Latin. Latin forms should be put first for ease of use and Cyrillic listed as the curiosity. 89.172.78.143 09:45, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
 * C comes before L in the alphabet, nothing else to it. —Rua (mew) 10:16, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
 * It might be worth noting that the last time it was discussed, there was fairly broad support for making Latin the primary script for Serbo-Croatian (even if there was some disagreement as to what exactly that should entail). Such a proposal hasn’t yet become policy, though, so (as Rua says) for now we follow the standard convention of keeping them in alphabetical order. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 17:25, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Yeah, but the reason we do so is that it is the same with all languages with multiple scripts that have been used so the order of the scripts is predictable by their names. Fay Freak (talk) 17:28, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Since worked together, we could rename the script Methodio-Cyrillic, and then it would come alphabetically after Latin. —Mahāgaja · talk 18:57, 31 January 2020 (UTC)
 * Well, there is already w:Arebica. 93.136.119.51 19:48, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Citing sources
Hello, I am wondering how to cite my source for information I just added to search. My source is at [redacted] [this link]. 2601:647:5300:670:21B2:F8D7:52D4:1DC4 00:37, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Please don't cite a URI redirecting service. You can include references within ref tags. Have you seen these before? —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 00:42, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Just for the record, that was a rickroll. After this edit, they started undoing everything that appeared in Special:RecentChanges (including an edit of mine)- so I blocked them for disruptive edits. Chuck Entz (talk) 01:03, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
 * You're a braver man than I: no way am I clicking on a URI shortener. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 01:13, 1 February 2020 (UTC)


text:
Wiktionary:Information desk/2020/February

red links instead of black
in the templates, is there a way to view the links to the pages that don't exist as red instead of black? it's just kinda hard to differentiate between blue and black (and especially violet and black) LICA98 (talk) 10:40, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I guess you mean "redlinks" in inflection tables (for instance, all or some of the links in the inflection table in ). You can change their color by adding the following CSS to your common.css:  This overrides the style that forces these links to have the default color of the text in the table . — Eru·tuon 10:52, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
 * so I just click "create" and paste that there? LICA98 (talk) 10:58, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes. And then it will apply the style whenever you are logged in on this website. — Eru·tuon 11:11, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

step by step
hello there, I'm a new member here, could you tell me step by step guide for a new beginner like me?

--PutriAmalia1991 (talk) 12:52, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

 * I have posted our usual welcome message to your talk page: there are some useful links there. Equinox ◑ 20:48, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Root or Affix
Hello

I took a brake from developing the pages on the Alutor language, and now that I'm back I've noticed a few pages I've created that seem inaccurate. Alutor is a polysynthetic language, and I'm not sure if root is used on Wiktionary or if I should stick to Affix. E.g the term is a root used in adjectives, should I call it "root", "adjective" or "affix"?

Millerutt (talk) 16:19, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * What term is used by linguists when they talk about the languages? DTLHS (talk) 16:19, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

 * Judging by the examples -ынп- functions as a prefix, somewhat comparable to the German prefix, although the latter is only used in combination with an adjective. --Lambiam 23:24, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

Sudden changes to interface
Am I the only person going crazy because of the colour change of clicked links?! Before today, every clicked link was displayed in a purplish hue, clearly different from unclicked links. Now it's strikingly similar to an unclicked link making it hard to differentiate. Is this caused by a recent update? Checked all my preferences, but I haven't touched them in ages and I don't have a custom CSS. Also the "Compare selected revision" button is different for us who use the MonoBook skin. How do I change it back to how it was yesterday? --Robbie SWE (talk) 19:22, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Nothing's changed for me. This must be an issue with your browser. —Mahāgaja · talk 20:52, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * That's the thing - it's not. I tried three different browsers. --Robbie SWE (talk) 21:12, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I didn't notice a change, but visited and un-visited links do look pretty similar. The easiest way to fix it for yourself is to add to your common.css: . I guess it would have to be a MediaWiki-wide change if it wasn't something in your browser, because our local CSS (MediaWiki:Common.css) hasn't been edited recently. I tried searching for "visited" in code changes on Gerrit but didn't spot anything relevant. Unfortunately not many developers visit this page regularly, but I can try posting on IRC. — Eru·tuon 22:05, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * By any chance would you be able to check an un-visited and a visited link with right click and "Inspect element" and report what the two color values in the CSS are? For me, they're  and   respectively. — Eru·tuon 22:25, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Some clicked links have colour, close to  . I think it has something to do with the anchor element having attribute  .  --Lambiam 22:50, 13 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Inspect Element tells me it is   --Lambiam 21:59, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

