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Language committee/Archives/2007-06

< Language committee | Archives
For a summary of discussions, see the archives index.

Spanned discussions

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These discussions span multiple months and are archived in the first relevant archive:

Wikipedia Ancient Greek

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A brief discussion concerning a member's confusion between the "Ancient Greek" and "Traditional Greek" requests.

  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    04 June 2007 23:24

    Hoi,

    I seem to remember that we had refused the ancient greek wiki. Now I find it up and running. Glad they’re okay, but what’s the step I missed, exactly ?

  2. Shanel Kalicharan
    05 June 2007 21:23

    The Ancient Greek Wikipedia was conditionally approved, not rejected. It also does not exist yet, as far as I can see.

  3. Jon Harald Søby
    05 June 2007 21:38

    What was rejected was Wikipedia in 'Traditional Greek', which encompasses (at least) three different periods of the Greek language, including the Ancient one, and had no ISO code. [1] It also had only one supporter. Ancient Greek, however, has a lot of supporters, and the language is unified and well-attested.

    [1] http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Traditional_Greek

  4. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    06 June 2007 06:06

    Hoi!

    Oh! Thanks
     I really thought I was starting to have acid flashbacks, stuff like remembering I spoke with Zeus on the Mount Olympus yesterday :-) Now it’s okay. It’s an important datum for me because the decision about traditional Greek is one of those I use as “precedents” in our decisional history (the archetype of “too little users”), so if that moves I happen to base my precedents on my senile delirium only :-)

Wikisource Belorussian & Wikipedia Insubric

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The requests for a Belorussian Wikisource and for an Insubric Wikipedia were rejected.

  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    04 June 2007 22:39

    Hoi!

    I propose denying and closing the following requests:

    - Belorussian Wikisource: let alone the small wikisize, there is too much conflict from both belorussian sides. Until they do not start to have normal relations I'd freeze them both for good. It is NOT a linguistic argument but rather a disciplinary intervention. It can be done only if we all share the idea that we can put constant pressure on conflict situations in order to force them to serious and public pacificatory moves. A less open way consists in never answering their request, but I’d rate this really unfair. People have the right to know what we think of them, if we do think something.

    - Insubric Wikipedia: they already have all the space they want in insubric at LMO wiki. LMO has 5-6 constantly active members, plus a number of occasional editors. No ISO code for insubric. I see no point in letting them there as an open request.

  2. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    04 June 2007 23:02

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  3. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    07 June 2007 19:24

    Hoi !

    Add-on : one of the arguments for insubric was (quite paradoxically) that lmo.wiki has... too much insubric (the interface is) so it would be better to divide orobic and insubric. It is weird that the argument comes from insubric speakers and it says a lot on the nature of the request. Anyway, this much is true. Could we possibly have an alternate user interface in orobic issued for lmo.wiki? It would be possible to choose it at user level, while the wiki would traditionally open in insubric.

  4. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    15 June 2007 22:27

    Hoi,

    Since nobody expressed opposition I proceeded to reject them.

Deprecate multilingual Wikisource

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GerardM proposed deprecating the multilingual Wikisource due to concerns with language codes, but no decision was reached.

  1. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    06 June 2007 05:04

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  2. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    06 June 2007 06:21

    Hoi,

    Well, I’d say that wikisource is the one case in which we do not use codes as fences, but simply as descriptive labels. I quite agree with Yann in what he writes about the project. Only, when seen in this perspective one thing remains unclear: why to have national wikisources at all, instead of one big “commons” wikisource with selectable linguistic tags in the search field. None of our business, obviously, I’m just speaking for the sake of logics.

Wikipedia Värmlandic

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The request for a Värmlandic Wikipedia was rejected.

  1. Jon Harald Søby
    06 June 2007 17:45

    Hi!

    I propose the immediate rejection of Värmlandic Wikipedia; there are no sources given indicating that this is a separate language from Swedish, and I have never heard talk of it either. It has no ISO 639-3 code, and the example articles in the Incubator use some sort of phonetic spelling.

  2. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    06 June 2007 17:50

    Kill it

Wikipedia Extremaduran

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The request for an Extremaduran Wikipedia was conditionally approved.

