Wikispecies:Village Pump/Archive 24

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Allotopus moellenkampi moseri[edit]

Allotopus moellenkampi moseri was identified by Bomans in 2007 as synonym with Allotopus moellenkampi moellenkampi. What to write articles on cases like that? Source Texas A&M University. Metrónomo (talk) 10:06, 8 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • On the A. m. moellenkampi page insert a Synonyms section and include A. m. moseri with its author information, references etc. The change the A. m. moseri page to simply read as a redirect to A. m. moellenkampi. Accassidy (talk) 08:55, 9 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Acheta domesticus[edit]

Originally described in the genus Gryllus, it should be named Acheta domestica now. Acheta domesticus is often seen, so I let anyone competent correct the article (and Acheta) in the good way. Totodu74 (talk) 18:41, 8 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Reposting of dated item posted elsewhere which belonged here[edit]

Забастовка против идиотизма[edit]

Taxon Tree[edit]

Is it possible to view the taxonomy as a tree representation or text/database file?

We don't include that kind of information as part of the database. The pages on Wikispecies are about the names, not the phylogeny. You'd need to look for that information on Wikipedia. --EncycloPetey (talk) 20:35, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, a couple of people are trying to convert Wikispecies into a file that could be used by a database. The've run into some problems because of inconsistencies that are probably easily fixed. For example, there are still many names which are not organism names, or names which are not entered in a consistent fashion (for example names which could not be parsed -- http://betula.mbl.edu/gna_test/wikispecies/problematic_names.csv.) Also several thousand entries are at the root of the hierarchy because a programming script was not able to find their placement http://betula.mbl.edu/gna_test/wikispecies/wikispecies_roots.txt . If Wikispecies editors could resolve some of these or at least help guide the programmers to how to handle them, we could use Wikispecies as a major source of trusted information for the Encyclopedia of Life http://www.eol.org. Csparr (talk) 13:30, 20 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Cindy, its not immediately obvious why some of the pages have been flagged up, for example, under problematic names. Look at Poritiinae which is not on the problematic list, and Polyommatinae, which is. These are both in my area. If someone could tell me why one appears on the list and not the other, it might be possible to do something about it. Regards, Accassidy (talk) 19:18, 20 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Good question. I'll try to find out and let you know. Csparr (talk) 16:04, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
See my comments below. The inclusion of the second authority (Eliot) in the first line of name section (which is a perfectly reasonable practice) on Polyommatinae throws their parser for a loop. Koumz (talk) 18:57, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I repeat again that Wikispecies does not include that sort of information. Putting Wikispecies into a database will create false information if that information is then used to create a tree. The Linnaean classification system currently used by biologists (and on Wikispecies) is inherently unable to code that information. This is why some taxonomists have begun advocating a new taxonomic coding system that can handle phylogenetic information. Again, putting the current taxonomic information into a database and rendering the results as a tree is inherently artificial, and will not produce a phylogeny of life. --EncycloPetey (talk) 23:23, 21 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I agree 100% that it won't be a phylogenetic tree but classifications (both Linnaean and non-biological) can definitely be trees in the sense that they are hierarchical (filesystems are trees, too). Quite a few previous projects have visualized in tree form the information from classifications and many tools for editing classifications use the standard hierarchical file system viewer.
Trees aside, if we bring in Wikispecies information EOL will finally have many pages that are currently missing because none of our sources include those names. So even if you don't like the tree representation, we'd like to make sure the names are what they are supposed to be and that we link to them from the right pages. What should we do with names that have "salvage mode" in them? Csparr
There are definitely some dangling species in the file http://betula.mbl.edu/gna_test/wikispecies/wikispecies_roots.txt that for some reason a computer program can't place in a genus. Not sure why -- maybe the genus page doesn't exist on Wikispecies or the species page isn't linked to it? Seems to me like the vast majority of Wikispecies works fine. Csparr (talk) 16:11, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
It looks like the file http://betula.mbl.edu/gna_test/wikispecies/wikispecies_roots.txt contains primarily (but not exclusively) pages that do not have a taxonavigation heading (or there is one, but it has an error in it) at the top of the page, or other formatting errors. I usually work on these type of problems slowly on principle anyway, so that list will be generally useful to me, but I make no guarantees at all about how soon they will all be fixed because the list contains thousands of pages, and there are a number of different types of errors, so it will take time to automate. The "salvage mode" phenomenon you discuss above seems to arise from the fact that the parser which generated that list does not deal well with variations in the "Name" section (for example, years with slashes, like 1823/24, or the reference information beyond just the author and name that is included in the name section by some editors here, and since that is a reasonable practice, the fact that the parser does not handle it well is not the responsibility of the editors here.) About 250 of the pages on the "salvage mode" list are for bacterial strains, and these don't fit strictly within the binomial model and thus won't be handled well. Many pages in that list contain formatting errors, but many are just on the list because of the limitations of the parser, and the errors are not systematic so all ~400 of them will have to be fixed by hand. Koumz (talk) 16:20, 24 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, this is very helpful! Will pass along to the programmer and eventually rerun once there's been time to update the parser and wait for some of the manual corrections. Csparr (talk) 13:36, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Following comments above, I have made some revisions to Polyommatinae which change the structure of the Name line. Perhaps now it will parse properly. If we have the reasons why some pages are not being picked up correctly, then we can fix it and aim for more compatibility. Accassidy (talk) 22:51, 25 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Great, thanks for your efforts! Csparr (talk) 13:36, 29 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Here's a new file with remaining problems: http://betula.mbl.edu/gna_test/wikispecies/2012-03-02-wikispecies_names_salvaged.html It looks to me like some of them are easy to fix -- there's an unmatched ) when there should either be none or a matched pair, there's a stray curly bracket from a template, or there's a / in the year. If the / is legitimate I'll suggest we just accept that. Very many of them are strain designations which should be accepted as is. All in all, this is a small number of problems! Csparr (talk) 14:43, 6 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I have been working on these and have now fixed all the obvious formatting errors as far as I can see, so unless I have somehow missed one here or there, all the remaining pages are legitimate for one reason or another, mostly due to either being bacterial strains, having a slash, bracket, ?, or other such character legitimately in the year, or certain formats of reference information on the first line of the name section. I am not going to change the reference information unless the users who put it there originally (most of whom are still active here) instruct me to do so. Koumz (talk) 21:54, 6 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Change may be needed on MediaWiki:Babel-footer[edit]

Hello everybody. MediaWiki:Babel-footer should give the name of the category where to find the contributors by language. But, for the moment, it's no the case (see my user page for an example), it links to Category:Babel - Users by language, which doesn't exist. I think MediaWiki:Babel-footer should link to Category:Babel (I did that type of modif on the Wiktionnaire some time ago [1]).

Best regards. ;-) --ArséniureDeGallium (talk) 17:46, 31 January 2012 (UTC) PS : the link to create a subject on this page breaks the https, this is bad. ---- (addition) This is probably solved [2].[reply]

I have made this change, but it looks like this MediaWiki:Babel-footer only affects the display name of the category, not what category it links to. The category link itself is deeper in the interface, and I have not been able to find where it is to adjust it. Koumz (talk) 15:59, 6 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Needs some template creating[edit]

. . . which I'm afraid I'm not sure how to do! Taxonomy updates for Coraciiformes:

Reference. Thanks! - MPF (talk) 18:38, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

 Done Koumz (talk) 20:03, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks! - MPF (talk) 20:23, 19 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Outdated conventions and data model[edit]

I am a newcomer to Wikispecies, so forgive me if my comments appear naïve, but I think the convention used to structure name data about species is arcane and old fashioned. I sort of understand that a synonym may arise whenever the same taxon is described and named more than once, independently in accordance with the long-standing Principle of Priority, but the way this information is displayed is not easy to understand unless you are conversant with the shorthand notation used in scientific papers.

