Wikispecies:Village Pump

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Atti della Società Italiana delle Scienze in Modena

Does anyone happen to know if this journal actually ever existed in any form at all? I'm struggling to find any information about it online at all outside of Wikispecies, let alone online copies of individual volumes of it.

Until today, the only two pages linking to this page were the fungus species Anaptychia runcinata and Athallia pyracea, citing volume 11, but on reexamination it turns out both these citations were incorrect and should actually refer to volume 11 of Atti della Società Italiana di Scienze Naturali in Milano, not Modena (see [1] for Placodium pyraceum and [2] for Heterodermia aquila). Monster Iestyn (talk) 01:24, 28 June 2026 (UTC)

Since nobody has responded so far... @Burmeister, since you created this journal page back in 2018, do you happen to recall what you used as a source for it, if you used one? In particular I'm curious about where "Società Tipografica" being the publisher came from. Monster Iestyn (talk) 13:56, 7 July 2026 (UTC)

I don't remember. Mark for deletion if you want. Regards, Burmeister (talk) 14:02, 7 July 2026 (UTC)

Understood, I'll go ahead and do that then in that case. Monster Iestyn (talk) 14:04, 7 July 2026 (UTC)

 Resolved: page now deleted. Monster Iestyn (talk) 22:01, 8 July 2026 (UTC)

Google finds a number of references to Atti Soc. Ital. Sci. Modena, not least from the Smithsonian: [3] Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 11:38, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

@Pigsonthewing: if by the Smithsonian, you mean this PDF, which has a page giving "Coluber m. nigrum Raddi, 1820. Atti. Soc. Ital. Sci. Modena 18: 38.", this is threefold in error: the species name is actually spelled Coluber m-nigrum, the journal is in fact Memoria di Matematica e di Fisica della Società Italiana delle Scienze Residente in Modena, and the page number is actually 338 not 38. (Case in point, this information is already shown at Erythrolamprus poecilogyrus.)

Weirdly, going by the other Google results I see checking for myself, a lot of them seem to have the same error for whatever reason: Atti Soc. Ital. Sci. Modena being actually a volume of Memoria di Matematica e di Fisica della Società Italiana delle Scienze Residente in Modena (seems to be volumes 18 or 19 just glancing at the results from the first page) Monster Iestyn (talk) 14:05, 9 July 2026 (UTC)

ZDB listed several changing titles of this Society in Modena, Italy: Atti della Società dei Naturalisti di Modena [3.Ser. 1=16.1883 - 16=31.1898], superseded by Atti della Società dei Naturalisti e Matematici di Modena [4.Ser. 1=32.1899(1900) - 15=46.1913; 5.Ser.1=47.1914 - 6=52.1921; 6.Ser. 1/2=53/54.1922(1924) - 74=127.1996(1997); 128.1997(1998)+] ISSN 0365-7027. Atti were preceded by Annuario della Società dei Naturalisti in Modena [1.1866 - 7.1873; 2.Ser. 1=8.1874 - 8=15.1882]. Full texts free available: [[4]] IFPNI Staff (talk) 21:52, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

@Monster Iestyn: Did you see the above? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:03, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

@Pigsonthewing: Oh, whoops, to be honest I'd completely forgotten to respond. Anyway, none of those titles match the one we've been talking about:

• Atti della Società Italiana delle Scienze in Modena (the topic of this discussion)
• Atti della Società dei Naturalisti di Modena
• Atti della Società dei Naturalisti e Matematici di Modena
• Annuario della Società dei Naturalisti in Modena

Monster Iestyn (talk) 12:44, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

Image template

Hi all,

About a year ago I was working on an improved Image template. I never got it across the finish line then, but I just put in a little time to polish the last few issues. I'd like some community feedback on it and whether it could be promoted to production. It's currently at {{Image/sandbox}}, and you can see it in action on the testcases page.

It preserves the existing arguments and behavior of the current image template, and if we have an image and caption specified locally, there's no change. When pulling an image from Wikidata, this version can:

• use the P180 "depicts" property of the Wikidata image to produce a more accurate caption
• use the P21 "sex or gender" property of the Wikidata image to add (♀) or (♂) to the caption
• intelligently handle when the page name and the taxon name are different (for whatever reason)
• automatically detect whether the taxon name should be italic or not
• Add the [[Category:Pages with incomplete image labeling]] category when pulling a Wikidata image for a supraspecific taxon without a "depicts" label available. This is intended to facilitate manual review and cleanup.

In the case of an image specified locally without a caption, the template will use relevant information from Wikidata (if there is any) when creating the caption. This can happen if the locally specified image is one of the ones attached to the taxon on Wikidata.

