PathfinderWiki talk:Manual of style
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Italics
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Changes Accepted |
The manual contains a section dedicated to italics. Can this section document the fact that magic items and spell names are italicized? I'm not certain if that's mentioned anywhere in the Policies. — Descriptivist (talk) 09:47, 7 August 2024 (UTC)
Support. -Oznogon (talk) 16:07, 8 August 2024 (UTC)Withdrawing all support and exiting conversation. -Oznogon (talk) 22:11, 19 September 2024 (UTC)
Dashes
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Changes Accepted |
Codify the use of HTML named character entities for dashes, long enforced by Fleanetha, to reduce confusion on which form is correct under wiki policy.
The second sentence of the first paragraph of the Dashes section states:
- The article on dashes shows common input methods for these.
The linked section no longer exists. At the time this MoS entry was added, it provided multiple means of entering dashes, including inputting the symbols directly or using HTML numeric character entities (i.e. –.
However, following this policy results in the dashes being reverted in practice in favor of HTML named character entities. I therefore propose we remove that sentence entirely.
I also propose that we add the following after the second paragraph of the Dashes section:
- PathfinderWiki prefers the use of HTML named character entities for en (–) and em (—) dashes. Avoid using any special character entry methods that allow directly entering these special dashes as typographic characters, including the wiki editor's Symbols or Special characters panels.
I also propose that we replace the parenthetical examples in the first sentences of the en and em dash subsections.
As now:
- En dashes (–) have three distinct roles:
...
- Em dashes (—) indicate interruption in a sentence. They should not be spaced.
Proposed:
- En dashes (–, –) have three distinct roles:
...
- Em dashes (—, —) indicate interruption in a sentence. They should not be spaced.
I also propose that we practice this in the MoS itself. Per the MoS's policy, replace all typographical en and em dashes in the MoS with HTML named character entities. Also per the policy, change all spacing around them to be internally consistent. -Oznogon (talk) 16:09, 6 September 2024 (UTC)
Obviously, happy with all of this—thank you, Oznogon—thus, I agree. We can internationalize the section too by noting the US and computer en dash and em dash are also termed en rule and em rule. Finally, on standardization, de facto wiki use of em rules is to leave no space either side, which aligns with Paizo's use, Oxford, and, I believe, most other US publishers. We can then delete point '2' of the 'En dashes' section and the 'Spaced en dashes as an alternative to em dashes' subsection to simplify. --Fleanetha (talk) 23:26, 7 September 2024 (UTC)
- Two months passed with no dissenters, plus the bot has enforced this as the de facto use across the wiki (use of character entities and associated spacing), so I shall update this accepted policy change shortly. Thanks Oz for bringing up this standardization improvement. --Fleanetha (talk) 17:28, 6 November 2024 (UTC)
Align on Paizo usage
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Changes Proposed |
Per Fleanetha in the edit summary of revision 552644, I propose that the MoS should specify that "worshippers" and "worshipped" are the only valid spellings of those terms, an exception to "National varieties of English" in order to keep articles internally consistent with Paizo's current usage of the terms, and to deter US English editors from using the spelling preferred by most spelling tools, including web browsers.
I've made a corresponding request to change {{Deity}}, which uses "worshipers", because Fleanetha's edits or reversion of edits to use "worshippers" have created internal consistency issues in spelling between the template and the body of articles using the template.
Other terms might fall under similar guidance, such as mechanically significant terms like armor, where Paizo exclusively uses "armor" sted "armour", or for subjects where Paizo has made intentional changes to align usage on a specific spelling, such as changes from "spectre"/Spectrewood to "specter"/Specterwood ca. Season of Ghosts.
If so, this proposal should result in a new section specifying that Paizo's consistent spelling of specific words where varieties of English might differ is preferred, as a general exception to "National varieties of English". -Oznogon (talk) 20:40, 15 December 2024 (UTC)
- Another example: the use of "alternate" sted "alternative" for domains. "National varieties of English" suggests "alternative" in an example specific to that term, which conflicts with Paizo's consistent usage of "alternate" in mechanical contexts. -Oznogon (talk) 20:58, 15 December 2024 (UTC)
- Hi Oz, I wasn't clear in my meaning, as I am not advocating any standardization on spelling as the above suggests. You changed an editor's spelling, which was originally perfectly acceptable, from 'worshippers' to 'worshipers'. That edit was not necessary and indeed, counter to the MoS, which allows us all to use our own varieties of English on the wiki. To 'correct' an editor's work in such a way suggests it's wrong and, in changing spellings to a US version, might suggest that the wiki only accepts US English. So, I changed it back to the original editor's version, as they were not wrong, hence comments like 're-correction' or 'uncorrected non-typos' - attempts here at humour have failed me once more, I fear. The comment about Paizo's use was simply an expression of further mystification as to why you thought that change was necessary. --Fleanetha (talk) 00:29, 16 December 2024 (UTC)
- As I note in the proposal, the {{Deity}} infobox uses "worshipers". Since the template requires administrative permission to change, internal consistency is broken by using "worshippers" on articles where that infobox field is, or might in the future, be populated. I changed the usage accordingly, as I have done several other times, and you reverted that change by citing the MoS's "National varieties of English" section.