My concerns are twofold:

  1. the conventions used in articles are not intuitive, and therefore not easily understood by new readers or contributors. For example, the extensive use of abbrieviations, such as Koch, 1865 creates a reference that is more akin to a loose end, requiring substantial detective work in order to match the reference with the actual source;
  2. there isn't even a hint of a data model used in any article that could be used to demonstate what this project is working towards in terms of an ideal or complete record. What I mean by this is that some other species databases have more robust data models (including the use of standarised XML tags that facilitate database searches), and this enables both the user and the contributor to recognise what infomation is included or missing from an article.

One pet annoyance is there no real disctinciton between the species actual name (its valid name) and its synonym. For instance, take the example of Agrius convolvuli (Linnaeus, 1758). If I understand correctly, the valid name is missing from the article because it is not present in the synonym section.

The point I am getting to here is that the way data is currently being entered in a relatively unstructured way, and the format that is being used that relies on a knowledge of complex conventions, over reliance of ambiguous abbreviations, and a lack of a data model that allows errors and omissions does not bode well for the future development of this project.

What I propose is the greater use of templates to structure data within articles based on a data model that incorporates the best of modern methods.--Gavin.collins (talk) 17:48, 9 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Gavin, thanks for your comments, some of which I understand. You are right to suggest that some authors leave references a bit short, but there are better examples. See Drupadia ravindra for example which has all references cited fully and links to those that are available for web browsing. With regards to valid names, this is what is actually given under the Name section, with synonyms being invalid for some reason. Hence Agrius convolvuli is valid in the view of the page's creator and the synonyms not. Strictly, the valid name is misplaced under the heading Synonyms but I usually add it, often as the last entry, to show how nomenclature has developed. I would prefer that the sub-heading was Synonymy as then including the current valid name would be less controversial, but the older standard still prevails. WikiSpecies is here for people to use and to contribute. Sadly, 'they' never do anything. So if there are improvements to be made, please explain more detail and get to work. Accassidy (talk) 10:02, 10 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
On the subject of author names:
  • There are at least two regular users here who are working systematically on disambiguating links to author pages (see Oncorhynchus nerka for an example of a page with all links disambiguated), and that is a huge job, so you are more than welcome to help with the work there if you'd like.
  • Your concern that the names and references for subsequent placements are not being shown is a valid one, but much of the reason for that is that, in many cases, finding sources for subsequent placements can require even more of the detective work you complain about above than sorting out the identity of the author of an original combination does. Koumz (talk) 15:32, 10 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Ummm.. one note about Synonyms: For botanical synonymys, generally only valid synonyms are listed. In zoological nomenclature a "valid" name is the "correct" name, However, a "valid" botanical name is one that was published in accordance with requirements of the Code, and may not be the "correct" name. If something isn't "valid" in botanical nomenclature, then technically it isn't even a "name". --EncycloPetey (talk) 16:53, 10 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
It needs more than a template, it need to be converted to a relational database. There is nothing elegant about Linnaen Taxonomy unless you speak latin which abstracts to obfuscation. If you search the web, you will see dozens of website that have simply done their own thing, put have yet to see one that was complete, internationally supported, and authoritative. I do not know if Wikispecies could host a database, or if that would have to be done externally but it definitely needs it. Template are okay for rigid formats, but the sub elements here can be defined in any number of ways and vary great by phyla. Even at the top level, you may see references to Kingdom or Regnum which is semantic. Further down on this page, there is also a request for Type of geography, which is needed for a variety of reasons. Wikipedia has garnered enough support to influence change, and I find to hard to believe that the science community hasn't perfected this in the past decade. I'd be glad to volunteer time and effort to help, but I do not personally have any inroad for Wiki support. Mapsurfer49 (talk) 10:32, 26 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

New Wikimedia Shop feedback/help requested[edit]

Hey all,

Some of you may already know that we've opened a shop at http://shop.wikimedia.org to sell Wikimedia Merchandise. We're now entering our "Community Launch" allowing us to hopefully get as much feedback from the community about the store, it's products and everything else involved. For those that are interested we've set up an FAQ/information page, feedback page and design page. We also have a 10% discount up for at least the next 2 weeks (CLAUNCH or 'Wikimedia Community Launch' in the discount box at checkout) and a $10 maximum shipping fee world wide for most orders.

However the big thing I wanted to ask you about was Wikispecies gear. Right now everything on there is Wikipedia related but we want to make sure we have merch from all of the projects as well. So far we have a couple things on order:

  • Stickers from all of the projects
  • 1" buttons (or 'badges' ) from all of the projects
  • Are in the design and digital mockup phase of lapel pins for all of the projects to both go independently and as a set. Right now we're getting mockups to see how they look and to see if we want to go with the Pewter look that we have right now for the globe (this new set will have an interlocked v W for the wikipedia piece) or the full color enamel look like This Strike Command pin.

We want to have more though both soon and in the future and I wanted to know what you thought. One of my thoughts for something early on was a series similar to the I Edit Wikipedia shirts (we have two versions right now) on the shop for each project. If we did something like that should we just use Edit or adjust the verb for wikispecies? Other ideas for products? Jalexander (talk) 00:42, 20 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

How about "I populate Wikispecies"? The project is still in a stage of parimarily adding new pages, rather than editing existing ones. --EncycloPetey (talk) 17:24, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Overcategorization[edit]

I have started to remove the top-level category on pages that have more specific categories on them already (e.g., Category:Antipodes Islands Diptera was in both Category:Antipodes Islands nonmarine fauna and Category:Categories — it seems obvious to me that it should only be in the first [more specific] cat, since otherwise Category:Categories will become ridiculously overpopulated). Just wanted to get agreement from others for this approach, since I've noticed that the editor who was putting stuff in the top-level cat is someone I have recently had "issues" with, and I would hate for him to think I was making these changes because of some ulterior motive.... - dcljr (talk) 21:57, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, go head by all means. My adding Category:Categories in those few cases was a mistake ... Stho002 (talk) 22:14, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. - dcljr (talk) 22:25, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I haven't continued this activity yet, because I've noticed quite a bit of variation in how things are categorized there at the top and need some time to think things through. In particular, I see that the category names refer to "flora", "fauna" and "biota" of "countries" and "regions" — which is all pretty straightforward, but the cats don't always nest the way you'd expect and the naming style varies greatly ("Flora of X" but "X fauna"). Most of the cats of this type that appear in Category:Categories are actually for islands or island groups. I'm thinking, therefore, that we need many new cats in a structure something like:
Note that although the naming style "X fauna" avoids the need for sortkeys, I think "Fauna of X|X" is preferable. Before I start creating a bunch of new cats, does anyone have suggestions for better naming or nesting systems? Also, this doesn't even count cats whose names are prefixed by "Locality:" or "Type locality:". I'm not sure how those cats should interact, if at all, with the above structure... - dcljr (talk) 20:31, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Categories work by nesting them appropriately ... it doesn't matter what they are called, as long as the meaning is clear. This is a non-issue ... Stho002 (talk) 23:15, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
If you take a look at the edit history of these categories, you will find that they were all created by a sporadic, over-enthusiastic, taxonomically-confused user who does not communicate in English. He has been blocked repeatedly for creating bogus species entries, as well. Some of his "endemic species" are not species at all. Whatever you choose to do with category cleanup or deletion should be fine. --EncycloPetey (talk) 17:21, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
This applies only to those categories specifically under Category:Biota, and not to the categories related to New Zealand. Koumz (talk) 17:34, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I've done about all I'm comfortable doing (related to this discussion). I abandoned the idea of "by country" and "by island" meta-categories, since countries are political entities with no real connection to the distribution of species, and "by island" just seems too specific. Instead, I've created Category:Biota by region and moved a bunch of stuff out of cat:Categories into there (not splitting up anything by regnum). Interested parties can go through that category and further improve/expand its structure. I've also simply removed cat:Categories from things that were already catted elsewhere. I've left the entire Category:Biota by country tree alone; someone else can move stuff out of there and delete the whole thing, if they want. (Oh, and I also didn't touch Category:Fauna by region, apart from making it a subcat of Biota by region.) I think some stuff still in Category:Categories should really go into Category:Biota (not Biota by region) and other (existing and potential) subcats of cat:Categories, but I'm not going to do any of that myself. In some cases, I moved things into Category:Primary types, Category:Localities, and Category:Type locality, just based on their names — but I must admit, I really don't understand the intended distinctions between those categories, so those cats should also be checked by more knowledgeable parties. - dcljr (talk) 08:40, 10 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Photo of Homo sapiens[edit]