  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    07 June 2007 18:02

    Hoi,

    I propose conditional approval for extremaduran. The code is there, there is a good number of requesting native speakers, everything seems okay. Is it?

  2. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    07 June 2007 18:27

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  3. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    07 June 2007 18:53

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  4. Jon Harald Søby
    07 June 2007 21:22

    I support.

  5. Shanel Kalicharan
    07 June 2007 23:48

    Fine with me too.

  6. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    15 June 2007 22:29

    Hoi,

    GerardM I’m not sure what you meant when you said you were collecting info :-) Is it okay for you to give them conditional approval ?

  7. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    15 June 2007 22:48

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  8. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    16 June 2007 10:50

    Done :-)

    If they keep this pace http://incubator.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wp/ext they’ll soon be ready to go :-)

Wikipedia Karelian

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The subcommittee briefly discussed the second request for a Karelian Wikipedia.

  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    07 June 2007 22:16

    Hoi!

    I asked the karelian community to contact me directly. Hopefully we can shed some light on the code forest and explain them why they have to make three separate wikies and not just one :-)

    It appears that what they are mixing is :
    1. Karelian proper
    2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Livvi (very few native speakers, ISO-639-3 OLO http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=olo )
    3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludic_language (3.000 natives, ISO 639-3 lud http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=lud )

    As an additional problem Ludic seems to be classified not as a dialect of Karelian, but rather as a contact (transition) language to Veps.

    FMI how does ISO 639-6 address transition and creole linguistic entities? Multiple inheritance?

  2. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    08 June 2007 04:50

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  3. Shanel Kalicharan
    08 June 2007 05:44

    Hello,

    I don't quite get what you mean...

    <this text is quoted from a user who has not agreed to public archival.>

  4. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    08 June 2007 10:58

    Hoi!

    It’s about how contact (transitional, according to other classificatory systems) speeches get mapped into ISO 639-6. A “transitional speech” is what arises along the contact line of two (or more) major speeches. In my native language map we have one such case with Orbasch, that is spoken all along the borderline between Ligurian (LLJ) and Piemontese (PMS). It’s got elements of both speeches but it cannot be reduced to none of the two. Don’t look for it in ISO, you won’t find it.

    It’s often easy to classify such entities as individual languages, but if you have to build a hierarchic classificatory system it’s not simple to deal with them. That’s why I was asking whether ISO 639-6 admitted multiple inheritance (i.e. more than one parent in the tree). This is also interesting when you have to classify creole languages.

    As per English I’d say it’s more like a stratified job depending on invasions/migrations, as per Walter Scott’s works. We have something similar in Piemontese, with the periodic shift of the “high language” towards either Tuscan (Italian) or French, depending on which nation we were part of (we twice were annexed by France). I suppose Savoy and FRP have a similar history. Although there is no such thing as a 100% “contact” or “stratified” language (all border regions show both behaviors, for obvious historical reasons), contact behavior is brought about mostly by spontaneous activity, like trade, passing voyagers, etc.

    Following this convention all current “anglified” versions of the modern languages are showing a “contact” behavior. Just a DB-designer curiosity, anyway :-)

  5. Shanel Kalicharan
    08 June 2007 14:46

    Thanks, I understand now. :)

  6. Sabine Cretella
    17 June 2007 09:34

    Well more languages on a wikipedia can be done - but: there are some drawbacks to it that need to be considered first. It is not as easy to manage this as it seems.

    I will write about it on my blog so it will be rather a very personal view, but hopefully can help to understand what can be done.

Procedural problem

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  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    11 June 2007 19:46

    Hoi!

    I proceeded to reject the request for insubric as there was no opposition, but I'm probably not aware of a number of steps in the procedure. What do I have to do apart from placing the rejection template? It seems that requests are also to be moved, are they?

Wikipedia South Korean

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  1. Jon Harald Søby
    15 June 2007 12:26

    I took the liberty of rogue rejecting the South Korean Wikipedia<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_South_Korean>. I hope you don't mind.

  2. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    15 June 2007 12:32

    I only applaude :-)

Wiktionaries Upper Sorbian & Zazaki

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The request for a Zazaki Wiktionary was rejected as inactive, and the request for an Upper Sorbian Wiktionary was conditionally approved.