It's a set of subtemplates, so if you want to see all the nitty gritty, those are:

• {{Image/sandbox}}
• {{Image/main}}
• {{Image/caption with category}}
• {{Image/caption}}
• {{Image/caption link}}

Tungolen (talk) 10:04, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

See Template:Image/testcases. From what I can tell, I  Support this and think it's lovely. I would encourage you to insert it in a few entries directly to show how it looks live, but near as I can tell, it's ready to replace the standard template. Great work. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 10:07, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

• That seems to work, personally I am not opposed to its use, provided that "if we have an image and caption specified locally, there's no change", as I said a short while ago. Christian Ferrer (talk) 11:52, 30 June 2026 (UTC)

Looks like a great improvement. I support its deployment in full. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 15:27, 2 July 2026 (UTC)

I've promoted the new version of the image template to production. Let me know if any issues surface. Tungolen (talk) 09:35, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

I took a look at the first 50 transclusions of Image, and all of them looked good to me. Either no change, or an improvement. If anyone else wants to spot-check, I put a copy of the old template version at User:Tungolen/Image/old - I used that and live editing previews to double check what it looked like before the change. Tungolen (talk) 09:50, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

I'm all for this, except in some cases the taxon names in the image captions are now presented with bold type, which I think they shouldn't. –Tommy Kronkvist (talk), 10:42, 14 July 2026 (UTC).

It's a side effect of linking - the template is set to always create the caption as a link, and a link to the current page is presented by mediawiki as bold. I can take a look at disabling the linking when it would be a self-link if it's an issue. Tungolen (talk) 19:23, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

There shouldn't be a self-link anyway, so please do. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 21:13, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

Done. Example page Menida violacea now shows the caption italic but not bold, while links are preserved elsewhere. Tungolen (talk) 23:05, 14 July 2026 (UTC)

I've also updated the documentation to characterize the Wikidata integration in detail. Tungolen (talk) 00:24, 15 July 2026 (UTC)

┌─────────────────┘ Good work! It looks a lot better now. Thanks. –Tommy Kronkvist (talk),00:35, 15 July 2026 (UTC).

• Please be aware that the autolink to the page name no longer exists. Unless WD has been updated you will have to fill in the correct name yourself after a move or similar. See Epilepis petrophiloides. Andyboorman (talk) 15:09, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

  In that case, an appropriate remedy would also be to remove the Wikidata link. The template would revert to the page name. My understanding of WD taxonomy is that invalid taxon names can retain their own entity, so the valid name combination should get it's own WD entity. Breaking the existing link is the right thing to do even if you're not going to make the new WD entity yourself - the page will then show up in the no-wikidata-link maintenance category and someone will create the appropriate new WD entity at some point. Tungolen (talk) 05:37, 25 July 2026 (UTC)

Request for comment (the future of Abstract Wikipedia)

You are invited to voice your opinions in a request for comment about the future of Abstract Wikipedia. Thank you! Kowal2701 (talk) 12:24, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

S.T. or S.I. Ljovuschkin

Who can help me with the full names of S.T. or S.I. Ljovuschkin. This is an Russian arachnologist and published in Russian in 1972. PeterR (talk) 07:24, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

WikiSpecies has the correct spelling: Stanislav Ivanovich Ljovuschkin. An obituary might be seen in Russian from Moscow State University: [5]. "S.T." is a lapsus, nobody exist with these initials. IFPNI Staff (talk) 15:39, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for your help PeterR (talk) 15:21, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Mela & Malmberg

Hi, I noticed on Wikidata that Aukusti Juhana Mela and August Johan Malmberg are the same person. He had finnicized his name in 1876 since that was trendy at that time. The name change is also confirmed also on IPNI and Harvard. Could you merge the pages and categories here? Samoasambia (talk) 20:28, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Should all be resolved now; please check. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:51, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

Thanks! Samoasambia (talk) 22:02, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

V.A. Murthy

Who can help me with the full names of V.A. Murthy (Department of Zoology Loyola College, Madras-600 034. He published in 1977 together with T.N. Ananthakrishnan (Taracad Narayanan Ananthakrishnan) Indian Chelonethi. Oriental Insects Monograph 4: 1–210. PeterR (talk) 15:30, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

This seems to be him; but no other names given. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 16:12, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Andy, thanks for your answer. PeterR (talk) 06:50, 29 July 2026 (UTC)

Main page talk page is protected

Hello! The talk page for the main page is currently protected, which means editors cannot suggest changes to it. Why is this? Is it intentional? Jornmann32 (talk) 23:05, 2 August 2026 (UTC)

@Pigsonthewing: You protected this a year and a half ago. Would you care to address the above? ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 23:31, 2 August 2026 (UTC)

Thank you.

The Main page's talk page is semi-protected, meaning that autoconfirmed editors (and above) can still edit it (see en:Wikipedia:User groups for an explanation of auto-confirmation); only new or unregistered users cannot edit it. That is indeed intentional.