I'd also like to request that we use an actual photograph of Homo sapiens on that page (and Homo sapiens sapiens, and the various higher taxa where the current image is used), instead of the Pioneer 10 line drawing. WS:NOT says we should prefer "scientific illustrations and clear photographs", and it certainly looks a bit odd to have a simple line drawing for humans when we don't do that for other extant, common species. I tried to add two images that I thought illustrated interesting human behaviors, but another user disagreed with my choices. I still like File:BushmenSan.jpg, since it shows tool use and (attempted) fire creation, two important hallmarks of human behavior, but I recognize that others may prefer a more straightforward image, especially one that illustrates our sexual dimorphism. OTOH, I wouldn't want something like the sterile, "artificial looking" File:Anterior view of human female and male, without labels.jpg. So, does anyone have suggestions for good photographs of our species that we could choose from? (Obviously, the "Human" article(s) on the various WPs would be a place to look, but I'm not really wild about any of the images I see there.) - dcljr (talk) 22:25, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm happy with the status quo. You are not the only one who wants to choose the Homo sapiens image(s) to suit your own tastes. The status quo is perfectly adequate, and as everyone knows what this species looks like, there is actually no real point in having any image at all ... Stho002 (talk) 22:54, 28 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Sure, everyone has their own ideas — that's why I'm asking here. I'd like to get consensus around a better image, since the one we have now is almost comically useless. And yes, "everyone knows" what homo sapiens looks like, but then everyone knows what dogs and cats look like, too, and we have photographs for those (which, BTW, are just as [non-] representative as any particular photo of a human would be, since those species are at least as variable in appearance as humans are). I would, in fact, prefer the images for humans, dogs, and cats all to be (respective) montages that give some idea of the variation seen in the species. But the present discussion is just about homo sapiens... - dcljr (talk) 19:42, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
You are making a big deal about nothing! Do you know what would be a really good idea (I will probably do it again today), go out and find a species for which no image is readily available, photograph it, and upload it for use on Wikispecies ... Stho002 (talk) 23:13, 30 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Could you please stop "suggesting" what I should be working on instead of what I want to do here. It's really getting annoying... Does anyone else have something useful to say? - dcljr (talk) 07:54, 1 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I really like the File:BushmenSan.jpg as it depicts homo sapiens a reasonably base, 'natural' form-much the same as the images WE tend to have of the other species are. It's a vast improvement over the current status quo, and I think a well thought-out suggestion. We have images of other species as found, not some cold, sterile dissection-kit pictures, or a dog in a trumped-up doghouse. Short: I second this suggestion. <anon> 16:05, 11 August 2012 (UTC)
Agree, that's a good pic. Another option is to show the designated type specimen. - MPF (talk) 08:53, 21 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The designated type specimen (Linnaeus) is the more appropriate example. LOL For the "Homo sapiens sapiens" page, I'd propose deprecation because the Apes are offended. Mapsurfer49 (talk) 11:42, 26 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Use of taxon_id in entries[edit]

I visited in the context of checking some data I'm entering in a database (thank you), which puts me in the "just passing by" category of user. I was surprised that the (well known animal) entries I visited had no visible taxon_id.

I see that you do use taxon_id numbers but they seem to be internal, invisible in URLs for links out. I searched the other namespaces and still didn't find much about taxon_id. Did you decide not to use them? Are they a poor fit for the granularity you need? Is it because "NCBI taxonomy database is not an authoritative source for nomenclature or classification"[3] ? Is it too obscure to use as a primary key?

These are some things I read parts of while searching about this,

I realise that casually suggesting you retrofit all of Wikispecies with taxids isn't very helpful. Could you do any of

  • Put a page in Wikispecies: explaining the project's position on or use of taxon_id? Listing the places they can/should appear?
  • Link that from the page furniture?
  • Create Category:Taxon Non-Authorities, in which to list other databases?
  • Change Template:NCBI to show taxon_id=nnn explicitly in the transclusion?

Thanks -- Silicosaurus (talk) 09:50, 29 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Please note NCBI's own disclaimer: "Disclaimer: The NCBI taxonomy database is not an authoritative source for nomenclature or classification - please consult the relevant scientific literature for the most reliable information."
  • On why pages here do not use page id numbers in the URL, this is a question for the MediaWiki developers. Wikispecies runs on the same software that is used to run Wikipedia and all of its sister projects, and none of these projects use page id numbers in their URLs.
  • Have you asked ITIS or any other high-profile database why they don't use NCBI id numbers? The taxon id numbers you see in NCBI links are NCBI taxonid (=page) numbers used for linking to NCBI pages and not intrinsic to this project (or, indeed, to anything outside NCBI) at all. Similarly, many other databases to which we have links have their own individual taxonid systems, and some databases have no taxonids displayed and just use text searches as we do. For this reason adopting and/or displaying the taxonid system of any one particular database for use here would be impractical, especially since the ids in these links can be revealed by just hovering over the link anyway. The individual pages here probably do have latent page numbers within the MediaWiki software, but these are never displayed or used in common wiki practice, and displaying them is something beyond the skill of anyone here and a question for the MediaWiki developers, even if those here thought it would be useful.
  • Even if Category:Taxon Authorities had anything at all to do with external database links (which it does not), creating Category:Taxon Non-Authorities would be like creating Category:Non-Wikipedians at Wikipedia (a category potentially containing an indefinite number of pages, all of which have little or nothing to do with the rest of the project and providing no benefit to it at much cost in terms of work). Help:Project sources already gives a list of what are generally considered the more reliable secondary sources (although there is some disagreement between users even on some of these), and listing these is much simpler and more functional than trying to make an authoritative list of every obscure database one might find that is not reliable. Ideally, the better external databases are used primarily as aids in finding primary taxonomic papers, which are the real sources anyway. You may note that neither NCBI nor ITIS, both of which are high-profile, but taxonomically unreliable, sources, appears at Help:Project sources. Koumz (talk) 13:16, 29 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Hey, someone seems to be playing around with this ... please don't! I'm getting some page urls suddenly appearing in a different form like this:

http://species.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=Metabronemoides_mirabilis&rcid=1447506

instead of

http://species.wikimedia.org/wiki/Metabronemoides_mirabilis

though the latter still seems to work (thank God!) for linking to the page from external sites

the latter is perfectly fine (in the form http://species.wikimedia.org/wiki/Genus_species) as a unique taxon identifier (particularly if other editors please refrain from including subgenera as part of the page name)

there is no point in giving taxa another unique identifier that is just entirely numeric ...

thanks, Stho002 (talk) 21:12, 29 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]


  • I think there is a point in giving taxa another unique identifier that is just mainly numeric.