  1. Shanel Kalicharan
    16 June 2007 01:03

    Hello all. I propose the following approvals and rejections.

    ===Upper Sorbian Wiktionary===
    I propose the conditional approval of this project. There is an interested community, the test project is active, and there are even a few translated localization files already available (thanks to the Upper Sorbian Wikipedia). All that remains is to finish translating the rest of the required files.

    ===Zazaki Wiktionary===
    I propose this request be rejected. It has been open for some time now (October from the looks of it), and it has received only 4 simple support votes. The supporters have not offered any arguments as to why this request should be approved; they are always welcome to open a new request, with supporting arguments.

  2. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    16 June 2007 10:41

    Okay 4 both :-)

    I seem to recall lots of fuss around Zazakis and Kurds... am I right? Maybe they just speak little english and still belong in the number of « friends who have been told to go support/oppose » :-)

  3. Shanel Kalicharan
    16 June 2007 16:31

    I don't know about Zazakis, but for Kurds I wouldn't be surprised.

  4. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    16 June 2007 17:31

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  5. Sabine Cretella
    16 June 2007 17:46

    The same is valid for me :-)

    Sorry for not being all too present.

  6. Tangotango
    17 June 2007 04:43

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  7. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    17 June 2007 09:54

    Hoi!

    There's no such thing as a stupid thing :) You're welcome :)

Vanishing requests

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  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    16 June 2007 11:02

    Is it me doing things the wrong way or something weird with bots ?

    All I marked as rejected :

    instead of being moved to the « rejected » list simply vanished from the main request page. See
    http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages

    Sometimes I have some funny proxy in between me and the servers, but this doesn’t seem to be something you can blame on a proxy.

  2. Shanel Kalicharan
    16 June 2007 17:09

    *Pokes Jesse with a stick*

  3. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    16 June 2007 17:31

    LOL no, if it’s a human doing it it’s no problem :-) You can always talk and set things ok
     it’s bots I fear, because you never know where else they started to “forget things”.

A private RFC

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<this discussion is marked as private.>

Wikipedia Cajun French

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The request for a Cajun French Wikipedia was conditionally approved.

  1. Jon Harald Søby
    18 June 2007 20:30

    I propose the conditional approval of the Cajun French Wikipedia<http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Cajun_French>. The language is well-established, and has a number of experienced Wikipedians interested in joining. I'll contact them and ask them to start translating the interface right away. :-)

  2. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    18 June 2007 20:37

    ok

  3. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    18 June 2007 21:40

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  4. Arria Belli (Maria Fanucchi)
    18 June 2007 21:49

    I'm swamped at the moment, but I've taken a look at the Cajun French request; they sound like nice people. It looks very interesting. I may take a peek at their work once they're up and running.

  5. Tangotango
    19 June 2007 05:05

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  6. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    19 June 2007 10:17

    Hoi!

    LOL I had a look at it, some words are really close to ours, although they have a different graphic convention… I suppose I can fake some hillbilly Cajun by moving some piemontese vowels once I get the idea of how it should sound like :-) They should add audio recordings for us to learn the sounds of it :-) I’ll write an article about it on pms, faraway cousins are always interesting to general public :-)

Wikipedia Korean Hanja

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No decision was reached on the request for a Korean Hanja Wikipedia.

Discussion 1

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  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    19 June 2007 17:46

    Hoi,

    Read here: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Talk:Special_projects_subcommittees/Languages#May_Korean_Hanja_Wikipedia_be_approved.3F

    I can’t see how we can pass this thing without violating the policies. Would a request to open a Hanja namespace within Korean wiki do? BTW, it could serve as a template for other such cases. Thinking of Belarusians but not only, even pms DOES have cases of local orthographic variations that sometimes originate small edit wars. I proposed using separated namespaces for alternate versions of a single article and the pms community loved the idea. I guess it’s because I entitled it as “let everyone pray as they wish”, which is the famous (for us) phrase that marked the end of our 500 year long religious war.

    Yet I do believe that it could be used in a number of cases to have formal fences without making separate communities. Only… how do you add a namespace?

  2. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    19 June 2007 18:00

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  3. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    19 June 2007 20:02

    Hoi!