- As I also note in the proposal, I have proposed changing the infobox field to Paizo's preferred spelling of "worshippers", but taking that step alone would in turn create internal inconsistencies wherever the US spelling is already in use, which would be equally protected by the MoS's "National varieties of English" section, so there is not a solution to this conflict that would comply with both the MoS's "National varieties of English" section and its requirement for internal consistency in usage.
- Therefore, this proposal requests at least a narrow exception to override the MoS's "National varieties of English" section in order to align all uses to your preferred spelling while respecting the rest of MoS. If that is feasible, I also request that we broaden such an exception further to codify alignment with Paizo's usage where it is significant to the mechanics or setting, in order to ensure that consistency is maintained both internally and with the published canonical sources. -Oznogon (talk) 03:44, 16 December 2024 (UTC)
Resolve policy errors
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Changes Proposed |
I propose the following changes to resolve errors within this policy:
Section headings: "Gives sections unique names within a page, including subsections." --> "Give sections unique names within a page, including subsections."
Use of "the" mid-sentence: "Follow common on a case-by-case basis." --> "Follow common usage on a case-by-case basis."
Italics within quotations: "Italics are used within quotations if they are already in the source material, or are added by a chronicler to emphasize to some words." --> "Italics are used within quotations if they are already in the source material, or are added by a chronicler to emphasize some words."
Hyphens: "Some words ending in -ly function as both adverbs and adjectives (a friendly-looking butcher, the natives used us friendly and with kindness)." --> "Some words ending in -ly function as both adverbs and adjectives (a friendly-looking butcher, the natives treated us friendly and with kindness)."
According to the En dashes section's explanation on handling negative dates, the following paragraph under Years should be re-written: "A closing negative AR year (a year before 1 AR) is given in full (-2590–2550 AR). While one era signifier at the end of a date range still requires an unspaced en dash (12–5 AR), a spaced en dash is required when a signifier is used after the opening and closing years (-5 AR – 29 AR)."
The "Spelling and transliteration" sub-section under the Foreign terms section contains no information and should either be updated or removed.
Lastly, the lower bullet points under the Quotation characters section should be indented as a sub-list. Rexert (talk) 21:00, 19 December 2024 (UTC)
- Approve. Most of the MoS still has cruft from being copied from an old version of the Wikipedia:Manual of Style and needs more work of this nature to clean up the resulting cruft. IMO these suggested changes are not controversial.
- Re: "Spelling and transliteration", the current Wikipedia MoS equivalent is its "Spelling and romanization" section. Because Paizo generally avoids the use of non-English characters or diacritics (I can remember them appearing only in Tian Xia World Guide), I don't think most of that section is relevant to PathfinderWiki. We do deal with diacritics in proper names of real-world authors and artists, in which case the relevant part adapted to our use would be:
- Proper names in languages written using the Latin alphabet can include letters with diacritics, ligatures, and other characters that are not commonly used in contemporary English. PathfinderWiki normally retains these special characters, except where there is a well-established English spelling that replaces them with English standard letters.
- Since we already practice that, codifying it wouldn't introduce changes in usage or administration. -Oznogon (talk) 04:43, 20 December 2024 (UTC)
Remove suggestions to convert imperial units to metric
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Changes Proposed |
Unlike Wikipedia (and much of reality), PathfinderWiki documents a subject where imperial units are used with mechanical importance, and metric units can introduce ambiguity or imprecision. Because the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game does not use metric units, I propose removing the MoS's suggestions to include parenthetical conversions to metric units.
In practice, this guidance is not applied or enforced across most of PathfinderWiki; it would involve vastly larger and more invasive changes to PathfinderWiki to begin enforcing this part of the MoS than it would be to remove it, and would introduce additional labor to editing toward few functional improvements.