At present each database around on the internet uses its own primary key for a species.

The first described marine ostracod Cythere lutea O.F. Müller, 1785 is listed under the following IDs, for instance:

Biodiversity Heritage Library NamebankID: 4819893

Global Biodiversity Information Facility Taxonkey: 2219864

Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS) Taxonomic Serial Number (TSN): 683776

ZipcodeZoo Species Identifier: 671857

WoRMS Aphia ID: 127969

Wikispecies internal ID: 1383867

In the long run, if some of those databases really want to become more useful for the scientist, they will have to develop a universal system.

I started myself a database dealing with Ostracoda nearly 40 years ago, at times of mainframes and machine readable punchcards. In 1980 the first parts were published. Within that database, known as "Cologne Database Ostracoda" in the beginning or "Kempf Database Ostracoda" later and up to now, a method has been developed that produces a UTIN (Universal Taxonomic Identification Number) for each taxon.

For example:

G2752 ===== Cythere O.F. Müller, 1785

G2752 39191 Cythere lutea O.F. Müller, 1785


G0849 ===== Alicenula Rossetti & Martens, 1998

G0849 15186 Alicenula serricaudata (Klie, 1935) Rossetti & Martens, 1998


G6333 ===== Arctostoma Schornikov & Zenina, 2006

G6333 71477 Arctostoma dudarevi Schornikov & Zenina, 2006

G6333 71798 Arctostoma nealei (Horne & Whittaker, 1985) Schornikov & Zenina, 2006


Such taxon codes (UTINs) are similar in appearance to ISSN numbers for titles of journals. The latter are used by a great number of quite different databases all over the world.

As the length of such universal taxon codes is constant, they are much more suitable for databases than the complete names of taxa that may be quite lengthy.

Kempf EK (talk) 00:50, 2 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

OK, it is clear that the issue of taxon_id is more complicated than I expected.

Would Wikispecies kindly carry one page (e.g. Wikispecies:Links to other databases describing, for any type of foreign key to other organisations' species databases
  • Why they are not given on each species page
  • How they may be used internally to reference specific pages, but this use is incidental
  • What properties would be needed of the primary key, for them to be useful here?
to cover the current position and act as a focal point for questions.

...or is there still something I'm missing when requesting this? Thanks -- Silicosaurus (talk) 12:20, 6 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thumb sizes[edit]

I've noticed a large number of thumbnail images here (based on the upper levels of Animalia, anyway) are hard-coded to 250px (and some use {{Image}}, which similarly hard-codes this size). AFAICT, the default thumb size for users not logged in is currently 220px, which isn't much different (and some image links hard-code this size instead). However, logged-in users have the ability to choose the default size of thumbnails that they prefer, and this is overrided by specifying the pixel size in the image link. So, shouldn't we really just use "thumb" without specifying a size? - dcljr (talk) 23:40, 6 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

No. Some vertical images are too tall and narrow, while some wide images would render too short. The Image Guidelines are to use 220px for standard proportion images in vertical orientation, and 250px for standard size landscape orientation, which works well as long as the images are close to the standard height:width ratio. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:21, 7 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not saying every image should be the same size. I'm saying that unless there is a good reason not to, we should allow users' choices of default size to prevail, which doesn't happen if we hard-code a size in the link. Based on what I've seen, almost every image we have a size specified on would be fine at the default size. - dcljr (talk) 22:31, 8 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Then take a look at what would happen to the images on Plioplatecarpus and Encephalartos sclavoi when set to the default on a mobile device. If we can allow users to customize their browsing experience, I'd be fine with that, but I'd rather not have a few badly displayed images or random sizes simply because most images would work at the default. Most isn't all. --EncycloPetey (talk) 02:42, 9 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Please reread the first sentence of my previous comment. The thing you're objecting to is precisely what I said I'm not calling for. I said, "unless there is a good reason not to", meaning: in a case-by-case basis, considering the appearance of the image at the default size. So, if an image looks OK at 220px, we should not specify the size in the image (File:) link (because it overrides the preference of users who have changed their thumbnail-size setting). If the image has an odd aspect ratio or contains many small subimages (say), then yeah, we should specify the size. This really shouldn't be a controversial position. The only reason I brought it up here is the sheer number of images that are (IMO needlessly) hard-coded at 250px and 220px, when there's nothing unusual about the images themselves that would call for them to be hard-coded at those sizes (example image, before and after removing the hard-coded size; and again, before and after — are these before/after images really so very different that it calls for overriding users' preferences?). And now I know why so many image links have these sizes specified: the Image Guidelines. So... now I'm saying, we should drop the recommendation to use 250px and 220px, and instead recommend setting the size only on images having extreme aspect ratios (say, more than 2:1? 5:3? whatever) or montages that are hard to make out at the default size. Finally, as for problems viewing the site on a mobile device, surely this should be dealt with by improving the software/style-sheet support for mobile devices, not by hard-coding image sizes that everyone sees... - dcljr (talk) 03:04, 10 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't much matter to me. I have been using the image template in case there are changes to the default, it would be easy enough to remove the 250 from the template. Open2universe | Talk 02:42, 13 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Who cares? I doubt a lot of people view our website on mobile. For me, it seems like this discussion is all about discussing the colour of bicycle shed. OhanaUnitedTalk page 17:13, 13 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

[outdent] Aha! I've "rediscovered" the mechanism provided by the MediaWiki software itself to deal with images having odd aspect ratios: the "upright" option, which scales the image width by a given factor. (I'm sure I've seen this option before, but I had forgotten about it.) The default value, 0.75, is suitable for (some) images that are taller than they are wide (hence the option name "upright" — a name, BTW, that people objected to when it was first introduced but seems to have stuck); it can also be set equal to a number greater than 1 for wide images (or image montages). In particular, see these examples:

default thumbnail size determined by user preference
hardcoded 220px (the size seen if user preference not changed)
using "upright" with no value specified
hardcoded 350px
scaled up relative to user preference, using "upright=1.6"

For me, the first two images are the same size and the last two images are the same size, because I have not changed my thumbnail-size preference from the default 220px. For users who have changed the preference setting (or go change it now), the first and last (and middle) images will be different sizes, as appropriate. (The middle image is only there for comparison, showing the default scaling factor of 0.75 — and this can be changed for a given wiki, if desired, by submitting a bug report requesting a change to the $wgThumbUpright configuration setting.) So... now I don't see how anyone could object to dropping the recommendation to hardcode image sizes and replace it by a recommendation to use the "upright" option to scale the images up or down in size only when necessary. For convenience, one or more templates could be created for commonly needed scaling factors. I have no objection to using templates in this way (within reason), as long as the actual size in pixels is not being hardcoded. And finally, for reference, people can check out versions of the pages Plioplatecarpus and Encephalartos sclavoi using "upright=1.6" and "upright", respectively. - dcljr (talk) 22:46, 15 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I should clarfiy, in case anyone got the wrong idea, that you can also set "upright=.8" or any other number less than one to scale an image down by a factor other than the default 0.75. So, EncycloPetey... since you're the only person who seemed to have a strong opinion about the matter, do you acknowledge that this provides a mechanism to "allow users to customize their browsing experience", as you mentioned above? - dcljr (talk) 03:15, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, yes certainly. If we can have a template that will handle most of this for use, and if there is good documentation so that I don't have to go hunting for this discussion again, then I'm satisfied with this option. --EncycloPetey (talk) 03:59, 30 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

What about Wikidata?[edit]

Redundant? Does the promotion of Wikidata to a new Wikimedia Foundation project make this wiki redundant? Koavf (talk) 02:48, 14 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Need an admin[edit]

Files Wikispecies doesn't host files, with the exceptions of a localized version of the logo for MediaWiki's sake and a copy of File:Icon tools.png, but there is also File:Leaf.png which is on here for some reason and protected as well... Could someone please delete this file? Thanks. Koavf (talk) 02:52, 14 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

 Done It was protected because it was still on one of the main pages. Replaced with an equivalent Commons file on that page and deleted. Koumz (talk) 03:34, 14 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Diceratocephalidae synonymy[edit]

Currently, Diceratocephalidae in the page Temnocephaloidea links to a family of Trilobites.