, I checked and I have the same colours, i.e.  (unvisisted) and   (visisted). But it wasn't like that earlier this week – I could've sworn that all my visited links were. That colour is clearly distinct and looks familiar. Is there any way that I can go back to the latter colour? --Robbie SWE (talk) 10:16, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't remember visited links being so purple recently. To set them to that color, add  to your common.css. — Eru·tuon 10:40, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Right, sorry to sound like a noob, but how do I create my own common.css? I know, pathetic not having one, especially as an admin, but I didn't need it until now. --Robbie SWE (talk) 10:46, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * You just click the link and edit the page like any other. — Eru·tuon 10:59, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Ok, I'll give it a go tonight. Thank you for your help! --Robbie SWE (talk) 11:00, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * 1.) Go to User:Robbie SWE/common.css, 2.) put this line at any point:, 3.) should work. Let me know if it doesn't. You may need to clear your cache, etc. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 11:09, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks Koavf! --Robbie SWE (talk) 11:11, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Just a tiny follow-up question – I followed the advice you guys gave me and created a CSS. It fixed the visited links colour, but now I'm starting to think that the unvisited links colour was also different? The current one just seems too "light" to me. Do you know anything about it and in that case, what is the appropriate CSS code if I want to change it? Tried some different codes myself, but couldn't make it work. --Robbie SWE (talk) 18:33, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Make sure you don't make it so dark the difference with plain text becomes hard to see. I think the way to do this is to add a line  (or whichever colour you prefer – for me this would be too dark). Disclaimer: I haven't tried this out; I have no common.css subpage.  --Lambiam 19:06, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Got it! Thank you for all your help! --Robbie SWE (talk) 19:10, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Namespace Reconstruction or asterisc
I was wondering. Was there a technical reason for choosing to use a namespace for Reconrstucted terms (-nós) instead of just an asterisc *-nós? Or perhaps *xxx (Proto...)? Does the asterisc cause problems? Should we avoid it at el.witkionary (just for a few, very few terms) Thank you. sarri.greek (talk) 20:46, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * The asterisk is potentially ambiguous because we have entries that are not reconstructions that use the symbol (such as *nix). Putting everything in a separate namespace is very explicit. DTLHS (talk) 20:50, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much . We have some unattested words and did not know if asterisk was harmful. sarri.greek (talk) 21:46, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Layout of Pali
Apart form the desirability of adding extra data (e.g. etymology, quotes and more senses), is this entry in a suitable state? I am worried that it may not be clear enough that the declension of etymologies 1 and 2 is different to the declension of etymology 3. How do I stably cross-reference etymologies or words within them? For example, there appear to be another two etymologies to be added - both adjectives and one also a noun. Should I just duplicate the declension table for etymologies 1 and 2, subordinating it to them? --RichardW57 (talk) 12:43, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
 * No, it is not. As you note, the declensions must be duplicated to be subordinated to the two etymologies. But there is a further problem: I have no idea what "Alternative interpretation" means, and a standard Wiktionary template should be used instead of plain text. If you mean an inflected form, you should specify which forms using . —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 17:17, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
 * It means that some people cite the stem as 'sara' (e.g. the Pali Text Society dictionary) and others as 'saras'. (The latter of course is not a possible Pali word.) The wording implies that some alternative case forms of the 4-letter stem are not consistent with the stem.  Would  be acceptable?  --RichardW57 (talk) 17:59, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
 * That would be fine. Pali is of course a bit of an unusual case, but in general, we wouldn't include a citation form that shouldn't exist. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 18:22, 16 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Well, Sanskrit isn't a permissible word (as opposed to lemma) either, but I believe it gets written in native grammars.  The Pali tradition seems to be more squeamish. --RichardW57 (talk) 04:22, 17 February 2020 (UTC)

Correct Cyrillic glyphs for Old East Slavic, Old Church Slavic
Is it even possible to say, which glyphs are correct or it depends on the period? I see some inconsistencies in usage here and other resources, especially for Old East Slavic. So which glyphs are correct, in particular ꙑ vs ы, є vs е. Compare vs ? Sometimes one form is a redirect to the other. --Anatoli T. (обсудить/вклад) 11:21, 18 February 2020 (UTC)
 * For Old Church Slavonic there is a conventional normalization, described to a decent extent at Appendix:Old Cyrillic script, and we try to adhere to it. Old East Slavic also has a page that describes some proposed conventions (About Old East Slavic), but because so little work has been done on OES here on Wiktionary, it’s far from set in stone. Personally I’m in favor of ꙑ and е, like we use for OCS. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 22:06, 21 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you for your response. It seems the intentions are good but they are rarely followed and external sources are not helping to maintain it. You get alll sorts of spellings and glyphs! --Anatoli T. (обсудить/вклад) 00:24, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Can we put missing senses of existing words at Requested Entries?
I found a sense of Russian that isn't covered by the existing entry, and I posted it to WT:RE:ru. Atitarev reverted it, saying "the entry request page is not for missing senses". Is that true?! I have frequently added words to request pages if there was a missing sense: I felt this was fine as long as you stated the missing sense; I would also mark the word with an asterisk * to indicate that it might not be complete even if it's a blue link. Is that wrong? Where should I post? Equinox ◑ 06:57, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I think that's the perfect place for it. "Pie" means a dessert in English and foot in Spanish: if we only had one of those definitions, then we would need the other and there has to be some way to document that. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 11:44, 25 February 2020 (UTC)
 * But if we already have English and Spanish entries at pie, but they're incomplete, they shouldn't be listed at WT:RE. I would add a new sense line at динамо with rfdef and then maybe an example sentence or quotation illustrating the sense you want added, so that other people know what the existing sense isn't sufficient. —Mahāgaja · talk 11:47, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

 * I did add an rfdef line to the entry after the above rollback, but I feel as though "unevidenced" rfdefs are very liable to be removed in passing, whereas Requested Entries has a higher barrier to stuff being removed (we even have text at the top saying "don't delete it just because you don't know the word"). Equinox ◑ 14:13, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

 * Sorry for not responding earlier. I consider requesting missing senses on any of Category:Requested entries pages incorrect, if it's the same language as the request page. You can discuss the senses at WT:RT or as you did, using . I have been looking after WT:RT and some other pages.
 * I would have added the missing sense when reverting your edit, if I thought it exists. I am actually unfamiliar with the sense you requested, I can't confirm it exists and can't see it anywhere. So, I am disputing its existence. If it can't be confirmed, I will remove your request. If you're sure it exists, please add a topic at WT:RT and quote some examples. It seems very individual and rare and I oppose the addition at present. If the sense DOES exist, it should be added as animate. --Anatoli T. (обсудить/вклад) 00:22, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

 * I have no objection to a request being removed if the word doesn't exist. But I think we should allow requests for words sensu lato. That is, we should read the page as "requested senses", not "requested entries". This is because senses may be totally unrelated to entries. Suppose that someone requests the word unionized (meaning "not ionized"), and then a day later an editor creates the page for a totally different meaning (past tense of "unionize"). Will you then delete the legitimate and unfulfilled request purely because in a robotic sense "the page now exists"? That doesn't help anyone. Equinox ◑ 07:18, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

 * I agree with Equinox. Requested senses should only be removed from the requested entries page if they are clearly covered by an existing sense, not anytime the entry exists. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 22:01, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