    Fine for me, I volunteer PMS wiki for a test case, if Erik thinks it can be dangerous and he needs a guinea pig to start with. We can have a public vote about it in days, so it can be regular from all formal POVs, but since we have been talking exactly about this kind of problems and we are all looking for a solution I can tell you it’s a big YES immediately.

    I would grant MLMW to Hanja, too. It would mean no exceptions to the policy and yes for them. BTW, it can also solve the Latgalian problem, if we cannot find any better way out of it. And it can be the final cut for Belarusians, too. Tell Erik I love him :-) As we say in Piedmont “He’s taking the chestnuts out of the fireplace” :-)

    So, if nobody opposes the idea I’ll tell Hanja that we can conditionally approve their project with the condition that they can be released only as an additional linguistic entity to the Korean database. Hmmm… On a second thought, I smell problems here… they will need a separate admin structure for Hanja, as they say most Koreans cannot read Hanja anymore they cannot even be expected to be able to administrate such pages.

    May MLMW allow separate admin structures? It would also do VERY good for Belarusians, while it’s irrelevant for PMS … In the meantime I’ll tell Hanja people that we are working on a technical solution that involves using new software, without entering in details.

Discussion 2

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  1. Sabine Cretella
    10 September 2007 07:04

    http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Hanja#Language_Code_Issue_2

    Could I please get your opinions on this one for eventual conditional approval or rejection?

    Since this is "only" a script quesion, shouldn't we ask the Korean wikipedia to offer articles in both scripts? Does it make sense to open a different wikipedia?

    The number of supporters is there.

    I just got the request on my meta talk page where I was asked for a decision about this matter.

  2. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    10 September 2007 07:10

    Hoi,

    What they are waiting for is MLMW, the Multilanguage feature. We still have no idea of how long it will take.

  3. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    10 September 2007 07:10

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  4. Shanel Kalicharan
    11 September 2007 01:31

    Hello,

    This request seems like a tough one. The multilanguage feature sounds like it would be perfect, but I can understand that they are getting annoyed (and bored) waiting for it. It seems unfair to me too, to make them wait god knows how long for that feature.

    Sabine mentioned it being "only" a script question, but looking at the request it is not so simple. It seems that most Korean Wikipedians are opposed to automatic conversion. Secondly, and more importantly, the request also states that the vocabulary and orthography are quite different.

    I really don't know enough about it at the moment to comment. I'm not sure what we've decided, or if we have even decided anything, but the people who made the request in the first place want an answer. I think they'd appreciate it if we had *something* to tell them.

  5. Sabine Cretella
    11 September 2007 09:06

    Hi Shanel,

    in some way you are right - but there is that but ... that is: if we create exceptions we will get into trouble since anybody will ask us to create exceptions.

    So we need a solution and the only one I can think of now is that they or wait for Multilingual Mediawiki or they agree with ko.wikipedia in some way so that both ways of writing can co-exist on one wikipedia ...

    Automatic conversion seems not to be an option ... so manual conversion should do the trick then, right? But how to get things there without creating too many hassles and long discussions?

    Have to think about it ...

Discussion 3

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  1. Maria Fanucchi (Arria Belli)
    13 January 2008 15:27

    (Last one, I promise.)

    http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages/Wikipedia_Hanja

    So... This one was proposed in November 2006. Some progress has been made into the language prefix, there's strong support, certainly enough speakers... Over to you.

  2. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    13 January 2008 16:53

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  3. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    13 January 2008 17:22

    Nope, no exceptions. They wait for MLMW, as stated many times. BUT… it would be nice to find a way to encourage them. Like a barnstar or something, and tell them that the project is already good for approval, and will be as soon as MLMW is useable. BTW, I’m installing a copy of MLMW on our servers, tonight, so I will soon be able to give more details.

    The project is okay and deserves space, it’s the idea of an exception that is not good. This is a problem we have in many contexts and it must have a regular solution, not just a quick patch.

  4. Jesse Plamondon-Willard (Pathoschild)
    14 January 2008 13:23

    Hello,

    Just to clarify for the archives, GerardM and Berto are referring to a dialect (with no ISO code of its own) separating from a wiki (with an ISO code) that uses another or multiple orthographies. Such a project fails the policy requirements < http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/WM:LPP#Requisites >, but the Multilingual MediaWiki (MLMW) would allow them to coexist on the original wiki.