Temnocephala are Platyhelminthes so this is clearly erroneous.

I checked and it appears that Diceratocephalidae Lu, 1954 (Trilobites ; based on Diceratocephalus) and Diceratocephalidae Joffe, Cannon, & Schockaert, 1998 (Temnocephala; based on Diceratocephala) are synonyms. Diceratocephalidae Lu, 1954 has apparently priority.

I have contacted specialists of Temnocephala about this and the scientific issue should be solved...one day. However, this could take some time and Wikispecies has to fix this problem before the competent taxonomists do it.

Currently it is impossible to create a page Diceratocephalidae for the Temnocephaloidea because the page already exists.

I don't know what is the policy here (add a disambiguation page? add an explanation in the Temnocephaloidea page? delete the link from the Temnocephaloidea page to the Trilobite family?) but certainly an administrator will know what to do. I hope this helps. Jeanloujustine (talk) 15:18, 23 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

 Done. Disambiguation page and page for the junior homonym created. Koumz (talk) 04:10, 24 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Well done! Jeanloujustine (talk) 14:58, 24 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Disambiguation[edit]

We need to standardise this, so that we can use the template {{Title without disambig‎|string}} to help to automatically link page names to external databases, like ION, etc. For this template to work, the disambiguation part of the page name *must* be in (). There are three classes of disambiguation types: (1) taxonomic names that are homonyms of other categories of name, like authors (mostly happens with genera), (2) between kingdom homonyms, and (3) within kingdom homonyms. In cases (2) and (3), the homonyms can be at the same rank, or different ranks (e.g. homonymy between genus and subtribe). Please can we start to standardise this way: Disambiguate between kingdom homonyms with the name of the kingdom in (), e.g. Solenopsis (Animalia), and Solenopsis (Plantae). Disambiguate same level homonyms within a kingdom by the name of the author in (), even if () would not usually be used around the name of the author. Disambiguate different rank, within kingdom, homonyms with the rank in (). More later ... Stho002 (talk) 03:19, 26 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If we can agree on a list of kingdoms, then we can use that for the kingdom-level disambiguation, but I doubt that we can agree on a list of kingdoms. However, we cannot have author names in parentheses for disambiguation, because the ICN accords specific meaning to having an author's name in parentheses, and there can even be one or more names in parentheses followed by one or more names not in parentheses. It will lead to a logical mess. --EncycloPetey (talk) 04:03, 30 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Most homonyms are Animal-Plant, Animal-Fungi, Animal-Protist ... only the last one is controversial, but we can still use it just for purposes of disambiguation. As for author in parentheses, I think you must misunderstand?? Templates like {{Title without disambig‎|string}} REQUIRE the disambiguation term to be in parentheses. There is no "logical mess" in using parentheses JUST FOR PAGE TITLES of ambiguous names ... Stho002 (talk) 04:21, 30 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
There are also plant-plant homonyms; lots of them. What is "Protist"? That is no longer a kingdom. I do understand what you mean about parentheses, but am strongly opposed to that approach for the reasons I have given. If the template requires such a format, then the template cannot be used. --EncycloPetey (talk) 17:41, 30 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, there are obviously lots of plant-plant and even more animal-animal homonyms! They are disambiguated by authorship. We need this ... Stho002 (talk) 03:52, 1 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
We already disambiguate by authorship, so that's not at issue. What you are proposing is that we sometimes use kingdom instead (and we should NOT do this), and that we add parentheses (which we also should NOT do). Kingdom cannot be used because (1) the list of kingdoms is not agreed upon, even here, (2) taxa move between kingdoms, (3) kingdom circumsriptions change. I've already pointed out why parentheses are a problem for "botanical" taxa. --EncycloPetey (talk) 18:17, 6 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

ウィキメディア東京ミートアップ開催のおしらせ[edit]

2012年5月27日(日)13時～17時（日本時間）下北沢でウィキメディア東京ミートアップを開催します。ウィキメディアへの書き込み方や画像の掲載方法などをレクチャーしたり、ウィキメディア・プロジェクトについて相談したりするお茶会です。初心者・ベテラン問わず、ふるってご参加ください。LT・プレゼンも募集しております。詳細はmeta:Meetup/Tokyo/34をご覧ください。お茶会ですので、お気軽にご参加ください！--Akaniji (talk) 14:46, 6 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Breeds and landraces[edit]

Sub-sub-species Does Wikispecies contain information about w:breeds and w:landraces? Why or why not? —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 08:50, 16 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Zoological and botanical holdings[edit]

Greetings Wikispecies editors,

I've just come to Wikispecies after seeing a link from Commons. I just uploaded a hundred or so images from the botanical gardens in Delft, NL, and am slowly going through them to try and identify all the plants. I tagged one of the images as Thuja plicata which linked through to Wikispecies.

I was wondering, with plants, would it be permissible and/or useful to link through to specific botanical gardens that have them on display? And same for animals in zoos, and other specimens held either alive or dead in museums and scientific institutions. This would seem to be very useful information that could be added to existing entries. Tom Morris (talk) 11:00, 18 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's outside of Wikispecies scope, just the same as having a description of the species, or details of its natural distribution, is outside of the scope (even though both are rather more important than lists of places with captive/cultivated specimens). If nothing else, the list of collections with e.g. Thuja plicata would number tens of thousands ;-) MPF (talk) 20:32, 18 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

We need consensus on Wollumbinia vs. Myuchelys[edit]

For background, please read this recent exchange on WP: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Faendalimas#Myuchelys_versus_Wollumbinia I have unprotected the pages, simply because it was a drastic measure to protect them, and it shouldn't be necessary anyway. User:Faendalimas [=Scott Thomson, co-author of Myuchelys] must not be allowed to change these pages without first gaining consensus from us, and I don't expect him to get it. Wikis are not a place for him to force his erroneous opinions on the rest of the world. We must protect WS against such attacks which would result in false information in our articles ... Stho002 (talk) 08:11, 19 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Double entry[edit]

Seems to be a double entry: Pseudognaphalium luteoalbum and Helichrysum luteoalbum. Assume the latter is most recent? JMK (talk) 11:24, 21 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Help needed with a file name/rename at Commons[edit]

Hi can anyone with a knowledge of insects help? We're having a at Commons with regards this image File:Silberner Grünrüssler (Phyllobius argentatus).jpg, and the claim that its misnamed (I think its a case of insect mimicry at play but I am no expert) and we would appreciate any help from anyone with greater expertise than us.--KTo288 (talk) 20:11, 22 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I have replied on the file talk page ... Stho002 (talk) 00:15, 23 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your input.--KTo288 (talk) 13:28, 23 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]

incomplete articles?[edit]

Hi, Is there a {{incomplete}} template that can be added to an article if a user notices that sub-orders are missing from an order? Something like

This article has been marked as incomplete. The may be sub-orders of this order that are not listed here. Please help Wikispecies by editing this page.