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


text:
Wiktionary:Information desk/2020/March

Targeted languages gadget not working
Something happened and the gadget is not working anymore. Initially I thought it was a problem with my browser, but then I realized it's from the website. Can someone investigate what's happening? - Munmula (talk) 12:03, 5 March 2020 (UTC)
 * The gadget hasn't changed recently, so maybe uninstall, clear your cache, and then reinstall at Special:Preferences? If that doesn't work, I'd recommend pinging authors from the edit history. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:33, 10 March 2020 (UTC)

Possessive forms of the Northern Sami noun ruoktu (home) for each of the seven cases, singular and plural
Nominative singular of noun with possessive suffixes: Accusative singular of noun with possessive suffixes: Genitive singular of noun with possessive suffixes: Illative singular of noun with possessive suffixes: Locative singular of noun with possessive suffixes: Comitative singular of noun with possessive suffixes: Essive singular of noun with possessive suffixes: Nominative plural of noun with possessive suffixes: Accusative plural of noun with possessive suffixes: Genitive plural of noun with possessive suffixes: Illative plural of noun with possessive suffixes: Locative plural of noun with possessive suffixes: Comitative plural of noun with possessive suffixes: Essive plural of noun with possessive suffixes: If one can say “of my homes”, “in my homes” etc, presumably one can say “my homes”. Therefore, equally presumably, it is possible to find out the nominative plural forms of ruoktu with the possessive suffixes. It may be that they are the same forms as for the nominative singular and have been given above as such, but perhaps someone could ascertain whether they are the correct forms. The inflection table template in Wiktionary gives the nominative singular forms with the first and second persons singular, dual and plural possessive suffixes as rūkton, rūktot etc, but in the Wikipedia article about Northern Sami these forms are given without the macron. Should there always be a macron over the vowel in the first syllable of these forms and in other forms where the diphthong is reduced to a single vowel, namely in the accusative and genitive singular forms with the first and second persons singular, dual and plural possessive suffixes, and in the illative singular forms rūktosan, rūktosat etc? From the above pattern it should be possible to work out all the forms of all other Northern Sami nouns with the possessive suffixes for each of the seven cases, singular and plural, using information available in the Wikipedia article about Northern Sami. Johnling60 (talk) 16:56, 7 March 2020 (UTC)
 * 1st person singular: rūkton
 * 2nd person singular: rūktot
 * 3rd person singular: ruoktus
 * 1st person dual: rūktome
 * 2nd person dual: rūktode
 * 3rd person dual: ruoktuska
 * 1st person plural: rūktomet
 * 2nd person plural: rūktodet
 * 3rd person plural: ruoktuset
 * 1st person singular: rūkton
 * 2nd person singular: rūvttot
 * 3rd person singular: ruovttus
 * 1st person dual: rūktome
 * 2nd person dual: rūvttode
 * 3rd person dual: ruovttuska
 * 1st person plural: rūktomet
 * 2nd person plural: rūvttodet
 * 3rd person plural: ruovttuset
 * 1st person singular: rūkton
 * 2nd person singular: rūvttot
 * 3rd person singular: ruovttus
 * 1st person dual: rūktome
 * 2nd person dual: rūvttode
 * 3rd person dual: ruovttuska
 * 1st person plural: rūktomet
 * 2nd person plural: rūvttodet
 * 3rd person plural: ruovttuset
 * 1st person singular: rūktosan
 * 2nd person singular: rūktosat
 * 3rd person singular: rūktosis
 * 1st person dual: rūktoseame
 * 2nd person dual: rūktoseatte
 * 3rd person dual: rūktoseaskka
 * 1st person plural: rūktoseamet
 * 2nd person plural: rūktoseattet
 * 3rd person plural: rūktoseaset
 * 1st person singular: ruovttustan
 * 2nd person singular: ruovttustat
 * 3rd person singular: ruovttustis
 * 1st person dual: ruovttusteame
 * 2nd person dual: ruovttusteatte
 * 3rd person dual: ruovttusteaskka
 * 1st person plural: ruovttusteamet
 * 2nd person plural: ruovttusteattet
 * 3rd person plural: ruovttusteaset
 * 1st person singular: ruovttūinan
 * 2nd person singular: ruovttūinat
 * 3rd person singular: ruovttūinis
 * 1st person dual: ruovttūineame
 * 2nd person dual: ruovttūineatte
 * 3rd person dual: ruovttūineaskka
 * 1st person plural: ruovttūineamet
 * 2nd person plural: ruovttūineattet
 * 3rd person plural: ruovttūineaset
 * 1st person singular: ruoktunan
 * 2nd person singular: ruoktunat
 * 3rd person singular: ruoktunis
 * 1st person dual: ruoktuneame
 * 2nd person dual: ruoktuneatte
 * 3rd person dual: ruoktuneaskka
 * 1st person plural: ruoktuneamet
 * 2nd person plural: ruoktuneattet
 * 3rd person plural: ruoktuneaset
 * 1st person singular: rūkton
 * 2nd person singular: rūktot
 * 3rd person singular: ruoktus
 * 1st person dual: rūktome
 * 2nd person dual: rūktode
 * 3rd person dual: ruoktuska
 * 1st person plural: rūktomet
 * 2nd person plural: rūktodet
 * 3rd person plural: ruoktuset
 * 1st person singular: ruovttūidan
 * 2nd person singular: ruovttūidat
 * 3rd person singular: ruovttūidis
 * 1st person dual: ruovttūideame
 * 2nd person dual: ruovttūideatte
 * 3rd person dual: ruovttūideaskka
 * 1st person plural: ruovttūideamet
 * 2nd person plural: ruovttūideattet
 * 3rd person plural: ruovttūideaset
 * 1st person singular: ruovttūidan
 * 2nd person singular: ruovttūidat
 * 3rd person singular: ruovttūidis
 * 1st person dual: ruovttūideame
 * 2nd person dual: ruovttūideatte
 * 3rd person dual: ruovttūideaskka
 * 1st person plural: ruovttūideamet
 * 2nd person plural: ruovttūideattet
 * 3rd person plural: ruovttūideaset
 * 1st person singular: ruovttūidasan
 * 2nd person singular: ruovttūidasat
 * 3rd person singular: ruovttūidasas
 * 1st person dual: ruovttūidasame
 * 2nd person dual: ruovttūidasade
 * 3rd person dual: ruovttūidasaska
 * 1st person plural: ruovttūidasamet
 * 2nd person plural: ruovttūidasadet
 * 3rd person plural: ruovttūidasaset
 * 1st person singular: ruovttūinan
 * 2nd person singular: ruovttūinat
 * 3rd person singular: ruovttūinis
 * 1st person dual: ruovttūineame
 * 2nd person dual: ruovttūineatte
 * 3rd person dual: ruovttūineaskka
 * 1st person plural: ruovttūineamet
 * 2nd person plural: ruovttūineattet
 * 3rd person plural: ruovttūineaset
 * 1st person singular: ruovttūidanguin
 * 2nd person singular: ruovttūidatguin
 * 3rd person singular: ruovttūidisguin
 * 1st person dual: ruovttūideameguin
 * 2nd person dual: ruovttūideatteguin
 * 3rd person dual: ruovttūideaskkaguin
 * 1st person plural: ruovttūideametguin
 * 2nd person plural: ruovttūideattetguin
 * 3rd person plural: ruovttūideasetguin
 * 1st person singular: ruoktunan
 * 2nd person singular: ruoktunat
 * 3rd person singular: ruoktunis
 * 1st person dual: ruoktuneame
 * 2nd person dual: ruoktuneatte
 * 3rd person dual: ruoktuneaskka
 * 1st person plural: ruoktuneamet
 * 2nd person plural: ruoktuneattet
 * 3rd person plural: ruoktuneaset