  5. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    14 January 2008 14:58

    Hi!

    Indeed, it cannot have a wiki on its own. This is not even another language or dialect, but mostly another script (although formal expressions may also differ). Hanja is based on Chinese characters and it used to be the Literary Language in Korea, being taught as such in schools.

    In time, the role of the script in school teaching has diminished, to the point that nowadays a vast majority of Koreans aren't able to read it. This leads to the current situation. A large number of admins will simply zap content they cannot read, although formally "legal" in Korean.

    I don't think imposing a rule that would make such content "good" on top of the community would make good internal relations. It's much better if they both remain inside a single ISO code and wiki (as per policy), but get given an IT that allows them putting things into separate linguistic namespaces.

    This way people do not get to clash for practical problems (that are quite understandably annoying in nature) while allowing everyone to use the communication style they like better. This will never solve situations in which the clash is politically based, yet it can IMHO do wonders for those cases in which frictions come out of practical life only.

    The preconditions to use such a system are:
    1) alternate flavors of a code (be it scripts, dialects or whatever) apply for an obtain a valid IANA code
    2) MultiLanguageMediawiki is made available to them

    In perspective, this can be used to finally reunite spawned communities like BE, and it can solve an impressive quantity of trouble for macrolanguages (or for those languages that while not being tagged as such by ISO still use a number of alternate orthographies).

    If from one hand we try and impose a correct cataloguing system, we shall not forget that people have to live with it, so it's nice if we can offer a system that allows everyone to "be themselves".

Wikipedia Ottoman Turkish

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No action was taken on the request for an Ottoman Turkish Wikipedia.

First proposal

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  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 16:26

    Hoi!

    I propose conditional approval. ISO code OTA

    The Turkish wiki is doing not bad: http://stats.wikimedia.org/EN/TablesWikipediaTR.htm and the language has a great historical relevance. While I quite agree with some of the opponents that maybe a Wikisource project would best fit this kind of languages having a standard wiki going would help forming a community that could later successfully run a Wikisource. Besides, deciding what exactly they should want from life is none of our business. Let’s see what they can do in the incubator.

  2. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    20 June 2007 17:00

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  3. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 17:11

    Hoi,

    You know what? I’m getting to think exactly like you. I wrote the proposal before seeing how many revival requests we have. It really makes more sense to include them as spaces inside the cultures they belong into, unless they cannot be included, like latin.

    I was acting based on Ancient Greek, and now I’m sorry we conditionally approved it, because it will put ourselves in contradiction with a precedent decision. Yet we did not know about MLMW when we did, so I guess we can simply reroute it into gr.wiki once it’s ready to leave the incubator.

    It would be nice to publish a page about historical linguistic entities and guidelines for them, but we need to have tech details about MLMW before doing it.

  4. Jon Harald Søby
    20 June 2007 21:25

    Ancient Greek is a completely different scenario than Ottoman Turkish. Ancient Greek is a classical language, while Ottoman Turkish is "simply" a historical language. The difference is subtle, but quite big.

  5. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    21 June 2007 07:55

    Hoi,

    Yes, I thought about after posting. It’s actually thought all over the planet. The reason why I always hate this kind of exceptions is that they imply a judgment in value. Most of the fights we manage our due to nouns/adjectives/rules that imply a value statement. Besides would we consider it “classical” if it was not a classical language for us westerners?

  6. Jon Harald Søby
    21 June 2007 12:12

    We consider Sanskrit and Tamil classical languages, don't we? ;-)

  7. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    21 June 2007 12:16

    Hoi,

    In my deep ignorance I ignored this, among million of other things :-) So it’s okay, not discriminatory.

  8. —
    20 June 2007 21:32

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  9. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    20 June 2007 21:44

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  10. —
    20 June 2007 22:13

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  11. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    21 June 2007 05:23

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  12. —
    21 June 2007 18:12

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  13. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    21 June 2007 19:49

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  14. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    21 June 2007 20:04

    May I extract pieces of this conversation and forward them to my student? :-) I know I’m f**king boring LOL

    Moreover, can anyone tell me why ISO 639-2 cronologically came BEFORE ISO 639-1?