I'd imagine that the template would add the article to an incomplete category. For example of an incomplete article, according to [4] there are 44 members of ripipteryx, but the article only lists only one. Csmiller (talk) 06:18, 3 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Firstly, the "..." at the end of the species list as it was (albeit a list of 1 species) already indicated that the list was incomplete. Secondly, I put the template:ait on pages that *are* complete, and all other pages are potentially incomplete by default. Thirdly, the best thing to do in this situation is just to make the page complete, as I have done for this example (Ripipteryx)... Stho002 (talk) 07:03, 3 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

APGIII[edit]

I notice that many plant families do not follow APGIII. For example Asparagaceae s.l. is still split into the older smaller families, such as Agavaceae, Laxmanniaceae and so on. It it the wish of Wikispecies to correct this as detailed in the Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society October 2009 and other publications? (contribution by user:Andyboorman)

Much of the work on plant families was done pre APG III, but I believe the intent is to use APG III Open2universe | Talk 16:10, 10 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

--Mikemoh (talk) 20:11, 11 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Block request for Mainline[edit]

Apologies for posting this here. I couldn't find a specific page to request admin help.

The non-sul account Mainline (talk | contribs) is being used to spam cross-wiki (see this overview). He also spammed on this wiki, see Special:DeletedContributions/Mainline. Please consider blocking it here as well. Thanks, Mathonius (talk) 06:41, 13 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Blocked. Thanks for flagging this issue. OhanaUnitedTalk page 19:56, 13 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

To verify[edit]

Some edits require verification - botany. Ark (talk) 12:27, 16 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

These edits are User:Fadams again. They appear not to be the kind of nonsense of which he/she is capable (based on my cursory search), but, as always, he/she provides no authority or reference information. This user has edited under many IPs lately since his/her several user accounts are blocked, and always with the same style (addition of useless and/or meaningless categories, new pages with no author or reference information and sometimes, though not lately, addition of hoax taxa). Koumz (talk) 15:12, 16 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
What should we do then? OhanaUnitedTalk page 18:51, 16 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Unless someone wants to spend time following him/her around to fix all the species pages with no information (etc.), the alternatives would seem to be either to let the pages be as long as they are not hoax taxa or to put long blocks on the IP addresses one by one as they appear until he/she runs out of addresses to use for contributions that don't improve the wiki. I was originally following the latter path until one such block was reduced .... Koumz (talk) 04:43, 17 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
I initially blocked him for these edits, but then I found pages on WP which seemed to validate them, but I'm no botanist, so I don't really know ... Stho002 (talk) 04:45, 17 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
These edits are not hoaxes based on what I've seen, but they (like almost all the others he/she creates) basically amount to empty placeholder pages containing just names and no other detail. He/she also has used bulleted species lists copied in Wikipedia format and other such things that would need cleaning up to match anything else here. He/she claims on user page to speak English well, but is a Bulgarian speaker who has not seemed to understand any of the many attempts we've made to help him/her learn what are useful contributions here, and I suspect the issue there is deeper than just one of language. Koumz (talk) 04:57, 17 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I know! Creating placeholders is pretty harmless, though. We don't know if his IP is shared with other innocent potential or actual editors. I am a little reluctant to block for that reason, but I will not stop other admins from blocking ... Stho002 (talk) 05:09, 17 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thus, much of the reason I am not currently doing anything about it myself. Since he/she is the only one to have used any of those addresses on this wiki, I doubt if there is much danger of significant collateral damage, though. Either way it's just not really worth effort anymore. Koumz (talk) 19:14, 17 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
This category Category:Decorative plants is out of wikispecies scope and needs deletion; I've removed all the taxa from it except for 3 orchid hybrids that need more detailed reformatting (including page moves to correct botanical format). - MPF (talk) 16:52, 21 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
[Groan . . .] this category Category:Biota and all its subcategories need emptying and deleting . . . quite a lot to do there! I'll help out but don't want to have to do all of it! - MPF (talk) 16:55, 21 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
He is becoming a problem ... I have blocked his latest IP for 1 month. If he comes back, we'll might just keep blocking for 1 month each time ... Stho002 (talk) 21:27, 21 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Another IP number with edits probably by the same person - MPF (talk) 09:55, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
and another (only one edit from there so far), another, another, another - MPF (talk) 15:11, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Just emptied a lot of the categories and tagged them {{Delete|out of wikispecies scope}}. A number of species with no ==References== section, I've tagged {{NSF}}; their validity will need verifying, and references added. - MPF (talk) 16:46, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
You are going a bit too far with your tagging. A category of any kind relevant to species is not necessarily "out of Wikispecies scope" ... it must just be a sensible category, with the correct species added into it. Also a taxon page created with just name and authority is minimally acceptable, and does not contravene standard taxon formatting .... Stho002 (talk) 22:30, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
But none of those categories were sensible! And I'd disagree, a reference is essential, though also most of those taxon pages didn't have an author either. I wasn't saying those taxon pages should be deleted, just flagging them up that they need review; the NSF tag was the only one I could find for this. - MPF (talk) 22:37, 24 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Finished checking the first 3 IPs listed by MPF, deleted some random pages & categories, and savaged some pages originally marked as NSF by MPF. Still needs to verify the pages from last 2 IPs. Looks like this guy hops around all kinds of IPs from Bulgaria and blocking IPs don't do much because the range of IPs covered is just too wide. OhanaUnitedTalk page 04:00, 25 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks! Hope that's a typo for 'salvaged', not 'savaged' ;-) One thing that would help a bit here I guess would be to make it impossible for unregistered contributors to start new pages. MPF (talk) 08:34, 25 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Again, that would be going too far ... it is unnecessary. At the end of the day, any page which isn't properly referenced should just be ignored anyway ... Stho002 (talk) 21:15, 26 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
"that would be going too far ... it is unnecessary" - Why so? It applies at Commons and on en: & de: wikipedias, and probably many other language wikis as well - MPF (talk) 08:31, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Mainly on what to include in difficult synonymies; and a plea for "best practice" examples[edit]

I am new to Wikispecies, but I am a professional biologist with a reasonable knowledge of taxonomy, and I also have experience writing articles for Wikipedia. I had the aim of entering in details of a slug species that I described recently. I have spent a couple of hours reading the help sections and Village Pump, but I am still somewhat confused about some aspects. No doubt I could learn more by delving deeper into the archives of the Village Pump (it would be nice if the whole set of its archives were searchable in one go), but perhaps it is useful to you if I express my present confusions.

1) I think that it would be extremely helpful as part of the help sections to list some completed pages that are “best practice”. It is always useful to know where one should be heading. Some of the illustrative examples could be ones where the taxonomy is straightforwards but also please some where synonymy, or other aspects, are more complicated. Sure, I can press the random-page button and get lots of examples, but I am not to know whether these are best practice and one is rather unlikely to find the more difficult or complicated examples.

2) It was unclear to me whether the references should be restricted to the articles describing the species (including the synonyms) or whether they should include works that review the taxonomy of that species or genus (even if they leave the taxonomy unchanged and the authors would thus not be mentioned in the text above). I think that you want both. But an article that does not deal with the taxonomy should be excluded even if it is the seminal guide to the biology of a taxon. Right? And what about an earlier taxonomic review that came to opposite conclusions than the one presented in the rest of the page?

3) I had most confusion about the synonyms section, both what names to include and what details to give. As an example, consider the slug Deroceras invadens, the name we gave last year to a common species that had been confused with another valid species Deroceras panormitanum. When we wrote the species description we put in its synonymy section:

"Deroceras (Agriolimax) panormitanum (nec. sensu Lessona et Pollonera, 1882): KERNEY & CAMERON 1979, CASTILLEJO 1998, BARKER 1999, FORSYTH 2004, REISE 2007."