 * Why are you making these posts? Also, please fix them so that they are actual lists and not just impenetrable blocks of text. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 00:18, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Veps illatives, first terminatives and first additives
The Wikipedia article on the Veps language gives the following rules for retaining the final vowel of the genitive singular stem in forming the illative singular in Veps (see under Grammar/Nouns/Principal parts):- 1. The genitive singular must end in a diphthong. 2. The nominative singular must have two syllables each consisting of one consonant followed by one vowel. 3. The genitive singular must consist of a single syllable or of three syllables. 4. The genitive singular must be a contracted form of the nominative singular. 5. The final vowel of the genitive singular stem must be preceded by either ll or ľľ. The illative singular is formed by adding to the genitive singular stem h followed by a vowel which is determined by the final vowel of the stem. If the final vowel of the stem is a or ä the vowel of the illative ending is a. If the final vowel of the stem is e or i the vowel of the illative ending is e. If the final vowel of the stem is o or ö the vowel of the illative ending is o. If the final vowel of the stem is u or ü the vowel of the illative ending is u. If the final vowel of the genitive singular stem is preceded by h is always retained and the illative ending is either ze or že, the latter occurring if the stem-final vowel is i. This is actually a sixth rule for the retention of the final vowel of the singular stem and should be listed with the other five above in the Wikipedia article. Therefore, presumably the illative singular, first terminative singular and first additive singular forms are as follows:- eraz (certain, some) Illative singular: erasehe 1st terminative singular: erasehesai 1st additive singular: erasehepäi pala (piece, bit, part) Illative singular: palaha 1st terminative singular: palahasai 1st additive singular: palahapäi faza (phase, stage) Illative singular: fazaha 1st terminative singular: fazahasai 1st additive singular: fazahapäi hambaz (tooth) Illative singular: hambhaze 1st terminative singular: hambhazesai 1st additive singular: hambhazepäi lambaz (sheep) Illative singular: lambhaze 1st terminative singular: lambhazesai 1st additive singular: lambhazepäi taivaz (sky, heaven) Illative singular: taivhaze 1st terminative singular: taivhazesai 1st additive singular: taivhazepäi tähtaz (star) Illative singular: tähthaze 1st terminative singular: tähthazesai 1st additive singular: tähthazepäi mec (forest) Illative singular: mecha 1st terminative singular: mechasai 1st additive singular: mechapäi vezi (water) Illative singular: vedehe 1st terminative singular: vedehesai 1st additive singular: vedehepäi jogi (river) Illative singular: jogehe 1st terminative singular: jogehesai 1st additive singular: jogehepäi järv (lake) Illative singular: järvhe 1st terminative singular: järvhesai 1st additive singular: järvhepäi veneh (boat) Illative singular: veneheze 1st terminative singular: venehezesai 1st additive singular: venehezepäi laineh (wave) Illative singular: lainheze 1st terminative singular: lainhezesai 1st additive singular: lainhezepäi laps’ (child) Illative singular: lapshe 1st terminative singular: lapshesai 1st additive singular: lapshepäi voz’ (year) Illative singular: vodhe 1st terminative singular: vodhesai 1st additive singular: vodhepäi nor’ (young) Illative singular: norhe 1st terminative singular: norhesai 1st additive singular: norhepäi korv (ear) Illative singular: korvha 1st terminative singular: korvhasai 1st additive singular: korvhapäi must (black) Illative singular: mustha 1st terminative singular: musthasai 1st additive singular: musthapäi živat (animal, beast) Illative singular: živataha 1st terminative singular: živatahasai 1st additive singular: živatahapäi paremb (better) Illative singular: parembaha 1st terminative singular: parembahasai 1st additive singular: parembahapäi parahim (best) Illative singular: parahimha 1st terminative singular: parahimhasai 1st additive singular: parahimhapäi suremb (bigger, greater, larger) Illative singular: surembaha 1st terminative singular: surembahasai 1st additive singular: surembahapäi penemb (smaller) Illative singular: penembaha 1st terminative singular: penembahasai 1st additive: singular: penembahapäi pidemb (longer) Illative singular: pidembaha 1st terminative singular: pidembahasai 1st additive: singular: pidembahapäi üks’ (one) Illative singular: ühthe 1st terminative singular: ühthesai 1st additive singular: ühthepäi kaks’ (two) Illative singular: kahthe 1st terminative singular: kahthesai 1st additive singular: kahthepäi koume (three) Illative singular: koumhe 1st terminative singular: koumhesai 1st additive singular: koumhepäi neľľ (four) Illative singular: nelläha 1st terminative singular: nellähasai 1st additive singular: nellähapäi viž (five) Illative singular: vidhe 1st terminative singular: vidhesai 1st additive singular: vidhepäi kuz’ (six) Illative singular: kudhe 1st terminative singular: kudhesai 1st additive singular: kudhepäi kahesa (eight) Illative singular: kahesaha 1st terminative singular: kahesahasai 1st additive singular: kahesahapäi ühesa (nine) Illative singular: ühesaha 1st terminative singular: ühesahasai 1st additive singular: ühesahapäi sada (hundred) Illative singular: sadaha 1st terminative singular: sadahasai 1st additive singular: sadahapäi tuha (thousand) Illative singular: tuhaze 1st terminative singular: tuhazesai 1st additive singular: tuhazepäi päiv (day) Illative singular: päivha 1st terminative singular: päivhasai 1st additive singular: päivhapäi ku (moon, month) Illative singular: kuhu 1st terminative singular: kuhusai 1st additive singular: kuhupäi lu (bone) Illative singular: luhu 1st terminative singular: luhusai 1st additive singular: luhupäi ma (land, country, ground) Illative singular: maha 1st terminative singular: mahasai 1st additive singular: mahapäi kodima (homeland, motherland) Illative singular: kodimaha 1st terminative singular: kodimahasai 1st additive singular: kodimahapäi pu (tree) Illative singular: puhu 1st terminative singular: puhusai 1st additive singular: puhupäi so (swamp, marsh, bog) Illative singular: soho 1st terminative singular: sohosai 1st additive singular: sohopäi su (mouth) Illative singular: suhu 1st terminative singular: suhusai 1st additive singular: suhupäi jä (ice) Illative singular: jäha 1st terminative singular: jähasai 1st additive singular: jähapäi pä (head) Illative singular: päha 1st terminative singular: pähasai 1st additive singular: pähapäi sä (weather) Illative singular: säha 1st terminative singular: sähasai 1st additive singular: sähapäi pühä (holy, sacred) Illative singular: pühäze 1st terminative singular: pühäzesai 1st additive singular: pühäzepäi sü (cause, reason, motive) Illative singular: sühu 1st terminative singular: sühusai 1st additive singular: sühupäi te (road, way) Illative singular: tehe 1st terminative singular: tehesai 1st additive singular: tehepäi tö (work, labour) Illative singular: töho 1st terminative singular: töhosai 1st additive singular: töhopäi ö (night) Illative singular: öho 1st terminative singular: öhosai 1st additive singular: öhopäi liha (meat) Illative singular: lihaze 1st terminative singular: lihazesai 1st additive singular: lihazepäi raha (money) Illative singular: rahaze 1st terminative singular: rahazesai 1st additive singular: rahazepäi hüvä (good) Illative singular: hüväha 1st terminative singular: hüvähasai 1st additive singular: hüvähapäi paha (bad) Illative singular: pahaze 1st terminative singular: pahazesai 1st additive singular: pahazepäi vanh (old) Illative singular: vanhaze 1st terminative singular: vanhazesai 1st additive singular: vanhazepäi However, it appears that there are some exceptions, which have been found on Wikipedia articles and which are as follows:- jumal (god) Illative singular: jumalha 1st terminative singular: jumalhasai 1st additive singular: jumalhapäi koir (dog) Illative singular: koiraha 1st terminative singular: koirahasai 1st additive singular: koirahapäi soda (war) Illative singular: sodha 1st terminative singular: sodhasai 1st additive singular: sodhapäi külä (village) Illative singular: külähä 1st terminative singular: külähäsai 1st additive singular: külähäpäi meri (sea) Illative singular: merhe 1st terminative singular: merhesai 1st additive singular: merhepäi In the above four examples it is the illative singular forms which have been found in Wikipedia articles; the first terminatives and first additives have been formed regularly from them. It may be that veri (blood) follows the same pattern as meri as far as the formation of the illative singular is concerned. Perhaps someone could check that the illative singular forms given above are correct, make any necessary corrections and add them, along with the first terminative singular and first additive singular to the relevant inflection table templates. Likewise, the correct illative singular, first terminative singular and first additive singular forms of the following words could be added to the relevant inflection table template. veri (blood) Illative singular: verehe or verhe (which is correct?) 1st terminative singular: verehesai or verhesai (which is correct?) 1st additive singular: verehepäi or verhepäi (which is correct?) seičeme (seven) Illative singular: seičemehe or seičemhe (which is correct?) 1st terminative singular: seičemehesai or seičemhesai (which is correct?) 1st additive singular: seičemehepäi or seičemhepäi (which is correct?) kümne (ten) Illative singular: kümnehe or kümnhe (which is correct?) 1st terminative singular: kümnehesai or kümnhesai (which is correct?) 1st additive singular: kümnehepäi or kümnhepäi (which is correct?) The occurrence of such irregularities highlights the importance of complete and correct inflection table templates for every noun, pronoun, adjective, verb etc, not only in Veps but also in every other inflected language. Perhaps someone could work out, from the above rules, the correct illative singular, first terminative singular and first additive singular for every Veps noun, adjective, numeral etc and insert them in the inflection table templates instead of the question marks. From now on, inflection table templates created for all other Veps nouns, adjectives, numerals etc should be complete. Johnling60 (talk) 22:43, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Veps imperatives
The third person singular and plural imperative of the verb olda (to be, to exist, to be present, to have, to possess) is given in Wiktionary: olgha. Therefore the third person singular and plural imperative of the verbs panda and tulda would presumably be pangha and tulgha respectively. In the Veps version of the Lord’s Prayer, found on Wikipedia, the third person singular and plural imperative of the verb tehta (to do, to act, to behave, to carry out, to perform, to arrange, to set up, to make, to create, to produce, to invent) occurs as tehkaha. Presumably, therefore, the third person singular and plural imperative of the verb nähta occurs as nähkaha. In the Wikipedia article in Veps about the number of the beast (Zverin lugu) the third person singular and plural imperative of the verb lugeda (to read, to recite, to count, to calculate, to inventory) occurs as lugekaha. Unfortunately the Wikipedia article about the Veps language gives no rules regarding which of the four possible endings (gaha, gha, kaha, kha) for the third person singular and plural imperative are to be applied to each verb. This lamentable omission seriously needs to be rectified. Perhaps someone could work out the correct third person singular and plural imperative for every Veps verb and insert them in the inflection table templates instead of the question marks. From now on, inflection table templates created for all other Veps verbs should be complete. Johnling60 (talk) 22:49, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Reply to message
I took a great deal of trouble to gather the information to complete the Northern Sami and Veps inflection table templates and you ask me why I did it. If that is the thanks I get for trying to find the forms in Wikipedia and other sources and to prepare the information for sending to you, my next question is: do you want me to send you any more of these lists of inflections or do you not? If you do not want any more of these lists, why are there requests such as "please provide" and "This noun(or adjective or verb etc) needs an inflection table template" for so many words in Estonian, Northern Sami etc? If I do not provide the requested information, who is going to provide it? Nobody seems to be doing any work on Wiktionary at all. If I do provide the requested information you ask me why I do it. This is my answer. If you ask for information such as the inflected forms of words in inflected languages and someone provides it, surely you could show some gratitude? The best way of showing your gratitude is to add the word forms to the relevant inflection table templates instead of asking the contributor why he or she provided them. I ask you again: do you want any more of these word forms or do you not? If your answer is no, I am not going to waste any more of my time compiling them, and therefore you will not get any more inflection lists from me. I do not know whether anybody else will provide them. Will you please decide now whether you want them or not? From now on I will not answer any more of your questions or comments and will not send any more inflection lists unless you decide that you want them. Johnling60 (talk) 23:23, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Are you talking to me? It seems like there is a lot of confusion and miscommunication here. Let's take a step back for a second and just try to figure out who the intended audience is of all your posts. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:30, 10 March 2020 (UTC)
 * The effort is appreciated, but unless active Sami or Veps editors show up, there is little we can do with it. I for one do not feel competent to make edits involving these languages. Also, the information desk is not a good place for leaving this information. A better page for the info on the possessives of is Talk:ruoktu.  --Lambiam 20:12, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