  15. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    21 June 2007 08:00

    Yes. I tell everyone that we should always step back in front of ISO then I myself overlook the rule :) LOLOL Typically human :)

    Delete what I wrote.

Wikipedia Palatinate German

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No action was taken on the request for a Palatinate German Wikipedia.

  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 16:28

    ISO code pfl ISO 639-3

    5 native requesters.

    I propose conditional approval.

  2. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    20 June 2007 17:20

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  3. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 17:32

    Hoi,

    Well… can’t speak even basic German, so I’m at a loss in judging. I suppose seeing what they can do in the incubator can be an answer. When ISO codes (like LMO) are fragmented into a huge number of dialects because of historical reasons the situation may become explosive because of personal conflicts, so quite a lot depends on how they can manage their internal diversity.

    I’d say that it would be much better if they did NOT speak the same variety, so we can have the bomb explode immediately, if a bomb is there. Apart from that… I find it difficult to evaluate the chances of success based on the number of actual speakers. Germany has a lot of internet connections, so the density of possible users for this wiki is probably much higher than the density for a multimillion speaker project in Ghana.

    Besides… to remain in Italy: fur.wiki is the best of us all with just 750k native speakers, while a double number of speakers make only a semi-dead lij.wiki. The script they choose and their capability to market the project will mean a lot.

  4. Sabine Cretella
    20 June 2007 18:30

    Hmmm considering that it is part of this region: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rheinland-Pfalz and some parts are in the federal states near it (original terriroty of the Pfalz was: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurpfalz) I would estimate approx. 1.000.000 speakers, but cannot be sure about it. The situation should be simiar to Kölsch, that is many "flowing" variations from one place to the other ... well also spoken Neapolitan is a bit like this. I am wondering about the written language ... ah just found this page: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pf%C3%A4lzische_Dialekte so approx. one million speakers is correct. In Germany you have that very particular situation that there were hundreds of small cities being considered own countries with borders in the middle ages. These cities were delimited by walls and had their own currency and of course also "language" therefore it can happen that from one small city to the other you find people who have a very different dialect.

    This means whatever German language you take you always have to deal with a continuum in itself. Please consider that nds for example has around 400 varieties, but the nds wikipedia applied only one of those as "being allowed" and that is writing method according to Sass. We had loads of fights about that time ago (with two users in particular since these more or less hijacked the project then). I don't know how things are going now. Anyway: we should consider to tell these people that they need to accept any variety, otherwise we will connect the iso code to one of them only and people often consider wikipedia to be the non plus ultra of language knowledge :-( and this would mean that the other variations over time get discriminated.

    Uhmmm ... not a nice situation, but it very likely will happen if the ones that start the wikipedia are all from the same place.

  5. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 19:42

    Yes, indeed... do we call them up and ask for a clarification?

  6. —
    20 June 2007 22:04

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  7. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    21 June 2007 05:45

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  8. —
    21 June 2007 18:33

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  9. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    21 June 2007 19:27

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

Wikipedia Pökoot

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The request for a Pökoot Wikipedia was conditionally approved.

  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 16:31

    ISO <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_639-3> 639-3: pko <http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/documentation.asp?id=pko>

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P%C3%B6koot_language

    Only ~250k speakers, yet they claim 6 native requesters.

    I propose conditional approval.

  2. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    20 June 2007 16:41

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

Localization documentation

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  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 16:57

    Hoi!

    This request points users to an inexistent link about localization: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Ancient_Greek_Wikipedia

    I was thinking to write a small page about how to localize the interface, but maybe we have something already done. Do we?

  2. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    20 June 2007 17:01

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  3. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 17:13

    Yes it is, we already conditionally approved it. But in the motivation it’s written that they should go to a “localization” section in the talk page to get further instruction, and there’s no such section there.

  4. Shanel Kalicharan
    20 June 2007 20:14

    Such a page would be good.

  5. Jon Harald Søby
    20 June 2007 21:31

    Hmm, I must have forgotten to paste it there. Anyways, they have already completed a lot of the interface translation; see http://nike.users.idler.fi/betawiki/Toiminnot:Tuoreet_muutokset?uselang=grc.

  6. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    21 June 2007 08:10

    Hmmm
    does this mean that there is a help page for localization already?