The authors in capitals here refer to important works that deal with D. invadens under the name D. panormitanum. I think Wikispecies does not want this type of information, because I haven’t come across such examples: right? But what about the “nec. sensu Lessona et Pollonera”? This points out that the original description of D. panormitanum was of another species, and so these authors were not using the name to refer to D. invadens. Thus, as used by Lessona et Pollonera D. panormitanum is not a synonym of D. invadens, but as used by nearly everyone else since, it is. How does Wikispecies deal with this situation? It seems misleading to list D. panormitanum merely as a synonym of D. invadens. I realise that D. panormitanum should also have its own page.

4) Another query with this same example as the last. Is it right in Wikispecies to put in the list of synonyms “Deroceras (Agriolimax) panormitanum”? This describes the situation that the species was described under the name Agriolimax but has been known more recently as Deroceras panormitanum after the genus name Deroceras was shown to have prioritiy over Agriolimax.

5) Here are two other parts of the synonomy section of the original description of D. invadens:

"Deroceras meridionale Reygrobellet, 1963: unavailable name, homonym of Agriolimax meridionalis Doering, 1874.

Agriolimax Scharffi Simroth, 1910: nomen dubium (insufficient description, type unavailable)."

I have no doubts that D. meridionale and A. Scharffi should be listed in Wikispecies as synonyms, but I am uncertain whether it is considered desirable to include the extra material giving the reasons why each name is invalid.

I am not suggesting that the conventions of Wikispecies should change, but just hoping that someone can explain to me exactly what the conventions are in difficult cases. I realise that taxonomy throws up all sorts of unexpected special situations (the Code is a full-sized book because of this!) and that your help section cannot deal with every eventuality, but some more information, and examples in particular, would be useful. Thank you for all your hard work. Jmchutchinson (talk) 09:30, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hi, have a look at Rapala enipeus. This is one of my pages, created recently. I think this is quite good practice, if not best. That would be immodest. The specific epithet is quite an old one and my aim in listing synonymies is to show how generic combinations and other later valid but junior names have developed over time. This is how I would write the list if I were including this species in the revision of the genus in an academic paper. I would not include earlier generic combinations in brackets as you show for “Deroceras (Agriolimax) panormitanum” as this is also the conventional way of showing a subgenus. In your case, some might understand that you consider Agriolimax to be a subgenus of Deroceras, when this would not be your intention. In my example, enipeus was originally described in Deudorix but is now considered to be in Rapala. You can deduce this from the synonyms, which are listed chronologically. In the last line of synonyms, when we have finally reached the current accepted combination I have included two recent authoritative papers as references supporting this latest hypothesis. I hope this helps you sort out your slugs. Regards, Alan Accassidy (talk) 22:13, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
As an aside, why is the family name there in smallcaps? Shouldn't it just be in normal type? Looks very odd. - MPF (talk) 09:32, 28 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
That's the way someone has set up the Taxonavigation template. I imagine that they had a good reason. I'm happy to let it be and get on with filling the gaps lower down. Cheers, Accassidy (talk) 21:06, 28 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, be guided by clarity and utility, and I'm sure all will be well. But please bear in mind that, being a wiki, other editor have the right to modify anything that you have contributed ... Stho002 (talk) 22:17, 27 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Anchoviella[edit]

A Anchoviella is a fish, not a insect. This page is wrong. Regards, --Metrónomo (talk) 05:19, 29 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

 Done. Good catch. OhanaUnitedTalk page 05:37, 29 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Block request for Babycandy[edit]

The non-sul account Babycandy (talk | contribs) is being used to spam cross-wiki. See sulutil:Babycandy for more information. Please consider deleting its spammy userpage and blocking it here as well. Thanks, Mathonius (talk) 17:19, 25 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

template loop detected[edit]

I am getting a message Template Loop Detected and need help getting rid of this. Any ideas appreciated!

Search in the Village Pump + Phylogeography[edit]

Hi, is there a way to search in the Village Pump to see if somebody already asked the same question ?

I want to know if it's allowed to write details of the phylogeography (as strong genetic breaks) of a species in the species page (with reference about paper showing that).

Thanks --Ndiver (talk) 13:01, 15 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

On species pages we don't normally give distribution data as such. However, there are a number of secondary ways to give some of this information. In references, for example, it might well be possible to list a number of documents describing synonyms or subspecies and the title of the documents might give good distribution data. For all subspecies and synonyms, it is perfectly acceptable to state Type Locations for the different taxa. Anything like this must help those scanning the pages. Here is an example. Accassidy (talk) 16:07, 17 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]
The Type Locations attribution is a little too simplistic for describing geography. I'd propose we add something that would accommodate an a text description along with maybe point data, bounding box, polygonal that links into an external map engine (Google, Bing, OGC, etc). Modern biology certainly recognizes geography being a factor for genetics of plants and animals. Furthermore, we include taxonavigation by geography. I'm a bit critical of Linnaen Taxonomy because it does not lend itself well to query, by geography, by common names, or by any other attribute in the data. To me, it defies logic that science uses type of classification when we have relational databases that are perfectly suited for the task. I have noticed that taxonomy seems to be very terse and abstract intentionally. The aspect of science seems to stuck cling to past traditions, while everything evolves. We can improve it, or just let it be lame. Mapsurfer49 (talk) 10:00, 26 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Block request[edit]

Hi. This user is active in cross-wiki spamming, and since it's not a SUL-account I can't lock the account. Could you consider blocking the account locally here on Wikispecies? -- Tegel (talk) 16:50, 29 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Comment period on the Wikimedia United States Federation[edit]

There is a proposal for an an umbrella organization for chapters and other groups in the US called the Wikimedia United States Federation. A draft of the bylaws is now up at meta. There will be an open comment period on the bylaws 17 September, 2012 to 1 October, 2012. The comments received given will be incorporated into the bylaws and they will be put up to a ratification vote from 8 October, 2012 to 15 October, 2012. --Guerillero (talk) 22:00, 17 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Translating "intro" pages[edit]

Wikispecies:Done and to do currently lists "Translate intro pages into other languages" as #18. I'd like to participate, but I've not found enough documentation to feel sure enough to start. Does "intro" here refer to the help: namespace? I see Help:Contents has a couple of translations (fr and hu), but I'm thinking of starting with Help:General Wikispecies, as that's more specific (sorry) to Wikispecies, whereas Help:Contents is of general MW usage that's already documented in Finnish elsewhere (not that it wouldn't benefit from a translated page here too). Is it okay if I just create Help:General Wikispecies/Fi and link to it from the parent page with a box similar to that on Help:Contents? -Uusijani (talk) 08:23, 26 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Intro means main page. Check {{Languages}} and see if it has Finnish. OhanaUnitedTalk page 01:47, 28 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

IUCN Red List[edit]

Probably someone have already asked/propose this but, because I'm not a regular editor here I wanna know why the classification of the IUCN Red List isn't used in articles. It can help improve them and also help knowing what species are extinct and what doesn't. - Sarilho1 (talk) 21:41, 29 September 2012 (UTC)[reply]

We do use {{IUCN}} to indicate conservation status. And extinct species are indicated by † OhanaUnitedTalk page 04:31, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. Can you indicate me one page with that to be my example? - Sarilho1 (talk) 10:12, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Here's an example: Betula leopoldae - MPF (talk) 17:50, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
And an example for a page using the IUCN template: Amphiglossus splendidus. Kennyannydenny (talk) 19:20, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you both! - Sarilho1 (talk) 10:58, 3 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Block request[edit]

This is probably the wrong place, but please block Yasemin (talk • contribs • block log • all projects) . It's a non-SUL cross-wiki spambot. Thanks! Trijnstel (talk) 16:04, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

One more account to block: Lovesunshine (talk • contribs • block log • all projects) . Same reason. Trijnstel (talk) 16:18, 1 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]
 Done. Thanks for notifying us. OhanaUnitedTalk page 02:37, 2 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal of better page clarity[edit]

I would like to know what you think of a better page formatting, using the template "ti" for titles such as Holotype, Type locality etc. See an example at Scybalocanthon korasakiae. Mariusm (talk) 17:22, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think it actually makes for greater clarity, just a different style. Very similar information is conveyed here with equal clarity. It would also entail a lot of backtracking over numerous pages to get any kind of retrospective standardisation. I think we should keep the current, simpler style and just create more pages. Accassidy (talk) 20:38, 4 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Block request for Guoyqi73[edit]

Please consider blocking this spambot and please delete their spam. Thanks, Mathonius (talk) 17:23, 20 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

 Done. Thank you for calling this to our attention. Much appreciated! -MKOliver (talk) 18:08, 20 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Do we really need a steward to help us update Main Page images?[edit]

As stated in the topic title, right now we frequently have User:Shizhao, who is a steward, to update our images on Main Page. Since we have quite a number of active admins now, I propose to take this job back and update them ourselves. OhanaUnitedTalk page 15:23, 22 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Improving communication between your wiki and "tech people"[edit]

Hi. I'm posting this as part of my job for the WMF, where I currently work on technical communications.