Protection was necessary due to excessive and repeated spamming over a period of years. I see no reason why that would have changed, but the decision of whether and when to change protection is, of course, one which the community at large can make.

User:Jornmann32 will be able to edit the talk page once their account is auto-confirmed; in the meantime, they are welcome to make suggestions for changing the main page here. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:02, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

Thank you for your response. I'm afraid I likely won't be auto-confirmed anytime soon as I am not a biologist or anything of the sort and would not be able to contribute. I'm pleased to hear I'm able to make my suggestion here.

I propose replacing the Unicode symbol 𝕏 with just the letter X on the main page in the sentence "You can also check us out on 𝕏 (formerly Twitter)" for accessibility reasons - screen reader software will not read the 𝕏 as an X, but rather as something more like "Mathematical Double-Struck Capital X".

It would also be a good idea to add a protection template to the talk page indicating that it is semi-protected, as it is otherwise unclear what degree of protection applies (the edit page just says "protected"). Jornmann32 (talk) 21:42, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

Good point on accessibility. I'd prefer we just drop any mention of X at all.

I don't believe we use protection templates in this project. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:37, 4 August 2026 (UTC)

I'm the current custodian of the official @Wikispecies X account. Nowadays it's a very sleepy place, and I agree with Andy Mabbett that we should remove the link from our main page. Also, I think most of our Wikimedia sister projects have already dropped their respective X accounts altogether.

As for protection templates I created Category:Wikipedia semi-protected templates earlier today, but haven't created any actual protection templates yet (if we decide we want them).

–Best regards, Tommy Kronkvist (talk), 12:59, 4 August 2026 (UTC).

@Tommy Kronkvist Slightly off-topic to the main page discussion, but I'd agree with the other sister projects that we should close/remove the Wikispecies account from twitter; since the Ondatra zibethicus-soundalike took over, it has descended into a fascist, racist, antiscience, and AI-promoting hellhole where science and civilisation has no place. - MPF (talk) 16:24, 8 August 2026 (UTC)

┌────────────┘

Syncing authors of a paper, on Wikidata, with Wikispecies

This may be of interest to those of you who work here and on Wikidata. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 10:43, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

Account creation change

From a recent Tech News:

After running several Account Creation Experiments to improve registration completion rates, a new version of the username field on Create Account has been rolled out. It includes a popover summarizing the username policy to provide clearer guidance during account creation. As part of this change, the messages createacct-helpusername and createacct-username-help that several communities have configured will no longer be used. If communities want to customize the guidance shown in the new popover, they can instead edit the following messages: createacct-username-policy-popover-bullet1, createacct-username-policy-popover-bullet2, and createacct-username-policy-popover-bullet3.

Do we wish to make any changes? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:58, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

Courtesy links: MediaWiki:Createacct-helpusername (blank) and MediaWiki:Createacct-username-help, as well as MediaWiki:Createacct-username-policy-popover-bullet1, MediaWiki:Createacct-username-policy-popover-bullet2, and MediaWiki:Createacct-username-policy-popover-bullet3. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:02, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

I think the three bullets are about as good as they could get. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 21:03, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

I agree. Andyboorman (talk) 19:30, 5 August 2026 (UTC)

Rosaceae: Aria

Updates in a new paper introducing a broader concept of Aria including Chamaemespilus, Karpatiosorbus, Majovskya, and Torminalis; appears to have been accepted in full by POWO: Simplifying the nomenclature of Sorbus sensu lato: new nomenclatural solutions in Aria and Hedlundia (Rosaceae) - MPF (talk) 10:32, 8 August 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for the information. It is about time this group of plants were simplified and rationalised. WS should now be updated. Andyboorman (talk) 11:20, 8 August 2026 (UTC)

@MPF: I have created the template {{Mosyakin, Fedoronchuk & McNeill, 2025}} and added it to some pages. More to come. Andyboorman (talk) 12:24, 8 August 2026 (UTC)

Super, thanks! Knew I could rely on you to sort out the templates etc., that I find hard to cope with 😁 - MPF (talk) 16:14, 8 August 2026 (UTC)

"Accepted" taxa

Hi, all,

Help:Name_section#Synonyms_or_Synonymy says to create redirects for synonyms and alternate combinations. But then having a content-page for one name and redirects for other names implies that the former is "more accepted" in some sense. When do we act on a revision/re-organization? Some databases like WoRMS (marine species) move quickly, and other checklists like SACC (south American birds) move slowly.

Pelagic (talk) 03:44, 16 August 2026 (UTC)

I update on the basis of scientific papers followed by a general consensus in the secondary sources. For example, see the difficult taxonomic group of Aria and Sorbus etc. in Malinae. Hope this helps. Andyboorman (talk) 11:09, 16 August 2026 (UTC)