"coronavirus" and grammatical article
Random question: Why is it common for people to use the countable noun "coronavirus" without a grammatical article? I've heard constructions like "he tested positive for coronavirus", "all you need to know about coronavirus", "if you thought coronavirus was no big deal", etc. Isn't this ungrammatical? ---> Tooironic (talk) 11:16, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Perhaps it's not always countable. When you're talking about coronaviruses in as viruses, they certainly are countable, but when you're talking about them as diseases, they don't seem to be. There's something odd going on with countability even with diseases that take the article, such as "the flu" or "the measles". It reminds me of "swimming in the water" vs. "there was water in the hole". Chuck Entz (talk) 13:46, 12 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I think a lot of people might parse it as a proper noun, partly due to unfamiliarity with the existence of other coronaviruses. A similar thing happens with Ebola, Zika, H1N1, etc. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 04:15, 14 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Interesting. I think you are on to something there. Cheers. ---> Tooironic (talk) 01:25, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

link to specific meaning
Hi, I added this link. Ideally I would have liked to link specifically to the adjective, rather than to the "English" section as a whole, which also includes a verb. How can this be done please? --Dani di Neudo (talk) 19:49, 12 March 2020 (UTC)

 * You can use template senseid to achieve the desired effect. --Lambiam 19:53, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

government name
Used especially by African-Americans and in hiphop/rap and gang contexts. Means someone's partial or full legal name. See for examples; things referred to as government names include "Benny" (instead of some nickname), "Mr. Prince" (instead of "Pistol G"), and full names like "Tim Armstrong" (instead of "Lint"). Is this idiomatic or SOP? - -sche (discuss) 03:36, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I definitely don't think it's SOP. If it were SOP, I would expect it to mean something like "the name of a government" or "the name one uses in connection with one's government roles". Andrew Sheedy (talk) 04:12, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
 * OK. I added it. The reason I was unsure is that it can be seen as basically meaning a name for use in dealing with the government, or a name approved or recognized or used [for a person] by the government, which puts it on a continuum with e.g. "that's my school notebook/outfit/etc, I need my writing notebook/outfit/etc". - -sche (discuss) 07:21, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I think the fact that it seems to be used in a wider variety of situations than just dealing with the government places it squarely in the NSOP category. It seems akin to kids using "church clothes" to mean "nice/formal clothes", which I hear from time to time. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 00:30, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

English pronunciations of berceuse, etc.
A user inserted several odd and unsourced English pronunciations and IPA transcriptions around the end of 2018, sometimes claiming them to be nonstandard alternatives. They seemed to me like pranks or vandalism at first, or at least not really appropriate for this project. The oddest was insisting on /bɛ˞ˈs(j)uz/ and [bɛɻ̟ˈsyːz] for berceuse. But I could be wrong. Can someone verify, source, and/or fix them, and locate any more examples of the same?

 * berceuse
 * theater
 * twenty
 * Belarus
 * blimp

Thanks. Hftf (talk) 05:34, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

 * Regarding Belarus, where the added pronunciation was /ˌbəˈlɑɹʌs/: I don't see /ˌbeɪləˈɹus/ in other sources I checked, either, as a separate issue; also, Dictionary.com and Merriam-Webster both list pronunciations beginning with /bj/ which we lack. Anyway, at least some of these seem like pranks (in the absence of sources); WF added at least a few prank pronunciation files once before. - -sche (discuss) 07:14, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

 * For the General American pronunciation of I expect . The earlier  seems implausible there; cf. the US pronunciations of,  and . The Michigander audio does not sound to my ears like the advertized ; the final vowel is unrounded. The editor is a member of  on Wikipedia, so I’m inclined to think these changes are not meant to be pranks.  --Lambiam 11:44, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
 * This editor was not pranking, but fond of "lame non-jokes": see Talk:eaublast for a bit of context. These may not all be wrong (there are definitely some weird regional US pronunciations of out there), but I'm removing all the ones you listed because at least some are definitely wrong, and none can be trusted. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 20:59, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
 * OF the funny pronunciations added, the only one I can confirm is for twenty; I pronounce it that way myself (and I'm not from Michigan or Canada). —Mahāgaja · talk 21:17, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