As you'll probably agree, communication between Wikipedia contributors and "tech people" (primarily MediaWiki developers, but also designers and other engineers) hasn't always been ideal. In recent years, Wikimedia employees have made efforts to become more transparent, for example by writing monthly activity reports, by providing hubs listing current activities, and by maintaining "activity pages" for each significant activity. Furthermore, the yearly engineering goals for the WMF were developed publicly, and the more granular Roadmap is updated weekly.

Now, that's all well and such, but what I'd rather like to discuss is how we can better engage in true collaboration and 2-way discussion, not just reports and announcements. It's easy to post a link to a new feature that's already been implemented, and tell users "Please provide feedback!". It's much more difficult to truly collaborate every step of the way, from the early planning to deployment.

Some "big" tech projects sponsored by the WMF are lucky enough to have Oliver Keyes who can spend a lot of time discussing with editors, basically incarnating this 2-way communication channel between users and engineering staff. But Oliver can only do so much: he has to focus on a handful of features, and primarily discusses with the English Wikipedia community. We want to be able to do this for dozens of engineering projects with hundreds of wikis, in many languages, and truly collaborate to build new features together. Hiring hundreds of Community Liaisons isn't really a viable option.

There are probably things in the way we do tech stuff (e.g. new software features and deployments) that drive you insane. You probably have lots of ideas about what the ideal situation should be, and how to get there: What can the developer community (staff and volunteers) do to get there? (in the short term, medium term, long term?) What can users do to get there?

I certainly don't claim to have all the answers, and I can't do a proper job to improve things without your help. So please help me help make your lives easier, and speak up.

This is intended to be a very open discussion. Unapologetic complaining is fine; suggestions are also welcome. Stock of ponies is limited. Guillom (talk) 14:36, 23 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

One more block request[edit]

Please block NarKo (talk • contribs • block log • all projects) , a non-sul spam-only account (cross-wiki), which is why I can't lock it. Trijnstel (talk) 14:00, 24 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

 Done. Koumz (talk) 23:13, 24 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The Awakening[edit]

Could The Awakening be moved to projectspace with a redirect being left in place? It's definitely not something that belongs in mainspace, but Wikispecies:Most missed articles shows that it's needed to help people who are looking for an en:wp page. Nyttend (talk) 14:04, 7 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

 Done. Koumz (talk) 14:13, 7 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]
On the topic of Wikispecies:Most missed articles, a very large number of them are English vernacular names of popular well-known species (e.g. Lion Panthera leo, Human Homo sapiens). Does wikispecies have any policy on making high-demand vernacular names into redirects to their scientific names? - MPF (talk) 18:39, 11 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Standard practice here is not to create pages (or redirects) for vernacular names in any language in order to avoid becoming a fork of the Wikipedias for each language. Most searches for vernacular names are a result of a lack of understanding that this is a taxonomic wiki where vernacular names are a relatively minor side detail, and not a fork of the various Wikipedias. A person searching for a vernacular name can still find the page at the proper scientific name in the search results for many well-known organisms, as the vernacular names are displayed at the bottom on the page in many cases. See the Charter and other documentation on the help pages for further background. Koumz (talk) 03:53, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps on those "most missed articles" page, rather than leaving it blank, we put a message explaining how our article naming system works? OhanaUnitedTalk page 07:13, 12 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Italic titles???[edit]

Hello there!
Species names should be written in italic.
However the template "{{Italic title}}" doesn't seem to work on Wikispecies sites.
Any suggestions on this? --AlchemistOfJoy (talk) 03:50, 23 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Page names are page names. Names in italics go in the Names section. There is no problem ... Stho002 (talk) 03:59, 23 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]
This is just a recommendation not a must. Thou though I must say a not italic title seems wrong for someone with a biologist eye.
So if wikipedia itself uses it, why not allow it here in the directory? --AlchemistOfJoy (talk) 15:03, 23 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Because we don't have nearly as big a need to differentiate it on the page header level. Besides it'd be easier to have all pages italicized by default and have a nonitalic title template! Circeus (talk) 18:59, 24 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Also, disambiguated page names complicate matters ... Stho002 (talk) 00:25, 27 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

A Work Without End[edit]

Between the years 2000 and 2009, a total of 176,311 new species were described, an average of 18,000 new species described in each year. Is it possible to stand against this endless flood which threatens to drown us?

See the details here.

Mariusm (talk) 11:47, 25 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I feel bad for the person tallying all those numbers! By perfecting the DNA techniques to identify cryptic species, I think the number of newly described species will go even higher. A bot would certainly reduce our workload. It's feasible and has been done in the past. Plus it's possible to have scripts from Commons to identify which pages are lacking pictures and are available on Commons. The only problem is that we can't draw enough computer programmers to help us achieve our goal. OhanaUnitedTalk page 22:09, 25 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Incorrect authors[edit]

I came here for a taxon that has a Wikispecies page. When I checked the taxon's page, it was linked to the wrong authority, another author with the same last name. When I checked what links here for the wrong author, I followed other links where an entomologist was named as the authority for a mammal, botanists for animals, and many others as I found more links with obviously wrong authors.

Is this project still active? Is this a widespread problem? I followed about 20 taxa and most had an incorrect author. I would be willing to correct one set, but not if this is the standard (non-verification and incorrect linking) and is very widespread. --BarbBarbBarb (talk) 19:35, 30 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If you want to know how active the project is, try the Special:RecentChanges page on the lefthand side of your screen. There are very active users here, just not very many of them. The issue you are pointing out is already known. It is widespread and is already a long-term project for at least two regular users here. Since authorities are cited primarily by last name (for animals, at least, botanists use abbreviations), many pages link just to the last name, which has often been redirected (especially in the early days of Wikispecies (2004)) to the first or most common instance of that last name. Sometimes (less common last names) this works well, other times (more common last names) not so well. These cases need to be converted into disambiguation pages and the links disambiguated (so that they link to the individual author and not just the last name). This is the long-term project. This type of phenomenon (and project) is common at just about any wiki of any size (see Wikiproject:Disambiguation at the English Wikipedia for instance). Koumz (talk) 23:19, 30 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, that gives me the info I wanted. I don't see the same problem with authors on English Wikipedia, they are either not linked or they are linked correctly, maybe it's not an issue in the areas I edit. You could try getting a bot to list whether the botanical article has a botanical author as a start to clean up. I wish you luck. --BarbBarbBarb (talk) 04:26, 31 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
We do not get as high profile as Wikipedia so you're absolutely welcome to help us address this problem by correcting it. OhanaUnitedTalk page 19:53, 31 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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