I specifically propose replacing the following content from the MoS:
- == Units of measurement ==
- See also: Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)
- The use of units of measurement is based on the following principles:
- Avoid ambiguity: Aim to write so you cannot be misunderstood.
- Familiarity: The less one has to look up definitions, the easier it is to be understood.
- International scope: PathfinderWiki is not country-specific; it is, however, based around a campaign setting (and game) which consistently provides US-based units of measurement.
- ===Which units to use===
- In general, prefer units provided in the source material, which will almost always be in imperial units. For this reason, unlike wikipedia and other international wikis, imperial units are preferred over other units, so 22 lb (10 kg) rather than 10 kg (22 lb).
- ===Unit conversions===
- Generally, conversions to and from metric units and US or imperial units should be provided, except where inserting a conversion would make a common expression awkward (The four-minute mile).
- In the main text, give the main units as words and use unit symbols or abbreviations for conversions in parentheses; for example, a pipe 4 inches (100 mm) in diameter and 16 kilometres (10 mi) long or a pipe 4 inches (100 mm) in diameter and 10 miles (16 km) long. However, where there is consensus to do so, the main units may also be abbreviated in the main text after the first occurrence.
- Converted values should use a level of precision similar to that of the source value, so the Moon is 380,000 kilometres (240,000 mi) from Earth, not (236,121 mi). However, small numbers may need to be converted to a greater level of precision where rounding would cause a significant distortion, so one mile (1.6 km), not one mile (2 km).
with:
- == Units of measurement ==
- The use of units of measurement is based on the following principles:
- Avoid ambiguity: Aim to write so you cannot be misunderstood.
- Familiarity: The less one has to look up definitions, the easier it is to be understood.
- Consistency: PathfinderWiki is not country-specific. However, it documents a campaign setting and its underlying game mechanics that consistently use specific units of measurement.
- === Which units to use ===
- In general, prefer units provided in the source material. For this reason, unlike Wikipedia and other international wikis, imperial units such as feet, miles, and pounds are preferred over other units. Do not provide conversions between units in Pathfinder source material and other real-world units, as these conversions can introduce ambiguity in fractional units and can suggest a correlation to real-world distances that might not be relevant in mechanical usage in the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.
I also propose rewording the following content in the "Unit symbols and abbreviations" section:
- Standard abbreviations and symbols for units are undotted (do not carry periods). For example, m for metre/meter and kg for kilogram (not m. or kg.), in for inch (not in., or ″), ft for foot (not ft., or ′) and lb for pound (not lb. or #).
- Do not append an s for the plurals of unit symbols (kg, km, in, lb, not kgs, kms, ins, lbs). A lowercase s is the SI symbol for second; thus, kgs can be confused with kg s, which means "kilogram-second".
- In tables and infoboxes, use symbols and abbreviations for units, not words.
- Ranges are preferably formatted with one rather than two unit signifiers (5.9–6.3 kg, not 5.9 kg – 6.3 kg).
to:
- Standard abbreviations and symbols for units are undotted (do not carry periods). For example, ft for foot and lb for pound (not ft. or lb.).
- Do not append an s for the plurals of unit symbols (lb, in, not lbs, ins).
- In tables and infoboxes, prefer symbols and abbreviations for units over words.
- Ranges are preferably formatted with one rather than two unit signifiers (5–10 ft, not 5 ft – 10 ft).
-Oznogon (talk) 02:42, 23 February 2025 (UTC)
- Approve. Unit conversion increases editor workload and article bloat while introducing uncertainty in mechanical details relevant for the game's setting. --Rexert (talk) 07:30, 23 February 2025 (UTC)
Expand link guidelines
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Changes Proposed |
I propose expanding the link section with clarification on possessive links, such as House Thrune's vs House Thrune's. Both provide the same functionality, but the first usage reduces bloat and speeds up writing for editors, while the latter usage ensures the entire word is linked including the "'s", providing a cleaner reading experience.
Both usages have their merit, but standardizing either one as the PathfinderWiki default would be useful to prevent unintentional edit-warring. However, if possible, the link functionality should be updated to treat all symbols except spaces the same way letters are treated and link the entire possessive without requiring a pipe.
Additionally, it might be helpful to include the "< ref > < /ref >" functionality in the external links section to clarify how to turn external links into references rather than in-line links. While this is mentioned under punctuation, repeating that information for more relevant usage under external links seems appropriate. --Rexert (talk) 14:39, 16 March 2025 (UTC)