 * How you can say is implausible? First, I would not consider Betelgeuse, masseuse, or chartreuse to be strictly analogous, as they seem far too anglicized; I conjecture that those are the three -euse words most likely to be learned as a child. Furthermore, you compare chartreuse, but that entry already has ! (Coincidentally, the first time I heard this word pronounced was a few days ago by my mom, surprisingly with .) I checked my pronunciation dictionaries:
 * Apple’s built-in English dictionary has, which is how I pronounce it.
 * Pronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names (Bollard) has (no language indicated, possibly defaulting to French).
 * Oxford/Routledge Dictionary of Pronunciation for Current English has British and US, but frequently uses US  for chanteuse, coiffeuse, danseuse, diseuse, mitrailleuse, etc.
 * Longman Pronunciation Dictionary (a weak source for US English in my opinion), which uses ‖ to separate British and US English, has — Fr, and a sidebar under "eu" says: ", in French words, as in masseuse .... In words borrowed from French, it may also be , as in masseur ."
 * Just because the user is in WikiProject Michigan does not mean it's not a prank: see also their insistence on moosak  . More recently, Юштыс also seems like a hoax to me. Hftf (talk) 23:02, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
 * At I see “”. None of the sources you mention supports  as the US rime of a word ending on -euse.  --Lambiam 07:51, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

How to move/rename a page?
I cannot see an option to move a page to correct its spelling. I am using a mobile phone so I selected the option to request a desktop view, but I still saw no tab or option to move a page (yes, I was signed in). I have had moving rights in Wikipedia for over a decade. May I also express my great surprise at not finding a help page covering this topic. O'Dea (talk) 16:26, 16 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Which page were you looking to move and to which target? —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 19:19, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

 * The Move function is in the drop-down menu under the “More ∨” tab near the top of the page. --Lambiam 22:38, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

 * Thank you, Lambiam, but there is no More tab, or any tab, displayed at the top of the page when viewing it on a mobile phone, even when I select the "Request desktop site" in my browser. This link displays a screenshot of what I see.

 * Out of curiosity, I went to a Wikipedia page to see if I could see the tab at that site, but it wasn't being displayed there either.

 * I have performed moves often enough using a laptop or desktop computer but my computer needs to be repaired at the moment. I'll perform the move once I have access to a proper computer. It's a pity that the feature is unavailable on a phone, and also a pity that there is no help page explaining the move feature. Thanks for your help. O'Dea (talk) 10:14, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

 * If this is a more general Wikimedia issue, a more appropriate place to bring it up is on the, or else our Grease pit. --Lambiam 19:04, 17 March 2020 (UTC)

Requesting a review
Is this kind of question better-suited for the Information desk (here) or the Tea room? Because it's half-formatting and half-technical, I'm not so sure.

So I want to edit this page 老司機, because it feels like an important aspect of this sense is missing:

"# old hand; veteran; insider;"

And to my best ability, I come up with this:

But I have a few questions/concern: - ZypA13510 (talk) 14:04, 19 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Is it better to indent the new definition under the existing one, or list them as separate items?
 * I remember seeing some kind of template for particularly or something similar, but I can't find it. Could you please tell me which one is it?
 * And the definition seems too long, and used one who a lot, is there a better way to express the same idea?
 * Any other suggestions?
 * Those are good question, ZypA13510, here are my responses in order:
 * Generally, if you consider the definition you are planning on adding to be a subsense of the already existing definition, I would would add it under the existing one. If you consider it to be a separate meaning/definition/sense, then I would list it as a separate item. There are three example situations that you could base your entry on. The first perfectly matches the phrasing you're suggesting. The pages and  use a specific system with the word "particularly". I would note that not all nested definitions use the word "particularly", the page  is an example of this. The second similar situation is that of  and . On those pages broader definitions are listed on their own lines and are marked by the label "by extension". The last example is that of, which has a definition that is on its own line and marked with the label "especially".
 * I am unfamiliar with and can't find a template that matches your description. In the aforementioned examples the template utilized is Template:label (shortcut: lb).
 * Each part of your definition might be worthy of its own line, instead of grouping them all together. It may also make sense to only list a single broad definition, e.g. "One who is frequently involved in activities related to lewd subjects", though that may be to broad or wholly inaccurate.
 * The last that I would say is that the definition that you add, whether it is separate or indented, should have its own set of labels, even if the existing definition already has the same ones
 * —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 19:51, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Are nouns the only term type that can have meronyms and holonyms?
It is all in the title, are nouns the only term type that can have meronyms and holonyms? Iff nouns are not the only type, what are the term types that can have meronyms and holonyms? What would a non-noun example look like? Thanks. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 04:39, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
 * No. For example, is a meronym of . But that may not be the most useful way to present the information to the reader... —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 05:34, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
 * In this case, would it not make more sense to say that "ultramarine" is a hyponym of "blue" (since ultramarine is a specific blue) rather than a meronym (which I understand to be based on the idea that ultramarine is part of the set of all blues)? Would you say that "ultramarine" is both a hyponym and a meronym of "blue"? Iff so, doesn't that degrade the specificity that both are supposed to hold to a certain extent? —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 16:51, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