  7. Shanel Kalicharan
    21 June 2007 21:16

    I think it's supposed to properly link to what Pathoschild wrote on the Kabyle Wikipedia proposal talk page.

Wikipedia Bungo

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No action was taken on the request for a Bungo Wikipedia.

  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 17:00

    Hoi,

    http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_new_languages#Bungo_Wikipedia

    I can’t judge myself. Is this a case like Hanja that we can candidate for MLMW?

Wikipedia Archaic Japanese

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No action was taken on the request for a Archaic Japanese Wikipedia.

  1. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    20 June 2007 17:07

    Hoi!

    I propose to put in line for MLMW, this has no ISO code on its own and really seems a candidate for inclusion in Jp.wiki, if they have the strength to get a project running.

  2. —
    21 June 2007 18:43

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  3. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    21 June 2007 18:56

    Can't help with this. You have a 200% probability that I would say something stupid, since all my knowledge of the japanese culture comes translated literary works. But we do have a japanese native speaker in the Commission.

  4. Tangotango
    22 June 2007 15:02

    There are actually two "Old Japanese" requests on [[[[Requests for new languages|m:Requests for new languages]]]] at the moment: Bungo Wikipedia, and the Archaic Japanese Wikipedia.

    As I understand it, the Bungo Wikipedia uses Bungo, which was the written form of Japanese until the early Showa period (around the 1920s and 1930s). Bungo is largely a written form of Japanese, and while it was popular in the pre-WW2 era in legal documents and such, it has largely died out since then. I do know some pieces of classical literature that are written in Bungo, but it is not a popular way to write Japanese nowadays.

    The Archaic Japanese Wikipedia, on the other hand, uses a much earlier form of the Japanese language, called Kobun (literally "Old Language"). While types of Kobun span many centuries and there is no one defined language, it was basically the language used in Japan during the Heian period (8th century - 12th century).

    Kobun (Archaic Japanese) is currently taught in junior and senior high schools in Japan, so I would guess a large proportion of the Japanese population is familiar with this type of Old Japanese, although nobody grows up speaking it or uses it in daily speech. (It's like learning Shakespeare in an English-speaking country. No one speaks or spells like Shakespeare in daily life.)

    Both types of Old/Classical Japanese are either difficult or impossible to read for the average Japanese speaker without a lexicon. None of them can be automatically translated from one another, as the grammar and diction are significantly different.

    I do believe that preserving these two forms of Japanese is an important undertaking; world-famous classics like "The Tale of Genji" were written in Kobun, for example. However, I am not really sure writing an encyclopedia, covering modern topics like computers and the latest anime cruft, is a plausible task for these two encyclopedias; I feel that there is a real danger that these two projects will also become dumping grounds for mutilated jawiki articles.

    == Related articles ==

  5. —
    22 June 2007 17:45

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  6. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    23 June 2007 09:07

    Hoi,

    I agree they are important. My doubt is whether we would have a better result in routing them towards a wikisource project, in which they could manage all in Bungo and Kobun (talk pages and interface included) instead of growing up a wiki about nuclear rockets in Kobun and Bungo.

    The current state of Latin wikipedia is a bit funny, from this point of view. Translating "Steven Spielberg" into "Stefanus Ludimontius" doesn't seem to make for anything better than a students' joke, while if they started to discuss Lucretium in latim it would probably end up in producing usable information.

    Just a personal impression.

  7. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    21 June 2007 19:13

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  8. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    21 June 2007 19:55

    That's my doubt, too. I'd rather give them a wikisource than a wiki. Producing new material in a dead language does look like Original Research. My idea is that possibly these requests would better fit as subsets of the current state of the contemporary culture(s) they gave birth to (the MLMW format would really help in this).

    Let alone Belarus' we have an increasing number of similar problems waking up in eastern wikies, and I suspect that this is but the start of a tide. Hanja wants out of Korean, Trad Chinese wants out of Simplified Chinese, etc. LMO just had it, Palatinate maybe a possible next spot. All this stuff clearly involves a number of personal conflicts that get incubated in a local political background. There also is a strictly technical part, though: most korean admins, for example, simply cannot read the Hanja script. Same may at least partially apply to entities that come from a fragmented historical background, like LMO/Palatinate.