 * Perhaps e.g. is a meronym of, because it's a necessary part of the process of drinking? Equinox ◑ 17:07, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Oh! That is sneaky, I like it! It stretches the meaning of "part" a little bit in the definition of "meronym", but it makes sense and seems to work in my mind. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 17:21, 20 March 2020 (UTC)
 * However, one can also swallow a bite of solid food, or metaphorically a bitter pill and one’s pride as well as the dictionary to boot. These are not acts of drinking. I don't know a term for terms that have a meaning in common (cenonym anyone?). --Lambiam 14:17, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
 * What you've described, Lambiam, is true, but swallowing is nonetheless a necessary part of the process that the term "drink" refers to. That makes "swallow" a meronym of "drink", though it may not make "drink" a holonym of "swallow". A word that may fit what your looking for (although idyosynchronosly) is "". —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 00:45, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Then I think you have painted yourself into a logical corner. To say that one can be a meronym of another but the other cannot be a holonym of the one is illogical and defies the defined relationships of meronym-holonym. One or the other of the statements must be wrong. -Mike (talk) 02:56, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Fair enough and thanks for making that point. I was mostly trying to accommodate what Lambian wrote into my response, but also leave the metaphorical door open to what you've pointed out. That is my reasoning for using the phrase "may not". At this point, though, I think the conversation has veered off topic. Cheers. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 18:37, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/sьrebro
I think it would be worth checking out the latest edit of. I didn't find any links to this data in the Proto-Slavic page. -- Gnosandes (talk) 15:40, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Word 'Capitalist' Older Than "Capitalism"
The word 'capitalist' goes back to the 1550s in the 16th century, see Google Ngram Viewer. The same way, running Ngram Viewer for 'Capitalism,' the word does not appear before Karl Marx' "Das Kapital," 1867. Also see Wikipedia article for 17th century appearance of 'capitalist.' Skeptiker (talk) 19:02, 22 March 2020 (UTC)  Skeptiker (talk) 19:02, 22 March 2020 (UTC)
 * The years of publication as given by Google Books (as well as other book data) are too often wrong to rely on without an extra check. Moreover, a term as seen by Google Ngram Viewer could be a scanno, or be embedded in a fragment of text that is not English, or have a different part-of-speech function or even an entirely different meaning in the context. Therefore one should always use actual quotations. Does anyone know in which language the term is used in the 1633 and 1654 uses in the Hollantse Mercurius or holländische Mercurius (not clear which one either)? Actual quotations would be helpful. The French noun is likely borrowed from or inspired by the older, but here, as so often, each of the dual pathways  = Kapitalist → capitaliste and  = capitaliste may have contributed. The modern sense of “supporter of capitalism” or “someone who owns means of production and uses that to appropriate surplus value”, is not older than the term capitalism as introduced by Marx.  --Lambiam 13:53, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Someone just silently removed my edit, inviting me for discussion on his talk page?
https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=tab&oldid=prev&diff=58988164

No need for the explanation when you do this?
 * It was essentially the same as the first definition. SemperBlotto (talk) 14:46, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
 * 1. It's used as a lever, what's essentially the same here? 2. You can't figure out without this definition that this thing on a can is called 'tab'. Moyprofile (talk) 18:30, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
 * In the course of development, there have been several types of tabs for opening cans. Of those, only the so-called stay-tab (see on Wikipedia) acts as a lever. This, as well as other specifics of these types of tab, is encyclopedic rather than lexical information. It would IMO have been more elegant (and also efficient) to explain the rationale in the edit summary.  --Lambiam 15:18, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Requesting help
Hi,

I am new to Wiktionary project. عورت • ('aurat) f (Hindi spelling औरत) Arabic عورت are popularly spelled same as aurat. Can some one help making mention of the same in article aurat and make necessary linking as rules and practices of Wiktionary project would permit.

Thanks & warm regards

Bookku (talk) 06:23, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

 * In which language is the term spelled “aurat”? English as used in Paksistan and India? Could you give links to uses of this spelling (preferably in books or news sources such as online newspapers)? For Arabic the link only gives verb forms, all of which have a different pronunciation. --Lambiam 15:06, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Editing strategy
Hello all- I am a somewhat arrogant and self-important person, and I have noticed troubling trends in my editing that remind me of my ban from July 2019. I would like to get some advice on historical cases of editors like me on Wiktionary and Wikipedia that you all know of, especially editors that made a lot of edits but were later blocked for not following community policy or that were abrasive and rude in some way. On Wikipedia, I have recently passed the 20,031 edit mark of the former user User:Lieutenant of Melkor who was a powerful China minor geography editor and was apparently removed for rudeness (although I never looked into that user's ban fully- should I?). I feel like I can make some great contributions if I can just remember the bad examples of people who might have been good editors on one level but fell on their own sword or something like that and avoid the trap I make for myself. All help appreciated. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 03:49, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Huh, never seen anything quite like this in 17 years... Well, if you don't want to get in trouble due to your attitude, then maybe you should make a personal rule that you won't write anything directed to anyone without thinking twice. Maybe go to Special:Preferences and turn on "Show preview on first edit" so that you'll have to press Enter twice. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 03:55, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I am basically half-internet troll, half reasonable person. This strategy sounds smart to me. This is my first edit with that option turned on. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 04:17, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
 * second attempt
 * Yeah, User:SPUI was a hardcore troll who joined en.wp and added a lot of valuable content on American highways for awhile. Humans are complicated. If you can be a good person, we're happy to have you. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 05:06, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
 * It is incredible that I have gotten this far. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 07:26, 25 March 2020 (UTC)
 * We have lost valuable editors because they got more stressed out by the environment than they could cope with. Not everyone has the same robust disposition; additionally, they may at the same time have to cope with other stressful issues – out of a job, a child with special needs, a chronic illness, ... It helps to keep in mind that the other person may be more vulnerable than they appear. This project is built on consensus, and consensus is only possible if we all sacrifice a little bit of ego (or for some a large chunk) for the goal we share.  --Lambiam 14:01, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

 * (I started reading this and thought "oh God did I post this one?". Whew.) Equinox ◑ 22:45, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

 * First of all I would suggest keeping the pointy end of your sword away from you. In fact you may just want to keep it in its scabbard while you are here. But really you should probably just leave it behind as there shouldn't be any need for such things. Swords.svg -Mike (talk) 23:54, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

title: Wiktionary:Information desk/2020/March


text:
nḏyt

Etymology
Possibly formed from. The verb is of later date and may best be seen as a back-formation.

Noun

 * 1) stinginess, meanness, thrift
 * 2) badness, baseness
 * 3) presumptuousness
 * 1) presumptuousness
 * 1) presumptuousness

title: nḏyt