    IMHO we could look for a solution that while allowing "more space" to lower interpersonal frictions would also keep communities toghether. I guess it would also help into marketing projects that otherwise risk getting very little partecipation.

    I suppose that many more Japanese and Turks would make use of such projects if they could see it as evidently present in their usual wiki environment. In a fully indipendent state they would attract only a limited number of literary fans/ancient language students but they would make a poor service for the general public.

    I believe that if "using another script" did not imply a "recognition of independence" the number of such requests would lower to reasonable limits. They would not mean drawing a border between you and the "enemy admin". They simply would add "a specialized museum space". Existing communities would not react to this as if it was a secession/betrayal (it would not be, in fact), but rather as an expansion of their project and possibly we could save lots of nerves to quite a big number of people.

    Only we need a clear criterion to do this, it cannot be based on motivations like "X is a dangerous place/culture". I'd rather use something like "Historical phase" or the like and put it as a blanket policy for all such situations.

    I'm aware that this is more of a community management issue. Yet, who else can act on how domains are formed? It's only us doing it, and since the problem is centered around the way domains are formed it could probably be addressed at the same level.

    I'm not clear on this stuff, though. It's just an early impression I get from reading meta here and there. Let's keep an eye on the conflicts and mostly on WHAT they use to bang each other on their heads. So far mostly it's requests for secessions, but it still may change.

Documentation for new subcommittee members

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  1. Arria Belli (Maria Fanucchi)
    21 June 2007 18:46

    Hello,
    If I haven't been very active on the LangCom since I was invited, it's because I was traveling and now I'm working quite a bit on frwiki's Wikicontest and handling real life crises. However, now that things have calmed down a bit in my life (but only a bit :-p ), I have a request to make of the veteran members of the LangCom. You often talk of ISO codes and other mailing lists and rules and regulations. Perhaps a list of useful links could be provided for us new members to read and consult when giving our opinions on the requests at hand. I cannot speak for the other new members, but I know I often feel out of place when reading your e-mails, wondering if I could comment without saying anything stupid or redundant. It's just an idea. I hope it is not too difficult a task, given how complicated the ISO issues seem to be.

  2. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    21 June 2007 19:00

    Hoi Maria!

    http://www.sil.org/iso639%2D3/

    http://www.ethnologue.com/

    You might want to consider that some academic linguists I spoke with consider ethnologue sometimes ‘aproximate’ in its data. Yet we have no better universally recognized source, AFAIK. As per an history of the linguistic ISO standards I still have a request from that student pending. So if anyone can point me to a source...

  3. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    21 June 2007 19:09

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  4. Shanel Kalicharan
    21 June 2007 21:04

    I actually started working on a langcom n00b guide (Tangotango said he liked the idea); I'll put it in my userspace soon. Perhaps the veteran members would like to edit it once it's up? :)

  5. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    22 June 2007 07:00

    Hoi,

    Well, “veterans” sounds a bit weird for a Committee whose history is measured in months :-) I’d say we’ll better edit it all together :-)

  6. Shanel Kalicharan
    22 June 2007 15:50

    :D

  7. —
    22 June 2007 19:08

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

Wikipedia Ingush & Gan & Niu & Pökoot & Rotuman & Palembang & Madinka & Southern Sami & Westfries

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  1. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    29 June 2007 02:23

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  2. Bèrto 'd Sèra
    29 June 2007 10:18

    Hoi,

    Ok for me :-) I thought Ingush was already cond-approved, though.

    I probably won’t be here until next Monday :-)

  3. Shanel Kalicharan
    01 July 2007 17:02

    Hello,

    Rotuman has already been conditionally approved as well. I would prefer to leave the Ingush request open for now, as it looks like the test project has no articles. For the Niuean Wikipedia, it would be better if they had at least one other interested user, but if the language is under threat of extinction I can understand the lack of interested users. Palembang has no test project, as far as I can see, and has no support or oppose arguments. I think this request should stay open. Everything else I agree with.

  4. Gerard Meijssen (GerardM)
    01 July 2007 21:56

    <this user has not agreed to public archival.>

  5. Shanel Kalicharan
    02 July 2007 00:17

    Ok. :) I get the feeling that some of the proposers/interested community are not entirely sure how they should start on the Incubator - would you agree?

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